America Has Been Exporting Homophobia For Decades

Warren's friends will come after us in America soon.

Can't anyone see that they will eventually make official persecution so commonplace on other places that it might be possible ro reverse Lawrence here?

---

by: CailleanMcM @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 13:47:30 PM CST

Agreed

And I said as much earlier this week in my own blog:

First they came for the Communists...

American christians were the impetus for this law in a foreign country. What's stopping them from attempting to enact something similar here? Think about this carefully. The rightwingers have been calling for the reinstatement of anti-sodomy laws ever since Lawrence vs. Texas was decided a few years ago. They subject gay people to vicious smear campaigns in every state, whether it's marriage or anti-discrimination laws. The sole object of these campaigns is to dehumanize us and gin up violence against us. We saw [a 100% increase in anti-gay harassment and violence in California] as a result of the Yes on 8 campaign. This shit doesn't happen in a vacuum.

Then they came for the Jews...

Remember, in Germany it began with the Nuremberg laws, which prohibited marriage between non-Aryans (Jews) and Germans, and which stripped Jewish Germans of their citizenship, downgrading them from "citizens" to "national." Such laws also affected gays, Roma, the disabled, anyone who wasn't a perfect specimen of the "Master Aryan Race." We see the same laws here against LGBT people, driven by christians, deliberately stripping us of our rights to family, to military service. Attempts to grant us equal protection in the public sector, in housing, employment, education, lending, and health care are painted as "assaults on religious liberty." There has been an annual rise in anti-gay and anti-trans hate crimes every year since 2004. We see such hate crimes against us go overlooked, unreported, and underreported. Our attempts at equal protection are laughed out of court [as in the Janice Lengbehn case]. Every LGBT-related SCOTUS case dismissal or refusal this year has been at the urging of this Administration. Currently, Obama's Office of Personnel Management is defying a 9th Circuit Court order to grant health care benefits to the legal same-sex spouses of two Federal Judiciary employees.

It wasn't a long drive from the Nuremberg laws to the camps for either the Jews or the gays in Nazi Germany. Mike Huckabee previously called for gay men with HIV/AIDS to be put in detention camps, the same type of action the Ugandan government is calling for. The Catholic church is declaring anti-gay lobbying as one of its top two priorities (with abortion being the other one). Make no mistake, pretty soon there will be a move for this same thing to happen here in America. We have seen the deep polarization happening where the hysterical right has fallen off the cliff into Glenbeckistan. These people have called for the stripping of rights of LGBT people in America. Their leaders are helping anti-gay extermination laws pass in other countries. They continue to spread vile smear campaigns against us, publicly call for our dehumanization, and encourage violence against us. Make no mistake, what is happening now to gays in Uganda is what they want to see here in America.

When you're not really a citizen, you have no rights. When you have no rights, you have no expectations of decent treatment. After being raped by a fellow sailor, I had no expectation of decent treatment as a woman, as a woman sailor, as a woman who loves women. I'm not really a citizen, you see, not really human. I'm just an uppity outspoken lesbian. When there are laws against people like you, you expect these things to happen. And when they DO happen, it terrorizes you.

The announcement of this law, and this Administration's complete failure to publicly denounce it - the fact that the President of the United States purports to be good friends with the "pastor" who was a driving force behind this obscenity - has me terrified.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

---

by: Keori @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 19:27:27 PM CST

[ Parent ]

You should be terrified Keori

because if he does not denounce the Churches, the American Churches and their leaders who helped work this nightmare, he is no better than the "good Germans" who looked the other way.

Further, once the executions get rolling in Uganda, other countries will dare to do the same...and these preachers will begin to preach the same..

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 21:24:44 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Saw something in this similar vein today

Jeffroby at Open Left had a column today, part of which made my blood run cold:

While the Palin legions grow and the cold shadow of Weimar creeps across the landscape, the progressive leadership is reacting to [progressive base lack of enthusiasm] with varying degrees of hysteria or pseudo-militancy.  Congressional Democrats must do something to inspire the base, they cry.  They must be bold.  When in fact they are cowering in their hutches.

Edmund Burke once said that all that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing.

Good men are doing nothing.

Expect an email from me shortly. I have a question for you.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

---

by: Keori @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 21:34:51 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Yep...Weimar Germany is exactly what it seems like.

---

by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 12:45:12 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Check out Bruce Wilson's diary

Rick Warren's mentor has ties to global antigay rights organizing. Unsurprisingly, they also have ties to Sarah Palin's "church" and Thomas Muthee, the "witch hunter" who "anointed" her back in 2005.

Bruce has been researching these people for years, and he knows his stuff.

I wrote about this back in September 2008.

These people want to take over the world, and they want to kill us. End of story.

There's more at Talk2Action.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

---

by: Keori @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:14:57 PM CST

[ Parent ]

*yawn*

The "good germans" who looked the other way?

Funny how americans constantly insist on making an example of Germany.

Americans have "looked the other way" through just as much shit, so give me a break.

---

by: Kamikapse @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 08:24:21 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Ok "The Obama who looked the other way"

better?
Certainly true...by the way, I've not been in America all that long, few decades off and on.

As for Obama looking the other way..well, Warren had ties to a Bishop(Akinola) who already was pushing draconian anti-gay laws in Nigeria, with his hands stained with the blood of 700 muslims whose murders he incited when Obama asked him to do the invocation. In Europe, Warren was already very controversial.

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:28:01 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Anybody who looks the other way, then...

Including ourselves.

Hate stops a beating heart.

---

by: KarenS @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 12:08:40 PM CST

[ Parent ]

This is well written Maura

and quite frightening.

---

by: kevinchi @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 13:51:57 PM CST

I second that

It is terrifying because it is so chillingly logical.

---

by: CailleanMcM @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 13:57:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Pan-African Anihilation of LGBT's will ensue

legaly in some states, illegally in others, forllowed by more overt repression in Eastern Europe as african executions continue with impunity.

Thanks, Caillean and Kevin. It is more that frightening or terrifying, it is montrous, and the community is responding sluggishly to this.  The American Churches responsible for this need to be publically denounced by the American Government as a step towards ending this, and international sanctions need to be persued. All handling of aid needs removed from the Churches advocating Final Solution.

The Jewish community needs to wake up to, after the gays, the next target that the Evangelicals and the Muslims will agree upon is the Jews, and the eastern European nations have a black and criminal track record on Jews as well.

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 14:25:35 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Uh, now you have me frightened

Pan-African Anihilation of LGBT's will ensue
legaly in some states, illegally in others,

As part of the African Diaspora, (and all black gays, lesbians, and transfolk here in the US) fall under this category.

---

by: kevinchi @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 14:55:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

When the Churhes and the Governents in Africa Make he Executions Routine

it will spread, Kevin, and the hatred here will be ratcheted up.

From a Recent Funeral Sermon In Uganda:

A senior member of the Anglican Church has thrown support behind the government move in a bid to phase homosexuality out of the country.

Rev. Michael Esakan Okwi said on Friday that not even "cockroaches" who are in the "lower animal kingdom" engaged in homosexual relations.

"What about the human being who was made in God's image?" he asked at the funeral service in All Saints Cathedral - Kampala for Tom Omongole, the former Resident District Commissioner of Bukedea.

Rev. Okwi also lectures Theology and Philosophy at the Uganda Christian University.

When this comes from pulpits in Black Churches in the US as well(oh, I can see Harry Jackson salivating at the chance) what will ensue in the streets, Kevin?

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 15:48:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I guess you didn't see this...

http://www.washingtoncitypaper...

---

by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 12:48:48 PM CST

[ Parent ]

And the comments like this, Kevin?

IT IS JUST COMMON KNOWLEDGE IN BLACK COMMUNITIES THAT WE DETEST HOMOSEXUAL MEN BECAUSE OF YOUR UNNATURAL ACTS. THIS IS IN OUR DNA.

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:19:58 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Well...that's part of the reason

I don't physically live in "the black community" and I haven't for sometime.

You think that's bad, though, try this thread...

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2...

I do think that some (but not all) of this is trolls. But yeah the religion thing plus the nationalism thing has produced those attitudes in some in the black community. And they do happen to be the loudest folks...

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 14:30:35 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Oy vey!

And yet, not surprised. Nope.  

"Oh, I thought you meant a specific plan. With maps and stuff." -Buffy

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by: Aspasia @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:24:33 PM CST

[ Parent ]

What will ensue is my asserting my Second Amendment

right to carry a concealed firearm and defending myself, even from the state if necessary.

History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government.-- Thomas Jefferson

---

by: Mykelb @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 11:33:04 AM CST

[ Parent ]

In much of Europe

it is Muslims who are the Nuevo Judio. In much of Europe, it is Muslims who are being targeted in all manner of ways, ranging from the Swiss ban on minarets, to a pregnant women being outright stabbed in a courtroom in Germany.

---

by: rfloh @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 07:48:41 AM CST

[ Parent ]

You know, if you're willing to specify Evangelicals and not all Christians...

(and by that I don't think you mean all Evangelicals), can you at least do the liberal and moderate (and sane) Muslims a favor and specify extreme, right-wing, Taliban/Jihadist or WEV for Muslim?

We need allies in the fight, not blanket statements.

Otherwise - hell yeah, everyone needs to wake the F up already.

---

by: lyonside @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:24:13 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Well, I willingly exclude Sufi Muslims and those who are more generally secular

But the radical elements in Islam are steadily gaining a stronger hand in Africa particularly.

In Iraq, about the only thing that Shiites and Sunnis agree upon is killing LGB's, T's who persue surgery the find religiously acceptable thanks to a fatwa from the late Imam Ayatollah Syed Ruhollah Mousavi Khomeini

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:32:51 AM CST

[ Parent ]

And No Pass For ANY Church Or Faith That Is "Silent but Tolerant"

If they don't denounce this, they are complicit.
Period.
No more recitations of the old "Also Doch" excuse from trials in the late 1940's.
You oppose evil or you enable evil

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:52:15 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Why are the Unitarians not making a statement?

Why not the Dalai Lama?

No one is free when others are oppressed!

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by: ThePhoenix @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 14:20:35 PM CST

[ Parent ]

It is so here in Hawaii

Native Hawaiian culture was accepting of homosexuality and gender variations until the European christians came. The aikane tradition was a well-established part of Hawaiian culture, until christians wiped it out with their concepts of sin and misogyny.

The Chiefs, the Ali'i, had male lovers of consequence among them, the aikane. These were favored courtesans of the royalty. Their presence is well-documented in the reports of Captain Cook. Since the concept of private property was foreign to the Hawaiians, the term noho'ai, loosely translated as "one who lies with," was used to imply a mate or spouse. Ancient Hawaiian culture was bisexual and fluid; families were not nuclear, gender-rigid units but hanai, extended groupings of lovers, children, siblings, aunties, cousins, uncles, and grandparents.

The mahu were men who chose to live as women; they were not considered sinful or broken by Hawaiian society, but were honored for taking on multiple gender roles. They were simply normal, legitimate, contributing members of the kauhale. To this day it is the mahu who are the primary keepers of the hula tradition, keeping the oldest halau intact, the history within the dances passed on unbroken.

All of this gender fluidity, the lack of private property, and the acceptance of varied sexual practices made for a much more open and accepting society than the Hawaii that this year voted down civil unions while the locals cheered on behalf of the religion of their oppressors.

Christianity has ruined this world, and I look forward to its demise.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

---

by: Keori @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 19:51:38 PM CST

One more time

I'll reiterate some of my favorite choice quotes from Nietzsche:

Christianity makes suffering contagious.

Morality is the best of all devices for leading mankind by the nose.

The Christian resolution to find the world ugly and bad has made the world ugly and bad.

I hope I don't need to say that I agree completely with everything you and Maura have been saying.  More and more I am convinced that Christianity is our enemy, and the enemy of nearly everything good in the world.  More and more I am appalled that so many LGBT people got behind Obama, who made it clear during the campaign, and in its immediate aftermath, that he is a Christianist--as are the bulk of his fellow Democrats.  (The fact that he isn't an obvious, foaming-at-the-mouth type like most of his "spiritual advisers" only makes him more dangerous, as far as I'm concerned.)  And more and more, I have no patience with the namby-pamby "all Christians aren't like that, so why should we change?" crowd.  Unless something is done--unless they do something and force their churches to--people will die.  Some religion.

And yet I have no expectation that they'll change.  The LGBT Christians will continue living in their safe (for now) little bubble and the Obamabots will continue their blind, mindless allegiance to the man.

As an atheist, as a voter not registered in the Democratic Party, and as a second-class citizen, there is relatively little I can do beyond speaking out about this matter.  The institutions that can actually stop it ignore people like me as a matter of policy.  But the fact that those institutions themselves are doing nothing reveals their true natures.  And I firmly believe those natures are evil.

Cynic, n.  A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.  

-Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

---

by: QScribe @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 11:09:13 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Any Christian Or Church That Doesn't Speak Out Is Complicit

Right with you, Q Scribe. I no longer care that some don't advocate re-criminalising us; I care that they do not denounce those who do so. They are COMPLICIT and EQUALLY GUILTY.
Americans enabled much of this; one of the major ministers behind this is Warren as well as close colleagues of his. Obama elevated him in the natioal eye, despite complaints from those of us familiar with Warren's track record and associates overseas.

When many of us vehemently objected to President-elect Obama's Faustian bargain with Warren, citing the crimes of his associates and the nature of his activities, we were shouted down, and yes, shouted down, by a self-opiated LGBT community (not at PHB, though, Pam Spaulding was alert to and aware of the implications) because the President-elect was "reaching across the aisle" or "trying to be inclusive."

F*CK THAT!

Would reaching out to the Klan have been an acceptable behaviour at the inaguration of Lyndon Johnson in 1965 by including the then rabidly segregationalist minister Jerry Falwell? No, LBJ kept a distance. But President Obama not only had Warren, he has included homophobes in his "Faith Advisor" group ( a huge violation of Constitutional law that even as far back as William McKinley no one would have attempted) as well as in his cabinet.

But hey, we have a voice, we have an out mattachinist accomodationist in the personnel office, right? And now an ambassador to New Zealand....and the infamous "Rental Truck Equality Memorandum" handed to us as a sop on the Stonewall anniversary to try and upset the LGBT revolution against our own leadership that was ongoing.

And a watered down hate crimes bill that leaves the Right with the ability to preach against us.... and to incite crimes against humanity overseas.

And guess what? Preident "Constitutional Law Shclar" has hooked up with people that ARE inciting crimes against humanity and are encoding them into law.

Complicit.
Guilty.

"..that by including Richard Warren in the first official act of his administration, Barack Obama, then President of the United States, implicitly and overtly not only raised the status of a man actively involved in a conspiracy to commit crimes against humanity and that conspiracy and previous crimes being public knowledge, he did further, by that elevation, lend the imprimatur of the Government of The United States to furtherance of the behaviour and intent of the conspirator Warren.
Therefore the prosecution charges Barack Obama under the Conspiracy portion of the indictment....
M E Hennessey,LL.B, Ph.D. Assistant Prosecutor,

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 11:36:31 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Before I Retire, I Will Be Prosecuting The Upcoming :LGBT Murders

Might be 15 years or so, but the sad thing is that a number of us have already opened files on this as records will disappear later; sad to think of that we can clearly see the crime coming to such a degree that it is worthwhile to take up precious file space with newspaper clippings and transcripts of speeches....  

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

---

by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 11:43:20 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Yup

When many of us vehemently objected to President-elect Obama's Faustian bargain with Warren, citing the crimes of his associates and the nature of his activities, we were shouted down, and yes, shouted down, by a self-opiated LGBT community (not at PHB, though, Pam Spaulding was alert to and aware of the implications) because the President-elect was "reaching across the aisle" or "trying to be inclusive."

Or that people who objected were making "too much" out of it and that all he was doing was delivering the invocation and that's it. Yeah. 'tever.  

"Oh, I thought you meant a specific plan. With maps and stuff." -Buffy

---

by: Aspasia @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:30:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I agree, it's nothing new

And that law recently passed in Lithuania which prohibited the "promotion of homosexuality in schools"? It has American fingerprints all over it, coupled with the "protect teh childrun!" hysteria we all know too well. It's not enough to exploit anti-gay sentiment for political power at home; there's an entire world out there, particularly Eastern Europe, Africa and the Middle East, places where homophobia is rampant. And besides, they're losing ground in the US to the point that they have to be content with anti-gay marriage campaigns...  

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by: Kokas @ Sat Dec 05, 2009 at 22:16:22 PM CST

New Europe ...

The East European Right got their talking points in preparation of the Iraq war directly from the US. I guess that is the case in general, see also the current Czech president on global warming.

But I think the law in Lithuania is incompatible with the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union which is now also part of the EU treaties since the Treaty of Lisbon entered into force on 1 December.

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by: Chris From Old Europe @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 08:36:16 AM CST

[ Parent ]

They want it both ways

Either they respect the principles of the Union or they should leave. It's that simple. And it's another good reason why so many people oppose allowing those countries to join.

---

by: Kokas @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 10:34:54 AM CST

[ Parent ]

The EU is first, foremost and always an economic union.

It's designed to ease the interpenetration of European and American corporations and their economic domination of the former soviet areas in eastern Europe and former European colonies, especially in Africa and south Asia.

The EU does sponsor better protective laws for GLBT folks because of efforts of socialist and left parties in the EU Parliament. They're even powerful enough to make English politicals obey but overall our agenda is not synonymous with the EU agenda.


The looter rich much prefer working with Democrats like Obama and the Clintons - they're greedier, they fool more people and they're able to get away with a lot more than Republicans.  

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by: donal1944 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 12:35:15 PM CST

[ Parent ]

yes, but

the adoption of anti-discrimination policies based on race, ethnicity, disabilities and sexual orientation is part of the  requirements any state must fulfil to join the Union, so there's a serious problem if those Eastern states are still discriminating against some European citizens. That's the bottom line.

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by: Kokas @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 16:53:54 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I don't think we're disagreeing.

The EU pays the same attention to it's anti-discrimination laws and decrees as the US government pays to the Bill of Rights. Not much.  

The looter rich much prefer working with Democrats like Obama and the Clintons - they're greedier, they fool more people and they're able to get away with a lot more than Republicans.  

---

by: donal1944 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 17:34:50 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I certainly agree with that

And the point I was trying to make is that we should be vocal and demand those leaders to speak out against any and all attempts to discriminate and criminalize people for the sole reason of being gay, no matter what country we're talking about.

---

by: Kokas @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 19:07:02 PM CST

[ Parent ]

In that case you need to apply

your standards to EVERY country, not just the Eastern states. The UK for example, for a number of years defied the EU on LGBT rights. It should have been kicked out.

The reason some people oppose other countries has little to do with giving a rat's behind about human rights. It has to do with the usual of fear of immigration.

---

by: rfloh @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 23:44:46 PM CST

[ Parent ]

One thing I've found troubling is...

that were I work, too often I hear the phrase 'Dont Ask, Dont Tell' when people simply want to sweep anything that deals with GLBT issues under the rug. It seems some actually belive on some level that its applicable to the civilian sector.

Even in the military, DADT is empty. Its used as a cudgel to keep GLBT's in line more than anything else.  

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by: Gina9223 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 07:34:54 AM CST

Yes, the Uganda situation is deplorable...

and must be firmly opposed by all civilized nations. But before we come completely unhinged here, assuming this is the start of a world-wide extermination, read this article from the BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/eur...  Not everyone is buying into the hate.


The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States. - The U.S. Constitution Article IV.Section. 2. Clause 1

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by: canoebum @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:23:53 AM CST

We are just one election away from laws like this.

Things are not looking good for Obama in 2012. His continued silence on Uganda as well as anything LGBT is not helping us. Most progressives, even the black caucus is disappointed by him. If the neocons get back in they could push this type of thing just like they did the patriot act.

We must get our government to stop what is happening in Uganda but how? This law appears to be a religious right test for future endeavors. Very scary!

---

by: InExile @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:54:57 AM CST

Defund all Aid to Uganda

Anything less means that our country is supporting genocide.  

---

by: mrqcguy @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 09:57:38 AM CST

Gays are NEW JEWS ... and GAY INC. is culpable as are all other silent ones..

Fully agree this is a very possible future.

Gays are not the Nuevos Negros, they are the Nuevos Judíos (new Jews). Sooner or later, the killings will begin, and not only in Uganda. And then, what do we do? Who will invade Nigeria, Columbia, Guatemala, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Russia as the Chruches see the US and Europe do nothing to stop Uganda? American churches will block any move to intervene and are just waiting for things to get worse in the States to begin such laws there. The danger is from the American's own house, and their Lesbianas y Hombres Homosexuales are blind or worse, indifferent.

..... One way to announce to the world that we do not 'export homophobia' would be for our MILITARY to 'integrate'.  Remove DADT, show the world we support an Equal National Role for our Gays and Lesbians.  

It's the Hammer of JUSTICE,
It's the Bell of FREEDOM,
It's the Song about LOVE between,
my Brothers and my Sisters
...All over this Land.

---

by: Orion45 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 10:22:34 AM CST

Sent to the WHITEHOUSE... with request for reply.

DADT must be stopped immediately.  and DOMA repealed. 

And all of you who are silent about this and your bar buddies etc, had better read the history of the Third Reicch ASAP. 

It's the Hammer of JUSTICE,
It's the Bell of FREEDOM,
It's the Song about LOVE between,
my Brothers and my Sisters
...All over this Land.

---

by: Orion45 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 10:29:15 AM CST

[ Parent ]

never again

Gypsies & gays were victims of the Nazi atrocities right along with the Jewish people.   There is no acceptable justification.
Personally I miss Liberation Theology.  Hammer of Justice indeed.  Truth should trump rapacity.  Values?  They seem too often inverted !

---

by: Passionforprog @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 16:57:48 PM CST

[ Parent ]

..also our Churches, Pastors, Priests and Bishops can speak out NOW.

I have permission to post this... it is from a commenter you all blasted to bits last year. You might want to reconsider in light of the above.

AN OPEN LETTER TO BROTHER AND SISTER CLERGY WITHIN AND WITHOUT THE GLBT COMMUNITY.

I, RDS, a bishop in Apostolic Succession, acknowledge my complicity in silent acquiescence as my jurisdiction and denomination used both Sacrament and Scripture as weapons of convenience to pummel my brothers and sisters into either suicidal submission or to aggressive atheistic activism.

Yes, there are always reasons to lessen one's own culpability. It seemingly assuages the guilt in witnessing the lives destroyed due to this homophobic theological literalism. After all, I personally promoted the fact that the Church considered me "intrinsically disordered", the State considered be a " sodomite felon" and that Science agreed with the theological diagnosis.

My answer was simple enough. I found a soulmate and lived with him.

.... continuing a schizophrenic existence, which eventually led to two life threatening illnesses.. and led to adoption of our wonderful son.

...

By segue, my brothers and sisters, let us reflect upon the many different branches ( or is it tiny "twigs") of Christ's Mystical Body, who have stood openly and proudly for the sanctity of same sex unions and for the moral imperative of our civil and human rights. We can proudly point to a founding pastor, Troy Perry, and the many other mainline and offline Churches who have joined the effort over the decades.

The most difficult witness was when the GLBT clergy person belonged to a mainline jurisdiction or denomination officially homophobic both in doctrine and discipline. Many of our brothers and sisters had only theological credentials and were not able to translate into any survival job. Homophobic Church leaders can and have removed the economic and medical insurance safety nets. Many are legally "independent contractors" and their "sustaining incomes" are voluntary. Love with Hooks. Hooks of Hate and Exclusion.

Many of our brothers and sisters were raised in Christian homes, or in homes where their religion centred their lives and those of their immediate and extended families. Generations upon generations, centuries upon centuries of witness obliterated in one life...a GLBT life....making that person an "atheist activist" unwilling to translate our moral crusade into anything but a secular subjective political issue. To the walking wounded, there is even the unwillingness to acknowledge their former association with Christ and His Church, let alone divorce true Christians from the Right Wing Theocratic Religonists.

My brothers and sisters, in Canada, one brother clergyman made marriage possible. Like Dr.Martin Luther King Jr., it is he who has been acknowledged as the leader who succeeded where secularists had failed. The irony is that the man's denomination was founded by Troy Perry in the USA in 1968. The name of our brother is Dr. Brent Hawkes.

Brent would often preach about discovering your faith by the back door. In prayer, he meditated upon the time when Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism were Canadian theocracies. In both traditions, as in the USA and unlike Europe, the Clergy are also able to sign civil documents of marriage. A marriage licence was necessary and a clergy signature with your licence number was required. That was the front door. Banns recited by the Pastor or Clergy on three successive Sundays with the officiants present, was sufficient for legal and canonical marriage in those traditions.No marriage licence was required. He discovered the back door to justice and equality. Sacramental theology informs that the marriage partners themselves married each other, while the Church merely presided as witnesses.

Dr. Hawkes married the first gay and the first lesbian couple ever in North America in 2001. He had death threats and he wore bullet proof vests but nothing to stop a "head shot". The couples also wore similar protection. Police swarmed the parish church and were in sanctuary vested or in pews themselves. The courts took two years, in the meantime Dutch and Belgian marriages were conducted. The ON marriage licences were dated to their wedding date in 2001. By 2005, Royal Assent was given and Canada's Marriage Act included all brothers and sisters worldwide.

We, my brothers and sisters set apart to serve in Ministry, have much to ask absolution from those most hurt and harmed by our silence. Tears are flowing freely as I reflect upon particular young gay and lesbian lives hurt by my silence born of fear and not faith. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

I contend that it is not enough to join GAY INC associations who have a totally secular agenda and who do not want Civil Rights to "devolve" ( I say "evolve") into the Moral Crusade that it is. WE NEED A LEADER. How frightening is the call to virtual or literal martyrdom? How difficult is it to both struggle from within and from without those who seek our Moral Imperative?

The names of those clergy with years of open witness flow from my lips to my fingers. And yet, I hesitate to mention any of them. They know who they are. They are working daily for the witness. They have organisations who change lives one soul at a time. They admonish those "enemies of theism" that anger challenged against oneself only harms the person further. We must all pay for the continuous sins of "false witness against neighbour" that major Churches violate daily.

We must find a leader from among us who will shout clearly and distinctly....IT IS LOVE, IT IS TRULY ABOUT LOVE OF THE GODHEAD AND THE LOVE OF YOUR NEIGHBOUR AS YOURSELF....EVEN THOSE WHO HATE YOU.

 

It's the Hammer of JUSTICE,
It's the Bell of FREEDOM,
It's the Song about LOVE between,
my Brothers and my Sisters
...All over this Land.

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by: Orion45 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 10:41:44 AM CST

I'm not a Christian

But that is such a powerfully moving letter for me.

Hate stops a beating heart.

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by: KarenS @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 12:54:21 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Nice letter

For the record, the letter writer and myself DO agree strongly in most substantive matters.

I simply loathe his style, though. I don't want to revisit that, I did want to clarify...

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 12:59:08 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Who was this sent to?

I see Christians who don't approve of the level of violence of the hetero-supremacists write letters along these lines quite regularly -- but they're almost always distributed primarily to LGBT people in a "don't give up on our religion" campaign.  I've rarely, if ever, seen this sort of statement directed at the violent 'phobes who are attacking us.  It's as if the primary "pro-LGBT Christian" mode of thinking is that it's our responsibility to overlook the violence in so much of their religion, not their responsibility to actually do something about the violence being done in their name -- and with their implicit approval.  Sure, they'll tell us they don't approve -- but they don't go hunting for confrontations with their own people either in the public sphere or even very extensively in intradenominational circles.

If this letter was sent to hetero-supremacists in the denomination, and if it's followed up with something more, then it'll be quite worthwhile -- finally someone living up to the very minimal ethical expectation of some responsibility for violence being done by one's own crowd.

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by: M @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:13:51 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Much worse than Nazis

These are the pure facts! These people are our worst enemies. I've been telling people the same, myself, for years. They intend to kill all of us, here in the United States. They're much worse than Stalin and his thugs, or the Nazis.  Doubt it?  Just sit back a while longer and do nothing, and you'll see what happens.  As for myself, I'm taking steps to leave this Christian slime pit.

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by: Madison Reed @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 10:43:15 AM CST

Right there with you.

No one is free when others are oppressed!

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by: ThePhoenix @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 14:25:40 PM CST

[ Parent ]

..also sent off to Rachel Maddow show/staff.

It's the Hammer of JUSTICE,
It's the Bell of FREEDOM,
It's the Song about LOVE between,
my Brothers and my Sisters
...All over this Land.

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by: Orion45 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 10:49:05 AM CST

Partially Agree

I second most of the things said in the article.  However, its false to identify the Christian faith as the biggest threat.  There are already eight nations on earth that execute homosexuals, all are Muslim.  You rarely hear anything about this sad fact from LGBT groups or bloggers.  The biggest threat to LGBT people remains fundamentalist Islam both in developing nations and the West.

To pretend that what is about to happen in Uganda is a new thing is disingenuous, Iran has been doing this for decades but somehow passes under the radar.  I am not sure why NOW we are all suddenly outraged, this is same old same old.    

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by: zazu @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:18:15 PM CST

The issue here is that American Churches facilitated this outrage

and this was done as part of a foreign policy initiative under Reagan....and continues to this day

And I have decried fundamentalist ISlam upon many occasions, particularly their inroads into previously secularised Bosnia

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:23:11 PM CST

[ Parent ]

American Christians can inculcate these laws elsewhere

They have the ear of a government that can set their ideology as a condition on aid - this has already happened in Uganda (slashing sex ed and the availability of contraceptives, resulting in Uganda going from one of the few African countries where HIV was under control to one where where it's exploding).

If the religious right maintains its influence, how long before it starts pushing for laws like this bill to be a condition?  And can we be really confident they won't get it?

That's what makes this more dangerous than the Islamic nations.

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by: SunlessNick @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 14:28:17 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I hadn't heard about this final solution in Uganda

What does it consist of?

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by: francislholland @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:40:45 PM CST

Mass murder

Have you not been around the Blend this past week?

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

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by: Keori @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:46:28 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Not Mass Murder

Genocide.

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:50:02 PM CST

[ Parent ]

The proposed Ugandian law

calls for the death penalty of HIV+ gays and lesbians, but it is much more far reaching than that.

Here's a link to BoxTurtle Bulletin which has provided the best and most comprehensive coverage of this as well as the involvement of the WHITE American Religious Reich in this (and the WHITE part really has my dandruff up...)

http://www.boxturtlebulletin.c...

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:49:07 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Obama's speech selling the escallation of troops in Afghanistan

He said America doesn't seize Nations and keep them as colonies.
That must have gone over like a pregnant pole vaulter to Native Americans, and Hawaiians, Puerto Ricans, and American Samoans, and Latino families who have Texas or California roots in their families.
AMERICA wouldn't exist except European COLONIAL GOVERNMENTS divided up this continent as their OWN, and committed brutal genocide of indigenious populations to achieve their goals. No one asked Eskimo people if they wanted Russia to sell their land to the US. No one asked all the Western tribes if it was OK for France to sell America half the country which was their homes.

"race, taste. and History finally overcome....and you ain't there"
by Tony Kushner

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by: peteyPornpig @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 13:42:01 PM CST

Well said!

No one is free when others are oppressed!

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by: ThePhoenix @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 14:28:02 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Manifest Destiny

We curse the day THAT concept was thought up!

"Oh, I thought you meant a specific plan. With maps and stuff." -Buffy

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by: Aspasia @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:35:59 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Here's a treat for you Maura

This black progressive site has reported on this:

http://blackagendareport.com/?...

this progressive site has been very hard on Obama and many of the writers are actually pretty pro-gay too

What I really wanted to show you, though, Maura (as the radical that you are), was this report on the New Black Panther Party and the revision of its' 10 Point Platform.

http://www.blackagendareport.c...

and especially the revision of point #1

We believe that black people will not be free until we are able to determine our destiny- 1966

We believe in the spiritual high moral code of our ancestors. We believe in the truths of the Bible, Quran, and other sacred texts and writings. We believe in Maat and the principles of Nguzo Saba. We believe that black people will not be free until we are able to determine our divine destiny.-2009

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 14:54:50 PM CST

And Bruce Dixon nailed this with his commentary

The Black Panther Party as I knew it was a determinedly secular organization, that while generally respectful of religious claims, held itself apart from affirmations of religious piety, lest it be seen as favoring one religion over another, or for that matter privileging those who were religious over those who were not.

 

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:00:55 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Here's the link to the full report, if anyone wants it

http://www.publiceye.org/publi...

All about how money from U.S. dominionists is attempting to re-brand American christianity in Africa as a force for good, rather than the evil it really stands for. It's an attempt to divert attention away from the fact that these same white American dominionists and their spiritual elders upheld policies of apartheid in Africa throughout history.

As Bruce Wilson at Talk2Action has pointed out, these are not nice people. Their aim is to take over the world in a Joel's Army style radicalization. The two main parts to their schtick are 1) Islam is a threat and must be wiped out. 2) Gays are a threat and must be wiped out. Everything else is just window dressing.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

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by: Keori @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:15:59 PM CST

[ Parent ]

And they have also been doing that

in black communities in the United States. Folks have been warning about the increasing influence of the religious reich in the black community since the late 1980's.

Yes, the GLBT communities had their own issues to deal with but also we were asleep at the switch and now it had born fruit.

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:23:34 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Thanks for the report, Keori

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:24:16 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Thank you for the link, Kev

The Black Agenda Report website has a LOT of useful information in it for those of us who actually are liberals.

Have you ever read Black Panther founder Huey Newton's statement on the gay struggle? He boils it down to one simple point: women and gays have been oppressed by the privileged class of wealthy, white men, and we all need to stand together against it.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

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by: Keori @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:47:41 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Of course I've read Huey's statement

I love it, even though some of the agy activists at the time were turned off by the Panther's sexism.

I'll never forget when I introduced some of the straight, black, and churchified to Huey's statement. Out came the "Huey Newton was a crackhead" and the "Panthers were the forerunners to the gang warfare" strawmen.

All of which is true to varying degrees but the fact that it rose when I specifically mentioned Huey's statement that black liberation had to support (and constructively criticize) the gay liberation movement spoke of a deep homophobia within some of those commenters.

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by: kevinchi @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 08:08:45 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Those people make me want to punch them

They do. I just want to punch them in the face repeatedly until by some miracle they finally get it. The lengths folk will go, the mental contortions they will perform to justify their senseless bigotry is astounding. It would be so much easier on their psyche if they would just let it the fuck go, already.

God save ornery old queens! - kevinchi

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by: Keori @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 09:49:11 AM CST

[ Parent ]

They should watch the "homeland" demand

because the government would probably specify Alaska

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 16:19:38 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Germany, 1925 - 1934. Berlin was the gay capital of the world.

It sported dozens of bars for every taste. Lesbians and Gay men openly lived together. The Gemeinschaft der Eigenen and the Wandervogel movement were mass scouting movements with a big gay difference.  Magnus Hirschfeld successfully formed a mass coalition of GLBT folks, socialists, communists liberals and even some protestant and Jewish cult leaders to repeal Paragraph 175.

A few years later thousands of gay men were in camps, being tortured and waiting for death. The friendly bishops and priests with a tiny number of heroic exceptions had learned a new greeting: Heil Hitler, and the rabbis had concerns of their own.

Will that kind of genocidal fury erupt again? Without a doubt. It's happening to muslims and GLBT people today and every day in Iraq, courtesy of the US armed forces and their allied sunni police and shiite militias. It's happening in Darfur, Zaire and it ravaged Rwanda and South Africa. It happened in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

And it could happen here. The savagery of the looter class knows no boundaries when they feel threatened.  

My father used to joke that he chased my mother until she caught him. The Democrats and Republicans have chased after the bigot vote without letup since the Reagan years and now are deeply interconnected with the theocratic cults. They control the DNC and the RNC. They enjoyed equal influence in the administrations of Reagan, the Bushes, Clinton and now Obama. Both parties compete without letup for bigot vote. The Democrats used to count on the LGBT vote assuming that we liked being stabbed in the back. No more. People are leaving the last closet, the political closet in droves.

To avoid that happening here we have to expose the connections between the theocrats, the looter classes and the two major parties and act on that information.  

That means creating our own movement independent of the Democrats. They and the Republicans are our open enemies. It also means campaigns of militant mass actions to mobilize our own communities and build serious alliances with the antiwar movement, feminists and groups like the NAACP and MALDEF.

And it means avoiding the mistakes that led to defeat for us and everyone in Germany - blind sectarian partisanship and wild swings between ultraleftism, collaborationism, assimilationism and other liberal idiocies.

What happened in Germany doesn't have to happen here but it will if we depend on 'fierce defenders' like Obama instead of our own communities.

The looter rich much prefer working with Democrats like Obama and the Clintons - they're greedier, they fool more people and they're able to get away with a lot more than Republicans.  

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by: donal1944 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:05:21 PM CST

Weimar Germany is one of my favorite historical periods

I studied the period a bit as I was taking a history class. The thing to remember, though, is not to divorce this great period for gays and lesbians with the economic turmoil of Weimar which gave the rise to Hitler.

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by: kevinchi @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:20:31 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Cafe Dorian Gray on the Bulowstrasse

was one of the most famous Lesbian nightspots in the world. My aunt used to hit it when she was in Berlin in the late 20's

It closed the year the Nazi's took power.

And Kevin...we have economic turmoil now, with dispossed peoples being pointed at liberalism, socialism and us as the scapegoats

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 16:28:16 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Yep.

People may deny it but the parallels to Weimar Germany are there.

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by: kevinchi @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 08:09:39 AM CST

[ Parent ]

A Name

There needs to be a word for this.  How about "Gendercide" the killing of individuals for their gender or sexual orientation.  It can cover anything from stoning of gays in Iran, to vicious repression of women in Afghanistan, to sex selective abortion in China.  

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by: zazu @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 15:37:04 PM CST

Isn't that...

Just reinforcing the idea of an "us" and "them". It's like calling racially motivated murders "blackicide". Genocide is genocide, regardless of the people or the reasons involved.

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by: ep @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 16:16:17 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Exactly.

The looter rich much prefer working with Democrats like Obama and the Clintons - they're greedier, they fool more people and they're able to get away with a lot more than Republicans.  

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by: donal1944 @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 22:02:30 PM CST

[ Parent ]

To succeed, you need the youth

There's a reason they are plying their trade overseas-- they don't have the youth in the US. They haven't had them for years.

All of the darkest genocides required the support of the youth.

Of course, most anyone under 25 isn't going to be concerned with anything beyond the border.

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by: Baconcat @ Sun Dec 06, 2009 at 22:29:48 PM CST

Pepsi-Sponsored Concert In Uganda Features Calls For Gay Murders

From Change Org

It was a concert series featuring Jamaican artist Beenie Man, as well as a handful of local performers in Uganda. Beenie Man has made a career for himself by writing songs where he advocates for gay people to be executed, for lesbians to be hung with rope, and for gay dee-jays to be murdered.

True to form, Beenie Man didn't disappoint in his Pepsi-sponsored performance in Uganda. Reports from the event have it that Beenie Man sung one of his classics, Mi Nah Wallah, where he calls for gay men to have their throats slit. The Daily Monitor also reports that Beenie Man gave a bit of a monologue about what he thinks about gay people.

"In my family, we don't have any gay person but if you're gay, my brother that's not my fault," the paper reports Beenie Man as saying.

I tell you Chica that no greater abomination exists than women denying their spirit of sisterhood and instead becoming the oppressor. -Rebeca, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

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by: MauraHennessey @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 06:05:21 AM CST

PEPSI should denounce this or stand for a long-term

boycott by our community ala Coors and those that stand with us.  All Pepsi products:

Pepsi, Jazz, Sierra Mist, Slice, Tropicana, SoBe products, AMP Energy, No Fear, Dole Juices, OceanSpray, Season's Harvest, Double-Shot, Frappuccino, Starbucks Iced Coffee, Aquafina, Ethos, Fiesta, Fruitworks, Gatorade, Lipton, Manzanita, Miranda, Mountain Dew, Mug, Patio, Propel and Slice.

History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government.-- Thomas Jefferson

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by: Mykelb @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 12:02:30 PM CST

[ Parent ]