The Gaytheist Agenda

Many people, political candidates in particular, are fond of the “states’ rights” argument when it comes to same-sex marriage. They choose the easy way out (for themselves) by claiming that this is the fairest option for all. But it isn’t the fairest option for the LGBT people who are denied rights in any state except MA, currently the only one that allows same-sex marriage. Nor is it the fairest option for any LGBT citizen who is married and moves out of MA, for those rights are not portable. Nor have Civil Unions/Domestic Partnerships proven anywhere near equal to marriage. So “states rights” is just another way of saying to LGBT citizens you don’t count.

 
Now another instance has arisen in which the utter inequality LGBT citizens experience under the law has been laid bare. And the “states’ rights” nonsense only becomes more insidious as we see how real-life couples are harmed by this notion.

(Miami, Florida) Janice Langbehn and Lisa Pond had planned to take their three children on a family cruise. The Olympia, Washington couple had been together 18 years and with their children were looking forward to the holiday.

But just as they were about to depart on the cruise from Miami, Florida. Pond, a healthy 39-year-old, suddenly collapsed. She was rushed to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami with Langbehn and the children following close behind.

But once Langbehn and the children arrived at the hospital the hospital refused to accept information from her about Ponds’s medical history.

Langbehn says she was informed that she was in an antigay city and state, and she could expect to receive no information or acknowledgment as family.

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Other than one five minute visit, which was orchestrated by a Catholic priest at Langbehn’s request to perform last rites, and despite the doctor’s acknowledgement that no medical reason existed to prevent visitation, neither she nor her children were allowed to see Pond until nearly eight hours after their arrival.

Soon after Pond’’s death, Langbehn tried to get her death certificate in order to get life insurance and Social Security benefits for their children. She was denied both by the State of Florida and the Dade County Medical Examiner.

With the help of Lambda Legal Langbehn has notified Jackson Memorial Hospital that she intends to file a lawsuit….

No opposite-sex couple in any state would have been put through that kind of hell. But since Pond and Lagbehn were lesbians the employees in that hospital felt it was fine to deny Lagbehn and their children crucial Human and Civil Rights. This is utterly unacceptable and will not stop until we as a nation put our foot down and make it stop.

We must stand up for what is right for everybody, for all families, in all states. Never again should a partner or child be unable to be with a loved one in their last moments or make decisions on their behalf because of the insensitivities or bigotries of others. Hatred and prejudice must give way, on a national scale, to Human and Civil Rights for all.

 

As you may have read here previously, Representative Stacey Campfield (R) proposed a bill whereby elementary and middle schools in TN would be banned from teaching or discussing any form of sexuality other than heterosexuality. I’m pleased to report that his attempt failed miserably.

“I’m trying to find out where this bill came from or is it part of your re-election legislation,” an annoyed Rep. Ulysses Jones asked sponsor Rep. Stacey Campfield, a Knoxville Republican.
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The lawmakers argued and were gaveled into silence at times when they raised their voices, and in the end, the House panel sent the bill to the State Board of Education, effectively killing the proposal.

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Lilith Jackson, 9, her hair highlighted in bright pink, sat on the front row at the meeting with her two moms, Audra Kelly and Ardyce Mercier.

They think teachers at her school, the Brown Academy public magnet school in Chattanooga, should be able to talk about families with two mommies or two daddies as being healthy family structures.

“They should be teaching about other kinds of relationships and families,” Kelly said. She agreed that teachers should not being talking about sexuality in terms of “who is sleeping with whom.”

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Groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the Tennessee Education Association said no Tennessee schools are promoting gay rights.

“There is not a problem here,” said Hedy Weinberg of the ACLU of Tennessee. “It is a clear attack on one community.”

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Campfield said he had heard complaints from two school districts but had not verified them. He went on to say that the Education Department could opt to include the topic as part of school curriculum.

“It is possible,” said Bruce Opie of the Department of Education. “But it’s highly unlikely and highly improbable.”

Campfield noted a 2006 resolution by the National Education Association saying that activities and programs must increase “acceptance” of gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people.

Tennessee Education Association lobbyist Jerry Winters insisted that TEA does not advocate for gays in schools.

Campfield lost one other battle: He asked for a roll call vote on any motion. Chairman Rep. Joe Towns denied the request. It appeared the subcommittee voted along party lines, with Democrats choosing to send the bill to the Board of Education.

My take? Campfield pulled the two “complaints” out of his backside as part of his anti-gay agenda. Kudos to Rep. Jones for his refusal to tolerate Campfield’s blatantly bigoted proposal. It’s high time such hateful legislation be recognized for what it is.

California could make history by becoming the first state in the USA to have an official holiday for a gay person.

Assemblymember Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) has announced he will introduce a bill that would formally recognize the efforts of civil rights pioneer, Harvey Milk.

The legislation, if passed, would establish a non-fiscal state holiday in his name on the anniversary of Milk’s birth, May 22.

In 1977, when he was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors Milk became the first openly gay elected official of any large city in the United States, and only the third openly gay elected official in the nation.

Milk and Mayor George Moscone were assassinated in San Francisco on November 27, 1978.

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Leno’s bill would proclaim May 22nd ‘Harvey Milk Day’ and add it to the list of state holidays, although it will be crafted in a way so as not to generate additional state costs or increase the number of paid state holidays.

‘Harvey Milk Day’ will provide a forum to raise public awareness of Milk’s work to extend basic human rights to all people and demonstrate that each one of us possesses the ability to create extraordinary change in our communities, our country and the world,” Leno said.

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“Harvey Milk knowingly put his safety at risk and ultimately gave his life because he believed that living as an openly gay man would help achieve true equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans,” said EQCA Executive Director Geoff Kors.

This is amazing. Harvey Milk is a true hero to GLBT Americans, and having a holiday in his name would be quite inspiring. I hope the bill passes so that Milk can be honored as he should be.

Several days ago I wrote about a proposed law in TN that would prohibit discussion in elementary and middle schools of any sexual orientation other than heterosexuality. Identical bills in the TN House and Senate would prohibit unmarried cohabitating couples from adopting children–be they straight or gay. And in Florida the ACLU had to intervene when a high school repeatedly restricted student’s 1st Amendment rights to speak up for GLBT equality by deeming such behavior “disruptive”.

Again Florida is in the news, this time for a “marriage protection” amendment backed by the RRRW group Florida4Marriage. This amendment barely got the required number of signatures by the deadline, and has met with significant opposition from a wide variety of individuals and groups within the state. Why? Because it is so broadly worded that it harms not only gay people but straight people who are not married to one another. Once again the RRRW hatemongers are so virulent in their need to harm gay people and “defend” their narrow definition of marriage that they do not care who else they harm in the process.

As a broad-based coalition of state, local and national organizations, Fairness for All Families will continue to educate voters and mobilize volunteers across the state. Many of our seniors rely on domestic partnership benefits that could be taken away by the so-called “marriage” amendment. Also at stake are other basic employment and health care benefits from local governments and businesses received by thousands of families including police, firefighters and other municipal employees. Why would we take away benefits that Florida families rely on? The law should not make it harder for families to take care of their loved ones. We should strengthen, not take away family protections. It is wrong to single people out and vote on the fundamental rights of others.

They have struggled to place this on the ballot because Floridians are learning just how intrusive and harmful this amendment is for our families. We are confident that fair-minded Florida voters will vote NO at the polls in November.”

When will legislatures learn that bigotry does not belong in our laws or our constitutions? These hateful, harmful bills and amendments need to be stopped before they even get started. The only benefit to over-reaching laws such as this one in Florida is that it may wake people up to their hideous unfairness sooner than later.

Allegedly the two RRRW groups have produced biased voters guides that clearly advocate for Mike Huckabee in violation of their tax-exempt status. I must say I’m astounded at the news.

The guides, posted on the groups’ Web sites, list the Republican candidates and their alleged stands on a range of issues, such as support for a human life amendment, “traditional marriage,” “business freedom” and “moral education” and opposition to “gay pride.” Only Huckabee is assigned a “yes” stance on all of the issues.

Said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United executive director, “These guides are not voter education, they’re partisan propaganda. Tax-exempt organizations are barred by federal law from partisan electioneering.”

AU’s Lynn said the organizations seem to have given the candidates no opportunity to respond to these issues and instead assigned stances based on the organizations’ own “research” and subjective analysis.

Footnotes supposedly documenting the candidates’ stances are often irrelevant or old. In several cases, the guides reference sources from 1994 and 1996.

The American Family Association, a Religious Right group based in Tupelo, Miss., is best known for its opposition to gay rights and risqué television programming. Its founder and chairman, the Rev. Donald Wildmon, has personally endorsed Huckabee for president.

WallBuilders, a Religious Right group based in Aledo, Texas, is known for spreading “Christian nation” revisionist historical materials. Its founder and president, David Barton, has appeared at pastors’ briefings that featured Huckabee as a speaker and were intended to promote his candidacy, according to news reports.

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“I am particularly outraged that these voter guides indicate that they are suitable for use in churches and other tax-exempt organizations,” Lynn continued. “In fact, they are not. Any church that distributes these biased guides is risking its tax exemption and casting aside its integrity.”

I’m beginning to think it might kill the RRRW if they had to obey the 9th Commandment for even one day. They seem to be unwilling or unable to do so. (Let’s not even get into all of the other violations they routinely commit). Then they claim they’re the party of “moral values”. Their audacity is overwhelming.

May AU get their request fulfilled, and the IRS stiffly penalize both AFA and Wallbuilders. It’s high time these organizations and others that abuse their tax exempt status to spread lies and harm others get what is coming to them.

Legislation designed to restrict the rights of LGBT individuals and couples is by no means unusual. But laws that go as far as to restrict straight individuals and couples, and even children, in the process of restricting LGBTs are becoming commonplace as the anti-gay lobby advances its agenda. Such is the case in Tennessee where two proposed laws would ban adoptions by any unmarried cohabitating couples, be they gay or straight. SB3910 and HB3713 are identical acts proposed in the TN Senate and House that would prohibit adoptions by “cohabitating adults in a sexual relationship” whether straight or gay.

It is the opinion of the general assembly that:

it is not in a child’s best interest to be adopted by a person who is cohabitating in a sexual relationship that is not a legally valid and binding marriage under the constitution and laws of this state.

Somehow single parents are acceptable to the general assembly though cohabitating parents are not. Methinks it has less to do with the children and more to do with hating gay people. I’m amazed they didn’t simply ban gay parents outright with the traditional “kids need a mommy and a daddy” argument. But perhaps they believe they’re creative with this method.

Maybe if straight couples rise up and fight, or if there’s a sudden dearth of adoptive couples the insanity of these bills will be made apparent. Sadly often takes such extremes for the oppression of the minorities to be overturned.

Florida is not known for its gay-friendly atmosphere. Mayor Jim Naugle of Ft. Lauderdale alone is well known for his blatantly homophobic opinions and propositions. So it’s no surprise it’s in the news again for oppressing the rights of LGBT individuals.

A Florida high school has been trampling the First Amendment rights of students who support equal rights for gay people, according to a federal lawsuit filed today by the American Civil Liberties Union. In its lawsuit, the ACLU described an atmosphere of fear and censorship at Ponce de Leon High School, where the school board’s attorney says even expressions like a rainbow sticker may mean students are members of an “illegal organization.”

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The ACLU sent a letter in November to the school board’s attorney on behalf of Gillman, asking for clarification as to whether a variety of symbols and slogans, such as the rainbow flag or “I support my gay friends,” would be allowed at the school. The school district replied that it would not allow any expressions of support for gay rights at all because such speech would “likely be disruptive.” The district then went even further, claiming that such symbols and slogans were signs that students were part of a “secret/illegal organization.”

The letter was sent after Gillman and other students approached the ACLU about an atmosphere in which students say they were routinely intimidated by school officials for things like writing “gay pride” on their arms and notebooks or wearing rainbow-themed clothing. According to students, problems began in September when a lesbian student tried to report to school officials that she was being harassed by other students because she is a lesbian. Instead of addressing the harassment, students say the school responded with intimidation and censorship.

“Because the Supreme Court has held that students have a right to free speech at school unless that speech disrupts the educational process, many administrators think they can just slap the label ‘disruptive’ on anything they don’t like and get away with stomping on students’ First Amendment rights. The law doesn’t work that way,” said Benjamin James Stevenson, a staff attorney for the ACLU of Florida. “School should be a marketplace of ideas, where students share new ideas and learn about themselves and others. Just talking about gay rights or any other topic outside of class isn’t inherently disruptive.”

In the complaint filed today, the ACLU asked the court for an injunction to stop Ponce de Leon High School officials from suppressing students’ First Amendment rights in the future.

“Writing something like ‘I support gay rights’ on your notebook doesn’t mean you’re part of some secret conspiracy or shadowy organization,” said Christine Sun, a staff attorney with the ACLU’s national Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project. “Schools shouldn’t be in the business of trying to frighten students into silence.”

It’s sad that it is so far gone that the ACLU must intervene on behalf of the students. Human rights are suppressed to the point that saying something like I’m not ashamed to be gay is considered disruptive and a sign that the student is part of an “illegal organization”. Have we returned to the McCarthy era? Is Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell now the official policy for high school students? When will the purges begin?

Excuse me, I realize am going a bit overboard. I’ve just read the second story in a row about these gag policies for students and I’m utterly frustrated. It seems that overall we are regressing rather than advancing with regard to rights for LGBTs in every way, shape and form across the nation and I don’t know where it will end.

The NEA (National Education Association) issued a resolution in 1994 indicating their support for equal treatment of LGBT students in school settings. To that end they recommend accurate information on the diversity of sexual orientations and gender identities as well as anti-bullying measures.

But Representative Stacey Campfield of Knoxville won’t hear of it. He filed a bill last week that would prevent elementary and middle schools in TN discussing any sexual orientation other than heterosexuality. Not only would heterosexual students not be told of the existence of LGBT students, but LGBT students (or students with LGBT family members) could not discuss matters of importance to them. Effectively LGBT people would not exist to elementary and middle school students.

“This is the kind of bill that you would have seen introduced back in the 1990s as a reaction to SpongeBob SquarePants or Heather Has Two Mommies,” says Tommie Simmons with the Shelby County Committee of the Tennessee Equality Project. The group advocates equal rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people.

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“I think the schools should stick to the basics: reading, writing, and arithmetic. And maybe some civics,” says Campfield. “But teaching transgenderism to middle school students … I don’t think that’s the road we should go down. I think that’s what parents should be doing.”

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“Why does [Campfield] feel the need to take control of what’s taught in a school system away from local boards of education and away from local communities?” asks Earl Wiman, president of the Tennessee Education Association. Campfield’s bill allows discussion of heterosexuality because he wants students to learn biology and the science of reproduction.

“If I were to say ‘Jack and Jill went up the hill’ or ‘George Washington and Martha Washington were husband and wife,’ there are groups out there that would say we were pushing a heterosexual agenda. To keep those lawsuits from coming, I thought we should still be able to talk about that side of it,” Campfield says.

Over the years, Campfield has proposed other controversial legislation, such as replacing the state’s food tax with a tax on pornography and requiring the state to issue death certificates for aborted fetuses. In 2005, Campfield compared the state’s Black Caucus to the Ku Klux Klan when they refused to let him join because he is white.

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Wiman worries the bill could lead to further alienation of gay students or students of gay parents.

“We have such a high adolescent suicide rate, and a large number of those killing themselves are struggling with sexual orientation,” Wiman says. “It’s a real concern for us that we be able to help boys and girls without some kind of arbitrary restrictions.”

This sounds like another deluded RW attempt to thwart the so-called “Homosexual Agenda” by preventing any mention of the existence of LGBT people to young children. It seems to be analogous to their “abstinence only” sex-education policy whereby they believe that if you merely tell teens don’t do it, then say nothing of birth control or anything else they’ll never consider having sex. The truth is that LGBT people are born every day, and ignoring their existence will not erase them from reality. Nor will it stop them from being L, G, B or T.

I hope that TN does the right thing and tosses this piece of proposed legislation in the wastebasket where it belongs. The teachers and students deserve better.

Yeah, he’s definitely got that “Hey little girl–you want a piece of candy?” look about him.

Kevin Alfred Strom, founder of the White Nationalist (as well as homophobic) group National Vanguard pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography in federal court recently.

Kevin Alfred Strom was originally scheduled for a trial this week on several child porn charges. Instead, the 51-year-old pleaded guilty to a single count and prosecutors dropped the remaining charges against him.

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Strom was once part of the leadership of the National Alliance, a West Virginia-based organization Potok said was a white supremacist group.

Strom edited some of the organization’s publications and produced and sometimes hosted its shortwave radio and Internet broadcast.

“Jews are so dominant and influential in debasing and deceiving white women and girls on such a massive scale that, to any decent white person, no forgiveness is possible,” Strom said at the beginning of one August 2003 radio show.

Jews debase and deceive women and girls? That’s the pot calling the kettle black, or perhaps good old-fashioned projection.

Elisha Strom, who is estranged but not divorced from her husband, said they moved to Greene County in 2000, when Kevin Strom was working for National Alliance.

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Things started to break down for the couple in 2006, after Elisha said she returned home one day and found her husband sitting naked in front of the computer looking at child pornography.

Afterward, in an apparent attempt to patch things up, the two signed a notarized contract in which Kevin Strom agreed to seek treatment for pedophilia. But the couple’s relationship continued to disintegrate.

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In August 2006, investigators seized Strom’s computer during a raid of his home. He was arrested in January 2007 after a federal grand jury indicted him on charges of witness intimidation and possession of child pornography.

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In April, Kevin Strom was indicted on an additional charge of attempting to sexually entice a minor. Authorities said he’d been fixated on a 10-year-old classmate of his stepdaughter’s.

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However, judge Norman K. Moon threw out the charges. Though he said there was “overwhelming evidence” that Strom was sexually attracted to the girl, Moon ruled that there wasn’t enough evidence to charge him with attempting to sexually coerce her.

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The trial for the remaining pornography charges was postponed until Monday. In a summary of what the case would have been had it gone to court, Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Gould wrote that Strom later acknowledged to authorities that he’d downloaded child pornography.

Strom will remain at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail until his sentencing. He could face up to a decade in prison at his April sentencing in U.S. District Court, though federal guidelines could call for a much lighter sentence.

It would be interesting to do a psychological study to determine if there is a correlation between openly espoused hatred of one or more groups and criminal sexual perversions. Given the number of such cases I’ve seen I imagine there would be.

In the meantime I’ll recommend Strom for Conservative Babylon. He’ll fit right in there.

When I was in the 5th grade I recall getting out of school one day and encountering a Gideons representative handing out lime-green New Testaments on the sidewalk. Flash forward more years than I care to count and Gideons International is still giving miniature Bibles to 5th graders. Of course they’re well within their 1st Amendment right to do so provided they’re doing so on public property. However that wasn’t the case in the South Iron School District of Missouri.

For more than three decades, the South Iron School District in Annapolis, 120 miles southwest of St. Louis in the heart of the Bible Belt, allowed representatives of Gideons International to give away Bibles in fifth-grade classrooms.
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The district altered its policy, saying the Gideons and others were still welcome to distribute Bibles or other literature before or after school or during lunch break, but not in classrooms.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Catherine Perry ruled both practices were illegal and granted a permanent injunction.

The purpose of both practices “is the promotion of Christianity by distributing Bibles to elementary school students,” Perry wrote. “The policy has the principle or primary effect of advancing religion by conveying a message of endorsement to elementary school children.”

Mathew Staver, president of Liberty Counsel, a Florida-based law group that represented the school district, said he would appeal.

“I think the current policy creates an open forum that allows secular as well as religious persons or groups to access the forum to distribute information,” Staver said. “The court has clearly misread the First Amendment and the cases regarding free speech.”

Technically the policy allows secular and other religious groups to access the forum to distribute information. We’ve seen before where that goes.

Some teachers in the Albemarle School District in Virginia are rebelling against their managers’ orders to hand out to students as young as kindergarten a promotion for a summer camp that advocates for “Atheists, Freethinkers, Humanists, Brights, or whatever…”

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It was the same school district that WND earlier reported was distributing publicity about a “Pagan Christmas ritual” being held in the community.

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The earlier advertisement was from a group called NatureSpirit from the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Church, a Unitarian Universalist congregation that also teaches “Exploring Islam,” “Women Weaving Wisdom,” “Discovering the Healing Power of Dreams” and other religious subjects.

Yes, they want religion promoted–but only their religion. If they get the tiniest whiff of any other religion (or freethinking) being promoted all hell breaks loose.

Kudos to District Judge Catherine Perry. Let Gideons International hand out their little Bibles in church or on the streets. Children shouldn’t be indoctrinated on the taxpayer dime.