Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters

Monday, August 09, 2010

Florida attorney general wants to ban gay adoption even after the Rekers scandal because of personal belief

One would think that after being embroiled in a scandal that rocked Florida, the religious right, and his gubernatorial aspirations, Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum would change his negative opinion of gay adoption, the very reason for the scandal.

Think again. From Think Progress:

Fresh off his George Rekers scandal, Florida Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Bill McCollum is telling Florida Baptist News that he wants to expand Florida’s discriminatory adoption laws to prohibit gay people from serving as foster parents:

MCCOLLUM: I don’t believe in gay adoption. I don’t believe in involving the government in enforcing or encouraging the lifestyle of gays and homosexuals. I just don’t believe that. [...]

Q: Florida permits homosexuals to serve as foster parents. That has been used as an argument to undermine the ban on adoptions. Should homosexuals be permitted to serve as foster parents in Florida?
MCCOLLUM: Well, I personally don’t think so, but that is the law.
Q: Should the law be changed?
MCCOLLUM: I think that it would be advisable. I really do not think that we should have homosexuals guiding our children. I think that it’s a lifestyle that I don’t agree with. I realize a lot of people do. It’s my personal faith, religious faith, that I don’t believe that the people who do this should be raising our children. It’s not a natural thing. You need a mother and a father. You need a man and a woman. That’s what God intended.

And here I thought God always commanded us to stand for truth. I guess I didn't get the memo McCollum received.

But we now see the reason why McCollum pushed in fighting for Florida's ban against gay adoption in spite of the fact that his office at first couldn't find any "experts" to speak on their side,

and the reason why George Rekers was the "expert" chosen in spite of the fact that McCollum's staff warned him that Rekers had credibility problems,

and the reason why McCollum is still pushing against gay adoption even after his case was soundly defeated in court and his office frittered away over $100,000 dollars to Rekers.

That reason being - McCollum's personal beliefs tells him that gay adoption is wrong. Never mind being destroyed in court and never mind the all of the research which demonstrates his position to be wrong because those things don't matter.

Facts and truth don't matter to McCollum. Just his personal pseudo-Christian beliefs.

Maybe it's just me but I don't think that this is right. I don't think that a politician has a right to waste money and discriminate against people simply because of his personal beliefs (and I underline that part about "personal beliefs" because again, nothing concrete backs up McCollum's stance that gay adoption is dangerous or wrong.)

But something must be noted here and needs to be the topic of discussions that go beyond blogs.

In two cases (this one and the case of Proposition 8), we are seeing the dangers of people sacrificing truth for personal beliefs.

In the case of Proposition 8, when the reality that same sex marriage is harmless wasn't to the liking of some folks, they manufactured a plethora of phony data to say that it was.

In this case in Florida, McCollum isn't manufacturing false data. He is doing much worse by saying "to hell with the data" and "to hell with reason and accuracy. Gay adoption is wrong because I think so."

When people can push phony data or push aside accurate data with a public assurance that they are doing so in God's name, I think there are bigger problems in this world than the so-called "homosexual agenda."

After all, us "homosexuals" aren't the ones lying with impunity.

More proof that the Family Research distorts information and other Monday midday news briefs

Tony Perkins' fearmongering about same-sex parenting is refuted by medical consensus - More reasons as to why the Prop 8 folks lost in court.

Pathetic Porno Pete Puffs Up Crowd Numbers At Failed Hate Conference - Why are we even surprised? And by the way, I love the first sentence of this piece.

You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet: Ominous Rumblings From the Right - Bring it on.

Staten Island Marches Against Hate Crime - Good for them!

NOM's Latest Target? Maine's Clean Elections Law - For a supposed Christian organization, they certainly have a lot to hide.

Prop 8 lawyer destroys religious right lies on Face The Nation

Very satisfying appearance by Prop 8 lawyer David Boies on Face the Nation yesterday as he took on the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins and destroyed him. I especially like when he said the following:

"In a court of law you've got to come in and you've got to support those opinions, you've got to stand up under oath and cross-examination. And what we saw at trial is that it's very easy for the people who want to deprive gay and lesbian citizens of the right to vote [sic] to make all sorts of statements and campaign literature, or in debates where they can't be cross-examined.

"But when they come into court and they have to support those opinions and they have to defend those opinions under oath and cross-examination, those opinions just melt away. And that's what happened here. There simply wasn't any evidence, there weren't any of those studies. There weren't any empirical studies. That's just made up. That's junk science. It's easy to say that on television. But a witness stand is a lonely place to lie. And when you come into court you can't do that.

"That's what we proved: We put fear and prejudice on trial, and fear and prejudice lost."

And that is why the religious right will eventually lose this so-called culture war. Their foundation is built on lies and all lies are sooner or later exposed as such.

Hat tip to Americablog.

Sunday, August 08, 2010

MLK's anti-gay niece smears Coretta Scott King for 'not having his DNA'

The National Organization for Marriage has continued its sad, poorly attended "Summer for Marriage" Tour across the nation, this time stopping in Atlanta. And speaking for the organization at this juncture was Alveda King, the niece of the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Her speech was ridiculous, especially the implication that gay marriage is "genocide." But what caught my eye were negative comments she made in an interview after the speech.

The crude comments come in at about 7:21 when she is asked about Coretta Scott King's support of gay marriage.

Alveda says that her (Alveda's views) supposedly come from the "Lord" and "Natural Law."

But then she adds a nasty little caveat:

She (Coretta) was married to him (Martin Luther King, Jr.). I've got his DNA. She doesn't. She didn't. She's passed away."

Views about gay marriage aside, Alveda's comments were nasty and totally inappropriate. And I would say that they reveal her mindset more than her ramblings.

Let's be clear. Coretta Scott King was very instrumental in the life and legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. She was more than his wife. She was an integral part in the African-American civil rights movement. And after his assassination, she carved a niche for herself as a human rights activist. Alveda was merely a teenager during the civil rights movement and as far as we know, she never had any discussions with King about civil rights matters.

In all honesty, Alveda has made a career off of exploiting the King name. If she didn't have this name, no one would really care about what she thought in regards to gay rights, African-American rights, etc.

But since it is her name, it is also her right to reap the benefits from having it.

But what she doesn't have a right to do is disrespect the legacy of a woman whose shoes she's not worthy enough to even latch.

Coretta Scott King was a hero.

You, Alveda, are an exploiter.

Please don't ever mistake Mrs. King as anything less or yourself as anything more.

Hat tip to Goodasyou.org

Harry Jackson doesn't like same-sex families

It has been fun to watch members of the religious right spin themselves into oblivion as they try to deal with the Prop 8 decision handed down last week.

But once in a while, one of them says something which makes you angry. For me, it is this piece by Rev. Harry Jackson which appeared on CNN's webpage.

Jackson, probably the most prominent African-American in religious right circles (probably because he is one of a scant few African-Americans in those circles) is claiming that gay marriage will damage families and society.

Jackson repeats the same anti-gay nonsense channeled by the religious right - and dismissed in the Prop 8 decision. But then he says this:

. . .if same-sex marriage becomes legally recognized across the country, our kids will be told that gay marriage is a civil rights issue and that those who oppose it are akin to the racists of history who opposed interracial marriage and supported slavery.

We can teach our children at home that marriage is between a man and a woman, but our children's public schools will teach them that marriage includes same-sex couples. Both would be "equal marriages" under the law.

What might this look like? In Massachusetts, where a ruling legalized same-sex marriage in 2004, kids in public schools are reading books depicting same-sex families. At a California charter school in 2008, kindergartners' parents objected when a school newsletter alerted them to "National Coming Out Day;" a parent told a local ABC-TV affiliate that a teacher at the school screened a film to kindergartners the previous year showing gay families.

While I disagree with Jackson's assessment that those who oppose gay marriage will be thought of as bigots, he makes a good case of why this could happen.

Usually when religious right figures list anecdotes about incidents which happen when lgbts gain marriage rights, non-discrimination rights, etc, the incidents end (albeit not truthfully) with the implication being that if we gave lgbts rights, someone would be deprived of their rights, put in jail, having to unfairly pay a fine, etc.

But not so in this case.

Jackson is saying that allowing gay marriage would make school acknowledge the presence of lgbt families.

What's wrong with that? Schools should be doing this all along because lgbt families exist and children who are in these households attend our nation's schools. Why should they have to be ashamed of their families just to suit the ignorance of others?

According to a report by Gary Gates, Lee M.V. Badgett, Jennifer Ehrle Macomber, Kate Chambers of the Urban Institute:

* More than one in three lesbians have given birth and one in six gay men have fathered or adopted a child.

* An estimated 65,500 adopted children are living with a lesbian or gay parent.

* More than 16,000 adopted children are living with lesbian and gay parents in California, the highest number among the states.

* Gay and lesbian parents are raising four percent of all adopted children in the United States.
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* An estimated 14,100 foster children are living with lesbian or gay parents.

* Gay and lesbian parents are raising three percent of foster children in the United States.

But in Harry Jackson's world, simple acknowledgment of these families is akin to the war, famine, or plague; scourges that have wiped out past societies.

Sounds like bigotry to me.

Saturday, August 07, 2010

The right's comparison of Michelle Obama and Marie Antoinette is more astute than they realize

So members of the right are using a trip to Spain to again smear First Lady Michelle Obama as uncaring and extravagant.

You'll forgive me for not being impressed but I've seen it before. Remember the rumor spread about her supposedly eating lobster, caviar, and champagne at the Waldorf-Astoria while Obama was preparing for the third Presidential debate in 2008? It didn't happen. Not that it matters, however. After all, why let truth stand in the way of a good rumor.

But there is a new thing in this recent smear. Members of the right, such as Rush Limbaugh, have compared Mrs. Obama to Marie Antoinette, the Queen of France during the French Revolution who was executed for crimes against the state. It's a talking point which several have repeated so don't think the comparison is spontaneous or by accident.

Antoinette's name is byword for uncaring extravagance mostly due to the legend of her comments regarding why the people of France were raising hell. Allegedly when she was told that they have no bread, she remarked "let them eat cake." The story symbolized her supposed nasty attitude regarding her subjects.

And so we have members of the right now using Mrs. Obama's vacation in Spain with her daughter to spread the meme that she is just like Antoinette in the fact that she is doesn't care about people suffering from this awful climate of recession in the United States.

However, I would advise those on the right to tread lightly with this comparison. While it is not known for a fact that Antoinette said the "let them eat cake" comment, it is known that the rumors were used to make her public enemy number one in France. She was not popular for a multitude of reasons, one of which because she was foreign (Austrian). Therefore any negative rumor told about her gained immediate popularity

So subsequently when she, her husband Louis XVI, and the rest of their retinue were arrested, she was subjected to many indiginities by the French mobs hungry for blood including:

nearly made to stare at the head of her mutiliated friend (Maria Teresa Luisa of Savoy, Princess of Lamballe) as crowds paraded it on a stick outside of her window,
being separated from her family and falsely accused of molesting her young son, a charge which she denied so vehemently that it is said she nearly turned the women who were against her to her side,
and even suffering a final indignity of being denied privacy before her execution to take care of the hemmorraging caused by her uterine cancer.

Certainly things are not as extreme for Mrs. Obama as they were for Antoinette the irony here is stark. Members of the right are using a historical symbol of uncaring extravagance to smear the First Lady while forgetting that this same figure became that symbol due to substantiated rumors designed to flame mobs against her.

Perhaps Limbaugh and the rest shouldn't worry about how much Mrs. Obama compares to Marie Antoinette and worry about how they compare to those bloodthirsty French mobs who demanded Antoinette's blood.

Friday, August 06, 2010

Know Your LGBT History - Don't be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood

The Wayans family is the first African-American film family of Hollywood and they got this monicker through their brand of blue humor comedy movies.

Some are funny, others areastupid and in a few of them, the lgbt community have been made fun of. But to be honest, so have a lot of other groups and nationalities.

Now their first movie to hit it big, Don't Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood, (1996) was a takeoff of the annoying plethora of movies which featured black men in danger of being murdered through gang activity and neighborhood violence.

I hate to say it but this movie grows on you and there are some serious laugh out loud scenes.

But I had a discussion with a friend of mine involving two scenes which didn't necessarily talk about the lgbt community per se but is still of some interest to us . . . maybe.

The first scene is a take off of the cookout scene from the movie Boys N Da Hood. In it, the head villain is bragging about how he is not afraid to go back to jail. And his sentiments are echoed by members of the cast, until the last part: