Well, That Didn't Take Long

Now that Rape-a-holic Kavanaugh is on the throne -- excuse me, I mean Supreme Court -- the government is jumping right in to give Tony Perkins another wet dream:

The Justice Department today told the U.S. Supreme Court that businesses can discriminate against workers based on their gender identity without violating federal law.

Solicitor General Noel Francisco told the high court that a civil rights law banning sex discrimination on the job doesn’t cover transgender bias. That approach already has created a rift within the Trump administration, contradicting the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s view of the law it’s tasked with enforcing.

This was, you understand, the EEOC's view under the Obama administration. They just haven't gotten around to changing their minds yet.

If the Court decides to take this case, it will be interesting to see what logical gyrations they undertake to find that Title VII does not protect against anti-LGBT bias. The Sixth Circuit was quite definite:

With its ruling in the funeral home case, the Sixth Circuit last year became the first federal appeals court in the country to conclude that transgender bias is sex discrimination under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. It previously recognized transgender discrimination as a form of prohibited sex stereotyping.

The court said Harris Funeral Homes violated the law by firing Stephens after she told owner Thomas Rost she was transitioning to a woman.

“It is analytically impossible to fire an employee based on that employee’s status as a transgender person without being motivated, at least in part, by the employee’s sex,” Judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote for the Sixth Circuit.

The court rejected the company’s claim that Stephens overstepped a funeral home dress code requiring her to wear clothing corresponding to her birth gender and that allowing her to continue to work at the funeral home would distract mourners. It also said the company wasn’t protected by a federal religious freedom law, even though Rost said allowing Stephens to continue working would conflict with his Christian beliefs.

“You’re talking about someone with the same bundle of experience and qualifications coming back in the form of a woman,” Nevins said. “That sounds like not only a viable sex discrimination case but a slam dunk case.”

I wonder if they can come up with a decision as badly reasoned as Citizens United or Hobby Lobby.

Via Joe.My.God.

Today's Must-Read #2: Looks Like Someting Was Edited

For most rational people, it's a given that the Bible was composed by a number of different authors over a period of time. Well, it looks like Leviticus wasn't immune:

The original version of Leviticus expressly permitted gay sex, a Biblical scholar writes in the New York Times.

Idan Dershowitz is a fellow at Harvard and has studied the development of the Old Testament carefully, including Leviticus 20:13 which reads that “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.”

. . .

“There is good evidence that an earlier version of the laws in Leviticus 18 permitted sex between men,” he argues. “In addition to having the prohibition against same-sex relations added to it, the earlier text, I believe, was revised in an attempt to obscure any implication that same-sex relations had once been permissible.”

Take that, Tony Perkins.

Looks like somebody way back when had issues.

But Ya Are, Blanche!

You are a bunch of bigots:

The Catholic Church has demanded an apology from the BBC over a video that referenced the impact of religious homophobia from a “Bible basher.”

BBC Scotland’s The Social project released a powerful spoken word video earlier this month exploring what homophobia feels like in 2018.

The video, which has attracted millions of views on social media, is a first-person account of a man grappling the fear of casual homophobia from strangers while walking with his boyfriend. . . .

Addressing the anti-gay preacher he adds: “See him? He thinks it’s faith but under all that din it tastes like cardboard and it smells like hate.”

So of course, it's an attack on the Catholic Church:

Bishop John Keenan of Paisley has written to the Director of BBC Scotland to demand an apology for the video, which he claims “sanctions the idea that Catholics engender public hated of homosexuals.”

Well, the hierarchy do. The laity, at least in America, not so much. I don't know if Catholics in the UK have the same tendency to ignore the pronouncements of the bishops that American Catholics do, but I wouldn't be surprised.

As for that "public hatred" bit, a spot check on the Church's teaching:

The current Catechism of the Catholic Church summarizes the Church's teaching on homosexuality as follows:

Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that 'homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered'. They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.

(Emphasis added.)

That doesn't sound much like acceptance to me.

Keenan goes on:

Keenan added: “In the current climate of growing hostility to Catholics I would appeal that the BBC guard against adding fuel to the fire. In that regard I would ask that the Corporation now reach out to Catholics to understand their concerns, that they are being portrayed in a prejudicial way.

“When it comes to important public debates about the wellbeing of the human person and the truth and meaning of human sexuality Catholics feel their views are becoming increasingly marginalised, almost criminalised’ by a narrative in BBC news, comment, arts and elsewhere that amounts to ‘LGBT views good, Catholic views bad,’ an assumption which you must know is simplistic and imposed, and which is not strengthened by longitudinal research.

If the views of the Church on human sexuality are becoming marginalized, perhaps it's because they are totally out of line with reality. And the "longitudinal research" comment is nonsense -- seriously, what does that even mean? "Longitudinal research" on what? Every bit of research that's been done on homosexuality has confirmed that a) it's a perfectly normal variation in sexuality, and b) the overwhelming majority of the difficulties that gay men and lesbians experience comes from things such as the teachings of the Catholic Church.

If the Church wants apologies, how about it start by apologizing to all the gay people whose lives it has ruined?

Here's the video. If you haven't seen it, it's worth watching. And for those who have trouble with heavy Scottish accents, it's subtitled:

Compare and Contrast: World AIDS Day, Here and There

Our "President" actually made an announcement:

In a signed statement on the White House website, President Trump has said: “Today, on World AIDS Day, we honor those who have lost their lives to AIDS, we celebrate the remarkable progress we have made in combatting this disease, and we reaffirm our ongoing commitment to end AIDS as a public health threat.” 

Trump continued: “Since the beginning of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, more than 76 million people around the world have become infected with HIV and 35 million have died from AIDS.

“As of 2014, 1.1 million people in the United States are living with HIV. On this day, we pray for all those living with HIV, and those who have lost loved ones to AIDS

This statement stands in comparison to President Obama’s final World AIDS Day address where he urged then President-elect Trump to maintain HIV/AIDS prevention work and highlighted the impact of HIV on the LGBT+ community.

It's worth noting the Trump administration's attitude toward the LGBT community, as reflected in its policy moves:

Since election day, Trump has removed rights for trans kids, banned trans soldiers from the military, appointed an anti-LGBT Supreme Court justice, endorsed a Republican who wants to make homosexuality illegal, hired an Army Secretary who says trans people are diseased, proposed slashing HIV AIDS funding, signed an order permitting anti-LGBT discrimination at work, removed opposition to North Carolina’s anti-trans bathroom bill, addressed a recognised hate group gathering and refused to acknowledge LGBT History Month.

The comparison with Obama is going to annoy him enough, especially since it seems to hit a very sensitive spot -- why else devote so much effort to undoing everything the Obama administration did? But contrast his proclamation with this:

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle attended a World AIDS Day event today in their first joint royal engagement.

The newly-engaged royal couple travelled to Nottingham to attend the #SeeRed event, which was organised by HIV charity Terrence Higgins Trust. 

The pair were photographed sporting red World AIDS Day ribbons as they spoke to the crowd.

Prince Harry said: “We mustn’t be complacent. We’ve got everything here: all the equipment, all the testing ability.

"We owe it to this generation to be able to eradicate this once and for all.”

The Prince, a passionate advocate on HIV/AIDS issues, spoke to people living with HIV as well as sexual health campaigners.

Andrew Bates, a gay man living with HIV who met the Prince at the launch of HIV testing week last month, was able to he spoke to the Prince about coming out.

(That garbled bit is theirs, not mine.)

The contrast is staggering. I mean, can you imagine Donald Trump actually shaking hands with someone who's HIV+?

I guess this only points up the fact that real leaders care about people. Donald Trump doesn't.

Headline of the Week

From Joe.My.God.:

Christian Group That Covered Up Sexual Assault Prays For God To “Anoint The Briefs” Of Anti-Gay Baker

That is actually a direct quote:

Today’s prayer from the Family Research Council:

May God preserve and protect the freedom of Christians and other Americans whose consciences say, “God made marriage between a man and a woman.” May He powerfully anoint the briefs and arguments presented to the Court on behalf of Jack Phillips.

(Emphasis added.)

And, as Joe points out:

It’s now been two weeks and Tony Perkins has remained silent on widespread reports that he covered up the sexual assault of a teenager by the Ohio Republican for whom Perkins had been raising money that very night in the hotel where the assault allegedly took place.

And then they (evangelical "Christians" of the Tony Perkins stripe) wander around all pouty because no one likes them.

Footnote: This sort of thing seems to be endemic among "Christians."

One of the ministers who serves a Theodore church where Roy Moore spoke Wednesday night was federally convicted of trying to block an investigation involving claims his son molested children in Honduras.

Rev. Bill Atkinson led the music portion of the Moore event at the Magnolia Springs Baptist Church, where the U.S. Senate candidate spoke for over 20 minutes and was interrupted twice by people in the audience.

In 2012, Atkinson was found guilty of obstruction and conspiracy for ordering two of his children to destroy a hard drive of a digital video recorder, which held evidence that incriminated his son for child molestation. At the time, William James "Will" Atkinson IV was in a Honduras jail awaiting trial on charges that he molested children at an orphanage the Atkinson family owned. Those allegations came to light when his younger brother, Jonathan Atkinson, set up a secret surveillance system in Will's office after some of the children said they had been touched inappropriately.

And then they circle the wagons.

Via Joe.My.God.

OF All Places

This is not something I would have expected:

Lithuania’s Parliament marked the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia this week.

Marked on May 17 around the world, IDAHOT raises awareness of persecution and hate crimes faced by lesbian, gay, bisexuals and transgender people around the world. . . .

The day is heavily marked in countries that are already progressive on LGBT rights, but it is also making inroads in places where there is still a way to go on LGBT equality.

Lithuania has lagged behind on equality, with no legal recognition for same-sex couples, no gender recognition for transgender people, a ban on same-sex adoption, and generally negative social attitudes.

However, progress is slowly being made, and the day was marked this week with celebrations in the country’s Parliament in Vilnius.

My father's family is Lithuanian; my grandparents came to the US before World War I, which marks us, I guess, as the first wave. I went to university with a group of kids whose families came over after World War II -- most of them were born in Germany. They tended to be very conservative, mostly because they hated Russia and everything Russian, but I suspect they reflected attitudes prevalent in the old country -- as the article notes, Lithuania has not been on the forefront of the struggle for gay rights.

But, times change, and so do attitudes. They even lit up Vilnius city hall with rainbow colors.

A more substantial mark of a change in attitude is this:

But two asylum seekers from Chechnya have been granted asylum in Lithuania, reports the Russian Interfax news agency.

Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Linas Linkevičius has confirmed that the two men have been granted asylum there after fleeing persecution in Russia.
.
He said that the Lithuanian Government had “issued visas to two people from Chechnya who were persecuted because of their sexual orientation”.

“We have consistently raised these issues both within the EU and in the parliamentary structures of the Council of Europe – regarding the possibility of helping and, if necessary, granting asylum,” he added.

The US, under our neo-fascist regime, has so far refused to grant visas to gays fleeing persecution in Chechnya.

Idiots du Jour

Which would be the majority of the Arkansas Supreme Court who came up with this decision:

Arkansas' highest court on Thursday threw out a judge's ruling that could have allowed all married same-sex couples to get the names of both spouses on their children's birth certificates without a court order, saying it doesn't violate equal protection "to acknowledge basic biological truths."

The state Supreme Court also issued a rare admonishment to Pulaski County Circuit Judge Tim Fox, saying he made "inappropriate remarks" in his ruling that struck down the birth certificate law. Fox had cited the U.S. Supreme Court's decision legalizing gay marriage in his ruling last year that said married same-sex couples should have both names listed on their children's birth certificates, just as heterosexual married couples do, without requiring a court order. . . .

"What is before this court is a narrow issue of whether the birth-certificate statutes as written deny the appellees due process," Justice Josephine Linker Hart wrote in the court's majority opinion. "...In the situation involving the female spouse of a biological mother, the female spouse does not have the same biological nexus to the child that the biological mother or the biological father has. It does not violate equal protection to acknowledge basic biological truths."

The stupidity evidenced here is staggering.

Right up front, birth certificates are not about biological parentage, they are about legal parentage: who has legal responsibility for the child. Under the Arkansas court's thinking, a child born through artificial insemination to a woman whose husband is sterile should have the (anonymous) sperm donor listed as the father. A child born through surrogacy should have the surrogate listed as the mother. Neither a sperm donor nor a surrogate has legal responsibility for the child.

The bias in this opinion is only compounded by the fact that it quotes the portion of Obergefell that says listing as parent/spouse on birth and death certificates as among the rights and benefits of marriage that must be accorded to same-sex couples, and then declares that part of the opinion irrelevant to the question of whether both same-sex parents must be listed on a child's birth certificate.

The Court mentioned birth certificates only once, stating,

Indeed, while the States are in general free to vary the benefits they confer on all married couples, they have throughout our history made marriage the basis for an expanding list of governmental rights, benefits, and responsibilities. These aspects of marital status include: taxation; inheritance and property rights; rules of intestate
succession; spousal privilege in the law of evidence; hospital access; medical decisionmaking authority; adoption rights; the rights and benefits of survivors; birth and death certificates; professional ethics rules; campaign finance restrictions; workers’ compensation benefits; health insurance; and child custody, support, and visitation rules.

Obergefell, ___ U.S. at ___, 135 S. Ct. at 2601. This single mention of birth certificates was related only to its observation that states conferred benefits on married couples, which in part demonstrated that “ the reasons marriage is fundamental under the Constitution apply with equal force to same-sex couples.” Id. at ___, 135 S.Ct. at 2599.

The full slip opinion is here.

Depending on how fast this gets to the Supreme Court, if the Court decides to hear it at all, rather than remanding it back to the state court, it will go down in flames, 5-3. Even if the Hairpiece manages to get an appointment through the Senate, it will still be 5-4.

And, just in case you were wondering, bias is alive and well in Arkansas.

Orlando: Compare and Contrast

From Nihad Awad, CAIR’s national Executive Director, in reaction to Orlando:

We offer condolences to the families and we pray for recovery of the survivors. This is a hate crime, plain and simple. We condemn it in the strongest possible terms. It violates our principles as Americans and as Muslims. Let me be perfectly clear. We have no tolerance for extremism of any kind. We must not tolerate hateful rhetoric that incites violence against minorities. Religious freedom is a cornerstone of our beliefs as Muslims and as Americans. Today, we must stand united.

For many years, members of the LGBT community have stood shoulder to shoulder with the Muslim community against any act of hate crimes, Islamophobia, marginalization and discrimination. Today, we stand with them shoulder to shoulder. The liberation of the American Muslim community is profoundly linked to the liberation of other minority groups: blacks, Latinos, gay, Jewish, trans and every other community that has faced discrimination and operation in this country.

There are statements from local and state chapters of CAIR at the link.

And from the Archbishop of St. Petersburg (Via Box Turtle Bulletin):

Second, sadly it is religion, including our own, that targets, mostly verbally, and often breeds contempt for gays, lesbians and transgender people. Attacks today on LGBT men and women often plant the seed of contempt, then hatred, which can ultimately lead to violence.

Those women and men who were mowed down Sunday were all made in the image and likeness of God. We teach that. We should believe that. We must stand for that.

Even before I knew who perpetrated the mass murders at Pulse, I knew that somewhere in the story there would be a search for religion as motivation. While deranged people do senseless things, all of us observe and judge and act from some kind of religious background. Singling out people for victimization because of their religion, their sexual orientation, their nationality must be offensive to God’s ears. It has to stop, too.

From the Anti-Defamation League:

We must remember that Americans should not blame all Muslims for the actions of one individual. Whether citizens like the individual suspected of committing this act or war-torn refugees seeking safety, we must remember that we do not define people by their faith. We are deeply concerned that this attack could lead to a backlash against American Muslims. We urge all Americans to not fight hatred with hatred, but rather to come together around our common values of decency and respect.

At this time of sadness and tragedy, we express our full solidarity with members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community. During this time of year when we celebrate Pride, they should know that they are not alone. As we mourn the victims and extend our deepest condolences to the families and friends of those lost, we will redouble our resolve to fight against the forces of hatred and extremism that led to this barbaric act of hatred.

And then there are the "Christians". Pastor Steven Anderson, another of the "kill the gays" contingent:

The good news is that there’s 50 less pedophiles in this world, because, you know, these homosexuals are a bunch of disgusting perverts and pedophiles. That’s who was a victim here, are a bunch of, just, disgusting homosexuals at a gay bar, okay? Obviously, it’s not right for somebody to just, you know, shoot up the place, because that’s not going through the proper channels. But these people all should have been killed, anyway, but they should have been killed through the proper channels, as in they should have been executed by a righteous government that would have tried them, convicted them, and saw them executed.

There's more. It's even worse.

And I'm noticing a thundering silence from most of the anti-gay leaders, give or take the Republican politicians who have made statements without naming names. Surprisingly, the AFA has issued a statement, but no telling which community was targeted from their press release:

“This is a time when a nation must come together, reminding that God loves all people, and all are His creation, made in His own image,” said AFA President Tim Wildmon. “All lives are precious, and because the American Family Association is known for its commitment to family values, we deeply mourn when lives are lost due to senseless violence. We know there are millions praying for the families and friends of the victims, and we ask all to join together with them and for those who are wounded, that a healing of both the body and the community will be reality.”

Ah. Thanks to Joe.My.God., Perkins speaks. It's his usual exercise in turning reality on its head, but this is absolutely astonishing, even for him:

What a stark contrast to Christianity, which believes that everyone is made in the image of God and has intrinsic value, regardless of the choices they make. And yet Christianity is the faith Obama won’t tolerate — a religion that teaches people not to confront sin with violence but to love people into the kingdom by speaking truth.

One wonders when Perkins is actually going to start practicing the Christianity he describes. And do note, it's all Obama's fault. Perkins and his fellow travelers had nothing to do with creating the climate that makes something like the Orlando shooting not only conceivable, but inevitable.

Question of the Day

Which do you think is more likely: That the oligarchs who are actually running this country -- you know, the ones who own Congress and a lot of statehouses, as well as most of everything else -- are going to decide that the "Christian" right is a liability and pull the plug on them, or that they're keeping them going to distract the rest of us from what they're up to?

Today's Must Read

This piece, by Amanda Marcotte, on the desperation of the "religious" right:

Unfortunately, though, Davis’s behavior isn’t just a bratty tantrum. This whole incident is also a sign of a troubling development in the religious right: As their cultural power declines in the face of growing diversity and liberalism, religious conservatives are embracing scary levels of radicalism. They don’t have the numbers anymore, so they are turning to scarier and more radical demands to seize power in any way that they can.

In this light, the ignorance displayed by leading Republican figures about the way the American legal system works is a little more sinister. Mike Huckabee, although we consider him laughable, is probably the best example:

Mike Huckabee has been at the frontlines of pushing the claim that Christian conservatives simply have the right to ignore or overturn democracy to impose their will, and not just because he’s been running around Kentucky, trying to get himself on camera as much as possible in support of Davis’s attempt to ban gay marriage by fiat. He’s also been using the campaign trail to argue that the president should be able to simply end rule of law and start ruling like a dictator.

He doesn’t use the word dictator, of course, but make no mistake, Huckabee has repeatedly and shamelessly promised that if he is elected president, he will start declaring his beliefs to be the law of the land without the cooperation of Congress. In a Google hangout, he laid out the scheme: Declare as president that there are “constitutional rights of the unborn” and simply ban abortion by fiat. He claimed a similar authority during the Republican debate, a moment that got startlingly little play even though it was literally a candidate for president arguing that he would make himself a dictator.

The calls for armed insurrection start to take on a little more weight. And if you don't think it can happen here consider this:

Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes announced yesterday that he had reached out to Davis’ lawyers at Liberty Counsel to offer the protection of his group, which he says is already forming a presence in Rowan County, Kentucky, where Davis was recently released from jail after prohibiting her office from issuing marriage licenses. Rhodes said in a statement that his position has nothing to do with gay marriage, but rather his conviction that Davis had been illegally detained by the federal judge who held her in contempt for violating multiple court orders.

You may remember them as the group that forced the stand-off at the Bundy Ranch, when Cliven Bundy wanted to use our land for free to graze his cattle.

What could possibly go wrong?

Remember Mark Regnerus?

And his "study" on people raised by gay parents? Except that almost none of them were:

In an upcoming article, a pair of sociologists are putting what they call the “final nail in the coffin” of the much-criticized study by University of Texas sociologist Mark Regnerus that purported to show that being raised by gay and lesbian parents harms children. The Regnerus study has become a favorite tool of Religious Right activists seeking to show that households led by same-sex couples are bad for children. At the same time, the study has come under scrutiny for the funding it received from anti-gay groups and for its lack of respondents who were actually raised in same-sex parent households.

Indiana University's Brian Powell and the University of Connecticut’s Simon Cheng didn’t just find methodological flaws in Regnerus’ research — they took the data he collected, cleaned it up, and redid the study, coming to a very different conclusion about families led by same-sex couples.

It seems that not only was the methodology flawed, but a significant portion of the data was suspect:

By eliminating suspect data — for example, a 25-year-old respondent who claimed to be 7’8” tall, 88 pounds, married 8 times and with 8 children, and another who reported having been arrested at age 1 — and correcting what they view as Regnerus’ methodological errors, Cheng and Powell found that Regnerus’ conclusions were so “fragile” that his data could just as easily show that children raised by gay and lesbian parents don’t face negative adult outcomes. . . .

Many people who he categorized as having been raised by a gay or lesbian parent had spent very little time with that parent or with his or her same-sex partner. Even Regnerus admitted that his data included only two people who said they had been raised for their entire childhoods by a same-sex couple.

There are also serious questions about the genesis and conduct of the study, as well as its publication -- why was it accepted for publication before the data analysis was complete? for example. (The article at the link strikes me as a little shrill, even verging on sensationalistic, but seems, ultimately, to be well-documented. A more concise and less slanted summary is at Wikipedia.)

Of course, this won't affect Anti-Gay, Inc.'s use of the study -- they'll just mutter something about "the gaystapo" and keep on citing it.

Gays vs. Christians?

The debate over Indiana's "religious freedom" law has drawn in stark relief a meme that's been around for awhile: it's gays and their allies (which apparently include everyone except evangelical Christians) against Christianity. Now, anyone who stops to think for a minute is going to realize this is bullshit. I've run across a couple of posts in the past few days that point this up quite clearly.

Max Mills, in a very erudite post at AmericaBlog, goes through and discusses the very few references to homosexuality in the Bible, and how they have been interpreted -- or misinterpreted. He starts off with "abomination":

The Hebrew word, to’ebah, is most accurately understood to mean “that which goes against the accepted order”. Dr. Friedman offers several examples in his book, The Bible Now:

“…in the Bible the term is in fact relative. For example, in the story of Joseph and his brothers in Genesis, Joseph tells his brothers that if the Pharaoh asks them what their occupation is, they should say that they are cowherds. They must not say that they are shepherds. Why? Because, Joseph explains, all shepherds are an offensive thing (tō‘ēbāh) to the Egyptians. But shepherds are not an offensive thing to the Israelites or Moabites or many other cultures. In another passage in that story, we read that Egyptians do not eat with Israelites because that would be an offensive thing (tō‘ēbāh) to them. But Arameans and Canaanites eat with Israelites and do not find it offensive. See also the story of the exodus from Egypt, where Moses tells Pharaoh that the things that Israelites sacrifice would be an offensive thing (tō‘ēbāh) to the Egyptians. But these things are certainly not an offensive thing to the Israelites.

He gives several more examples, all of which point to the fact that the "abominations" in the Old Testament are really no more than things that depart from accepted custom.

He also gives us the real story on the "sin of Sodom."

In a post at Mahablog, Barbara O'Brien points up an essential fact:

A number of religious groups, including Christian ones, have spoken out in opposition of Indiana’s “religious freedom” law and call it plain old bigotry. Here’s a roundup. I’d already mentioned the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and the Indiana Episcopal diocese, and other denominations speaking out in support of equal treatment for LGBT people include the United Church of Christ, the Presbyterian Church USA, and the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. I’m betting the BJCRL doesn’t include Southern Baptists, but still … also the Unitarian Universalists, the Sikh Coalition, the Religious Action Center for Reform Judaism and the Central Conference of American Rabbis.

The dichotomy we’re seeing is a faction of hyper-reactionary religionists — some of whom are about as genuinely religious as the Las Vegas strip — versus everybody else. Let’s keep that straight.

Both posts are worth reading in full.

Now, the lesson to be learned from this is one that I've found myself repeating again and again lately, to the point where I'm getting a little tired of it, but here it is again, with a slight variation: In the sacred texts, teachings, and doctrines of any religion, you can find something to justify what you wanted to do anyway -- or something that can be interpreted to justify what you wanted to do.

I'm also a bit more cynical about motivations, and just want to point out that for some -- Family Research Council, American Family Association, National Organization for Marriage -- anti-gay is a big cash cow. I point this out because in American politics, it's always a good idea to follow the money if you want to know what's really going on.

Indiana: Let the Backpedaling Begin!

Looks like the heat was a bit much for Indiana Gov. Mike Pence:

Gov. Mike Pence, scorched by a fast-spreading political firestorm, told The Star on Saturday that he will support the introduction of legislation to “clarify” that Indiana’s controversial Religious Freedom Restoration Act does not promote discrimination against gays and lesbians.

“I support religious liberty, and I support this law,” Pence said in an exclusive interview. “But we are in discussions with legislative leaders this weekend to see if there’s a way to clarify the intent of the law.”

Governor, the intent of the law is quite clear, and has been from its introduction.

Sen. Schneider was the sponsor of the bill.

And of course, it was all a misunderstanding:

Amid the deepest crisis of his political career, Pence said repeatedly that the intense blowback against the new law is the result of a “misunderstanding driven by misinformation.”

And here I thought it was taken out of context.

But everyone else is doing it!

In defense of the legislation, he noted that 19 other states and the federal government have adopted RFRA laws similar to Indiana’s. And he pointed out that President Barack Obama voted for Illinois’ version of RFRA as a state senator.

Actually, I'm hard put to figure out why Indiana's bill is getting such blowback, except that it is very broad. It may just be that this one marks the tipping point. I bet Pence and the Republicans in the legislature thought they were going to sneak this one through, just like everyone else has.

And drawing comparisons with Illinois' RFRA doesn't cut it:

But the Republican governor and possible presidential contender left out an important fact. While Illinois does have a law that gives special protections to religious objectors, it also bans discrimination based on sexual orientation. Indiana, on the other hand, has no such ban.

That distinction is crucial, legal experts say, because anti-discrimination laws are considered stronger than religious exemptions.

According to Pence, a similar ban is "not on his agenda."

It's going to be interesting to see how this plays out: the "clarification" is going to be happening under a microscope. And there's also no guarantee that this and similar laws are going to hold up in the courts:

In a letter to Senate Judiciary Chairman Brent Steele, a group of 16 legal scholars from across the country — including law professors from Indiana and Notre Dame universities — write that "it is not at all clear that the proposed Indiana RFRA would lead courts to recognize such an exemption."

In fact, only one such case has arisen in states that already have a religious freedom law. In that case, a Christian wedding photographer was sued after refusing to photograph a same-sex commitment ceremony in New Mexico. Although that state has a religious freedom law, the photographer lost.

"Courts generally believe that anti-discrimination laws serve compelling governmental interests, and nothing in the proposed legislation would change that," they wrote.

On the other hand, I can't quite shake the idea that these laws are as much a delaying tactic as anything else: like the sodomy laws that are still on the books in a number of states, the RFRAs will serve as a means to intimidate and harass gays and lesbians.

"Religious Freedom"

For some. This article by Eric Ethington on Utah's "breakthrough" gay-inclusive civil rights legislation lays the whole strategy out very clearly:

That's why, when just a few weeks ago Oaks held a press conference to announce that he and the Mormon church were ready to endorse a statewide nondiscrimination law for LGBTQ people if only the leaders of the local LGBTQ community would sit down and negotiate a “compromise,” many were suspicious.

Oaks was up front about what he was looking for. He and other leaders of the Mormon church enumerated the religious exemptions they wanted included with a nondiscrimination law, including a right for government and health care workers to deny service to LGBTQ people.

SB296, the bill that resulted from those negotiations, was hailed by equality groups and the Mormon church as a “historic compromise” of nondiscrimination and religious freedom. The bill does indeed ban workplace and housing discrimination against LGBTQ people in Utah. But buried underneath those important protections, is a small clause guaranteeing the right of individuals to express faith-based anti-LGBTQ views at work.

This is similar to bills passed in other states, which include similar provisions, although not as explicit, allowing "people of faith" to avoid obeying laws they don't like -- specifically, ant-discrimination laws.

Maggie Gallagher's on board with this, among others. In a laughable attempt to establish that sexual orientation is a choice, she inserted this little nugget:

The place to rest our case for equal treatment of traditional believers is that actions are choices, choices which in a free society must be subject to moral reflections, not policed as if they were skin color, something over which the individual has no control.

(Emphasis added.)

That gives the whole game away, although Gallagher, still trying to present herself as the "reasonable" face of anti-gay bigotry, is doing her part to reinforce the "Christian martyr" mantra.

Ethington's essay is a "must read." Gallagher's is garbage.

Today's Must Read

Laurie Higgins, who is something called a "cultural analyst" for the hate group Illinois Family Institute (which you may remember as Peter LaBarbera's old gig, before he proved himself incompetent even in their eyes, and is one of the few state-level organizations designated as a hate group by the SPLC) has once again gone off the deep end: It seems that Kelly Cassidy, openly gay representative from Chicago's North Side (and my former rep, actually) has introduced a bill to ban so-called "conversion therapy" for minors. Rob Tisinai has an excellent analysis/take down at Box Turtle Bulletin, so I don't need to rip it to shreds myself.

I do want to point out one thing, where Higgins gives the game away:

The bill claims that homosexuality is not a “disorder, deficiency, or shortcoming,” stating that “The major professional associations of mental health practitioners and researchers in the United States have recognized this fact for nearly 40 years.” What specifically does this mean? Are the bill’s sponsors asserting as fact that engaging in homoerotic activity is not morally disordered, morally deficient, or a moral shortcoming? If so, where is their conclusive scientific proof for such a claim about the moral status of freely chosen activity?

So we know it's not about the welfare of young people, or the fraudulent basis for what they're now calling "SOCE" (Sexual Orientation Change Efforts. Apparently "reparative therapy" wasn't working, as in, if it ain't broke, don't fix it), it's all about enforcing her warped sense of morality on everyone else. And what kind of loon wants a scientific proof of claims about morality?

Anyway, read Tisinai's post -- it's long, but it's thorough and just a wee bit snarky.

And Today In Unintentional Irony

The Catholic Church in Florida, needless to say, has its cassocks twisted, what with coming out against same-sex marriage and being ignored by the courts and all. This statement, from Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski, is choice:

The letter, from Archbishop Thomas Wenski, told employees that "because of the Church’s particular function in society, certain conduct, inconsistent with the teachings of the Catholic Church, could lead to disciplinary action, including termination, even if it occurs outside the normal working day and outside the strict confines of work performed by the employee for the Archdiocese.”

Wenski’s letter also warned employees that the conduct requirements also extend to the Internet. “Employees should exercise discretion when posting on social media sites, and note that online activity indicative of prohibitive behaviors may subject an employee to disciplinary action or termination," it read.

"But where is the irony?" you ask. "This just seems like typical Catholic hierarchy overreach."

Well, yes, but get this:

Florida’s Catholic bishops have blasted a federal judge’s decision to overturn a state constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

The bishops claim it “threatens both religious liberty and the freedom of individuals to conscientiously object.”

Ahem.

Via Towleroad.

Duh!

I have to hand it to the "Christian" right -- even though they're doing as much damage as they can to human rights worldwide, they do provide some entertainment.

You may have heard about Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar's invitation for married couples to post pictures of themselves kissing on their Facebook page. Apparently they didn't realize that people other than good "Christians" get married and also have access to the Internet -- you can guess who posted pictures:

Fans quickly responded to the challenge with photos of themselves and their spouses smooching for the camera. According to John Becker, however, some of those photos were deleted — because they featured same-sex couples.

Becker, who runs the LGBTQ blog The Bilerico Project, wrote on Tuesday, Nov. 11, that the picture he posted of himself and his husband was deleted from the comments section, along with other shots of same-sex twosomes.

"Oh no, I think I've been banned from the Duggar Family Official Facebook page! (I'm crying into my coffee cup right now, I assure you)," he shared on his own Facebook page, and on The Bilerico Project. "I posted this photo of Michael and me with the following comment: 'Happily married for nearly nine years; working hard for #MarriageEquality for all loving couples."

He continued: "It was getting lots of likes, but the Duggars must not have liked it very much — they pulled it down and blocked me from posting, liking, or commenting on the page altogether. How sad that they feel so threatened by other loving marriages."

I'm sure the Duggars see those responses as persecution, because we all know that if you disagree with "Christians," you're suppressing their religious freedom.

Well, it seems that the Duggars are a little more vicious than I had realized. So someone started a petition at change.org asking TLC to cancel their "reality" show (in sarcasm quotes because, after all, what do the Duggars know about reality?). Needless to say, the American "Family" Association jumped in with a Twitter campaign to Save the Duggars! You can imagine what happened:

At the core of the issue is not whether or not the Duggars should have their TV show, which reportedly has netted them millions of dollars. At the core of the issue is that TLC and the show's producers aren't being honest with the Duggar family's practices and beliefs. Also at issue is the outrageous hypocrisy that conservatives are claiming liberals have no right to boycott or petition a company about their beliefs, but conservatives claim they do.

So Twitter made sure that those lapses in transparency are being corrected.

Click through to read the tweets -- for some reason, I can't copy them from The New Civil Rights Movement.

The lesson is plain: If your mind is stuck in the early 19th century, avoid social media.

Now We Know

Why Brian Brown's fundraising appeals have gotten so desperate:

In a time when virtually every nightly newscast, political debate, even television series delves into discussions about marriage rights for gay and lesbian couples, the beleaguered National Organization for Marriage (NOM) can’t seem to raise enough money to cover its expenses. According to analysis of the organization’s 2013 tax filings done by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), NOM raised $5.1 million in 2013, dropping by over 50% since 2012. Just 2 donors accounted for more than half of the organization’s funding – further evidence that everyday Americans have little interest in furthering NOM’s extremist agenda. In addition, the NOM Education Fund also dropped by nearly $3.5 million in funding -- a drop of almost 70% since the previous year. NOM ended the year more than $2.5 million in debt.

Any guesses on which two churches are the major donors? Oops -- did I say that out loud?

I don't normally gloat, but in this case, I'll make an exception.

Logic and Robert George

I just happened to run across this story from last month, but I thought it was worth noting:

Last week, National Organization For Marriage cofounder, Federal Marriage Amendment author, and Princeton University professor Robert George went on Catholic radio to talk about openly gay Christian singer Vicky Beeching.

When pressed by host Todd Wilken for a biblical reason to stop at affirmation of consenting adults who love one another rather than move on to those who sexually abuse minors or who end the lives of others through serial murder, the prominent conservative thinker couldn't think of any "logical stopping place"[.]

I've read some of George's articles. I won't say that George and logic are complete strangers, but they're not what I'd call "intimate," you know?

Of course, one of George's problems, being the good Catholic that he is, is that he never questions his assumptions. Sorry, but if you're going to persuade me about anything, you first have to demonstrate that your assumptions are valid and have some basis in reality. So far on that score, George's arguments, such as they are, have proven to be notably lacking.

The Persecution Complex

This is the tactic that's been coming more and more to the fore with the right wing, particularly the anti-gay right wing. It starts with the inversion of calling critics of the homophobic right "intolerant," as Alvin McEwen notes with regard to Sen. Marco Rubio:

One of the most transparent tactics opponents of marriage equality will attempt is to claim that supporters of marriage equality are intolerant of their opinion.

It’s not only a transparent tactic but highly cynical. And apparently it’s the tactic that Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida is attempting:

While Rubio has consistently held conservative positions on abortion and gay marriage, his current emphasis appears to be an effort to appeal to social conservatives who have yet to settle on a favored candidate for 2016. “Even before this speech is over, I will be attacked as someone who is a hater or a bigot,” Rubio said.

That's really only the tip of the iceberg. Enzo at Aksarbent links to this article from Right Wing Watch, which is a detailed analysis of the strategy.

The tales of horror keep pouring in: Two middle school girls are forced into a lesbian kiss as part of an anti-bullying program; an Air Force sergeant is fired because he opposes same-sex marriage; a high school track team is disqualified from a meet after an athlete thanks God for the team’s victory; a Veterans Affairs hospital bans Christmas cards with religious messages; a man fixing the lights in a Christmas tree falls victim to a wave of War-on-Christmas violence; an elementary school student is punished for praying over his school lunch; a little boy is forced to take a psychological evaluation after drawing a picture of Jesus.

None of these stories is true. But each has become a stock tale for Religious Right broadcasters, activists, and in some cases elected officials. These myths – which are becoming ever more pervasive in the right-wing media – serve to bolster a larger story, that of a majority religious group in American society becoming a persecuted minority, driven underground in its own country.

This narrative has become an important rallying cry for a movement that has found itself on the losing side of many of the so-called “culture wars.” By reframing political losses as religious oppression, the Right has attempted to build a justification for turning back advances in gay rights, reproductive rights and religious liberty for minority faiths.

We've seen this coming, first with the cries of "persecution" from the usual suspects when people in business -- photographers, bakers, etc. -- try to use their "deeply held religious beliefs" as a pretext for flouting anti-discrimination laws. It's a tantrum over the loss of privilege turned into a political strategy, and the next stage in the "Christian" right's ongoing war against everyone else. And I mean everyone, not only gays, lesbians, and trans people, but women (Hobby Lobby, anyone?), Muslims (the whole Ground Zero mosque flap and the Murfreesboro Islamic Center case, including claims that Islam is not a religion), and refugee children from Central America (see this post from Digby for some history of this attitude -- it's not a new thing).

Before you start parsing, the "Christian" right is the Tea Party is the Republican Party. And their heroes are crazy. (Michele Bachmann is the classic case, but just pick a Republican 2016 presidential hopeful at random and you'll find any number of equally bizarre statements.)

And as they lose more and more ground among the majority of Americans the rhetoric gets more and more shrill and it becomes more and more apparent what disgusting people they are. (Who was it who said, regarding yet another school shooting, that "Your dead kids don't trump my Constitutional rights"? Hint: he wasn't a liberal.)

And they complain of being persecuted.