'Porno Pete' LaBarbera getting hot and bothered over upcoming street fair

Oh mercy, it's that time again.

Time for your friend and mine, Porno Pete LaBarbera to fake shock and outrage over Folsom Street Fair.

And of course he doesn't disappoint:

Deviance and Folly of Liberal ‘Tolerance’

Nothing screams “Perversion!” like the annual Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco, America’s first homosexual Mecca — where mostly homosexual men (and some “straights,” using that term loosely) party in the city’s streets — many in near- or total nudity. AFTAH has documented the unprecedented public perversions and nudity of this bizarre outdoor “fair,” as police stand idly by.  [See our photo-reports: Folsom 008 (part one); Folsom 2008 (part two); "Slavery Makes a Comeback" (Folsom 2008); "Up Your Ally" fair 2008; Folsom 2010 and  Folsom 2007.] Here is the link to the Folsom Street Fair website (warning: offensive material). Below is the 2012 poster for this well-attended sadomasochism and “sexual freedom” celebration, which demonstrates that for the liberal minded, there are few if any limits to “tolerance.” THIS is the depraved end game of the Sexual Revolution. (Click on image to enlarge.) – Peter LaBarbera, AFTAH

I find it interesting how he attacks gays for this street fair while at the same time acknowledging that heterosexuals also attend and participate.

Oh well, I look at it as progress. In writings about past Folsom Street Fairs, LaBarbera was very reluctant to acknowledge heterosexual appearances there.

At any rate, I will say what I always say when Porno Pete starts on his fake outrage (which is extremely Freudian, seeing that he provides links to past "street reports" which he and his supporters "forced themselves" to view and talking about in lovingly long details):

I have never attended one of these nor do I have any desire to. So to generalize about the gay community because of those who attend this thing is like generalizing about heterosexuals because of  the straight men and women who attend the fair.

Although between you and me, if it was discovered that the committee behind Folsom was paying LaBarbera under the table to publicize this event, I wouldn't be shocked.

Video superbly refutes lies about marriage equality

Want a simple way to refute the lies about marriage equality? Check out this video from the Australian Marriage Equality Campaign. Send it to your friends and especially your favorite homophobes


Hat tip to ThinkProgress and Goodasyou.

'AFA:' Big gay' activists are going to hell' and other Monday midday news briefs

Buster Wilson Warns 'Big Gay' Activists That They Are Destined for Hell - First of all, what in the world is a "big gay" activist? Secondly, who designated a guy named "Buster" to send people to hell? I don't remember that verse in the Bible.

In other news: 

Woman Becomes First Openly Gay General - THIS is a pretty darned big deal! 

Paul Ryan Has Acted On Every Anti-Gay Belief Mitt Romney Has - Translation: the religious right will love Paul Ryan.

Anti-Gay Groups Officially Launch Campaign To Remove Pro-Equality Iowa Justice - Nothing says fairness like voting out a judge simply because you don't agree with his or her opinion.

Regnerus was approached to do anti-gay parenting study by Witherspoon Institute

Regnerus

A new article about the anti-gay parenting study created by University of Texas Mark Regnerus gave some new details about how the study came to being.

And these details should lead to more questions.

First, a little background

Earlier this year, Regnerus published a study which claimed that children in same-sex households face several problems. Conservatives and the religious right quickly lauded this study. But many others pointed out errors in the study's conclusion and methodology. In fact, over 200 professors and researchers signed a letter condemning it.

A chief complaint has been where Regnerus received his funding.  According to Wayne Besen of the group Truth Wins Out, the head of the study, Mark Regnerus, received a $695,000 grant from the Witherspoon Institute for the study

The Witherspoon Foundation is affiliated with Princeton professor Robert George. At the Witherspoon Foundation, he is a Herbert W. Vaughan Senior Fellow  George is also a founder and chairman emeritus of the National Organization for Marriage, an organization whose goal is to stop marriage equality.

Since Regnerus's study was published, NOM and the Witherspoon Institute has been pushing it steadily.  According to the Huffington Post, Maggie Gallagher, the former president of NOM and other groups associated with the organization have widely publicizing Regnerus' work:

Gallagher has been especially active in promoting the study, writing three posts about it on the website of the conservative National Review.  She penned a column for the conservative Town Hall under the headline, "The Gay Murphy Brown Effect."

Gallagher's Culture War Victory Fund, which was incubated at the American Principles Project, a group founded by Robert George in 2009, promoted the same articles that NOM did on its blog.

Another NOM-connected group, the Love and Fidelity Network, also promoted the study.

The Love and Fidelity Network shares an office with the Witherspoon Institute. Gallagher and George, the founders of NOM, are on the Network's advisory board. Luis Tellez, who founded the Witherspoon Institute with George, is also on the advisory board of the Love and Fidelity Network.

For its part, the Witherspoon Institute wrote a lengthy analysis of Regnerus' study under the headline, "The Kids Aren't All Right: New Family Structures and the 'No Differences' Claim."

The Witherspoon Institute also launched a website featuring Regnerus' data.

Regnerus has insisted that the study's funders had nothing to do with its outcome.  But this is where the new information comes in from The Statesman newspaper in Texas.

According to an article which appeared on Thursday, Regnerus was approached to do the study by a member of the Witherspoon Institute. This is noted at least two times in the article:

1. The Witherspoon Institute approached Regnerus, a sociologist, about doing a study on gay parenting and contributed about $700,000 to his project, according to Regnerus and Luis Tellez, president of the Princeton, N.J.-based institute. The Bradley Foundation, based in Milwaukee, supplied $90,000 for the work, according to Regnerus. The Bradley Foundation did not respond to requests for comment.

The grant — the largest the Witherspoon Institute has ever given for faculty research — came with no strings attached and no pressure for a particular outcome, Tellez says.

2. In the case of the Regnerus study, Witherspoon solicited Regnerus for the work, according to Tellez, the institute's president. Tellez said he sought money to help pay for the study from liberal philanthropists as well as Witherspoon's mostly socially conservative contributors. But no liberal individuals or groups gave money for the project, he said.

Regnerus, in an email to the Statesman, said, "the plan for the particular study that was carried out was generated by me, with the help of a variety of consultants."

Tellez said he approached Regnerus for the study because he had met the scholar at events sponsored by Witherspoon and found him to be "a darn good scholar, a careful scholar, (and) easy to work with."

"We knew that (the study) would probably, one way or the other, be a disappointment to some people. It would disappoint us, or donors, or people on our left," Tellez said, later adding, "We let the chips fall where they may."

Sorry but I have a hard time believing, in spite of the assurances, that the Witherspoon Institute, a conservative organization with a specific agenda, would approach someone to do a study and freely give what it calls "the largest grant given to faculty research" if it didn't have expectations of what it would be receiving.

Certain questions need to be asked of the parties involved in the creation of this study - specifically why did the Witherspoon Institute want to create such a study and what did it hope to accomplish?

Waaaaah! The gays are picking on me!!!

In the middle of the fest about Mitt Romney picking Paul Ryan, here is something we missed, but I'm sure the National Organization for Marriage won't.

Hold on to your hula hoops because this first paragraph is hilarious:

The gay movement is not a random assortment of motley rebels. It is highly organized, with major nerve centers in places like the Human Rights Coalition. The movement has its prominent generals, such as Dan Savage and Wayne Besen.

In other words, this is a movement equipped to pick its battles. In 1999, history was made because Vermont's high court legalized same-sex civil unions. The battle plan then could have been to focus on civil unions, forging a new model of romantic commitment in a nation where the old notion of "marriage" had long suffered from stasis.

That sounds like something coming from Bryan Fischer or Porno Pete LaBarbera, but guess who wrote that hilarious missive.

Oscar Robert Lopez, whom I wrote about earlier this week. Lopez is a self-described bisexual college professor who claims that he was raised in a same-sex household and that made his life difficult.

I don't have a problem with that. But what I do have a problem with is that Lopez is slowly but surely attempting to make himself the point man in what is becoming a quiet war waged against same-sex couples raising children.

In that same piece about his childhood, he vouched for a recent study on gay parenting that has come under fire for numerous errors.

The paragraph above (which insults me personally because I thought I was a general in the gay rights movement) is from a new piece he wrote claiming that the gay community is waging a war against him because of his earlier piece.

Without going into actual detail, Lopez channels Vanessa Redgrave when she played Mary of Scotland on the way to the chopping block:

Since my article came out, I have been through far worse than I ever thought would happen. My job is at risk, and worst of all, my coworkers received an e-mail from a gay rights organization with the title "COMPLAINT AGAINST CSUN'S ROBERT LOPEZ: GAY BASHER." Soon I got e-mails from administrators. People really investigate claims like this.

Gay basher?

What the heck has this movement come to?

For God's sake, I am a bisexual raised by a lesbian couple, who helped countless people dying of AIDS. I've spent my life cleaning up the messes left by gay politics. I wrote an honest essay. That's bashing?

The gay marriage movement has finally crossed the line into insanity. They must burn their own villages to save them from their phantasmal bullies. All the real things that gays could do to improve their real problems are right before their eyes: be humane to one another, forgive others, care for their most needy, and most of all, pick their battles. Support pro-life politicians and adopt foster kids saved from abortion. Vote for Republicans who believe in school vouchers, get bullied gays into safer schools... But they choose not to. They have dedicated themselves to a scorched-earth campaign for gay marriage.

In between giving command performances of Mary, Queen of Scots, Lopez goes into detail about his personal life. Let those who do such things ruminate. I won't.

I would rather point out how he generalizes about the gay community. I'm not saying that he is lying about his persecution claims, but I don't think that it's a part of a larger effort to silence him.

And the irony is that while he accuses the gay community of missing the larger picture, it is obvious that he is a little blind himself. He mentions several things that we could be doing instead of pushing for marriage equality. Allow me to point out just how clueless he is:

Lopez - Support pro-life politicians and adopt foster kids saved from abortion.

Reality - First of all, how many "pro-life" politicians do you know believe in the concept of gay equality? Secondly, gays and lesbians are already adopting children, period. However if those supporting Lopez have their way, we won't even be allowed to do this.

Lopez - Vote for Republicans who . . . get bullied gays into safer schools...

Reality - And how many Republicans will actually speak about bullied gay students. And also, where has Lopez been when GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network) have been doing their job about bullying? Where was Lopez when Dan Savage began "It Gets Better."  I find it hard to believe that Lopez doesn't know about Savage's work seeing that he chose to name him as a "general" in the gay rights movement (yeah I'm still pissed about that).

Basically it come down to this - I don't know what Lopez is facing but him playing the victim seems to follow the familiar blueprint of religious right organizations and figures when the gay community reacts to them calling us out.

I'm certainly not in favor of his job being in jeopardy (IF this is the case), nor am I in favor of name-calling, but the bottom line is this:

Don't screw with our families and expect us not to react.
 

Did NOM's anti-gay pastor lie about involvement in Civil Rights Movement?

Rev. William Owens

Know Your LGBT History has been postponed this week because of this HOT piece from the Huffington Post.

And the hits keep coming at CAAP (the Coalition of African-American Pastors), the astroturf group of black pastors that the National Organization for Marriage is using in an attempt to sabotage President Obama's African-American support as a part of its wedge strategy.

Earlier today, we learned that CAAP had received monies from anti-gay hate groups such as the Family Research Council and the American Family Association.

But now, via the Huffington Post, comes the explosive possibility that the leader of CAAP, William Owens, may have been lying about his history as a civil rights leader:

Owens, who runs a group called the Coalition of African-American Pastors (CAAP), has claimed that he participated in protests and sit-ins in Nashville in the late 1950s. “I didn’t march one inch, one foot, one yard, for a man to marry a man, and a woman to marry a woman,” he said during a news conference last week at the National Press Club.

. . . But Adam Serwer of Mother Jones spoke to several prominent civil rights leaders who were involved in organizing the Nashville sit-ins and who said they have no recollection of Owens. A librarian at the Nashville Public Library, which maintains an extensive library on the sit-ins and protests, could find no mention of Owens either, outside of a 2004 interview that Owens himself gave with the library in which he said he was involved. 

Here are more details from the Mother Jones article linked in the Huffington Post:

Rev. C.T. Vivian, an ally of Martin Luther King Jr. who helped organize the Nashville sit-ins and who is now president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, said he did not recall crossing paths with Owens. Rev. James Lawson, the famed practitioner of non-violence who trained the sit-in activists, did not remember Owens either. The same goes for Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), one of the major student leaders in the Nashville sit-in movement who went on to lead the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

The only evidence Mother Jones could find of Owens' involvement in the Nashville civil rights movement was at the Nashville Public Library, which maintains an extensive collection of historical materials on the subject. In 2004, the library conducted a 60-minute interview with Owens, in which he describes his role during that era. Other than attending some activist meetings, the only protest he mentioned participating in was the picketing of the drug store where he once worked, according to Jennifer Quire, the Nashville Public Library's educational outreach librarian, who handles the civil rights oral history project and who reviewed the tape for Mother Jones. Even this could have been something of a fluke: Owens told Quire he came across the drugstore being picketed and held up a sign to show his solidarity with the protesters. "There definitely was no leadership role, certainly not on the level of James Lawson or Diane Nash or anything like that," Quire says. (Owens did not respond to repeated queries about his civil rights role in Nashville, including a detailed request concerning his oral history interview with the Nashville library.)

In addition, that same article reveals that Owens' group, CAAP, is in fact receiving funding from NOM.

It's up to Owens to fill in the blanks, but most likely he won't.

I don't think it takes a palm reader to guess that Owens will play the victim. He will probably claim that there is a plot underfoot to undermine him because CAAP's protest is resonating.

Let me kill that lie right now.

CAAP's protest is not resonating and this is not a plot to undermine Owens.

What's going on is a bit of truth-telling.

Owens and his cohorts should try it sometime.

'Black pastor group received money from anti-gay hate groups' and other Friday midday news briefs

Black pastors group has deep conservative ties, records show - Surprise, surprise! That supposedly non-biased group of pastors (CAAP, led by Rev. William Owens) attempting to get the black community to withhold its vote from President Obama because of his support of marriage equality has a history that it failed to mention. USA Today gives the scoop, including the following choice tidbits:

Frank Cannon, head of the American Principles Project, a group opposed to same-sex marriage, confirms his group's political action fund is paying public relations firm Shirley & Banister to assist CAAP's communications strategy.

CAAP received loans totaling $26,000 in 2004 from the conservative Family Research Council, American Family Association and Mississippi Tea Party activist Ed Holliday, according to its IRS filings.

Owens, . . . endorsed 2008 GOP presidential contender Mike Huckabee and Ohio GOP gubernatorial candidate Ken Blackwell.

Remember that the Southern Poverty Law Center has declared the American Family Association and the Family Research Council to be hate groups because of the lies they spread about the gay community.

In other news: 

 Thanks for taking my call, Bryan; long time listener, first time stalker - My blogging buddy Jeremy Hooper has crazy Bryan Fischer on the run.  

Washington State Bishop: Oppose Marriage Equality To Keep Heterosexuality Special - Well now I have heard EVERYTHING!

 Restored Hope Ex-Gay Network Will Not Oppose Criminalization Of Homosexuality - Well that makes me feel special.

 Anti-Gay Ex-Michigan Attorney Taken to Court - Oh mercy! Andrew Shrivell again!