News, analysis and fact-checking of anti-gay rhetoric
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Posts via daily email:A Beautiful Ad Supporting Marriage
Timothy Kincaid
May 7th, 2009
The ad Equality California should have ran a year ago.
Latest Posts
The Baptist Standard calls out Texas Baptists on their hypocrisy
Canada's Anglicans oppose Uganda's 'Kill Gays' bill
A review of the Manhattan Declaration
NJ Democrats Wiggle and Waffle
Texas kid beaten with metal pole, entirely preventable
Austria gets civil partnerships
Featured Reports
David Benkof: Behind the Mask
At first glance, David Benkof appears to be a young gay man who believes that same-sex marriage will damage the institution of marriage, that there are better options for gay couples than marriage, that the community should join him in prioritizing other more pressing issues, and that the marriage discussion is harming the efforts of gay couples in red states to get recognition for their unions. He also claims that he’s a gay columnist, that he speaks for an influential collection of gay thinkers, and that he is part of the gay and lesbian community and that he shares our goals and dreams. But none of that is true.
“Repeat After Me”: The Reparative Therapy Echo Chamber
The April 2008 edition of the pay-to-publish vanity journal Psychological Reports featured a new report from NARTH. Written by NARTH president A. Dean Byrd, past president Joseph Nicolosi, and Richard W. Potts, the report carries the unwieldy but self-descriptive title, “Clients perceptions of how reorientation therapy and self-help can promote changes in sexual orientation.” While the title describes what the authors meant to show — how clients describe the benefits of reparative therapy — the report itself actually illustrates something very different: the ex-gay movement’s remarkable ability to instill an almost robot-like parroting of ex-gay rhetoric among their clients.
Testing the Premise: Is MRSA The New Gay Plague?
The Toronto Star said that a new study “discover[ed] a new strain” of a super-bug “hitting gay men.” Headlines in Britain screamed, “Flesh-eating bug strikes San Francisco’s gay community,” and anti-gay extremists across America spread the alarm that gays were introducing another plague into “the general population.” But there was a small problem with all of this: None of it is true!
Paul Cameron’s World
In 2005, the Southern Poverty Law Center wrote that “[Paul] Cameron’s ‘science’ echoes Nazi Germany.” What the SPLC didn”t know was Cameron doesn’t just “echo” Nazi Germany. He quoted extensively from one of the Final Solution’s architects. This puts his fascination with quarantines, mandatory tattoos, and extermination being a “plausible idea” in a whole new and deeply disturbing light.
From the Inside: Focus on the Family’s “Love Won Out”
On February 10, I attended an all-day “Love Won Out” ex-gay conference in Phoenix, put on by Focus on the Family and Exodus International. In this series of reports, I talk about what I learned there: the people who go to these conferences, the things that they hear, and what this all means for them, their families and for the rest of us.
Prologue: Why I Went To “Love Won Out”
Part 1: What’s Love Got To Do With It?
Part 2: Parents Struggle With “No Exceptions”
Part 3: A Whole New Dialect
Part 4: It Depends On How The Meaning of the Word "Change" Changes
Part 5: A Candid Explanation For "Change"
The Heterosexual Agenda: Exposing The Myths
At last, the truth can now be told.
Using the same research methods employed by most anti-gay political pressure groups, we examine the statistics and the case studies that dispel many of the myths about heterosexuality. Download your copy today!
And don't miss our companion report, How To Write An Anti-Gay Tract In Fifteen Easy Steps.
Testing The Premise: Are Gays A Threat To Our Children?
Anti-gay activists often charge that gay men and women pose a threat to children. In this report, we explore the supposed connection between homosexuality and child sexual abuse, the conclusions reached by the most knowledgeable professionals in the field, and how anti-gay activists continue to ignore their findings. This has tremendous consequences, not just for gay men and women, but more importantly for the safety of all our children.
Straight From The Source: What the “Dutch Study” Really Says About Gay Couples
Anti-gay activists often cite the “Dutch Study” to claim that gay unions last only about 1½ years and that the these men have an average of eight additional partners per year outside of their steady relationship. In this report, we will take you step by step into the study to see whether the claims are true.
The FRC’s Briefs Are Showing
Tony Perkins’ Family Research Council submitted an Amicus Brief to the Maryland Court of Appeals as that court prepared to consider the issue of gay marriage. We examine just one small section of that brief to reveal the junk science and fraudulent claims of the Family “Research” Council.
Review: The Gay Report
When Karla Jay and Allan Young published The Gay Report in 1979, it quickly a favorite source of statistics for many anti-gay extremists. But before you accepts these statistic at face value, you should examine the inner workings of this survey very carefully. What you learn might surprise you.
Daniel Fetty Doesn’t Count
The FBI’s annual Hate Crime Statistics aren’t as complete as they ought to be, and their report for 2004 was no exception. In fact, their most recent report has quite a few glaring holes. Holes big enough for Daniel Fetty to fall through.
Lindoro
May 7th, 2009 | LINK
Agreed. This is running a year late. Too bad the gay apologists needed to spend millions and millions apologizing for wanting to marry.
This is the campaign that should have run. Beautiful job.
Tavdy
May 7th, 2009 | LINK
That actually brought a lump to my throat. That really is about the best compliment possible.
gar
May 7th, 2009 | LINK
Good. Perfect. Excellent. Now that I know they are running ads of this caliber, I can feel good about giving them money again.
Bruno
May 7th, 2009 | LINK
EQCA may have bungled the campaign, but they’re a solid organization with a lot of pull, and they mean well. Here’s to hoping they know what’s needed in the coming years to win back equality in California.
Regan DuCasse
May 7th, 2009 | LINK
Yes, and these ads should show how long the couple has been together, should show their beautiful healthy and loving children, show them in uniform if they are serving in the military or law enforcement.
Mores the point, it’s the opposition that has to prove how wrong all this is for society and just how much harm is done by showing these caring, normal and committed people who are and have always been a part of the human race for all time.
We know they can’t. It doesn’t exist to the extent these couples and families do.
And boy…do they know that…
Clancy
May 8th, 2009 | LINK
I think Regan has an excellent point. Instead of trying to convince everyone we deserve marriage, we should show who we are and leave the burden of proof to the anti-gays trying to stop/take away our rights. It really should be on them anyway.
Ben in Oakland
May 8th, 2009 | LINK
Funny about this. I received the following from an EQCA guy yesterday in response to several emails I have sent them regarding their requests for money.
Ben,
Thank you for your email. I am sorry that you are upset and disappointed with Equality California.With your past support, we supported the No on 8 campaign.
The campaign hired the best strategists and pollsters and we were able to move California 20 points on same sex marriage but we were not able to win.
You are correct. More of the same will not work.
I hope that you will see our new ads and the field campaign that will engage voters face to face, door to door as a first and strategic step in changing course and winning back marriage. Again, your past support and your feedback are most appreciated.
My response was perhaps less than perfectly gracious. Let’s see what they do with it.
Dear Sean:
Thank you for your email. I’m not sure which email you are referring to. I’ve sent a number of them over the past few months.
I will say this. I spent a lot of time and energy trying to get someone, anyone, to listen to me on this. No one was interested. The disdain was palpable. I got treated like a crazy person by no less a person than Mark Leno. I’m not. I finally just gave up and did what I could on my own.
As I wrote in a piece that was published in the BAR, that closeted attitude from which the campaign was run was the problem. It may make sense for people immersed in that political culture, but it makes no sense in my world, and never has. The enemy is The Closet, not the religious right, not social conservatives. The strategists you hired were far from the best– they were just available– if they could not understand that simple fact, and failed to notice that it hasn’t worked but once in ten years. I 100% believe that we did as well as we did not because of that closeted campaign, but despite it. That horrible Harvey Milk ad was just more of the same– closeted. I didn’t know him, though I did meet him a few times, and he influenced me tremendously. He would have hated it.
I am glad to see that EQCA is beginning to get this, and I am still willing to work with you. I am a professional photographer with 25 years experience, and would be happy to offer my services. I also wrote extensively against Prop. 8, and was published in several newspapers. I was very active against Brigg 30 years ago, writing the speaker’s bureau book that was eventually used statewide, and doing a great deal of public speaking. I am very presentable, very good at public speaking, and very knowledgeable on the issues.
Please let me know if there is something I can do.
Ben
Gabriel Arana
May 8th, 2009 | LINK
Actually, EQCA hired incredibly incompetent strategists, then fired them, then re-hired another consulting firm later. The first firm they hired had never done political consulting before. The EQCA people have been so cagey because they know they messed up.
Eddie89
May 8th, 2009 | LINK
The way I see it, ECQA got tens of millions of dollars and screwed it up.
Coming back to it’s supports and asking for more tens of millions with a promise to get it right, this time, won’t work.
Courage Campaign had the right formula from the very beginning and I think that they are on the right track today.
Sorry, ECQA. You had your chance and you failed. And that’s putting it nicely.
My money’s going to Courage Campaign.
MassachusettsLGBT
May 10th, 2009 | LINK
Marc Solomon from MassEquality is now EQCA’s point man for marriage equality. Solomon bragged that he was part of the strategy team for EQCA before the Prop 8 vote. Knowing Solomon personally, he needs to be more of a team player and especially in the strategy of following the money and in your face activism, he has ALOT to learn.
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