Tag Archives: LGBT

Other crimes against humanity we shouldn’t be talking about

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As noted in the first comment on the Uganda post below, we were admonished by a frequently irritated visitor to this blog for talking about the crimes against humanity unfolding in Uganda. Apparently – and I don’t know how else to interpret these words – because we are “highly educated” and fortunate to live in the rural end of the most affluent county in “the most free country in the world,” our concern about what’s going on in Uganda at the alleged direction of a US-based hate group leader is “over the top.”

I take the position that if you’re a human rights advocate, you should be concerned about crimes against humanity anywhere, not just where you live. And you should be especially concerned when the crimes are the outcome of collusion with a U.S. hate group leader, who is running the operation from within your own country precisely because it is free.

The situation in Uganda began with propaganda that defamed and dehumanized LGBTI people with claims that we sexually assault children. All human rights catastrophes started somewhere, and studying them is how we learn to do better. Do I think that what’s happening in Uganda could happen here, just because Scott Lively is the leader of a hate group, and Eugene Delgaudio is also the leader of a hate group? No – but pretending so is a lazy, simpleminded way to attack Eugene’s critics, isn’t it?

Anti-gay hate groups don’t have much of a future here. It’s more likely that when Nervous Eugene‘s cash cow runs its course in the U.S. he’ll move on to something or somewhere else. And if that new enterprise involves human rights abuses of LGBTI people in some other country we’ll have a responsibility to help them, too.

So this happened in 1935, as human rights advocates were warning of the deteriorating climate for certain disfavored groups in Germany: Continue reading →

This is why they’re called “hate groups”

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Crossposted at Equality Loudoun

[The lawsuit] boils down to nothing more than an attempt to define my Biblical views against homosexuality as a crime..

..Clearly, this lawsuit is intended not only to silence me as an effective voice of opposition to the ‘gay’ agenda, it is also to intimidate everyone else who would dare to follow my example.

Now, who does that sound like? A certain disgraced and censured Sterling supervisor who fills his bank account by running a hate group at Loudoun taxpayers’ expense? And some of his shameless apologists?

Yes, but it’s actually another hate group director, Scott Lively. Mr. Lively is currently facing a federal lawsuit for his role in creating a deadly climate for the LGBTI community in Uganda. Readers may remember him also as the man who hired a known child rapist to run his fake “ministry” out of a coffeehouse designed to attract teenagers. But that was okay, because the predator had “accepted the salvation of Christ” (and of course, the children he preferred were female).

Mr. Lively has tried to have the lawsuit against him dismissed on First Amendment grounds. But it turns out that there are limits even to free expression when that expression is an integral part of criminal activity, and the criminal activity of which Mr. Lively is accused is aiding and abetting in the commission of a crime against humanity.

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What a surprise, religious liberty is alive and well

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Have you all noticed that there is very little complaining on the anti-gay fringe about the ongoing avalanche of changes to public policy in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling on DOMA? The Department of Defense now extends full military benefits to same sex spouses, the Department of State is issuing immigrant visas to same sex spouses, and a multitude of other federal benefits of marriage will now be enjoyed by LGBT families previously denied them. But the anti-gay fringe is largely silent about these events that are actually happening, preferring to talk instead about a hypothetical event that is not only not happening, but is impossible due to our First Amendment protections. What they are talking about – and talking about incessantly in that hysterical, strident tone they favor – is the impending loss of religious liberty for churches “forced to perform homosexual weddings.” Really. It’s bound to happen any day now.

Fear not, fearful mongers of fear: Churches can (still!) refuse to marry any couple, for any reason. The First Baptist Church of Crystal Springs in Mississippi, for instance, just told an African American couple that they would have to be married in a different church, because, according to the pastor, “This was, had not, had never been done here before so it was setting a new (precedent) and there were those who reacted to that.”

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Why does Ken Cuccinelli want to leave Virginia children vulnerable to sexual abuse?

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In 2003, as surely everyone knows, Virginia’s archaic and nearly universally ignored “Crimes Against Nature” law was rendered unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Lawrence v Texas. Because it is unconstitutional, because it is a blanket prohibition of oral and anal sex for everyone, it can’t be used to prosecute anyone. Case in point: When the law was used in 2005 to prosecute a 47-year-old man for soliciting a 17-year-old girl to perform oral sex, the conviction was overturned.

That outcome was perfectly predictable – and avoidable. In 2004, there was a bipartisan effort in the Virginia legislature to fix the law by eliminating the part that makes it unconstitutional:

§ 18.2-361. Crimes against nature.

A. Any person who (i) carnally knows in any manner any brute animal is guilty of a Class 6 felony, or (ii) carnally knows any male or female person by the anus or by or with the mouth, or voluntarily submits to such carnal knowledge, is guilty of a Class 6 felony 3 misdemeanor, except as provided in subsection B. B. The provisions of clause (ii) of this subsection shall not apply where all persons are consenting adults who are not in a public place and who are not aiding, abetting, procuring, engaging in or performing any act in furtherance of prostitution.

and leaving in place a statute that would be viable in the prosecution of adult predators: Continue reading →

A sci-fi version of “tolerance”

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Crossposted at Equality Loudoun.

With the recent Supreme Court ruling, the gay marriage issue becomes moot. The Full Faith and Credit clause of the Constitution will, sooner or later, give legal force in every state to any marriage contract recognized by any other state.

Now it will be interesting to see whether the victorious proponents of gay marriage will show tolerance toward those who disagreed with them when the issue was still in dispute.

The above is science fiction writer and anti-gay fanatic Orson Scott Card (humorously, he once referred to marriage between two people of the same gender as itself “an act of intolerance,” openly advocated the criminalization of “homosexual behavior,” and more recently threatened to “act to destroy [the] government and bring it down” if marriage equality became a reality). Card is upset because some people who might otherwise be his fans have publicized his long history of inflammatory statements targeting LGBT people, and suggested that our money could be better be spent elsewhere. Among normal people, making such informed choices is known as “the free market.” For Card, though, “tolerance” demands our silence regarding his behavior.

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Dave LaRock’s social media problem

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In an article published Wednesday, Times-Mirror reporter Trevor Baratko explores the “wild, wild west” of campaigning in a still emerging online social media environment. Baratko approached my husband and me for this article because we had both been removed multiple times after “liking” Dave LaRock’s campaign page on Facebook. It’s common practice on Facebook to “like” a page for the purpose of monitoring the page’s activity and engaging in dialogue, and as I note in comments at the Times-Mirror, we have at no time been enabled to participate in discussion on that page although LaRock is campaigning to be our representative in the House of Delegates.

It’s an open question how exactly candidates for public office should navigate the new environment in which they find themselves. Many public figures and businesses have discovered that blocking critical comments from their Facebook pages only makes them appear imperious and as if they have something to hide. For an example of a different way to handle criticism (or in this case, open hostility and threats) see how the group Queer at Patrick Henry College dealt with PHC Chancellor Mike Farris’ comments on their Facebook page.

Facebook management isn’t the only area in which Dave LaRock has exhibited an inability to tolerate disagreement or criticism, however. A need for control coupled with entitlement, the sense that he has a special right to operate above the law, seems to be the character trait that most animates him. His 2012 arrest (final disposition still pending) for trespassing and destruction of property has become somewhat well known, prompting a falsehood-riddled “damage control” post (authored under an unaccountable pseudonym on a Republican blog) that LaRock is now distributing as his official statement on the matter. Continue reading →

Meet the woman who just told everyone she thinks of herself as a vagina.

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Her name is “Natassia,” at least that’s the name she uses at the Patch. I won’t bore you with the rest of her moronic comment describing “openly homosexual boys” here, but this is how she ended it:

“(And yes, a sexual attraction to the male anus is a disorder.)”

I trust that we can all see the problem.

Usually I try to cultivate compassion for the terminally stupid, but not today. Dehumanization kills people, and there’s been more than enough killing. I hope Natassia is mercilessly ridiculed. I hope the ridicule makes her cry. The only thing that will make a person who would say something this clueless finally pull her head out of her nether regions is for someone who cares about her to firmly grasp her shoulders, look directly into her eyes, and say “Stop. You are embarrassing yourself and everyone else.”

If there is someone out there who knows and cares for this confused woman: Please. For the love of God. Help her.

Gay Men’s Chorus Benefit Concert at UUCS May 10

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Crossposted at Equality Loudoun

The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Sterling has always been a great friend to Equality Loudoun and the LGBT community. We are pleased be co-sponsoring this event with them, along with the Unitarian Universalist Church of Loudoun, St. James United Church of Christ, and Loudoun Out Loud.

The concert will benefit the outreach work of People of Faith for Equality in Northern Virginia, a subset of the People of Faith for Equality in Virginia (POFEV). POFEV is an interfaith collaboration that seeks equal rights for all citizens through prayer, education, organization, and advocacy while challenging those who equate religious faith and intolerance.

It’s unfortunate that there are people who do equate those things (!), but it’s clear to most that it’s all over but the shouting. So let the bitter folk shout and whine while the rest of us sing. Hope to see you there!

Today

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Today, realistic Republicans are secretly praying that the Supreme Court will respond to the arguments presented in the Prop 8 and DOMA cases before it with a broad ruling finding a constitutional right for all Americans to marry the person they love.

That is the only way of avoiding a foreseeable future in which Republicans will be forced to either repeatedly alienate the rapidly growing supermajority of Americans who support equality, or repeatedly betray their own aging base, that angry 36% demanding the “right” to forcibly shove society into still the coat which fitted him when a boy.

If the Court announces a sweeping ruling in June that makes marriage for all the law of the land, GOP strategists can breathe a sigh of relief – they will then be able to deflect the rage of their base toward those nine rogue “unelected judges.”

The alternative future will be a punishing series of state battles over the next four, eight, twelve years and beyond, in which they will not have the luxury of avoiding the issue, however much they might wish they could do so.

In either case, marriage equality is inevitable.

If you want your party to live, pray hard.

Worst argument ever

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Marriage should be limited to unions of a man and a woman because they alone can “produce unplanned and unintended offspring,” opponents of gay marriage have told the Supreme Court.

By contrast, when same-sex couples decide to have children, “substantial advance planning is required,” said Paul D. Clement, a lawyer for House Republicans.

In their opening briefs, this was the reasoning offered by both Clement in defense of Section 3 of the “Defense of Marriage” Act and Charles Cooper in defense of Prop 8: Because opposite sex couples are burdened with the “unique social difficulty” of frequently producing children by accident, and same sex couples “don’t present a threat of irresponsible procreation,” same sex couples and their children should be excluded from the security and benefits of marriage. This is what anti-equality American taxpayers are getting for $3 million in public funds?

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