French President Hollande Signs Marriage Bill
The Daily Agenda for Saturday, May 18
Fox News Ignores Marriage Equality Wins
The Era of Civil Unions Is Coming To An End
Orthodox Priests Lead Violent Attack On LGBT Rights Rally in Tbilisi, Georgia
France's Marriage Equality Bill Clears Final Hurdle
The Daily Agenda for Friday, May 17
Marriage Equality Made This Maryland Legislator Drive Drunk
Featured Reports
What Are Little Boys Made Of?
In this original BTB Investigation, we unveil the tragic story of Kirk Murphy, a four-year-old boy who was treated for “cross-gender disturbance” in 1970 by a young grad student by the name of George Rekers. This story is a stark reminder that there are severe and damaging consequences when therapists try to ensure that boys will be boys.
Slouching Towards Kampala: Uganda’s Deadly Embrace of Hate
When we first reported on three American anti-gay activists traveling to Kampala for a three-day conference, we had no idea that it would be the first report of a long string of events leading to a proposal to institute the death penalty for LGBT people. But that is exactly what happened. In this report, we review our collection of more than 500 posts to tell the story of one nation’s embrace of hatred toward gay people. This report will be updated continuously as events continue to unfold. Check here for the latest updates.
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.
News, analysis and fact-checking of anti-gay rhetoric
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Désirée
January 10th, 2010 | LINK
The idea of people essentially being forced to flee their homes for fear of death makes me want to weep. The idea that a place like Simply Blue exists gives me a little hope.
Ben in Oakland
January 10th, 2010 | LINK
As with so many “native” cultures, it took Christianity to introduce the idea that some kinds of sex were ok, and all of the others were bad, with homosex being the worst. The very tale of the ugandan king who was going to “rape” all of those young men is probably a good example of how anti-homo Chrsitianity turned something that was probably well accepted into something that was closer to the tale of Sodom than how Uganadans at the time percevied it.
Japan had a highly homoerotic culture among the samurai. and although tye are not particularly homophobic now, neither are they particularly accepting of something that waso nce considered ihghly noble.
Likewise, Hawai’i had the tradition of the ‘aikane, which has been pablumized to “bosom buddy.” I’ll say! ‘ai refers to sex, though it also refers to eating. Kane means man. you do the math.
My understanding is that homosex was considered quite normal in polynesian society, and the mahu, what we would now call transgendered, are still quite accepted in Hawai’i, though actual homosex not so much.
Thanks to the mormons, Samoa and Tonga are now highly homophobic, when they didn’t used to be.
Regan DuCasse
January 11th, 2010 | LINK
Absolutely right Ben. And all those locations more closely resembled Eden than anywhere else on Earth.
First Peoples had a little simpler view of men and women. The considered the fusion of man and woman a blessed thing, not something to fear or abhor.And actually, this shows an understanding of reality in the human world, instead of building artificial boundaries which inevitably can only be challenged just by existence.
It’s a shame that Eastern and African people and Native Americans have been forced to forget that by the influence of Christianity on these cultures.
Certainly has proven to be wasteful and restrictive of otherwise productive and talented people.
Just as religion based misogyny and racism has been wasteful of that same potential in other members of humanity.
anteros
January 11th, 2010 | LINK
And so what if it were “un-African” (which it clearly isnt)… should everything deemed “un-African” be criminalized? Is it even possible to define “un-African”, considering the continent’s massive population, its constantly changing cultural and social values and its incredibly vast diversity which includes countless minority groups such as LGBT? Whatever happened to protecting minority groups from discrimination and intolerance from the “majority”? It would seem, judging by the sadder parts of African history… that the protection of African minority groups is “un-African”.
anteros
January 11th, 2010 | LINK
…”un-African” …as though Africa were some distant utopian planet that would crash and burn upon any interaction with anything “alien” (as defined by a loud group of assuming “leaders”). What would Africa look like today, if all things deemed “un-African” were vigorously rejected by African leaders? What would education, healthcare, infrastructure, industry and technology in Africa look like today?
Ephilei
January 12th, 2010 | LINK
Africa, to my knowledge, is the strongest example of cultures having a history of same-sex marriage. When someone says same-sex marriage is new, I always point them to female-female marriages in southern Africa.
One example:
http://www.tribune.com.ng/19062009/opinion.html
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