And one such trader in fantasy is J. Matt “Bam Bam” Barber, formerly the voice of Concerned Women for America. Barber always manages to amuse and, in his critique of McDonalds and the AFA boycott, Barber delivers in spades.

You can almost see the spittle and hear his rapid breathing as he writes:

Unfortunately, the radical San Francisco-style policies both the NGLCC and McDonald’s advocate run directly counter to the best interests of the vast majority of Americans outside California’s “Sodom on the Bay.” For example, under communist-tested, McDonald’s-approved “hate speech” legislation, such as the so-called Employment Non-Discrimination Act, Christians and other business owners with traditional values would be forced – under penalty of law – to abandon sincerely held religious beliefs and adopt McDonald’s own secular-humanist, moral-relativist view of right and wrong.

It’s not often that you can get “communist”, “Sodom”, and “McDonalds” in the same paragraph. You’ve got to hand it to him. When it comes to nutbaggery, it just doesn’t get much more bat-poopish than Barber.

Oh but he doesn’t stop there

Yet McDonald’s has now thrown its full weight, brand name and presently tarnished reputation behind the push for “gay marriage” in all 50 states.

All because they contributed a $20,000 pittance to the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce, an organization that doesn’t even mention marriage in their mission or programs. Ah, but if we were looking for logic and sanity we wouldn’t look to Barber, now would we?

But it is this doozie that I really love. Barber sarcastically proclaims

If you happen to support the historical definition of marriage – which is, and has always been male-female – then you’re a drooling, inbred hatemonger.

Well, Matt… not everyone who supports the historical definition…

Some day the anti-gays may realize that lunatic ranting doesn’t win hearts, minds, or Culture Wars. Let’s hope it’s too late by then. And in the mean time, someone give Bam Bam a word processor.

Meanwhile, Peter LaBarbera was living up to his nickname and having quite another type of gay weekend. He spent his Memorial Day celebration at the International Mr. Leather competition in Chicago. IML is an event, mostly for gay men, that celebrates the leather community. It also appeals to fetishists including those whose sexual tastes run to the unconventional or peculiar.

IML really isn’t my cup of tea – I tend to think leather is best when made into a belt or a pair of shoes. So it would never cross my mind to trek out to Chicago and spend my time in a hotel ballroom gawking at fetish porn.

But LaBarbera never misses a year.

And, yet again, Memorial Weekend found him oogling men in leather regalia and taking pictures of every bare butt cheek or risque poster he could find. Pete could hardly wait to get back to tell his buddy Matt “Bam Bam” Barber about all of the pig sex and watersports and “sodomy on steroids” that he found. Just think, gasp, of all the raunchy sex that was going on right in the very hotel where he was standing! Pete and Bam Bam almost worked themselves into a froth going on about anal sex and fetishes and all sorts of “satanic, depraved sodomitic orgies involving feces and urine”.

Now I’m a tolerant guy. If you’d rather check out the Pecs and Personality contest than sail with the Pirates of the Caribbean, it’s no business of mine. If your idea of fun is a boot shining contest rather than watching a really impressive card trick, who am I to complain?

But if you go, I have a word of advice: avoid getting your picture taken by LaBarbera. I don’t even want to think about how Pete uses those pictures. Ick.

See also:
LaBarbera Blames Gays for Heterosexual Beastiality Porn

Bob Knight and Peter LaBarbera are old friends from when they were part of Concerned Women, but I really don’t know if either Barber or Knight also share Pike and Duke’s racist and anti-Semitic agenda. They may just have been brought into the alliance by LaBarbera.

In an article titled Jamming and the ‘Gay’ Agenda – What is the truth?, Ms. Bell ignores all of Kern’s factual errors – and even the dangerous mindset that places “terrorism and Islam” as less of a threat to our country than gay people who contribute to campaigns – and jumps straight to “the truth”:

Oklahoma State Representative Sally Kern (R-Oklahoma City) has taken a Biblical stand against homosexuality, and she is being maliciously attacked by militant homosexual activist groups. Representative Kern has exercised her right to free speech, and the “jamming” has begun.

The “jamming”, you ask?

Merriam-Webster online has no idea what Bell is talking about. And the Urban Dictionary seems to think jamming is relaxing, playing music, or (the closest I could find) engaging in some sort of foot-fetish sex act.

Surely Ms. Bell isn’t claiming that Kern’s rant is causing an outbreak in fetishist sex?

No. Ms. Bell clarifies for all her non-militant-homosexual-activist audience just exactly what us militant homosexual activists mean when we are jamming.

The term “jamming” refers to the public smearing of Christians, traditionalists or anyone else who opposes the “gay” agenda.

But alas, poor Ms. Bell is a victim of her own organization’s propaganda. You see, Ms. Bell heard all about the book After the Ball and she actually believes that it is “the homosexual lobby’s blueprint for success in what is regarded as the handbook for the ‘gay’ agenda”. And because the term “jam” was used in the book in 1989, Natalie thinks she has discovered a secret word used by gay activists.

Poor funny little Natalie Bell.

I did read that book back in the late 80’s or early 90’s. I thought it was interesting and worth discussion, but I also know that at no time has any gay organization considered Madson and Kirk’s book as some blueprint or handbook. And to my knowledge, no gay group uses the term “jamming” or even knows what it’s supposed to mean.

So now we know why CWA usually leaves the anti-gay rants to Concerned Person Matt Barber. While he never hesitates to make wacky proclamations that bring shame on the organization, he usually gets the words right.

I leave you now to enjoy your Tuesday evening with the lyrics from Club Nouveau:

Lean on me when you’re not strong
And I’ll be your friend
I’ll help you carry on
For it won’t be long
‘Till I’m gonna need
Somebody to lean on

We be jammin’
We be jammin’ hey yeah
We be jammin’

See also:
Sally Kern Is a Little Confused
Sally Kern’s Economic Fallout
Sally Kern’s Meeting with PFLAG on Tape
Exodus’ Local Ministry Aligns with Sally Kern
Certified Cameronite: Sally Kern
Kern Speaks to College Republicans
Sally Kern: Out of Context? The Complete Transcript
We Be Jammin’
Muslims and Gays United
OK State Rep. Sally Kern’s Son is “Straight and Not Gay”
Sally Kern Exaggerates Death Threats
A Letter to Sally Kern
LaBarbera Award: Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern

The Gay and Lesbian Leadership Institute is teaming up with homosexual groups such as the Human Rights Campaign, the Stonewall Democrats, and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force for an initiative called the “Presidential Appointments Project.” It is being billed as a “talent bank” for openly homosexual professionals who want to “set or influence” policies of a potential Obama, McCain, or Clinton administration. …

Matt Barber, policy director for cultural issues at Washington, DC-based Concerned Women for America, says the project puts to rest the notion that there is no “gay agenda.” He says the homosexual lobby is committed to infiltrating the executive branch with people who define their identity based on changeable, sexually deviant behavior.

“The ultimate goal, of course, being to have people who engage in these aberrant sexual behaviors in a position of power to influence public policy in such a way that they gain more power,” he explains.

Shocking indeed. Because there’s certainly no evidence that Exodus, Focus on the Family or even Concerned Women like himself would ever do anything to influence public policy and “gain more power,” is there? But I suspect that real problem Barber has is that gay Americans are participating in a fundamental American right:

Amendment I: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Why does Matt Barber hate freedom?

As we reported earlier, the usual crowd of anti-gay activists jumped all over the faulty stories about outbreaks of MRSA in San Francisco and Boston. Although subsequent reporting (and our indepth analysis) clearly shows that the anti-gays were completely wrong in their accusations, rather than repent of their false accusations, they simply changed directions.

Concerned Women for America issued a press release quoting their own Matt Barber “inviting” the gay community to join his campaign against bathhouses

Therefore, these groups should publicly condemn those specific ‘high-risk behaviors’ which this study has concluded are responsible for spreading MRSA among homosexuals.

“In light of this behaviorally related MRSA outbreak,” said Barber, “we additionally ask HRC and other groups to call on local health agencies to shut down the many bathhouses and sex clubs around the country where men meet for anonymous sex with other men, often multiple partners, on a daily basis. These places create the ‘perfect storm’ for infectious disease, including MRSA.

Peter LaBarbera printed Concerned Woman Barber’s press release with the heading

CWA Invites Homosexual Groups to Work to Curb Spread of MRSA

and put in his own support for the effort

Well, folks, I’m not exactly expecting Human Rights Campaign and the rest of the “gay” lobby to hop on this request for cooperation from my good friend Matt Barber of CWA, but it sure would be progress if they did.

So will Box Turtle Bulletin join the cry to close down those bathhouses in San Francisco and Boston that were so integral to the spread of MRSA? Well, we might consider the question, if they existed!

What the anti-gays failed to notice is that neither San Francisco nor Boston has a single public gay bathhouse. San Francisco closed down bathhouses in 1984 at the outbreak of the AIDS epidemic and the closest bathhouses to San Francisco are in Berkeley and San Jose. Bostonites can head down to Providence.

So yet again we see that the claims of anti-gays have no basis in reality.

But while reasonable heads are coming forward, the unreasonable ones are still hacking away. Concerned Woman Matt Barber has issued a cynical and shameless press release calling on the homosexuals to “join him” to “help curb the spread of a potentially deadly strain of Staph infection.”

The gay community doesn’t really need an invitation from Barber. Given the neglect and open hostility that too many so-called Christians demonstrated during the HIV/AIDS crisis, the gay community has had to learn how to draw on their own resources. But if Barber were to actually consider the overwhelming weight of medical evidence concerning MRSA, he might consider issuing a call to the “straight community” to help curb the spread of MRSA into the gay community. After all, if one were to really look for someone to blame, that’s the first place one should look. 

But don’t count on it. People like Barber have no qualms about exploiting the suffering of others to score cheap political points. If there was any doubt about that, Barber’s latest stunt is just another example.

• New York Times: “After linking new strain of staph to gay men University scrambles to clarify.”
• Newsweek: “A new ‘gay disease’? A drug-resistant staph is infecting some gay men, but experts say a lot of media got it wrong.”

Peter LaBarbera and Matt Barber couldn’t conceal their glee when the lead researcher’s ill-conceived statements landed on their lap. Now that UCSF has apologized and denounced LaBarbera’s and Barber’s statements and major news outlets are correcting initial reports, will we see a similar apology from LaBarbera and Barber? After all it would be the Christian thing to do. I somehow doubt it. They’ve built a career by exploiting the suffering of others to score cheap political points. “With love,” of course, as they like to say when they remember it’s what they’re supposed to say. But in the end, this is just another day at the office for them.

You can read more about the overblown hype in our latest report, Testing the Premise: Is MRSA The New Gay Plague?

We probably had it here first, and now it is spreading elsewhere… This is a national problem, and San Francisco is at the epicenter.

The Toronto Star said that this latest 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,” while Australians panicked over the more widespread, “Flesh-eating bug spreads among gays.”

But there’s a problem with all of this. None of it is true!

In our latest report, “Testing the Premise: Is MRSA The New Gay Plague?”, we examine some of the medical research on MRSA over the past two decades — there are over 750 articles listed in the PubMed Database on community-acquired MRSA — and reach several conclusions which should be obvious to anyone familiar with the subject:

• San Francisco is not the epicenter of the new disease,
• this disease in fact is not new,
• and gay men are not spreading it into the “general population.”

The overwhelming medical evidence actually shows the opposite — it’s the “general population” that’s responsible for spreading MRSA into the gay community. In our report, we examine some of the communities that have been hardest hit by MRSA, including:

• Cities all across the U.S. and around the world.
• American Indians, rural Alaskans, Native Hawaiians, prisoners, and kids in day care;
• A religious community in upstate New York;
• Soldiers and sailors in the U.S. and on a ship at sea;
• And athletes. Lots of athletes. The USC Trojans, St. Louis Rams, Miami Dolphins and Washington Redskins were all hit in recent years, as were other professional, college and high school programs around the country. (One study blamed “cosmetic body shaving and turf burns,” and the Clinical Journal of Sports Medicine described MSRA as “the latest sports epidemic.”)

But for some reason, there has not been a hue and cry over a “flesh-eating jock staph” threatening the “general population.” In fact, none of this has anything to do with gay men. But that doesn’t keep the popular press and anti-gay demagogues from accusing disease-ridden gay men of spreading filthy diseases to an innocent, unsuspecting population. Sound familar?

In our latest report, you can:

• See the actual medical evidence — including direct links to the medical research so you don’t have to take our word for it;
• Examine the statements by lead researcher Binh Diep which helped to fuel the hysteria about the latest “gay plague”;
• Look at how the usual suspects have used the researcher’s comments to flame anti-gay bigotry;
• Learn what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention really say about MRSA and gay men.

You will find all of this in Testing the Premise: Is MRSA The New Gay Plague?