As pundits and legislators scream about the federal government infringing on the religious rights of people, they might want to remember that many of these religious facilities have no trouble accepting federal aid.
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Rev. Al Sharpton: Contraception Isn't a PR Game; It's a Woman's Right - 0 views
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contraception and the Catholic Church. Before falling victim to the hype, let's get one thing clear, this issue isn't about religious freedom or the federal government; it is about the rights of women all across this country to have access to appropriate care. It is about protecting the rights of those workers at religious institutions who may not be of that faith (and have no choice but to find work there), but deserve the same health care that a woman in corporate America does. This is about the notion that some religiously affiliated hospitals and schools receive federal money and therefore cannot deny a woman a federal guarantee. Let's get one thing straight, this is real 'class warfare' from the right and this time the victims are the most vulnerable -- women from lower-income neighborhoods.
The first sexual revolution: lust and liberty in the 18th century - 0 views
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the first sexual revolution can be traced in some of the greatest works of literature, art and philosophy ever produced – the novels of Henry Fielding and Jane Austen, the pictures of Reynolds and Hogarth, the writings of Adam Smith, David Hume and John Stuart Mill. And it was played out in the lives of tens of thousands of ordinary men and women, otherwise unnoticed by history, whose trials and punishments for illicit sex are preserved in unpublished judicial records. Most startling of all were my discoveries of private writings, such as the diary of the randy Dutch embassy clerk Lodewijk van der Saan, posted to London in the 1690s; the emotional letters sent to newspapers by countless hopeful and disappointed lovers; and the piles of manuscripts about sexual freedom composed by the great philosopher Jeremy Bentham but left unpublished, to this day, by his literary executors. Once noticed, the effects of this revolution in attitudes and behaviour can be seen everywhere when looking at the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. It was one of the key shifts from the pre-modern to the modern world.
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The law codes of the Anglo-Saxon kings of England treated women as chattels, but they also forbade married men to fornicate with their slaves, and ordered that adulteresses be publicly disgraced, lose their goods and have their ears and noses cut off. Such severity reflected the Christian church's view of sex as a dangerously polluting force, as well as the patriarchal commonplace that women were more lustful than men and liable to lead them astray.
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During the 17th century this figure had been extremely low: in 1650 only about 1% of all births in England were illegitimate. But by 1800, almost 40% of brides came to the altar pregnant, and about a quarter of all first-born children were illegitimate. It was to be a permanent change in behaviour.
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Real Fags Join The Priesthood? « Quiet Riot Girl - 0 views
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using hypothetical examples of girls being abused saying if it was girls being 'sexually abused' by men priests, people would come up with spurious justifications for it. And yet, the main reason this sexual abuse 'scandal' in the priesthood has been newsworthy is that the men doing the 'abuse' got away with it for years and years. It's classic oppression olympics with girls and women always winning the gold victim status medal, even when they are made up examples!
Edward C. Green - Condoms, HIV-AIDS and Africa - The Pope Was Right - 0 views
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One reason is "risk compensation." That is, when people think they're made safe by using condoms at least some of the time, they actually engage in riskier sex.
Another factor is that people seldom use condoms in steady relationships because doing so would imply a lack of trust. (And if condom use rates go up, it's possible we are seeing an increase of casual or commercial sex.) However, it's those ongoing relationships that drive Africa's worst epidemics. In these, most HIV infections are found in general populations, not in high-risk groups such as sex workers, gay men or persons who inject drugs. And in significant proportions of African populations, people have two or more regular sex partners who overlap in time. In Botswana, which has one of the world's highest HIV rates, 43 percent of men and 17 percent of women surveyed had two or more regular sex partners in the previous year.
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So what has worked in Africa? Strategies that break up these multiple and concurrent sexual networks -- or, in plain language, faithful mutual monogamy or at least reduction in numbers of partners, especially concurrent ones. "Closed" or faithful polygamy can work as well.
Bishops Renew Fight on Abortion and Gay Marriage - NYTimes.com - 0 views
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Some liberal Catholic commentators have criticized the bishops’ priorities, saying they are playing into the culture wars. John Gehring, Catholic outreach coordinator with Faith in Public Life, a liberal religious advocacy group in Washington, said, “The bishops speak in hushed tones when it comes to poverty and economic justice issues, and use a big megaphone when it comes to abortion and religious liberty issues.”
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The bishops are struggling to reclaim the role they played in the 1980s and into the '90s as a nationally recognized voice on the moral dimension of public policy issues like economic inequality, workers' rights, immigration and nuclear weapons proliferation. Since then, however, they have reordered their priorities, with abortion and homosexuality eclipsing poverty and economic injustice.
Mississippi 'Personhood' Amendment Vote Fails - 0 views
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Mississippi voters Tuesday defeated a ballot initiative that would've declared life begins at fertilization, a proposal that supporters sought in the Bible Belt state as a way to prompt a legal challenge to abortion rights nationwide.
The so-called "personhood" initiative was rejected by more than 55 percent of voters, falling far short of the threshold needed for it to be enacted. If it had passed, it was virtually assured of drawing legal challenges because it conflicts with the Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that established a legal right to abortion. Supporters of the initiative wanted to provoke a lawsuit to challenge the landmark ruling.
The measure divided the medical and religious communities and caused some of the most ardent abortion opponents, including Republican Gov. Haley Barbour, to waver with their support.
Opponents said the measure would have made birth control, such as the morning-after pill or the intrauterine device, illegal. More specifically, the ballot measure called for abortion to be prohibited "from the moment of fertilization" - wording that opponents suggested would have deterred physicians from performing in vitro fertilization because they would fear criminal charges if an embryo doesn't survive.
Epiphenom: In the West, religious nations are more sexist - 0 views
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In these Westernised countries there's a strong, linear relationship between religion and sexism.
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let's look at the correlation with a straightforward measure of whether women can be leaders, which was assessed by asking the level of agreement with two questions: “On the whole, men make better political leaders than women do” and “On the whole, men make better business executives than women do.”
Overall, there's a fairly good correlation. But there is an exception, and that's Asian countries. There are only a few Asian countries in the sample, so it's hard to draw sweeping conclusions. But they are all very sexist, whether their citizens are religious (Thailand, Taiwan) or non-religious (China, Hong Kong, Japan) -
The more religious countries also have lower gender empowerment, meaning fewer seats for women in parliament, fewer women in economic decision making positions, and lower female share of income.
Now, the reason for this, it seems to me, is that religion tends to be tied to 'traditional values'. What this analysis suggests is that these traditional values can persist in the absence of religion, but that getting rid of traditional religion seems to be a prerequisite for ditching sexism!
Quick note on divorce « Samson's Jawbone - 0 views
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the lefties who crafted this video seem to be seriously out of touch with the folks they are arguing against. Worlds apart.
To the point that I initially failed to realize that the piece is intended as satire, and I still think it utterly fails as a parody. Why? Because I and many others agree with it literally. Look, the essence of successful political satire is to take a position, alter it slightly, and ridicule the new, altered position. The goal is for everyone to thus realize just how absurd the original stance was, too.
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, none of this is news to either Christian traditionalists or the pagan manosphere. In these camps, the idea of curtailing divorce laws is pedestrian (how many of you, as you watched the first minute of that video, found yourselves agreeing completely and wondering where on earth the punchline was?). Outside the internet, in The Real World, there are similar rumblings in actual state legislatures. And that’s the reason I bothered to write about all this in the first place: I was stunned that these lefties actually thought that banning divorce was so far-fetched that the idea could only appear as parody. That’s how out of touch the anti-traditional values crowd is.
The Gay Case Against Gay Marriage and Gay Bigotry | marksimpson.com - 0 views
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Miss California, a practising Christian, was last week denounced by Miss America judge Perez Hilton on his blog as ‘a dumb bitch’ and unworthy of the Miss America crown because she gave the ‘wrong’ answer to his chippy question about gay marriage. Like most Americans – including the current Democratic President of the United States – she believes that marriage is ‘between a man and a woman’. Boo! Hiss! Rip her to shreds!
It wasn’t just the famously bitchy gay gossip-monger Hilton casting stones, however. For honestly and somewhat courageously answering his question Miss California was roundly condemned as a ‘bigot’ by hosts of gay and liberal bloggers, and was even denounced by the directors of the Miss California pageant who declared themselves ‘saddened’ by her views and that they had no place in the ‘Miss California family’, whatever that is. Most now agree with Hilton’s gloating claim that her answer cost her the crown.
Candidate Obama expressed the exact same view during the Presidential Election: “I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman. Now, for me as a Christian, it’s also a sacred union. You know, God’s in the mix.” Instead of being scorned as a bigot and a dumb bitch, Obama was handed the Mr America crown by liberals and probably most gay voters. But I suppose that being President of the United States is a rather less important title than Miss America.
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gay marriage zealots, many of whom admit that they themselves don’t wish to get married, insist on characterising civil unions as ‘second class’, ‘social apartheid’ or ‘riding at the back of the bus’. I’d like to think it was merely a ploy to make fully-recognised civil unions more achievable, but many really seem to believe their own shrill propaganda. Worse, they’ve made even more of a fetish of the word ‘marriage’ than the religious right they rail against.
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In the UK, where nationally recognised same-sex civil unions with the same legal status as marriage – called civil partnerships – were introduced in 2004 there is little or no appetite now for gay marriage. In my experience few lesbians or gays feel they are ‘riding at the back of the bus’. Maybe because in many ways they’re actually riding at the front. It’s probably only a matter of time before gay civil partnerships in the UK are made available to all, as they are in France – where the vast majority of applications are now made by cross-sex couples disenchanted with traditional marriage.
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Branding Christians and traditionalists 'bigots' for being Christians and traditionalists and thus none too keen to fundamentally revise the definition of marriage is a highly unattractive exercise in liberal self-righteousness that makes Miss America look quite sophisticated. Not to mention sounding a lot like pots and kettles rattling. It's faintly absurd to have to even say this, but it isn't bigoted to believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. It's just being conventional. And after all, marriage itself is convention and tradition tied up in a big red bow and covered in confetti and sprinkled with Holy Water. Which is exactly why lesbians and gays should have nothing to do with it.
The Logic and Morality of Feminism - At the Intersection of Faith and Culture - 0 views
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if the masculine terms used to describe God in the Bible are proof of its hostility toward women, then the masculine terms in which it characterizes Satan must be proof of its hostility toward men. Yet we can go further: if the Bible is a piece of “misogyny,” then why is Wisdom, which Christians later identified with God, feminine? The name of “Judas” has for 2000 years been synonymous with unspeakable treachery throughout Christendom; so horrible is it that in spite of having once been fairly common, it has been millennia since any parent in the Western world thought to curse his child with it. Indeed, Judas, the apostle who betrayed Christ, is the Villain Extraordinaire in the Western imagination, and has been for thousands of years. Why, we may ask, would the authors of a book (or collection of books) allegedly shot through with “misogyny” identify, not women, but men and male figures as the worst of monsters? Why would it not infrequently portray women as being the most loyal servants of God?
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As for statistics, the task of demonstrating “misandry” or “anti-male ‘sexism’” is unrivaled for the ease with which it can be performed. The feminist’s argument from numbers to substantiate the pervasiveness of “structural sexism” against women admittedly has an air of plausibility, but this is only because the statistics to which she alludes are divested of any and all context. Numbers aren’t self-interpreting, and to paraphrase Hume, even the most patently erroneous theories can be made to appear plausible if they are sufficiently abstract.
UK Muslims prouder of gay rights than others | Liberal Conspiracy - 0 views
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Here is the break-down
The poll also found that:
· Over 4 in 5 British Muslims say they are ‘proud to be a British citizen’
· Only 1 in 5 British Muslims are not proud of ‘Britain’s role in the world’
· Two-thirds of British Muslims say they are ‘proud of British culture’
· British Muslims were more positive about Britain’s future than secularists or Anglicans
Ugly politics in NY gay marriage vote - 0 views
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"Our unofficial Facebook policy is not to automatically delete comments that disagree with us, but when the comments come into untruths or uncharitable, then we have to delete them," Poust said. "And when it really becomes abusive we have to ban them."
According to the group, one Facebook post stated: "Eventually your kind of 'religion' will be extinguished from the memory of mankind forever, because this sort of interference in the lives of people you only wish to harm. You have NO MORAL AUTHORITY any longer because of your evil pedophilia."
Another said the Catholic church only approves of marriages "that produce altar boys to be molested."
The group deleted both.
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"The tension has really reached a fever pitch for some people. ... I'm sure there are certain unstable members of both sides who are prone to excess," Poust said.
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The Democrat has been using a
kind of shuttle diplomacy to privately test proposals for additional religious exceptions within the Senate's Republican majority. He's talked to individual senators or small groups of lawmakers privately, breaking down barriers and letting them take his message to others in the Republican caucus.
The proposed protections are aimed at saving religious groups from discrimination lawsuits if they refuse to recognize gay marriage based on their principles.
"Will the conference allow a vote to be taken, that's the threshold," Cuomo said Wednesday evening. "I'm pro-marriage equality, I'm also pro-First Amendment, I'm pro-church-state separation and I'm pro-religious freedom. So I also have the same concern."
Even if Republicans agree to the religious exemptions, that's no guarantee the bill will pass.
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San Francisco Sentinel » Blog Archives » Fundamentalists get a big one - Irre... - 0 views
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Michael wrote of “people scrambling for a home amidst the labels,” and in another he hoped for the day when “men who love women wave flags for identification.”
It all sounded very much like the Michael I knew at XY, a young man who was fascinated by queer theory — namely, the idea that sexual and gender identities are culturally constructed rather than biologically fixed — and who dreamed of a world without labels like “straight” and “gay,” which he deemed restrictive and designed to “segment and persecute,” as he argued in a 1998 issue of XY. Though he conceded back then that it was important “to stay unified under a ‘Gay’ political umbrella” until equality for gays and lesbians had been achieved, Michael preferred to label himself queer.
As Ben and I reminisced, I couldn’t help wondering if Michael’s new philosophy might, in a strange way, be a logical extension of what he believed back then — that “gay” is a limiting category and that sexual identities can change. Ben nodded. “A radical queer activist and a fundamentalist Christian aren’t always as different as they might seem,” he said, adding that they’re ideologues who can railroad over nuance and claim a monopoly on the truth.
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I told Michael about a recent conversation I had with our former boss at XY, Peter Ian Cummings, who surprised me by wondering aloud if Michael was ever truly gay. “In retrospect, more than you or me or anyone else who worked at the magazine, his sexuality almost felt more theoretical than real to me,” Peter told me. “At a very young age, he had all these very well thought out theories about identity and sexuality. Maybe this gay or queer identity that fascinated him, and that he had taken on, wasn’t really true for him. It doesn’t explain why he says such ridiculous things about gay people now, but maybe, just maybe, he’s not in denial about his own sexuality.”
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It doesn’t get better if you’re gay? Michael would have punched me in the mouth if I said that back when we worked together. I never would have, of course, because it’s a lie. But also dishonest, in retrospect, was our claim in a 1999 issue of XY that “everyone is happier” after coming out. Michael insisted that we include that line, but it was wishful thinking, and ex-gays are living proof of it.
Patrick Strudwick - Blogs - GayTimes - 0 views
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Iain Dale says there’s nothing anti-gay about believing we’re not suitable to look after children: “There are lots of people in this country who aren’t homophobic who don’t believe in gay adoption”.
Andrew Pierce attacks those who criticise homophobes: “The very intolerance that was once targeted at gays is now being directed at those who have sincerely-held…objections to gay equality.” He attacks Graham Norton for being a “mincing” “vulgar” “parody”. He mocks Alan Carr for being a “limp-wristed, lisping screamer”. He criticises Gok Wan for being “more camp than an Ascot marquee”. Only those who secretly think there’s something wrong with being gay – or being obviously gay - deem “camp” a valid criticism. When the Pope smeared Harriet Harman’s Equality Bill saying it “violates the natural law” Pierce wrote that he “agreed with much of what he said”. -
Alan Duncan openly opposes gay marriage. “It’s helpful to keep the distinction between civil partnerships and full marriage rights,” he told me. He has also admitted that he’s “seriously uneasy” with gay people having children, which, he thinks, is “not consistent with being in a gay partnership”. When I asked him about these assertions he replied: “There’s a risk it’s more for the interest of the gay person than it is in the long term interest of the child.” This is despite study after study finding that children of gay parents fare just as well if not better than those of straight couples. There is a word for negative feelings that are not based on fact: fear. Which is, of course, the chief ingredient of homophobia.
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What Andrew Pierce and the rest fail to realise is that part of the reason for their prominence is that they are the ultimate gift to those who loathe us. They are the puppets of our oppressors. Powerful organisations can wheel them out and cry, “Look, even gay people think the gay rights movement has gone too far!” When David Starkey, for example, made his “tyrannous” remark on Question Time, it spread across Christian websites like news of the Second Coming.
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The decision to fine the Christian B&B owners for refusing to let a gay couple stay represents "a tyrannous new morality which is every bit as oppressive as the old". Children "should be raised by a man and a woman." "Being a campaigning, ardent gay is no longer necessary." And, "Imagine the demons that could plague Elton John's little boy with his unconventional parentage."
Who do you think said these things? The BNP? A bishop? Muslim fundamentalists? No. You're way off. These quotes come from some of Britain's most prominent gay commentators. There were uttered or written by, respectively, historian and TV presenter David Starkey, political blogger and radio host Iain Dale, Minister for International Development Alan Duncan MP and Daily Mail columnist Andrew Pierce.
All Religious Affiliations Are Pro-Choice, Except for White Evangelicals - 0 views
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people also tend to identify with both "pro-choice" and "pro-life" labels, indicating that the binary may be rather useless. This is visible in almost every demographic group. PRRI's research director, Daniel Cox, points out in the news release that many Americans believe that abortion is morally wrong, but that it should also be legal. This view is not compatible with the "pro-choice"/"pro-life" divide.
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"more than 7 in 10 religious Americans believe it is possible to disagree with the teachings of their religion on the issue of abortion and still be considered a person of good standing in their faith."
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"with the exception of white evangelical Protestants, majorities of all major religious groups say abortion should be legal in all or most cases." This flies in the face of the widely held notion that religious people are pro-life.
Ban homophobic clerics from mosques, gay rights campaigners urge | World news | The Gua... - 0 views
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Gay rights campaigners have urged mosque leaders in east London to ban homophobic clerics from using their premises, following a 21% rise in gay hate crime in the area.
Activists, including journalist Julie Bindel and Pride trustee Colm Howard-Lloyd, said some preachers at the East London Mosque and the London Muslim Centre had "created an atmosphere in which hate is socially acceptable; they have spread a message in which maiming and violence is the most dutiful, honourable, devout thing to do".
Their concerns follow the £100 fine given to Mohammed Hasnath, who put up "Gay-Free Zone" stickers in the area; the case of Oliver Hemsley, who was paralysed from the neck down in August 2008 following a vicious attack; and Metropolitan police figures showing that gay hate crime had risen in the borough of Tower Hamlets - where the mosque and adjoining centre are located - from 67 attacks to 81 in a year.
We Do It All The Time | Politics | The American Scene - 0 views
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this is not a peculiarity to homosexuality. The woman who is a devoted mother who’s fallen out of love with her husband has a conflict. You could say that she “needs” to take care of her needs and leave him, or she’ll wind up dragging her kids down with her misery, or you could say that she “needs” to put her selfish needs aside and think of her children, and that if she does this she’ll find fulfillment within the life she has. But these aren’t advice – they are ways of making us feel better about the advice we’re giving. The reality is: she’s got a profound conflict. Her true self is divided.
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whatever way you wind up jumping in these sorts of conflicts, you first have to acknowledge that the conflict is real. It’s really easy to tell ourselves happy little lies to convince ourselves that the conflict doesn’t actually exist, but we’re not really fooling ourselves. We’re getting through the day, but at a cost of escalating levels of stress and alienation from ourselves. And, as a consequence, from those who care about us.
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When the woman tells her husband about her conflict, he’ll have to respond. That response, in turn, will help clarify for her what is and isn’t possible.
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Reporters find tragic story amid embarrassing scandal - CNN.com - 0 views
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Siblings say gay brother 'broken' by experimental therapy
The article received less attention than our other Rekers stories, but we thought it was more important. Entitled "Before Hiring a Rentboy, Rekers Tried To Spank The Gay Away," it explained how Rekers had attempted to cure a 5-year-old boy of exaggerated feminine behavior with an increasingly aggressive regimen of psychological and physical rewards and punishment, first in a lab, and then in the boy's home.
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Details about therapy's reward and punishment system
Rekers later said the treatment worked and declared the boy, whom he dubbed "Kraig," "had a normal male sexual identity."
Though Rekers conducted similar experimental therapy on more than 60 children during the same period, it was the experimental therapy on Kraig that earned Rekers his doctorate.
Moreover, it became foundational research for those who think gay people can become "ex-gay" -- taught or counseled to become straight. In 2009, Kraig's case was still being cited as proof that homosexuality can be prevented. We wanted to know: Who was Kraig? What had become of him, and of the many children like him?
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Recently Rekers told CNN that it "would be inaccurate to assume" that Kirk Murphy's suicide was linked to the therapy. "But I do grieve for the parents now that you've told me that news," he said. "I think that's very sad."
Even after his suicide, Kirk Murphy's case was still being used as a success story for a movement to treat "unwanted sexual attraction" -- a movement Kirk Murphy never elected to join, and whose use of his childhood story, Maris Murphy was sure, he would have abhorred.
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"To force, especially Christian, classrooms or schools to have homosexual clubs would, of course, be an affront to their family values," said Charles McVety, president of Christian Canada College. "And what does this have to do with bullying? Nothing."