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Loading ...LGBT site names supporters of Ark. gay adoption ban
04.29.2009 2:22pm EDT
(Little Rock, Arkansas) Backers of a ballot inititiative banning gays from adopting children in Arkansas are livid after an LGBT rights group posted the names and zip codes of those who signed petitions that led to the question appearing on the ballot.
KnowThyNeighbor.org has posted the names of 83,000 Arkansas citizens who signed the anti-gay adoption and foster care petition in 2008.“This is about responsibility and dialogue,” said Tom Lang, the director of the Massachusetts-based KnowThyNeighbor.
“These petition signers need to stand behind their signatures and be responsible for this dehumanizing attack on the gay community. It’s disgraceful that they have chosen to exercise their prejudice at the expense of children who are now being denied access to loving adoptive and foster parents. Such activity must be challenged and cannot be allowed to pass under the cover of darkness.”
The group previously has posted online the names of over a half million anti-gay petition signers in Massachusetts and Florida.
The group behind the amendment said Wednesday that it will ask the Arkansas Legislature to pass a law prohibiting the release of petition signers’ “personal information.”
“If Arkansas doesn’t have a law prohibiting the release of petitionsigners’ personal information, we will ask the Arkansas Legislature to pass such a law next session,” said Jerry Cox, president of the Family Council Action Committee in a press release.
“This would provide equal protection to any voters who sign a ballot petition, regardless of the cause.”
But Lang defends the publication of the names saying it will lead to a dialogue between gays and opponents of gay rights.
“These conversations can be uncomfortable for both parties,” said Lang, “but they are desperately needed.
“The more that gays and lesbians talk about the importance of their relationships and their love for their children, the faster stereotypes break down and both sides begin to realize how much they have in common.”
Although the law bans both unmarried opposite-sex couples and same-sex couples from adopting or fostering LGBT rights advocates argue the law is particularly harsh for same-sex couples who are banned from marrying in Arkansas.
When you sign a petition, you generally agree that you “personal” information can and will become public in order to verify the signatures are of registered voters. This is different from participating in poll or survey. Now, if they are truly doing god’s work, then they should be proud to have their “John Hancock” readily and easily viewable. However, if they are doing something underhanded, like bearing false witness, I can see why they want to hide in the closet, as it were. If they believe that signing this petition is reprehensible in some other way, then they are guilty of at least hypocrisy, again! Of course, there are those messy clauses in the Constitution about due process and facing your accusers. There is a reason why you are not supposed to secretly denounce strangers, friends, neighbors, and family members without reason. Religion is not a reason; it is an opinion, a capricious and arbitrary choice, and it should not be inflicted on anyone else against their will.
I am ashamed to be a gay Arkansan. Every time I read stuff linked to the ban, I just get so ashamed. Even though I don’t want children, I think it’s a right that should be afforded to those who do.
As someone stated, these aren’t your run-of-the-mill rednecks. A lot of the signers are educated book wise, but ignorant when it comes to some issues(such as this one). This should be a non issue, but that day won’t come anytime soon.
I think it’s the best thing since sliced bread to put their shit on blast. They’re only making a huge deal out of this because nobody wants it to be known what they really are and how they really feel about us. As someone posted here, if you sign something, you ought to have the balls to stand behind it. I co-sign with that!!
I don’t know about anyone else, but any petition I have signed throughout my entire life is something I have truly believed in and fought for. I believe that if you are going to sign a petition, then by damn, you ought to have the b@lls to stand behind it. Anything else is cowardice, but then, we ARE talking about the bible thumping hets, aren’t we?
Well, here’s something for those who supported this anti-gay legislation to think about. It’s now being discovered that the gay community is, so far, one of the most recession-proof groups in the country, if not the world. That’s because the vast majority of us don’t have children, and we tend to be better-educated than our straight counterparts, so we have better-paying jobs in industries that, even in an economic downturn, are still in high demand.
But, by legally prohibiting gays from adopting or fostering, they’re forcing even more of us to keep money in our pockets that would otherwise be spent on raising children. So, while straight people are losing their homes left and right, we’re able to come in behind them and buy those foreclosed houses for next to nothing. Then, once we’ve moved into the houses of former heterosexual homeowners, we still have enough money left over to travel, buy new cars, and otherwise enjoy a standard of living that all those uppity straight people have had to say good-bye to…all this even after having to pay the higher taxes we’re required to just for being gay. We’ll probably even go ahead and buy multiple houses, since they’re so cheap right now (at least, for us), so we can reap the benefits of owning rental property, too.
So, I guess I should actually thank the gay bashers for helping to ensure my people don’t suffer the same fate they have. I don’t know about you all, but I’m enjoying the hell out of my community’s seeming immunity to all this economic mess the straights are in.
And don’t worry, straight folks. When it comes time for you to try to move out of your apartments and back into a real house, I’ll be happy to rent one to you, because I don’t discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation, even though I’m legally allowed to. Heck, you might even get lucky enough to rent the very same house you lost in your foreclosure. In the mean time, just know that you’ll have my gratitude as I sip my favorite tequila on a beach somewhere in the Bahamas.
But if you type http://www.knowthyneighbor.org into your web browser, there’s a donate option.
I urge people to donate to this very important cause. Without the light shining on these people, they’ll never change.