Last Minute Bid to Sink Marriage Bill Fails in British Commons
Will Illinois Be #13?
The Daily Agenda for Monday, May 20
Gay Man Shot To Death In NYC Hate Crime
The Daily Agenda for Sunday, May 19
French President Hollande Signs Marriage Bill
The Daily Agenda for Saturday, May 18
Fox News Ignores Marriage Equality Wins
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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Ben In Oakland
February 23rd, 2012 | LINK
I sent them some money, and my analysis of what went wrong with prop. 8– the failure to talk about bigotry, to show us and our families, to talk about and SHOW religius entities supporting us, to talk about why marriage is important to us. They ignored it last time. I hope they don’t do it again, because if they do what they did last time– and their few TV spots I’ve seen indicate they will– then we will lose aqain.
cowboy
February 23rd, 2012 | LINK
The LDS Church has paid millions for their “I am a Mormon” ads. We’d do great if we made our own similar “I am gay.” ads; ads showing our families and our diverse set of people.
I am a gay veteran. I am a gay accountant. I am a gay Sheriff. I am a gay gynecologist.
Along those lines…
Timothy Kincaid
February 23rd, 2012 | LINK
I agree…
However, I think that there is a unique opportunity, one we have never considered and which will seem foreign and uncomfortable to some of our community.
I think that if we want to win we have to make this about what it really is about – a morals issue.
We believe, as part of our moral/ethical code that it is wrong to treat people differently based on things like race, religion, ethnicity, and yes orientation. It’s not just well yeah maybe the gays can have marriage too. It is immoral and unethical to exclude gay people from equality in civil life.
And you know what? There are a lot of churches that agree with us. Even some who won’t allow gay pastors or conduct gay marriages believe – and state in their guiding documents that civil equality is a matter of “justice and mercy” and is part of the church’s mandate. It isn’t optional. It’s a godly direction.
We’ve never asked them to rise up and act as a community of believers on the commandments of God to live with justice and mercy.
And I personally believe – based on following this stuff – that now is the right time.
And think of the power behind that. A whole lot of not very religious people defer to “the church” and “the bible” without any clue what either really teach. If, say, the Methodists and the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians all call this a matter of christian duty then all of the anti-gay god crap has no power.
And besides when Aunt Thelma tells her neighbor Bessie that she’s going down to the church to paint a pro-gay marriage sign, you can bet that Bessie will accept “oh, that’s what we believe now”.
Aaron
February 23rd, 2012 | LINK
Mreh, I still feel entirely uncomfortable with the people voting on my rights.
tristram
February 23rd, 2012 | LINK
The hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church is doubling down on its anti-gay (and generally socially/sexually regressive) policies nationwide. As happened last time around in Maine, they will say whatever they have to say (however scurrilous it might be) and spend whatever they have to spend to defeat marriage equality. And unfortunately they still have enough influence (not credibility, but influence) in Maine to make it work.
Ryan
February 24th, 2012 | LINK
This is going to be a very nerve wracking election. In addition to Maine, we’ll likely have our rights put up to a vote in Washington and Maryland, too. Plus, Romney, Santorum and Gingrich have all sworn to fight us every step of the way towards equality. We could lose very big or win very big. I believe Timothy is right. The ads should feature religious leaders arguing that their rights to perform the marriages they want are being taken away. And of course, their should be gay couples and families. Lots of them.
Jay Jonson
February 24th, 2012 | LINK
Don’t forget the votes on constitutional amendments in North Carolina in May and Minnesota in November. The North Carolina election has been rigged by the Republicans to coincide with the Republican presidential primary, and we probably have no chance to win with all the wing-nuts coming out to vote, but we do have a good chance in Minnesota.
Claire
February 24th, 2012 | LINK
I went door to door in northern Maine on question 1 last time. Living in Maine these past few years(as well as the vast majority of my life), I have watched the general climate change regarding this issue.
Also, with the documentary, Question One, were were able to get some very interesting and compelling footage, that I dearly hope finds its way onto our televisions this fall.
http://youtu.be/ADqimp6QU2o
and an actual trailer:
http://youtu.be/0Qc2fwGNLv4
With how close it came last time, taking into account the climate change on this issue, I’m very hopeful.
On the issue of the public voting on a minority’s rights, I agree with Aaron, it makes me uncomfortable. However, if we can win in the ballot box at just one state, it changes a great deal of the dialogue. Marriage equality is no longer being ‘forced on states by legislatures and judges’ it becomes the choice of a population in one of our 50 states. That is as powerful as it is compelling.
Now, once we get this whole marriage thing sorted out, can we please work more on a gender identity inclusive ENDA? As a transgendered lesbian, I would really appreciate it. Given that I’m legally male still, I can marry my partner right now, but I’m working on this for our larger community. It would be very nice of all you GLBs out there to reciprocate.
Please.
Reed
February 24th, 2012 | LINK
Timothy –
Your commentary about “a unique opportunity, one we have never considered” and “We’ve never asked them to rise up and act as a community of believers on the commandments of God to live with justice and mercy . . ?”
Well, gosh . . . this part of “we” has been asking (nicely, until I gave up ‘nice’ for Lent one year – and firmly, politely, pleadingly, and pleasanter variations of request) for days and weeks and months and years now. And it has been based very much on “After the Ball” (yes, a long, long, time ago, in a publishing world far away) – with facts backing an emotional appeal to the moral issue of equality.
However, sweeping editorial “we’s” and “nevers” aside, I DO entirely agree with your personal statement: that now IS the right time.
And Ryan – thank you for raising one of my favorite points: the right to free exercise of religion in performing marriage rights (or not) should not be dictated by government (nor should “some religions be more equal than other religions” in this particular Animal Farm).
Ben In Oakland
February 24th, 2012 | LINK
Timothy, I should add with Reed that you said in much expanded form what i bwas saying. I wholeheartedly agree.
Mark F.
February 24th, 2012 | LINK
“I still feel entirely uncomfortable with the people voting on my rights.”
More uncomfortable than a legislative body or a judicial panel? Face it, someone is going to have to vote on it. That’s just how it is.
Mary
February 25th, 2012 | LINK
LIke Ben, I was concerned with the content of some of the pro marriage TV ads I saw. The ads seemed to rely to heavily on “the gays are respectable middle class folks.” They seemed designed to appeal to the southern coastal communities that already support same sex marriage. Maine has a lot of poor people, working class people, and old people. Ads need to talk to these people and make a case for why they should support marriage. I suspect many of these folks were turned off by ads that seemed to show that people who already have everything (aka money) want “special rights.” Too many of the gay people featured in the TV spots looked like summer people.
Priya Lynn
February 25th, 2012 | LINK
AAron said “I still feel entirely uncomfortable with the people voting on my rights.”.
Mark asked “More uncomfortable than a legislative body or a judicial panel?”.
Yes.
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