Anti-gay lies about 'threats to religious freedom' exposed in front of Congress

This post is dedicated to the intelligent but misguided colleagues of mine who complain when anti-gay spokespeople are given a platform to spread their homophobic lies.

You cannot stop lies by covering the mouth of those who tell them. You only give them power through pity. As the following post, courtesy of Right Wing Watch proves, by all means, give anti-gay spokespeople a platform to spread their lies. But not a platform which offers no challenge. Let people like Tony Perkins, or in this case, Mat Staver, speak. But make sure they are challenged by someone who knows their stuff such as Rep. Jerry Nadler:

Testifying before a House committee today about supposed threats to religious freedom in the U.S., Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver struggled to defend his support for allowing businesses to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.

 New York Rep. Jerrold Nadler grilled Staver about his view that it would be wrong for a wedding photographer to discriminate against a Jewish couple because of a religious objection, but that the photographer is free to discriminate against a same-sex couple.

 First, Staver tried to avoid the question by saying a photographer wouldn’t refuse to work for a Jewish wedding, but ultimately agreed that such anti-Jewish discrimination is in fact a violation of the law.

 “I don’t see any difference at all” between refusing a Jewish couple and a gay couple, Nadler said.

He continued: “I’m holding out myself in commerce and my religious belief is that I don’t want black people or Jewish people or gay people in my restaurant and the federal government says that is discrimination, is that a violation of the freedom of religion?”

 “No,” Staver conceded.

Public condemnations are messy, but in the case of anti-gay groups and spokespeople, it is something which is very necessary. You see, even when their anti-gay propaganda is refuted on paper,  they tend to repeat it as if nothing happened. They tend to get away with this a lot.

Public condemnation and exposure is one of the only few actions which they have a difficult time ignoring. It not only exposes flimsiness of their arguments but also their lack of integrity. Don't think so? Ask Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family about the 2011 incident in which Sen. Al Franken called him out during his testimony for distorting a study.

I doubt he will want to talk about it.

'NOM supporter caught trying to deceive about upcoming march' & other Tuesday midday news briefs

NY state senator filling #March4Marriage buses without actually mentioning march itself - So a NOM supporter, State Sen. Ruben Diaz, Sr., is pulling a fraud to get participation in its upcoming march. Not surprising but I seriously have to give props to the blogs who have been on top of this. The work that lgbt blogs have put in to expose anti-gay distortions should never be forgotten in the annals of lgbt history. 

Brace Yourselves: Marriage Equality’s Going To Have A Rougher Ride In The Courts From Here On Out - Bring it on. The fight for equality isn't supposed to be easy.  

New Jersey Judge: Ex-Gay Therapists May Be Liable For Damages To Former Clients - While the Texas Republican Party put support of ex-gay therapy in its plank, New Jersey could tear its playhouse down.  

Dispelling Myths, Misconceptions and Lies About Gender-Nonconforming Children - A very appropriate article and an excellent push back to anti-gay propaganda on the issue.

FRC's Tony Perkins exploits Bergdahl controversy to make tacky attack on judges

I've heard of throwing tantrums, but what the Family Research Council president Tony Perkins recently said about Wisconsin judge Barbara Crabb (the justice ruling against Wisconsin's anti-marriage equality law) was just plain nasty:

Tony Perkins

While Americans are glued to the story of one high-profile deserter, the courts seem packed with them -- lawless judges eager to walk away from the Constitution and the oath they swore to uphold it. Unfortunately, the country is all too familiar with one of those activists, U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb, who's been tied to the National Day of Prayer, which she tried -- unsuccessfully -- to strike it down. Obviously, Crabb hasn't learned anything since her rogue days in 2010, when a higher court rebuked the ideologue for her obvious political agenda. Now, the Wisconsin judge is back to her old ways, ruling late Friday afternoon that natural marriage belongs in the same garbage pile as public prayer. Like her past outrages, this ruling makes a case for same-sex "marriage" absolutely devoid of religious or legal authority.

To make matters worse, we don't even know all of the facts behind the situation of the person Perkins compares Crabb to, i.e. Bowe Bergdahl.  To call Bergdahl a deserter without knowing all of the facts is vile and totally un-Christian. Clearly Perkins is exploiting a hot controversy in a pitiful attempt to smear Crabb.

Unfortunately, when it comes to Perkins and company, the case in Wisconsin is no different from the other cases in which anti-marriage equality laws have been struck down. It was easy for them to get people to vote for these laws by spreading vicious lies about lgbt or useless homilies such as "every child has a right to a mother and a father." However, none of these arguments can be used as a defense in the courts.

So when they lose in court cases, Perkins and company throw extreme tantrums, making sure to call the ruling judges everything BUT a "child of God" in a sad effort to obscure how empty their arguments against marriage equality were in the first place.

Even though it's enjoyable when fake Christians like Perkins show their true faces when things don't go their way, this act of feigned shock and outrage they put on when they lose marriage equality cases is beginning to become tiresome and redundant. And extremely offensive.

Take a look at the 'Christians' who support NOM and its upcoming march

With the National Organization for Marriage planning its big march (March4Marriage) and taking the guise of a group whose followers "supports marriage between a man and a woman," the flyer below, comprised by the site NOManiacs, shows otherwise.

'How NOM doomed itself to collapse' & other Friday midday news briefs

How the National Organization for Marriage Doomed Itself to Collapse - According to Slate writer Mark Joseph Stern, the National Organization for Marriage is imploding before us all for a simple reason which has nothing to do with homophobia. While I don't like to pronounce the end of any anti-lgbt equality group before they are in the grave, Stern makes an excellent point. However, I have to disagree with him on this point:

After its success in California, the group took its tactics on the road, successfully batting away marriage equality in Maine and North Carolina while exacting revenge on judges who dared to uphold legal equality. Through these campaigns, NOM rewrote the modern anti-gay playbook, demeaning the LGBTQ community as promiscuous, predatory, diseased, and disordered. 

That's simply not true. NOM merely followed the same playbook that Anita Bryant and others did when attempting to defeat pro-lgbt laws and such. It's an old playbook and I wish the community would get serious about analyzing it in a manner which can broken down in simple terms. Wait a minute. Some of us have.

In other news

  Seriously? What Marriage Equality Opponents Are Saying - Another reason why anti-marriage equality groups are losing is because you simply can't introduce these arguments in a court of law.

Tony Perkins Says Gay Rights Advocates Want Anti-Christian Holocaust, Will 'Start Rolling Out The Boxcars' - Have you ever heard of something so stupid that it refutes itself? Say hello to THIS argument.  

Edie Windsor Now Plans To Focus Her Efforts On Homeless LGBT Youth - The more I hear about Edie Windsor, the more I absolutely LOVE THAT WOMAN!

'Professional ex-gay industry' to hold 2nd 'awareness month'

Remember that lovely big flop of an event last year - 'Ex-Gay Awareness Month - which got canceled because of a lack of interest, and then rescheduled with the same disastrous results?

Guess what? It's back:

Say what you want, but with a line-up like this, I don't think they will have a lot of success, but lawd, the speeches will be  . . . . something

Hat tip to Jeremy Hooper.

Video demonstrates why anti-gay activist is called 'Porno Pete'

If anti-gay activist Peter LaBarbera hates it when we call him "Porno Pete" then why does he give us such juicy reasons such as what he said in the following video courtesy of Right Wing Watch: