Joe screen-capped this tweet from Porno Pete about a new proposed law in Alberta:
Wow, that would be just crazy if the Canadian province of Alberta passed a law denying parents the right to teach their children to be little bigots! Homo-fascism indeed!
Of course, that’s not happening in any way, shape or form. Is Porno Pete just excitable, or is he a liar?
Here is what is actually happening. The actual story can even be gleaned from the hysterical “news” article at WingNutDaily, if you read between the lines of abject bigotry and fear:
Homeschooling families will soon be forbidden from teaching that homosexual sex is sinful as part of their schooling program, according to the government of Alberta, Canada. Under the province’s Education Act, homeschoolers and religious schools will be banned from “disrespecting” people’s differences, Alberta Education Minister Thomas Lukaszuk’s office told LifeSiteNews just last week. “Whatever the nature of schooling – homeschool, private school, Catholic school – we do not tolerate disrespect for differences,” said Donna McColl, Lukaszuk’s assistant director of communications. “You can affirm the family’s ideology in your family life, you just can’t do it as part of your educational study and instruction.”
So, again, reading between the lines, Alberta is considering a homeschooling curriculum which doesn’t include hate. Parents who happen to be bigots will have to find supplemental materials in order to indoctrinate their children into hate, I suppose. I’m sure they can find appropriate churches for that?
The question, one more time. Porno Pete: excitable/gullible/ravaged by fear of gays around every corner and behind every tree, or just a liar?
A lot of public attention and criticism has been directed at Rev. Marcel Guarnizo, the Washington, D.C.-area priest who denied the Eucharist to a family member and bailed out in the middle of a deceased woman’s funeral last weekend. Naturally, folks are curious to know Fr. Marcel’s side of the story.
I wondered how old Guarnizo is. I wondered if he was a nice guy. I wondered whether he was a rigid man, or a forgiving one.
Unfortunately, Guarnizo isn’t talking.
Until Guarnizo comments, this is what the public has seen in the past: A hardline public figure who defames a doctor who performs abortions and, Rosenwald observes, “compares the doctor and the act of abortion to the crimes and criminals of Nazi Germany during the Holocaust.” Watch, and compare to what Jesus would do:
Methinks we won’t be hearing an apology from Guarnizo to the bereaved family and other funeralgoers anytime soon.
“We stand by Life with Archie #16. As I’ve said before, Riverdale is a safe, welcoming place that does not judge anyone. It’s an idealized version of America that will hopefully become reality someday. We’re sorry the American Family Association/OneMillionMoms.com feels so negatively about our product, but they have every right to their opinion, just like we have the right to stand by ours. Kevin Keller will forever be a part of Riverdale, and he will live a happy, long life free of prejudice, hate and narrow-minded people.”
It’s an idealized version of America… Even as the hatemongers in Florida managed to enact a constitutional amendment banishing same-sex couples from marriage equality, Disney World began letting those same couples have their magic day in the Disney World Wedding Pavilion, with Cinderella’s Castle poised above Main Street USA in the background. Disney Maggie. Riverdale. Main Street USA. That idealized version of America Maggie…Robert…Tony…Peter…we’re a part of it. We were always a part of it. A hidden part because for generations hate mongers like you preached that we were alien to that vision. That we were corrupters, destroyers. The ideal had to be protected from us. But if anyone was a corrupter of that ideal Maggie, Robert, Tony, Peter…it was you.
When the day came that your kind could no longer reliably teach us to hate ourselves, that was the beginning of the end of the lie. The final act of it has arrived in the form of an Archie comic book no less. Picasso once said that art is a lie that makes us see the truth. Riverdale is no more real then Disney World but it is the story we tell ourselves. And it is one thing for gay folk to tell it to ourselves, to imagine a time when we have our rightful place in the telling and retelling of the ideal, and another when our heterosexual neighbors begin to tell themselves that story and write us into it, insist that the ideal isn’t…well…ideal…until we are part of it too.
The happily ever after part. The it’s a small world after all part. The free of prejudice, hate and narrow-minded people part. Yes, it’s a vastly romanticized ideal. But if you don’t have a dream, how you goin’ to have a dream come true? What was your dream all this time Maggie, Robert, Tony, Peter…all this time you were looking your neighbors in the face and telling them lies about each other? What part of that idealized vision of America did you think you were?
As we all know, the leaders of the American Roman Catholic Church are engaging in an all-out campaign of spiritual bullying and religion-based bigotry against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, couples, and families. Fighting back against this extremism has been a majorfocus of ourefforts here at TWO. Notable examples of anti-gay bigotry from the Catholic hierarchy include:
New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, recently elevated to the rank of cardinal, made the (ultimately unsuccessful) fight against marriage equality in New York state a top priority of his episcopate.
When he United States Conference of Catholic Bishops — of which Dolan is president — met in Baltimore in November, the issue to which they devoted the bulk of their discussion was that of marriage equality and how they could stop it from spreading across the country.
Also in November, Dan Avila, then serving as the USCCB’s “Policy Advisor for Marriage and Family,” resigned in disgrace after TWO and many other groups condemned him for writing that homosexuality was caused by Satan entering the wombs of pregnant mothers and messing with their hormones.
Early this year, Chicago Cardinal Francis George apologized after an uproar surrounding remarks he made comparing the LGBT movement to the Ku Klux Klan.
Minnesota’s Catholic bishops have diverted tax-exempt church resources to push for the passage of a constitutional marriage discrimination amendment in that state, silencing dissent in the clergy, injecting a prayer for marriage discrimination into the Catholic Mass itself, and embracing “ex-gay” propaganda in their efforts to oppose marriage equality.
And just yesterday, we heard about a Maryland lesbian who gave her deceased mother a Catholic funeral according to her final wishes, only to be denied communion by the priest. Fr. Marcel Guarnizo also refused to deliver the final blessing at the woman’s grave.
And now, this: Al Fischer, a popular, openly gay music teacher at a St. Louis-area Catholic school, was fired earlier this month after an archdiocesan official overheard him talking with co-workers about his upcoming plans to marry his longtime partner in New York. a popular and openly gay music teacher at a St. Louis-area Catholic school who was fired in February when an archdiocesan official overheard him talking with co-workers about his upcoming New York wedding to his same-sex partner of nearly 20 years. Fischer’s firing was fast-tracked last month when his partner posted the news on Facebook, but it was originally scheduled to take effect on March 9, one week from today — the day of the couple’s 20th anniversary and their wedding day.
The report from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch makes it clear that Fischer’s sexual orientation was no secret at St. Ann Parish. Fischer directs the local gay men’s chorus. His partner, Charlie Robin, noted that the two attend school functions like concerts and staff parties as a couple. In a letter he emailed to the school’s parents shortly after receiving his pink slip, Fischer wrote: ”I think the word has been well spread that this is not the fault of St. Ann School or its leadership, and I want to emphasize that I get that, too.” He said further that the school principal and parish priest “are still there for me in a big way.” Parents at the school are said to be very upset.
In the midst of all of this, Mr. Fischer is taking the high road and doing what a good teacher does: thinking not about himself, but about how his very public firing will impact the children he teaches. His letter encouraged parents to talk to their kids, to make sure that they don’t let what’s happened to him make them scared to be themselves. ”A family conversation about whether or not justice was served here could be a great thing. I do not want the lesson from this for the kids to be, ‘Keep your mouth shut, hide who you are or what you think if it will get you in trouble.’”
Stories like these are intensely personal for me. I’m a musician and former Catholic who, like Fischer, was dismissed for (in my case) being married to my soulmate — simply because that person is another man. I know dozens of wonderful, dedicated, talented LGBT musicians serving the Catholic Church as organists, music directors, liturgists, cantors, choir members, and teachers. Al Fischer’s story could happen tomorrow to any one of them. I also know dozens more kind, compassionate gay priests who understand that their church is out of touch and protect their LGBT employees as best they can, as the priest at St. Ann Parish appears to have done.
Unfortunately, many pro-LGBT Catholics do not speak out when people like Fischer are attacked because they don’t think they have the authority to challenge their bigoted bishops. Gay and pro-LGBT priests often cannot stand up against these injustices unless they are prepared to face the very real risk of being silenced, fired, or moved by their bosses, the bishops (who also control their retirement plans, by the way).
But until more lay Catholics, priests, and even bishops start to stand up and speak out against the Catholic hierarchy and its persecution of LGBT people, the bullying, oppression, and repression will continue unabated, and we’ll continue to hear more sad stories like that of Al Fischer.
When I was in my teens a friend of mine had a very nice camper-van our gang use to go traveling in. It could seat a bunch of us easily and at night the seats could fold down into bunk beds with the spillover putting up a few small tents around it. One afternoon some of us were on the road to Ocean City Maryland. With us was a guy I was massively crushing on at the time. It was one of those things that could never be because he is straight, but he was nice about it and we are still friends to this day. Thankfully, in spite of what I am about to relate.
While we were on the road someone on a high speed motorcycle of some Japanese make went screaming on past us and I shouted out what was at the time the standard derogatory name for such machines…
Rice Burner!
The object of my affections, of Asian descent, was sitting to my left. I can still hear his more then a little pissed off “What?” But it was the look on his face I’ll never forget. Not anger, but a touch of betrayal. I could see it. I can still see it. He knew how I felt and he’d let me into as much of his heart as a straight guy could, let us become friends…let his guard down in other words…and there I was sticking the old knife into him. It didn’t matter that I was just a teenager horsing around, that I hadn’t meant to insult him.
So of course I babbled some pathetic apologies and he shook his head and rolled his eyes and I think he forgot about it by the time we got to OC but I felt like an ass the rest of the trip. Well I’ve never used that expression again, but more to the point, it drove home to me how you can just casually absorb things from the culture around you that you never would if you thought about them even a little. Or more specifically, if you had a face you could connect them to. Especially the face of someone you like very much.
I voted yes on Prop 8. I lived to regret that vote and I wrote about it here. I also ended up apologizing to my gay neighbors. In my case, loving my neighbors as myself really meant loving my literal neighbors.
This passage leaped out at me…
There’s nothing like the immediacy of an idea to drive its meaning home. Which is to say, when I vote to deny someone else the same rights I enjoy, there’s nothing quite like seeing that person every day to realize what exactly it is I’ve done.
(Emphasis hers) We are not gods and other people are not demons. Sometimes you say or do the wrong thing and it isn’t always out of malice, it could simply be you just didn’t know any better…until you saw the look on their face. And then it hits you. And…you learn from it. And you grow a little bit. What separates the bigot from everyone else is when you can do that, when you can look at the stranger, the different Other, and see a neighbor…a friend…yourself…
Please watch and share this touching video from Randi Reitan. She and her son Jacob are friends of TWO; they let me stay at their house during part of the time I was undercover getting “reparative therapy” at the Bachmann clinic last year.
Jake’s grandparents live in Washington State, which just this month passed a law granting same-sex couples the freedom to marry. Rev. John and Dorothy Reitan have been married for nearly 70 years and have nine grandchildren, two of whom are gay; Rev. John is also a Lutheran pastor. They recorded this video because they support their state’s marriage equality law and believe that ALL of their grandchildren deserve the right to marry the person they love. It’s a powerful statement, especially considering that a constitutionalmarriagediscriminationamendment will be put before the voters in Jake’s home state of Minnesota this November.
Tim Carpenter wrote a column in the Topeka Capital-Journal today that brought up something that I have long said: The more anti-gay activists fight our movement, the more we progress.
The number one enemy for LGBT equality has always been the closet, which renders our families invisible. The legislative conflict created by anti-gay organizations hurts us in the short term — with sharp spikes in intolerance and even violence. But it also forces many people to come out and confront friends and family members. This inevitably leads to greater understanding — with the final stop being equal rights under the law.
Now comes a University of Kansas political scientist — working in the hotbed of opposition seven years ago to the amendment — who believes national advocacy since the 1990s for state laws and constitutional amendments against same-sex unions to have fostered public empathy for gay and lesbian partners and their families.
“If it hadn’t been for states pushing to ban same-sex marriages, people might not have been exposed to personal, often very tragic, stories of difficulties that gay couples experience without benefit of marriage,” said Don Haider-Markel. “It’s an ironic outcome.”
Haider-Markel, with a research emphasis on U.S. gay and lesbian political movements, said evidence could be found by exploring movement since 2003 in states to legalize same-sex marriage or civil unions.
“We have seen broader changing attitudes in the past 30 years as well as an increasing number of people saying they know somebody who is gay or lesbian,” Haider-Markel said.
Thank you Brian Brown and Maggie Gallagher. While your nasty crusades to strip a minority of their rights may pay your bills today — these efforts will backfire and ensure equality in the future.
The sponsor of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill, David Bahati, is practically begging the United States to cut off aid if his grotesque bill is passed.
“If there was any condition to force the Western world to stop giving us money,” David Bahati told Josh Kron of the New York Times. “I would like that.”
Newsflash to Bahati: The United States does not need Uganda and 99-percent of our citizens would not notice if every last nickel was withdrawn from the dictatorship. Indeed, in a time of economic distress at home, many people are questioning whether we should be sending our hard earned tax dollars to places like Uganda — that may not represent our interests and values.
If Uganda passes this hideous violation of human rights the US should take six actions:
1) Cut off all aid to Uganda.
2) Work to ensure LGBT Ugandans can escape their country’s tyrants and resettle to more friendly nations.
3) Offer legal immunity for LGBT Ugandans who defend themselves and their families in the face of state terror. Everyone is entitled to a vigorous self-defense and is not required to sheepishly walk into the hands of security forces that would violate international human rights standards and lock them in prison for life and throw away the key — or worse.
4) Congressional hearings about the involvement of American evangelicals in egging on Uganda’s anti-gay hysteria — that has already led to fear, violence, and death of gay activists.
5) Evidence should be compiled to eventually take to the International Criminal Court to prosecute Bahati, Martin Ssempa, and the Americans involved with this anti-gay bill.
6) A travel ban to the United States for all Ugandan officials
The most cynical part of violent tyrants like the oddly gay-obsessed Bahati is that he claims attempts by the West to stop the human rights violations are “neocolonialism.” In fact, Bahati had no problem when American Christian colonialists like The Family (aka The Fellowship), Rick Warren, and Lou Engle embraced him and made Uganda their right wing experiment. As Bahati pointed out, Uganda became their virulently anti-gay laboratory because the Americans admitted that it was “too late” to pass such heinous laws in the U.S.
Furthermore, I would still like to know why a Ugandan General was at a party at the same hotel where the Values Voter Summit was taking place last year in Washington. What unsavory plotting and planning may have been taking place? Who were the evangelicals who may have been involved with undermining US foreign policy and promoting violent homophobia overseas?
Finally, the Obama administration should not forget Bahati’s insult today against the President. He told the Times: “The good thing with the West is that we know that Obama can influence the world only up to 2016. That’s definite.”
The Obama Administration should recognize exactly what the Republican-embracing Bahati does — that as long as Obama occupies the White House, America can reduce our financial obligations abroad by cutting off Uganda like a midnight drunk at the bar.
If the hate bill is passed, the rabidly euphoric anti-gay celebrations would eventually die down. Ugandans would soon realize that the money from Uncle Sam has dried up. In short order, the public would turn on Bahati and others of his ilk who put their prejudices before the best interests of their nation.
And if I’m wrong and they still support Bahati in the face of poverty, economic and diplomatic isolation? Well, then it is rather clear that our money would be better spent elsewhere — like in more tolerant nations or fixing the aging infrastructure back home.
It is simply unacceptable that American citizens would be asked to continue subsidizing anti-LGBT violence and discrimination.
TWO’s John Becker wrote yesterday about the Rev. Marcel Guarnizo, the Maryland priest who denied Communion and disrupted a parish funeral on Saturday because the deceased woman’s daughter, Barbara Johnson, happened to be a lesbian.
Today the Washington Post reported that “the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington is commenting only with a brief statement that says the priest’s actions were against ‘policy’ and that officials would be looking into the incident as a personnel issue.”
As if to pre-empt possible hope for compassion and inclusion, the archdiocese implied that Guarnizo’s mistake was merely in being so public:
“In matters of faith and morals, the Church has the responsibility of teaching and of bringing the light of the Gospel message to the circumstances of our day,” the archdiocese said in a statement. “When questions arise about whether or not an individual should present themselves for communion, it is not the policy of the Archdiocese of Washington to publicly reprimand the person. Any issues regarding the suitability of an individual to receive communion should be addressed by the priest with that person in a private, pastoral setting.”
Johnson’s brother Larry cautioned against turning the incident into a discussion about gay rights or Catholicism.
“We agreed this is not a discussion about gay rights, or about the teachings of the Catholic Church,” he said. “We’re not in this to Catholic-bash. That’s the farthest thing from our minds. We just want the public square to have knowledge of what this priest did.”
Larry asked whether some church priests are becoming “state of grace” police, and whether that trend is “consistent with the teachings of Christianity.”
At least one Washington-area Catholic conservative came to Guarnizo’s defense, stating, “The blame here is not on the priest, but on Barbara Johnson.” This blogger asserts that antigay forces are “losing the battle over same sex marriage” because the church hierarchy is too charitable toward homosexuals — and too harsh toward “faithful” priests.
