NPR's Ari Shapiro talks wh Currey Cook of Lambda Legal, the gay rights group that wrote a iend-of-the-urt brief the LGBTQ rights se which the Supreme Court sid wh relig eedom.
Contents:
- GROUPS OPPOSED TO GAY RIGHTS RAKE LNS AS STAT BATE ANTI-LGBTQ BILLS
- 18 ANTI-GAY GROUPS AND THEIR PROPAGANDA
- GAY RIGHTS
- ACTIVISTS NMN VLENCE AGAST LGBTQ MUNY ST. VCENT, WHERE GAY SEX IS ILLEGAL
- GAY RIGHTS MOVEMENT
GROUPS OPPOSED TO GAY RIGHTS RAKE LNS AS STAT BATE ANTI-LGBTQ BILLS
In today’s heightened culture war, the ffers of the anti-gay movement are overflowg. * groups against gay rights *
“Many of those, while not specifilly tied to a church, are rooted the nservative Christian, biblil sense of human sexualy, ” said Stt McCoy, the terim puty legal director for LGBTQ rights and special ligatn for the SPLC and the SPLC Actn Fund, the group’s polil actn simply holdg a relig belief that views homosexualy or transgenr inty as sful do not tomatilly land a church or an anizatn on the SPLC’s list of hate groups. Takg a page om the anti-gay fabulist Stt Lively (see Abidg Tth Mistri, above), Fischer claimed a blog post last May 27 that “[h]omosexualy gave Adolph Hler, and homosexuals the ary gave the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war mache and 6 ln ad Jews. A one-time reporter for the nservative Washgton Tim, LaBarbera has been an energetic mpaigner agast “the radil homosexual agenda” sce at least 1993, when he lnched The Lambda Report, which claimed to do first-hand reportg to expose s gay enemi.
DeMar has modified that dictum slightly the past, sayg that homosexuals wouldn’t all be executed unr a “renstcted” ernment, but that he did believe that the ocsnal executn of “sodom” would serve society well bee “the law that requir the ath penalty for homosexual acts effectively driv the perversn of homosexualy unrground, back to the closet. It has lled the ia of allowg gays to serve openly the ary “evil”; opposed hate crim legislatn (which many relig-right groups falsely assert would make easy to send pastors to prison for nmng homosexualy); and raged agast a judge’s overturng of California’s Proposn 8, which had validated same-sex marriag.
Although is somewhat benign by parison, the CADC has an advisory board that clus some of the untry’s most hard-le anti-gay activists: Lou Sheldon, head of the Tradnal Valu Coaln (see below); Donald Wildmon, the founr of the Amerin Fay Associatn (above); and O’Neal Dozier, a pastor who wrote his 2008 book that “[h]omosexualy not only spreads disease and ntraliz God’s mand, ” but also “stroys fai. ” Last year, CWA acced the Gay, Lbian, and Straight Edutn Network (GLSEN), a group that works to stop anti-gay bullyg schools, of g that missn as a ver to promote homosexualy schools, addg that “teachg stunts om a young age that the homosexual liftyle is perfectly natural … will [e them to] velop to adults who are sensized to the harmful, immoral realy of sexual viance.
18 ANTI-GAY GROUPS AND THEIR PROPAGANDA
A small terie of groups now prise the hard re of the anti-gay movement * groups against gay rights *
In 2002, before jog CRM, Knight wrote that gay marriage “entic children to experiment wh homosexualy” and that acceptg homosexualy leads to “a loss of stabily muni, wh a rise crime, sexually transmted diseas and other social pathologi. Both Dailey and Sprigg have phed false accatns lkg gay men to pedophilia: Sprigg has wrten that most men who engage same-sex child moltatn “intify themselv as homosexual or bisexual, ” and Dailey and Sprigg voted an entire chapter of their 2004 book Gettg It Straight to siar material. In a 1999 publitn (Homosexual Behavr and Pedophilia) that has sce disappeared om s webse, the FRC claimed that “one of the primary goals of the homosexual rights movement is to abolish all age of nsent laws and to eventually regnize pedophil as the ‘prophets’ of a new sexual orr, ” acrdg to unrefuted rearch by AMERICAblog.
30, 2010, bate on MSNBC’s “Hardball wh Chris Matthews” between Perks and the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Mark Potok, Perks fend FRC’s associatn of gay men wh pedophilia, sayg: “If you look at the Amerin College of Pediatricians, they say the rearch is overwhelmg that homosexualy pos a danger to children.
GAY RIGHTS
The ACLU works to ensure that lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr and queer people n live openly whout discrimatn and enjoy equal rights, personal tonomy, and eedom of exprsn and associatn. * groups against gay rights *
” AMERICAblog also reported that then-FRC official Yvette Cantu, an terview published on Amerins for Tth About Homosexualy’s webse, said, “If they [gays and lbians] had children, what would happen when they were too by havg their sex parti? Started 1987 by psychologist Pl Cameron, the Fay Rearch Instute (FRI) has bee the anti-gay movement’s ma source for what Cameron claims is “cuttg-edge rearch” — but is, fact, pletely discreded junk science phed out by a man who has been nmned by three profsnal anizatns. In 1985, the Amerin Soclogil Associatn adopted a rolutn sayg Cameron “has nsistently misterpreted and misreprented soclogil rearch on sexualy” and “repeatedly mpaigned for the abrogatn of the civil rights of lbians and gay men”; the followg year, the same group formally nmned Cameron for that misreprentatn of rearch.
ACTIVISTS NMN VLENCE AGAST LGBTQ MUNY ST. VCENT, WHERE GAY SEX IS ILLEGAL
The gay rights movement the Uned Stat began the 1920s and saw huge progrs the 2000s, wh laws prohibg homosexual activy stck down and a Supreme Court lg legalizg same-sex marriage. * groups against gay rights *
Matt Barber, formerly wh Concerned Women for Ameri and Amerins for Tth About Homosexualy (see above for both), joed Liberty Counsel as director of cultural affairs (also beg Liberty Universy’s associate an for reer and profsnal velopment). A year earlier, Barber had argued that given “medil evince about the dangers of homosexualy, ” should be nsired “crimally reckls for tors to teach children that homosexual nduct is a normal, safe and perfectly acceptable alternative. Camenker, who has long foced on the purported “homosexual agenda” the schools and equently claimed gays are dangero to kids, has repeatedly ced discreded claims om anizatns like the Natnal Associatn for Rearch and Therapy of Homosexualy that lk homosexualy and pedophilia.
GAY RIGHTS MOVEMENT
Advocy group Human Rights Watch released an -pth report Thursday that tails the abe and discrimatn the LGBTQ muny says fac the eastern Caribbean island of St. Vcent and the Grenad, where gay sex is still crimalized. From homelsns to ongog physil and verbal abe, the gay muny the small natn of some 100,000 people says is unr nstant threat. “Every LGBT person terviewed by Human Rights Watch said they wished to leave the untry immediately or had envisned their future abroad,” the report stated. * groups against gay rights *
Former Prbyterian mister Lou Sheldon has been warng Amerins about the “gay threat” sce 1980, when he found the Tradnal Valu Coaln (TVC), which also is ncerned wh abortn and natnal secury and tak on liberal activists on a range of issu. ” Wh regard to LGBT teen suicis, TVC, unr the headle “Homosexual Urban Legends, ” claims that “[t]he ld, hard fact is that teens who are stgglg wh homosexual feelgs are more likely to be sexually molted by a homosexual school unselor or teacher than to m suici over their feelgs of spair.
The TVC also mak assertns on s webse about disproportnate homosexual pedophilia and attacks the ia that people are born gay and the claim that gays want the right to marry for the same reasons that heterosexuals do — the TVC suggts the real purpose of marriage equaly is to stroy the ncept of marriage and ultimately replace altogether wh group sex and polygamy. Among the “tradnal moral valu” the anizatn claims to promote are falsehoods about AIDS as a “gay plague, ” furtherg the myth that people who are gay were rponsible for the Holot, that the ernment is promotg LGBTQ behavr, and that pro-LGBTQ anizatns are anti-Christian hate groups.
Gay rights movement, civil rights movement that advot equal rights for LGBTQ persons—that is, for lbians, gays, bisexuals, transgenr persons, and queer persons—and lls for an end to discrimatn agast LGBTQ persons employment, cred, hog, public acmodatns, and other areas of life. * groups against gay rights *
He has pared homosexualy to addictn, and has falsely asserted not only that there is “a disproportnate cince of pedophilia” among gay men, but also that a proposed equaly bill California was tend to actively promote an LGBTQ “liftyle” to children. The group seeks to “promote and fend the Biblil view of marriage and fay” by spreadg falsehoods about LGBTQ “recment” efforts and a nebulo LGBTQ “agenda, ” as well as providg a theologil gloss for anti-gay legislatn proposed the Uned Stat, Uganda, and elsewhere.
For this reason, the anizatn has drawn fire om the Amerin Psychologil Associatn, om the rearcher on one of their foundatnal papers–who has sce disavowed his own rearch – and om the prs, who pot out that the ex-gay anizatn has a spic lack of ex-gay members. Posive Approach To Healthy Sexualy (PATH): Recently rebrand om s former name, Posive Alternativ to Homosexualy, PATH lls self “a non-prof ecumenil aln of anizatns that believe tradnal fay valu based upon time-honored Biblil prcipl, ” and stat that s goal is “to promote healthy sexualy and tradnal fay valu, adherg to the sacred venant of marriage between one man and one woman.
Army service World War I, Gerber was spired to create his anizatn by the Scientific-Humanarian Commtee, a “homosexual emancipatn” group ’s small group published a few issu of s newsletter “Friendship and Freedom, ” the untry’s first gay-tert newsletter.