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
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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
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News, analysis and fact-checking of anti-gay rhetoric
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GOP Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), who has been identified as a rising star in national politics, is making robocalls on behalf of the National Organization for Marriage to voters in Maine, Maryland and Washington state, where marriage equality is on the ballot (Minnesota, which is considering a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, prohibits robocalls.) And in a sign that marriage is still seen as a wedge issue, those calls are also going out to the swing states of Wisconsin, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
tim
November 2nd, 2012 | LINK
Minnesota’s ban on robocalls hasn’t stopped the HRC from cold calling me twice today. Yet another reason not to send a dime to that organization.
Hunter
November 3rd, 2012 | LINK
My solution is that I don’t answer the phone. If I happen to be home and it’s family or friends leaving a message, I’ll pick up, but otherwise, not no way, not no how.
elaygee
November 3rd, 2012 | LINK
HRC makes LIVE calls which are NOT illegal. If you’s answer the phone just once and they heard your litany of woes, I’m sure they’ll stop calling your cheap ass
Lucrece
November 3rd, 2012 | LINK
I live in Florida, soI geta front seat to the disdain these Cuban Republicans with their special refugee programs that no other refugees get cause among other Hispanics. Cryingcommunism everywhere while cashing in on Medicare scams and smugly enjoying state programs for Cuban refugees.
Then they cry that there’s some Jewish mafia as that CNN anchor did, when the only mafia I see is the Cuban dominated media in South Florida.
tristram
November 3rd, 2012 | LINK
This is a strong indication of where he expects the Republican Party to be in four years (or eight) when he runs for President.
Robert
November 3rd, 2012 | LINK
Tristram, He is indeed the Republican to worry about in the next Presidential Election.
Lucrece,
Unfortunately the rest of the Country doesn’t understand the difference between the Cuban’s and the rest of the hispanic/latino comunity…He is a dangerous oponent in my view.
Here’s hoping to a scandal in his future.
Snowman
November 4th, 2012 | LINK
I live in Michigan, but I’ve heard about how things are down there and I know Marco Rubio is heavily supported by the Tea Bagger wingnuts.
I wouldn’t vote for the guy if someone offered me a million bucks to do it.
Ryan
November 4th, 2012 | LINK
Rubio’s going to have a problem if he wants the nomination in 2016; many far-righters believe that you must be born of American citizens to be considered “naturally born” (this is a new belief they invented four years ago that nobody even considered until then) and Rubio’s parents are Mexican.
Robert
November 4th, 2012 | LINK
Ryan,
Marco Rubio is NOT mexican. He is CUBAN, as are his parents. I know it might seem inconsequential, but as Lucrece points out above, it does actually make a difference in how Republican’s look at him. Cubans have a tendency to be more conservative and support Republican candidates more frequently than the Mexican-American contingent.
Also, he was born here in the USA, but neither parent was a citizen of the country at his birth (they became citizens in 1975, he was born in 1971, so he techniclly is not a natural born us citizen, as neither of his parents were citizens at the time of his birth).
TampaZeke
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
I seem to remember Log Cabin and GOP and a certain Box Turtle Bulletin blogger making the case that THIS was going to be the year that Republicans stopped using LGBT people’s lives as a political football.
TampaZeke
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
*GOProud*
TampaZeke
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
Ryan, Republicans only believe that when it pertains to a Democrat, just like they “believe” in one man/one woman marriage and a host of “family values” positions but ONLY for Democrats.
Ryan
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
Test.
Ryan
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
Sorry about the above post test. I couldn’t post yesterday all of a sudden. I though
Timothy Kincaid
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
Zeke,
Perhaps you should seek medical attention regarding your memory problems. Because no blogger here has suggested that Republicans (a rather broad group of people) would in 2012 stop using gay issues politically. Not even close.
(Of course, I’m jesting. But seriously, knock it off with the cheap shots. They’re beneath you.)
Yes, some Republicans will work against us for quite some time to come. And, for that matter, some Democrats (far fewer) also play in gay baiting. And they won’t stop in 2012 either.
However, I think the take-away point is that in 2012, general acceptance and even support for our community has advanced to the point where gay baiting is no longer part of the national campaign. Yes, it’s in the GOP platform. Yes it’s right there below the surface. But it’s not part of the campaign.
In 2004, Dubya attached his campaign to the anti gay movement. They were seen as an asset to him. But in 2012, the anti-gays are no longer the power they were. Now it is they who need prominent help, not the other way around.
As for Rubio, this was a stupid move. I suspect it will come back to haunt him.
Ben In Oakland
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
Couldn’t they get Snow and collins to maek the calls in Maine?
I saw rubio on Jon stewart and kinda liked him, politics aside. But then he does this to rmeind me hwat his politics actually are.
TampaZeke
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
I wish I knew how to research past posts and comments Timothy. Anyone who knows how to do the research PLEASE refresh Timothy’s selective memory. I think it was in a post about how LCR and/or GOProud was predicting that the GOP would avoid anti-gay campaigning this year.
Timothy Kincaid
November 5th, 2012 | LINK
Zeke,
I’ll make you a deal:
If you find where I said that “THIS was going to be the year that Republicans stopped using LGBT people’s lives as a political football”, I will readily apologize.
But if I didn’t, then please stop seeing me as some cartoon evil villain who is spending every moment crafting some nefarious scheme to hurt the Democrats.
I’m not anti-Democrat. Yes, really. Believe it or not.
cowboy
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
@Ryan,
There might be other problems for Rubio’s political future other than the controversy about being naturally born in the USA.
Lots of things can change in four years. The Supreme Court will have rulings/opinions about gay civil rights. DOMA will be declared unconstitutional. More States will enable gay civil marriages. A much larger younger generation will not take kindly to someone who has this kind of connection with a bigoted hate group.
Those who fought against gay civil rights might be ridiculed so much that it will be a liability in the 2016 political arena. This will come back to haunt Rubio.
Or I just love to fantasize while I await the tallies today.
Robert
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
Tampa Zeke, there are posts regarding LCR and the Platform. It’s from a month or more ago, and in every single post Timothy does indeed decry the anti-gay language used in the GOP Platform. He, at least in all the posts on the Platform, did not claim that the republican’s wouldn’t use anti-gay social attacks. If there were conversations longer ago, I am not sure. But I went over the last two months or so, and I can find nothing to back your assertions up. BUT, that isn’t to say that something might not have been declared longer ago than that. And the only ability to search, that I could find, was to simply keep clicking on the Older Posts link at the bottom of the page. I’m not sure why Timothy wouldn’t tell you if there WAS a search function. But if he knows, maybe he will share it with you. (I went to Jim’s article about the LCR Platform and there was a link to every story discussing the issue in Jims posting, hasd something like five links or so.).
Priya Lynn
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
Guys, there’s a search function in the upper left corner of the BTB home page. You can select to search the web or BTB, it should already be clicked to BTB.
Robert
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
Thanks Priya Lynn,
It will save me time so I don’t have to scroll through every page for the last few months. I never noticed it, but I’m still (slightly) new around here.
Apreciated.
tristram
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
@cowboy – we will find out if Rubio is as smart as many Republicans say he is. As I opined above in this thread, he appears to be trying to establish his credentials to run for President in 2016 or 2020 – so he thinks the base of the GOP will still be strongly anti-equality at that time.
Depending on what happens today, he could be correct. If Romney wins, it is very likely that the Senate will go Republican. That changes all the dynamics, including the balance of power on the Supreme Court. Under those circumstances it’s hard to imagine the Court finding any part of DOMA unconstitutional. Unless there were a clear countervailing force – say victories for equality in at least two of today’s referendums – the Court is not going to buck the Executive and Legislative branches.
If Romney wins and the Senate goes GOP, there will be an immediate barrage of anti-gay executive actions and legislation. Since Romney will not be able to effect even a fraction of the changes he promised for “Day 1″ or “the first 100 days”, he will gladly use the social issues to keep the GOP base off his back.
Robert
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
@tristram,
Well If your last post is correct, I certainly hope the Supremes decide to hear the DOMA case later this month. I think they will strike it down if they review it, too many lower courts hav aggreed it is Unconstitutional. Yes, it is a tough court to put it in front of, but I think after Lawerence V Texas, it would go our way.
But I don’t think Rmoney is going to win, and I think we will hold the Senate and gain about 5 in the House.
tristram
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
@Robert – in the worst-case scenario (Romney, GOP Senate and 3 or 4 referendum losses), the Supreme Court would go into lock-down on gay issues. They would find a way to defer the pending cases, or hear them and decide against equality. This Court is not going to lead on these issues. In fact, if Romney appointees succeed any two of justices Ginsburg, Breyer and Kennedy over the next four years, Lawrence v. Texas will be back play.
tristram
November 6th, 2012 | LINK
“. . .back in play.”
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