The Religious Right, what LGBT people are really up against

[dsc]

They are now after suicide prevention programs. Lest one think they are worried about government waste it isn't that they don't work. No, it is that they have the audacity to make gay people, and some non gay people, think that being gay isn't evil. I know, you think I am making this up, so here are some links.

http://www.pamspaulding.com/weblog/2006/07/1-800-suicide-targeted-for-extinction.html

With teenage suicide being the 3rd leading cause of death between 18 to 24 year olds - our government should not be duplicating prevention efforts but helping fund the many local organizations and non-profits with proven track records on prevention. In addition our government should not be in the business having access to this private and sensitive information!

Despite the fact that almost 2 million callers have reached help and hope over the last 8 years, and a government funded evaluation stating the benefits of 1-800-SUICIDE, the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Service Administration (SAMHSA), a division of Health & Human Services, has decided to create their own government run system where they would have direct access to confidential data on individuals in crisis.
You might recall SAMHSA, which came under fire from the fundies back in February of last year. Agency officials were forced by the Bush admin (after the WH received hopping mad calls from Family Research Council's Tony Perkins) to remove all LGBT references from a federally funded suicide prevention conference in California and to kill gay-positive content from the SAMHSA site.

The Bushies also suggested a session on "faith-based" suicide prevention, and threatened the conference's funding. The wingnut admin functionaries backed down after an outcry for sanity from response from mental health professionals.

SAMHSA also took a big hit when its web site featured a section called "Celebrating the Pride and Diversity Among and Within the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Populations" which flew in the face of the flat-earth science often promoted in government under Bush that seems to either ignore or condemn homosexuality. The SAMHSA link above is to The Memory Hole, btw. My original post on this was called How long before a Bush drone puts a stop to this?

The answer was 12 days. That's how long it took for a Bush drone to scrub a government web site of gay-positive content.

end of quote

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=158x9368

ACCORDING TO BRIAN, "In Massachusetts, anything labeled 'youth suicide prevention' is always a homosexual program in disguise. No one else is ever interested in youth suicide issues because it is not really a problem in the schools. In fact, there is no youth suicide 'epidemic' in Massachusetts."

Please do the right thing for parents and children - DO NOT CAVE-IN TO THE MURDEROUS RIGHT-WING BIGOTED AGENDA! THEY ARE CONSERVATIVES WITHOUT A CONSCIENCE!

end of quote

Brian is the head of the anti gay alliance of Massachusetts.

Let me be blunt this is pure evil. It is nothing less than the idea that Matthew Sheppard is the ultimate ex gay. These aren't, sadly, the Fred Phelps of the word. These are the supposedly reasonable anti gay zealots. We can't let these people win. If they are willing to sacrifice straight teenagers just so someone, somewhere who is gay won't get a positive feeling about him or herself. This is the type of Christian we are up against. Why should we believe for a minute they will entertain the notion of compromise? At best they don't care if we live or die. At worst, they wish us dead. Compromise isn't an option.

[Guy Fawkes]

1. Over 1/3 teen suicides is by LGBT youth

:scared:

[Ian David]

2. You forgot to refer to Brian as the Maoist anti-gay fag-hag. n/t

[ruggerson]

3. Gay people are the Number One target in the culture wars

and for those who think this isn't a big issue, compared to minimum wage, Iraq and healthcare, you couldn't be more mistaken.

Because this is about the control of your government by superstitious, evil frauds who wish to stop science, teach your children destructive untruths about the origin of mankind, force women to be subservient to the whims of men and control every aspect of your daily lives.

This is about freedom versus theocracy.

Gays and lesbians are just the first, convenient stop for the fundamentalist right.

You are next.

[H2O Man]

5. Well said.

I nominated this thread, because it is an extremely important topic. The OP is presented very well. Your post is of the same high quality.

Always, always, always when a dictatorship wants the general population to forget about their own low level of being, they select enemies to take the "blame." This is distinct from picking an external enemy. It serves a related purpose, of course. In my opinion, gay people are being targeted for an increasing amount of irrational hatred. Every person of good will should be concerned by this.

[dsc]

7. I sometimes wonder if gays and lesbians had simply stuck

to gay ghettos in cities if the religious right would have left us alone. I honestly don't think they would have. I can't prove that, clearly, but I really think that it is such a power thing that there is no way they would have accepted us living our lives as we saw fit in cities and them just living their lives in the rest of the country. And, in any case, we won't be the last group they take on, that is for sure.

[tbyg52]

17. No, it wouldn't have helped...

These nuts don't object to your being around them, they object to your *existing*. If they didn't have a problem with something that was no skin off their nose in the first place we wouldn't even be having this discussion, because they would be behaving in a civilized manner.

[noonwitch]

18. I doubt it would have helped in the long run

It would have been like the Warsaw ghetto-the pigs just would have central locations to round gays up, if they ever chose to do so.

I could care less who people sleep with behind closed doors. I am not offended by gay couples who kiss or hold hands in public. I don't want to see anyone, gay or straight, having sex in public, however.

I don't get why conservatives want the public to discriminate against gays. I don't care what they do in their own churches and schools, or what they preach, other than I feel extreme sympathy for any child they have that may turn out to be gay. But don't tell the rest of us we can't treat gays as fellow humans.

[dsc]

19. It was for fear of those children

in some part, that the gay ghetto system broke down. It also broke down because cities couldn't grant all the rights one needs to live a normal life.

[ruggerson]

4. Kick n/t

[Maven]

6. kick

[oberliner]

8. This is our generation's civil rights struggle

That someone can call something a "homosexual program in disguise" and people perceive that as a valid criticism is alarming.

The demonization of the LGBT community that the RW machine is working so passionately on has eerie paralells to the racist tacticts of the 1950s.

They must be stopped in their efforts to normalize their hate.

[YankeyMCC]

9. K & R

[Stinky The Clown]

10. Geeze ..... nothing's ever good enough for you people ......

:sarcasm:

dsc, my friend, I don't think for one second you're making this up. It has been simmering in the Three Monkey Media's underbelly of under reported stories for a long time.

This is a definite tactic. They intend not to hit this on the head so much as just keep nipping at it, keeping their base (the backwash) aware of it. They may not even ever go directly at it because it is useful as a way to keep kicking the can whenever the can needs to be kicked.

It is LONG past time that this country had a serious dialogue about gay issues. Much like racial issues - which are HARDLY solved. At least it isn't acceptable in too many circles to be an outright racist anymore. Even ol' Trent got his ass kicked for what was really not all that bad a thing.

I don't know how we can effect this raising of the national consiousness, but whatever it takes is okay by me.

[ComerPerro]

11. And you know churches are desperate to get the government fundnig

for suicide prevention.

Its a fundie wet-dream.

Not only will the government send people who are their ideal targets for "conversion" right to them, but they get extra taxpayer money for their recruitment.

[dsc]

12. It is a very scary notion

I am adamantly opposed to this faith based initiative. I am sober today because I was able to find a gay friendly group to dry out at. I can't imagine finding such a thing in faith based iniatives in large swaths of the country.

[Democrats_win]

13. Yes, they want us dead. Larry Kramer understands this:

"They have not exactly been making a secret of their hate. This last campaign has seen examples of daily hate on TV and in the media that I do not believe the world has witnessed since Nazi Germany. I have been reading Ambassador Dodd's Diary; he was Roosevelt's ambassador to Germany in the 30's, and people are always popping in and out of his office proclaiming the most awful things out loud about Jews. It has been like that."


Check out his post-2004-election speech (11/07/04) The Tragedy of Today's Gays which has been published and is widely available on the internet:
http://www.oasismag.com/node/view/8295

[dsc]

15. Kramer isn't always on

but when he is on, he is very on.

[Nikki Stone 1]

20. Yes. They can't see this hatred is pure evil

:kick:

[sueragingroz]

14. kick

[dsc]

16. kick