Withers: Inhofe thinks straight soldiers will not fight for gay soldiers
[1]
Let’s play a “what if” game. Supposing there is your standard tree-hugging liberal pol out there. Loved by the ACLU and NPR. Gets perfect marks from Planned Parenthood, HRC, the NAACP, and PETA. This theoretical politician talks to a liberal organization and muses about his military days. Says there is no way good American soldiers will put their lives on the the line for their nasty, church going, “abortion is a sin” conservative comrades.
Got the image? What do you think the response would be? How would conservatives respond? Outrage? Disgust? Glenn Beck crying and whimpering about his fears for the republic (well he does that all the time)? The blogosphere would be afire. Even Volvo loving liberals would pounce.
Back to the real world. Here is Sen. James Inhofe [2], from the great state of Oklahoma, opining how straight troops will act if they have to serve alongside the gays.
“And you know — you hear the stories all the time. A military guy — I happen to be Army, and Army and Marines always feel that when we’re out there, we’re not doing it for the flag or the country; we’re doing it for the guy in the next foxhole. And that would dramatically change that.”
Allow that hot mess to sit with you for a minute. Gays serving openly means the very values of the military will end. Inhofe’s estimation of our serving men and women is surpringly low. Sort of sad that a guy, who extols his military service, thinks so little of soldiers like Spcs. Zachary Boyd, Cecil Montgomery, and Jordan Custer [3].
[1] http://www.365gay.com/wp-content/uploads/Inofe-top.jpg
[2] http://thinkprogress.org/2010/05/13/inhofe-gay-foxhole/
[3] http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104493189
E. Lynn Harris Made Sexuality A Bestseller
Author E. Lynn Harris, best known for his novels portraying black male characters conflicted with their sexuality, died Friday in Los Angeles at age 54. Host Michel Martin offers a remembrance of the bestselling author, who talked about his writing as a guest on Tell Me More. See E. Lynn Harris Made Sexuality A Bestseller
NPR
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DeFrank Center’s boss knows a challenge when he sees one in San Jose
Paul Wysocki was about to show me the drop-in center for youth at the Billy DeFrank Center when the silent burglar alarm went off. Wysocki fiddled with the box to accept his code and wound up calling the alarm company, telling them all was fine. “There’s usually a little lag time before they call the police,” he explained. The situation bore more than a little irony. As interim executive director, Wysocki is sounding the public alarm for the center, San Jose‘s gathering place for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community. But he has no lag time. Last week, he dispatched an e-mail that bluntly said the center would have to close its doors by Sept. 1 unless it raises $50,000. Wysocki hopes to coax backers to sign up for continuing contributions that would total $20,000 a month. “We had been talking about what we needed to do to get people’s attention,” said the red-haired 60-year-old, an exuberant and funny man who has become an expert in turning around nonprofits. “We decided we had to hit them right between the eyes.”
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International gathering of gay activists kicks off in Copenhagen
COPENHAGEN — Music and aerial acrobats are kicking off the second edition of the World Outgames – nine days of sports, cultural and human rights events for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
Some of the 5,500 participants from about 100 countries are marching in a parade of nations on Copenhagen’s City Hall Square. Artists, suspended in wires above them, are performing spectacular acrobatics to deafening music and a frenzied light show.
See International gathering of gay activists kicks off in Copenhagen
The Canadian Press
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Minister defends decision not to fund gay arts festival
OTTAWA — Industry Minister Tony Clement says his government had to consider “regional fairness” when doling out stimulus money to big tourism events – and that’s why a gay arts festival in Montreal didn’t make the cut.
The organizers of Montreal’s Divers-Cite festival, which features gay and lesbian performers from around the world, said they were shocked to find out this week that their application for funding under the new program had been rejected.
They had been told by bureaucrats they had met all the rigorous criteria for their $155,000 bid – a fact not disputed by the government.
Director Suzanne Girard had initially scoffed at suggestions that ideology might be at play in handing out grants, but now says she suspects politics were involved.
After some Conservative caucus members complained last month that Toronto’s Pride Week had received $400,000, junior tourism minister Diane Ablonczy lost responsibility for the file.
But Clement said Wednesday there had been an “avalanche” of applications under the $100-million Marquee Tourism Events Program and decisions had to be made.
See Minister defends decision not to fund gay arts festival
The Canadian Press
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McEntee: Discrimination is still with us
o Salt Lake City is stepping out, urging a new anti-discrimination law that actually includes sexual orientation and gender identity in the traditional list of those affected by housing and employment discrimination. Take that, all you legislators who have squashed any such thinking on the state level, arguing disingenuously that “choosing to be gay” is not grounds for civil rights protection. Mayor Ralph Becker, a Democratic representative for 11 years, knows all about that ruse. And one of the most fascinating things is how the city’s Human Rights Commission got there: Its members sat down and talked to people in five “dialogues on discrimination” late last year. No lectures, no surveys. Just conversations about classism/poverty, people with disabilities, racism, faith and sexual orientation. Kilo Zamora, whose nonprofit Inclusion Center trained the commissioners, says the opener was, “How’s the city doing, and do you think there’s discrimination here?” As people talked, it became evident that race, gender, class, income and religious biases “we thought we had buried in the ’60s were much alive in our communities,” he says. People were shocked. “Are you sure?” they would ask. “I never knew racism was still alive!”
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IML’s (International Mr. Leather) executive…
IML’s (International Mr. Leather) executive committee has banned vendors at the group’s annual convention from displaying or selling any pornographic photos and videos which portray or promote unprotected sex, also known as barebacking.
A statement released on International Mr. Leather, Inc. letterhead and signed by Chuck Renslow, President of IML, reads as follows: @ IML bans material promoting unsafe sex
ChicagoPride.com
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India: Legal gay sex ruling challenged
A landmark ruling that legalized gay sex between consenting partners in India was challenged Thursday in the country’s high court, lawyers said.
Activists protest against the ruling to decriminalize gay sex in New Delhi on Sunday.
The supreme court issued a notice to the nonprofit Naz Foundation that had won a lower-court verdict after a seven-year legal fight to decriminalize gay sex.
Notices also were issued to the federal government and the New Delhi high court, which ruled last week that consensual sex between partners of the same gender was legal.
An astrologer filed a petition challenging the ruling. The petitioner argued that no constitutional right is violated by the Indian penal code’s Section 377, which had outlawed gay sex, said his lawyer Praveen Agrawal.
The petition also cited Indian culture and health as grounds for seeking a stay on last week’s ruling, he said.
The supreme court posted the next hearing for July 20.
Last week’s ruling meant the law — Indian penal code section 377, which had previously criminalized consensual homosexual acts between adults — was partly struck down but remains in place as far as forced homosexual acts are concerned.
The verdict affects law enforcement all around India because it deals with a law enacted by the federal parliament.
See India: Legal gay sex ruling challenged
CNN Internationa
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Religious groups in India have warned they will…
Religious groups in India have warned they will oppose any move to legalize homosexuality as the federal government prepares to hold talks on a law that classifies same-sex acts as crimes.
India’s Hindu nationalist main opposition has in the meantime called for a national debate on the legislation that law minister M. Veerappa Moily last week said would come up for a discussion within the government.
“This is a sensitive issue and warrants a debate within the Indian society at large before arriving at any decision,” said Sidharth Nath Singh, spokesman for the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party.
An Indian court is due to give its judgment on a petition filed by a nonprofit group that has challenged the anti-gay provision of the penal code.
In a news conference last week, Moily refused to spell out his government’s stand on it because it awaits judicial determination. But his comments that the federal home minister was “contemplating” a meeting with his Cabinet colleagues on the law drew widespread coverage in the largely conservative country.
“Hope floats at rainbow parades,” read a caption on a front-page picture from a gay parade in New Delhi in Monday’s Times of India newspaper.
Participants in that march demanded repeal of Section 377 of the penal code, which criminalizes private consensual sex between adults of the same gender in the country. 
Watch a New Delhi march in support of gay rights »
Religious leaders, however, oppose any suggestion to scrap 377, describing homosexuality as “unnatural.”
“We are against calling homosexuality a criminal activity, but we are certainly in principle against legalizing it, because that would mean the state endorsing same-sex relationships,” said Babu Joseph, spokesman for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India.
Homosexuality “violates fundamental norms of a family,” he said.
See India faith leaders: Anti-gay law must stay CNN International
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Sask. appeal court asked whether commissioners can opt out of same-sex marriages
REGINA — The Saskatchewan government wants the province’s highest court to weigh in on proposed legislation that would allow marriage commissioners to not perform same-sex marriages if it is contrary to their religious beliefs.
Justice Minister Don Morgan said Friday that the government is referring legislative options to the Court of Appeal for its opinion on whether the proposals meet the requirements of the Charter of Rights.
“We’ve given the Court of Appeal two suggested options: one that we grandfather the existing marriage commissioners that are reluctant or refusing to perform a same-sex marriage, and the other one would be to create a religious exemption for those and for future marriage commissioners,” he said.
“It would require us to have two pools of marriage commissioners. One that would be willing to perform the same-sex marriage and one that would not.”
Whether officials can refuse to marry same-sex couples is the subject of a lawsuit and a complaint before the Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal – both of which are being heard by Saskatchewan Court of Queen’s Bench.
The complaint arose in 2005 when marriage commissioner Orville Nichols, a devout Baptist, told a gay couple he wouldn’t marry them because it went against his religious beliefs.
See Sask. appeal court asked whether commissioners can opt out of same … The Canadian Press
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