Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters

Monday, August 23, 2010

Is Jennifer Keeton being left out in the cold by her anti-gay allies?

It may be too early for such speculation, but I find it interesting that it's been a couple of days since Jennifer Keeton lost her lawsuit against Augusta State University and not one religious right talking head has commented on it.

Keeton, a graduate student, sued the university because, as she put it, it would have forced her to compromise her "Christian beliefs" on homosexuality.

It really came down to the fact that Keeton didn't want to read material on counseling gays nor did she want to counsel gays period.

The courts ruled against her on Friday.

Seeing that it's Monday, I would have thought to hear at least the usual slate of anti-gay lies from our friend Peter LaBarbera, but he seems to be on an Elizabeth Hasselbeck/Ann Coulter kick.

One News Now has been silent about the Keeton case. And there isn't even a statement from her lawyers at the right-wing Alliance Defense Fund.

Before the case went to court, we were bombarded with lies about how Keeton was unfairly targeted, how she was forced to choose between her Christian beliefs and her degree.

Now that the courts ruled against her, all we are hearing are the crickets.

Maybe the folks are in shock over the loss. Or could it be that they have deserted Keeton because they recognize just how ridiculous her case was (and they wouldn't be alone in this regard because Keeton neither offered witnesses nor testified.)

Only time will tell.

Ugandan official proud of his persecution of gays and other Monday midday news briefs

Ugandan MP: Homosexuality is an abomination punishable by death - Sad, sad, sad.

Gay Muslims exist, and they need solidarity too - Amen.

Hong Kong Residents: Beware Of Fraudulent Information By Discredited Ex-Gay Therapy Group - Junk science is global my friends.

Coulter on fundie Take Back America confab: 'They're a bunch of fake Christians' - Well duuuuh.

Tensions Rise in Guadalajara - With the Catholic church unfortunately leading the way.

Breaking the taboo over the mental health crisis among Britain's gay men - And when the religious right manipulates this information, they always conveniently omit how homophobia causes these things.

One News Now and Cliff Kincaid demonstrate homophobia, ability to lie

The sad thing about homophobic lies (or any lie in general) is the ease which people repeat them even after they have been refuted.

Take the case of Bradley Manning, the soldier in the middle of the Wikileaks scandal. Wikileaks is a site which has displayed classified documents of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. Manning, a 22-year-old soldier suspected of leaking documents to Wikileaks. He is currently awaiting court martial. The fact that Manning is allegedly gay has brought the wolves out, so to speak. This is from this morning's edition of One News Now:

An conservative activist and author says members of the Senate need to made aware that the U.S. soldier accused of leaking classified information to the WikiLeaks website is an open homosexual who apparently held a grudge against the U.S. military for its law excluding homosexual military service.

The British newspaper Daily Telegraph first reported that Private 1st Class Bradley Manning, a U.S. Army intelligence analyst, was not only openly homosexual but also considering a sex change. Manning could face more than 50 years in prison for passing secret documents to WikiLeaks, whose founder Julian Assange has an anti-American and anti-military bent.

Cliff Kincaid, president of America's Survival and editor of Accuracy in Media, says that information is finally getting some notice.

But the Daily Telegraph never reported that Manning was seeking a sex change operation.

The claim about the sex change, as well as the entire narrative of Manning being "an angry gay soldier who leaked documents because he is mad at military's policy on gays and lesbians" is a concoction of Kincaid.

And basically, anything Kincaid says about the lgbt community should be taken with a grain of salt.

He leads the right-wing group Accuracy in Media, the same group which had to retract a blog post falsely accusing a gay Obama appointee, Kevin Jennings, of being a pedophile. Kincaid has also made the vile claim that disease-tainted gay blood threatens our troops.

In addition, Kincaid has unashamedly defended Uganda's infamous "Kill The Gays" bill.

As we have seen last week with the situation involving Peter LaBarbera, Glenn Beck and Chai Feldblum, little things like accuracy usually get pushed out of the way when there is an anti-gay meme to be repeated.

And it's up to the lgbt community to beat down these memes before they can become the "official story."

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Insanity defined: Man is accosted for 'looking like a Muslim'

This anti-Muslim sentiment in this country is heading to a level of insanity and the above video proves it.

At the anti-Islamic Center rally held today in New York, a man walking through the crowd of protesters gets mistaken for a Muslim and madness ensues.

Luckily no one gets hurt but it's still sad.

It reminds me of the Shakespearean play Julius Caesar where a mob of citizens is looking for a certain group of men to murder. They come upon an innocent poet and butcher him because he has the same name as one of the men they are looking for.

If this country doesn't pull back from hysteria and those chosen by whatever "powers-that-be" to be leaders and spokespeople don't stop feeding into this hysteria (i.e. Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, etc.), then someone is really going to get hurt.

Enough already.

Hat tip to the Political Carnival and my online pal Evan Hurst.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Second 'I don't want to counsel gays' lawsuit struck down by the courts

How did I miss this one:

Augusta State University's requirement that a graduate student read material about counseling gays and increase her exposure to that community after she objected to counseling homosexual clients was "academically legitimate," a federal court judge ruled Friday.

U.S. District Judge Randal Hall's decision enables university officials to expel Jennifer Keeton if she does not follow the remediation plan, which professors designed to "address issues of multicultural competence and develop understanding and empathy."

Hall said the case is not about "pitting Christianity against homosexuality," but rather the constitutionality of the school's requirement.

This denunciation comes at the heels another case in which a student claimed that she was "forced" to choose between her religious beliefs and her vocation. Last month, the courts ruled against Julea Ward, a student at Eastern Michigan University who claimed that she was removed from the school's counseling program because of her strong religious views against homosexuality.

Ward has refused to counsel lgbt clients because of her beliefs. In the ruling, U.S. District Judge George Caram Steeh said:

" . . .the university had a rational basis for requiring its students to counsel clients without imposing their personal values.

In the case of Ms. Ward, the university determined that she would never change her behavior and would consistently refuse to counsel clients on matters with which she was personally opposed due to her religious beliefs -- including homosexual relationships."

Keeton and Ward were both made as cause celebres by the religious right as victims of a so-called "gay agenda" which would punish Christians for expressing their beliefs.

However many others, myself included, disagree.

My feeling is that if you can't do the job completely and for everyone then we have a serious problem, especially if you are seeking to be a healthcare worker.

And those who seek to make Keeton and Ward into martyrs would be advised to remember that this sort of thing has a habit of coming back in a nasty way.

If people are allowed exemptions in the counseling of the lgbt community today, who's to say that tomorrow exemptions won't be given in the counseling of the African-American or Latino communities?

Or even the Christian community?

UDPATE: The article also going on to say something which should be remembered should Keeton's name come up in religious right talking points (and it will) - the university presented three professors as witnesses but Keeton presented no witnesses. And she didn't even testify.

Hat tip to Daily Kos.

Related post:

Court knocks down latest religious right cause celebre

Friday, August 20, 2010

Know Your LGBT History - Stewardess School

Stewardess School (1986)was one of those tired 1980s ensemble comedy movies where a group of outsiders band together to show the world that they can make something of themselves.

It's a formula that was repeated with Stripes, Hot Dog: The Movie, Hamburger: The Movie, Revenge of the Nerds (which may be an upcoming feature of this blog), etc. etc.

Stewardess School was one of the worst ones. In this particular case, we have a female wrestler (despondent because her meek boyfriend can't handle her occupation), a nearsighted cute guy and his annoying friend (played by Happy Days's Donny Most), a clumsy woman, a ditzy blonde, and overweight oddball (the late Wendy Joe Sperber seemed to specialize in this type of characterization), a sexy, SEXY prostitute trying to reform (how strange is it that va va voom actress Audrey Landers puts in the funniest performance in this movie), and for the purpose of this site, the gay guy:

Fight for lgbt equality has gone global and other Friday midday news briefs

Man this is a slow and dull Friday. But as a self-described "radical gay activist," I shall soldier on:

Shifting attitudes take gay rights fight across globe, experts say - You better believe it!

Fischer: Ann Coulter Is The "Ashley Dupre of the Conservative Movement" - Did he just call Ann Coulter a "ho?"

Obama Appoints Gay Man to HHS - Okay religious right, what's wrong with THIS appointee?

Video: Paper, personal objections, and fear = non-binding anti-equality - Because "standing against gay marriage" is more important than job creation, crime prevention, etc.

Dr. Laura Knows Black Person, Gay Person - Well I guess that makes her no longer a homophobe who freely uses the "n-word."