What Chick-Fil-A's money supports - a video montage of homophobia

Again I say that we must make it clear why we are angry at Chick-Fil-A. There are religious right organizations and talking heads (and unfortunately mainstream journalists) who are attempting to make it solely a religious issue.

They claim that Chick-Fil-A doesn't have an anti-gay agenda and that supposedly us "radical homosexuals" are demonstrating intolerance.

Let's remind them what it's all about.

In 2010, Chick-Fil-A donated nearly $2 million to groups who make it their mission to attack the gay community through lies and distortions. These groups push several false notions from homosexuality is connected to pedophilia to the idea that gays can change their orientation - an idea frowned on by the legitimate scientific community.

According to Equality Matters, the Family Research Council is one of these groups:

The Family Research Council has been labeled a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) for its propagation of known falsehoods about the LGBT community. For example, president Tony Perkins has a long history of false and inflammatory attacks, such as claiming that pedophilia is a "homosexual problem." [Washington Times, 11/24/10; SPLC, accessed 6/27/12]

The Family Research Council employs Peter Sprigg, who once said that gays should be exported out of the United States:



and that "homosexual behavior" should be criminalized:



And let's not forget FRC's head, Tony Perkins, who has called gays vile, intolerant, and pawns of the Devil:



That is when he is not making ugly comments about gay youth (beginning at 3:10):



Let me be clear - there have been several elected officials attempting to use the power of their office against Chick-Fil-A. I am not in favor of this.

However, I am equally bothered by the need of so-called Christians to deliberately sugarcoat the issue to the point of omitting several facts about the groups that Chick-Fil-A supports.

Chick-Fil-A's money supports hate and lies and the last time I checked, hate and lies are hardly Christian principles:



Related posts -

Simple answers to the questions about the Chick-Fil-A boycott


Fake Christians are lying about Chick-Fil-A

Fake Christians are lying about Chick-Fil-A

I have to admit that I am not totally in tune to the Chick-Fil-A controversy as much as my fellow blogging colleagues and the rest of my lgbtq brothers and sisters.

But what I do see of it does bother me a bit.

It's not the boycott per se more than how folks who claim to support Chick-Fil-A in accordance to their "Christian values" are deliberately distorting the reasons why the lgbtq community are angry at Chick-Fil-A.

Folks like Mike Huckabee and organizations like the National Organization for Marriage and the American Family Association are attempting to force a false narrative that the gay community is angry at Chick-Fil-A simply because its owner, Dan Cathy, made an ugly comment about not supporting marriage equality.

They are attempting to make it seem that Chick-Fil-A is a victim of "alleged gay intolerance" because its president supports the "traditionally Biblical definition of marriage."

And they are not being truthful.

In 2010, Chick-Fil-A donated nearly $2 million to groups who make it their mission to attack the gay community through lies and distortions. These groups push several false notions from homosexuality is connected to pedophilia to the idea that gays can change their orientation - an idea frowned on by the legitimate scientific community.

DeMint succeeds in getting pro-gay ad pulled from SC television station

Unbelievable:

U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint’s attorney has succeeded in getting one Charleston media outlet to pull an ad that attacked DeMint’s eight-year-old position against gays teaching in public schools.

Warren Redman-Gress, executive director of the Alliance for Full Acceptance, said the story has received national attention in the gay and lesbian community since it first was reported this week.

“People just can’t believe one person can stop an advocacy campaign just because he doesn’t like the fact he was quoted in it,” he said.

The ad begins: “What if you saw this headline: Senator Jim DeMint: Jews Should Not Teach Public School. You wouldn’t tolerate such blatant prejudice and persecution. Substitute the word ‘gay’ and the reality is, you do.”

DeMint’s Washington attorney, Cleta Mitchell, had asked Charleston area televisions stations to pull the ad.

WCBD Channel 2 had asked the alliance to edit the ad by including a disclaimer clarifying that the first headline with the word “Jews” in it was not a real headline. A similar disclaimer appears under the second headline clarifying that it’s real.

WCBD station manager Rick Lipps said he made the request to eliminate any confusion, not in reaction to political pressure.

AFFA declined to edit the ad, so WCBD pulled it. In response, AFFA declined to let the station air its two less controversial ads.

In an email from Mitchell to a local television station, Mitchell claimed the ad portrayed DeMint, R-S.C., as anti-Semitic, though Charleston’s Jewish community has raised no concerns along that line.

Mitchell declined to comment, saying, “I just can’t talk about the work I do for my clients.” DeMint’s staff also declined comment, but Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said he found the ad “incredibly offensive and unfair to Senator DeMint.”

Brooks called DeMint “a great friend of the Jewish community.”

During his 2004 Senate bid, DeMint said he didn’t think gays should teach in public school — a remark reportedly widely around the state, and the ad was designed to show how the public still accepts discrimination against gays and lesbians, Redman-Gress said.

It's ridiculous to even ponder the notion that anyone looking at the ad would think that DeMint was anti-Semitic.

Seems to me that the claim the DeMint people are making is bogus. And in the case of one station, the bogus complaint has succeeded:

You can view all of the ads at  www.affa-sc.org/imagine
 
You can also donate to AFFA at http://www.affa-sc.org/affa/donate.htm

Know Your LGBT History - The Jeffersons (a repeat)

This week, I was saddened to learn that one of my favorite actors, Sherman Hemsley, passed away. Hemsley will be remembered for his role as George Jefferson in the groundbreaking comedy The Jeffersons. However, many are not aware of the fact that for years, there were rumors about his sexual orientation. He had neither a wife nor children and most likely we won't ever find out whether or not he was gay, seeing that he was a private person.

In tribute, I am repeating the first episode of my Know Your LGBT History series. It focused on a 1977 episode of The Jeffersons entitled Once A Friend.

The episode was the first time I had ever heard or saw anything about the transgender community.

I say that it still holds up as a good episode after all of these years. A transgendered woman did not play George's friend but I still loved her performance. While she was definitely wanting to keep George's friendship, she did not take any disrespect.

If there is anything that can be seen as offensive in this episode, it would have to be the sequence where George tries to pass off a male employee as his friend. However, I don't think the sequence was making fun of the transgender community, but people's ignorance of the community:







Past Know Your LGBT History posts:

'Anti-gay parenting study blasted in audit' and other Friday midday news briefs

Controversial Gay-Parenting Study Is Severely Flawed, Journal’s Audit Finds - This is HUGE. When an auditor calls a study "bullsh@!," you just KNOW there is a problem.

 FRC now targeting public universities; trying to nix UL's LGBT studies program - It's not enough for the Family Research Council to speak against homosexuality. Now the organization wants to alter the curriculum of colleges in regards to gays.  

Around the country, students demand removal of Chick-Fil-A from campuses - Say what you will about Chick-Fil-A, you can't deny that this situation is heating up.  

Catholic Church Blatantly Discriminates Against Gay Couple In Property Sale - Religious liberty my tush! 

VICTORY! Florida Lt. Governor Apologizes For Comments About Black Women and Lesbians - BAM! 

Kirk Cameron refuses to meet with lgbt youth

Kirk Cameron

This week, there has been some buzz on whether or not former child star and "born again Christian" Kirk Cameron will meet with a group of lgbt teens in New Jersey.

According to Pam's House Blend, 17-year-old Corey Bernstein, Co-Chair Garden State Equality Youth Caucus, sent him a letter asking for the meeting:

I am Corey Bernstein, age 17, a resident of New Jersey and co-chair of the Youth Caucus at Garden State Equality, the state’s organization for LGBT civil rights. I endured brutal bullying at my former school because I am gay.

Mr. Cameron, I understand you are visiting Ocean Grove, New Jersey from Friday, July 27 through Sunday, July 29 to speak to the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association. When you are in town that weekend, I would like to extend this invitation for you to join me and other members of Garden State Equality’s Youth Caucus – many of whom are also teenagers who have been bullied because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

In fact, I would like to invite you to meet us for lunch at 1:00 pm on Saturday, July 28th in Ocean Grove, along with leaders from the local organization Ocean Grove United and from Garden State Equality. The lunch would be at the home of the co-chairs of Ocean Grove United.

In a kind, respectful and constructive way, we’d like to talk to you about the pain your words about being LGBT have personally caused me and other LGBT youth. If you can’t join us for lunch that Saturday – when we youth will be meeting regardless – but can meet us at another time that weekend, we will do everything to make the timing convenient for you.

Mr. Cameron, words casting negative judgments about LGBT people not only perpetuate prejudice in our wider society, but also hurt LGBT youth in particular. Some of your public comments about being LGBT have devastated us LGBT youth. We yearn to grow up in a world that provides us dignity and safety. That is our simple, most heartfelt dream.

Cameron has not only publicly opposed marriage equality but has also voiced some strong negative opinions about the gay community. Earlier this year on the Piers Morgan talk show, he called homosexuality “unnatural… detrimental, and ultimately destructive to so many of the foundations of civilization.” While Cameron claimed that he was not speaking out of hatred, Bernstein's letter illustrates the simple fact that his words were hurtful to gay children.

And now Cameron has sent a message back via his manager saying that he will not honor a request for a meeting.

Via the site Democratic Underground:

Hi Corey,

My name is Mark Craig and I am Kirk's manager. His schedule is quite hectic with his movie "Monumental" and working on a new one at the same time, as well as his Love Worth Fighting For events.

He usually flies in the day of the event and after the event is actually traveling to the next one. Because of this intense schedule, there is not time to set up extra meetings like you are suggesting. That being said I would normally just write a simple reply, "Thanks for your invitation, however Kirk's schedule will not permit," but because you have taken some time to share some of your feelings, Kirk asked me to personally thank you on his behalf for your kind invitation and is very sorry he can not attend because of the schedule that weekend. I also want to thank you for taking the time to write and share your heart in your letter.

For this reason, I want to share this thought with you, from someone who sees and works with Kirk almost everyday of the year - I promise you his goal is not one of trying to hurt people in any way, in fact it is just the opposite. He has a concern for their well being - not only now, but eternally. He goes out to share a positive message through events like this weekend and I assure you he will only be presenting a positive/ inspiring message.

I would like to suggest if you really are interested in Kirk's thoughts on the matter, you can listen online to the interviews and comments Kirk has shared where he was given ample time to communicate his heart and thoughts. I hope you can attend the event and see for yourself.

In the big ado that Cameron caused a while back, there were a lot of things said for and against his words but for the most part, we all forgot who his words hurt the most.

Our children.

Many of them don't have the survival skills that many of us have attained through painful years of being bullied. Many of them have not yet acquired the internal coping mechanisms to deal with the constant barrage of negativity which flows from individuals like Cameron.

 When hearing of Cameron's attacks, we gays who are adults reacted with annoyance and anger because we have been trained through years of practice. But to a gay child, Cameron's words are like a push in an empty grave and a shovel-full of dirt thrown in their faces.

It's sad that Cameron can make ugly comments about gays on a talk show, team up with an organization and claim to be a free speech victim (he is a spokesman of the National Organization for Marriage), but will not meet with the most powerless victims of his ugly words.

That's not being Christian. That's wanton cowardice.

Editor's note - Congressman Frank Pallone will meet with the teens and has written Cameron a letter asking him to reconsider.

Your religion WILL NOT protect you from criticism

When it comes to people who hide behind their religion while attacking us gays, we need to be clear about something.

First check this out from Religious Right Watch:

Jack Hakimian is a Florida pastor who is turning into something of a Religious Right martyr after the North Miami public schools rebuked him for delivering anti-gay screeds on school property. Today, Hakimian took his case to American Family Radio, where he complained of “censorship” by gay groups. He said gay rights advocates “know that if we keep debating from biology, from theology and from sociology that homosexuality is not a healthy lifestyle, it’s not God’s plan, we will persuade people’s minds,” and so those advocates “want to destroy our presence.”

The thing which is sadder than Hakimian's ridiculous screed is that if we as a community cried foul, he, Tony Perkins, Donald Wildmon, and other members of the religious right would call US the bullies.

No matter how these folks push the false notion that they are "talking about the lifestyle," the fact remains that they are talking about us as people.

We haven't called them out. They've called us out.

The late lesbian poet Audre Lorde once said "your silence will not protect you." Allow me to paraphrase her words when speaking to people like Hakimian and other denizens of the religious right:

Your religion will not protect you from criticism.  You don't know us and based upon your words, you do not care to know us.

That's fine. Lgbtqs don't exist to get in your so-called good graces. Nor do we seek "tolerance" from you like some pet who has urinated on your favorite rug.

You can believe what you want and you can say what you want.  But when you start talking about us, don't expect us to sit in a corner and cry. And above all, don't expect us to take your abuse with the pitiful good nature of a battered spouse.

We are not "things" nor are we "trapped in a lifestyle." We are human beings and we will not settle for less than being treated like human beings. Your religion does not entitle you to take verbal potshots at us without the courtesy of a highly angry response nor does it entitle you to freely lie about who we are without the courtesy of a stern correction. Our lives will not be dictated by your fevered imaginations of what we allegedly do in the bedrooms. Nor will you restrict every aspect of our lives to those fevered imaginations.

I don't care if you speak in tongues, can heal the sick, or raise the dead. You don't have rights and privileges above us. You never have and you never will.

Basically, it comes down to this - if you can't handle our response, don't call us out in the first place.