“Dr. Tam was Asian-American. One of the things I asked him is I reminded him of the really shameful history that California has in terms of discrimination against Asian-Americans. There were actually laws less than a hundred years ago that prohibited Asian-Americans and Caucasians from marrying, and if they did marry they lost various property rights. I asked him how he would feel today if the state of California was telling him how he could get married and to whom he could get married. He said he wouldn’t like it but he also said it didn’t change his mind. I think that in some senses that too was one of my favorite moments because it showed the extent to which certain views are beyond reason. It says why you need to have constitutional protection for minority rights,” said David Boies.
“Make no mistake: every major, reputable professional psychological and medical association has stated that not only is there no evidence supporting the possibility of changing somebody’s sexual orientation, but that such programs harm those involved; depression and suicide are all-too-common in the ex-gay world.
Below are some of the strangest and most disturbing techniques ex-gay leaders use in their failed attempts to turn their victims — who are tragically struggling to reconcile their faith with their sexuality — straight,” writes Ted Cox
“The bottom line in looking at the census data, which has massive sample size and therefore tremendous statistical power, is that there’s no deficit in these same-sex couples for their children, that their children do just fine. This is a fundamental finding because this is something that people have been wondering about and haven’t been able to find data for. So, actually, if you look at the data which is the best data that we have and maybe the best data we’re ever going to have on same-sex couples and their children, the data show pretty clearly that their children do just fine. Instead of worrying about the problems of same-sex couples raising children, what we really need to worry about is getting the state out of the business of raising children and letting families do the job that they already know how to do. The group that isn’t doing a good job raising children is the state. The orphanages, foster care, the shelters – they’re no substitute for family. The children who are in those environments are dramatically worse in school than the children who are in families. What we really need to focus on is moving children out of the orphanages and into families. The real problem that we have is not that gay and lesbian couples want to adopt kids. The real problem we have is that there aren’t enough of them to adopt the kids who are in the orphanages and the shelters that we have,” says Michael Rosenfeld, Associate Professor of Sociology at Stanford
Ken Mehlman said that he plans to be an advocate for gay rights within the GOP, that he remains proud to be a Republican, and that his political identity is not defined by any one issue.
“What I will try to do is to persuade people, when I have conversations with them, that it is consistent with our party’s philosophy, whether it’s the principle of individual freedom, or limited government, or encouraging adults who love each other and who want to make a lifelong committment to each other to get married.”
“I hope that we, as a party, would welcome gay and lesbian supporters. I also think there needs to be, in the gay community, robust and bipartisan support [for] marriage rights.”
If I had to say what one thing really moved me to create this site it would be the 2004 reelection campaign of George W. Bush, the most homophobic national campaign in history. That campaign was run by one of the nation’s worst closeted individuals, Ken Mehlman.
Even fending off advances from male cadets can create problems. “You can’t say, ‘Sorry guys, I’m gay,’ ” the senior [female cadet] said. “And if I say, ‘I have a boyfriend,’ I’m breaking the honor code.” Breaching the Cadet Honor Code — “a cadet will not lie, cheat, steal or tolerate those who do” — can result in serious discipline.
“The general trajectory has them transitioning from minstrel acts and punch lines to relatable everyday characters,” says David Hauslaib, founder of @Queerty.
“Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people have stories that are capturing the imaginations of Americans because fundamentally, we’re as American as everyone else,” says Jarrett Barrios, president of @GLAAD.
“But if the Right does sacrifice California, either by choice or because the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals finds they lack standing to pursue the case, the groundwork has been laid. Americans of all political stripes believe that their gay friends and family members have the right to equal protection under the law, and there is now a solid legal and factual precedent to back it up, shaped in large part by a conservative lawyer, filed by a conservative judge, and echoed by the traditions of a nation devoted to fairness and respect,” says Michael B. Keegan.
When coming upon a conversation questioning the wholeness of human beings who happen to be gay or transgender, feel free to use the text below as your response. An anti-lgbt homophobic religious bigot isn’t worth a long rebuttal. And since many bigots don’t fully understand the context of the lifestyle they’ve chosen, you can help bring them immediate and damning clarity with these words..
Dear _______,
I read your comment regarding _______.
Please don’t romanticize your banal anti-gay bigotry as sourced in ancient texts or in the mind of a god being or in any elevated place outside of your self. You made the choice to stand with the racists, the anti-Semites, the sexists; their sin is now yours. You’ve chosen to be a supremacist, like them. Own it.
If you’ve never looked at racists, anti-Semites or sexists and wondered why they can’t see how misguided their views are, why they seem trapped in their bigoted mindset, now’s your chance. You and they are of the same ilk. Face a mirror. Don’t look away.
Steadfast in my belief that you can leave this immoral supremacist lifestyle,
_______
Don’t hesitate to personalize the text. Just remember, edit for clarity and brevity.
“Life is profoundly & naturally diverse in almost every characteristic you can think of. The sexuality characteristic is no exception.
To believe homosexuality is an unwhole, broken, unhealthy, corrupt, wicked, unnatural, abnormal or sinful characteristic just because you infer that it is from reading an ancient text written by men a thousand or so years ago is BIZARRE, DUMB, BARBARIC, and WICKED.
Sexual orientation manifests itself, as most people who are introspective and honest can attest, along a spectrum. That a minority of human beings discover themselves to be attracted to and affectionate for people of the same-sex is not, in fact, any of the negative things described above.
Having a gay sexual orientation is natural, normal and a beautiful variation of life.
But let’s stop debating the worth of LGBT people or whether they should be welcomed at all the various important institutions and traditions people create life around. They ought to be welcomed. Anything less is absolutely yet another supremacist view about yet another minority group.
Be assured, there will be a time not too long from now in which your descendants will wonder what side of this absurd debate about the humanity of yet another minority group you came down on. Don’t make the same mistake many of our own living ancestors made when a different minority’s worth and place at society’s various tables were being debated.
The only debate worth having here is how much damage these sorts of debates have on young people who are just discovering their gay sexual orientation and how hurtful it is to see otherwise intelligent people making anything other than whole hearted support for them as people.” ~@PatrickYaeger
On Responding to Anti-Gay Religious Bigots
When coming upon a conversation questioning the wholeness of human beings who happen to be gay or transgender, feel free to use the text below as your response. An anti-lgbt homophobic religious bigot isn’t worth a long rebuttal. And since many bigots don’t fully understand the context of the lifestyle they’ve chosen, you can help bring them immediate and damning clarity with these words..
Don’t hesitate to personalize the text. Just remember, edit for clarity and brevity.
via @PatrickYaeger.