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Loading ...Petition blasts Starr for Prop 8 ‘lies’
03.16.2009 11:14am EDT
(Washington) Copies of an online petition electronically signed by 46,000 people has been hand-delivered to the Washington, DC offices of Kirkland & Ellis where Ken Starr is counsel.
Starr argued before the California Supreme Court to both uphold Proposition 8, which bans marriage between loving same sex couples, and to strike down the 18,000 marriages performed when marriage equality was legal in the state.The petition drive was featured on EndtheLies.org, launched by the Human Rights Campaign to confront what HRC said are lies and distortions repeatedly used to defeat LGBT equality measures.
Starr has referred to the struggle for marriage equality as “seizing and hijacking the marriage relationship in order to achieve apartheid-type values.”
EndtheLies.org launched on March 5, the day of the California high court arguments.
“This kind of response to the lies repeatedly used to block our equality demonstrates that many Americans have had enough,” said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese. “Grassroots tools like EndtheLies.org will be critical to our community’s upcoming legislative battles, including passing the Matthew Shepard Act in 111th Congress.”
HRC also has added four new profiles to the interactive site: Colorado State Senator Scott Renfroe, right-wing radio personality Rush Limbaugh, GOP Chairman Michael Steele, and the Washington Values Alliance.
Renfroe gained notoriety when he compared homosexuality with murder during a legislative debate.
Limbaugh has repeatedly made anti-gay statements, including a comment accusing LGBT students of “trumpeting” their sexuality and “inviting dissent.”
Steele, who once chaired a political action committee urging the Republican Party to be more inclusive of LGBT people, has apparently abandoned those efforts and recently called civil unions “crazy.”
The Washington Values Alliance has been fighting a Washington State bill that would establish equal benefits for couples registered as domestic partners, including that children will not be safe in schools. The Alliance has argued the bill would make it illegal to speak against marriage for lesbian and gay couples.
EndtheLies.org features an interactive wall that includes videos, audio, pictures, and quotes from the anti-gay figures it highlights.
By clicking on the panels of the wall, users can access more information about those on the wall, watch videos, add comments on multimedia discussion boards, and learn how to take action to counteract their misdeeds.
Along with Ken Starr and the four new additions, the wall also features the American Family Association, elders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Oklahoma State Representative Sally Kern, and Utah State Senator Chris Buttars. Users can also nominate their own candidates for inclusion on the wall.
What’s the point of a petition? I watched the hearings like many did. The “No on 8″ folks had terrible legal representation that seemed to be trying to sway the judges emotionally rather than by presenting their own compelling argument or by refuting the arguments of the other side. That may be frustrating, but tearing down the other side (which did an excellent job of presenting legal argument) is pointless. Where did your community dig up those lawyers? Truly awful.
This is one reason why courts should decide our rights, not the voters, because the opponents of gay equality use reckless, and blind ignorance to advance their christianist corporation. It is a very profitable business to oppose everything gay. The other important reason why courts should decide our rights is because the federally protected majority don’t have a clue what it feels like to be on the receiving end of religious zealotry, and we wouldn’t want them to be exposed to it either. If the christianist corporation’s rights were up for a popular vote, they would ask the court, in a flash, to invalidate this measure, and rightfully so. This is exactly what we’re doing.
So for anyone who still believes that they should be able to vote on our liberties, you’re an absolutist, irrational hypocrite, and I don’t have any time for you!
Unfortunately too many people believe that their CHOSEN MORAL POSITION is something sacred and holy. In nearly all cases, that can never be true. Below is my list of items that one’s “moral or immoral” position does not grant to anyone. They must understand what they can do and CANNOT do with their ideals and goals associated with their position.
That said, every person who chooses a moral position does just that: THEY CHOOSE A MORAL STANCE. It does not choose them. And thusly, their choice affords them no special place or status in society. They need to get over themselves and quit listening to the brainwashing done by their not-so-holier-than-thou morality leaders.
So let it be known to everyone, moral or not, that because a person chooses their moral position, and adopts the ways and policies of their chosen belief system, their choice ABSOLUTELY:
(1) Does NOT give them a superior moral position over anyone else.
(2) Does NOT endow them with a monopoly on good, kind, ethical and high moral behavior,
(3) Does NOT transfer to them a position of authority over any other human being.
(4) Does NOT allow them to become judge and jury over any other person or group.
(5) Does NOT grant them any privileges to spew hateful speech, to incite hateful actions, or to manifest hurtful actions or evil deeds against another.
(6) Does NOT authorize them to act with discrimination, picking and choosing whom they believe to be virtuous and faultless, or the opposite.
(7) Does NOT pardon them for their discriminatory behavior.
(8) Does NOT authorize their so-called moral texts to have any superior status over the secular laws of the land.
(9) Does NOT allocate to them any preferential status within the United States government or governments of the States or its local communities.
(10) Does NOT allow them to act contrary to law, or against another person, without rebuke or reprisal.
Please take this list and apply it to every so they will begin to understand their status with our society. I do not wish to belittle their beliefs, but then again, I require that they do not diminish me or any other suspect minority which they may dispute. I demand to be treated with dignity, and they must comply, and according to law or court ruling, as the case may be.
Let it be written; let it be done, NOW.
I want to nominate the Knights of Columbus and the Archbishop of San Francisco.
Sarrellec Said: “Please…all of you…STOP buying into the playing field as it is designed by the straight a-holes opposing our right to equal protection under the law. STOP arguing about whether gays are born gay or not. That is a red herring…a strawman argument.
IT DOESN’T MATTER.”
Yes, it does matter. No, it is not a red herring. Just because you don’t see the relevance doesn’t make it irrelevant. If homosexuality is genetic (and I believe it is), and given that our advances in genetic engineering will someday bring us to the point that homosexuality may actually be a choice for the parents, saying it doesn’t matter is no different than agreeing we are genetically flawed and should be “fixed”. If orientation is a choice, then we as a society already regulates many behaviors that are considered dangerous or immoral. If it is a choice, then how do we say that we should be allowed our abberation and deny the same rights to others. I’ve never met a single gay or lesbian yet who said they had a choice in the matter and most scientific evidence seems to support this. I see no problem using scientific truth as a basis of arguement.
Incedentally, my response is designed to make them think. If they cannot correlate their lack of choice in their orientation with our own, then I doubt any constitutional arguement will make an impact either. Some people do choose stupidity and will not be swayed.
Thank you, Michael W!
Please…all of you…STOP buying into the playing field as it is designed by the straight a-holes opposing our right to equal protection under the law.
STOP arguing about whether gays are born gay or not. That is a red herring…a strawman argument.
IT DOESN’T MATTER.
Equal protection under the law for citizens of the United States is guaranteed by the 14th Amendment which also defines a citizen of the United States without mentioning gender AT ALL.
The 14th Amendment doesn’t say “christian citizen” or “male citizen” or “female citizen” or even “male and female citizens.”
It says “citizen”. period.
Every time we allow ANY straight person to frame the argument against us under ANY pretext other than equal protection under the law, we are allowing them the ammunition to keep us from full citizenship and the protections therein.
So, the next time a straight asks you when you chose to be gay or why you chose to be gay, answer that the question is irrelevent. You are a citizen of the United States and expect and demand, not “tolerance”, but respect and equal protection under the law as guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.
That’s it. End of argument. End of discussion. End of religious imposition.
Even tho the United States IS a theocratic oligarchy, the citizenry do actually believe that it is a representative democracy; that elections matter and that the Constitution actually is for everyone.
Wouldn’t it be nice if it actually was?
The issue that I have is that regardless of whether you believe it is genetic or a choice – what does that have to do with equality and the foundation of our constitution? There are many many things that a choices that are protected…choice of religion, choice of gun ownership, choice of an abortion etc. regardless if it is a choice or not, discrimination should not be tolerated. I understand the humanization that comes from saying homosexuality is not a choice, but in the end, it is unimportant in terms of whether or not we should be treated equally.
“My usual response when straight men try to tell me being gay is a choice is to ask them back, “How many di%ks did you suck before you chose to be straight? Oddly enough, every last one of them insisted they were born straight.”
Yeah but, pathetic as it may seem, some of those very same straight men seem to think they are the only ones entitled to that claim, that they were born that way.
This is a debate I just, for the life of me, cannot and never will understand. Sexuality is not a light switch. You can’t turn off your feelings for another person, whether you’re gay or straight. It just doesn’t work that way. Why do you think so many of these “ex-gay” clinics are being discredited? Think what would happen if we, in the gay community, began opening “ex-straight” ministries to counteract this nonsense. There would be outrage across the board from people of all walks and backgrounds: “You can’t do that!” or “I’m straight, you can’t turn me gay!”
Touche.
I doubt the petition will do much, but it cannot hurt.
http://stuffqueerpeopleneedtoknow.wordpress.com/wp-admin/
Kris Said: “Gay is not a choice, if it is, please ask them “when did you choose to be straight”.
My usual response when straight men try to tell me being gay is a choice is to ask them back, “How many di%ks did you suck before you chose to be straight? Oddly enough, every last one of them insisted they were born straight.
Now, do these “right wing nugget heads” think of the gay children going to school now?
Do they really think that being gay is taught by “schools, strangers, or sexual deviants”? Someone needs to drill into their heads that some of the children going to school with their kids today are gay. Gay is not taught by others, being gay is not a choice. Why would someone choose to be gay? All of the hate groups, dangers, and fright being “non-equal”, is not a choice. My mom thinks it’s still a choice. Time after time, I told her that I didn’t choose to be gay, with all of the hatred out there. I’m glad I’m gay, but why would I choose to live a life, where others tell me I will burn in hell, or gay bashing or any other violence committed against me “for being gay”.
I didn’t have a choice in the matter of sexual preference, but if I did, I would’ve wanted to live my life as non violent as can be.
Gay is not a choice, if it is, please ask them “when did you choose to be straight”.
Kris–Jax,Florida