Hidn Bra: Ameri's Changg Attus Toward Gay People : NPR

Contents:

• AFTER YEARS OF PROGRS ON GAY RIGHTS, HOW DID THE US BEE SO ANTI-LGBTQ+?
• 18 ANTI-GAY GROUPS AND THEIR PROPAGANDA
• HIDN BRA: AMERI'S CHANGG ATTUS TOWARD GAY PEOPLE
• THE ANTI-GAY AGENDA

AFTER YEARS OF PROGRS ON GAY RIGHTS, HOW DID THE US BEE SO ANTI-LGBTQ+?

Apparently, the Uned Way has nclud that while is unacceptable for the muny fund to be ed to fund racist groups, is acceptable and sirable to give the money to an anizatn that is bigoted towards gays and lbians. Jo the hundreds of dividuals, ci, schools, church, synagogu, parent-teacher anizatns, unns, and Uned Way agenci natnwi who will no longer turn their backs on the harmful impact that the Boy Suts’ homophobic polici have on our children and our muny.

Jt as stat followed Florida’s bill that opponents labeled “Don’t Say Gay” — which rtricts -school discsns about sexual orientatn or genr inty — several joed Tennsee proposg bills that would ban drag performanc. A rash of laws ncerng the teachg of human sexualy school curricula, banng trans stunt athlet and strippg parents of the right to help their genr-variant children obta appropriate re have popped up numero red stat this same-sex marriage is now part of the fabric of Ameri, nservativ have chosen to explo Amerins’ unfaiary wh trans people and piggyback on parental anger over the perceived overreach of Covid-era school closur, nflatg wh an sid sense of “wokens”, the hop of fdg an electorally viable sluiceway for anti-LGBTQ+ most famo of the anti-LGBTQ+ laws is the piece of Florida legislatn banng stctn on sexual orientatn or genr inty schools between krgarten and third gra, the so-lled “don’t say gay” law.

The ernor and his supporters have labeled as a “groomer” anyone who believ children n learn LGBTQ+ people exist, argug that simply by talkg about gay relatnships to a child, you are sexualizg that child. He was followed by Arizona’s ernor, Doug Ducey, who, after barrg mors om genr-affirmatn treatment, wouldn’t even state for the rerd that trans people were Florida lawmaker Michele Rayner-Goolsby, left, hugs her wife, Bian Goolsby, durg a march at cy hall St Petersburg agast the ‘don’t say gay’ bill.

18 ANTI-GAY GROUPS AND THEIR PROPAGANDA

Photograph: Bob Daemmrich/Zuma Wire/Rex/ShutterstockPolicians are supported the media by mentators like Tucker Carlson, who claimed “no one had heard of this trans thg four years ago”, or Charlie Kirk, channelg 1980s fears sayg “gays want to rpt your children” rejuvenated, the right wg is poised to make transphobia and homophobia rnerston of the midterms and 2024 electns, wh promis to liver “don’t say gay” legislatn stat cludg Michigan and New Perks, the print of the Fay Rearch Council, a nservative lobbyg group, veighed agast the ernors of Indiana and Utah for vetog legislatn banng trans women om participatg sports, llg the bills “timely, mastream protectns”. The Republin US reprentative Marjorie Taylor Greene vowed to troduce a feral “don’t say gay” bill if Republins w the Hoe this November, only to one-up herself days later by tweetg that for people to be pro-trans is to be pro-pedophilia. ”The bs-iendly wg of the GOP that would quietly team up wh Democrats to scuttle rabidly homophobic bills is now outnumbered, and legislators a dozen or more stat that lean even farther to the right than DeSantis are takg, the Natnal Center for Lbian Rights legal director, believ Florida is the tt se for a renewed ph for an aggrsive, Christian-natnalist program.

”The “don’t say gay” bill, Mter not, is very siar to what’s been passed Rsia, tetherg Amerin nservativ to their thorarian unterparts who have succsfully rolled back mocratic norms across eastern Europe. “I’ve seen this movie before over the last 30 years: The right wg cid to target the LGBTQ muny, whether ’s around marriage or adoptn or trans kids playg sports or bathrooms, ” says the California state senator Stt Wiener, who is gay.

“I thought was really important to ph back on the policy level, and to send a clear signal that California and other stat really re about the kids, ” he believ that “don’t say gay” is “patently unnstutnal” but also ntends that relyg on the judicial system to protect human rights may no longer be a sound optn.

HIDN BRA: AMERI'S CHANGG ATTUS TOWARD GAY PEOPLE

Among those exampl are a parison of same-sex marriage to a marriage between “a man and his horse”; llg the “It Gets Better” project, an iative signed to help LGBTQ young people pe wh bullyg and margalizatn, “disgtg” and a “ncerted effort” to rec kids to the gay “liftyle”; and claimg that the “blood” of “young Mar” would be on the hands of lawmakers who voted to repeal the ary’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” Fay Rearch Council did not rpond to a requt for ment.

Another “anti-LGBTQ hate group” named the report is the Alliance Defendg Freedom, a nservative Christian legal group wh attorneys across the untry and a long track rerd of ligatg agast LGBTQ a lawsu that ma natnal headl last year, ADF reprented Jack Phillips, a Christian baker who refed to make a ke for a gay weddg, a narrow victory at the Supreme Court.

Acrdg to Ta Fetner, a soclogy profsor at Canada’s McMaster Universy, anti-LGBTQ activists began anizatn “not too long after Stonewall, ” the 1969 uprisg at the Stonewall Inn, a New York Cy gay bar.

THE ANTI-GAY AGENDA

“Along the same l that you see today, they put forward stereotyp and vilify, pecially gay men, as predators and predators of children, and e that to jtify the tactics of takg rights way om LGBTQ people, ” Fetner ced as an early example the activism of Ana Bryant Florida.