Personal ethical failures.

August 23, 2010 by Dan Hooper.

Dr. L. Schlessinger was at it again a few weeks back, and we could hope it is the last. To have gotten into a tit-for-tat argument with a caller to a radio show is typical, but to use the “n” word 11 times in five minutes is pretty exceptional. Dr. L. However seemed to want to bait the caller and to rant about whether it’s okay to use the “n” word because she hears it on HBO.

The Los Angeles Times editorial on August 20 re: Dr. L. Was right on. She had complained after the “n” episode that she had to quit in order to get her First Amendment rights back. “The First Amendment is just fine. Schlessinger exercised her right to use a racial slur when criticizing a caller, and offended listeners exercised their right to criticize her for it. That’s America.”

Schlessinger is just another nag who is trying to stoke indignation in our society. It would have been pathetic and nasty enough if she had simply used the racially-charged “n” word, but to argue with the caller about whether she should have the right to use it reveals a deep well of racist antipathy which lay below her surface. It makes me wonder, if she now quits broadcasting in order to get her free speech back, if she wants to use the “n” word a whole lot more in private.

I am not using her first name here, BTW—only the “L” abbreviation—because her name is just as offensive to me as the “n” word is to African-Americans. Dr. L. also has a deep well of homophobic sentiments which caused a backlash, thanks largely to John Aravosis and others who beat the drum over her bigotry. The “Stop Dr. L…” campaign 10 years ago didn’t let loose of Dr. L.’s calling homosexuals “biological errors.” Dr. L. has also repeatedly slammed women as a class. It seems the broader the audience that one of these social commentators gets, the more likely they are to sweep more and more people into their vitriolic dustbins. Think Rush Limbaugh.

According to the Times on August 20, Laura was defended by Sarah Palin, another sassy individual with a firearm mouth who is fighting her political failures by trying to stoke more indignation. Palin, according to the Times, tweeted to Dr. L.: “Don’t retreat … reload.”

Makes me wonder if people like Rus, Sarah and Dr. L. should be labeled as “personal ethical failures.”

— Dan Hooper

Posted in wingnuts, Homophobia, Public Affairs | Print | No Comments »

ADF misrepresents Yale study.

August 6, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

After the previous post’s review of the Alliance Defense Fund’s participation in Perry v. Schwarzeneggar, the landmark case decided earlier this week by Judge Vaughn Walker, I looked further into ADF’s web site. The ADF is self-described as ” a legal alliance of Christian attorneys and like-minded organizations defending the right of people to freely live out their faith.”

As we know, the argument to “save the children” from the scourge of knowing about homosexuality and therefore opening the possibility—they think—that some children will grow up with open minds about homosexuality, figures prominently into the highly inflammatory rhetoric about gay and lesbian couples.

Never mind that many of the same-sex couples who wish to, or have already, wed are not raising children, the “save the children” mentality assumes that civil marriage is primarily about procreation and nurturing the young. So, of course the social conservatives wish to pull in every bit of evidence they can to bolster their view that two moms or two dads either can’t do a decent job of parenting or homosexual parents will harm the children. That argument, by the way, failed to be presented convincingly in Judge Walker’s court room, for lack of evidence.

But look what I found on the ADF’s web site (the right-wing Christian legal outfit who put up at least 8 attorneys to fight back against Olson and Boies): In the press release announcing that ADF will enter an appeal of Walker’s ruling, it said this:

“A recent study conducted by Yale University supports the position that children, all things being equal, should be raised with their own mom and dad: 81 percent believe that society should do everything possible to encourage the ideal of children being raised by their mom and dad, 57 percent believe the law should encourage that children be raised by a mom and a dad, 68 percent worry about the decline of the traditional family, and 70 percent believe that a man-woman relationship is important in teaching children about how men and women interact.”

Since such an 81% finding would seem to be quite the opposite of reports I have read elsewhere suggesting that no harm is being done to the kids, I wanted to know what Yale University said that “supports the position.” This 17-page report from the “Cultural Cognition Project” are actually preliminary findings of a survey on people’s attitudes, not on whether the children are actually alright or are being harmed by gay or lesbian parents. Event at that, what is “summarized” on the ADF page is grossly misleading. The Findings reported on page 4 reveal that 57% said “the law should encourage that children be raised by heterosexual couples wherever possible.” It also reported:

• 56% said that when a court decides whether a person should be allowed to adopt their partner’s children, the court should not be allowed to consider the person’s sexual orientation.
• 58% said Gays and lesbians should be allowed to legally adopt children.
• 59% said Gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve as legal foster parents.
• 59% said Lesbians should have access to sperm banks on the dame terms as heterosexual women.

In fact, the 81 % figure shows up only on page 9 in the Yale report where it is used to label “Liberals.” But the report’s authors say, “Those who oppose gay and lesbian parenting generally view it as a threat to the ideal of the biological family.” They are not reporting data which show that biological families are harmed in any way, or that children are harmed in any way, but that gay/lesbian parenting is “a threat to the ideal of the biological family.”

Apart from the fact that heterosexual divorce and remarriage should be seen similarly, or for that matter, the orphaning of children, etc., what exactly is a threat to an ideal? Is a alleged threat to an ideal sufficient basis to deny civil rights to real people? Is an ideal, any ideal, sufficient reason to shape public policy in a manner which categorically treats an entire class of people as inferior to others? And for that matter, weren’t the anti-miscegenation laws for a big part of American history trying to protect “an ideal family” as all one color?

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Family, wingnuts, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, LGBT Rights | Print | No Comments »

The Legal Playing Field on the morning after.

August 5, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

It was this morning’s top headline: “Ban on gay marriage overturned.” I expected that. The Los Angeles Times article [updated 7:42 a.m.] reviewed much of the same ground that yesterday’s on-line commentaries did. I have already downloaded the decision and read the back-end completely, from page 109–136, so I’m already somewhat familiar with Judge Walker’s careful legal reasoning in dispensing the Pro-Prop 8 arguments one by one under the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the federal 14^th Amendment.

After dispensing with other pro-prejudice arguments (two moms or two dads aren’t good for the children, etc.), and underlining the complete lack of supporting evidence for those arguments, Judge Walker concludes that the State of California has no compelling reason to deny lesbian and gay couples the fundamental legal right of marriage. “The evidence shows conclusively that moral and religious views form the only basis for a belief that same-sex couples are different from opposite-sex couples,” he wrote.

Still, it is interesting to see what others have to say about the quality of the decision, especially authoritative minds. Shannon Price Minter was quoted in the Times, for example. She is the legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) a major player in the larger LGBT movement for many years. Said Minter: “This is a tour de force—a grand slam on every count. This is without a doubt a game-changing ruling.”

(The game that changes is because of a judicial ruling which goes beyond the close-in arguments about the meaning and scope of civil marriage, to rather help build a case in support of full equality before the law for sexual minorities.)

It did not surprise me that the defense counsel had little to say–the guys hired to defend the constitutionality of Proposition 8. At least in what they were quoted a saying, there was no counter-argument (e.g. that Judge Walker had erred in legal reasoning, that there is solid evidence that gay marriage will wreck heterosexual marriage, damage children, destroy the institution and sink the State of California, etc.) except the one which attempts to stoke right-wing indignation: How dare the judge decide against the 52.3% majority of voters who [having been intentionally mislead in the fall of 2008 by a blitzkrieg of anti-gay advertising paid for largely by members of the Mormon religion] said they don’t like gay or lesbian couples. The Times quotes Andrew Pugno (General Counsel for Protect Marriage) as saying that Walker’s “invalidation of the votes of over 7 million Californians violates binding legal precedent and short-circuits the democratic process.” The Alliance Defense Fund is calling Judge Walker’s ruling “dangerous.”

(Pugno has a tendency to puff and bluff, which is understandable because that is the posture of the organization which pays him. For example, this is what Pugno said about the lawsuit filed the day after Prop 8’s passage by the ACLU and Equality California: “The lawsuit filed today by the ACLU and Equality California seeking to invalidate the decision of California voters to enshrine traditional marriage in California’s constitution is frivolous and regrettable. These same groups filed an identical case with the California Supreme Court months ago, which was summarily dismissed. We will vigorously defend the People’s decision to enact Proposition 8.” As it turned out, the arguments advanced against Proposition 8 are certainly not frivolous, and Pugno’s “vigorous defense,” at least in Judge Walker’s court room, turned out to be a total dud.)

On “being intentionally misled” I think Protect Marriage sums it up for me:

“In the campaign, voters were told clearly that voting YES on Proposition 8 would do 3 simple things: . . .

• It would protect our children from being taught in public schools that ‘same-sex marriage’ is the same as traditional marriage, and would prevent other consequences to Californians who will be forced to not just be tolerant of gay lifestyles, but face mandatory compliance regardless of their personal beliefs.”And binding legal precedent is a valid concept. But it generally means that lower courts must abide by the decisions of higher courts. The whole concept of judicial review, which has been with this American republic for two centuries, is meant to, yes, have the authority to overturn legislation—whether written by elected lawmakers or by the initiative process—which is inconsistent with and in conflict with America’s highest principles. That’s what declaring a law “unconstitutional” is all about. The pro-Prop 8 attorneys, by the way, failed in Judge Walker’s courtroom to demonstrate that there is binding legal precedent for forbidding same-sex couples to have civil marital rights. For example, here is the Protect Marriage blog page for Pugno’s Closing Argument before Judge Walker 7 weeks ago:

Hmmm.  Whether pugnacious Pugno’s whimper has any muscle remains to seen. Judge Walker has given the defense counsel until tomorrow, August 6, to submit more papers for a follow-up hearing about whether Walker’s Order should be “stayed” until the 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals has a chance to consider it. According to Times writers Maura Dolan and Carol Williams, “To win a permanent stay pending appeal, Proposition 8 proponents must show that they are likely to prevail in the long run and that there would be irreparable harm if the ban is not enforced.”

Meaning: the don’t-like-gay-marriage side must immediately convince Walker and/or the 9^th Circuit that when all the legal dust has settled, the anti-gay view will have won; and that permitting any more same-sex marriages in the meantime would cause “irreparable harm.”

The second half of this is easier for non-experts to analyze. For starters, can attorney Pugno prevent evidence now (that he couldn’t produce during the trial phase) showing that there was irreparable harm caused by the existing marriages of some 18,000 same-sex couples who wed between June and November, 2008? I don’t think so.

The first half is of course open to much debate. Will the anti-gay forces ultimately win? A lot of commentators still fear that the United States Supreme Court, if and when this case comes before them, and if they choose to review it, is so conservative it will make a decision that reinforces anti-gay prejudice in America for many years to come. That’s mostly a political guess based on attitudes which can and do shift. For example, the Lawrence v. Texas decision (2003) which decriminalized consensual sexual activity between persons of the same gender surprised many of us because we thought the right-leaning Supremes would echo the reactionary Bowers v. Hardwick decision (1986), a grossly prejudicial decision even for the times.

I can’t speak to the legal procedural issues on this, but it would seem to me that Pugno and his forces can’t argue for a “permanent stay” of Walker’s ruling on the assumptions that (a) this case will one day be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, (b) that they will accept the case, which they don’t have to do, and (c) that they will overturn the lower court. What comes in between is the 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals, a noticeably more liberal court that could very much agree with Judge Walker’s legal conclusions.

So my suspicions are that Pugno and company (Texas attorney Austin Nimrocks representing the Alliance Defense Fund is another attorney being quoted, but there were a total of 11 attorneys listed on the Closing Arguments filing) will not be able to get a “permanent stay” against the Walker decision until the appeal process winds through the 9^th Circuit Court–which could take a year or two. This would mean that Walker’s Order (on page 136) would have to be given full force—Proposition 8 would not be enforceable and marriage licenses would begin to be issued again for same-sex couples. We should have an answer to this within days.

The Christian reactionary Alliance Defense Fund (founded by leaders of Campus Crusade for Christ, Focus on the Family and Coral Ridge Ministries among others), you will remember, is also opposed to hate crimes legislation. ADF also seems quite nervous about the Walker decision, if its website is any indicator, especially about the apparent intentions of the American Bar Association to endorse same-sex marriage later this week! See: ABA to Consider Same-Sex Marriage Measure” The ABA is meeting in San Francisco, beginning today (what timing, what synergy!).

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Family, wingnuts, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, LGBT Rights, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

Boycott Target and Best Buy!

July 30, 2010 by Dan Hooper.

Date: Fri 7/30/2010 3:06 PMFrom: “Joe Solmonese, Human Rights Campaign” hrc@hrc.org
Subject:  Target and Best Buy!  Make it right!

$250,000 in donations to a rabidly anti-LGBT candidate? Tell Target and Best Buy: You need to make this right. Add your name!                         Dear Daniel, One candidate for Governor of Minnesota has promised to veto marriage equality legislation and has ties to a Christian rock band that advocates death to gays. Target and Best Buy, both based in Minneapolis, have donated $250,000 to a political committee supporting his campaign. But they still have a chance to make it right. We’ve drafted an open letter calling on the companies to donate an equal amount to support fair-minded candidates. We’ll publish it in a full-page ad in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Will you help us ratchet up the pressure by adding your name? Tell Target and Best Buy to make it right. Add your name now. By signing on, you’ll help make it clear that Target and Best Buy are risking the business of millions of pro-equality customers – and show the rest of corporate America, which is watching this situation very closely, that support for hateful and intolerant candidates won’t go unnoticed. But don’t stop there. Print out our letter, take it to the manager of your local Target and Best Buy, and let them know how disappointed you are. Here’s the backstory: Earlier this week, reports surfaced that Target had donated $150,000 to the political committee MN Forward. Best Buy pitched in another $100,000. MN Forward’s mission? Elect as governor an anti-LGBT state representative with a long history of attacks on LGBT Americans. This representative’s campaign even donated to a controversial “punk-rock Christian ministry” whose leader has advocated executing gays and lesbians! After all these two companies have done to build a fair and equitable workplace, it’s a slap in the face. In years past, Target and Best Buy consistently received 100 percent ratings on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s Corporate Equality Index. They need to make this right – by donating an equal amount to support candidates who will fight for equality. But they won’t do it just because we ask. They need to see that hundreds of thousands of customers across the country are upset and disappointed. Add your name now. I hope Target and Best Buy will do the right thing. But it’s up to us to show that fair-minded consumers are paying close attention to what they do next. Let’s make this happen, Joe Solmonese President  Share on Facebook  Share on Twitter This link is specific to you, so please take action on this campaign before you forward to your friends. Having trouble clicking on the links above? Simply copy and paste this URL into your browser’s address bar: https://secure3.convio.net/hrc/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=911

© 2010 The Human Rights Campaign. All rights reserved. Human Rights Campaign | http://www.hrc.org/ 1640 Rhode Island Ave., N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036-3278 Phone: 202/628-4160 TTY: 202/216-1572 Fax: 202/347-5323

Do not reply to this email. This inbox is not monitored on a regular basis. Replies to this email will not be read or responded to. If you would like to unsubscribe from a specific Human Rights Campaign list, or update your account settings, you can visit your Subscription Management Page.

Well, I was pretty outraged by this, and I have to assume it is accurate, even if Human Rights Campaign did not entrust us with the actul facts.  I frequently shop in both of these chains, especially the Target store in, of all places, West Hollywood, California. 

When I reflect back just a few years ago when people were fired or had a criminal record just for associating with a known homosexual, such guilt by association was assumed to be justifiable.  Politicians continue to use this practice to discredit and shame the other candidate and the other party.  Why then, if the public mind accepts the reasonable conclusion that association with bad is bad, should businesses be able to duck every blemish on their carefully-groomed public relations skin?

Fox News (!) reports that Republian candidate Tom Emmer doesn’t like the flap over the campaign contributions because “I thought we were supposed to be able to exercise our rights of free speech.”   Well, it is about free speech, so everybody is free, thanks to the Supreme Court decision earlier this year, to buy all the speech that their corporations want to pay for.  But that’s not the issue, Tom.  We are just as free to tell Target and Best Buy not that they don’t have a right to speak with their campaign dollars, but that we think what they’re saying is disgusting.

Am I being cynical about the Supreme Court?  Hardly.  The same Fox News story explains it in detail:

Target and other Minnesota-based companies, including electronics retailer Best Buy Co., Red Wing Shoes and snowmobile maker Polaris Industries Inc., donated to MN Forward after a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allowed companies to spend money on elections. The decision overturned prohibitions on corporate campaign spending in about half the states, including Minnesota.

If you can’t stand Fox News, catch the story on ABC News.

 

Posted in Violence, wingnuts, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, LGBT Rights, Public Affairs, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

Are we individuals or couples before the law?

March 12, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

I am no attorney, and I often try to talk law students out of their intended career. But after working in law offices for more than 15 years it is impossible not to attempt to think legally. And it is less dangerous to blog about law than to practice amateur medicine; no one will die if I’m wrong.

But on this same-gender marriage issue that will not go away for years to come (it first burst into our consciousness in 1997 when the Hawaii Supreme Court saw no reason to people of the same gender shouldn’t have the right to a civil marriage), sometimes it is hard to express a legal reasoning that even makes senses in the court of public opinion. After all, the public doesn’t follow anything which is too complex or convoluted, so if you want to change public opinion you have to keep it simple. But that’s how Proposition 8 slipped by the voters in the first place.

Anyway, it occurs to me that all LGBT people already have the right to get married! As individuals, we can get married in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Just not to each other except in a handful of states. In other words, as individuals we can always marry heterosexually. We can marry someone of the opposite gender.

So by my reasoning we are not fighting for individual rights. (Well, I know we really fighting for the right to marry the human being of our choice without some wingnut insisting that it would lead to bestiality.) My reasoning is that it is lesbian or gay couples who are fighting for equal rights. My fundamental question is, Does the concept of justice and equality before the law extend to couples, period, not just to individuals?

We’ve already seen corporations given enormous legal rights, including the recent Supreme Court decision that gives corporations the right to buy candidates for public office and sell them to the voters (but that’s another issue). So it isn’t a stretch to begin analyzing this issue by arguing that lesbian couples and gay couples are entitled to legal rights.

Is that hair-splitting or unimportant? No, it’s central, because in fact American marriage laws grant rights to couples. Federal law, it has been determined, grants 1,049 distinct rights to married couples which are given to them through the vehicle of civil marriage. Most of these rights, I think it can be argued, are grant to the couple, not to the individuals who are in the marriage.

If that can be satisfactorily explained, then it makes perfectly clear sense to me that, under “due process” and a lot of other legal theorizing which make up the stuff of civil rights cases being argued in courtrooms, gay couples and lesbian couples cannot rightfully be discriminated against and heterosexual couples be given carte blanche.

Okay, that much is clear in my mind, but so what? Well as we watch the Perry v. Schwarzenegger case play out in the next 2-3 years, I want to watch how couples are treated legally. Do lesbian couples, for example, have the same rights under domestic partnership law as they would have under marriage law? Do gay male couples have identical rights under a civil union as they would automatically receive in a civil marriage?

Good questions. Check back often for answers.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in wingnuts, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, LGBT Rights, Public Affairs | Print | No Comments »

Sudden acceleration.

February 24, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

I am reading and watching politics more often lately, and I am absorbed by the similarities between the Religious Reich and the political right wingnuts.

Yes, I know they are in bed together, or they are really the same people. We’ve known that since the days of the Moral Majority (Hmmm. They still have a website is up but it hasn’t been updated in 2½ years! See highlightd above.) and the politically opportune ascent of a B-rated actor named Ronald Reagan to become Governor of California as his first public elected office.

But what fascinates me is that religious, social and political conservatives use the exact same technique to promote their views, as if they are all reading the exact same playbook. Is there a modern-day Machiavellian book like The Prince that the entire right wing is circulating? (See this cynical reference; don’t bother to scroll down.)

What I refer to is this 24/7 streaming of public outrage, which seems to be rapidly accelerating in our society. We “get it” that outrage achieves results. People love to get over-excited, as if their dreary daily lives offer no rewards whatever, and it takes an interactive, 3-D action film to get them out of bed in the morning.

But the media, including blogs etc. also exaggerate the effectiveness of outrage. A few weeks ago, the election of Scott Brown as a darling conservative to replace the late Senator Ted Kennedy, the “Lion of the Senate” was supposed to prove that independent voters were outraged with the Obama administration. Now with less than three weeks in office Senator Brown has voted with the democrats on an Obama jobs bill and the right wing is outraged against their own darling.

The outrage I see is more than Rush Limbaugh’s putrid opinions calculated to “stoke indignation” as MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow observed. But probably the easy access to media, the explosion of blogs and Twitter, etc., have all aided and abetted noisy anger over everything. The new American paradigm is one continuous, relentless confrontation which continues to accelerate with no responsible “recall” in sight. 

• Road rage on public streets, highways and freewaysguy slams his Toyota vehicle directly into a Toyota dealership, claiming the vehicle had an episode of sudden acceleration which Toyota should have fixed.
• “Light up the Border” outrage (not outage) over illegals coming into America.
• Outrage over the fact that McCain lost and Barrack Hussein Obama is president of the United States.
• Fred Phelps & co.
• Neighborhood gangs who take offense at the slightest slight.
• Making everything into a culture war. (incidentally, www.culturewar.com is probably for sale if you want to trivialize, market, and profit from it. And www.publicoutrage.com is definitely for sale.

• Making people’s private lives (right to marry, adoption of and caring for children) into a a public fury, Armageddon-moment.soggy-brained tea-party Republicanswhite supremacists, neo-Nazis, NRA, and hothead/ red-faced rednecks
• The noisy derision and resistance of the 2010 Census because, after all, it is being done by The Government.

(I don’t count Dick (”heart attack”) Cheney among the professional stokers of indignation. He seems to be more proficient at sneering than stoking anything.)What I find especially ironic, of course, is that the vast majority of this outrage and indignation in American society is coming from what social and religious conservatives still insist on labeling as a “Christian nation.” Is there something about being Christian, or about Christian doctrine, which is inherently angry, indignant and outraged? Did I miss something when I got the message that God is love, and that we are to love one another as a sign of following Jesus? Help me out here, folks.

—Pastor Dan

Posted in Go figure!, wingnuts, Violence, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, Public Affairs, LGBT Rights, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

The crazies are at it again.

February 19, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

Fred (”God Hates America“) Phelps continues to attract media attention, which is the only pay-off he could possible get out of flying his family/congregation around the country. … and I won’t say anything more disparaging, not that he doesn’t deserve it.  His “God hates” web sites are evidence enough of his twisted nature.

 

In fact, St. Paul warned us about Fred Phelps and talks to people today who listen to his anti-Christian, ungodly diatribes:

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you in the grace o fChrist and are turning to a different gospel— not that there is another gospel, but there are some who are confusing you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ.  But even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that one be accursed!  As we have said before, so now I repeat, if anyone proclaims to you a gospel contrry to what you received, let that one be accursed! — Galatians 1:6-9 (NRSV)

This just in from Pastor Dan forwarding it from Rabbi Steve (I have added emphasis because this apparently happens tomorrow, February 20).  Please pray for our friends in faith, and if you are extra brave, say a prayer for Fred, who has completely blown off the gospel of Jesus.  ~  P.D.

A Message from Rabbi Steven Moskowitz…

Dear Temple Israel Family,

As you may already know, an anti-gay, anti-Semitic group, the Westboro Baptist Church from Topeka, Kansas, is scheduled to come to Long Beach to engage in a series of protests at various locations February 19-21.  Among those places to be picketed are Wilson High School, the Alpert Jewish Community Center, and Temple Israel.  Specifically, the group’s schedule states that it will picket Temple Israel on Saturday, February 20, 10:00-10:30 a.m.  Westboro is a small group, which typically has a small number of picketers displaying hateful and offensive signs, engaging in vocal demonstrations but refraining from any violent or unlawful activities.  Below is a link to a Press-Telegram article announcing the group’s intentions. 

The staff has been in touch with the Long Beach Police Department, the Jewish Federation, the Alpert Jewish Community Center, the ADL, and other agencies.  Following discussions that included Sharon Amster Brown, Education VP Judy Blumenthal and Torah Center Chair Katherine Bussi, we have decided to move the 7^th grade program scheduled for that morning to a parents’ home.  Sharon will shortly be sending an email to the 7^th grade families with the details for that morning’s schedule. 

After giving the matter much thought, I approached the South Coast Interfaith Council and proposed that we host at our synagogue that morning a unity prayer service as a way to refocus the story of the day away from Westboro’s message of hate to our community’s message about love, diversity, and unity.  I invited clergy and congregants from this interfaith community both to attend and to contribute to such a service with prayers/readings/songs which speak of the sacred power of love and unity.  I am delighted to say that the SCIC was very enthusiastic about this invitation.  Already I have received responses from neighboring congregations expressing their support for us and their interest in participating.  We are going to change the start time of our service that morning to 9:30 a.m.  It will conclude at 11:00 a.m.  Similarly, we will shift the start of our regular Torah study session to 8:15 a.m. 

Members of the Long Beach Police Department will be present at Temple Israel that morning.  Please do respect their recommended guidelines that there be no direct encounters with the picketers and no counter-demonstrations.  That would only help the group to feel that they had achieved their goals of provocation and attention.  I invite you to join us on February 20 at 9:30 a.m. as we give voice to the view that there are many paths to God, except the path of hate.  On that day we shall bear witness to the prophetic words inscribed on the outside of our synagogue: “My house shall be a house of prayer for all peoples.”

Rabbi Steven Moskowitz

Press-Telegram link: http://www.presstelegram.com/search/ci_14272240?IADID=Search-www.presstelegram.com-www.presstelegram.com

Posted in Homophobia, wingnuts, Doctrine, Bible & Interpretation, Public Affairs, Faith, PRAYERS | Print | No Comments »

Ignorance is death.

February 18, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

When did the gay rights movement run out of gas? Yes, it did run out of gas. I’m only asking when did it happen to us. Last week I passed my 40-year mark as a gay/Christian activist. Didn’t get a pin or a T-shirt, though.

When did the gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender rights movement run out of gas? One answer is that it was when we had buried about half of our activists who died of AIDS.

Or is that we ran out of energy when we got half a loaf? When people were able to have some quality of life in some of our larger cities, and when we could use Damron’s guide to clubs worldwide or take gay or lesbian cruises and sail the seas under our own flag?

Clearly, we need a source of renewable energy to replace the gas we used to have. And that really means recruiting. Not recruiting straights to become queer. If you’ve ever tried that, with a “bi boy” or “straight-but-curious type” you probably had your heart broken within a few weeks. Recruiting no more works than praying-away-the-gay or getting reparative therapy.

No, we need to recruit the young who are already out and LGBTQ. What they need to be recruited to is to get off the couch, unplug the latest iPleasure, and zoom in from outer cyberspace. We need fresh recruits for many things, including the gathering of signatures to repeal Prop 8. But, even more basic, we need recruits to pay attention to what our right-wingnut enemies are doing out there.

American society may appear to be relatively tolerant right now (if you live in the coastal zones or in a city bigger than, say, a quarter million people). The 20-something generation, in most bigger communities, do not have homophobic issues with “the gay thing.” Everybody under 30 seems to know somebody who is gay or bi or trans or queer. It’s become a non-issue.

But at the same time, extremely backward and weird neanderthals are organizing, marching, writing, phoning, blogging and amassing money that could completely yank away the few civil rights we have patched together.

I have talked repeatedly about Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point, and the case could be made we’re at the tipping point now. LGBTQ rights could win the entire culture war, or the entire war could be lost because social attitudes, homophobia, and small-mind electoral muscle simply tip things backward again.

The late Dr. John Boswell researched and lectured persuasively that Europe was relatively tolerant up to the 11^th century or so. And then a lot of medieval factors including fear, xenophobia, war and disease began to “tip” the needle on social tolerance against homosexuals (and I think Jews and Gypsies, etc.) The visceral attitudes of an entire continent began to look for someone to blame for current social ills, a scapegoat. Gay people became the scapegoat. And within about a hundred years’ time, social tolerance for gay people not only evaporated but the death penalty for same-sex acts became the law all over Europe.

Given modern communications, what took a century 900 years ago could take only a few years in our time. Think Uganda, think Fred Phelps, think Sarah Palin and other tea party boobs.

I am not Chicken Little here, crying that “the sky is falling!” When I look up, in fact, I am hopeful. But the muck at my feet is likely to pull me under if I do nothing.

Thanks to Ali Davis on 365Gay.com for alerting me to a Washington Monthly article on how simpletons from small town Texas have hijacked the entire national system on what goes into our nation’s textbooks. The article, “How a group of Texas conservatives is rewriting your kids’ textbooks” by Mariah Blake is more horrifying than any Hollywood horror film.

People in the upcoming generations are not being dumbed–down by inattention and electronic toys alone. They are being dumbed-down by the already-stupid who have been conspiring in plain sight to make sure the young will not be able to think.

I wish I remembered who said this to me a few years back: “There are uneducated people and there are ignorant people. The problem is that the ignorant are teaching the uneducated.”

In the meantime too many of us are doing white parties, etc. If we are not vigilant, the next Burning Man event may be staged by the Hateful Right.

—Pastor Dan

Posted in wingnuts, Violence, LGBT Rights, Public Affairs, Ex-Gay | Print | No Comments »

Know your wingnuts.

February 13, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

from  http://www.streetprophets.com/tag/LGBT :

 Criminalizing GLBTs: the “Christian” thing to do?

Fri Feb 12, 2010 at 12:35:59 PM PST

Recently there has been a spate of commentary from the loony wing of the Christian right, calling for the criminalization of homosexuality in this country.

Item: Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council said that gays should be imprisoned.

“I think that the Supreme Court decision in Lawrence v. Texas which overturned the sodomy laws in this country was wrongly decided,” said Sprigg. “I think there would be a place for criminal sanctions against homosexual behavior.”

“So we should outlaw gay behavior?” asked [MSNBC’s Chris] Matthews again.

Yes,” said Sprigg.

For a second bit of coverage on this, see FRC’s Sprigg Wants To See Homosexuality Criminalized on the Right Wing Watch.

Lately I’ve been digging up a lot on other wingnuts, such as David Blankenhorn, Arthur Abba Goldberg, Rick Santorum, Hak-Shing William (”Bill”) Tam—and the usual suspects (Dobson, Robertson, Phelps, etc.). Sprigg is new to me—I don’t actually enjoy reading every word that issues from the Family Research Council mouth. FRC is an instrument of James Dobson and his religio-political apocalyptarians, after all.

But research is indispensable if you’re going to blog, and the more thorough I try to be in online research, the more amazed and dismayed I feel. We think we had a movement going (the so-called Homosexual Agenda), but there is an equal and opposite (hopefully no more than equal) movement of hate-filled, power-lusting, fear-mongering, pseudo-Christian money magnets out there who have more interlocking corporate directorates than a Lego kit and an Agenda which would take us back to burning faggots at the stake if they got their way.

Bottom line is we absolutely have to pay attention because these wing nuts, at every level of our society, are trying to twist public policy in their direction. If they have their way, the future will not include us, nor would it be safe for young LGBTQ kids who are just discerning their orientation, gender and self-esteem in the world.

Be afraid. And then be motivated. Be the change you want to see in the world, not the change that Sprigg, Dobson, Phelps and their more extremist friends are trying to put into place.

— Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in wingnuts, Violence, Sex, LGBT Rights, Public Affairs | Print | No Comments »