Times Dispatch Runs Mealy Mouth Response to Publishing Hate Speech

Image from GayRVA.

Earlier in the week I wrote about the Richmond Times Dispatch's publish of an anti-LGBT advertisement place by the Virginia Christian Alliance ("VCA"), a certified hate group.  In response to the overwhelming negative action to the ad, the Times Dispatch issued basically a non-apology and gave a mealy mouthed response about "freedom of speech" although that does not guaranty one the right to have hate speech published.  I strongly suspect that had the ad been a rant against blacks, Jews or other minorities, it would not have been published. Especially if the Times Dispatch had bothered to check out the facts on the Virginia Christian Alliance the way the Southern Poverty Law Centered has done.  Once again, I suspect what was in play was undeserved deference to religion and those who bandy about the "Christian" label even though their behavior and beliefs are the antithesis to Christ's message.  A column in GayRVA looks at the disappointing response of the Times Dispatch and the ugliness of the Virginia Christian Alliance. Here are column excerpts (NOTE what Republicans are in bed with VCA):

[T]he Richmond Times-Dispatch ran an advertisement from the Virginia Christian Alliance in their Tuesday, April 10 edition. The ad was full of anti-LGBTQ hate . . . If you did miss our article about it, it seems you were in the minority; indeed, the RTD saw it themselves and issued a “response” — they didn’t call it an apology, because it wasn’t one.

In the brief response from Times-Dispatch Publisher Tom Silvestri, which you can read in full here, Silvestri said the Virginia Christian Alliance ad “does not represent the views of The Times-Dispatch” and that the decision to run it “was guided by First Amendment freedoms that allow for a divergence of viewpoints and opinion.” He then stated that response from staff and others “has prompted us to begin a review of our content guidelines for future paid advocacy advertising.”

As I wrote on Tuesday, the ad was “written in the kinds of hateful terms that any reputable publication should think twice about printing — even if they did get paid for it.”

Indeed, Times-Dispatch reporter Graham Moomaw seemed to agree with us, tweeting yesterday in response to the issue that “there is no First Amendment right to have your views printed in a privately owned newspaper. The First Amendment is what gives newspapers the right to reject submissions (paid or unpaid) that don’t meet their standards.”

Standards should particularly be brought to bear on any content submitted by Virginia Christian Alliance (VCA), the group who placed the ad. They were listed as a hate group earlier this year by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). At the time of this designation, VCA president Don Blake told the Baltimore Sun that VCA are “as opposite as you can get from a hate group,” and that “we’re pro-Christ and pro-Bible. We aren’t anti-anything.”

The Sun then pointed out that the group’s website linked to articles with headlines like “Fear Of Muslims Is Not A Phobia, But Rational,” and “Islam Is Satanic, Says Dallas Pastor Robert Jeffress.” To this list, we’d add our own discoveries: “The Top Ten Myths About Homosexuality,” and “Homosexual Behavior Is Inherently Destructive,” for starters.

Why is a group like this even getting the time of day from the Richmond Times-Dispatch?

Virginia politicians including Congressman Dave Brat and Delegate Nick Freitas (who is currently running for Tim Kaine’s Senate seat) have previously been awarded the VCA’s “Courageous Leadership Award.” Keep that in mind next time you go to the voting booth.

Most politicians are smart enough not to enthusiastically accept awards from groups that boldly touted white supremacist views. By the same token, it would be shocking for a newspaper to accept advertising from white nationalist groups, regardless of how overtly they pointed out that it was just an advertisement. Why should anti-LGBTQ hate be different?

Hateful views toward marginalized groups of any kind should never be tolerated as part of public discourse. This was the message we were sending with our first article. And we will continue to repeat it until the Richmond Times-Dispatch gets it.

 Kudos to GayRVA and shame on the Times Dispatch, Dave Brat and Nick Freitas.

Richmond Times Dispatch Prints Anti-LGBT Ad

image via William Mccormack/Facebook

The Richmond Times Dispatch has long been viewed as a "conservative" newspaper - the paper's former right wing editorial columnist James Kilpatrick was even ridiculed on for years Saturday Night Live for his bigotry - but in recent years the paper seemed to be belatedly coming into the 21th Century.  Apparently, such was not the case given that the newspaper recently published an ad by a Christian extremist group attacking LGBT rights and pushing deliberate lies against the LGBT community.  Richmond has made great strides towards becoming a modern, progressive city.  It is a shame that its newspaper continues to lag behind.  One can only wonder if an ad by white supremacists or Neo-Nazis will be next. Perhaps no coincidentally, the ad was run shortly before Equality Virginia's Commonwealth Dinner that takes place this coming Saturday in Richmond.  Gay RVA looks at the disturbing ad that should never have been published by a reputable newspaper.  Here are highlights:

There’s hate speech in today’s paper. It’s right there in black and white, in the Richmond Times Dispatch. Headlined “Homosexuality (LGBTQ) & Culture Change,” there is a small line of text above the black-bordered essay that reads “Paid Advertisement.” But what follows is a clear-cut attack on LGBTQ rights and reproductive freedom, written in the kinds of hateful terms that any reputable publication should think twice about printing — even if they did get paid for it.

The advertisement was paid for by the Virginia Christian Alliance, and the essay it contains is attributed to Greene Hollowell, listed on Virginia Christian Alliance’s Board Of Directors page as Founder and Web Editor of the group.

Painting the struggle for LGBTQ rights as a sinister plot, the essay says that “the homosexual community saw how the culture was changed by using slogans like ‘a woman’s right to health care’ and ‘choice’… they organized and have been very successful in changing people’s minds by demonstrations, appeals for ‘fairness,’ comparisons to the African-Americans’ fight for freedom, and again, the Supreme Court’s rulings” At this point, things go from dog-whistle implications to outright anti-LGBTQ propaganda. “This has occurred despite the universal feeling of the not-so-distant past that the acts were so gross that they were referred to as ‘unmentionables.’ Through the years, it has been referred to as sodomy, homosexuality, gay, and now LGBTQ.” That’s right, folks — the newspaper just told you and everyone who cares about you that attempting to treat LGBTQ people fairly is a sure path to burn in the fires of hell. Either that, or they’re saying that supporting the LGBTQ community will straight-up get you killed — that last line could really be read either way. Regardless, not the sort of thing anyone wants to read in their hometown’s biggest and best-known print publication.

Virginia Christian Alliance previously grabbed headlines when they sponsored a 2015 bill introduced by the unlamented former delegate, Bob Marshall. The bill, 2015′s HB 1414, was known as a “conscience clause” bill, and was intended to allow for discrimination against members of the LGBTQ community under the guise of “religious freedom.” These sorts of bills continue to bedevil the LGBTQ community in this state and others to this day, though thankfully none have yet been passed here in Virginia.

LGBTQ people and their allies who read the Richmond Times-Dispatch today got to hear about how they were courting damnation. I hope the money that paid for that ad was worth risking a loss of support from the significant majority of Americans who support marriage equality (64 percent according to a 2017 Gallup poll). Maybe they were just hoping we wouldn’t notice.

Shame on the Times Dispatch.  Hopefully, the Virginian Pilot and Daily Press will not participate in publishing lies and hate-based propaganda if such an ad is submitted to them.  

Neo-Nazi Site Argues Anti-Jewish "Troll Storm" Is Free Speech

As a previous post noted, a ruling for the Christofascist plaintiff in Masterpiece Cakeshop could embolden white nationalists to make similar "religious freedom" arguments to support their active discrimination against minorities.  Already, one neo-Nazi site is claiming that a so-called "troll storm" that was unleashed against a Jewish target is protected "free speech."  Welcome to Trump/Pence's America.  It's an American where whites/Christian extremists are above the law and can abuse anyone who doesn't conform with their racial and/or religious views.  And the separation between right wing, evangelical Christians and white supremacists is much smaller than many want to believe.  It is no coincidence that the head of Family Research Council - an anti-gay hate group - has ties to white supremacy organizations.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at the insidious "free speech" argument being made by neo-Nazis.  Here are excerpts:

The founder of a popular neo-Nazi website who was sued after he called on his readers and followers to “troll storm” a Jewish Realtor from Montana is arguing that his actions are protected by free speech.

Andrew Anglin, founder of the Daily Stormer, has asked a federal court in Montana to dismiss a lawsuit that Tanya Gersh filed against him last spring. In court records filed last week, Anglin’s attorneys said that the First Amendment “is blind to viewpoint” and that the Constitution protects Anglin’s right to express his views about Gersh, “no matter how many people find those views intolerable.”

“If a local business were polluting the environment, any editor could rally his readers to write to that business in protest,” his legal team, led by First Amendment lawyer Marc Randazza, wrote in court briefs asking for the dismissal of the lawsuit. “If a local business were discriminating against black customers, the NAACP can exhort its members to send correspondence to it. And, conversely, the KKK can ask its members to send letters of protest to an establishment that treats all races equally.”

Gersh, of Whitefish, Mont., sued Anglin in April in the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana. The complaintdetails many of the more than 700 anti-Semitic and hateful messages, including death threats, to Gersh, her family, friends and colleagues.

The deluge of messages began after Gersh, who was involved with a local organization called “Love Lives Here,” spoke with Sherry Spencer, the mother of white nationalist and alt-right leader Richard Spencer.

“There are only 6,000 Jews in the entire state of Montana, yet they’re 100% of the people trying to silence Richard Spencer by harassing his mother. So Then — Let’s Hit Em Up. Are ya’ll ready for an old fashioned Troll Storm?” Anglin wrote.

Anglin’s attorneys argued that his articles do not constitute a “true threat” of violence against Gersh. Although there have been death threats, they said those did not come directly from Anglin, but rather, from third parties. The attorneys added that Anglin included disclaimers urging his readers to avoid threats of violence.

“Political hyperbole is not a threat. . . . The third parties’ statements are generally recognized anti-Semitic tropes, without actual harm reasonably construed,” the attorneys wrote. “And, even Nazi expression, no matter the psychic harm on Jewish residents, is nonetheless protected speech.”

The attorneys further argued that although the speech in question is unpopular, banning it would create a dangerous precedent for the First Amendment rights of advocacy organizations.

Gersh’s lawsuit, which is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, alleged invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress and violation of Montana’s anti-intimidation act. Gersh is represented by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Last summer, Anglin’s site was evicted from its home on the Internet after a violent white nationalist rally drew fresh attention to hate speech in the United States. The web hosting company GoDaddy announced in August that it will no longer host the site, after Anglin disparaged a protester who was killed in the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville.

Anglin characterized Heather Heyer as a “drain on society” and insulted her appearance. Heyer, 32, was killed after a car allegedly driven by a Nazi sympathizer plowed into a crowd of counterprotesters.

The Right, Not the Left, are the Real Haters.

In the wake of the shooting in Alexandria, Virginia, much effort has been expended by the far right to blame liberals and progressives as being haters and fostering an atmosphere where the targeting of Congressional Republicans was the natural outcome.  This effort, like so much else spewing from the right is a lie.  Yes, the shooter seemingly opposed the GOP's agenda, but he clearly seemed to have mental issues and a very troubled history.  Had he been a right winger, the same pundits and Republican apologists would have been listing all the reasons why the shooter was disturbed and argued ad nausea that their extremist agenda had nothing to do with his motivations.  A piece in Moyer.com looks at those really responsible for the hatred overtaking the political discourse and it is not those on the left.  Here are excerpts:

Many commentators are suggesting that both right and left are equally to blame for all the polarization between them. They’re wrong. The reason for all the bitterness between left and right is entirely the right’s fault. Right-wingers who suggest otherwise are self-deluded — and usually projecting.

Exhibit A: Newt Gingrich. On June 18, Gingrich capped off a week in which he once again blamed the left for a mass shooting by suggesting on ABC’s This Week that the Russiagate investigation is “baloney” because there is no evidence that Trump colluded with the Russians. When anchor Martha Raddatz suggested that an investigation is needed to reach this conclusion in the first place, Gingrich responded with the non-sequitur that Bill Clinton, John Podesta’s brother and the “Iranian deal” should be investigated.

And when Raddatz questioned Gingrich’s false statement earlier in the week that the president cannot in principle commit obstruction and reminded him that he himself tried impeaching President Clinton for this crime, Gingrich dodged with the same non-sequitur: “[T]here’s no evidence” that Trump committed obstruction.

What Gingrich exhibited in just this one interview is a problem that is rampant throughout not only the Trump administration but also the modern Republican Party: bad reasoning. Like the rest of them, Gingrich is marvelously inept at persuading. His points don’t even qualify as sophistry because sophistry at least has the form and appearance of valid, cogent argumentation. In 2008, Susan Jacoby wrote in her book The Age of American Unreason that the American right has “been so effective at turning the once honorable word [“intellectual”] into a political pejorative. The right wing has been able to get away with this disingenuous logic — and with putting it in the mouths of genuinely anti-intellectual right-wing politicians — because nonreading Americans know less and less about their nation’s political and intellectual history.” Similarly, five years later, then-Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal urged his fellow Republicans to “stop being the stupid party.”

Unfortunately, the GOP never heeded Gov. Jindal’s uncharacteristically sage advice. Instead, they continued in precisely the reverse direction and chose Trump to be their standard-bearer.

Trump is hardly a trendsetter. He is merely following the lead of the right’s most prominent propagandists on Fox News and hate/outrage/grievance radio: Newt, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, the formerly influential Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Alex Jones, Laura Ingraham, Mark Levin, etc. None of them can reason well. When challenged, they don’t act like good thinkers would — by listening carefully and then responding with careful, effective, fact-based arguments. Instead, they interrupt and shout down their opponents, belittle them with some pejorative term (“feminazi,” “libtard,” “snowflake,” “elitist”), attack their character or motives, and then avoid further challenge of their vapid rants by escaping to advertisements. Reactionary demagogues have effectively programmed millions in their audiences to argue in this willfully — indeed, proudly — ignorant manner. Hence the demonic, furious, malicious, sneering comments that routinely populate right-wing blogs and comments sections, not to mention social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. such baseless, inflammatory comments do not measure up to the kind of rational political dialogue envisioned by our Founding Fathers and encouraged by academic institutions. Just the opposite, they are the odious residue of minds poisoned by exposure to thousands of hours of manipulative, deceptive, McCarthyist filth. All of this toxic irrationality is very frustrating for the left, who, unlike the right, don’t have it all figured out. Quite the contrary, they always want to learn more, to make intellectual and moral progress, to pursue difficult questions and try to solve difficult problems. They are not afraid of different perspectives, which is why only they, not the right, value multiculturalism, immigration, diversity and scientific exploration. All that people like Ann Coulter, Milo Yiannopoulos and Richard Spencer have to offer is demonization — demonization of non-whites, of Muslims and of the left. This unenlightened, know-it-all mindset, completely impervious to conflicting facts and theories, is just not the stuff of rationality, progress and constitutional democracy. It is, rather, the stuff of superstition, cults and fascism. Fortunately, the brainwashed right constitute a minority — only 35 to 40 percent — of the American population. This is why Republicans have to cheat to win local, state and national elections. Because they can’t be honest about their self-serving, oligarchical motives, they have to resort instead to the most ruthless, unscrupulous, anti-democratic tactics: voter suppression (including voter purges), unconstitutional gerrymandering and dissemination of fake news. The election of the first black president alienated the right, but the fault for this alienation lies entirely with the latter. The same is true today, in Trump’s America; the right, not the left, are the real haters. [W]e on the left are “not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.”

The Rise of Hate Search

One phenomenon that ought to be disturbing is the rise of hate speech, especially among the Republican party base.  And the increase in such hate speech has, in my view, directly correlated to the rise of the Christofascists and racists in the party base.  The mind set increasingly seems to be that if one is not a white, far right, heterosexual Christian, then you are not human and worthy of all kinds of lies, threats and intimidation.  We've seen this pattern directed towards gays for years by the "godly folk," but now it is taking on a wider range of targets.  Worse yet, Republican candidates are getting in on the act.  A column in the New York Times looks at the phenomenon.  Here are highlights:

HOURS after the massacre in San Bernardino, Calif., on Dec. 2, and minutes after the media first reported that at least one of the shooters had a Muslim-sounding name, a disturbing number of Californians had decided what they wanted to do with Muslims: kill them.

The top Google search in California with the word “Muslims” in it was “kill Muslims.” And the rest of America searched for the phrase “kill Muslims” with about the same frequency that they searched for “martini recipe,” “migraine symptoms” and “Cowboys roster.”

People often have vicious thoughts. Sometimes they share them on Google. Do these thoughts matter?  Yes. Using weekly data from 2004 to 2013, we found a direct correlation between anti-Muslim searches and anti-Muslim hate crimes.

When Islamophobic searches are at their highest levels, such as during the controversy over the “ground zero mosque” in 2010 or around the anniversary of 9/11, hate crimes tend to be at their highest levels, too.

In 2014, according to the F.B.I., anti-Muslim hate crimes represented 16.3 percent of the total of 1,092 reported offenses motivated by religious bias. Anti-Semitism still led the way as a motive for these crimes, at 58.2 percent.

The frightening thing is this: If our model is right, Islamophobia and thus anti-Muslim hate crimes are currently higher than at any time since the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.  

If someone is willing to say ‘I hate them’ or ‘they disgust me,’ we know that those emotions are as good a predictor of behavior as actual intent,” said Susan Fiske, a social psychologist at Princeton, pointing to 50 years of psychology research on anti-black bias. “If people are making expressive searches about Muslims, it’s likely to be tied to anti-Muslim hate crime.”

[M]any Muslim Americans have already experienced the havoc that one Islamophobe can create.

Asma Mohammed Nizami is a 23-year-old Muslim woman from Minnesota who directs services for students at a nonprofit and wears a head scarf, or hijab. Last Saturday, driving home from an event, she stopped at a traffic light, where she saw a man in the next car over glaring at her. He rolled down his window and called her a “Muslim bitch.” When Ms. Nizami started to drive away, he trailed her and then tried to run her off the road with his red Chevy Impala.

While the vast majority of Muslim Americans won’t be victims of hate crimes, few escape the “constant sense of fear and paranoia” that they or their loved ones might be next, said Rana Ibrahem, a Muslim woman from Long Island who works as a paralegal.

We examined prejudicial searches against black people, white people, gay people, Asians, Jews, Mexicans and Christians. We estimate that negative attitudes against Muslims today are higher than prejudice against any group in any month since 2004, when Google began preserving detailed data on search volumes.

[W]e think there are three things the rest of us not giving speeches in the Oval Office can do.

First, parents should be talking to their kids about how the overwhelming majority of Muslim Americans pose no threat to them.

Second, police departments would be wise to use search data to allocate resources through predictive policing. The data, for example, could tell police chiefs when sending a cop to do an extra drive through a Muslim neighborhood, or making sure that the town mosque was safe overnight, would be a good idea.

Third, Muslim Americans are right to take some precautions. Like most grave threats, hate crimes are rare. Our model suggests that, if Islamophobic sentiment stays at its current level, about one in every 10,000 Muslims will be the victim of a reported hate crime over the next year, similar to the rate of automobile fatalities and orders of magnitude higher than the chance of being a victim of terrorism.

Swiss Gay Group Files Criminal Complaint Against Catholic Bishop for Bible Based Hate Speech

Get ready for shrieks and howls from American Christofascists as they point to a criminal complaint filed against a homophobic Swiss Roman Catholic Bishop who quoted the passage from Leviticus approving death as the penalty for gay sex and gay relationships.  I can already hear the claims that Christianity is being criminalized.  The gay rights group filing the complaint stated that  Bishop Vitus Huonder's statements amounted to incitement to violence against gays.  Just as disingenuously as a Republican presidential candidate claiming the his remarks were "misunderstood" Huonder issued a mealy mouthed "apology".   Newsweek has details.  Here are highlights:

A gay rights group has filed a criminal complaint against a Roman Catholic bishop after he quoted Bible verses calling for gay people to be killed and said the passage made clear what Church policy was on homosexuality.

Vitus Huonder, the Catholic Bishop of the city of Chur in eastern Switzerland, made the speech on 31 July, during a debate on marriage and family organised by the German Catholic Forum in Fulda, Germany.

His reading was followed by applause, before Huonder continued: "Both of these passages alone suffice to clarify unambiguously the church's position on homosexuality," according to a statement released by Pink Cross, an umbrella association for Swiss gay groups that is filing the complaint.

Pink Cross, supported by the Swiss Lesbian Organisation, argues that these comments amount to "inciting people to crime or violence," and handed a lawsuit to the public prosecutor of Canton Graubünden in eastern Switzerland on Monday. If found guilty, Huonder faces up to three years in prison.

Huonder has since issued an apology, saying his comments were misunderstood. "I am sorry if my 50 minute lecture in Fulda on 2 August 2015, which dealt with the biblical basis for marriage and family, was understood as diminishing homosexual people," 

Baumann says the group does not accept the bishop's apology. "There is no question in this case of what he was talking about—there was no misunderstanding. We don't need charity or mercy from the Church at all, we don't accept his apology."

It is not the first time Huonder's comments have landed him in trouble. Earlier this year he called for a priest in Switzerland to be sacked for blessing a lesbian couple, according to the UK-based online newspaper Pink News.

Religious Extremism - Words Can Be Just As Dangerous As Knives

Annette in action

One of the principal forces opposing the civil rights of LGBT citizens are the "godly folk" and the professional Christian set who live off of the ignorance and bigotry of their parishioners and, of course, the GOP base, like leeches and other parasites.  To keep the money flowing it, it is crucial that the sheeple be convinced that they are under attack and that their "rights" are threatened.  As the prior post notes, one favored target is the black community (and by extension all other non-whites).  Another favored target is the LGBT community.   And in order to fan the requisite paranoia and fear, all kinds of hate words are the principal currency.   Facebook friend and fellow activist Annette Gross looks at how dangerous such hate words can be in a piece in Huffington Post.  Here are highlights:

For the past week, the City of Goshen, Indiana has been a hot-bed of debate about whether the City Council should grant civil protections to its LGBT citizens. Goshen mayor Allan Kauffman brought up the conversation at the end of the city council meeting on Tuesday, May 19, handing out copies of the city's 2009 failed amendment.

Mayor Kauffman also said that he does not want anyone who lives outside of the city to provide input at the meeting. That can be a problem for Eric Miller, executive director of Advance America, a right-wing organization that claims it is devoted to protecting the constitution and the family.

On Tuesday, July 14, Miller spoke to a crowd of about 100 people at Calvary Assembly church. He stated that, "The homosexual agenda has now come to Elkhart County. These two ordinances (Goshen and Elkhart) are wrong. These two ordinances need to be defeated."

Eric Miller has long been a foe of LGBT Hoosiers. He was one of the proponents to have same-sex marriage banned in Indiana by way of a state constitutional amendment. He testified at every hearing at the Statehouse in order to push his agenda. He also was present in 2005 when the Marion County City Council debated inserting sexual orientation and gender identity into their Human Rights Ordinance. He was one of the people seen with Governor Pence when Pence signed RFRA behind closed doors.

Eric Miller claims that he is trying to protect families. He falsely claims that churches and businesses could face punishment or legal problems if they refused to take part in a gay marriage ceremony. We know these are scare tactics. Miller warns repeatedly of the "homosexual agenda."
He [Miller] uses religion to push his agenda. He has been known to bus people from all over the state to hearings on same-sex marriage and LGBT equality.  Miller uses words to make his points. But words hurt -- just as much as violence can hurt. So my question is -- where does this go? Last week we saw an Orthodox Jewish man stab six people at the Jerusalem Pride Parade.

There is no excuse for killing anyone in the name of religion. And there is no excuse for telling lies and mistruths in the name of religion. When I look at people like Eric Miller, I get scared. He may not be wielding a knife or a gun, but his words can have an impact on those who believe them. Words have been known to lead people to do dangerous things. How far will people go? I cannot imagine going to any house of worship to listen to words of hatred and discrimination.  

What will they say to stop LGBT Hoosiers from gaining these rights? What ideas will they put in peoples' heads?

We have to be vigilant. Not only do we have to write letters and speak with our legislators -- we have to call out the religious zealots who will deny our friends and loved ones the rights they deserve. We need to talk to our religious leaders -- those clergy who support equality and fairness. We need to urge them to call out people who hurt others in the name of religion.

I have watched Eric Miller and his friends Curt Smith (from the Indiana Family Institute) and Micah Clark (from the American Family Association of Indiana) for the past ten years as they push their messages of discrimination. It is about time we call them out and not allow them to hijack the good that religion really is. Religious extremism is dangerous -- whether by using knives and guns -- or by using words. 

People like Miller are dangerous.  And Annette is right - we need to call on the "good Christians" and other gay friendly faith leaders to get off their butts and end their silence.  Bad things happen when good people remain silent. 

Teen Who Claimed Obama Made Kids Gay Loses Radio Show

Get ready to see nasty little piece of work, Caiden Cowger, turned into the latest "Christian martyr" by the far right hate industry.  As you will recall Cowger - who not surprisingly  hails from West Virginia - said among other things that "homosexuality is a "belief," and that he is disgusted by it," that "The person is not born that way, no matter what Lady Gaga says," and that "he used to be friends with several peers who came out as gay, and that President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are responsible for making his peers gay."  The backlash has been loud and furious and the organization that broadcasted Cowger's batshitery has taken Cowger off the air for engaging in hate speech.  Would that more media organizations would cease giving platforms to hate merchants.  Here are some highlights:

There's no more show for the teenager who generated an outsized firestorm online by claiming President Obama had turned his friends gay.

The recording service Spreaker has shut down Caiden Cowger's online radio show after deeming it hate speech, but it will let him continue as a user of the site.

"We’re really sorry, but the show The Caiden Cowger Program is not available," a message says instead. "Spreaker has deleted this show due to offensive contents."

“While we not only support free speech, we help it find its way to more people faster and easier with our service that is the audio equivalent of YouTube, but like them, we cannot and will not condone hate speech," said Spreaker CEO Francesco Baschieri in a statement. "Consequently, we have pulled down audio content from Caiden Cowgar, whose recent gay-bashing clearly crosses the line from free — to hate — speech.”

Cowger has been defended by CNN contributor Dana Loesch, who has a radio show called The Dana Show. Loesch at first said on Twitter that Cowger was just being "a conservative teen" and deserved praise for "civic participation." But then Loesch clarified that she not only hadn't listen to what Cowger said but also didn't necessarily agree with him. Instead, she claims it's Cowger who is the victim of bullying.

Anti-Gay Richard Land Reprimanded and Show Cancelled After Racist Remarks

My experience has been that when harbors hate and one is a bigot towards one group, it's likely that the individual also harbors similar feelings towards other minority groups.  Richard Land, laughably the chief ethics official of the Southern Baptist Convention ("SBC"), is a case in point.  Land is viciously anti-gay and would appear to be a racist as well.  In the wake of the murder of Trayvon Martin Land shot off his big mouth with vitriolic and inflammatory remarks attacking Barack Obama and supporting racial profiling of blacks.  Apparently, this was too much from a PR perspective even for the SBC which came into being when southern Baptist churches broke from the American Baptist Association so that they could continue to support slavery.  Land has reportedly been reprimanded and has had his hate spouting radio show cancelled.  What the SBC should have done was flat out fired Land and given him his walking papers.  The Richmond Times-Dispatch has details.  Here are highlights:

The Southern Baptist Convention's ethics chief was reprimanded today and his radio show canceled after he made inflammatory comments about the Trayvon Martin case.

Among other things, Richard Land accused President Barack Obama and other black leaders of shamefully exploiting Martin's death for political gain. He also said racial profiling was understandable given the crime statistics for black men.

Land’s comments upset many black Southern Baptist leaders, one of whom called for Land's resignation. The controversy got more intense when a blogger revealed that Land's commentary was copied nearly verbatim from an editorial in The Washington Times, although Land did not credit the newspaper on the air.  After an investigation, the trustees board of the SBC's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission reprimanded Land for the comments and the plagiarism. Land, who is the commission's president, has previously apologized for both.

The commission takes public stands on issues like abortion and same-sex marriage. In his position at the commission’s head for nearly 24 years, the outspoken Land has become the Southern Baptist Convention’s most visible spokesman.

But his comments on Martin came as the nation’s largest Protestant denomination is attempting to distance itself from a past that includes support for slavery and segregation. Faced with declining membership, the Nashville-based SBC is trying to broaden its appeal beyond its traditional white, Southern base - a goal that Land supports.

The board’s statement, which was released in the Baptist Press, calls Land’s comments about Martin "hurtful, irresponsible, insensitive, and racially charged."  .   .   .   . 
"We must now redouble our efforts to regain lost ground, to heal re-opened wounds, and to realize the dream of a Southern Baptist Convention that is just as diverse as the population of our great Nation."  The statement also reprimands Land for his unattributed use of The Washington Times editorial, saying he unwisely accepted practices that occur in the radio industry.


"Finally," the statement reads, "we have carefully considered the content and purpose of the Richard Land Live! broadcast. We find that they are not congruent with the mission of the ERLC."  On the call-in show, Land discusses the news of the day, including politics. The board says the show will be cancelled as soon as possible within the bounds of their contract with the Salem Radio Network.

Police Open Criminal Investigation in Bullying Suicide of Buffalo Gay Teen

Earlier in the week I wrote about the sad story of the suicide death of high school freshman Jamey Rodemeyer. Now, the Amherst police (Rodemeyer lived in Amherst a Buffalo area suburb) are investigating whether school bullies could be charged with harassment or hate crimes related to Jamey Rodemeyer's suicide. As I have noted many times, actions and words do have consequences and if there are identifiable bullies that drove this young man to end his life as the only escape he could recognize, then they should face the consequences of the mean and vicious attacks on Rodemeyer. So to, in my opinion, should anti-gay zealots like Maggie Gallagher, Tony Perkins, Benedict XVI, et al, who continue to fan the flames of anti-gay bigotry and lend a level of respectability to hate and bigotry. Here are some excerpts from the Buffalo News:

Amherst police are investigating whether school bullies could be charged with harassment or hate crimes related to the suicide of Williamsville North High School freshman Jamey Rodemeyer.

Jamey was found dead outside his home Sunday morning after years of complaints by him that he was bullied and subjected to hateful comments in school and online, mostly related to his sexual orientation.

"We're going to look into whether he was the victim of any crimes leading up to his suicide," Police Chief John C. Askey said. "We're not indicating, not speculating at this point, that that is the cause of his death, ... but independently, there may have been crimes that have been committed against him."

"We've heard that there were some specific students, an identifiable group of students, that had specifically targeted Jamey, or had been picking on him for a period of time," Askey said.

While investigators are focusing on what may have transpired in the recent past, he said, police are under the impression that one to three students may have been bothering Jamey since he was a student at Heim Middle School. "We're looking into it to see if he was the victim of any crimes, and that's the bottom line," the chief said.

Jamey's mother had previously told The Buffalo News that she believed that a core group of middle school students bullied her son and that the situation worsened for him about a year ago, when many anonymous posts began showing up on Jamey's Formspring blog stating that he would be better off dead.
She knew about them because guidance counselors at the school had spoken with friends of Jamey who reported the posts. Many of his friends came to his defense on Formspring.

The Police Department's Special Victims Unit is assigned to handle Jamey's case, he said. If there are students who can be criminally prosecuted in Jamey's case, they could face minimum harassment violations. Using a computer to bully someone would elevate the charges to aggravated harassment, he said. And if the bullying centers primarily on Jamey's sexual orientation, then it's possible that hate crime charges could be filed, he said.

It is far past time that bullying be taken seriously and that Christianist endorse and/or generated hate speech be dealt with by police authorities. Freedom of speech ends when its is fostering and creating physical harm and/or the denial of civil rights of others. Personally, I hope that some of the bastards that bullied Rodemeyer literally to death have their sorry asses prosecuted.

NYT: More Faces of Norway Victims - Meanwhile, Pam Geller Justifies Breivik’s Terror

The perverse moral sickness of the far right is becoming increasingly clear in my view. Even as the New York Times has a new interactive page that shows photos and information on the victims of Anders Breivik horrific rampage the vast majority are under 20 years of age and some as young as 14), anti-Muslim far right extremist Pam Geller (picture with Virginia douche bag Eric Cantor) is braying that Breivik's rampage was justified because she says the camp is part of an anti-Israel “indoctrination training center.” To supposedly support her unfounded claim, Geller posted a picture on her blog of the youth camp children Breivik targeted with the caption “Note the faces which are more Middle [sic] Eastern or mixed than pure Norwegian.” The photo can be found here. A cursor view of the faces assembled by the New York Times makes it clear that Geller's an even bigger liar than she is a bigot. In her sick world - and that of many of today's GOP base - if one's skin isn't white and one's faith not deemed Christian, one's life is worthless and expendable. It is a frightening reality of how hate filled the far right has become. Here are highlights of what Think Progress reported on this morally bankrupt bigot and hate merchant:
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Popular hate blogger Pam Geller has received scrutiny in recent days as the public became aware that the right-wing terrorist in Norway, Anders Behring Breivik, had praised her blog and thoroughly cited her writing in his political manifesto. After a number of blogs made the connection, as well as the New York Times, the Atlantic, and other major outlets, Geller became incensed and began lashing out at her critics.
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In a post defending herself yesterday, Geller — who has called Obama “President Jihad” and claimed that Arab language classes are a plot to subvert the United States — reached a new low. Geller justifies Breivik’s attack on the Norwegian Labour Party summer youth camp because she says the camp is part of an anti-Israel “indoctrination training center.” She says the victims would have grown up to become “future leaders of the party responsible for flooding Norway with Muslims who refuse to assimilate, who commit major violence against Norwegian natives including violent gang rapes, with impunity, and who live on the dole.”
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To get her point across, Geller posts a picture of the youth camp children Breivik targeted. The picture was taken on the Utøya island camp about 24 hours before Breivik killed over 30 children, so it is likely Geller is mocking many of the victims. Under the picture, Geller writes: “Note the faces which are more MIddle [sic] Eastern or mixed than pure Norwegian.”
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Could Geller’s outburst of smears be a distraction against mounting evidence that she might have communicated with Breivik in the past? A post from Geller in 2007 reprints a reader-submitted letter in which an anonymous Norwegian complains of Muslim immigration and boasts that he is “stockpiling and caching weapons, ammunition and equipment.”
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And she is not the only leading conservative to rationalize Breivik’s beliefs and actions. Pat Buchanan wrote a column recently arguing that “Breivik may be right.” On his radio show, Glenn Beck said the youth camp Breivik targeted, which could be compared to the College Democrats or other mainstream political organizations, reminded him of “Hitler Youth.”

Faces of the Norway Victims

While the hate merchants of the right for the most part continue to endeavor to disclaim any responsibility for the role that they and those like them played in setting the stage for last week's deadly rampage in Norway, it is worth taking a look at the victims of Breivik's hate inspired shooting spree and bombing. The youngest victim so far identified on the BBC's website is 14 year old Sharidyn Svebakk-Boehn (above left).

The BBC is updating the article as more victims are identified and photos made available. I have include photos of two other victims - Margrethe Boeyum Kloeven and Diderik Aamodt Olsen - both under age 20. I urge readers to visit the article and witness the consequences of hate sppech - hate speech often delivered to enrich the hate merchants and/or their organizations.

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Yes, Breivik detonated the bomb and pulled the trigger, but others set the stage that helped convince him that he was acting in a necessary manner. Hate speech and constant screeds against other be they liberal, Muslim or LGBT has consequences. The Maggie Gallaghers, Tony Perkins, Ruben Diazs, Don Wildmons, and anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim hate merchants such as Rep. Peter King need to be confronted with the fruits of their vile work.

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Words do not begin to convey my disgust for people who denigrate others for profit and to stroke their own very sick and warped psyches that require that others be inferior so that these individuals can feel self-congratulatory. It is sickening.

Christianists and Far Right Continue to Claim that Norway's Breivik Wasn't One of Them

Personally, I believe that the facts and a connection of the dots if you will referenced in Anders Breivik's self-described "Manifesto" make the conclusion very clear: Brevivik is the not too surprising end product of the constant hate and militant language of Christianists and anti-Muslim zealots on both sides of the Atlantic. It's a reality that I suspect many in the far right acknowledge in their hearts even as they disingenuously shriek that Breivik wasn't really one of them. They can yell and scream and posture all they want, but the truth is that Breivik took their their hate speech and propaganda to be true and put it into concrete action. An example of this phenomenon of haters trying to disavow the fruits of their own actions is self-described religious leader Michael Brown who has a piece in Townhall.com. Take a good look at the photo via The Telegraph of Tore Eikeland, age 21, one of Breivik's young victims, set forth above. It's individuals like Brown who have helped set the stage for the murderous rampage of Breivik - and future Breiviks in our midst. And Brown's not alone. With him are many in the GOP and professional Christians like Tony Perkins, Don Wildmon, Linda Harvey, Maggie Gallagher and many others. Here a sampling of Brown's drivel:
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[T]he murderous acts of Anders Breivik in Norway will be seen as proof that conservative Christians in America might just turn violent too, as if the demented actions of an anti-Muslim, anti-multiculturalist Norwegian have anything to do with the spiritual, moral, and cultural aspirations of American Christ-followers who espouse the non-violent teachings and example of the Master himself.
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Sadly, the atmosphere in our country has become so toxic that venerable ministries like Focus on the Family and the American Family Association have been branded as “hate groups” by the Southern Poverty Law Center, while People for the American Way sends out regular warnings about evangelical Christian leaders on its RightWingWatch website. And this will surely intensify in the days to come in the wake of the tragedy in Norway.
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Let us, then, who call ourselves conservative Christians, redouble our efforts to expose the folly of these false charges, overcoming evil with good and hatred with love, thereby proving ourselves to be genuine followers of Jesus.
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Right Wing Watch has more examples of hate merchants playing the victim here. Excuse me as I run to the bathroom and vomit.

Far Right Tries to Duck Ties to Terrorist Even As AFA's Bryan Fisher Says Breivik Views Were "Accurate"

It has been entertaining - if such a term can be used in the wake of the horrific slaughter in Norway last Friday - to watch the anti-Islamic bloggers, neocons and far right columnists and Christianists strive to distance themselves from the actions and views of mass murderer Anders Breivik who quoted many of them in his "manifesto" and obviously took many of their rantings, bigotry and messages of hate to heart. Those feigning shock range from gay conservative Bruce Bawer who used a Wall Street Journal column to dodge his own responsibility for anti-Islamic rhetoric to the anti-Muslim blog FrontPageMag led by conservative activist David Horowitz. In contrast to these, and not surprisingly to those who follow his daily doses of poisonous screeds, American Family Association’s hate merchant in chief, Bryan Fischer, said that after reading Norway terrorist Anders Behring Breivik’s manifesto, he concluded that Breivik’s “analysis of cultural trends in Europe and the danger created by Islamic immigration and infiltration is accurate.” All disclaim the violent actions of Breivik even though his actions - at least to the mind of a fanatic - were arguably the natural result of their lies and propaganda. Here's a sampling of Fischer's disingenuous bullshit:
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Much of his analysis of cultural trends in Europe and the danger created by Islamic immigration and infiltration [sic] is accurate. . . . Breivik’s angst was caused by the presence of so many Muslims in Norway and Europe, which he correctly observes is leading to “cultural annihilation.’ But he blames their presence not on the Muslims themselves but on the “cultural Marxists” and their obsession with diversity and unrestricted Islamic immigration.
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Fischer then goes on to try to argue that Breivik wasn't a "true Christian" apparently on the premise that Christians don't engage in mass murder. Fischer seems to forget the atrocities committed during the Crusades, the treatment of Moors in Spain, the religious wars in Europe in the 16th Century, etc. He also ignores the passages in the Old Testament celebrating the destruction of the opponents of Israel be they men, women or children.

Why Norway Could Happen Here

For the last two days I've written about my concerns over the manner in which the unending inflammatory hate speech of the Christian Right and elements of the political far right creates an atmosphere where some unhinged individual or individuals could commit a heinous crime like that the struck Norway on Friday. Worse yet, the constant hate speech would make such individual(s) feel completely justified in the unleashing murder and destruction. I'm not the only one that had such thoughts. Peter Beinart at The Daily Beast has an article that looks at the same concerns. Here are some highlights:
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How would the American right have responded had Anders Behring Breivik been a Muslim? Luckily, we don’t have to guess. In the immediate aftermath of Friday’s terrorist attack in Norway, conservative Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin did us the favor of simply assuming that he was a Muslim. She then used the attack to denounce lawmakers who in the name of deficit reduction favor “huge cuts in defense” and to lambast President Obama for suggesting “that we can wrap up things in Afghanistan.”
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But had Breivik actually been a Muslim, I suspect Rubin’s efforts to tie the attack to the Afghan war and the defense budget would have quickly been overtaken by the search for his American counterparts: homegrown Muslim terrorists. . . .
The media’s primary question in the wake of the Breivik attack would have been, Can it happen here? And conservatives would have answered, Hell yes.
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So let’s ask that question about the real Breivik attack: Could an anti-Muslim bigot commit a large-scale terrorist attack in the U.S.? The answer is, Absolutely, because the same anti-Muslim bigotry that influenced Breivik in Europe is widespread here.
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There’s actually been a lot of right-wing, extremist Christian terrorism in the U.S. in recent years. The biggest terrorist attack in U.S. history prior to 9/11—the 1996 Oklahoma City bombing—was carried out by Timothy McVeigh, a white ex-Army officer with ties to the militia movement. That same year, Eric Rudolph bombed the Atlanta Olympics to protest abortion and international socialism. The only major WMD attack of the “war on terror” era—the 2001 anthrax mailings—apparently was the handiwork of a microbiologist angry that prominent Catholic politicians were pro-choice. In 2009, anti-abortion militants murdered Wichita doctor George Tiller.
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[W]hat makes a larger, Breivik-style attack possible is that terrorism usually stems from the intersection between militant ideology and mentally vulnerable people. That’s why people like McVeigh and Rudolph latched onto extremist militia and anti-abortion ideology in the 1990s. And it’s why their equivalent today might well be influenced by Islamophobia, the current obsession of America’s extreme right.
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Islamophobia is at least as prevalent on the political right today as militia-style, anti-government conspiracy-theorizing was in the 1990s. . . . . It’s painfully clear that in today’s Republican Party, the price of publicly opposing anti-Muslim bigotry is higher than the price of fueling it. And somewhere out there, someone like Anders Behring Breivik is watching.
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Words do have consequences and it is long past time that the demagogues of the Christian and political right be held accountable for the hate and violence they engender.

Homophobia Kills

Yes, homophobia kills literally. Yet, our Christianist enemies continue to disseminate lies and hate directed towards gays and pat themselves on the back as they knowing create an atmosphere where gays - or those perceived to be gay - take their own lives through suicide or end up the victims of deadly violence. Pam Spaulding has a post that looks at just how vile and hate inducing this poisonous rhetoric can be and recent murder cases demonstrate that there are those in society who believe this message gives them a license to kill. Pam correctly notes that:

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Now it's time to stop pussyfooting about what Renfroe and professional "Christian" outfits like Focus on Your Family and WND are doing by incessantly quoting Leviticus as justification for discrimination. Ye shall not lie with a man as one lies with a female. It is an abomination," he read. "If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act, and they shall surely be put to death. If they believe that the Bible is the literal word of God, then they do believe gays must die. You can't pick and choose (though we all know these literalists do so all the time). I assume, then, that adulterers should be stoned for their sins.

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Am I [and Pam] too tough on the Christianists? I don't believe so. Murders of gays and those thought to be gay have shown that there ARE those who take this "Christian" message literally and as a result people die. One recent case is that of the December killing of an Ecuadorean immigrant in Brooklyn, New York, who was beaten with a bottle and a baseball bat by men who yelled anti-gay and anti-Hispanic slurs at him. In point of fact, the victim wasn't even gay but had been seen holding the arm of his brother as they walked home from a party. As the New York Times is reporting, now an arrest has been made in that case. Here are some highlights:

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The attack occurred about 3:30 a.m. on Dec. 7 when Mr. Sucuzhanay was walking arm in arm with his brother, Romel Sucuzhanay, along Bushwick Avenue and Kossuth Place, in the Bushwick neighborhood, after attending a church party. About a half-block from Mr. Sucuzhanay’s home, Mr. Scott and Mr. Phoenix appeared in a sport utility vehicle and, believing the brothers were gay, shouted what witnesses described as vulgarisms against Hispanics and gay men, officials said.

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Mr. Scott approached Jose Sucuzhanay and smashed a beer bottle over the back of his head, the police said, and then chased Romel Sucuzhanay. Mr. Phoenix then took an aluminum baseball bat from the rear of the vehicle and struck Jose repeatedly on his shoulder, ribs and back until he fell, the police said. “At that point Phoenix struck Jose several more times, full force, with crushing blows to his head,” said Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly, . . .

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“The sad part of this case for me is that these two brothers were apparently caressing each other because they were cold on the way home and the cretins that were charged with the attack mistook them for gay people,”

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And yet despite such fruits of their tirades of hate, the professional Christians continue to issue a never ending stream of anti-gay lies and hatred - even in the halls of state legislatures - and go unrebuked by and large. They certainly are never challenged by the mainstream media as the should be. Another sad case, this time from the UK shows that the Christianist induced violence is not limited to the USA. In this case, Michael Causer, an 18-year-old hairdresser, was battered to death while he slept upstairs at a party. The teenager accused of his homophobic murder has has been acquitted and belatedly sparked a campaign in Liverpool for justice. Here are some highlights from the Independent:

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Michael Causer had never even considered concealing his sexuality: he was proud to be gay. He grew up in a tight-knit family in a working-class suburb of Liverpool, and friends would describe the trainee hairdresser as a “little sweetheart”. He was a gentle young man on the cusp of adulthood who “wouldn’t hurt a fly”; someone who loved his many friends and adored life.

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But last July, as the 18-year-old lay in an upstairs bedroom at an after-pub party, sleeping off the effects of a night’s drinking, he was viciously assaulted and his bleeding body dumped outside in the street. The attack took place at the home of a friend’s grandmother, in the Liverpool suburb of Huyton.

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On Friday however, Mr Causer’s family and friends who had packed into the public gallery at Liverpool Crown Court to hear a jury decide on Gavin Alker, a 19-year-old man accused of carrying out his homophobic murder, were left in tears as the defendant was acquitted at the end of a three-week trial. Last Sunday, 100 friends and relatives returned to the court precincts to express their sense of shock and outrage at the verdict and to demonstrate for what they see as justice in the case. They said they are now hoping to launch a private prosecution.

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According to evidence put before the jury, the trigger-point for the violence came when sexually explicit images of the trainee hairdresser were found on his mobile phone, prompting a “sustained and brutal” attack on his naked sleeping form and leaving him with a fractured skull and a swollen brain. . . . It was alleged that Mr Alker, who had never met Mr Causer, screamed “You little queer faggot” adding, “He’s a little queer, he deserves it.” During the trial it was also claimed that a cigarette lighter was used to burn the hair on Mr Causer’s legs, and that threats were made to rip out his body piercings with a knife. But the jury accepted Mr Alker’s evidence that he had been acting in self-defence after he denied making homophobic comments, blaming the attack on O’Connor.

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When will society - including our weak kneed president and gutless Congressional Democrats - say enough is enough and enact strong non-discrimination laws to protect LGBT citizens from brutality based upon religious discrimination? Will I live long enough to see i happen?