Monday, September 09, 2013

'American Family Association BUSTED in lie about Home Depot' and other Monday midday news briefs

American Family Association Ends Home Depot Boycott With Nothing To Show For It - Oh look. Claims by the American Family Association that its boycott against Home Depot ended in success is refuted by none other than Home Depot. Don't you guys know that lying is a sin. BUSTED! 

The top 12 strangest arguments against equal marriage from Scotland’s first day of Committee stage - And I thought the religious right in America were screwy!  

Sochi Olympic Chief to IOC: Make the Criticisms Stop. IOC to Athletes: Stop Criticizing When in Sochi - It's your own problem, Russia. When you pass a draconian anti-gay law, you really don't expect people to be silent about it, do you?  

Video: How to sell an organization based 100% around gay (youth) discrimination - Ah yes, the organization which supposedly be the alternative of the Boy Scouts. Proceed watching this video at your own risk.

  Coming Out Of The Closet: 12 People Who Should Always Know You're Gay - This is a damn good article.

Stolen document underscores the need to expose anti-gay propaganda

Nothing I have ever written or read about in regards to religious right propaganda could prepare me for what you are about to see. I apologize beforehand but this needs to be seen:

According to the Washington Blade, a British journalist was able to nab a document from the Ugandan Parliament. What that document showed blows away any and everything I have ever seen on anti-gay propaganda:

The document he stole is titled: “Protect our young people from homosexuality: Debate and pass the anti-homosexuality bill now!”

Smith took the document from the Press Office at Parliament when the secretary wasn’t looking. It contains morbid images, such as one that may be posed or altered to depict a human figure lying on a bed with his or her intestines literally extruding onto a bed from his or her rectum.

The photo purports to be of a young man named Turyamureeba Wycliffe, who supposedly died from complications of “fisting” and tuberculosis (supposedly also brought on as a result of his homosexuality).

Mercifully and perhaps manipulatively, the document also includes a photo of Wycliffe in far happier and healthier days sitting in a decidedly effeminate posture. The juxtaposed imagery more subtly drives home the same point the brief hammers out in writing as, “Attention Ugandan MPs and parents: If you don’t do something about your gay (or gay-acting) kid, he’ll end up in a grave with his guts hanging out, just like this one did in Katungu Village."



This is why it is so important that the lgbt community shine the spotlight on anti-gay propaganda. What's funny to us is deadly to lgbts in other countries.

Saturday, September 07, 2013

San Antonio vote reveals the hard truth about anti-gay propaganda

The passage of the pro-lgbt non-discrimination ordinance in San Antonio on Thursday brings to my mind yet again the urgency of the lgbt community needing to call out the propaganda spread about  us via deliberate liars such as Todd Starnes and Fox News and funneled by ignorant folks blinded by their interpretations of Biblical truth.

Before San Antonio voted for the ordinance, members of the lgbt community had to sit through demeaning testimony which cast gays as "abominations" or went into grotesque detail in regards to how we supposedly engage in intercourse. I personally felt nauseated when I read the tweets of testimony. I felt as if I was strapped down into some time machine and transported back to when Anita Bryant was trumpeting the false idea that gays recruit children.

It was such a long time ago since that happened but here we are decades later hearing the same lies. The problem is we don't take this junk seriously until after the fact. We laugh at the outrageous comments uttered by Bryan Fischer and the rest but in doing so, we underestimate these comments. We forget that they do in fact move a significant part of the population either due to their religious beliefs or when Fischer and company can infuse fear of a gay takeover into their minds.

We are under the false belief that addressing this propaganda gives it power, but we have the entire idea backwards. NOT confronting this propaganda is the thing which gives it power.

 Until the lgbt community and our leaders declare war against the lies and liars and makes a serious effort in confronting this propaganda head on, America will have serious problems seeing the real lgbt community:





Instead, the lgbt community will have to contend with this:


And this:



Make no mistake about it. Those who spread anti-gay propaganda are only part to blame when that propaganda successfully hinders gay equality. The other part of the blame has to go to the powers-that-be in the lgbt community with the power to educate  about this propaganda beforehand but will do nothing but gripe and groan after it does its work.

To hell with being reactive. We need to be proactive.

Related post: How They See Us: Unmasking the Religious Right War on Gay America - a short, but definitive guide in calling out and refuting homophobic propaganda.

Friday, September 06, 2013

Know Your LGBT History - The Lion In Winter


Richard confronts Philip in "The Lion in Winter" by 123lucyfur

One of my favorite plays and movies. The Lion In Winter, (1966 play) has been performed several times, the most famous being the 1968 motion picture in which Katherine Hepburn won an Oscar for Best Actress. It's a somewhat complicated play based upon English history mixed with a little fiction.

Henry II of England has let his wife, Eleanor of Acquitane, out of prison to spend Christmas with him. She had been imprisoned for constantly plotting to overthrow him. Also present are Henry's three sons, Richard, Geoffrey, and John. And let's not forget Alais, Henry's mistress and Richard's one-time fiance. She is also the half-sister of the last guest, King Philip of France. The entire play is an intense gamemanship as Henry attempts to keep his throne while verbally jousting with Eleanor. Eleanor, for her part, is plotting with Richard to overthrow Henry. Geoffrey and John are plotting to overthrow Henry also, but need the help of Philip. Meanwhile, Henry is torn between leaving his throne to John, who he thinks loves him the most out of all of his sons, and gaining a new heir with Alais.

You got all of that? The Lion in Winter is a serious wild ride in which alliances are formed and broken within seconds. Where characters express their love for each other in the middle of verbally slashing each other to ribbons. For the purpose of this blog, there is just one more interesting point.

 It would seem that Richard had an affair with Philip when Philip was younger. That is the subject of the above clip featuring Andrew Howard as Richard and Jonathan Rhys Meyers as Philip in the 2003 movie . Be forewarned, however and remember what I said. In spite of the tender moment at which the clip ends, there is a vicious betrayal on the part of Philip.   Philip exposes Richard as his lover in front of his father and reveals that the only reason why he started the affair was to be able to rub it in Henry's face in the future. Nasty!

 In reality, Henry did have several sons, including Richard and John, who continued to plot against him with the help of their mother. Their rebellions earned them the name of the "Devil's Brood."  As for the supposed affair between Richard (who was later named as Richard The Lionhearted) and Philip, historical details are rather sketchy.

Past Know Your LGBT History Posts:

'NOM's false concern for children is sad' and other Friday midday news briefs

NOM: ‘Generations Of Children Will Be Sacrificed To The Gods Of The Gay Lobby’ - What's up with the extreme hyperbole? NOM is constantly claiming that children do better with a mother and a father, but let me ask you something. Other than attempting to keep gays from getting married, what has NOM done for the issue of foster care and adoption? NOM seems to be more interested in keeping children away from good gay homes than making sure children are placed in homes period.

AFA does what AFA always does: Ends boycott, fakes 'success' - What if you announced a victory in a boycott WITHOUT showing how you were victorious?  

National Organization For Marriage Is Branching Out - Apparently attacking our transgender brothers and sisters is getting into vogue.  

Fox’s Todd Starnes Will Lie Until The Very End About San Antonio’s Proposed Non-Discrimination Law - Based upon his constant and deliberate attempt to push false and piss-poor stories depicting the gay community as the aggressors and "Christians" like himself as the innocent victims, I refuse to believe that there is not more to the hiring of Todd Starnes at Fox News than meets the eye. He serves a definite purpose for someone and that purpose doesn't entail accuracy.  

Fox's Todd Starnes: "Christians Are Trading Places With Homosexuals" In The Military - See my comment on the above news brief.

Hate Group Spokesman Peter Sprigg Shows Why NALT Christians Project Is Necessary - And where has Peter Sprigg from the Family Research Council been these days?

Video footage of the victory in San Antonio



Via the Associated Press comes the moment when the San Antonio passed the non-discrimination measure. Enjoy this moment of victory with the folks in San Antonio.

Thursday, September 05, 2013

Family Research Council tries to spin San Antonio loss

In case you haven't heard, after a contentious debate which included supposed education about anal sex, San Antonio passed a pro-lgbt non-discrimination ordinance. And the vote - eight to three - wasn't even close.

Of course, leave it to the Family Research Council to put a lying spin on things. In case you don't recognize the "fear predictions," they were the same thing said by folks like FRC when DADT and DOMA were struck down:


Hat tip to Jeremy Hooper