Your gay and lesbian neighbors have been staring into this sewer for decades now and the only thing that keeps surprising me personally, is how big the lies have to get before anyone in the mainstream news media notices the stench. But it isn’t the big outrages like Foley you should be paying attention to. It’s the quick little moments of flinching guile, when even though honesty won’t hurt them, they still can’t own up to anything. Let me show you one I came across this morning, while reading the news.
Pure. Think about that word for a moment. Think about the images it conjures. Pure. Edinburgh University’s course on Christian marriage is called, "Pure". It teaches students Orthodox Christian teaching on relationships and sex. It teaches chastity before marriage and so on. Oh, and incidentally, that homosexuality can be cured. Well…maybe not just incidentally …
Students nationwide have expressed their outrage after a Christian course aiming to ‘cure’ homosexuality piloted at Edinburgh University.
Students at the university began protesting the PURE course after it was discovered to recommend homophobic literature, such as What Some of You Were by Christopher Keane, which details the stories of "ex-gays" who have been “cured” of their homosexuality by the power of Christianity, and how "gay relationships are characterized more by promiscuity than by fidelity."
In response to the course, students at Edinburgh set up a Facebook group called "Stop Pure", which has enlisted 1,400 members within a fortnight. Students from around the country have joined from universities such as Oxford, Cambridge, St Andrews and Kings College London.
Group creator Lucy Chambers said: "We want to use the group to help make students aware of the issues raised by the presence of this course on our campuses and to encourage them to make a stand. Facebook is a great means to contact lots of students up and down the country in the space of a few minutes.
"We have already set in motion a process whereby our students’ association is investigating the course and it is our hope that we will be able to use the group, or perhaps set up a new one, to affect change nationwide."
Which, in their own way, is something the creators of "Pure" also have in mind…
The controversy surrounding the course called Pure, began after pilot courses were held at Edinburgh University. The pilot was deemed a success and the Edinburgh University Student newspaper printed details of the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship plans to roll out the courses across Britain.
But just because the Colleges Christian Fellowship is teaching kids that homosexuals don’t love, they just have sex, and that they can pray their dirty godless habit away, that doesn’t mean they’re homophobic mind you…
The [University’s Student Representative Council] has already been backed by the university’s chaplain, who said the course can no longer be held at the chapel for fear of upsetting people. But Matthew Tindale, a [Christian Union] staff worker, has denied it is discriminatory against homosexuals.
He said: "This is looking at the orthodox view on marriage, which says there should be no sex before marriage.
"If a heterosexual man came along who sleeps around, I am sure he would find it uncomfortable too.
Homosexuals don’t love, they just have sex…
"This is not about discriminating against homosexuals.
"Christian teaching shows that all sin is treated the same way, whether you are homosexual or heterosexual."
Now, look at that for a minute, look at the flinching guile in that statement. He could have said, "Yes but the bible calls upon us to discriminate." But he didn’t do that. Instead he threw out a cheap sophistry. Now think again about what "pure" means. Does the word "truth" also come to mind? As in, Honest? Genuine. Real. Pure. Here we have a course that is ostensibly about marriage, which is in fact more about spreading ex-gay propaganda then it is about marriage, and it’s called "Pure". The only thing that’s pure about it is its animus toward gay people. But the defenders of "pure" cannot even be honest about that much.
If a totalitarian state, like the old Soviet Union, decreed a law forbidding Christian religious worship, could it plausibly argue that the law did not discriminate against Christians, because everyone had to obey it, even the atheists? Yet here is a man from the Christian Union claiming that their course does not discriminate against homosexuals, because even heterosexuals are forbidden from having homosexual relationships. A fact which has heterosexuals all over the world crying in their beer I’m sure. Or…you know…not.
A course on purity in relationships taught by louts like these is a bit like a course on economics as taught by Ken Lay and the board of Enron, or Dick Cheney and Haliburton. All the lofty concepts of mutual honor and respect and trust and faithfulness between lovers, are merely waved around here like a street gang’s colors, and serve no higher purpose then to ennoble bigotry and make bigots respectable. And what the students attending this course pay in tuition, is everything fine and noble and decent within themselves, that they could have become. The reason this course and the people teaching it should be thrown off campus isn’t so much that it’s anti-gay, but that it degrades the very thing it purports to elevate and preserve, and thereby every trusting kid who sits through it, gay or straight.
No stream rises higher then its source… "Pure" makes the sacred a slave to the profane. But it had to. Look at the sort of people who created it. Now look at every other thing this sort has ever done in the name of Values and Morality. If you’re still wondering how the figureheads of the religious right, James Dobson and his like, could instinctively jump to the GOP’s defense in the matter of Mark Foley, you must still think that they really believe the things they say about morals and values and righteousness. No. They only wear those things, so you won’t see them for the gutter crawling scum that they are.
Another FRC Protest…At GW University This Saturday
Looks like this is going to be a protesting weekend… This comes from another MySpace friend. Please pass it around if you know anyone in the area. I’ll be there.
Protest Against Conversion Therapy In Palm Springs
This is a friend’s MySpace bulletin. Daniel writes for Ex-Gay Watch which you should be reading regularly if you aren’t already. If you live in the Southern California area please consider adding your support to this protest on Saturday September 23rd in Palm Springs from 7-9am.
For those of you who don’t live in So Cal please pass this along to your friends in the area who may be interested.
Focus on the Family is having a one day workshop in a suburb of Palm Springs to promote their lies about "curing" gay people. The event is Saturday Sept 23rd and there’s a group of people from my website www.ExGayWatch.com who will be there protesting outside the host church from 7-9am which is when people arrive at the conference for check-in. Very few people who actually want to be "cured" attend, most tend to be parents who want to push their gay child into a conversion program. Signs I’m making up include:
exgay therapy is child abuse (most people attending the conference are parents of gay kids)
You are the parent of a gay christian
love needs no cure
caution junk science ahead
Don’t psychologically torture your child
Exodus deceives by omission
Focus: Stop antigay politics
don’t oppress us because you can’t reconcile your faith and sexuality
science and reality win out (the name of the exgay conferene is "love won out")
I reconciled my faith and sexuality
If you’re interested in joining us please email me at daniel@exgaywatch.com
Allegations arise after failed gay rights referendum attempt
The Hamilton County Prosecutor’s Office is investigating alleged election fraud in the failed attempt of a group called Equal Rights Not Special Rights to force a ballot referendum on whether over gay people should be protected by Cincinnati’s anti-discrimination law.
Equal Rights Not Special Rights officially withdrew its petitions Thursday, saying it discovered one paid signature gatherer had fraudulently signed 18 names in the more than 7,600 signatures that were validated by the Hamilton County Board of Elections last June.
Thousands of those validated signatures were to be challenged Thursday by a pro-ordinance group called Citizens To Restore Fairness, which said the referendum sponsor was systematic in its use of fraud and tampering of petitions to push the issue onto ballots this fall. A protest hearing at the Board of Elections, scheduled for Thursday, was canceled when Prosecutor Joe Deters started his investigation.
According to 365Gay.com, Fidel Castro and Cincinnati Reds owner Bob Castellini were among the signees. Maybe Castro gave Phil Burress a box of his best Cohibas while he was there…
Phil Burress, chairman of the group behind the referendum, said he referred to Deters the name of the signature gatherer who he thinks committed fraud. Burress said his staff alerted him to the 18 questionable signatures, and he didn’t look at any beyond that because it was clear they wouldn’t have enough signatures to force a referendum.
"No one else from staff has said anything about (other) signatures that are corrupt," Burress said.
"Why would I be required to check that out, when it’s the homosexual activists making the claims (of massive fraud)."
They pulled the petitions because they went a little too far this time, and Phil has somehow sensed this. The election process in Ohio has been corrupt for so long now under republican rule that the kook pews figured they could get away with anything now and threw caution to the wind. Citizens To Restore Fairness had only just started looking at the signatures and they found Fidel’s name in there and that was too much, even by Ohio standards. And true to form, Phil is looking for a scapegoat. Oh yes…it was that guy we paid to collect signatures. You sure it isn’t the gays Phil? Isn’t it always the gays?
No Phil, it’s you. Someone who feels utterly no compunction about lying through their teeth to incite the mob cannot possibly have any moral brakes when it comes to a little thing like election fraud. Your kind will lie, cheat and steal any election you come anywhere near and not feel the slightest twinge of guilt or remorse about it either, because you’re on a mission from God and God doesn’t mind it when people lie and cheat and steal for Him. God is that big mafia boss in the sky…right Phil? He likes it when you bring Him bling.
This is the republican party in a nutshell. I wander the liberal and progressive blogs and constantly I see amazement over how completely amoral the republicans have become. There’s Bush wiretapping Americans right and left at will as though he can do as he damn well pleases a fuck the rule of law. There’s the bogus rationals for the war in Iraq, in-your-face lies like Saddam was involved in 9-11 that have been debunked over and over again and yet the Bush administration keeps repeating them. There’s the whining petulant sense of entitlement and bitter resentment towards everyone who isn’t One Of Us. I’ve been seeing it for decades in the anti-gay kook pews: That Fuck The Constitution, Fuck Democracy, Fuck The Rule Of Law we’ll do to you as we damn well please attitude…that ritualistic waving around of one damn stupidly transparent lie after another, long after the lie has stopped convincing anyone, because as long as the lie can still incite the mob it’s still useful…that whining, petulant sense of entitlement by virtue of heterosexuality, and bitter resentment toward gay people who stubbornly refuse to hate themselves like they hate us. I’ve had to face that open sewer of arrogance and hate and resentment ever since I left puberty behind. And then I watched as the republican party became that.
This Tom Tomorrow cartoon has been my favorite, ever since he put it up right after 9-11 (click on the link to see the whole thing). In it, Uncle Sam exhorts Americans to hold firm in their basic American values in the face of the threat from Osama bin Laden and his Taliban backers.
Of course, the creator of This Modern World sees those basic American values a tad differently then the president and the congress we unfortunately happened to have on 9-11. Uncle Sam brings forward a political dissenter who says he still thinks Bush is a dufus ("That’s the spirit son!"), a feminist who says women make their own choices in this democracy ("Yow! Take that Osama!"), some gays, and an atheist to step up to the podium and flaunt themselves in the enemy’s face for America. Finally Sam says "The only way to beat these terrorists is to stand up for tolerance and diversity and everything else they hate about our free society! Are you with me Americans?" It was irony of course, but I think with tongue only partially in cheek; and I found myself thinking wistfully "If only I lived in that America…"
Well…we all know how things have gone since. Some days it seems like the religious wackos here at home are a grim mirror of the ones throwing bombs abroad, their views on social justice, women, gays, human sexuality and liberal secular democracy are so much alike. So it was with pleasure that while I was scanning the news today and I came across this…
Israel’s military campaign against Hizbullah in Lebanon was a "failure" and demonstrated to Palestinian groups the Jewish state is weak and can ultimately be defeated, a senior terror leader told WorldNetDaily in an interview.
The leader, Abu Oudai, chief rocket coordinator for the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in the West Bank, said Hizbullah’s "tremendous victory" has emboldened his group and other Palestinian terror organizations to immediately coordinate violence against Israel and to focus their "resistance" on rocket attacks.
"I think the most important achievement this war in Lebanon demonstrated is that Israel – with all its power, its air force, its tanks, its navy and its unlimited budget – can be defeated," said Abu Oudai.
"If we do (what Hizbullah accomplished), this Israeli army full of gay soldiers and full of corruption and with old-fashioned war methods can be defeated also in Palestine."
Star of gay adult films to entertain Israeli troops
A star of gay pornographic films is traveling to Israel to entertain the troops and shoot two films, PageOneQ has learned.
Michael Lucas (picture, right), head of Lucas Entertainment, is planning to give troops free admission to a live sex show in Tel Aviv. It will be his third appearance there.
"I toured Israel before with Rob Ramos in 2004 (Haifa and Tel-Aviv) and with Wilfried Knight in 2005 (Tel-Aviv)," he wrotes in the announcement on his blog. "I haven’t decided yet who will be my partner for the live sex show I’m doing there (Israel has no problem with that type of entertainment)."
Taaaake thAT you miserable bunch of gutter crawling flea bitten human hating religious wackos…
Via my friend Bob Cutler, who lives far too close to the Rotting Crypt Keeper…
I’m going to get smacked for not posting this sooner…but if you’re in the mood to give Fred a piece of your mind, it’s happening tomorrow, right at his doorstep:
This is about the protest against Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church.
(The www.godhatesfags.com church who are anti-Gay and are picketing the funerals of soldiers who die in Iraq.)
This will be on SUNDAY JUNE 18TH (Fathers Day)
The protest will start at 7:00AM, and run until whenever, with the Band "BiteBoy"
playing on the street at 10:00AM.
The location is:
Westboro Baptist Church
3701 SW 12th St
Topeka, KS 66604
US
It’s time again to bring this to PHELP’s Doorstep.
(Just west of Oakley on 12th street, a one-way street going west)
Bring your signs protesting Phelps hatred and desecration of ANYONES funerals. (No sign? No problem! Just bring yourself)
Remember that Phelps was protesting the funerals of Gays, and those who had died of AIDS 15 years before he started in on the soldiers.
So, Gay, Straight, Soldier, Soldier supporter, and those concerned about the Tide of Hatred Are welcomed and encouraged to show up.
I went to the protests yesterday, in front of Focus On My The Family’s so-called Love Won Out conference at Immanuel’s Church in Silver Spring Maryland, missing the D.C. Pride parade and block party, and what was even worse, Baltimore’s "Hon" Fest in Hampden. But I had to go, and it was the more rewarding experience. I met so many kind and decent people on the picket line, all ages, gay and straight, all deeply troubled by the lies being told about homosexuals and homosexuality inside the sanctuary of a church.
The first thing I noticed when I got there was how remote Immanuel’s Church actually is from the city. If Focus is bringing its circus to Washington D.C., why put it inside a church, and not all that big of one, all the way out here in the outer suburbs? I discussed it with some of the other protesters and came to think that they did it so that they wouldn’t be mobbed by an angry gay community. The thought also struck me that it was why they held the event right on D.C. Pride day…to have it happening while the city’s gay community would be busy with something else. It wasn’t until I got home that another reason occurred to me: a number of Focus supporters might not have wanted to go into the city for such an event. For all its appeals to black ministers lately, the anti-gay religious right is largely a phenomena of the well to do suburbs…the vanguards of the white flight of the 60s and 70s. They may draw support from the rural voters, they are perfectly willing to appeal to the prejudices of some in the African American community, but the anti-gay agenda is being driven largely by the rich white burbs. Dobson had to know his base probably wouldn’t want to drive into a largely black, never mind largely democratic city for his conference.
Our picket line was not huge, but according to Steve Boese of A Tenable Belief, neither was the crowd inside the conference. Steve actually went into the conference (a thing Wayne Besen is apparently no longer allowed to do) and sat through most of the presentations and his estimate of the crowd size was about 300 or so people, in a church that could hold about four-hundred or so. Lance Carroll, who protested Love Won Out when it was in St. Louis, said they’d gotten over a thousand people at their conference in that city. But the people who stood in front of Immanuel’s Church yesterday, and held their signs for the attendees to see, had strength in more then simple numbers: the strength that comes from truely loving your neighbor, and caring about what happens to them.
Lance Carroll, the 18 year old who was taken to Love In Action against his will when he was 17, was there, as was Wayne Besen. During the afternoon picket Lance spied what he thought were a group of LIA staff members and walked across the street to talk to them. Having been forced to walk the walk of shame last year on the LIA campus in Memphis, it had to have been an exhilarating feeling for him to be able to freely choose whether or not to talk to LIA staff. As it turned out only one of them was from LIA, the others were Exodus. The LIA guy was new, and hadn’t been at LIA when Lance was in the program. He told Lance that he and John Smid were the only two people from LIA there at the conference. They all chatted with Lance for a bit, and Lance asked the LIA guy to tell John he said ‘hi’. Of course Smid never had spine enough to come out and talk to him. But later the other guy from LIA come back out, by himself, and walked over to the picket line. He told Lance he wanted to hear from him directly why he was so upset over how he was treated at LIA. Lance gave him an earful. It had to have felt good to be able to get that off of his chest to someone on LIA staff.
I met many good and decent people…did a little chauffeur work for Lance and Wayne and Steve, back and forth to the Metro station, and watched so many interesting moments as the people inside the Love Won Out conference encountered people outside their doors, who were bearing witness to actual human love and compassion. I’ll be chewing on what I saw for weeks I’m sure. In the meantime, here are a few photos…
God Loves You
I just have to mention this about the image above…these folks there at the head of the picket line had just broken into a chorus of Amazing Grace when I walked over and snapped this one. Listening to their quiet, insistent voices singing that song just there, just then, nearly brought me to tears.
Vigil Against Love Won Out Tomorrow In Silver Spring Maryland
I should have posted this earlier in the week after I got back from Memphis…but anyway…
Montgomery County Maryland is my growing up place. I’ve been waiting for these rats to stick there noses there. I’ll be at the vigil in the morning, or if not the morning one, the afternoon one. If you expect to be there please email me.
This has been one ex-gay protesting week for me…
Join Us at a "Love Won Out" Vigil
June 10, 2006
Focus on the Family is coming to Montgomery County Saturday June 10. They are presenting their "Love WonOut" conference at Immanuel’s Church in Silver Spring. We know from other similar events around the country that these conferences propagate the view that LGBT people must choose between their Christian faith and their own God given sexuality; that homosexuality is a mental disorder and that this"disorder" can and must be cured.
In other communities, citizens of all walks of life have joined together to bear witness that these statements are not true. We hope to do the same. A vigil is being held in front of Immanuel’s Church the day ofthe conference. We desire to let people know that being faithful to God and being a healthy, LGBT person are not inconsistent; and to counter the conversion therapy notions set forth by Focus on the Family, which are dangerous to the well being of those to whom it is directed. We further want to provide a friendly face of support for any individuals attending the conference due to coercion.
The morning vigil is between 7:30 – 9:30 AM in a lot across from the church. The press conference will take place at 9:00 AM. The afternoon vigil is 4:00 – 6:00 PM. Our vigil will be silent and peaceful. Respectful placards are welcome.
Immanuel’s Church is located at 16819 New Hampshire Ave. Silver Spring, MD. It is just north of Spencerville Road, 6.8 miles north of Colesville Road.
For further information about the Love Won Out conference: www.lovewonout.com
For further information about the vigil, email Rev. Sandy Dodson, Christ Congregational Church, UCC: sandy@christ-ucc.org
The Sunday before the protests, the protesters organized a wee poster making party at Peabody Park in the Forbidden Zone (the forbidden Zone being being those regions of Memphis that Love In Action inmates are not allowed to enter while in the program). It was an affair that might have stuck you as a tad carefree, given the brutal nature of Love In Action’s Refuge program. But these folks, nearly all of them teens themselves (Morgan told me to go to Peabody Park and look for a bunch of crazy teens), had a message of genuine love and courage to be oneself, to speak to the people trapped inside LIA, and there were times when the atmosphere got a little giddy with it. But I could not emphasize this enough: the message they were determined to bring to the doorstep of LIA was not one of anger and fear and hurt, but of courage and love.
I can think of no quicker, surer solvent of the hatred and fear inside of John Smid’s hollow church, then the spirit these determined teens brought to the protests. They are an amazing group.
I never thought I’d find myself applauding an essay on abstinence. Most essays you read on the subject start from a strongly negative view of sex itself. But then that’s because most essays you read on the subject come from religious right sources, and the religious right considers joy anathema. You should be ashamed, ashamed of your body, of your feelings, of your deepest inner self. Otherwise, why would you want to let them take control of your body, your feelings, your deepest inner self? Most essays on abstinence start from the premise that there is something evil about sex, and especially if you’re gay, something evil about you. When people speak of abstinence and gay people, what they’re really talking about is lifetime celibacy, lifetime shame.
This generation views 16 to 17 hours of television each week and sees on average 14,000 sexual scenes and references each year. That’s more than 38 references every day.
INTERNET
This generation spends three hours a day online and is the first to grow up with point-and-click pornography. Almost 90 percent of teens have viewed pornography online at one of the 300,000 adult websites, most while doing homework.
MUSIC
More than 25 percent of teen-targeted radio segments contain sexual content; 42 percent of the top selling CDs contain sexual content.
Well no duh. Human beings are sexual creatures (its how we reproduce), and at a certain time in our lives (scientists call it ‘puberty’), sex starts becoming a pressing interest for us. So much, so goddamned obvious. Ask me if I’m happy about the commercialization of sex. Ask me if I think sex is being treated in this culture with the respect it deserves. But it’s not like any of the above are things you wouldn’t expect from human beings. The presence of sex in popular culture is as unsurprising a thing as the presence of weapons and violence. Note however, that you don’t hear a peep from Battle Cry about how frequently teens encounter violent images in popular culture. That’s probably because Battle Cry is itself dealing in violent imagery. It’s okay to imagine yourself as a warrior slaying thousands of your neighbors in blood strewn battle for all that is righteous and holy, but imagining yourself as a lover, laying down with someone and taking them into your arms and driving each other into fits of joyful sexual ecstasy is evil, and you need to have your mind washed out with soap. Jesus didn’t say love thy neighbor, he said to make war on them.
But if Battle Cry is a teen website, the teens writing for it are doing so with adults looking over their shoulders, and feeding them the words. Contrast it with a recent essay I found on Mogenic, a site for gay teens, about abstinence. It’s by a gay teen, and it’s titled, A Virgin, and Proud of it…
…gays have traditionally felt the need to identify themselves as separate from the mainstream. We have created our own subculture, and every subculture needs its own doctrines to follow. We tend to throw out religious teachings—especially Christian teachings—without fully considering their worth. We create our own beliefs, and often we choose beliefs that directly oppose those espoused who have adopted a dislike for homosexuality—like Christians, say. In doing so, we drop many things that perhaps Christianity got right. An example of this is abstinence.
The other problem in gay society is that we don’t have a point to define as the moment when abstinence should end. Abstinence traditionally means waiting until marriage to have sex. As long as gay marriage remains illegal, we don’t have that magical marker in the sky that shows us when, if we decide to abstain from sex, we can stop abstaining. Those of us who choose to remain abstinent, therefore, must forge our own definitions, such as “Once I’m in a meaningful, loving relationship, then I’ll have sex.” But there’s no sure indicator as to when that occurs, and it is easy for us to begin to have sex without infringing upon our morals.
I, personally, am a proud virgin. And by virgin, I mean Virgin, with a capital “V”. Unless you consider masturbation a means to end virginity, I am about as close to 100% virgin as they come. I intend to remain this way until I find myself in the aforementioned “meaningful, loving relationship.” It’s not that I do not find myself attracted to the idea of no-strings-attached sex. In fact, I fairly often fantasize about it. But I cannot imagine myself actually going through with such an act. There are several reasons why I believe abstinence to be the best way to go…
Okay, he gets many things completely wrong in this essay, like when he says "the sexual abandon of gays is legendary". Yeah it’s legendary…as in urban myth legendary. There’s a lot of claptrap talked about gay men and sex, most of it pushed by religious right propaganda machines using studies they’ve either distorted or produced themselves to arrive at the conclusions they were after, namely that gay people are dirty twisted sexual perverts who have sex compulsively and never experience anything like love. This kid buys into a lot of that myth, but so so a lot of us, even many of those of us who should be old enough to know better. Never mind.
And…personally…I strongly doubt that abstinence before marriage is a good idea. I think after you’ve made a vow is the wrong time to find out you’re not sexually compatible. Again…never mind.
What was so heartwarming, so thrilling, about reading that gay teen’s essay, was the self confidant conviction running throughout, that he was entitled as a human being to experience sex in a context of pride, dignity, and self worth.
That’s it. That’s the golden heart of it. Right there. You give that to kids, and it won’t matter what the popular culture says at them. They’ll take from it what they need, what validates their lives, and ignore what does not. Look at the example of the Netherlands, where sex education is frank and comprehensive, and prostitution is legal, and yet they have among the lowest of teen STD and pregnancy rates. Pride matters. And for so many years, my own teen years included, pride was such a scarce commodity for gay teens. I have seen the cost firsthand, of the absence of pride. I have experienced it. And that is why, to this day, I still fight for it.
I never thought I’d find myself applauding an essay on abstinence. And there I was, seeing to my delight, the difference, the profound life affirming difference, between an abstinence discussion based on shame, and one based on self worth. So many kids, so many gay kids especially, never get to have that discussion, because the adults talking to them aren’t really concerned about whether or not they have sex. They’re concerned that they might wake up one day, and realize that to be a human being, is not a dirty thing.
Kids start believing that, and it won’t matter what the religious right says to them, never mind pop culture. And that is exactly why the religious right does not want them to have pride, dignity, and a sense of self worth. They must be ashamed of themselves. Ashamed of what they are: sexual beings. Ashamed, ultimately, to be human.
I’ll be protesting in front of Love In Action here in Memphis tomorrow. Already I’ve heard from some of its supporters, posting on the QAC comment boards, how homosexuals have given themselves up to their base sexual urges, over a holy god. No. We have embraced life. And we are angry at those who would take away from teens, their pride, their dignity, and their self worth, in the name of the creator that gave them life.
Those of us who were following the events in Memphis last year closely knew there were other teens imprisoned in Love In Action besides Zach…
"When we drove around to the front…we saw these men and trailing behind them–four young guys, all with their heads hung, staring at the ground as they walked. They are not allowed to make eyecontact with ANYONE for the first few days.so they are forced to fucking…i’m crying now…but…they have to look at the ground as they walk, for three days it’s a walk of shame, their heads hanging for being themselves, for having the courage to stand up and say "this is who i am"…and now all these people are saying ‘no you aren’t and we will change it. and you will be punished for thinking such things.’ I will NEVER get that picture out of my head. those four guys…"
Thus began the summer of shame for at least four gay youths. One of them will be back in Memphis a year later, 18 now and free to speak for himself, to bear witness to what John Smid is doing to innocent children, in the name of love. His name is Lance Carroll…
…and this is what happened to him last year:
In January of 2005, I came out to my parents as being gay. After an initial positive and supporting reaction they began to change their minds. They had me see three separate counselors, the last of which was a Christian counselor in St. Louis who worked for a fundamentalist, evangelical church. He told me that I wasn’t really gay, in fact no one was “really” gay. He tried to convince me that the whole idea of homosexual orientation is a lie, and that I felt the way I did because of some sort of early emotional/psychological deficiency. This counselor recommended Love in Action to my parents.
On June 6, 2005 I left Jackson, Missouri at five o’clock in the morning to make the long trip to Memphis, Tennessee. The first things I saw at the Love in Action campus were the protesters. That morning began my summer as a participant in the Love in Action Refuge program.
…
I am attending the protest in reaction to my own horrendous experience last summer, and as an opportunity to voice my personal opinions concerning the Love in Action Refuge program…while I was there, it just seemed to make people more depressed and self-loathing than they already were. I, myself, went through several of these depressive periods.
And in case you’re wondering how John Smid handles these sorts of depressive periods in his clients, here’s what he told Tom Ottosen, when he was on the verge of suicide:
"I would rather you commit suicide than have you leave Love In Action wanting to return to the gay lifestyle. In a physical death you could still have a spiritual resurrection; whereas, returning to homosexuality you are yielding yourself to a spiritual death from which there is no recovery."
"That’s exactly how he put it," states Tom Ottosen, 24, an expressive, articulate two year ex-LIA group member.
Ottosen says he clearly recalls that experience. He says it occurred in October of last year during his last one-on-one conference with John Smid, LIA’s Executive Director, who claims to be able to change gay men into straight men through a live-in rigidly controlled indoctrination program Smid calls "reparative therapy."
Ottosen says Smid clearly and emphatically warned him, "It would be better if I were to commit suicide than go back into the world and become a homosexual again. He felt that a physical death–with my soul intact–was much preferable to a spiritual death, which would happen if I were to leave the group and go back to being gay." claims Ottosen.
Ottosen further states that Smid said this at a time when Smid clearly was aware he had strong suicidal feelings and was going through periods of extreme depression, guilt and loneliness.
Ottosen recalls his depression had been building for several months during his second year at LIA, primarily because of a warm and emotional relationship he was experiencing with another group member. "It wasn’t sexual at all, but it was strictly forbidden and I was kept from even talking to him for several months."
Also, earlier in July, "Another house member, who was in his fourth year with the group and in a position of authority, became depressed and attempted suicide" and was sent away for observation. "He was taken from his position of leadership and then he just kind of disappeared." Ottosen admits that he too, within a few months was at point where he had never been before. "I couldn’t work. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t do anything."
It is bad enough that this man is counseling gay adults who go to him of their own free will. But John Smid is determined to expand his program for gay youth, dragging in more and more of them against their will, to be taught to hate themselves for what they are.
They will be kids who have already gone through one of life’s most traumatic moments – coming out to parents who have reacted in shame and anger. Smid will take these already wounded and bleeding kids, and in essence try his almighty best to rip their hearts out of them, tell them that its all their fault, make them believe that they are broken, make them ashamed and deeply afraid of their inner selves, in the hope, the earnest hope, that they will never know what it is to love another person whole heartedly. And I don’t think even the suicide of one of his teenaged clients will be enough to make him stop. Shame is for his clients. Smid is on a mission from god, and gods don’t feel shame.
We will be gathering Monday, June 5th at the Love In Action HQ on at 4780 Yale Road in Memphis, Tennessee. There will be two protests: one from 8:30am until 10:00am, and another from 4:00pm until 5:30pm. If you can be peaceful and respectful, please come. Come to support the young ones silently walking the walk of shame. Come to support the survivors bearing witness. Come in the name of love. Show the world what love in action looks like.
It was about a year ago that I first read these words…
I pray this blows over. I can’t take this… noone can… not really, this kind of thing tears you apart emotionally…It’s so horrible. This is what it’s doing to me… I have this horrible feeling all of the time… I wish this on no person…
A 16 year old gay teenager had been outed to his parents. It happens probably every day in this country, and all too often with brutal results for the kid. Parents, who should love their children unconditionally, are taught by this nation’s men of god to hate them instead if they are homosexual, the better to make gay teens hate themselves, and thereby produce self destructive, self hating adults: convenient scapegoats for all the problems heterosexuals would rather not deal with in themselves.
Zach’s misfortune was not only to have parents who could not see the child for the homosexual, but also to be living just a few miles from the first ever ex-gay program, Love In Action, which had relocated from its San Fransisco birthplace to the friendlier climes of the bible belt, and its current leader John Smid had only recently decided to create a program, ostensibly for teens, but actually for frantic fundamentalist parents who were easy pickings for his ex-gay snake oil. Smid was able to talk Zach’s parents into his little two-week teaser program, which of course led to the full eight week course.
It’s a brutal, sexually abusive program where a teen’s deepest feelings about themselves, their bodies, their sexuality, their relationships to their parents, peers and god are systematically ripped out of them using the same mind control techniques that cults throughout the world use to alienate people from the world, the better to imprison them within themselves. And make no mistake, Love In Action is a cult. You want proof, read the rule book that Zach found on his parent’s computer, and posted on his blog for the world to see. A teen who is forced into the "program" finds their life utterly controlled, who they can talk to, what they can read, what they can wear, even down to the kind of underwear they’re allowed to put on, when they can eat, and even – I am not kidding – how many minutes a day total they can spend in the bathroom. There are actually timers placed in or near the bathrooms to insure compliance.
It has one purpose and one purpose only: to break a kid’s spirit. Not to make them a better person. Not even, really, to make them heterosexual. As with any cult, the purpose is to erase the soul within, so the cult leaders can put their will in its place. And in June of 2005, a 16 year old gay teen was thrown into that cult, that ex-gay soul grinder so laughingly misnamed Love In Action. But before he vanished into it completely, he was able to get a cry for help out to the world. You can pretty much bet that John’s advice to parents nowadays is Take The Fucking Computer Away Before You Tell The Kid Where They’re Going!!!
When I read Zach’s words, and the LIA rule book, I literally could not sleep for about a week after, so sick with worry was I for him, and for other gay teens who I believed were almost certainly being forced into that "program" too. I was later to learn that it was not an uncommon reaction. People from all over the world have since told me the same thing: I couldn’t sleep for days after reading that… But for Zach’s amazing, loving, devoted friends, worry and stress turned into activism. They could not stand silently by, they did not stand silently by, while their friend was being abused behind closed doors. They took to the street, and stood side by side in front of the door to a gay teen’s nightmare, and with their simple presence sent a message of support of their friend, and all the other teens inside, and they took to the Internet, to shout out to the world what was being done to helpless kids in Memphis, and to spread the word about LIA and programs like it, so other teens wouldn’t have to suffer the same silent abuse.
Now, on the one year anniversary of that moment, the Queer Action Coalition is calling for a protest at LIA’s hollow church in Memphis. And the need is as urgent as ever, because even having suffered setbacks and losses, John Smid is as determined as ever to expand his "program" directed at gay teens. Child abusers are like that…they never stop with just one:
From LIA’s document: REFUGE International BOOK/Summer 2006:
Although we have seen success in our ministry, we see the culture relentlessly fighting back. So, we are expanding our ammunition to battle for young people and their families. Our experienced counselors and staff will offer a whole new array of options starting during the summer of 2006:
• Residential recovery for young adults (ages 18-25)
• College campus outreach
• Revamped summer program for youth (ages 13-17)
• Seminars to equip church and community youth leaders
• Conferences to heal wounds within families
• Creative support for parents and families
It appears, in this 8 page document, that LIA will launch a 3-month pilot program this summer for youth ages 13-17, and have begun to request funds for its operation. They have also launched a MYSPACE.COM blog in an attempt to further target youth by adopting main-stream/pop-cultural avenues of communication/outreach….these tactics seem to be the stepping stones towards a much larger front in an attack on youth, and their vunerable parents…
The Queer Action Coalition is rather concerned about these actions on LIA’s behalf, simply because WE ARE CONCERNED ABOUT THE WELL BEING OF OUR FELLOW CITIZENS.
The Lords Of The Ex-Gay Cults claim they act in love. During the first week of protests in Memphis last year, witnesses saw for themselves what had been largely hidden from the world up until that moment: their love, in action:
Whilst in this centre he [Zach] had to spend the first three days in total silence unable to talk while he was talked to by their counsellors. An eye witness has reported "When we drove around to the front…we saw these men and trailing behind them–four young guys, all with their heads hung, staring at the ground as they walked. They are not allowed to make eyecontact with ANYONE for the first few days.so they are forced to fucking…i’m crying now…but…they have to look at the ground as they walk, for three days it’s a walk of shame, their heads hanging for being themselves, for having the courage to stand up and say "this is who i am"…and now all these people are saying ‘no you aren’t and we will change it. and you will be punished for thinking such things.’ I will NEVER get that picture out of my head. those four guys…"
You may have a different definition of love then beating shame into an innocent kid because you hate what they are. If so, then come to Memphis on June 5, and show your love in action.
Yesterday was the Day of Silence, a day when students all over the country refused to speak, in silent solidarity with those whose voices have been silenced by hatred and bigotry. Sounds just like one of those foofoo liberal protest kinda things that the bleeding hearts are always doing…right…? I mean…what the hell is that all about anyway…who needs it…why can’t they just stop waving it in our faces…?
Three-quarters of students surveyed across America said that over the past year they heard derogatory remarks such as "faggot" or "dyke" frequently or often at school, and nearly nine out of ten reported hearing "that’s so gay" or "you’re so gay" – meaning stupid or worthless – frequently or often.
Over a third of students said they experienced physical harassment at school on the basis of sexual orientation and more than a quarter on the basis of their gender expression.
Nearly one-in-five students reported they had been physically assaulted because of their sexual orientation and over a tenth because of their gender expression.
Today the other side gets its shot. They’re calling it, without any apparent irony, the Day Of Truth. And if you’re wondering when truth ever even remotely mattered to a group of people who wave Paul Cameron’s lies about homosexuals around like a goddamn bible, then you’re probably a filthy heathen.
Via Ex-Gay Watch, here’s what Alan Sears, president of the Alliance Defense Fund, which fights anti-bullying measures in public schools with the ferocity of…well…a bunch of bullies, has to say about it:
“Day of Truth” participants will hand out cards of their own, offering to share a candid, loving, fact-based counterpoint to the unspoken assertions of the advocates for homosexual behavior. While making their case from a Christian perspective, the “Day of Truth”ers will confront with compassion — not condemnation — and restrict their discussions to the periods before, after and between classes.
Loving. Compassion. Not Condemnation. How about a little truth in this Day Of Truth? In April 2004, while other students at Poway High School in northern San Diego County were observing the Day Of Silence, student Tyler Harper put masking tape all over the shirt he was wearing, and wrote messages on it specifically to let the gay students at Poway High School know his contempt for them, and for those who thought their lives, and their right to a decent education, were worth defending:
A candid, loving, fact-based counterpoint….confronting with compassion, not condemnation… If you’d think the Alliance would object to this sort of thing…well…think again. The school ordered Harper to take it off. Harper, with the help of Alan Sears and his Alliance Defense Fund, sued the school. They lost:
In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said that a T-shirt that proclaimed "Be Ashamed, Our School Embraced What God Has Condemned" on the front and "Homosexuality Is Shameful" on the back was "injurious to gay and lesbian students and interfered with their right to learn." The court said that the shirt can be barred on a public high school campus without violating the 1st Amendment.
"We conclude that" Poway High School student Tyler Harper’s wearing of his T-shirt " ‘collides with the rights of other students’ in the most fundamental way," wrote 9th Circuit Judge Stephen Reinhardt, quoting a passage from Tinker vs. Des Moines Independent Community School District, a seminal U.S. Supreme Court decision on the free speech rights of students.
"Public school students who may be injured by verbal assaults on the basis of a core identifying characteristic such as race, religion, or sexual orientation have a right to be free from such attacks while on school campuses. As Tinker clearly states, students have the right to ‘be secure and to be let alone,’ " Reinhardt said.
It seems so simple. All American kids have a right to an education, that’s what the public schools are for. They’re there for the fundamentalist kids, and the heathens alike, but they’re there for everyone. While you’re in school, you have to respect each other. That means the other kids can’t harass you, and you can’t harass the other kids. It seems so simple. But it isn’t. That kind of live and let live agreement is anathema to the religious right.
Had a the school allowed its students to wear t-shirts condemning fundamentalist Christianity as shameful and telling the student body it should be ashamed for tolerating the fundamentalists among them, Alan Sears would be furiously throwing lawsuits around like an antipersonnel mine throwing shrapnel. But let the school tell fundamentalists kids they can’t to the same thing to their gay and lesbian peers, and Sears sides with the harassing students. Hypocrisy? Oh mes non! Fundamentalists have rights that no one else has…because they’re god’s favorite people. To claim that the heathens have the same rights they do isn’t merely an attack on their privileged status, it’s literally an attack on God Almighty Himself. Heathens simply don’t have the same rights god’s people do. Certainly not the right to be left alone. Especially not the right to an education.
Or for that matter, the right to even live. In Iraq and Iran as I write this, gay people are being kidnapped and tortured to death at the behest of the mullahs, whose sense that they are god’s right hand is little different from the theocrats of the religious right here in America. Exodus’ Randy Thomas takes note of that, and compares it to the persecution Christians face…
If you are Christian in Iran … you get stoned to death.
If you have same sex attraction in Iran … you get stoned to death
If you are a Christian who struggles with same sex attraction in Iran … you get the point.
Alas…he doesn’t.
We must keep this in mind for perspective and seek out ways to intercede (prayer and other ways) for our Christian siblings and for those being murdered because of their sexual orientation.
Homophobia is not some off the cuff comment about Tinky Winky. Homophobia is what you see happening in Iran. I am grateful for the Dutch government finally giving asylum to those fleeing Iran. I pray that those who want to find Christ will and those who want to overcome homosexuality will be allowed their right to self-determine that path for their lives as well.
What’s missing from this? Any hint that homosexuals in Iran have the right to exist just as they are. Thomas’s prayer is only for those who wish to change. For the rest, he has no prayers.
Exodus is now taking it’s tacit approval of anti-gay violence to the caribbean, and to Jamaca, where a murderous killing nightmare is taking place. Wayne Besen writes:
An article in last week’s Time magazine calls Jamaica the "most homophobic place on Earth." It points out that two of the island’s leading gay rights advocates, Brian Williamson and Steve Harvey, were recently ruthlessly slain. If that was not enough, a crowd essentially danced on Williamson’s grave by celebrating over his mutilated body.
In 2004, a father learned his son was gay and went to his school to invite a group of peers to lynch his son. Now that’s family values!
Not too long after this sickening episode, witnesses claim, police egged on a mob that stabbed and stoned a gay man to death in Montego Bay. Earlier this year, a Kingston man, Nokia Cowan, drowned after a crowd shouting "batty boy" (a Jamaican slur for queer) chased him off a dock.
"Jamaica is the worst any of us has ever seen," Rebecca Schleifer of the U.S.-based Human Rights Watch explained to Time.
That’s what was left of Brian Williamson after the mobs got through with him. Another human life lost to hate. Another voice forever silenced. Truth. But for Exodus, PFOX and the Alliance Defense Fund to come out strongly against anti-gay violence would be to completely contradict their own message, which is that homosexuals can leave behind all the harmful effects of the gay lifestyle any time they want to. Change is possible. Or, to put it another way, whatever happens to homosexuals is their own fault.
If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. -Leviticus 20:13
There is the ex-gay message. Not Change Is Possible, but Their Blood Shall Be Upon Them. Brian Williamson. Nicolas West. Billy Jack Gaither. Gwen Araujo. Matthew Shepard. Barry Winchell. Allen Schindler. Seventeen year old Kristofer Guy King, who was killed when a neo nazi with a knife broke into the trailer he was sleeping in, looking for his eighteen year old gay friend. This is what happened to his friend’s mom, Patricia Wells:
Well Maybe I’ll Stop Again In Kanab Again After All
Looks like the decent folk in town aren’t taking that "Natural Family" resolution laying down…
(Kanab, Utah) Signs began popping up in store windows this week in Kanab, Utah proclaiming ”Everyone welcome here!” in a desperate move to avoid a threatened gay boycott. Some businesses went so far as putting small rainbow flag stickers on their front doors.
Dozens of business owners in the small southern Utah community are trying all they can to distance themselves from a proclamation by the city council that Kanab supports the "natural family" consisting of a working husband, a stay-at-home wife and a "full quiver of children."
…
The signs and stickers are being distributed by the Kanab Boosters, a business owners group. The Boosters are selling the signs and small stickers for cars for between $2.50 and $4.50.
The group hopes to raise enough money to take out newspaper ads throughout the state to promote the town as a diverse place to vacation.
…
Kanab is the only Utah governmental entity to pass the resolution, which was sent to cities all over Utah by the Salt Lake City-based Sutherland Institute, a conservative think tank.
Earlier this week Sutherland President Paul Mero told the AP that studies show community problems such as crime, violence and poverty increase when family structures break down.
I question (as in ironically) the importance Mero places on intact families, so long as he’s busy teaching families to hate their gay and lesbian sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles. But anyway…
That view was supported by Councilor Terril Honey who voted for the measure. Honey, who also is a local businessman, said it isn’t the council that is discriminatory, its the boosters.
He says that the poster and sticker campaign is likely to drive away families.
You gotta love how the bigot mind works. Gay people have families too of course, and families have gay people in them. And that never occurs to a jackass like Honey. But…never mind… The Everyone Welcome Here signs are discriminatory, because they will drive away people won’t go anywhere everyone is welcome.
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