This Date in History – The Stone Wall Riots

This date in 1969, the Stone Wall Riots occurred.

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Whoever?

Raw story reports that “Don’t ask, Don’t Tell” is not just used for gays in the millitary anymore, but also possibly for Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists?

New Hampshire Governor Signs Legislation Legalizing Same-Sex Marriage

Governor John Lynch (D-NH) has signed legislation legalizing gay marriage in the granite state today. The legislation comes after it was passed by both chambers of the state legislature last month.

It was initially uncertain rather Lynch would sign the legislation. However a compromise that would ensure religious institutions and faiths opposed to the concept of same sex marriage would not be forced to perform ceremonies officiating the marriages.

New Hampshire is now the sixth state in the nation to legalize same sex marriage. Rhode Island is now officially the only New England state not to yet legalize gay marriage.

Traditionally conservative New Hampshire today became the sixth state in the nation — and the fifth state in New England — where same-sex couples will be allowed to marry.

“Today we’re standing up for the liberties of same-sex couples by making clear they will receive the same rights, responsibilities, and respect under New Hampshire law,” Governor John Lynch said before signing the legislation in a State House ceremony at about 5:20 p.m.

Lynch said it was a New Hampshire tradition “to come down on the side of individual liberties and protections, and that tradition continues today.” The room, filled by scores of the bill’s supporters, resounded with applause as he signed.

Joe Solmonese, President of the Human Rights Campaign, praised the move by Lynch and the state of New Hampshire.

“With Gov. Lynch signing legislation passed by the state Senate and House, New Hampshire has become the latest state to recognize that loving, committed couples, and their families, should receive equal dignity and respect under the law,” said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese. “No religious institution will have to recognize any marriage under this law, as the language proposed by Gov. Lynch and agreed to by the legislature made abundantly clear.”

Despite the religious protections inserted in the legislation, the move didn’t happen without protest from some voices. Some people still persist in getting their kicks from bashing gays and invoking God in thier defense.

After the House vote, Barbara Haines, 54, of Manchester, whispered, “Repent, repent,” to people passing by her in the State House halls. Haines said God meant marriage to be reserved for a man and woman. “The basis of marriage is in God, and he created the male and female to be married and have a family — and these people are deceived,” she said.

Foxx says Crime Bill Named after Murder Victim is "a hoax"

U.S Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC,5) is facing criticism for remarks she made yesterday regarding legislation passed yesterday that would broaden the definition of hate crimes to include crimes where the victim is targeted because of their sexual orientation.

What is known as the Matthew Sheppard Act, named after a gay college student who in 1998 was picked up by two men who robbed him, before taking him out to a prairie, tying him to a fence and beating him to death; passed the U.S House. In the past it has been proposed by was defeated by conservative Republicans, Christian conservative activists, and clergy who believe that their opposition and denunciation of homosexuality could be interpreted as a hate crime and thereby infringe upon their first amendment rights.

Republicans reacted negatively to the passage of the bill. House Minority leader Rep. John Boenher (R-OH) said in an interview with the Washington Times that the legislation made him “want to throw-up”, though a spokesperson for Boehner later said he was expressing disgust with the broader Democratic legislative priorities. But it is the remarks of Foxx that are receiving the most attention and are the most shocking.

Glenn Thrush:

North Carolina Republican Rep. Virginia Foxx is questioning whether the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old gay University of Wyoming student, was a bias attack motivated by his sexual orientation.

Shepard’s mother Judy was in the gallery at the time, according to a senior Democratic aide.

The socially conservative Foxx, arguing against a new Democratic hate crimes bill that includes new protections for gays and lesbians, described the description of Shepard’s murder as a anti-homosexual attack a “hoax” — and questioned whether prior bias crime legislation should have been named after him.

“I also would like to point out that there was a bill — the hate crimes bill that’s called the Matthew Shepard bill is named after a very unfortunate incident that happened where a young man was killed, but we know that that young man was killed in the commitment of a robbery. It wasn’t because he was gay.”

She added: “This — the bill was named for him, hate crimes bill was named for him, but it’s really a hoax that that continues to be used as an excuse for passing these bills.

Disgusting and completely false! A statement by Foxx’s office later claimed that her statement as “a poor choice of words”. But it doesn’t seem by calling the heinous death of someone a”Hoax” to the face of that victim’s mother is beyond heartless. Its not a better choice of words she needs. But a scintilla of humanity and a conscience.

Its sentiment and cruelty like this that has diminished the Republican party to the husk of the organization that it is today. Not just gays, but their families, young voters, and nearly everyone with any type of heart is offended by and rightfully so. If talk like this and others. This rhetoric is a disgusting maneuver either motivated by at best sick political desires to tap the hate of a small minority or worse yet the blind hate of someone who forgets she is a Representative in esteemed elected office. If this keeps up, the Republican Party will be in the wilderness in perpetuity, which if they keep espousing such rhetoric will be the status they deserve.

Gay Marriage and the Seperation of Church and State

Rod Dreher reacts predictably to the vote by the state legislature in Vermont to legalize same sex marriage.

It is increasingly obvious that the US Supreme Court is going to have to rule on this matter soon. It is an untenable situation for a same-sex couple to be married in Vermont and Massachusetts and Iowa, but not in Texas, Nevada and Montana. I believe SCOTUS will constitutionalize gay marriage, and that being the case, it might be better for my side if it gets done sooner rather than later. If done sooner, there might still be enough backlash left in the American people to get a constitutional amendment passed erecting a high barrier or protection around religious institutions. Thoughts?

Thoughts? Well here Dreher means one of two things. The first could mean that the entire fate of civilization and Christianity itself rests soley on prohibiting two people of the same gender from getting married. The other is Dreher is unconsciously advocating for the separation of church and state without really knowing it.

A barrier of protection around religious institutions? Sounds like the separation of Church and state to me. The concept of the separation of church and state is often forgotten by religious conservatives in that it not only protects the government from the forces of religion but also religion from the excesses and management of religious institutions. Both need to be protected from one another at times. I myself compare it to the relationship between my best friend and my girlfriend. I honor both and want them to be harmonious in their relationship and even craft a friendship of sorts. But I don’t want the two to sleep together. That same co-existence and tolerance, yet distance between the affairs of government and those of state is just as necessary.

Marriage though can be a challenging one, since Marriage for many has both a religious and legal component. When a marriage certificate is sought and given that is the legal function of marriage thus the government. When at a wedding a religious figure such as a priest presides over a ceremony codifying that union in God’s eyes that is the religious function. Gays don’t seem so much as asking for the religious community to perform such marriages (although i would imagine they would like to be accepted or at least tolerated). Rather they seek the legal benefits and protections that come with that marriage certificate.

Rod Dreher: Afraid Gays Could Force Christians into the Closet

The Iowa state decision to legalize Same Sex Marriage by the Iowa State Supreme Courtcourt was of course reached with mixed reaction. Gay Rights groups predictably applauded the move, while those opposed like the always inflammatory Congressman Steve King (R-IA) raised the possibility that the state could become “a gay marriage mecca”.

But one of the most histrionic reactions was by blogger Rod Dreher who tried to paint Christians as the victims in this matter, by saying that if gays are accepted it could force Christians to be silenced. So he is basically afraid that Gays having full civil rights and legal protections would result in Christians being treated the way that many of those same Christians treated gays. Forcing them to be silenced and scorned by society.

One blogger reacts by telling Dreher to stop his whining, and that acceptance and tolerance of gays is not the toughest challenge Christians have had to pay.

Rod Dreher, commenting on the Iowa State Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage, notes that the anti-gay marriage position is being likened to racism and complains that as this mindset takes hold “it will be very hard to be a public Christian”.

For heaven’s sake. Harder than it was for Christ himself, whose crucifixion we will be commemorating shortly? Harder than for the early Christians who were tossed to lions, not just served with a harrassment summons from the HR Department?

Or harder than it is for Christians in China today? C’mon, you give witness and take your lumps.

Well. Worrying whether the United States will tolerate Christians – I am giving Mr. Dreher HUGE points for creativity.

Now as a straight man, I am sorry but I just don’t see how allowing two people of the same gender who have a genuine love for each other to legally codify that love in the covenant of marriage is a threat. Furthermore I don’t see why anyone with a life should care. I mean this affects your relationship and marriage how? Are you worried that at the first sight of a gay couple, your lover and you might suddenly be overcome by the urge to be gay like it is a contagious disease? That a couple might break up at the sight of a same sex couple? All I can say is that if a same sex couple is a threat to your marriage or relationship, you are probably gay yourself or your relationship was in critical condition already.

Besides, what is with these people who seem to think that being a Christian is all about denouncing gays, Muslims, and opposing abortion? What about helping the poor and tending to the sick? Those are no doubt referenced in the Bible more times then Jesus denouncing gays.

CA Court Rules; Christian Schools can Expel students Who are Percieved as Gay

Watch out girls who hold hands or guys who share the occasional manly hug, if you “seem” gay and go to a Christian Private school you could be expelled. Don’t people like this have anything better to do then fan the flames of sexual witch hunts? Who cares who loves who as long as they don’t hurt anybody. And is there really a way short of an admission by a person themselves or catching them in an overtly sexual act that proves someone is gay? Note to everyone Religion is about more than just sex and asking ourselves “Who would Jesus sleep with?”

If some Christians who are constantly bloviating about sex, invested just half the energy speaking out against racism, invading other countries, tending to the ill, mending broken spirits, and helping the impoverished; the world would be a better place. I know not all Christians subscribe to this narrow minded drivel, but there are many loud voices who do.

A California appeals court ruled Monday that a Christian high school can expel students perceived to be lesbians, upholding a 2008 lower court ruling that there were “no triable” elements to the case.

The 4th District Court of Appeal in Riverside on Monday upheld California Lutheran High School’s right as a private, religious organization to exclude students based on sexual orientation. The ruling was released late Tuesday.

The two 16-year-old girls sued the school for expelling them on the basis of a “bond of intimacy” “characteristic of a lesbian relationship,” under a California discrimination law.

H/T: Raw Story

U.S and Middle Eastern Countries Against Decriminalizing HomoSexuality

A sad reminder of just how far the U.S has fallen and how much of its image as a stalwart leader of truth and justice for all people’s has fallen.

The Bush/Cheney administration, the Christian right, and the Middle East theocratic governments they now condemn and brand as evil for denying many of their citizens equal rights stand together in this instance. The U.S now is the only western country standing against a United Nations declaration that calls for the decriminalization of homosexuality.

Now in the United States homosexuality is not illegal. But there are still parts of the nation where an employer can terminate the employment or refuse to hire a homosexual, where hate crimes against people of that sexual persuasion are committed, couples are denied the benefits that would be afforded to heterosexuals, and are barred from so much as speaking freely about their sexuality if they are in the U.S Military.

But even worse in many non western countries, especially some in the Middle East where it is acceptable to execute homosexuals. Yet the United States which positions itself as the island of tolerance, justice , and freedom between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans is now in affect tolerating that, by standing with such countries in opposition to this resolution. So much for compassionate conservatism.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Alone among major Western nations, the United States has refused to sign a declaration presented Thursday at the United Nations calling for worldwide decriminalization of homosexuality.

In all, 66 of the U.N.’s 192 member countries signed the nonbinding declaration — which backers called a historic step to push the General Assembly to deal more forthrightly with any-gay discrimination. More than 70 U.N. members outlaw homosexuality, and in several of them homosexual acts can be punished by execution.

Co-sponsored by France and the Netherlands, the declaration was signed by all 27 European Union members, as well as Japan, Australia, Mexico and three dozen other countries. There was broad opposition from Muslim nations, and the United States refused to sign, indicating that some parts of the declaration raised legal questions that needed further review.

Now the U.S in the United Nations says they are opposed to this because it could make the Federal government impede on some functions normally reserved for the states. Funny, Marriage is usually a legal function reserved for states and municipalities, yet Bush/Cheney and their social conservative allies seem not to hesitate to do just that when the issue comes to banning marriage between gays.

Obama Draws Fire For Inviting Rick Warren to Do Invocation

There is little need for me to inform you over the blitzkrieg of criticism President-Elect Obama has encured from many gay rights activists, liberals, bloggers, and Democrats over his choice of Pastor and best selling author Rick Warren as his choice to deliver the traditional invocation at his approaching inauguration in January.

Critics of that decision are infuriated pointing to his fervent opposition to abortion, his efforts backing Proposition 8 in California which barred Gay Marriage, and his agreement that would should assassinate foreign leaders like Iranian President Mahmoud Amadenijad.

Sarah Posner has a piece in the Nation stating that Rick Warren is basically James Dobson or Pat Robertson with facial hair, Hawaiian shirts, and what Warren himself says is a difference in tone, with those titular heads of the Christian Right.

There was no doubt that Obama, like every president before him, would pick a Christian minister to perform this sacred duty. But Obama had thousands of clergy to choose from, and the choice of Warren is not only a slap in the face to progressive ministers toiling on the front lines of advocacy and service but a bow to the continuing influence of the religious right in American politics. Warren vocally opposes gay marriage, does not believe in evolution, has compared abortion to the Holocaust and backed the assassination of leaders like Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Warren has done a masterful job at marketing himself as a “new” kind of evangelical with a “broader agenda” than just fighting abortion rights and gay marriage. He dispatches members of his congregation to Africa to perform AIDS relief and has positioned himself as a great crusader for bringing his “purpose-driven” pabulum to the world.

Faith in Public Life, a nonprofit cultivated by the Center for American Progress, was so wowed by Warren that it co-sponsored a presidential forum in August at Warren’s Saddleback Church. There, his “broader agenda” included asking Obama whether he believed that life began at conception (which Warren believes, he says, based on the Bible, not science) and to ruminate on the nature of evil. (As for Pastor Rick, he believes the Bible dictates that the US government “punish evildoers,” as in Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.)

Beneath the sheep’s clothing lurks a culture warrior wolf. After the Saddleback forum, he told the Wall Street Journal that the only difference between him and James Dobson was that of “tone.” After insisting that his agenda was “broad,” and holding himself out as an impartial arbiter of the forum, he declared that voting for a “Holocaust denier” (i.e., someone who is pro-choice) is a “deal-breaker” for many evangelicals. Obama was pressured to talk about “abortion reduction,” but Warren likens such rhetoric likening it to Schindler’s List: an attempt to save some lives but not end a “holocaust.”

In the world of the “broader agenda” evangelicals, when liberals advocate for gay marriage, they’re stoking the culture wars; when a “broader agenda” evangelical crusades against it, he’s merely upholding biblical standards. In that tradition, Warren in October implored his followers to vote for Proposition 8 because “there are about 2 percent of Americans are homosexual, gay, lesbian people. We should not let 2 percent of the population…change a definition of marriage that has been supported by every single culture and every single religion for 5,000 years.” Warren called opposition to gay marriage a “humanitarian issue” because “God created marriage for the purpose of family, love and procreation.”

President-elect Obama in response insists that he has always been a stalwart advocate for Gay Rights and that he is merely trying to be inclusive.

To some degree Warren defenders are right. He has taken actions to reduce HIV/AIDS and combat poverty. And unlike many in the Pat Robertson mold he has given at least lip service to fighting global climate change, being bi-partisan, and expressed at least token opposition to the use of torture or as it is called by its critics “harsh interrogation techniques”.

Myself, I am conflicted about this. On one hand some of Warren’s views I don’t just disagree with but think of as backwards such as Gay Marriage, comparing abortion to the holocaust. Even his opposition to torture while he should get credit for breaking with the Bush loyal Christian right, he has failed to do much to speak out about it, while investing much of his energy in opposing the twin evils of many cultural temporants, two gays who love each other getting married and a woman making reproductive health decisions.

But the number of Ministers in America who support Choice and/or gay rights is sparse in number. My feeling I guess is somewhat of a compromise on the issue. Warren should at least be invited to the inauguration maybe even allowed to speak as other ministers will. But another figure less vocal and less politicized should take the reigns and give the invocation. I don’t know like I said I am still a bit conflicted on this one.

Young Conservative Quits Republican Group After Racist Obama Remarks.

Between the offensive remark by a commentator from the conservative Media Research Center about Liberal talk show host and MSNBC commentator Rachael Meadow, as that ” Lesbian Air American host” and the slew of hate that has been spouted by conservatives about Obama and the African American Community, it is stomach turning to hear these activists.

Tragically it even seems to be trickling down to some conservative far right college activists, including the leader of the Pennsylvania Federation of College Republicans. The millennial generation largely is abhorred and doesn’t subscribe to this kind of narrow and primitive thinking. But it does seem to rear its hideous head occasionally even with college age youth. Its shameful and embarrassing.

Yahoo News:

ALLENTOWN, Pa. – The leader of a statewide group of college Republicans has been forced to resign after posting racially insensitive comments about Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama on the Internet.

Adam LaDuca, 21, the former executive director of the Pennsylvania Federation of College Republicans, wrote on his Facebook page in late July that Obama has “a pair of lips so large he could float half of Cuba to the shores of Miami (and probably would.)”

Fortuanatly, the organization had the decency to force this idiot to resign, but he has dabbled in what one could call “racial insensitivity” at best and stocking the flames of racism at worst before. Look what he called Dr.Martin Luther King Jr.

LaDuca, who previously had called Martin Luther King Jr. a “pariah” and a “fraud,” also wrote: “And man, if sayin’ someone has large lips is a racial slur, then we’re ALL in trouble.”

He also held one of those conservative anti-affirmative action bake sales that make white people think they are the ones now victims of racism.

LaDuca is a senior at Kutztown University. Two years ago, Kutztown’s College Republicans chapter was heavily criticized for holding a “bake sale” to protest affirmative action in which whites were charged more for cookies than blacks. LaDuca, then the group’s spokesman, made a public apology on the group’s behalf.

Are these the future leaders of conservatism? It sounds a lot less like Edmund Burke and alot more like Rush Limbaugh. They may want to take a page from their hero Ronald Reagan (or at least this clip of him in this 1951 obscure number about the Ku-Klux Klan, (although according to the Youtube description the movie contained neither victims of color nor did it take place in the south.)