Students at the University of Alaska – Fairbanks are protesting a long series of on-campus lectures by an “ex-gay” proponent of antigay prejudice.

Edward Delgado, a deacon at an Anchorage Baptist church, on Saturday launched a series of 14 lectures against sexual honesty. Delgado contends that honesty about one’s sexual orientation requires adherence to a non-existent “homosexual lifestyle” of “promiscuity, abuse, alcoholism, and drug abuse.” He further argues that people with a predominant same-sex orientation can only achieve “freedom” through conformity to antigay evangelical bigotry, misleading assertions of heterosexuality, shame regarding one’s same-sex attraction, sexless marriage, or lifelong celibacy.

While Delgado is not listed as a member of Exodus International, his poster slogan is borrowed from past Exodus billboards which imply that all gay people are — or should be — inherently lonely and confused. Delgado’s poster refers students to Exodus International and to “ex-gay” political activist Joe Dallas.

According to the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Chancellor Brian Rogers said he wouldn’t order the poster removed.

Rogers said he wants a “welcoming and inclusive university” but said tolerance of opposing views and freedom of speech are at the core of the campus’ values.

No one appears to have been invited to offer “opposing views” to Delgado, however.

In his self-promotions, Delgado speaks about his “life of homosexuality” as a Southern California teen, when — according to the News-Miner — he says he had 10 male sex partners by age 19: A tally not much different from many heterosexual teen-agers. Delgado asserts that his own unfulfilling lifestyle choices must be representative of all gay people. “The things that I speak [against gay people] are not a lie, because I’ve lived these things,” he said.

Delgado is now married with two sons — though the Daily News-Miner does not say whether Delgado is sexually active with his wife, whether he is (or ever was) predominantly same-sex attracted, or whether the sons are his through biology or adoption.

Members of a campus gay-straight alliance planned to counter Delgado’s smears against healthy and well-adjusted members of the academic community with “Stop the Hate” T-shirts and literature, according to Queers United.

Scott Lively is the western Massachusetts-based ex-gay activist most famous for claiming that Nazi Germany was run by a hypermasculine homosexual conspiracy.

Lively co-founded the east European organization Watchmen on the Walls, which applauds violence against gay people and has been certified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group.

Lively also joined with Exodus International board member Don Schmierer in Uganda to co-keynote a March 2009 ex-gay conference, the purpose of which was to launch a nationwide campaign of antigay vigilantism — led by at least one alleged ex-gay child-molester — and to impose a death penalty upon that nation’s LGBT population.

In an article on his ex-gay organization’s web site dated for release tomorrow, Lively equates Christian compassion with less-than-desirable effeminacy — and violence with true “masculine Christianity.”

Unfortunately, the modern American church, along with the majority of its leaders, has rejected masculinity in favor of an effeminate Christianity.

Lively addresses his audience as “brethren,” as if his female readers were irrelevant:

Brethren, this is not an attack on femininity. If anything, the church should be commended for its appreciation for and fulfillment of the feminine aspects of its role. The vital compassion-based ministries ‚Äî feeding the hungry, clothing the naked and soothing the broken-hearted ‚Äî are prospering today. These ministries are very much a reflection of the feminine side of Christ’ complete personality.

In Lively’s brutal worldview, it is unmanly to be compassionate, charitable, graceful, humble, or nurturing. Lively idolizes Biblical hyperwarriors, some of whom are guilty of indiscriminate slaughter against the women and children of rival tribes in the ancient Middle East.

The defining characteristic of each of these examples is the conquest of evil by God’ people — mostly men. … The church and this nation cry out for a revival of masculine Christianity, which is to say that we church leaders need to stop being such, for lack of a better word, sissies when it comes to social and political issues.

Lively concludes with a sociopathic call to war against those who might educate the Christian Right’s children and young adults in alternatives to violence, bigotry, and rejection of religious diversity, history, science, and community values:

We have reached that split-second of decision in which we must choose whether to rush forward into battle on the chance that we can defeat the invaders, or to surrender and look on in resignation as our children are marched off into slavery in a foreign land.

Violence and deliberate ignorance: True markers of “masculinity” among the ex-gay Christian Right. According to Lively, this machismo is under mortal threat not only from uppity women, but also from the same educated, lazy sissies who operated the supposedly hypermasculine Nazi regime.

Go figure.

When we last visited the new Freedom Federation, Exodus International was joining this federation of Christian Right organizations in order to proclaim “real freedom” from the dangerous personal and religious liberties of any Americans who might seek equality under the law.

Now, through its sponsorship of the Freedom Federation, Exodus has joined the religious right’s war against “real change” of America’s broken health-care system.

Last week, according to Talk To Action:

Speaking for the organization, Ken Blackwell, former Ohio Secretary of State and now a senior fellow for family empowerment at the Family Research Council said that the Freedom Federation “will be a stop sign and say, `Let’s apply reason and thought and broaden participation.’” Organization spokespersons say that some of their major concerns about health care reform revolves around “taxpayer-supported abortion, rationed health care for the elderly and government control of personal health decisions,” USA Today recently reported.

Blackwell’s unflattering characterizations of reform were civil compared to those of Federation members. Talk To Action pointed out that Gary Bauer’s Campaign for Working Families is working on a campaign to “stop Obama’s socialism,” while Andrea Lafferty’s Traditional Values Coalition — according to the Washington Post — is “trying to stop `Obamunists’ from destroying private health care.”

Why does Exodus support the Freedom Federation, if in fact Exodus does not support the religious right’s war against “real change” in health care?

And just how does Exodus — which claims to offer counseling and support to persons who are conflicted about their same-sex attraction — foresee a defamatory culture war against health care offering “real hope” to ex-gays who need legitimate mental-health care?

Despite accusations that he sexually accosted a young male client and uses public property to promote sectarian religious bigotries, Mike Jones and his Corduroy Stone ex-gay ministry will continue to receive its web hosting from Michigan State University.

The Michigan Messenger reported Friday that David Gift, vice provost for libraries, computing and technology at MSU, said that the university’ hands are tied because Mike Jones is a retired university employee.

We have made systematic progress over the past year at removing public purchased web publishing and e-mail accounts that had been established at MSU. However, retirees have the benefit of continued use of their MSU web space and our existing policies for controlling their use of that space are quite limited and do not permit us to address this particular case. The owner of this site is a retiree, and after we closed his purchased account under our general change of business practices he set up shop in his retiree space. He apparently has arranged for a .com URL, but has that URL redirected to his MSU personal webspace.

Terry Denbow, vice president for university relations, further explained MSU’s policy:

The point is that we do allow retirees to have Web spaces that link to other organizations. The fact that this organization has material that is offensive does not, in and of itself, violate any University policies. We cannot, under the First Amendment, make content based distinctions on what sites we allow and which ones we do not. We are continuing to review and update our acceptable use policies and will take this under advisement as we do so. In the meantime, so long as Mr. Jones is in compliance with U policy, his web space will remain available to him.

Denbow said that while the university was blocked from further action under
current policies, it might be time to revisit those policies.

Truth Wins Out executive director Wayne Besen and Jones’s victimized client, who is no longer ex-gay, reacted here.

It is frankly alarming that MSU policy allows alleged predators to host websites on public property simply because they are retirees. MSU’s see-no-evil policy may serve as an open invitation for other retirees to launch sites inciting prejudice and sexual violence against ethnic and religious constituencies.

A true “conservative,” small-government, or libertarian policy would demand that no personal or private sectarian sites of any kind be hosted on taxpayer-supported government property. Instead, taxpayers are being forced to host the work of a predatory ex-gay who inflicts his failures upon students.

Truth Wins Out has sought comment from Corduroy Stone and from Exodus International regarding the accusation of sexual abuse; both have refused to comment.

In an excellent article, The Washington City Paper exposes Parents & Friends of Ex-Gays (PFOX) as a shady front group for rabidly anti-gay legal organizations.

Amanda Hess, the reporter, could not even find real “ex-gays” in Washington, DC to interview who were not getting paid to say they had “changed”.

The article rightfully calls PFOX a “smokescreen” and also raises the important question of whether the group has a strategy of staging hate crimes, to portray so-called “ex-gays” as victims.

The truth is, PFOX has zero credibility and is a magnet for anti-gay extremists. If it they were not so tragic and litigious, they would be a total joke.

LesBePure.com was launched in 2008 by Kori Ashton. Kori’s journey is filled with religion, fame and finally freedom – True Freedom!

As a pastor’ daughter Kori Ashton grew up in the church and a very religious environment. She committed her heart to God at four years old and began dreaming of traveling the world singing for Jesus. However, Kori’ feelings of same sex attraction began at this early age as well. She was taught that those feelings were sinful and that she could never admit to them, much less act on them. Homosexuality seemed to be the worst sin possible. Her secret struggle began and it would last for more than 25 years.

Kori attended private Christian school her whole life so at 18 when it was time to go off to college the natural step was to attend Bible college – Southwestern Assemblies of God University in Texas. Within two weeks she had already met her first girlfriend who was another pastor’ daughter. SAGU is adamantly against homosexuality, so again Kori knew better than to be open about her feelings. She fought to keep her sexual desires secret so that she could attend the University and keep up the appearance of a “healthy, normal Christian.” She even dated guys to help camouflage her lesbian relationships. She was “outted” in 1995 and immediately kicked out.

It was inevitable to feel regret and confusion in a situation like this. Kori had been reared to believe a certain way, and everything she had been living for said that she was a hypocrite and a failure. She began to weigh it all out, and decided that the shame of being a lesbian was too overwhelming. Pushing all of her true feelings deep inside, she confessed her “sins”, renounced being gay and was allowed to re-attend SAGU in 1996. Over the next few years Kori would have multiple partners – all secret relationships with fellow, female students. But the fear of being a disappointment and disgrace to her family would soon take its toll.

Wanting to please others — Kori decided once again to suppress her sexual desires and attempt to become the “ideal” Christian, young lady. She left SAGU in 1999 and rekindled her dream of singing around the world for Jesus. Along with a few friends, Kori started a Christian band called “Exit” and began using the title “Ex-Gay” for publicity. Word spread quickly about the band and almost overnight they began working with Exodus International, Exodus Youth, PFOX, Focus on the Family and several other ex-gay affiliates. Kori founded MyTrueFreedom.net — an ex-gay website helping kids and young adults who struggled with same-sex attraction and within two years it had over 180,000 viewers. (Read More)

Michigan Messenger:

After assuring LGBT activists and leaders for two years that a controversial website would be removed from its computer servers, Michigan State University said last week it will continue to host the website of the ex-gay ministry Corduroy Stone.

In an email, David Gift, vice provost for libraries, computing and technology at MSU, told Michigan Messenger that the university’ hands are tied because Mike Jones, who runs the site that promotes therapy as a way to convert gay individuals to a straight lifestyle, is a retired university employee.

Wayne Besen, executive director of the national organization Truth Wins Out, which opposes the ex-gay movement, also called on the university to remove the website:

“Michigan State should cancel Jones’ e-mail address and immediately stop hosting his site. It gives the false impression that the university endorses a dangerous form of therapy that was just condemned by the American Psychological Association.”

Besen is particularly familiar with Corduroy Stone because when he was in Grand Rapids earlier this year to speak at an event at Grand Valley State University aimed at countering the national ex-gay conference held locally. While there, he met Patrick McAlvey, 24, of Lansing, who says he was victimized by Jones and the Corduroy Stone programs. He even went so far as to do a video interview with Besen, which was posted last month on YouTube. And Besen features McAlvey’ story on his website.

“As both a graduate of Michigan State University and a recovering victim of Mr. Jones’ “ex-gay” therapy I find it sickening that the Corduroy Stone website continues to be supported by MSU. It is horrifying to think that taxpayer money, including my own, is supporting Mr. Jones and his strange and dangerous “work” with Corduroy Stone,” said McAlvey in an email to Michigan Messenger. “I am disturbed that this use of MSU server space could be be mistakenly interpreted as lending Corduroy Stone some sort of credibility it certainly doesn’t deserve and in reality does not enjoy.”

A new article in Scientific American explores issues of sex behavior-role labeling among men who have sex with men (a category that includes ex-gays). The article, written by Jesse Bering, refutes some assumptions among heterosexuals about what men do behind closed doors, and how they label themselves:

…Survey studies have found that many gay men actually self-identify as “versatile,” which means that they have no strong preference for either the insertive or the receptive role. For a small minority, the distinction doesn’t even apply, since some gay men lack any interest in anal sex and instead prefer different sexual activities. Still other men refuse to self-label as tops, bottoms, versatiles or even “gay” at all, despite their having frequent anal sex with gay men. These are the so-called “Men Who Have Sex With Men” (or MSM) who are often in heterosexual relations as well.

The article observes that predominantly insertive and predominantly passive partners tend to be honest in labeling their role — but not necessarily their sexual orientation.

Tops were more likely than both bottoms and versatiles to reject a gay self-identity and to have had sex with a woman in the past three months. They also manifested higher internalized homophobia—essentially the degree of self-loathing linked to their homosexual desires.

Attitudes among predominantly insertive partners appear to differ substantially from those who identify as “versatile”:

Versatiles seem to enjoy better psychological health. Hart and his coauthors speculate that this may be due to their greater sexual sensation seeking, lower erotophobia (fear of sex), and greater comfort with a variety of roles and activities.

The article cites one 2003 Centers for Disease Control study, published in the Journal of Sex Research, which observed that while labels do not directly correlate to unsafe sexual behaviors, they do reflect upon individuals’ likely awareness of safer-sex protocols:

Although self-labels were not associated with unprotected intercourse, tops, who engaged in a greater proportion of insertive anal sex than other groups, were also less likely to identify as gay. Non-gay-identified MSM [again, "Men Who Have Sex With Men"] may have less contact with HIV prevention messages and may be less likely to be reached by HIV-prevention programs than are gay-identified men. Tops may be less likely to be recruited in venues frequented by gay men, and their greater internalized homophobia may result in greater denial of ever engaging in sex with other men. Tops also may be more likely to transmit HIV to women because of their greater likelihood of being behaviorally bisexual.

Another study, published in Sexual and Relationship Therapy in 2008, warns that gay male couples “might want to weigh this issue of sex role preferences seriously before committing to anything longterm. From a sexual point of view, there are obvious logistical problems of two tops or two bottoms being in a monogamous relationship. But since these sexual role preferences tend to reflect other behavioral traits (such as tops being more aggressive and assertive than bottoms), ‘such relationships also might be more likely to encounter conflict quicker than relationships between complementary self-labels.’”

In an op-ed for CNN, Republican lobbyist John Feehery suggested today that the GOP begin to manage and discipline the Tea Party movement, rather than riding it like a “bucking bronco.”

Feehery stated that “the Tea Party is distinct from the Republican Party, probably as distinct as Sam Adams beer is from Bud Lite” and that “the folks who go to Tea Parties are not concerned primarily with tax policy.” Feehery contended that tea partiers are “mostly motivated by out-of-control spending, towering debt, and the pervasive feeling that government is too big, too powerful, too unaccountable and too cozy with Wall Street.” Feehery added:

While the Tea Party movement presents a threat to the Obama administration, it also presents a challenge to congressional Republicans. After all, many of the protesters have as low a regard for the GOP as they do for the Democrats, and they hold the previous administration in as much as contempt as they do the Obama White House.

Feehery blamed “the bailout of Wall Street and the creation of the Troubled Assets Relief Program” for “Middle America’s complete loss of faith in the Washington-Wall Street industrial complex.” But Feehery failed to name the source of those scandals: the GOP itself.

In just six years, social conservatives in the Bush administration and Republican-controlled Congress tripled the national debt from $3 trillion to more than $9 trillion even as they gutted the nation’s industrial base, implemented tax cuts to prevent that debt from ever being repaid, and laundered billions of taxpayer dollars into the pockets of far-right evangelical political activists through so-called “faith-based initiatives.”

Instead of riding the resulting wave of anger among irrational and emotionally unstable Tea Party supporters, Feehery said that the GOP…

…should seek to get ahead of the stampede by offering good ideas that will reform the government and bring back into balance the role of the government to the taxpayers.

They should focus on three important areas: transparency, accountability, and thrift.

Transparency, accountability, and thrift: These are qualities that the GOP has utterly lacked. The “small government” party has, since the 1980s, doled out trillions of dollars in corporate welfare and expanded government regulation of every American’s lifestyle and religious beliefs.

Feehery revealed his own potential bias against complete transparency when he sidestepped massive corporate and evangelical graft. Feehery diverted his readers with a call for conservatives to further expand government in order to regulate a small fraction of government misspending: “who is cheating us on Medicare reimbursements, why HUD grants are going to political cronies, and who is getting special appropriations for members of the family.”

Instead of calling for accountability from the biggest wasters of tax dollars — the bloated and mismanaged Departments of Defense and Energy — Feehery fell back upon the tired fundamentalist tactic of blaming the Department of Education, where — despite obvious problems — only a tiny fraction of federal spending occurs.

By adopting a reform plan, Feehery suggested, the GOP can harness the best of the Tea Party movement while disabling the extremists.

But if the Tea Partiers can be said to be undermedicated, then perhaps Feehery has been breathing too much nitrous oxide. The GOP has already proven itself incapable of self-reform — and the Democrats, who have changed little since they gained control of Congress in 2006, may likewise be incapable of self-reform. After all, the same Democrats whose Republican-lite economic policies created the real-estate and Wall Street bubbles in the 1990s are firmly in control of the party now.

Americans continue to face the same difficult task that we have avoided since the end of the Cold War: The two ruling parties must be reinvented to serve basic modern economic, military, and human needs. We the voters must repudiate outmoded definitions of left and right, take time off from work and family to educate ourselves with facts and not rumors; and form new coalitions that are energetic, daring, intelligent, coherent, collaborative, non-violent, forward-thinking, and determined to put human interests ahead of those that presently control the two ruling parties: big business and big religion.

Until millions of Americans put aside their own pride, make sacrifices, and reject outmoded ways of thinking and acting, little will change — at least not for the better.

There wasn’t a Billy left in the hills on Saturday, when tens of thousands of anti-government types, gun nuts, white supremacists, religious zealots, tax evaders and crazies streamed into Washington. It was pure delirium, as the National Mall resembled a sanitarium.

In a sea of American (and many Confederate) flags waved by more than a few secessionists, Obama was pictured as Hitler and portrayed as Stalin. The federal government was likened to an alien invader run by an illegitimate, foreign-born black president, who just happened to be elected by the American people.

I wish I could say that this unruly behavior is an anomaly, but it seems to be a growing and vocal part of the Republican Party. In the 1980′s, Rev. Jerry Falwell and Ralph Reed used direct mail and talk radio to organize what were previously known as busybodies into the Moral Majority. Today’s GOP has harnessed the power of the Internet and cable television to lure the loons and create a constituency of crackpots.

The result has been disastrous for this nation. Our healthcare system is broken and we are rated near the bottom when compared to nearly every other industrialized country. We pay more per person for healthcare and we live shorter lives. There is instability, as families often go broke when a loved one falls ill and there is insecurity because losing a job means forfeiting coverage. American businesses are saddled with growing healthcare costs, which make it more difficult to compete in the global marketplace.

Yet, instead of an adult conversation about an issue that is crippling our nation, our dimmest citizens have derailed the debate. These out-of-control, severely under medicated, surreptitious partisans hijacked town hall meetings and may cost the rest of us decent healthcare reform. Obama’s powerful speech last week helped mitigate the damage, but having frittered away the summer, it may be too late for the president to regain momentum.

At fault is the media — who routinely offer right wing sickos a stage to air the most outrageous allegations. Max Blumenthal, author of the new book, “Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement that Shattered the Party”, discussed the media’s culpability last week on National Public Radio.

“The mainstream media attempts this veneer of balance of entertaining both sides,” said Blumenthal. “But when one side is completely hysterical, conspiratorial, and leveling baseless attacks, should it be taken seriously? And what are the consequences for taking these attacks seriously in a democracy?”

The result, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), is an explosion of militias and hate groups. In a new report, the SPLC documents at least, “50 new militia training groups — one of them made up of present and former police officers and soldiers.”

“Almost a decade after largely disappearing from public view, right-wing militias, ideologically driven tax defiers and sovereign citizens are appearing in large numbers around the country,” says the report. The bizarre theories include:

1) Nativist theories about secret Mexican plans to “reconquer” the American Southwest

2) A secret network of U.S. concentration camps to imprison “patriots” who stand up to the federal government

If these were just harmless blowhards, that would be one thing. The problem is, these nuts are heavily armed and are a staple at shows that hawk firearms. SPLC reports that, “Sales of guns and ammunition have skyrocketed amid fears of new gun control laws, much as they did in the 1990s.”

Unless the media culture changes, there will be another Oklahoma City-type disaster or even an assassination attempt on our President. Responsible media outlets must stop offering platforms to serial distorters such as Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck. The next time Sarah Palin makes up a lie, such as death panels, the story should be about how she twisted the truth. Not a single story should be written or broadcast giving legs to the lies and allowing mistruths to run amok.

Thanks to the press winking and nodding to the nuts, Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) felt empowered to heckle the President during his healthcare speech. More disturbing are reports that say many people in Wilson’s district applaud his sophomoric actions.

Clearly, it is time we stop calling these people “conservatives.” True conservatives, who believe in respecting authority and protocol, would have been appalled at the example Wilson set for children. After all, how can young people be expected to obey parents and teachers when the president is catcalled in the halls of Congress?

I’ve had it with such antics. This crowd destabilized Bill Clinton’s presidency. Then, they stole the 2000 election, by sending partisan thugs down to South Florida to disrupt the recount. Now, the paranoiacs are in a full-blown panic over the first black president.

This fight is no longer about healthcare, nor is about deficits. It is about the very health of the political process and turning back the deficit in decency exemplified by Joe Wilson, Sarah Palin and the demagogues out to undermine our system of government.