Box Turtle Bulletin

Uganda’s “Kill Gays” Bill Still Has American Defenders, Death Penalty And All

Jim Burroway

January 10th, 2010

Grove City College professor Warren Throckmorton has a rundown on several American evangelicals who support Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill, with some even supporting the death penalty or explaining it away by lying about its application. One post by Joel McDurmon appeared on the American Vision web site, appropriately titled “A Perfect Hatred.” He writes:

Where God says a civil crime deserves the death penalty, I propose that we keep in step with the first greatest commandment and recognize His total sovereignty in heart, soul, strength, and mind…. Now, it just so happens that God revealed that the homosexual act is a civil crime, and it just so happens that He revealed that the homosexual act as a civil crime deserves the death penalty.

Larry Jacobs of the World Congress of Families rushed to defend Exodus International board member Don Schmierer, but offered not one word of criticism of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill which came on the aftermath of Schmierer’s March 5-7 conference in Kampala. He didn’t even bother to mention the death penalty provisions.

Warren also noted one article by Cliff Kincaid which earned a LaBarbera Award from BTB’s Timothy Kincaid (no relation), but that’s not the only example from this guy. In another post Cliff Kincaid complains that criticizing the wide-ranging bill amounts to “bashing” Uganda’s Christians, metaphorical language that is insulting in the extreme to those gays and lesbians who have actually been physically bashed bodily, sometimes to death.

If you know of other examples of American supporters of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, feel free to leave them in comments at Warren Throckmorton’s web site.

Click here to see BTB’s complete coverage of recent anti-gay developments in Uganda.

Australian Quakers call for marriage equality

Timothy Kincaid

January 10th, 2010

Press release:

Australian Quakers, meeting in their annual meeting in Adelaide today, called on the Federal Government to amend the Marriage Act to give full and equal legal recognition to all marriages, regardless of the sexual orientation and gender of the partners.

‘Australian Quakers celebrated our first same sex marriage in 2007 and seeking legal recognition for such unions is consistent with our long held spiritual belief in the equality of all people’, said Lyndsay Farrall, Presiding Clerk of Australia Yearly Meeting.

A reminder that gay marriage bans really are about religious freedom, the freedom denied to those faiths that wish to honor and treat their gay and straight parishioners equally.

“Un-African” Homosexuality?

Jim Burroway

January 10th, 2010

Many of those behind Uganda’s proposed Anti-Homosexuality Bill complain that homosexuality is a foreign import, despite the ironic fact that it was Europeans who imposed bans on homosexuality on their African colonies — and despite the huge impetus given the current drive to legislate LGBT people out of existence by three American anti-gay extremists. The idea of homosexuality being somehow “un-African” is widely believed, despite being ignorant nonesense. Douglas Foster, writing for the Los Angeles Times, provides proof of that from his visits to a Johannesburg, South Africa gay nightclub which served as a haven for Africa’s gay diaspora:

To get to Simply Blue’s curved bar and large dance floor, patrons had to climb a long flight of stairs and go through a security pat-down. You could always spot newcomers because they usually sat off to the side in the shadows, on broken-down couches, their eyes wide and jaws slack. Many of them literally had had the idea beaten into them that they were part of a cursed, despicable, tiny minority.

There was the middle-aged man from Zimbabwe, formerly married, whose brother had plotted to have him killed because of the shame he’d brought to his family when he’d switched to dating men. There was a young Nigerian who lingered on the sidelines for weeks before inching out onto the dance floor, but then moved in an explosion of long-suppressed joy at finding himself dancing in public across from another man. I met an older fellow, a soft-spoken farmer from Uganda who’d raised his children before leaving his home, his wife and his country. He’d finally decided he couldn’t live to the end of his life without having the chance to express his truest self.

[Hat tip: BTB reader Regan DuCasse]

Click here to see BTB’s complete coverage of the past year’s anti-gay developments in Uganda.

Seventh-day Aventists update their statement on the Ugandan legislation

Timothy Kincaid

January 8th, 2010

Yesterday we noted that the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Uganda had endorsed the Anti-Homosexuality bill which, in its current form, would incarcerate for life any gay person that touched another and which had death penalty provisions, including for “repeat offenders”, a very broadly defined category.

We also noted that the response of the church in America to having this brought to their attention was woefully vague. It could have meant most anything, including their endorsement of the bill. Today they have a new statement:

Church leadership noted with concern some statements reportedly made by the Uganda Union Mission Executive Director in connection with the Anti-Homosexuality Bill under consideration in Uganda. These views do not reflect the values of the Church as expressed in published statements on same sex conduct.

Seventh-day Adventists continue to affirm the equal dignity and rights of every person as articulated in the relevant international human rights declarations and Covenants.

–Rajmund Dabrowski, Communication Director

While this is more informative, it is far from an unequivocal opposition to this piece of legislation. And considering that many other Christian voices – including those who do not need to reverse public statements of endorsement – have been clear in their opposition, I think that the church does a disservice to itself by speaking in generalities.

It would well serve the integrity of the church to clearly state that they, as a body, oppose the criminalization of non-coercive same-sex behavior and support the rights of gay persons to live in freedom.

If, indeed, that is what they mean.

Click here to see BTB’s complete coverage of recent anti-gay developments in Uganda.

Deacon succinctly lays out Catholic objection to marriage equality

Timothy Kincaid

January 8th, 2010

Writing in Catholic Online, Deacon Keith Fournier laments that courts have treated Janet Jenkins with respect and honored the commitments that she and Lisa Miller made. In the midst of his tirade, is a sentence that epitomizes the attitudes of those who rally forth to oppose equality.

They want the State to treat homosexual partnerships as the equivalent of marriage, thereby denying real marriage and the family founded upon it, the favored legal place it has long held as the first society.

It is not that they wish to “preserve tradition” or “uphold the definition” or are “worried about the children”. Those are just subterfuges presented to the media to distract from the real reason.

No, they truly believe that they deserve a favored legal place and that our lives, our relationships and our very citizenship is inferior to their own.

Ugandan MP Refuses To Withdraw Anti-Gay Bill

Jim Burroway

January 8th, 2010

Late last night, we noticed an item in Uganda’s largest independent newspaper reporting that the Ugandan Minister of State for Investment Aston Kajara said that the government would ask MP David Bahati to withdraw the Anti-Homosexuality Bill due to backlash from foreign investors. Now the Associated Press reports that MP David Bahati, the lawmaker who introduced the private member’s bill, will not back down:

“I stand by the bill,” Bahati said. “I will not withdraw it. We have our children in schools to protect against being recruited into (homosexuality). The process of legislating a law to protect our children against homosexuality and defending our family values must go on.”

Ethics and Integrity Minister James Nsaba Buturo also insists that debate on the bill will take place in about three weeks, claiming that “there is no way government can withdraw that bill.” He also warns that any elected politician who opposed the legislation would be comitting “political suicide.” Parliamentary and presidential elections are scheduled for 2011.

Click here to see BTB’s complete coverage of recent anti-gay developments in Uganda.

Portugal parliament approves marriage equality

Timothy Kincaid

January 8th, 2010

Portugal’s legislature has approved a bill legalizing same-sex marriage. (The Guardian)

Right-of-centre parties opposed the change and sought a national referendum on the issue, but their proposal was rejected and the government’s bill was passed by 125 votes to 99.

The bill now goes to a committee and back to parliament for a second vote before being presented to the President.

The conservative president, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, is thought unlikely to veto the socialist government’s bill, which won the support of all left-of-centre parties. His ratification would allow the first gay marriage ceremonies to take place in April, a month before Pope Benedict XVI is due on an official visit to Portugal.

Portugal will be the eighth nation (sixth in Europe) to recognize same sex marriages.

Parliament did not, however, pass a second bill which would allow adoption by same-sex couples.

Don Schmierer “sets the record straight”

Timothy Kincaid

January 8th, 2010

We tried diligently to get Don Schmierer to not go to Uganda. He went anyway.

We tried desperately to get Don Schmierer to speak out against the legislation proposed in Uganda to execute gay Ugandans or imprison them for life. He was silent.

In fact, Schmierer ignored us and the results of his international anti-gay activism until he was exposed on Rachel Maddow’s show. Then he issued a statement that appeared to be in conflict with the facts as we knew them to be.

Now he has told the Fox affiliate in Sacramento that it’s all a misunderstanding.

He says he thought he was preaching about open communication in parenting.

But now that his inbox is being flooded with hate-mail he says it’s all a misunderstanding.

“I’m trying to help people understand the differences and how to communicate and how to listen to each other.”

If Mr. Schmierer wishes to communicate, he knows how to reach us. If he wishes to clear up any misunderstandings, he can explain why his version of events contradict the video, news reports, and first hand accounts from the conference. We’d be happy to let him set the record straight – accurately, this time.

Click here to see BTB’s complete coverage of recent anti-gay developments in Uganda.

New Jersey roll call

Timothy Kincaid

January 7th, 2010

The New Jersey Senators voted as follows:

Those voting for equality:

Buono – D
Codey – D
Cunningham – D
Gill – D
Gordon – D
Lesniak – D
Ruiz – D
Scutari – D
Smith – D
Stack – D
Vitale – D
Weinberg – D
Whalen – D
Baroni – R

Those voting to keep same-sex relationships inferior:

Girgenti – D
Madden – D
Rice – D
Sacco – D
Turner – D
Van Drew – D
Bateman – R
Beck – R
Bucco – R
Cardinale – R
Connors – R
Doherty – R
Haines – R
S. Kean – R
T. Kean – R
Kyrillos – R
Oroho – R
O’Toole – R
Pennacchio – R
Singer – R

Those not voting:

Beach – D
Sarlo – D
Sweeney – D
Allen -R
Ciesla – R

Dvorak on Miller-Jenkins

Timothy Kincaid

January 7th, 2010

In an article in the Washington Post, Petula Dvorak gets props for the best quote yet on Lisa Miller’s kidnapping of Isabella Miller-Jenkins. Well, actually, the two best quotes:

Miller told Newsweek two years ago that letting Isabella live with Jenkins would be like giving her child to the milkman.

Well, yeah — if you lived with the milkman, made love to him, bought a house with him, entered a civil union with him at a quaint resort blanketed in snow and bedecked with greenery, sat through fertility treatments that he helped pay for, let him catch the baby as you pushed and shared midnight burping and diaper duties — it would be just like giving your child to the milkman.

and my favorite:

Miller’s legal team said in court that a move to Vermont, with a new school and new friends, would be disruptive for a 7-year-old.

And going into hiding isn’t?

Mrs. Robinson Is an Adulterous Cougar

Jim Burroway

January 7th, 2010

Anti-gay Northern Ireland MP Iris Robinson and wife of Northern Ireland’s First Prime Minister Peter Robinson, said in 2008 that homosexuality was worse than pedophilia and that gay people suffered a mental illness that could be “cured.” Well now she has recently admitted to some mental troubles herself. At about the same time she made those statements, Robinson was having an affair with a friend who needed “consoling” following a death. What’s more, Robinson herself then had a mental breakdown of her own and attempted suicide, and announced in December that she is stepping down from politics.

Now the BBC is reporting that the young lover Mrs. Robinson took up was 19 years old at the time. Robinson was 59, more than three times Kirk McCambley’s senior. McCambley now runs a cafe in South Belfast after Robinson encouraged friends to invest in his business. The cafe is located in a visitor’s center built by the Castlereagh Borough Council. Robinson is also a member of that council.

Equality NJ is going back to court

Timothy Kincaid

January 7th, 2010

On October 25, 2006, the Supreme Court of the state of New Jersey unanimously found that the constitution of that state requires that same-sex couples be provided with all of the rights, benefits, and responsibilities as heterosexual married couples. But by a 4 to 3 split they allowed the state to determine the method by which to provide equality.

The state legislature opted the next month for civil unions.

However, civil unions have not provided New Jersey’s same-sex couples with all of the rights, benefits and responsibilities as married couples. This was determined in a study and, more importantly, conceded during today’s debate by the opponents of marriage equity.

So Equality New Jersey is going back to court to ask the Judiciary to force the legislature to provide full marriage. (Blue Jersey)

With today’s vote in the state Senate, the New Jersey legislature defaulted on its constitutional obligation to provide same-sex couples in New Jersey equal protection, as unanimously mandated by the New Jersey Supreme Court in 2006. That’s why we at Garden State Equality are here with our partner Lambda Legal, which has an extraordinary track record of advancing LGBT civil rights in the courts.

Now our organizations will announce major news. Our side is going back to court to win marriage equality.

Several of the senators who voted against marriage equality have pledged to “fix” civil unions. Marriage supporters doubt that separate but equal can be fixed.

If one of the four justices is convinced that only marriage can remedy the inequality, then marriage may come to New Jersey.

Marriage Equality Sleeps With the Fishes In NJ

Jim Burroway

January 7th, 2010

As Timothy reported, it’s over for now.

New Jersey votes on marriage equality

Timothy Kincaid

January 7th, 2010

Today the full New Jersey Senate voted on a bill to provide the same legal protections, responsibilities, and recognition to same-sex couples that it offers to opposite-sex couples. As expected, the full Senate voted against marriage equality 20 – 14. To pass, the bill needed 21 votes, seven more than it received.

(for the record, Sen. Teresa Ruiz nearly brought me to tears)

What this means in practical terms is that New Jersey will not have marriage equality for the four (or eight) years of Chris Christie’s governance. Or, I suppose, until two thirds of the senate is committed to marriage and can overturn a veto.

However, we finally have a tally of those who believe in equality under the law and those who believe that our lives, our relationships, and our citizenship are inferior to their own. I’ll bring you the roll call once I know it.

It is quite likely that support for the idea of marriage in New Jersey will continue to grow. At some point I think it likely that the no vote of some Senators today will cost them their career.

Let’s try and make that sooner rather than later.

Cato Institute’s Levy calls for marriage freedom

Timothy Kincaid

January 7th, 2010

The Cato Institute is a pro-free market, libertarian think tank which seeks to “increase the understanding of public policies based on the principles of limited government, free markets, individual liberty, and peace.” Today the New York Daily News ran an opinion piece by Robert Levy, Cato’s chairman. He sees the unconstitutional restriction on gay couples to be the consequence of politicians inserting themselves into our lives and controlling what has historically been a private contract.

For most of Western history, marriage was a matter of private contract between the betrothed parties and perhaps their families. Following that tradition, marriage today should be a private arrangement, requiring minimal or no state intervention. Some religious or secular institutions would recognize gay marriages; others would not; still others would call them domestic partnerships or assign another label. Join whichever group you wish. The rights and responsibilities of partners would be governed by personally tailored contracts – consensual bargains like those that control most other interactions in a free society.
…
Yet our politicians, unwilling to privatize marriage, seem congenitally unable to extricate themselves from our most intimate relationships. One would hope, in the coming months and years, that more enlightened federal and state legislators will have the courage and decency to resist morally abhorrent and constitutionally suspect restrictions based on sexual orientation. Gay couples are entitled to the same legal rights and the same respect and dignity accorded to all Americans.

Oh how I wish that “libertarian minded” legislators would act in accordance with their claimed principles.

Iowa legislature not to debate marriage in 2010

Timothy Kincaid

January 6th, 2010

Senate Majority Leader Michael Gronstal has ruled out debating marriage equality in 2010. (Sioux City Journal)

“I think our attitude is, if it doesn’t help balance the budget, if it doesn’t help create jobs, it can wait until another year,” Gronstal said.

This delays any possibility of Iowa residents losing basic civil rights for another four years.

If he holds to it, Gronstal’s decision delays the cumbersome process of amending the constitution, which requires the approval of two consecutive General Assemblies before going to voters. If lawmakers don’t approve this year, the issue would have to be approved by lawmakers convening in 2011 and those convening in the assembly beginning in 2013.

The earliest the issue could reach voters would be the 2014 general election.

“Being the First Sucks”

Jim Burroway

January 6th, 2010

Amanda Simpson, credited with being the first openly transgender presidential appointee, said that to ABC News. “I’d rather not be the first, but someone has to be first, or among the first,” she continued. “[There will be] questions like: Is this a token? Are you here to do a job or just to fill a quota or appease other people?”

Well, one thing I know in my own personal dealings with Amanda, you know, back when she was a nobody like the rest of us back here in Tucson, is that she is certainly no token. She was well-recongized in the community for her many accomplishments. And to add to that, by all accounts her professional accomplishments were well respected by her previous employer, a major missile contractor, where her job was to make sure missiles flew and where tokenism doesn’t. But yes, it sucks to be the first, and along with that having to see yourself on late night television like this:

GLAAD and HRC have both condemned the skit, and for good reason. Transgender “panic” has too often been excused as justification for brutally beating and murdering countless numbers of people. One high-profile case was that of Angie Zapata. Her killer, Allen Andrade, said he was provoked into beating her to death with a fire extinguisher because Angie smiled at him. Late night comedians aren’t the first people we turn to for serious reflection, but this is a very serious problem and, all too tragically, it’s not a joking matter.

In related good news however, the Obama administration’s Office of Personnel Management has added gender identity among the classes protected by federal Equal Employment Opportunity policies.

Olson/Boies Prop 8 trial to be recorded and available

Timothy Kincaid

January 6th, 2010

On January 11, Ted Olson and David Boies will begin their case against Proposition 8, arguing that it runs contrary to the US Constitution. In a strange turn of events, the case will be recorded but not made available for live media coverage. (SJ Merc)

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker approved court-operated cameras in his courtroom for delayed release on YouTube, but rejected a bid by media organizations to televise the proceedings themselves for live broadcast.

Walker, by approving some broadcast of the Proposition 8 trial, became the first federal judge in the West to make use of an experimental program put in place recently by the 9th Circuit Judicial Council, which sets policy for federal courts in nine states, including California.

Supporters of Proposition 8 had argued against any public presentation of the trial, saying that their witnesses were reluctant to testify if their testimony was made available to public scrutiny.

They used one of the anti-gay community’s favorite arguments: fear of retaliation. Personally, I believe that their objection is based in fear of exposure. I suspect that the purposes and beliefs of the funders, organizers, and administrators of Proposition 8 are not aligned with the public, not even the majority of those who voted for the proposition.

“Family” Member Speaks About Uganda’s Anti-Gay Bill

Jim Burroway

January 6th, 2010

Bob Hunter appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show last night on behalf of the secretive conservative Christian group known as The Family, to talk about The Family’s role in the Ugandan proposal to legislate LGBT people out of existence. Most of his statements on Rachel Maddow were a repeat of what he had said earlieron NPR’s Fresh Air on December 22. He claimed that The Family never involved themselves in politics — he was particularly combative on that point on Maddow’s show — and that The Family was working to try to get the Anti-Homosexuality Bill withdrawn. You can see the videos from Rachel Maddow’s show here and here.

As I said, Hunter was particularly combative in insisting that The Family is just a bunch of small groups of people who gather for prayer and Bible study, and doesn’t get involved with politics. He also vigorously slammed Jeff Sharlet’s book, The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power, particularly its cover highlighting “Fundamentalism” at the heart of American power. After the show aired, Sharlet tweeted, “It’s true — I don’t like the cover of The Family. Much of the rest of what Hunter said on Maddow was plain wrong.” Sharlet expanded on what was “plain wrong” in a comment he posted on Warren Throckmorton’s web site:

With respect for Bob’s good intentions in opposing the bill and bringing a smidgeon of transparency to an organization that has been defined by secrecy for 75 years, there’s much in his statement on Maddow — which I helped arrange — that is inaccurate. I’ll have more on this later today, but the most significant point is that the Family/Fellowship has functioned as a political organization ever since it was first formed in the 1930s to elect Arthur Langlie to the office of the Washington governor’s office. It was political when it threw its muscle behind the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act that undid much of the New Deal … it was political when it sent Senator Chuck Grassley to Somalia (and Uganda) in the early 80s to build U.S. support for the genocidal regime of dictator Siad Barre; and it’s political now, as it struggles to do damage control over the Uganda issue. Sending someone like Senator Jim Inhofe to meet with foreign leaders — readers should know that goes through the State Department — on the taxpayer’s tab is political. ..There is a religious function, too; but let’s lay all the cards on the table.

Click here to see BTB’s complete coverage of recent anti-gay developments in Uganda.

Portugal marriage vote on Friday?

Timothy Kincaid

January 6th, 2010

The Vancouver Sun is reporting:

Catholic Portugal, traditionally one of Europe’s most socially conservative countries, is expected to approve the legalization of gay marriage on Friday with a minimum of fuss.

With the governing Socialists and other left-wing parties enjoying a strong majority, the new law is likely to sail through the first reading debate and gain final approval before a visit by Pope Benedict XVI, due in Portugal in May.
…
Deputies are also expected on Friday to vote two other bills submitted by the Green party, the Left Bloc and others which would grant gay and lesbian couples the right to adopt children.

If the gay marriage proposals do pass through parliament, they will the have to go through a parliamentary commission before coming back for the final approval.

As yet, I’ve not seen corroborating sources about a Friday vote. But we’ll keep our eyes on this.