White House: No Plans for 'Religious Freedom' Order 'Right Now'
But Press Secretary Sean Spicer did say that “political correctness” sometimes inteferes with religious expression.
www.advocate.com/politics/2017/2/02/white-house-no-plans-religious-freedom-order-right-now
DGM
kengikat40 posted a photo:
Dale is someone I’ve known for a while, but did not actually get introduced to him until recently.
About a week ago I show up to his apartment in Los Angeles with camera in hand to capture some images of him. Not only is he good looking, freakishly talented, but he is very funny and such a humble human being who also happens to be very giving.
It was a huge honor to be able to photograph him in his apartment for this series.
Teen’s antigay rant shows the bigotry LGBTQ youth face every day
A Queerty reader has directed us to a video of a teen expressing his severe homophobia, and we feel it deserves to be seen. We must warn you that he uses highly offensive language, and if you’re sensitive to hate speech, you may want to move on.
While antigay hostility on high school campuses (or anywhere else for that matter) is by no means a recent phenomenon, the willingness of bigots to wear their ignorance on their sleeves has become noticeably more pronounced in our recent sociopolitical atmosphere.
Permission for bullying has been given by example at the highest levels of our government, and that attitude trickles down to America’s youth, who look to adults to develop a sense of what is right or wrong.
Related: LGBTQ youth summit shut down to avoid clash with Trump
In the video, the boy goes on a five minute rant about an “influx” of queer kids at his school. “More people are coming into the ninth grade that are gay,” he says. “I’m also going to call them fa**ots, and if that offends you, unfriend me on Facebook because I really don’t care. And it’s not so much that they’re gay, it’s that they are flashing their gayness to everybody, and that’s the part that’s pissing me off.”
He continues: “I don’t want to see two little queers walking down the hallway grabbing each other’s butts. I just can’t take that — that’s disgusting to me.”
If a straight couple wants to do the same thing, he later explains, that’s a totally different story.
Also among his list of offenses are boys who dye their hair or “act like women.” Actually, he thinks many of them aren’t gay at all, and are only seeking attention with their “queerness.”
“To be honest with you,” he says, “I don’t think most people want to see that, because it’s not that accepted — it’s really not.”
Related: Is the White House intentionally trolling LGBTQ Americans by threatening their rights?
We sincerely hope this boy develops beyond his current state of ignorance, and it’s certainly possible that he will.
But unfortunately, his adolescent view of the world falls in line with a large and vocal group of adults who also perceive anything different from them as offensive and a threat. And that’s to say nothing of the fact that homophobia has been linked to same-sex attraction.
According to the 2015 GLSEN National School Climate Survey, anti-LGBT harassment at schools is on the decline, and we want to see that trend continue even in the face of a new government run by bullies.
Watch below if you want a firsthand look at what many kids are up against every day:
Gay Rant from JoeJoestar on Vimeo.
Trump SCOTUS Nominee Neil Gorsuch ‘Founded’ ‘Fascism Forever Club’ in Prep School
From the “you can’t make this up” department, it appears that Neil Gorsuch claimed to have founded a “Fascism Forever Club “ while at Georgetown Prep, from which he graduated in 1985.
Known to be fiercely conservative at Georgetown Prep School, #Gorsuch joked in yearbook he founded and led “Fascism Forever Club” pic.twitter.com/zrZZ53iP4I
— Michael J O’Loughlin (@MikeOLoughlin) February 1, 2017
The man who has been nominated to replace the late Justice Scalia on the Supreme Court, apparently in more ways than one, included an organization by that name on his yearbook page, declaring himself its founder and president. That he would later be put forth by an administration many have warned has fascist tendencies is one of those coincidences that would almost be amusing if it were not so chilling.
Even if it is just an example of a young, entitled man’s strange sense of humor, the fact that he also included a notorious Kissinger quote—“The illegal we do immediately; the unconstitutional takes a little longer”—both there and in his Columbia University yearbook should also give pause. This is, after all, a man who may soon decide the definition of unconstitutional.
Gorsuch, a federal judge who sits on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, is by all accounts a solidly credentialed jurist. But that does not mean he should escape the same sort of scrutiny he wishes to apply to the Constitution.
Just like Merrick Garland, Neil Gorsuch is a respected judge. He should receive the same type of fair & honest consideration in the Senate.
— Mark Takano (@RepMarkTakano) February 1, 2017
The post Trump SCOTUS Nominee Neil Gorsuch ‘Founded’ ‘Fascism Forever Club’ in Prep School appeared first on Towleroad.
Trump SCOTUS Nominee Neil Gorsuch ‘Founded’ ‘Fascism Forever Club’ in Prep School
Did you notice Denis Leary and Kellyanne Conway look exactly alike? Denis Leary did.
If “alternative facts” are officially a thing, surely alternative realities are a distinct possibility, too.
Well, on one such inter-dimensional plane, Kellyanne Conway may be a piece of performance art by actor/comedian Denis Leary, and not the unsettling talking head who speaks of “gaping, seeping wounds” and attends presidential inaugurations dressed like The Nutcracker.
You have to admit, Conway and Leary look a great deal alike. It’s not lost on him, either.
Related: 10 things Kellyanne Conway looked like other than a respectable politico at Trump’s inauguration
The comparison was first made on Twitter this week by British comedian David Baddiel, who posted pics of the two personalities and wrote “I remain convinced that Kellyanne Conway is a character played by Denis Leary.”
I remain convinced that @KellyannePolls is a character played by @denisleary pic.twitter.com/e73UqgRMf4
— David Baddiel (@Baddiel) January 31, 2017
Related: Randy Rainbow’s “Interview” With Trump’s Attorney May As Well Be True
Denis Leary thinks Baddiel might be onto something, adding: “And I better win a fu*king Oscar for this role.”
And I better win a fucking Oscar for this role: t.co/s6MYvOyjL5
— Denis Leary (@denisleary) January 31, 2017
Oh, and let’s not forget that Kellyanne Conway has also tried her hand at stand-up comedy…
President Takes to Twitter to Defend Hate Speech
Trump adviser Steve Bannon is a close ally of Milo Yiannopoulos.
www.advocate.com/politics/2017/2/02/president-takes-twitter-defend-hate-speech
Could the new ‘Doctor Who’ be an out gay man? (Yes, he could.)
Peter Capaldi announced this week that he will end his run in the role of The Doctor in the BBC television show “Doctor Who” at the end of the 2017 season, making way for a new actor to take on the iconic part.
Capaldi has been playing The Doctor since 2013.
Bookies have placed odds on openly gay actor Ben Whishaw to replace Capaldi, reports Gay Times.
Related: “Coronation Street” actor Rob Mallard comes out as gay
This is not the first time fans have expected Whishaw to win the part, as many expected he would take over for Matt Smith back in 2013.
In those years, he has instead starred in a number of films and television projects, including the BBC Two drama “London Spy,” for which he won a BAFTA nomination for best actor, and the films “Lilting,” “The Lobster,” and “The Danish Girl.”
Related: An interview with Hong Khaou, the writer and director of “Lilting”
He came out publicly in 2013, and announced at the same time that he was in a civil partnership with Australian composer Mark Bradshaw, which they entered into in 2012.
Watch Whishaw in action in the video below.
Tony Perkins Remains Bullish That Trump Will Issue ‘Religious Freedom’ Executive Order
Tony Perkins remains bullish that the Trump administration will still target the LGBT community with a forthcoming executive order.
The leader of the Family Research Council, designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group, spoke with Fox News following Trump’s address today at the National Prayer Breakfast, in which he vowed to lift the Johnson amendment that prevents the endorsement of political candidates by tax-exempt religious organizations. On the subject of the draft executive order on “religious freedom” that has been circulating, Perkins declared himself “optimistic that this administration is going to address that.” He had previously expressed similar confidence on the matter even though the administration claims it has no plans to sign it.
The EO is entitled “Establishing a Government-Wide Initiative to Respect Religious Freedom,” and would allow so-called exemptions from federal law for groups and individuals who maintain religious objections to same-sex marriage, trans identity, and a raft of other similar issues.
When confronted with the apropos words of Sarah Kate Ellis, the GLAAD president, that this EO “would be a national license to discriminate, and it would endanger LGBTQ people and their families,” Perkins ignored the point entirely.
Referring to sexual and gender identity as “doing anything you want and making everybody embrace it,” he claimed that the free market would provide a failsafe. It is the same sort of argument that justified Jim Crow laws in the South and does not acknowledge that this purported “free” market itself would be sectioned off from entire segments of the population.
Watch:
The post Tony Perkins Remains Bullish That Trump Will Issue ‘Religious Freedom’ Executive Order appeared first on Towleroad.
Tony Perkins Remains Bullish That Trump Will Issue ‘Religious Freedom’ Executive Order
