I would like to point out that Rep. Leonard Lance of New Jersey’s 7th has a distinct “R” behind his name. Jon Runyan of New Jersey’s 3rd does as well. So does Frank LoBiondo of New Jersey’s 2nd.
These are Northeastern Republicans, of course, and their willingness to be human toward gay people says nothing about the dominant provincial elements of the Republican party, but just the same — when Republicans and Democrats are getting together to tell LGBT kids that it gets better, well then, it’s actually getting better.
Oh, he doesn’t say it in those words, but that’s the basic gist. If schools teach that bullying people because of their sexual orientation or gender identity is bad, it will conflict with the religious bullying that comes from the pulpit, from kids’ wingnut families and from their little miniature minions, who otherwise might not be able to tell gay kids that they’re going to hell. From his press release:
“Schools administrators and teachers must ensure a safe and protective learning environment for all students, but they can do so without injecting divisive ‘sexual orientation’ and radical ‘transgender’ politics into the classroom,” LaBarbera said. “There is a real danger that ‘anti-bullying’ policies will be used to curtail any speech in schools critical of homosexuality, and create curricula that discriminate against religious students who believe homosexual behavior is morally wrong.”
[...]
LaBarbera also opposes a federal bill, the Safe Schools Improvement Act (SSIA) — supported by Senate Democrats and lone Republican Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL) — as “a Trojan Horse that would push politically correct agendas about homosexuality and ‘transgenderism’ in schools in the name of stopping bullying.”
LaBarbera said a key anti-bullying watchdog — BullyPolice.org — specifically recommends AGAINST “defining victims” in bullying legislation: “Defining victims will slow the process of lawmaking, dividing political parties who will argue over which victims get special rights over other victims,” states a BullyPolice document suggesting a model anti-bullying law.
Hold up. Peter is playing with words here, because he knows his readers are stupid. The document in question does indeed recommend against defining victims, but their point is very different from Peter’s. BullyPolice is saying that all cases of bullying, for whatever reason, need to be treated equally. Peter is trying to protect the rights of religious bigots to spiritually bully LGBT kids on campus. It should be noted [because liars won't] that BullyPolice, on their front page, specifically congratulates New Jersey for their new, update anti-bullying law, which they give a grade of A++. Indeed, the new law had the fervent support of all the major LGBT equality organizations in the state, and was passed in the wake of Tyler Clementi’s suicide.
As an addendum to the press release, Peter says this:
AFTAH is joining Mission America April 1-2 in Columbus, OH to co-sponsor an educational “Truth Academy” on how to respond to the aggressive homosexual-bisexual-transsexual agenda; the theme is: “The Hate Labeling of Christians: Why it’s Happening and What We Can Do.”
Let’s save Peter a trip to Ohio. Why is the hate labeling of no, not “Christians,” but fundamentalist extremists like Peter, happening? Because they’re rank bigots. What can they do? Stop being bigots.
There. Saved you some money. Take your family to the Creation Museum instead, where they can learn about how Adam and Eve had pet dinosaurs and the debbil plants fossils in the backyard to deceive people.
A Rutgers University freshman posted a goodbye message on his Facebook page before jumping to his death after his roommate secretly filmed him during a “sexual encounter” in his dorm room and posted it live on the Internet.
Items belonging to 18-year-old Rutgers student Tyler Clementi were found by the George Washington Bridge last week, according to authorities. Clementi’s freshman ID card and driver’s license were in the wallet.
Clementi’s post on his Facebook page, dated Sept. 22 at 8:42 p.m. read, “Jumping off the gw bridge sorry.”
[...]
Paul Mainardi, the attorney representing the Clementi family, released a statement confirming Clementi’s suicide.
“Tyler was a fine young man, and a distinguished musician. The family is heartbroken beyond words. They respectfully request that they be given time to grieve their great loss and that their privacy at this painful time be respected by all,” Mainardi said.
Two students, Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei, have been charged with two counts each of invasion of privacy after allegedly placing a camera in Clementi’s room and livestreaming the recording online on Sept. 19, according to a written statement by New Jersey’s Middlesex County Prosecutor Bruce Kaplan.
Garden State Equality released the following statement:
Garden State Equality
For immediate release
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Statement of Garden State Equality Chair Steven Goldstein
All of us at Garden State Equality are in a state of shock over one of the most unconscionable, hate-related deaths of a student in the history of the State of New Jersey. Today we learned that a Rutgers freshman committed suicide by jumping off the George Washington Bridge after his roommate and other students apparently broadcast the freshman – without his knowledge – making out with another man. According to reports, the other students disseminated the video widely by Twitter. The freshman was seemingly so distraught, he leapt to his death.
There are no words sufficient to express our range of feelings today. We are outraged at the perpetrators. We are heartbroken over the tragic loss of a young man who, by all accounts, was brilliant, talented and kind. And we are sickened that anyone in our society, such as the students allegedly responsible for making the surreptitious video, might consider destroying others’ lives as a sport. As this case makes its way through the legal system, we can only hope the alleged perpetrators receive the maximum possible sentence.
That the victim’s roommate was also a freshman, just months out of high school, demonstrates once again that our high schools are not doing enough to educate their students that harassment, intimidation and bullying of other students is unacceptable in every instance. It is grotesque to think that people such as these alleged perpetrators went onto college without, apparently, ever having been taught basic life lessons of decency – and that they made their way through the educational system before allegedly committing this unconscionable act.
Garden State Equality is currently working on a new anti-school bullying bill that if enacted, would be the nation’s strongest such law. It would follow the three anti-bullying laws the state has enacted since 2002, all of which include bullying based on sexual orientation and gender identity and expression.
We have also reached out to the Rutgers University administration and LGBT campus groups. We will keep you apprised of developments.
We are sickened.
So are we. NorthJersey.com has more background on Tyler, who was, of course, described as well-loved by all, musically gifted, shy and kind. Sounds like me at that age.
Last month, the Burlington County, New Jersey, public library director Gail Sweet — acting in violation of library guidelines – censored the book Revolutionary Voices: A Multicultural Queer Youth Anthology. She acted in collaboration with Christian Rightists who had succeeded in censoring the same book at Rancocas Valley Regional High School in May. Both actions were effected solely on the basis of antigay bigotry; in the view of the censors, all literature relating to youth and sexual orientation constitutes “child pornography.” Anti-censorship, free-speech, and pro-equality advocates mounted an ongoing resistance campaign.
Today, a few weeks later, the Cookeville Herald Citizen in Tennessee reported that the Alliance Defense Fund and local evangelical author Ilene Vick are suing the Putnam County Library for prohibiting the use of a public room by her evangelical book club.
The newspaper cites the library’s policies for room use:
* Library activities have priority over any outside pre-arranged or regularly scheduled groups or events.
* Bookings for meeting rooms are to be arranged through the reference librarian no less than 24 hours before the meeting.
* Meeting rooms are available for public gatherings of a civic, cultural or educational character. Rooms are not available for meetings of social, political, partisan or religious purposes; for the benefit of private individuals or commercial concerns; for the presentation of one side of controversial matters; or when in the judgment of the Library Board, disorder may be likely to occur.
* The rooms may be used by joint committees or associations from more than one church for business, educational, and cultural transactions when no religious services are involved.
Christian Right media outfit OneNewsNow joined the ADF in asserting that Christian Rightists enjoy a special right to bypass any usage restrictions and to evangelize wherever they please.
Should an atheist, Buddhist feminist, Jewish environmentalist, or gay conservative author seek to use the Putnam County library’s meeting room, I’m betting that ADF, OneNewsNow, and all of their friends will threaten the author — not the library. Censorship is great — until you’re not the one being denied access to the public.
On Thursday, the New Jersey Senate ended the chance for approval of homosexual “marriage” [sic] in the legislature, but the fight to push the measure through continues.
…[D]espite the defeat, says Greg Quinlan of New Jersey Family First, homosexuals will continue to push for approval. “The homosexual lobby has threatened now to go back to the New Jersey Supreme Court to have them change the definition of marriage as courts have imposed it in other states like Iowa and Massachusetts,” he explains.
Not taking “no” for an answer? You betcha! And why would that be, Greg? Well, you see, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled in 2006 (Lewis v. Harris) that it’s unconstitutional to give lesser rights to same-sex couples and deferred to the Legislature to correct the problem. The legislature shirked its responsibility, and so now, we go back to the courts.
Capisce?
Let us know if there’s anything else we need to clear up for you people.
What happened when the New Jersey Senate vote on marriage equality went down? If you skip to around 1:12 in this video, you’ll see a woman named Aughtney Khan, whose religion apparently trumps her humanity, and whose expression of joy at the prospect of hurting gay people can be described as nothing less than unmitigated, sadistic glee. She appears to be a normal human being, but then the religious programming* kicks in:
And oh lookie, she’s a minister. Isn’t that the kind of mentally stable person you want leading you spiritually?
*And look, I’m not knocking all religious faith. I’m knocking the kind that causes people to lose their moral compasses and their humanity, in the service of meaningless, unfalsifiable dogma. The kind that causes people to rejoice in the suffering of their neighbors. In short, I’m knocking religious sadism.
UPDATE: Ah, but it looks like they’ll be going back to court, and Garden State Equality seems to think they’re in a better position to win than they were a few months back.
The New Jersey Civil Rights Division has ruled that a church group broke the law by refusing to rent out its beachfront property to a same-sex couple for a civil-union ceremony.
“Our position remains the same,” said Brian Raum, senior legal counsel for ADF. “Religious organizations have a right to use their property in a way that’ consistent with their religious beliefs.
“It’ clear, based on Supreme Court decisions, that religious organizations have a First Amendment right to associate with messages that they agree with.”
According to the Newark Star-Ledger, the civil rights division ruled that a lawsuit may proceed, not that any law had been broken.
The Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association violated the terms of a special tax exemption which it received in exchange for granting public access to public boardwalk pavilion.
In short, the association sought, accepted for years, and ultimately misused public tax benefits to discriminate against members of the general public.
At no time was the association required to use its private property in a manner inconsistent with its beliefs.
The Star-Ledger elaborates:
Lawrence Lustberg, cooperating attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, called the decision “a spectacular victory.”
“The primary message of the decision is once you open your facility to the general public, then it’s got to remain open on a non-discriminatory basis,” Lustberg said.
In a second ruling Monday, the Civil Rights Division said that the Camp Meeting Association did not discriminate against another lesbian couple that applied to use the pavilion for their civil union ceremony in April 2007. That’s because by then, the group had stopped renting out the pavilion entirely.
The association and its religious-right allies — preoccupied with financial gain at taxpayer expense — continue to distract public attention from a very simple choice that they face:
Either treat all taxpayers equally, or refuse taxpayer subsidies.
In a Nov. 26 press release, ex-gay ministry network Exodus International says it’s “disappointed” and “saddened” that matchmaking company eHarmony is launching a dating site for GLBT singles.
Now, we’ve heard a lot about eHarmony of late: The site founded to serve Christian unmarrieds in 2000 initially discriminated against gays and lesbians seeking mates. Recently, the company announced plans to open CompatiblePartners.net, a companion site that will serve the GLBT community. Some have reacted with glee, while others find eHarmony’s separate-site approach to attracting gay dollars offensive. Still, this is the first time we’ve heard an entity admit to feeling sadness over the matter.
Exodus had wanted the issue surrounding eHarmony’s former no-gays-allowed policy settled by a judge. Two years ago, a gay man filed suit, claiming the company’s old plan violated New Jersey’s anti-discrimination law, which covers sexual orientation. (Exodus, interestingly, felt the need to surround the words “sexual orientation” with quotation marks.) Rather than risk a negative outcome in court, eHarmony decided to found CompatiblePartners.net as a way to settle the legal complaint.
This makes Exodus President Alan Chambers sad.
“Raising a white flag of surrender over foundational Christian principles cannot be an option when we truly believe that such truths are the gateway to freedom and new life,” Chambers said in the release. “The Bible is clear that homosexual relationships were never part of God’s creative design for humanity, nor is it His best plan for individuals. Those of us who have experienced the emptiness of gay life know that promoting it will inevitably lead to more heartache for many.”
What this has to do with the way in which a business chooses to operate escapes us. And what does eHarmony’s outreach to prospective gay and lesbian clients have to do with Exodus’ work? The group leadership says again and again that ex-gay ministries and likeminded reparative therapists exist to help those seeking relief from unwanted same-sex desires. In order to make a profit, eHarmony seeks to serve those looking to act on those desires. How does this threaten the work of Exodus and its hundreds of affiliates?
Chambers should take comfort knowing that eHarmony’s new GLBT-focused site may clear the decks, so to speak, so he can avoid wasting time on happy gays and more easily locate and “save” those not so accepting of their sexuality. And he shouldn’t take the existence of gay men and lesbians being happy and well-adjusted as a cause of misery — that’s just… sad.
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