Prop 8

Will the Supreme Court Read the Most Horrific Children's Book of All Time?

Earlier this week, we looked at the slightly conflicted amicus briefs that the Family Research Council submitted to the Supreme Court ahead of its consideration of two major marriage equality cases. Today, Warren Throckmorton alerts us that the “ex-gay” group Parents and Friends of Gays and Ex-Gays (PFOX) has submitted its own brief to the Court.

The PFOX amicus brief [pdf], unsurprisingly, argues that gays and lesbians should not be a “protected class” under the law because homosexuality “is not an immutable characteristic.” As evidence, it presents the stories of four self-proclaimed “ex-gays” whose lives purportedly show that “sexual orientation can shift over time and does so for a significant number of people.”

One of the stories the brief presents is that of “Richard Cohen, M.A…an ex-gay who is now married with 3 children. He struggled for much of his life with unwanted same-sex attraction. Richard is the founder of the International Healing Foundation (IHF) and the author of Coming Out Straight, Gay Children Straight Parents, Let’s Talk About Sex, and Alfie’s Home.”

As it happens, Cohen is one of the most prominent purveyors of reparative therapy, the harmful process of trying to “cure” homosexuality that was recently banned for minors in California. And his book Alfie’s Home, cited in PFOX’s Supreme Court brief, is the most horrifically disturbing children’s book we have ever seen. We know, because we are unlucky enough to have a copy in our research library. Here is some of what the Justices have in store if they check out Cohen’s work:

Alfie’s Home was published in 1993 by Cohen’s International Healing Foundation. It starts out with a picture of the protagonist on a boat with his dad.

But it goes bad fast, going right for the right-wing myth that homosexuality is caused by childhood sexual abuse…

…and by insufficiently attentive parents:

Eventually, Alfie seeks help and takes part in the “touch therapy” advocated by Cohen…

…which leads him to “realize that I’m not gay” and start dating a woman:

You can see Cohen’s “touch therapy” in practice in this 2006 CNN interview:

He also made a cameo on the Daily Show.

For their own sakes, I hope the Justices don’t look too far into Cohen’s story. But if they do, they’ll get a revealing glimpse of the world that is trying to sink gay rights laws across the country.
 

Miranda Blue's blog

FRC: Anti-Gay Laws Reflect Public Opinion, Gay Rights Laws Reflect Powerful Gay Lobby

The Family Research Council submitted two amicus briefs to the Supreme Court yesterday urging it to reject challenges to DOMA and to California’s Proposition 8. The briefs lay out some of the same arguments that we’ve heard many times from the FRC. But we were curious if the FRC would jettison one of its favorite talking points– the success of discriminatory measures at the ballot box –in light of last year’s resounding marriage equality victories in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota and Washington.

The answer was yes and no.

In its brief on Hollingsworth v. Perry, the Prop 8 case, the FRC goes back to the old talking point, ignoring the events of last November, to argue that “there is no ‘emerging awareness’ that the right to marry extends to same-sex couples.”

This Court has never stated or even implied that the federal right to marry extends to same-sex couples.  And, with the exception of the district court’s decision below, which was affirmed on other grounds by the court of appeals, no state or federal court has held that the fundamental right to marry extends to same-sex couples.  In sharp contrast to the “emerging awareness that liberty gives substantial protection to adult persons in deciding how to conduct their private lives in matters pertaining to sex,” Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 572, which, in turn, was based upon an examination of “our laws and traditions in the past half century, id. at 571, “[t]he history and tradition of the last fifty years have not shown the definition of marriage to include a union of two people regardless of their sex.”  If anything, the fact that thirty States have amended their constitutions to reserve marriage to opposite-sex couples strongly suggests that there is no “emerging awareness” that the right to marry extends to same-sex couples.

But when the FRC wants to argue that gays and lesbians are not a “politically powerless” group deserving protection from discrimination, they flaunt the 2012 election results and point to how close previous anti-gay votes on state ballots were. This is from the brief on U.S. v. Windsor, the DOMA case:

Any lingering doubt that gays and lesbians are able to influence public policy, particularly with respect to the issue of same-sex marriage, should have been laid to rest by the results of the last election.  Three States – Maine, Maryland and Washington, by popular vote, approved laws allowing same-sex marriage, and in a fourth State – Minnesota – voters rejected an amendment to the state constitution that would have prohibited same-sex marriage.  Even in States where such amendments have been approved, the margin of victory has often been narrow, in some cases barely passing (as in California in 2008 and South Dakota in 2006), indicating that homosexuals, who comprise no more than one to two percent of the population, have succeeded in enlisting many heterosexuals to support their cause for same-sex marriage.  In such a dynamic social and cultural environment, the belief that homosexuals are “politically powerless in the sense that they have no ability to attract the attention of the lawmakers,”  strains credulity. 

So when voters reject gay rights at the ballot box, they are reflecting public opinion. But when they vote in favor of gay rights, they have been “enlisted” to the cause by powerful gay rights lobbyists.

Miranda Blue's blog

Prop 8 Appeal Sent to the Supreme Court

Tue, 06/05/2012 - 3:06pm — Justin

This afternoon, the full 9th Circuit Court of Appeals declined to hear an appeal of the Prop 8 case.  In February, a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit struck down Prop 8, finding California's revocation of the right of same-sex couples to marry same-sex marriage ban to be unconstitutional. The 9th Circuit's decision means that either the Supreme Court will take up the case or the 9th Circuit’s decision striking down the law will stand.

The appeals court ruling is on narrow grounds unique to California, where same-sex couples were left with all the state rights of marriage but not the name. It found that taking away gay and lesbian couples’ designation of “marriage” while leaving their rights unchanged did not serve any of the purposes put forth by its defenders. Instead, its only purpose and effect was to lessen a targeted group’s status and dignity by reclassifying their relationship and families as inferior. The Court did not address the larger question of whether gays and lesbians have a constitutional right to marry. While the Supreme Court will be presented with the narrower question as framed by the Ninth Circuit, it is impossible to tell, if it agrees to hear the case at all, whether they will rule on this principle or more broadly on the ability of states to deny lesbians and gays the right to marry.

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PFAW Foundation

Virginia Rejects Openly Gay Judicial Nominee After Campaign By Far-Right Activists

Tue, 05/15/2012 - 10:45am — Miranda

Virginia’s House of Delegates yesterday rejected the nomination of a state prosecutor to serve as a judge – just because he is openly gay.

Tracy Thorne-Begland, a Navy veteran who has been a prosecutor in Richmond for 12 years, enjoyed bipartisan support in the House of Delegates until, at the last minute, he came under attack from far-right Delegate Bob Marshall and the right-wing Family Foundation. The Richmond Times Dispatch reports:

A late-hour lobbying offensive by social conservatives prevailed in the House of Delegates early Tuesday to torpedo bipartisan support for the judicial nomination of an openly gay Richmond prosecutor.

After a lengthy discussion, the GOP-controlled House of Delegates defeated the nomination of Tracy Thorne-Begland, Richmond's chief deputy commonwealth's attorney. He would have been the first openly gay judge elected in Virginia.

Thorne-Begland received 33 votes, and 31 delegates voted against him. He needed a majority of the 100-member House -- 51 votes -- to secure the judgeship.

….

In an email blast to supporters late last week, the Christian conservative Family Foundation questioned Thorne-Begland's fitness for the bench given his support for gay marriage, which is not legal in Virginia. Thorne-Begland and his partner, Michael, live together and are raising twins.

Marshall, too had charged that Thorne-Begland pursued an "aggressive activist homosexual agenda.

Opponents of gay rights, in their effort to keep LGBT people out of the public square, have in the past few years gone after several openly gay judges and judicial nominees. Supporters of California’s discriminatory Prop 8 tried to get a federal judge’s ruling against them thrown out because the judge is openly gay. Another judge issued an epic takedown of their argument.

A number of Republican delegates in Virginia, as well as the state’s socially conservative governor Bob McDonnell backed Thorne-Begland’s nomination until Del. Marshall began his onslaught.

Del. Marshall is the one who claimed in 2010 that disabled children are God's punishment for abortion. On Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell – a policy that Thorne-Begland worked to end after his distinguished career in the Navy – Marshall said openly gay troops would distract their fellow servicemembers: "It's a distraction when I'm on the battlefield and have to concentrate on the enemy 600 yards away and I'm worried about this guy whose got eyes on me." Once Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was repealed, Del Marshall tried to get gay Virginians banned from the state’s National Guard.

Marshall later told the Washington Post that he objected to Thorne-Begland’s brave coming out in protest of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell:

I would guess — law of averages — we’ve probably nominated people who have homosexual inclinations,” Marshall said. Marshall faulted Thorne-Begland for coming out as a gay Naval officer on “Nightline” two decades ago to challenge the military’s now-repealed ban on gays openly serving in the military. He said that amounted not just to insubordination, but to a waste of taxpayer dollars, since it resulted in his dismissal from the Navy. “The Navy spent $1 million training him,” Marshall said. “That’s cheating the country out of the investment in him.”

In the end, it was Del. Marshall’s arguments that won out in the effort to halt the career of a dedicated Virginia public servant.

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PFAW

Engle Tells Robertson that Prayer Defeated the 'Homosexual Agenda' in California

Like his fellow Proposition 8 supporters Che Ahn and Jim Garlow, Lou Engle maintains that their prayers led to the reversal of marriage equality in California in 2008 and a “sovereign appointment” with former San Francisco mayor (and current Lt. Gov.) Gavin Newsom “to call him to accountability to what he was going to do in that city concerning the homosexual agenda.” While speaking today with Pat Robertson on the 700 Club to publicize the upcoming The Call: Virginia, which Robertson has endorsed, Engle said his September, 2010 prayer rally in Sacramento “removed” the state’s governor from office. However, then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had already made the decision not to run for re-election in November, 2009, and Democrat Jerry Brown won the gubernatorial race later that year.

Watch:

Robertson: Tell me one example where prayer that you know of—I know many—changed things in a nation?

Engle: I look at my own story and my prayer history in California, on a forty day season of fasting and prayer, God spoke to me that I needed to contend with those heavenly powers through humility and fasting. We believe, two stadium gatherings, a forty day fast across California, the governor of California, right after The Call in Sacramento, was removed from office, also put me in front of Gavin Newsom in a sovereign appointment to call him to accountability to what he was going to do in that city concerning the homosexual agenda. It’s actually changed so much, in my life and with the journey that I’m in, let alone many, many, stories of prayer changing history.

Robertson: One more time, Fredericksburg, Virginia, a linchpin state, there’s people coming all around the nation to join The Call.
Brian Tashman's blog

Prop 8 Makes Its Stage Debut

Mon, 03/05/2012 - 1:53pm — Jen
Dustin Lance Black, the writer behind J. Edgar and Oscar winner for Milk, is bringing the story of California’s Proposition 8 to the stage.
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Olson: ‘Marriage is a Conservative Value’

Wed, 02/08/2012 - 2:33pm — Miranda

Ted Olson, who served as solicitor general under George W. Bush and is now half of the legal team fighting the anti-gay Proposition 8 in California, went on the Rachel Maddow show last night to discuss the marriage equality victory handed down by the Ninth Circuit yesterday.

Asked by Maddow why animus toward gay rights is still so mainstream in Republican politics, Olson gave a defense of marriage equality as a conservative value – one that he says more and more American conservatives are embracing:

 

Maddow: Why do you think it is that hostility to gay rights is still something that is still so utterly mainstream and expected of both mainstream politicians and mainstream institutions in conservative politics today?

Olson: I don’t know the answer to your question, Rachel, but I think that it’s terribly unfortunate. Marriage is a conservative value. Not that conservatives own it or liberals own it, but the loving relationship between individuals that want to be respected by their society and treated as equals is a conservative value. It involves liberty and privacy and association and identity.

Marriage is the building block of our society. Young people get it. Older people are still getting it. But all of the polls are changing. People more and more are understanding that these are American citizens, these are our brothers and our sisters, we have got to treat them right and we’ve got to treat them decency, and we’ve got to give them the same freedom and justice that we give to other people. More and more people in America are understanding that. I’m pleased to say that more and more Republicans are understanding that.

I’m sad to say – it makes me sad to say – that Republicans haven’t fully understood it. But I think that they will come, and every time that David Boies and I have a chance to address this question, we believe that we’re converting more people, and persuading more people that this is the right thing. It is not a liberal or conservative issue, or Republican or Democrats. When David Boies and I came together on this, our mission was to persuade the American people that this is an issue of American justice, American freedom, American equality. These are the principles, all men are created equal in this country, we have got to get there.

 

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PFAW

PFAW Commends Ninth Circuit Ruling on Prop 8

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agrees with a lower court that California's anti-equality Proposition 8 is unconstitutional.
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The Hypocrisy Hall of Fame: Schwarzenegger and Marriage Equality

In our latest Huffington Post, we discuss how Arnold Schwarzenegger has placed himself with the likes of John Ensign and Newt Gingrich on the long and growing list of GOP officials who accused gay people of ruining the institution of marriage while they themselves flouted their wedding vows.
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Losing Their Appeal: The Real Reason the Right is Terrified by the Prop 8 Case

In the weeks since Judge Vaughn Walker found California's gay marriage ban unconstitutional, the Right Wing has, unsurprisingly, worked itself into a characteristic bigoted bluster. But this time, something about the bluster is different.
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Prop 8 Judge Denies Permanent Stay on Marriages

In an important statement of confidence in the strong case for marriage equality, Judge Vaughn Walker today denied a motion to indefinitely stay his decision allowing gay people to marry in California.
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PFAW Statement: Federal Judge Overturns Proposition 8

A federal judge in California today overturned Proposition 8, the state’s law that prohibited gay people from marrying. Proposition 8, Judge Vaughn Walker wrote, “is unconstitutional under both the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses.”
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Statement of Rev. Byron Williams on Proposition 8 Decision

A federal judge in California today overturned Proposition 8, the state's law that prohibits gay people from marrying.

Reverend Byron Williams, pastor, columnist, a member of People For the American Way Foundation's African American Ministers In Action, and editor of the forthcoming book, Inconvenient Love African American Clergy and Theologians Speaking on Behalf of LGBT Equality, stated:

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Supreme Court Blocks Cameras from Prop 8 Trial

The Supreme Court yesterday issued an order blocking cameras from the courtroom in the case Perry v. Schwarzenegger which challenges the constitutionality of California's anti-gay ballot initiative.
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Mormon Leader Compares Pro-Equality Activists to Violent Segregationists

In a speech yesterday Elder Dallin H. Oaks, an official of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, compared the alleged anti-Mormon backlash over the Church's support of Proposition 8 in California to the intimidation of Southern blacks during the civil rights movement.
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Religious Right Targets Maine & Marriage Equality with Money, Anti-Gay Swat Teams and Reprise of Prop-8’s False Fearmongering Strategies

National Religious Right organizations that bankrolled the effort to put Proposition 1 on the ballot in Maine descended on the state this past weekend with a SWAT team of anti-gay leaders and veterans of last year’s Prop 8 battle in California.
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Rev. Byron Williams on Prop 8 and Marriage Equality on CNN's Campbell Brown

Rev. Byron Williams spoke about Prop 8 and marriage equality on May 27th 2009, on Campbell Brown's show on CNN. Williams is a member of African American Ministers In Action (AAMIA).
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Marriage Equality Opponents Blur Distinction Between Civil And Religious Marriage

Efforts to bring down discriminatory legal barriers to marriage equality have met with fierce resistance led by Religious Right organizations. Anti-equality leaders routinely blur the distinction between civil and religious marriage in order to portray legal marriage equality as a threat to their religious liberty. The truth can be a powerful weapon against that deception: when Americans understand that allowing same-sex couples to be legally wed would not require any church or congregation to bless or perform such weddings, support for legal equality jumps substantially.
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Prop 8 Protest - Washington, DC - Nov. 15, 2008

People For the American Way joined thousands of protesters to stand against Prop 8 and for marriage equality.
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