Hate group leader advises parents to reject their lgbt children

Tony Perkins

In a speech today, Family Research Council leader Tony Perkins performed a verbal contradiction:

A prominent social conservative leader compared homosexuality to drug use on Wednesday while urging parents not to “condone and enable” a child being gay.

Tony Perkins, president of the anti-gay Family Research Council, made the remarks while speaking at the National Press Club luncheon after being asked if he would disown one of his children if they came out as gay.

Perkins, the father of five children, replied that he wouldn’t “disown my children for anything,” but advised parents they should express disapproval if their children make such an announcement.

Perkins claims that he is not advising parents to disown their gay children, but he certainly is implying it.

What exactly does he think would happen should parents follow his advice when their children come out to them? Just what is his definition of "expressing disapproval" which does not involve disowning a child or acting in a manner which implies great unhappiness which can be construed to a child as a parent disowning them?

We will never know because Perkins did not go into more detail. And we shouldn't be surprised about that. Perkins is a fraud offering artificial solutions to complex problems which do nothing but exacerbate the problems.

Dan Savage had the following to say about Perkins in a tweet:

Hostile parents double gay kids already quadrupled suicide risk. Perkins literally urging parents 2 kill their kids.

While I wouldn't make the statement so succinctly as Savage, I will say this:

Perkins has no degree in psychology, psychiatry, or pediatrics. Those who do - and therefore KNOW what they are talking about - say the following:

1. Parents who are intolerant of their lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB) teens may increase the risk that their kids will suffer health problems in young adulthood, such as an increased risk of suicide, depression, drug abuse, and unsafe sex, according to a new report.

Researchers interviewed 53 families with gay teens to identify certain parental behaviors as "accepting" or "rejecting," then surveyed 224 young-adult white and Latino gays and lesbians (ages 21 to 25) to see which of these behaviors they'd experienced during adolescence.

The results? Higher rates of family rejection were strongly associated with poorer health outcomes. Among respondents who had high levels of family rejection:

more than two-thirds said they had tried to kill themselves (vs. about 20% among those who reported the lowest rates of rejection)

many reported high rates of depression, illegal drug use, and substance abuse

46% said they'd had unprotected sex with a casual partner in the past 6 months (nearly twice the rate of those in the least-rejected group) - "Family Rejection as a Predictor of Negative Health Outcomes in White and Latino Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Young Adults," Pediatrics, Jan. 2009.

2. I have heard too many LGBT youths tell horrifying stories of violent abuse and rejection from their parents. The teenage boy from upstate New York, who, when his father learned he was gay, he beat him to a pulp, then threw him out of the house and told him that if he tried to come back, he would kill his son and bury him in the backyard. Or the boy from Florida whose father put a gun to his head and said "You are no longer my son. Leave the house now." The 17-year-old transgender child whose mother attacked him when she learned of his male identity, ripping out a piece of his scalp, and screaming homophobic abuse as her child fled. Or the 15-year-old boy who came out to his family at a picnic in rural Delaware. His father, a Christian minister, jumped on him and tried to strangle him. That evening he gathered his belongings into a few garbage bags and banished his son from his home. Or the family that drove their daughter out into the backwoods of New Jersey and tossed her from the car for being a lesbian. This is clearly not something to joke about

Research now documents the terrible scope of this crisis. Approximately 50% of LGBT youth whose sexual orientations and gender identities become known to their families experience some degree of family rejection. A recent report published by the Center for American Progress estimates that there are over 100,000 homeless LGBT youth on the streets of our nation, and that LGBT youth make up to 40% of our nation's homeless youth population. - Carl Siciliano, Family Rejection of LGBT Youth Is No Joke

Of course Perkins will claim that he was telling parents to reject the "lifestyle" and not the child, but don't fall for the false semantics. 
 
If you pardon my candor, when it comes to gay children and their families, Tony Perkins doesn't know his ass from his elbow.

'Hate group leader Tony Perkins wallows in hypocrisy' and other Thursday midday news briefs

Tony Perkins Kicks Off Values Voters Summit By Comparing Homosexuality To Drug Abuse - Right after comparing homosexuality to drug abuse, Family Research Council head Tony Perkins reportedly said “It’s time to dial down your demonization of those who differ with you.” Oh brother! 

 NARTH Posts Article Comparing Homosexuality To Rape - Phony medical group reprints phony article. 

Hundreds rally for gay marriage in Portland, Maine - Good for them because the article also says that NOM is spending $500,000 on the fight. Ugh.  

What Marylanders should know about equality's cynical opposition - And in Maryland, Marylanders for Marriage Equality issued an incredible memo to the media. Let's hope they pick up on it.  

Jesse Jackson Urges Maryland Voters to Support Gay Marriage - Jesse Jackson lays the smack down about marriage equality. 

Barney Frank refuses to apologize for comments made about Log Cabin Republicans

Last week, Congressman Barney Frank caused a huge controversy when he called the Log Cabin Republicans "Uncle Toms."

Many mainstream lgbt organizations distanced themselves from his words.

Yesterday, in a piece published by the Huffington Post, Frank made it clear that he was not apologizing or backing down:

 . . . my use of "Uncle Tom" was based not simply on the awful fact that they have chosen to be actively on the wrong side of an election that will have an enormous impact on our right to equality, both in fact and in the public perception of the popularity of that cause. If the Log Cabin Republicans -- or their even more outlandish cousins, the oddly-named GOProud -- were honestly to acknowledge that they let their own economic interests, or their opposition to strong environmental policies, or their belief that we need to be spending far more on the military or some other reason ahead of any commitment to LGBT equality, and on that ground have decided to prefer the anti-LGBT candidate to the supportive one, I would disagree with the values expressed, but would have no complaint about their logic.

The damaging aspect of the Log Cabin argument, to repeat the most important point, is that they may mislead people who do not share their view that tax cuts for the wealthy are more important than LGBT rights into thinking that they are somehow helping the latter by supporting Mitt Romney and his Rick Santorum platform.

It is a good thing for Republicans to try to influence other Republicans to be supportive of LGBT rights. The problem is when they pretend to be successful when they haven't been, and urge people to join them in rewarding the Republicans when they have, in fact, continued their anti-LGBT stance. I have been hearing the Log Cabin Republicans proclaim for years that they were improving the view of that party towards our legal equality. In fact, over the past 20 years, things have gotten worse, not better.

. . . Some have complained that in comparing the Log Cabin Republicans to Uncle Tom, I was ignoring the fact that they are nice. I accept the fact that many of them are nice -- so was Uncle Tom -- but in both cases, they've been nice to the wrong people.

Teabagger - Obama secretly a gay slut who likes bathhouses

Sometimes you something so bizarre that it makes you speechless. The following counts as at least 20 of those times.

From the Huffington Post:

The right wing Tea Party author and conspiracy theorist who last month suggested that Obama might be secretly gay is at it again, this time citing both a Chicago-based ex-gossip columnist and an investigative journalist who are making similar claims about the president.

Jerome Corsi, who, despite his books sales is not a credible author, spoke with Kevin DuJan in a new article for WND. DuJan, who reportedly worked as a gossip columnist in Chicago during Obama's years as a community organizer and an Illinois senator, alleges that the president was actively involved in the city's gay bar and bathhouse scene.

"It was preposterous to the people I knew then to think Obama was going to keep his gay life secret,” DuJan, who describes himself as "conservative, Christian gay man" on his website, is quoted as saying.

Suggesting that the president's closeted life "would have to come out just like John Edwards’ secrets came out," DuJan says that Obama is "homosexual" as opposed to bisexual, and went on to note: "If you just hang out at these bars, the older guys who have been frequenting these gay bars for 25 years will tell you these stories. Obama used to go to the gay bars during the week, most often on Wednesday, and they said he was very much into older white guys."

You can read Corsi's full article here. 

Now before you start laughing, I am going to tell you something which may depress you:

For his lies, someone is paying Corsi more than a lot of us make in a year . . . combined.

It's like that old say - God sometimes demonstrates what he thinks of money by who He chooses to give a lot of it to.

'Romney wasn't aware that same-sex families existed' and other Wednesday midday news briefs

Mitt Romney's Reported Interactions With Massachusetts Same-Sex Couples Detailed - According to this article, Romney reportedly said to same-sex couples meeting with him, “I didn’t know you had families." Ugh!

Reminder: Terry Jones is also *INCREDIBLY* anti-gay - That Islamophobic SOB who got our Libyan ambassador murdered is also a homophobe. Forms of hatred usually travel in packs.

 The First “Approve Referendum 74″ TV Ad Airs Statewide in Washington - Sweet!Let's get marriage equality in Washington state!

  New National Strategy For Suicide Prevention Calls For More Data On LGBT Communities - YES! 

Uh oh! Controversy brewing with Ann Romney and Family Research Council?

Earlier reports said that his Mitt Romney's wife, Ann, would be speaking at the Family Research Council's annual Values Voters Summit, or as I like to call it - "God loves us better than the rest of you heathens and he has designated US to save America" summit. You can clearly see that she is listed in the guide below:

Since it was announced that she would be there, there was controversy about her appearing with an anti-gay hate group.

Now it seems that there has been a 360 180 degree turn. According to BuzzFeed:

Despite a program advertising her attendance at this weekend's Value Voters Summit, Ann Romney never planned to attend the social conservative conference, the campaign told BuzzFeed.

"Mrs. Romney is not scheduled to attend VVS this weekend. To my knowledge, it has not been on our schedule," said Sarah Haley, a campaign spokesperson.

As of Tuesday evening, the online schedule for the conference, which is hosted by the Family Research Council (FRC), still had Mrs. Romney attending the Friday morning plenary session, from 8:40 a.m. to noon.

 . . . Sending (VP candidate Pau) Ryan to court the summit is one thing, but Mrs. Romney could risk jeopardizing her role as the soft, humanizing face of the campaign if she's perceived as engaging in divisive culture war issues. It's something she apparently realizes: Last week she repeatedly declined to answer an interviewer's questions about same-sex marriage, saying she wouldn't engage in "hot-button" issues.

Also, according to BuzzFeed, FRC gave a statement about Mrs. Romney not attending:

FRC spokesperson Darin Miller told BuzzFeed that the "people listed on the online program were those both invited and confirmed. Only the ones with an asterisk next to their names were confirmed — and Mrs. Romney never had an asterisks."

I suppose that's a reasonable explanation if you looked at the full schedule of events. The only question I have is why in the heck did FRC put her name in the program in the first place?

Anti- gay pastor - 'It wears me out to see two men together. It does something to me'

I took these clips from my blogging buddy friend (and the Arn Anderson to my Tully Blanchard), Jeremy Hooper:






I know that I am supposed to get angry at the words of Southern Baptists of Texas Convention President Terry Turner, but I can't.

They are simply too funny. I can just picture gay men in the church, whether they be behind him in the choir stands or in the pews, secretly laughing to themselves because of unintentional Freudian slip of his words.

And check out the urgency in his voice when he talks about how wrong it is for gays and lesbians to be together. It would be another thing that should get me angry, but I can just picture two black women talking to each other on the phone:

"Please? That queen? Who is he trying to kid?"

or even better:

" I don't know who he is trying to condemn. Like we don't know his son is dating so-and-so."

Turner underscores the hypocrisy in some black churches about the gay community. We sing in choirs, we are deacons, usher board members, even pastors and no one is naive about who we are. But publicly, we are reviled.

So how do lgbts of color deal with it, you ask? How do we deal with the conflicted feelings of loving our religion and our church while having to deal with homophobic leaders?

Here is a big secret - People like Turner make it so easy for us sometimes with their stridency because they give us so much to laugh at.