Tag Archives: gay

June 14, 2011 · 10:00 pm

Bible Cited As Reason for Kicking Gay Men Out of Public Pool

Unbelievable…

Obviously someone in Kentucky has not heard about the Constitution and the separation of Church and State.

This is why we need anti-discrimination laws.  This was a public pool paid for by our tax dollars….

And, even worse, these guys were apparently developmentally disabled…

From RawStory.com:

Activists in Kentucky are planning a peaceful response after two gay men with developmental and intellectual disabilities were kicked out of a public pool.

A maintenance technician reportedly cited the Bible while telling the two men they couldn’t swim at The Pavilion, a government-funded recreational facility in Hazard, Kentucky.

“We own this place and can tell you to leave if we want to,” the couple was told, according to the Kentucky Equality Foundation.

“The Pavilion staff immediately entered the pool area and asked my clients and their staff to leave the Pavilion,” Mending Hearts Executive Director Shirlyn Perkins recalled. “My staff asked The Pavilion staff why they were being asked to leave, and they were informed that ‘gay people’ weren’t allowed to swim there.”

“My staff told this man that what he was trying to do was discrimination. The man stated that what he was doing was in the Bible and he could do it. My staff continued to argue with this man, but was ultimately forced to leave. My clients, whom already feel ridiculed and different, left the city owned facility crying and embarrassed for trying to participate in ‘normal’ activities that everyday ‘normal’ people do,” she added.

“This is completely outrageous, The Pavilion is owned by the City of Hazard and paid for by our tax dollars,” Kentucky Equality Federation President Jordan Palmer said. “Rest assured Kentucky Equality Federation will not tolerate discrimination in any form and our Southern Kentucky volunteer management, as well as our Discrimination, Hate Crimes and School Bullying Committee have planned a peaceful response.”

Will Taylor, the Kentucky Equality Federation’s Assistant Regional Director for Southern Kentucky, explained that the city could stop planned protests at City Hall and The Pavilion by simply issuing an apology.

“In addition, should an apology and corrective action not be forthcoming, we call on Governor Beshear to rescind funding to The Pavilion and the City of Hazard in the spirit of his executive order prohibiting discrimination of LGBTI people in Kentucky government,” he said.

via Bible cited as reason for kicking gay men out of public pool | The Raw Story.

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June 4, 2011 · 1:29 am

And Then There’s Maude….

I can’t believe it’s been over 30 years since this show premiered.

I remember our neighbors were scandalized my parents let us watch it.

They weren’t liberal, merely lazy.

We all had TV’s in our rooms so we wouldn’t have to talk to each other….

Anyway…

Here it is…Thirty years later and it seems as relevant and fresh as can be…

Unfortunately…

You would think we would have moved farther and it would seem antiquated by now…

Still.  It was a great show and Bea Arthur was priceless….

And it was actually well written…

I had forgotten good network television was possible…

 

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May 29, 2011 · 12:30 pm

Married Couples in less than Half of US Households

When are people going to finally face the fact that the “Ozzie and Harriet”, “Father Knows Best”, “Leave it to Beaver” world is gone?

If it ever existed in the first place…

The Conservatives keep harping on Family Values, but I always ask “Whose Family?”

My family of two Gay Men, a dog and two cats?  A family of 2 twentysomethings too financially insecure to think about a house and kids?  A family led by a single mother with children she has to feed, clothe and take care of alone?  A family of two women with children?  A family of one elderly American living alone?

Let’s get real here….

If you are going to talk about Family Values, it’s time to think about what a Family really is….

There are many kinds of Families…

Not all are what some  political Conservatives with an agenda want to force a Family to be…

Three mornings a week, when Becky Leung gets ready for work, her boyfriend is just getting home from his overnight job. When her mother drops hints about her twin sister’s marriage, she laughs it off. And when she thinks about getting married herself, she worries first about her career.

Leung, 27, cohabits in a Portland, Ore., townhome with her boyfriend but has no plans yet to wed, a reflection of the broader cultural shift in the U.S. away from the traditional definition of what it means to be a household.

Data released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau shows married couples have found themselves in a new position: They’re no longer the majority.

It’s a trend that’s been creeping along for decades, but in the 2010 Census, married couples represent 48 percent of all households. That’s down from 52 percent in the last Census and, for the first time in U.S. history, puts households led by married couples as a plurality.

via Married couples in less than half of US households – Yahoo! News.

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May 22, 2011 · 6:53 pm

NC Faith Leaders Stand Up for LGBT Equality — Equality North Carolina

I’m always pleased to find evidence that all Religious leaders aren’t like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson…

I really have to be reminded of that sometimes as those guys, and similar opportunists and zealots, really created a negative image or organized religion for so many of us….

I’m also particularly pleased to see the diversity in this group…

We’ve come a long ways from Jesse Helms….

Thanks to my friend Kirk for originally sending this to me…

As anti-LGBT forces once again used religious reasons to justify their support of a ban on marriage equality on the outside, inside Rep. Brandon, and the statewide coalition of religious leadership standing beside him, took on these claims directly, citing the religious and historical context for opposing anti-LGBT legislation like the constitutional amendment current circulating the North Carolina legislature.

“The Bible has been used in this nation to support slavery, segregation, laws against interracial marriage, and to deny women’s rights,” Brandon said, adding that he’s a Christian himself. “Jesus was a compassionate person. And Jesus would not be having a rally outside right now.”

During the hour-long press conference, five faith leaders, flanked by other people of faith and state legislators, publicly spoke to the specific harms of Senate Bill 106/House Bill 777:

“This extreme legislation will only cause needless pain and suffering,” Rev. Anthony Spearman is pastor of Clinton Tabernacle AME Zion Church in Hickory said of the proposed amendment. “It sends a message to major employers that North Carolina does not welcome a diverse workplace,” Spearman said. “It tells young people who are gay they’re second class citizens, unworthy of basic dignity and equal treatment…It is not fair and it is certainly not just.”

“Martin Luther King Jr. said the moral arc of the universe bends toward justice,” said Rev. Stephen Shoemaker from Charlotte’s Myers Park Baptist. “We’re here to say today it also bends toward inclusiveness.”

“Don’t let those selling fear on the cheap, buy your hearts,” said Rev. Dr. Amy Laura Hall, ordained elder, United Methodist Church in Durham. “I appeal to you, dear children of God, charged with leading us in North Carolina, please do not block the true recognition of gay and lesbian families in North Carolina as what they are…families, with all the vulnerability, need and intimate trust that go with the word ‘kin.'”

“We oppose the use of sacred texts and religious traditions to deny legal equality to gay and lesbian couples,” said Ari Margoils, assistant rabbi at Temple Beth Or in Raleigh.

“This, I would like to suggest, is our moment,” said Bishop Tonyia Rawls of Unity Fellowship Church in Charlotte. “We will in this moment in time acknowledge what type of a state we really are.”

During the press conference, it was announced that clergy and congregation members from all denominations could sign on with a statewide faith coalition, joining more than 300 faith leaders who have already publicly opposed this type of discriminatory legislation.

via NC Faith Leaders Stand Up for LGBT Equality — Equality North Carolina.

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May 20, 2011 · 12:11 am

World to End Saturday, May 21st at 6:00 pm Because of Gay People

I just knew they would find a way to blame this on us….

This guy is so old he doesn’t care if he is proved wrong…

He knows, for him,  it’s only a matter of time and he goes out with a lot of publicity…

And I hope he takes a lot of the hate and ignorance with him when he goes…

By the way, I plan to be in a very nice little Italian Restaurant in Washington, NC on Saturday, December 21 at 6:0o pm.  I hope the Rapture doesn’t happen until after they serve the main course….

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May 13, 2011 · 8:27 am

AFA Writer Condemns Christians Who Practice Yoga | Right Wing Watch

I am so tired of these people at the American Family Association….

They want to drag everyone back to the Dark Ages.

Just for reference and in the interest of full disclosure, the Southern Poverty Law Center, to whom I contribute, has named them a Hate Group and put them on their Hate Watch List along with militia groups and other militant right wing organizations that are potentially dangerous.

Writing for the American Family Association, Marsha West is insisting that Christians stop practicing yoga. West defends Albert Mohler of the Southern Baptist Convention and Douglas Groothuis of the Denver Seminary, who drew controversy for criticizing Christians who practiced yoga, lamenting that “we have blended into the dishonest, destructive and debase culture so thoroughly that it’s near impossible to tell the difference between Christians and heathens!” West calls Buddhism and Hinduism “evil” religions and argues that yoga is “diametrically opposed to the Gospel of Jesus Christ”:

via AFA Writer Condemns Christians Who Practice Yoga | Right Wing Watch.

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May 12, 2011 · 7:05 pm

Was Your High School Boyfriend Gay?

I have to keep checking this site to see if I show up….

I figure it’s only a matter of time before someone turns me in…

The site is My High School Boyfriend Was Gay…

Love it!

http://www.myhsboyfriendwasgay.com/

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May 11, 2011 · 9:51 pm

Gay Donors Fuel Obama’s 2012 Bid

The Gay ATM is back in business…

Funny, when we all stopped giving last year because of the seeming lack of commitment to our issues, the Obama administration suddenly became very active in supporting equality….

Again, in Politics, money talks and that’s all they really listen to….

President Barack Obama’s reelection campaign is banking on gay donors to make up the cash it’s losing from other groups of wealthy supporters who have been alienated and disappointed by elements of Obama’s first term.

Pleased by an all-out White House push to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” gay donors have surprised campaign officials with the extent of their support. And the campaign’s new fundraising apparatus appears designed to capitalize on their enthusiasm: Obama’s finance committee included one gay man in 2008; there are 15 this year, a source said.

The Obama campaign finance director, Rufus Gifford, was a top California gay fundraiser; the DNC treasurer, Andrew Tobias, is gay; and the White House social secretary — traditionally a key, if unofficial, fundraising job — is also a gay man, Gifford’s former partner Jeremy Bernard.

The spur for the gay community becoming an anchor for Obama’s reelection fundraising is a series of policy shifts in 2010. After a year of rocky relations and suspicion from Obama’s gay supporters that he wasn’t really committed to their issues, the last year saw a surge in activity. Along with the high-profile repeal of the military ban, Obama’s Justice Department recently refused to defend the Defense of Marriage Act. And the administration has taken smaller steps, like gay partner hospital visits and hate crimes legislation, concrete and important gestures that simply weren’t made during the Bush administration.

“It’s ironic — a year ago there was no constituency more unhappy. There was a sea change,” said David Mixner, a veteran New York gay activist, who said that White House actions during the past year had swayed restive gay donors. “You not only will see a united community that will contribute to Obama, but they will work their asses off.”

via Gay donors fuel Obama’s 2012 bid – Yahoo! News.

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May 11, 2011 · 9:14 pm

Rupert Everett: Beyonce is Dull and Sharon Stone Unhinged

I’ve loved Rupert Everett ever since I saw him in one of my favorite movies,  “Another Country.”

He’s definitely off the wall- and very outspoken…

He kind of reminds me of someone I “dated” back in the 1980’s who was also great fun, but totally crazy…

Believe me, no matter how enthralling they are, it’s best to observe guys like this from a distance….

From London’s The Daily Mail:

‘When I got to Hollywood I had this fantasy that all these huge stars would be these amazing, fabulous creatures. I grew up devouring books on Montgomery Clift, and so much of his appeal to me lay in the gutter side.

‘But you get to Hollywood and everybody’s so boring. Being an actor in Hollywood is like joining the Army or something.When you see them in a restaurant raising an arm, it’s more likely to be to make a call to their banker than swig back a glass of champagne.

Rupert described Madonna as smelling ‘vaguely of sweat’ and being an ‘old, whiny barmaid’

‘So many of these stars today are just boring, boring, boring. Listening to Beyoncé  Knowles talking about her life, her career, is like listening to an Army general talking about a military operation. Beyond dull.’

via Rupert Everett: Beyonce is dull and Sharon Stone unhinged | Mail Online.

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May 11, 2011 · 8:38 pm

Presbyterians Approve Ordination of Gay People

More progress….

It’s nice to see some of the mainstream denominations coming around….

Even if it did take them 33 years….

The times, they are a changing…

After 33 years of debate, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has voted to change its constitution and allow openly gay people in same-sex relationships to be ordained as ministers, elders and deacons.

The outcome is a reversal from only two years ago, when a majority of the church’s regions, known as presbyteries, voted against ordaining openly gay candidates.

This time, 19 of the church’s 173 presbyteries switched their votes from no to yes in recent months. The Twin Cities presbytery, which covers Minneapolis and St. Paul, cast the deciding vote at its meeting on Tuesday. The vote was 205 to 56, with 3 abstentions.

Cynthia Bolbach, moderator of the church’s General Assembly, its highest legislative body, said in a phone interview from Minneapolis after the vote: “Everyone was civil. There was no applause, no cheering. It was just reflective of the fact that we are moving forward one other step.”

via Presbyterians Approve Ordination of Gay People – NYTimes.com.

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