Tag: Gay Politics

Globe to Gay Employees: Marry or Lose Bennies

Buck Banks

Shotgun weddings: Massachusetts’ 2004 law sanctioning same-gender marriage has had at least one unintended consequence, as gay and lesbian employees of the Boston Globe are finding out, according to the Boston Herald. Those claiming their partner as a dependent to qualify for dental and health insurance coverage must get married by Jan. 1 or lose their domestic partner benefits.

The irony of the thing is that since gay marriage is legal in Massachusetts, companies that offered coverage to same-sex domestic partners because they could not marry in the past now risk being sued for discrimination by straight unmarried employees who are not elligible for domestic partner bennies. Further complicating the situation, employees who work for the Globe in Boston but live in another state are screwed because they can’t legally marry. The Globe said it would continue to offer domestic partner coverage to employees who live outside Massachusetts.

Jeb Tries to Disown Nutjob Crony After Islam Slurs

Trish

Momma always said to watch who you hang around with: Jeb Bush is recoiling like a man who discovered a snake under a rock after anti-Muslim comments on a Florida radio show from his faithful Repug beard in the black community.

Jeb wasted no time yelling, “Ho-lee shee-it!”

The always-good-for-a-shocker Rev. O’Neal Dozier is at it again, this time venting his spleen not on gay people but on Muslims.

God’s man in South Florida says he doesn’t want a mosque in his neighborhood, because Those People are terrorists and their religion is a cult. But you, not being a Man or Woman of God, couldn’t be expected to know that.

”I don’t look for everyone to believe what I believe, because everyone is not as astute about religion as I am,” said Dozier, pastor of the Worldwide Christian Center in Pompano Beach. ”That’s my life.”

Right ho. Still, some people feel the good rev should have devoted a little more study to the matter.

…Altaf Ali, executive director of the Florida Chapter of the Council of American-Islamic Relations, said he has tried unsuccessfully to meet with Dozier.

”I want a chance to respond and refute these accusations,” Ali said Friday. ”It appears that he doesn’t have that much knowledge about Islam.”

Jeb, who appointed Dozier to the powerful Broward County Judicial Nominating Commission to help select county and circuit court judges, wasted no time yelling, “Ho-lee shee-it!”

On Friday, Gov. Bush’s office issued a statement distancing him from Dozier.

”Gov. Bush in no way shares Rev. Dozier’s views on Islam,” said Alia Faraj, Bush’s spokeswoman.

Of course, it suited Jeb fine until now for Dozier to be a nutcase in other areas.

In the past, Dozier has asked Gov. Bush’s appointments to the Broward circuit and county courts if they were ”God-fearing,” and inquired about their parenting abilities.

With Christians Like These, Who Needs Satanists?

Trish

The demented vicious weirdos of Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka were a big no-show at the funeral of a Florida vet killed in Afghanistan, after authorities made it clear that they would be pleased to make an example of them.

If they are not being monitored like their fundamentalist brethren in better-known terrorist groups, there’s something really wrong with national security

Florida’s two-week old law, similar to a national one, bars protests at military funerals. It was enacted just for the sick puppies at Westboro and any other freaks of nature of who might get a similar idea to proclaim that God kills soldiers to exact revenge on gays. Because you know, God can’t just take the direct route and kill gays. Or something.

The Patriot Guard Riders, a group of mostly former veterans on motorcycles, did attend the service. The group formed to protect the families targeted by Westboro and its ilk and its captain, Clayton Murphy, correctly predicted the so-called church members would chicken out.

Murphy praised the new laws but said Westboro members probably won’t show. The group often sends announcements of protests that never happen, he said.

If the protesters come to town, Murphy suggests people ignore them.

“They feed off people who show up to counterprotest,” Murphy said. “When they break the law, let the local law enforcement officers in the area arrest them.”

I’m not exaggerating how bizarre these folks are. Among their teachings are that the idea that God loves everyone is “the greatest lie ever told,” and that God in fact hates America. If they are not being monitored like their fundamentalist brethren in better-known terrorist groups, there’s something really wrong with national security. Check them out yourself at godhatesfags.com, but be warned: you will want to take a hot shower after you visit their site.

Is Heterosexuality a Lifestyle Choice?

Jon Ponder
Conservatives’ internalized homophobia is like bulimia of the spirit. Its victims starve their psyches by regurgitating their self-loathing.

A new study has identified a small but significant biological factor that influences the sexual identity of males. The study proves that “having one or more older brothers boosts the likelihood of a boy growing up to be gay — an effect due not to social factors, but biological events that occur in their mother’s womb…”

While the study does not provide the ultimate proof that sexual orientation is innate, it does offer definitive evidence that biological forces have a role.

This is significant because, according to a 2003 Pew poll, 42 percent of Americans believe that homosexuality is a lifestyle choice — and it is among this group that we find the conservatives’ consensus of opposition for equal treatment under the law for gay people.

What fascinates me about rightwingers’ belief that sexual orientation is a choice is that, while they project this decision making onto those of us who grew up to be gay, they are apparently blind to the converse decision-making that it implies about themselves.

If homosexuals “decide” to be gay, then the corollary must be true: Heterosexuality must be a lifestyle choice, too.

What this means is that, at some point in their lives, these conservatives seriously considered becoming gay but then decided to pass.

This decision must have been wrenching. And over time, their suppressed desires turned into self-loathing — a disgust which they came to project onto others who, they believe, did not have the fortitude to conquer their attraction for members of their own gender.

This internalized homophobia is like bulimia of the spirit. Its victims starve their psyches by regurgitating their self-loathing.

Truly straight people do not — cannot — make a choice about their sexual orientation, just as gay people don’t, and can’t, choose. People who are comfortable in their own sexual personae are not threatened by the way the sexuality of others is expressed.

BBC: ‘Gay’ Means ‘Rubbish’

Buck Banks

And “fags” means “cigarettes”: According to a short in The Hollywood Reporter, the BBC Board of Governors has ruled that the word ” ‘gay’ now means ‘rubbish’ in modern playground-speak and need not be offensive to homosexuals.”

Wonder how all the rubbish people are taking that ….

Apparently this all came about after a listener complained when a morning talk-show host dismissed a cell phone ringtone with the remark, “I don’t want that one, it’s gay.”

The BBC’s program complaints committee noted, “The word ‘gay’ … is often now used to mean ‘lame’ or ‘rubbish.’ This is a widespread current usage of the word amongst young people.”

Who needs “gay” anyway, when we’ve got so many other descriptive adjectives available?

Florida’s Next Republican Governor Could Be Either Pot Smoking Adulterer or Allegedly Closeted, Self-Hating Gay Guy

Trish

Florida headlines are fairly drooling over revelations that Republican candidate for governor Tom Gallagher is a jerk.

Miami Herald: Gallagher’s Family Values Take Hit With Revelations

Sarasota Herald Tribune: Divorce Records Dogging Hopeful

Bradenton Herald: Gallagher Apologizes for Affair, Marijuana Use

Palm Beach Post: Gallagher Apologizes for Misdeeds

Sun-Sentinel: Gubernatorial Candidate Gallagher Used Marijuana, Cheated on First Wife

Tampa Tribune: Gallagher Admits Fault For Failed Marriage

Any outrage is a bit misplaced. In February, when charges of insider trading while on the taxpayer dole arose, hardly a gasp was heard from Pensacola to the Keys. Lakeland Ledger:

…an allegedly intoxicated Gallagher returned to their home and tore a screen off the house, the court documents say. The next day, he returned and took the dog. Ann Louise Gallagher asked a judge for a restraining order

Tax records show Gallagher made at least 70 separate online orders to buy or sell AES Corp. stock in 2003, and 60 of those came within weeks or days of five significant federal announcements about the [government] pipeline between the Bahamas and Broward County.

…Gallagher joined Gov. Jeb Bush and other Cabinet members when they voted in 2004 to support an easement for the AES project as well as a competing company’s pipeline proposal…He didn’t declare his ownership before voting but it was included on his annual public disclosure forms.

The deals were made on his state-issued computer during office hours while Gallagher was carrying out his duties as Florida’s Chief Financial Officer. And they weren’t the first.

Gallagher’s online trading and other investments first were reported by the St. Petersburg Times…The paper noted the tax records also showed Gallagher had invested in insurance companies while he was Florida’s insurance commissioner and in an airline that had a contract with the state.

But infidelity and drug use are…so much more interesting. In this case, anyway. […]

21st Century Pentagon Still Uses Long Discredited 19th Century ‘Disorder’ Classification of Homosexuality

Jon Ponder

In his groundbreaking work on psychoanalysis, published in 1896, Sigmund Freud famously classified homosexuality as sexual disorder. Fifty years later, a shift in thinking about homosexuality occurred among two groups: psychotherapists and gay people themselves. In the field of psychology, both practicioners and researchers began to question homosexuality’s inclusion among disorders like neurosis and schizophrenia, while at the same time — perhaps as a result — the gay rights movement was founded. (Forget Stonewall, the movement began with the formation of the Mattachine Society in Los Angeles by Harry Hay and others, on November 11, 1950.)

By 1973, the mental health community had reached a consensus. That year, the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of personality disorders.

So it is shocking, and yet not surprising, to learn today that the Pentagon is still using Freud’s long-descredited diagnosis:

A Pentagon document classifies homosexuality as a mental disorder, decades after mental health experts abandoned that position.

The document outlines retirement or other discharge policies for service members with physical disabilities, and in a section on defects lists homosexuality alongside mental retardation and personality disorders.

Talk about internalized homophobia! This is purely willful ignorance, also known as bigotry, plain and simple.

No wonder Iraq is a quagmire.

CA Gov: Schwarzenegger to Address Gay GOP Group – And Then Veto Gay History Bill

Jon Ponder

Is there any sadder group in America today than gay Republicans? Here in California the queer GOP group, the Log Cabin Club, will put its members’ pathetic self-loathing on display on June 29 when it hosts an address by Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is running for reelection in November.

The governor vetoed a bill last year that would have legalized gay marriage — and soon after his address to the gay Republicans will reportedly veto a bill that would promote the teaching of gay history in schools.

The address by Schwarzenegger is a craven attempt by his campaign to court the vote of the state’s burgeoning “independent” voters, many of whom are fiscally conservative but socially liberal, by symbolizing his alleged tolerance on sexual identity issues. It also represents a hard shift to the left by the governor after years of catering to California’s anemic conservative base.

But why would the members of the Log Cabin Club allow themselves to be subjected to such feckless pandering? Listen to the defensive tone in Log Cabin President Patrick Guerrero’s explanation of the invitation to the governor:

“There is a better than 50-50 chance this man will be the governor of California for the next four years, and for the gay community to label somebody based on one veto is shortsighted,” Guerrero said. “We thought allowing him to address these issues in a friendly setting as well as giving him a chance to get another look at who gay and lesbian families are was important both for him and for us.”

Right. That’s all he needs — just one more look at gay and lesbian families.

What could the real reason for this devotion be? Are the gay Gops simply shallow? After all, even though Schwarzenegger has had tens of thousands of dollars of work done on his face and (probably) elsewhere, wears makeup by the trowel-full and has fake-looking dyed hair, he is a movie star. Or maybe it’s a fetish — for daddies, bullies or both.

J’Ville Church ‘Outs’ Gay-Marriage Haters

Buck Banks

Naming names: Christ Church of Peace, a nondenominational church in Jacksonville, Fla., has published on the Internet the names of 400,000 Floridians in 60 counties who signed a petition supporting a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages. While publishing the names violates no privacy law, wingnut supporters of the amendment are predictably crying foul, according to the Miami Herald.

”It’s a gross invasion of people’s privacy,” said John Stemberger, president and general counsel of the Florida Family Policy Council, an offshoot of James Dobson’s national Christian conservative group Focus on the Family.

‘It’s time for another voice that is Christian to be heard.’
– Gary Debusk, pastor of Christ Church of Peace

Stemberger argued that, if Christian conservatives published the names and addresses of gay-rights activists, they would likely be condemned as hatemongers. ”A lot of people would be outraged and say it’s a hateful, un-Christian gesture,” he said.

Yes, John, it would be a hateful, un-Christian thing to do, much like the hateful, un-Christian act of signing a petition in support of a repressive, discriminatory constitutional amendment.

Gary Debusk, pastor of Christ Church of Peace, said the church began the ”Know Thy Neighbor” effort Monday to encourage dialogue and prevent voter-signature fraud. As the head of a congregation that supports same-sex marriage, Debusk said he also wanted to add a new perspective to a debate that he said has been dominated largely by religious conservatives. ”It’s time for another voice that is Christian to be heard,” he said.

The website, knowthy neighbor.org/florida, is linked to the church’s home page and contains a searchable database of names. The names on such petitions are part of the public record, according to the Florida Department of State.

I went on the site and searched for my last name, and out of four pages of names found that neither my mother nor my siblings had signed up. Checking under my mother’s maiden name, however, revealed an aunt in the town where I was born who did sign the petition. A page of folks with the same last name as Editor Trish who might or might not be related to her also signed up.

Are you a Floridian? Have relatives who live in Florida? Want to find out if they are intolerant, would-be discriminators and hatemongers? Go to the site at http://www.knowthyneighbor.org/florida/ and look them up. And then let us know what you discover.

Brad and Angelina: World’s Stupidest Attractive Straight People Turn Up Their Nose at Marriage

Trish

So these two defective-in-every-
way-except-looks people would have Pres. 30% Approval and Sinking’s blessings but none of my gay friends are fit?

Let’s get this straight, so to speak. Pres. Sanctity is Only for Straight People won’t allow my cousin and his partner of more than 20 years or my friends Joe and Julio, who have been together almost 10 years, to marry. But he wants these two clueless idiots to be able to have at it.

They’re too stupid to so much as spell the word matrimony if you put them together in a room with a dictionary open to the page that starts with marshmallow and ends with matzo. Read this and see if I’m wrong:

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt denied Wednesday that wedding bells are in the air, saying they want to concentrate for now on their newborn daughter and Jolie’s two adopted children.

“There is nothing in the air. The focus is the kids, and we are obviously extremely committed to the children and as parents together,” Jolie [said]. “So that kind of says it for us, and to have a ceremony on top of it is nothing.”

If only. If only a ceremony between you two could be ignored. So…Brad’s adopted the kids you adopted and changed their last names to Jolie-Pitt, plus now you’ve had another child together. But you don’t want to like, be committed or anything.

Pitt and Jolie sold rights to images of Shiloh Nouvel through Getty Images photo agency, saying proceeds would be donated to a charity, not yet named.

People magazine paid a reported US$4 million for the right to release the pictures in North America, while Hello! obtained British rights.

Quick, somebody hand me a loaded firearm.

Brad and Angelina began their affair while he was still married to Jennifer Anniston. If he and the Beautiful One wed, it will be his second marriage. But he is 42, after all.

She, of course, is only 30 and was previously married to Billy Bob Thorton, whose name is presumably still tatooed on her person, although the vial of his blood she used to wear around her neck is no doubt bobbing in the waves somewhere. She was also married to the less famous Jonny Lee Miller. With Brad having only two names and the fact that their marriage will be her third, I can see why he’d be a little hesitant. If he had a brain.

So these two defective-in-every-way-except-looks people would have Pres. 30% Approval and Sinking’s blessings but none of my gay friends are fit? If I weren’t already divorced, I might get one just to protest.