Thursday, February 28, 2008

The Sentinel: Shower-Nuts Lied To People

I'm glad to see this story. I have wondered if there wasn't any law regulating what you can tell people when you get them to sign a petition.

Unfortunately for us, The Sentinel is behind a paywall. Here's the story.
Petition Faces Big Road Blocks

A top attorney with Montgomery County said that some if not all of the signatures gathered by Citizens for a Responsible Government for a petition may be invalid if it is born out that petitioners were misrepresenting the contents of the petition to potential signers.

Citizens as diverse as members of the media, church goers, county council members and their staffers have reported that the CRG, a group responsible for a petition drive to try and get a referendum vote on County Council bill 23-07, which protects transgender individuals from being discriminated against in employment, housing and public accommodations, have been misrepresenting the content of the bill and their petition for several weeks.

True, that. We heard them say all kinds of stuff. They said, This law will require men and women to use the same bathroom. They said it would enable pedophiles and predators to come into ladies rooms. We saw one guy with a sign that said, "Protect our children," though the law has nothing whatsoever to do with children.

Hey, we know of at least one person who signed it because it said "Just the Facts" on it, and they thought it was "Teach the Facts." They asked the petition-pusher, is this Teach the Facts, and were told yes, it was. Another person said they almost signed it, thinking it was us, but caught themselves at the last minute.
The Council passed the bill unanimously in November. CRG claims that the bill grants special rights to transgender people and provides easy access for pedophiles and adult men to women's bathrooms and locker rooms.

When asked if verbally misrepresenting a petition while gathering signatures can invalidate the petition, the attorney, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said, "It could." He also confirmed that he has heard about several people familiar with the bill being misinformed about its content by signature gatherers.

The County Board of Elections is currently evaluating the more than 30,000 signatures gathered by the group. Twenty-five thousand valid signatures are needed to get a question on the ballot in November asking about repealing the bill.

During CRG's push to collect signatures, several people familiar with the legislation said many of the petitioners were inaccurate about what the bill allows. Council President Mike Knapp said he got into an argument with one CRG member gathering signatures at a polling place on Maryland's presidential primary last Tuesday.

"I asked them if they knew what they were promoting," Knapp said.

"They were misinformed in what they were telling people."

Knapp said when he explained that the legislation doesn't say anything about bathrooms or locker rooms to the petitioner, they replied, "I think you're wrong." They asked Knapp how he knew, and Knapp said, "Well, I voted for the bill."

Asked how the petitioner was misrepresenting the legislation, Knapp said, "They were asking, do you want your kids sharing bathrooms with adults of the opposite sex?" Knapp added, "To their credit, the person that was there didn't know a lot about it [the bill]."

Dr. Dana Beyer, Senior Policy Analyst to Council Member Duchy Trachtenberg said she also confronted some signature gatherers last weekend outside of area grocery stores.

By law, every page of the petition must have a summary of the bill printed on it. The summary must be approved by the Board of Elections attorney when the final petition is turned in. A full copy of the bill must also be present at each petitioning site. Board of Election attorney Kevin Karpinski said that it is very rare that someone gathering signatures misrepresents legislation because the summary is right there.

"If there was a misunderstanding, it was on the part of the individual signing the petition," CRG spokeswoman Michelle Turner said.

I am interrupting this narrative to make you think twice about that last line. Do you remember when P.T. Barnum had a sign at the circus that said "Egress" and pointed to a door? Customers who had never seen an "egress" before went through the door and found they were outside and had to pay again to get back in. As Barnum would say, "There's a sucker born every minute." Ms. Turner is also happy to blame the poor sucker who signs the petition thinking he is making children safer, when in fact it's about discrimination against a vulnerable minority. They should have known better, she's saying.
She emphasized the fact that a summary was provided and a full copy of the bill was present at every site.

"It shouldn't be overlooked that petition gatherers were being harassed and intimidated," Turner said.

She added that one transgender individual introduced herself as a senior member of the Montgomery County Council and abused her authority by doing so.

CRG's director Theresa Rickman said she provided volunteers with talking points and literature to pass out, which is all legal. "I think Mr. Knapp is confused," Rickman said. "I don't think he's looked at this bill in the context of what it changes."

"This bill doesn't address the conflict between gender identity and personal privacy," Rickman continued.

"What we think is, if you have male genitalia, you can't go in. I challenge the county attorney to publish a legal opinion that says this legislation doesn't cover bathrooms."

But Knapp says it may be Rickman who is confused, and there could be ramifications when the petitions are evaluated. "I think there are going to be some issues there," Knapp said. "If you have well intentioned, critically minded people who are out there on the basis of misinformation, that's not right."

The Board of Elections plans to have a final signature tally by March 9.

There is currently no law regulating who can go into what bathroom, and never has been. It sounds like the Citizens for a Responsible Whatever are saying they want a different law, one that regulates restroom access.

What they really want is the re-legalization of discrimination against transgender people, and the only way they can get the county to go along with it is by lying to everybody. I will be curious to see how far that gets them.

108 Comments:

Anonymous Derrick said...

Isn't lying a sin, Theresa, Michelle and Ruth? SHAMEFUL!!! I'll keep praying for you.

February 28, 2008 2:42 PM  
Anonymous objective observer said...

Does everyone see what Jim has done here? Faking umbrage at the "lies" of CRG, he tells a tall tale himself. The title "Sentinel: Shower-Nuts Lied To People" is a lie. The Sentinel reported on statements made by both sides. It didn't take a position.

It's not surprising that Knapp or a county attorney or Duchy or Beyer says the petitioners are lying. The petition, and there hasn't been a successful one recalling a county law for decades, represents a rebuke of the County Council. Of course they want to discredit it. They're hardly objective.

February 28, 2008 3:31 PM  
Anonymous Derrick said...

OO- do you know how to fly a kite?

If not, learn!

DKR

February 28, 2008 3:45 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Unobjective Observer you've proven again and again that you're the one that's not objective. No one in their right mind opposes the equal rights of those who harm no one.

February 28, 2008 3:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

In that case, the council can continue putting up "whites" only signs on bathrooms across the county, can't they Jim ?

And the media is merrilying following Mike Knapp around as he essentially says the public accomodations code (written 30 years ago) to desegregate public accomodations and their facilities was never intended to racially desegregate bathrooms. Really ?

That's news to ever Lawyer in MC. Public accomodations don't include bathrooms... and the sun will set in the east this evening.

February 28, 2008 4:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Andrea- not anon
Of course, the petition collectors lied and Michelle- so proud of her liars- counted on people not to read. People were suckered into signing and that is what CRG counted on. if they had told the truth- some people would have signed- we saw their comments on the on-lin petition. However, many others would have signed up to support discrimination.

Hey, any reports yet on the Showernuts explanation of how their kindly petition collectors called me a facist and told me I should be aborted???? I haven't heard Theresa- I have an answer for everything- explain.

February 28, 2008 5:02 PM  
Anonymous objective observer said...

"Of course, the petition collectors lied and Michelle- so proud of her liars- counted on people not to read."

Differences of opinion on how a law will be interpretted are not lies. Saying they are is a lie. County officials themselves have said the law would likely be interpretted to allow men who dress as women into bathrooms but they changed their story when it became clear CRG was getting traction with their arguments.

"Hey, any reports yet on the Responsible Government explanation of how their kindly petition collectors called me a facist and told me I should be aborted????"

My guess is you went out with the same nasty attitude you project here. Acting confrontional, screaming epithets and accusations- if you're going to try to raise a ruckus and disrupt an orderly democratic process, you shouldn't be surprised if a few people without the patience of a saint send a few insults your way.

Of course, that's assuming you're telling the truth. That's a big "if", considering the kind of hyperbole we've seen from you.

February 28, 2008 5:20 PM  
Anonymous Derrick said...

Anon- I have a great kite for you... may I give it to you as a gift?!

Segregation...well, if you want to go by those standards, the Bible is ALL ABOUT IT! However, TTF is not.

So, as it looks, CRW(eirdos) would support segregation! SHAME!

February 28, 2008 5:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It is the county council trying to claim that bathrooms are "distincty private and personal" and thus not covered by the public accomodations desegregation law, not us.

February 28, 2008 5:30 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Unobjective observer said "In that case, the council can continue putting up "whites" only signs on bathrooms across the county, can't they Jim ?".

You've been justifying that very thing all along, insisting that people should be allowed to associate with whomever they choose and that business owners be allowed to set their own rules for who gets to use their bathrooms.

February 28, 2008 5:31 PM  
Anonymous Derrick said...

AnonFreak, you are a mess.

February 28, 2008 5:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

No, we think bathrooms should be seperated by biology. Simple, easy, not discriminatory.

We are not the ones saying business owners should be able to decide, that would be Knapp again (we can't find any justifaction for that position in the law, either).

February 28, 2008 5:57 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Andrea- not anon
OO- you are a jerk and a liar. I stood quietly with a sign and with handouts for decline to sign. I asked people who the baseball cap guy buttonholed to please read my hand out before signing. Your thug friends yelled at me and baseball cap guy threatened me with the police and by screaming at me to leave. And no one who ever tells anyone they should be aborted has anything to do with "the patience of a saint".

And I don't lie- I don't need to-the truth is enough when you know what you are doing is right. and unlike your pathetic friends, I wasn't ashamed to tell them who I was but Baseball cap guy freaked when I asked his name- and wouldn't give it.

February 28, 2008 5:59 PM  
Anonymous Derrick said...

AnonFreak, want to meet for coffee?

Just give me your first name and we'll go from there. I am Derrick (I started, your turn---since you are all about game-playing and immature tactic). Typical CRW(eirdo) game... SICKOS!

February 28, 2008 6:03 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"Unobjective observer said "In that case, the council can continue putting up "whites" only signs on bathrooms across the county, can't they Jim ?"."

Guys, you're arguing with two different people. OO and anonymous are not synonymous.

Derrick, maybe we'll get some coffee later in the Spring. Can't get away this time of year.

You won't take my picture and put it on the internet, will you?

February 28, 2008 6:07 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"OO- you are a jerk and a liar. I stood quietly with a sign and with handouts for decline to sign."

Well, if that's all you did then I'm on your side. Those guys need to get some manners.

Let's say, theoretically, you did do what I said earlier. Would these guys have been justified in returning the same treatment, in your opinion?

February 28, 2008 6:10 PM  
Blogger BlackTsunami said...

getting back to the point:

I wouldn't mind seeing the talking points given out.

And also, I do remember that volunteer who said on camera that the law would lead to men being able to go in the ladies room, even if they are not "dressed up like a woman" (i'm paraphrasing).

now where would she get such a notion if not from the talking points?

February 28, 2008 6:36 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think you can find the talking points on their web site notmyshower.net

February 28, 2008 6:50 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Unobjective observer said "Guys, you're arguing with two different people. OO and anonymous are not synonymous".

Stop lying Red Baron, you claim to be a Christian and that's against your ten commandments. Its immoral for you to pretend to be more than one person.

February 28, 2008 7:29 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

Believe what you want, Priya.

February 28, 2008 8:06 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"Stop lying Red Baron, you claim to be a Christian and that's against your ten commandments."

By the bye, Priya, which commandment would that be?

February 28, 2008 8:35 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

I have a request of Theresa.

When I made comments (which I believed were accurate though snarky) about her masculine appearance in the photo Jim posted, she complained vociferously and asked me to remove my comments.

I couldn't, but asked Jim to do so out of respect.

So now I am asking Theresa to call Lou Sheldon (I'm sure you have his number) and ask him to take down his TVC webpage where Anna Lafferty called me a "she-male," mentally ill, and insinuated I'm a pedophile and a predator.

February 28, 2008 10:12 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

Oh, Anon, keep showing us your ignorance about "biology." You're a real gem, and should be studied in high school biology.

February 28, 2008 10:42 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Dana wrote: So now I am asking Theresa to call Lou Sheldon (I'm sure you have his number) and ask him to take down his TVC webpage where Anna Lafferty called me a "she-male," mentally ill, and insinuated I'm a pedophile and a predator.

______

Rio Theresa will do this? Her behavior has been one of the sense of entitlement in telling everyone else what to do, think, feel and throw in there only seeing things in her bigoted/hateful way. Hey the whole CRW(hatevers)behave this way.

What Anna Lafferty wrote was horrid and way beyond any word description. There will most likely be special place in Hell for people like that.

Ted

February 28, 2008 11:37 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"So now I am asking Theresa to call Lou Sheldon (I'm sure you have his number) and ask him to take down his TVC webpage"

This is a little unfair, Dana. You asked someone to delete your own words. Theresa didn't write the story about you.

February 29, 2008 12:17 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

OO said, This is a little unfair, Dana. You asked someone to delete your own words. Theresa didn't write the story about you.

______________

Uh huh.. and you think they do not know each other? OO open your OO wider if you cannot see that.

The kind of hatred they both spew can and does cause hate crimes.

Ted

February 29, 2008 1:38 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hmmm....apparently, conspiratorial paranoia is yet another aspect of the gay psychosis.

February 29, 2008 7:33 AM  
Anonymous Derrick said...

Oh, AnonFrea. Why do hate yourself so much?? You're obsession with hating GLBT individuals is a true color of your insecurities with your own sexuality.

February 29, 2008 8:07 AM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

I made the request of Theresa. I believe she knows Lou Sheldon, or, at a minimum, is in contact with someone in his office.

Yesterday at the House of Delegates for the marriage equality hearing I bumped into a colleague by the name of Rick Bowers. Rick is head of Defend Maryland Marriage, the most vociferous organization in Maryland opposing marriage equality and promoting a constitutional amendment.

OK, you might ask, why would I be speaking with him, let alone be on friendly terms?

Because, first of all, I make it a habit of engaging with my adversaries. If a civil dialogue is possible, I go for it. It is what I do, and have always done. I can say that when elected I will represent all the people, and that includes those who don't want to even acknowledge my existence.

During last year's Senate hearing Rick happened to stick around for the trans civil rights bill hearing. Afterwards he grabbed my arm, begged me not to leave because he wanted to talk to me. As you might imagine, I was stunned, but I walked with him to the rotunda and we talked for fifteen minutes. He told me he had no idea who I was, no idea what being trans was about, and after having listened to me and the other witnesses that he was my friend and that I had his support.

This is less surprising than you might think, Theresa and her merry band notwithstanding.

So yesterday we were catching up and I mentioned the vile TVC slander. He was appalled, whipped out his cell and called Lou Sheldon. Now, of course, maybe he was calling his boss, or secretary, and just pretending to call Sheldon. I prefer to trust him and believe he was offended and was trying to correct the problem. I appreciate the act, and I have no doubt that Theresa can do the same. Sheldon might not listen to Bowers, but he would listen to her because she is, at a minimum, passively complicit in the TVC slander.

So, Theresa, I'm sure you've read this by now. When can I expect the page to be taken down and a retraction printed?

February 29, 2008 8:47 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

According to account, Dana used her County Council employment status to try and get CRG’s petitioners thrown out. Did the members of the County Council sanction Dana to do this? Did the County Council sanction Dana to harass and intimidate the petitioners and signers of the petition?

February 29, 2008 10:38 AM  
Blogger MonicaH said...

There is something that people seemed to forget when they are trying to defend this law. At this point in time, 37% of America's population ALREADY LIVES IN JURISDICTIONS THAT PROTECT TRANSGENDER PEOPLE. Some of them since the 1980s.

The bigots have used the bathroom issue since the dawn of mankind, when people peed in caves. And yet, there has NEVER been any male person arrested for being a predetor in a woman's restroom. None. Zero. Nadda. Zippo. It is an unrefutable fact. And, if a man wants to attack women and children in women's bathroom, he isn't going to wait for any law to justify him going in there. Geesh!

If the Maryland bigots are so hot on this issue, then ask for proof that this has been a problem in other jurisdiction. I'm disappointed that the trans people in MD are not repeating this fact over . . . and over . . . and over . . .

February 29, 2008 10:52 AM  
Anonymous MCPS Mom said...

According to what account, Anon? An account by the CRG who scripted fraudulent talking points about what the law said for their volunteers to use in their attempts to fool voters into signing petitions?

February 29, 2008 11:48 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

"If the Maryland bigots are so hot on this issue, then ask for proof that this has been a problem in other jurisdiction."

It hasn't, Monica, because other jurisdictions have made reasonable exceptions for bathroom facilities, religious institutions and businesses under a certain threshhold. The problem here is a radical group has gained influence and is emboldened by the delusion that anything goes in MC. They may be surprised by the outcome. Or maybe not, since they seem so determined to keep this issue from voters, they may already know that a full public discussion and vote will reveal that MC is not the place it's assumed to be.

CRG, for example, clearly doesn't want the discrimination bill. They have publicly committed, however, to acquiesence if the exemptions can be realized. It's your extremist, uncompromising friends causing the problem.

As with the grocery stores a couple of weeks ago, they think causing a ruckus is the way to achieve their goals. Voting citizens aren't going to be impressed.

February 29, 2008 1:53 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

Wyatt,

I have invited Theresa for months, and she has never responded. All you have to do is check the TVC website to understand what this is about.

As Monica has made clear, there has never been an incident in any bathroom, something you clearly know. There is no religious exemption in MoCo for discrimination of any sort, so there should not be for anti-trans bigotry.

February 29, 2008 3:06 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The only ones causing the ruckus are the liars of the CRG, who even after they have been repeatedly told the law is not about bathrooms, insist that it is. It is a NON-discrimination bill to prevent discriminatory practices against transgender people in employment, housing, and taxi service. Every citizen of MoCo is already protected from discrimination based on their religion. But by all means, keep lying to your choir -- those lemmings eat it up.

February 29, 2008 3:17 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"There is no religious exemption in MoCo for discrimination of any sort, so there should not be for anti-trans bigotry."

Many religions feel transgenderism is a form of homosexuality. Whether they are right or not is not a matter for governmental involvement because we value religious freedom. Basically, if you believe transgenderism is acceptable, you have different religious beliefs than some religions. Religious groups should be free to hire those who believe in their cause.

Do you want to work for an organization that holds this view? There is little slave labor left these days. Most people want to work somewhere where they believe in the organization.

You were wrong to omit this. Admit it and fix it.

"The only ones causing the ruckus are the liars of the CRG, who even after they have been repeatedly told the law is not about bathrooms, insist that it is. It is a NON-discrimination bill to prevent discriminatory practices against transgender people in employment, housing, and taxi service."

And, as you so deftly omit, public facilities.

February 29, 2008 3:37 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron said "Many religions feel transgenderism is a form of homosexuality. Whether they are right or not is not a matter for governmental involvement because we value religious freedom.".

Your right to religious freedom ends where it infringes upon the rights of others. The right to religious freedom is not absolute. Your bible commands that gays be put to death. You most certainly do not have the right to religious freedom to pursue that. You have the right to do whatever you want as long as you don't interfere in someone else's right to do the same.

February 29, 2008 4:20 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"Your right to religious freedom ends where it infringes upon the rights of others."

Jobs, taxis, cable TV and bathrooms are not rights. They are granted only with the consent of the deliverer of the services.

We aren't slaves in the U.S.. We are free to associate with and provide services to whoever we wish to.

We aren't socialists in the U.S.. We have property rights. The government can't tell us who to provide the use of our property to.

"The right to religious freedom is not absolute."

It is for Christians. This is because our society is based on Christianity.

As the bible says of Christian ideals, "against such things, they are no laws."

"Your bible commands that gays be put to death."

The Bible says God will put unrepentant gays to death. Christians aren't charged with doing it. As with all sinners, Christians are charged with offering the gospel of mercy to gays. What Christians seek is to reconcile as many as possible to God.

"You most certainly do not have the right to religious freedom to pursue that."

Don't tell me. Putting anyone to death is not required of Christians so this is academic.

"You have the right to do whatever you want as long as you don't interfere in someone else's right to do the same."

Exactly. Same with gays. I have the right to associate with whoever I want and gays have the same right.

No one has a right to endorsement.

February 29, 2008 4:56 PM  
Blogger JimK said...

00 Of course that's an easy philosophical stance to take, but our society has by consensus decided that fairness is going to be a value we expect, and one that we will let our government enforce. It is fine to discriminate on the basis of merit, but we do not consider it acceptable to discriminate based on certain traits. Some years ago, it was acceptable to use race, or religion, and now it's not. More recently it was acceptable to discriminate based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Now it's not. There will always be people such as yourself who want to go back to stereotypes and prejudice. I hope you are always outnumbered, but of course there's a chance that your viewpoint will predominate if the rest of us are not vigilant.

JimK

February 29, 2008 5:23 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron said "Jobs, taxis, cable TV and bathrooms are not rights. They are granted only with the consent of the deliverer of the services.".

People have the right to be considered for a job based solely on their ability to do the job. People have a right to public services. The deliverer of such services must serve all who are qualified to receive them. If you make your living off the public you are obliged to serve the public - all of it, no "whites only" signs or "we don't serve transexuals" allowed.

I said "The right to religious freedom is not absolute."

Red Baron said "It is for Christians. This is because our society is based on Christianity.".

Christians most certainly do not have an absolute right to religious freedom and your society most definitely is not based on Christianity. Your constitution never mentions god or Christianity, it specifically requires the seperation of churcn and state and the government cannot favour any one religion (or lack thereof) over any other. You do not live in your longed for Christian theocracy.

Red Baron said "The Bible says God will put unrepentant gays to death. Christians aren't charged with doing it."

Wrong. Leviticus 20:13 says:

If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.





It does not say "I will put them to death", it gives the order that "they must be put to death". the inescapable implication is that Christians are to do it. One does not say "they must be put to death" if one intends to do it oneself.

Red baron said " I have the right to associate with whoever I want and gays have the same right.".

False. Gays are obligated by law to associate with (not discriminate against) Christians. You have a special right under the law they do not have. No special rights for Christians. By the same token both gays and Christians are obligated to associate with blacks and jews - no one has the free right to discriminate as they choose.

February 29, 2008 5:28 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

Hey, I had a brilliant response to Jim's remarks above and they somehow disappeared in posting. Oh well, no time to repeat now.

Priya, I also have no time for one of your extended debates on religion. I will say, however, that the purpose of seperation of church and state was to protect Christianity from governement not the other way around. You should read more outside of your comfort zone.

Furthermore, the civil laws within the ancient state of Israel were instituted by God for that society to demonstrate righteousness. Christians have been freed from the law. They live under grace. You don't seem to understand that not only gays are under a death sentence from the Mosaic law but all people are. All of us have broken these laws and deserve death. There is no one left capable of enforcing or penalizing the violation of these laws save God. Straights are as condemned as gays. Before we start killing gays for breaking laws, we'd have to kill ourselves first. Read the Sermon on the Mount for details.

We are all sinners in need of a way out. Christ is the way not judging others.

February 29, 2008 6:48 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron, the people who founded the states were eager to escape an oppressive religious regime in England. They purposely prevented religion from dominating the states because they knew that was tyranny.

Red Baron said "Furthermore, the civil laws within the ancient state of Israel were instituted by God for that society to demonstrate righteousness."

The idea that it "deomonstrates righteousness" to put innoncent gays to death is preposterous - it demonstrates exactly the opposite of that.

Red Baron said "There is no one left capable of enforcing or penalizing the violation of these laws save God.".

Your imaginary god's never penalized anyone and never will. Its always been up to humans to penalize those who break the rules of fairness and always will be. If we leave justice up to your "god" anarchy will reign supreme - that's why we've never done that.

February 29, 2008 7:14 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

I'm still waiting for Theresa's response about her calling TVC to ask them to take the posting down.

I know she's not busy because she's got nothing to do now but wait for the BoE and for us to finish our jobs.

February 29, 2008 9:04 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"the people who founded the states were eager to escape an oppressive religious regime in England. They purposely prevented religion from dominating the states because they knew that was tyranny."

The idea that the colonists left England to escape a theocracy is completely ignorant.

We can start with the Pilgrims. They didn't think England was too religious. They thought it wasn't religious enough. Read some of their writings. They came to found the New Jerusalem.

Move forward to the 1700's. In the middle of the century came one of the greatest revivals the world has ever known. The generation raised by these pious converts were completely brought up in a Christian environment. Convinced of the Protestant idea of the equality of all men before God, they asked themselves what kind of a government God would want them to have. Their answer was a representative democracy with inalienable rights guaranteed by a system of checks and balances. Before you start arguing, go find a history professor and have a chat with him.

England wasn't "an oppressive religious regime", it was an oppressive licentious and hedonistic society.

"The idea that it "deomonstrates righteousness" to put innoncent gays to death is preposterous - it demonstrates exactly the opposite of that."

They are not innocent before God. No one is.

"Your imaginary god's never penalized anyone and never will. Its always been up to humans to penalize those who break the rules of fairness and always will be. If we leave justice up to your "god" anarchy will reign supreme - that's why we've never done that."

And that's why there is so little justice in the world and always has been. Fallen men can't be trusted. That's why our system of checks and balances was created, acknowledging the biblical view of the essentially fallen nature of man.

February 29, 2008 9:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"I'm still waiting for Theresa's response about her calling TVC to ask them to take the posting down."

She has no obligation to do so. She didn't write anything derogatory about you like you did to her.

You've already had a person with more influence call the guy. Why do you think Theresa knows the people who write that column.

February 29, 2008 9:18 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

Anon,

You don't need to answer for Theresa -- she's a big girl, and owes me the decency of a response.

I may have been snarky to her, but calling her "masculine-looking" or something to that effect is not rude in my book, and pretty mild. Her allies have called me a "she-male" and insinuated that I'm a pedophile and predator -- that's slander, and I don't think she wants to be caught up in that net. Given that there is a quote from her close friend, John Garza, and that the material is obviously culled from the CRG, it is clearly her responsibility.

February 29, 2008 9:37 PM  
Anonymous oo said...

"Of course that's an easy philosophical stance to take, but our society has by consensus decided that fairness is going to be a value we expect, and one that we will let our government enforce. It is fine to discriminate on the basis of merit, but we do not consider it acceptable to discriminate based on certain traits. Some years ago, it was acceptable to use race, or religion, and now it's not. More recently it was acceptable to discriminate based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Now it's not. There will always be people such as yourself who want to go back to stereotypes and prejudice. I hope you are always outnumbered, but of course there's a chance that your viewpoint will predominate if the rest of us are not vigilant."

Jim, my viewpoint is that discrimination based on behavioral and psychic criteria should be permissible. Personally, I tend toward compassion and would probably not do so outside of the context of a decision-maker in a religious institution or in a situation where it would be detrimental to the mission of an organization. Still, it should be permissible to maintain freedom of association. Forcing people with opposed views together doesn't promote harmony, it promotes bad feelings.

Modernity is not a factor here, btw. Many cultures in the past have embraced "sexual minorities."
The most famous example is Germany after WWI. Gays and transgenders were a socially acceptable part of the culture. This is why gays were heavily represented in the Nazi party at its beginning. Indeed, the SA, led by a gay guy and his gay right-hand man, were key to the Nazi climb to power. These "stormtroopers", who counted a large number of gays in their ranks in addition to their leadership, would go around raising a ruckus any time a protest was organized by opponents of the Nazi regime.

Eerie, huh?

You see the normalization of homosexuality is not some novel twenty-first century phenomena. It's been tried many times before and will be tried again in the future.

February 29, 2008 9:38 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

"that's slander, and I don't think she wants to be caught up in that net. Given that there is a quote from her close friend, John Garza, and that the material is obviously culled from the CRG, it is clearly her responsibility"

Clearly not. She didn't slander you.

February 29, 2008 9:40 PM  
Blogger JimK said...

00, I'm not going to pretend you are trying to reason with me, but I'll respond to some of your provocations.

discrimination based on behavioral and psychic criteria is a meaningless phrase, it's just a set-up to let in the stuff that makes you uncomfortable.

Nobody here believes you "tend toward compassion," we've seen what you've been saying this whole time.

The idea is not to "promote harmony," the idea is much simpler than that. Say a transgender person needs to pee -- they ought to be allowed to pee, if everybody else is allowed to. Say they need a taxi -- the taxi ought to stop. Taxi driver doesn't have to feel good about it, but the person needs a ride.

As for the Nazis, I appreciate that you would like to bring them into this, but it has nothing to do with anything, and your slime isn't sticking. It just makes you look stupid for trying something like that.

There's nothing here about the "normalization of homosexuality, in fact this isn't about homosexuality at all, and it's not about "normalization" of anything. Person goes into a restaurant, they're hungry, it's open, they ought to be served. There's no more to it than that. If people get over it, fine, but that's not the point. Racism didn't go away but now black people can get served in a restaurant, and I believe they appreciate that even if you don't.

JimK

February 29, 2008 10:05 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

You dolt, I didn't say she slandered me. You don't know how to read? Andrea Lafferty slandered me, TVC slandered me. Theresa's attorney, John Garza, is quoted in their story.

I'm saying that if she doesn't disassociate herself from it, then she will be guilty by association.

February 29, 2008 11:03 PM  
Blogger MonicaH said...

Arguing religion is as pointless as arguing whether to eat turkey or ham at Christmas. It's your choice. (Where have I heard "choice" before? Hummmm.) It seems that those who hate like to quote the Bible, picking and choosing one line out of the Bible, always out of context.

As much as the haters would like to think, this is NOT a religious issue. Sorry boys and girls. It doesn't translate. Jobs do not equal religion. A quick look in a thesaurus will confirm this. You aren't going to make OJ from a Delicious.

And, "bathrooms" are not in the Bible. Do a word search. So, you can't use the Good Book for that, unless you want to whack somebody over the head with it. Oh wait. That's what you've been doing.

So, what do we have after distilling down all of this screaming and whining. One side (the supposed "Christians") have lied, instilled fear in others, lied, spread hate, lied and even suggested transgender people should be put to death. Oh, did I mentioned "lied?"

The other side is trying to use logic and truth, but unfortunately, logic is not a concept the Religious bigots will ever understand. It's as understandable as Chinese is to Ugandans. It's pointless to try to educate those who relish being clueless. Let your votes do the talking. Remember, "37%." They can try, but they can't brush away successes in other places. Seems logical to me.

March 01, 2008 12:29 AM  
Blogger MonicaH said...

There is one thing I have found to be true over the years.

"Mother Nature (God) can think beyond binaries. Human Nature cannot."

Some of the comments here prove that in a big way.

March 01, 2008 12:46 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

"discrimination based on behavioral and psychic criteria is a meaningless phrase"

Well, that's what this bill is based on.

"As for the Nazis, I appreciate that you would like to bring them into this, but it has nothing to do with anything, and your slime isn't sticking."

Oh, you think someone is trying to slime the gay movement with Nazi associations?

That's unconcionable! I mean, what kind of a sick mind would do something like that? Compare someone to Nazis just because they had a different opinion than them?

"Person goes into a restaurant, they're hungry, it's open, they ought to be served."

Then why don't you just go for a law that says that?

It's because the normalization of "sexual minorities" is the real goal.

"I'm saying that if she doesn't disassociate herself from it, then she will be guilty by association."

Well, you're wrong.

"Arguing religion is as pointless as"

The only way to avoid arguing about religion with Priya is to never bring it up.

"It seems that those who hate like to quote the Bible, picking and choosing one line out of the Bible, always out of context."

Priya takes verses out of context all the time and does hate who is not 100% behind the gay movement.

Interesting.

"Jobs do not equal religion."

Jobs in religious institutions do.

"And, "bathrooms" are not in the Bible. Do a word search. So, you can't use the Good Book for that, unless you want to whack somebody over the head with it. Oh wait. That's what you've been doing."

See. This is a lie. CRG has never quoted from the Bible over the bathroom issue.

"One side (the supposed "Christians") have lied, instilled fear in others, lied, spread hate, lied and even suggested transgender people should be put to death. Oh, did I mentioned "lied?""

TTF lies regularly.

"The other side is trying to use logic and truth,"

Except when it doesn't support the gay agenda.

"but unfortunately, logic is not a concept the Religious bigots will ever understand"

Homosexuality is inherently illogical.

March 01, 2008 1:12 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

Fifth post in this thread said…
"In that case, the council can continue putting up "whites" only signs on bathrooms across the county, can't they Jim ?

And the media is merrilying following Mike Knapp around as he essentially says the public accomodations code (written 30 years ago) to desegregate public accomodations and their facilities was never intended to racially desegregate bathrooms. Really ?

That's news to ever Lawyer in MC. Public accomodations don't include bathrooms... and the sun will set in the east this evening."

--
So, Miestress Prevaracatrous, we meet again.

I see you’re back to not signing your posts...

Tell me, how is the repackaging of lies business working out for you? Have shipments been on time? It would seem so, you’ve had some really big deliveries of late.

In fact, if you were to describe yourself, would you say that you were more on the import end of the operation, or the export end?

And out of curiosity, what exactly is the shelf life of a repackaged lie these days?

I ask because they just seem so old.

Ya know, the whole “divide and conquer” thing, by “ensuring the fear and loathing” of a helpless minority thing.

In this case, was it the ‘hope of a better life’ thing that bothered you most?

Did you feel that even that was too much of a possession to own, for those of whom you disdain with such pleasure?

"Peddler on the rooftops," does this describe you, yes or no?

March 01, 2008 6:05 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

OO said...
"discrimination based on behavioral and psychic criteria is a meaningless phrase"
Well, that's what this bill is based on.
"As for the Nazis, I appreciate that you would like to bring them into this, but it has nothing to do with anything, and your slime isn't sticking."
Oh, you think someone is trying to slime the gay movement with Nazi associations?
That's unconcionable! I mean, what kind of a sick mind would do something like that? Compare someone to Nazis just because they had a different opinion than them?
"Person goes into a restaurant, they're hungry, it's open, they ought to be served."
Then why don't you just go for a law that says that?
It's because the normalization of "sexual minorities" is the real goal.
"I'm saying that if she doesn't disassociate herself from it, then she will be guilty by association."
Well, you're wrong.
"Arguing religion is as pointless as"
The only way to avoid arguing about religion with Priya is to never bring it up.
"It seems that those who hate like to quote the Bible, picking and choosing one line out of the Bible, always out of context."
Priya takes verses out of context all the time and does hate who is not 100% behind the gay movement.
Interesting.
"Jobs do not equal religion."
Jobs in religious institutions do.
"And, "bathrooms" are not in the Bible. Do a word search. So, you can't use the Good Book for that, unless you want to whack somebody over the head with it. Oh wait. That's what you've been doing."
See. This is a lie. CRG has never quoted from the Bible over the bathroom issue.
"One side (the supposed "Christians") have lied, instilled fear in others, lied, spread hate, lied and even suggested transgender people should be put to death. Oh, did I mentioned "lied?""
TTF lies regularly.
"The other side is trying to use logic and truth,"
Except when it doesn't support the gay agenda.
"but unfortunately, logic is not a concept the Religious bigots will ever understand"
Homosexuality is inherently illogical.

---
Wow. Gosh. Golly. Gee. OO. Your points are so very…very…valid.

After having read all that, on top of everything else in this thread that's yours, I am officially convinced that you are a member of TTF. Not meant to distract from the issues at hand in any way, but to help provide focus onto the idiocy of CRW “arguments,” and by extention, all religious-supremacist arguments.

I have to admit, you’ve had me going for several months now.

Nope Jim, seriously, there’s nothing you could say or do to convince me that OO is not one of your/our own. It’s not physically possible to be that stupid.

I’ve researched this too, and I am good friends with a Dr…Soinzo, who says the exact same thing as I do. Namely that "It’s just not logically possible to be that stupid."

No, it’s true, he said so. I have no link what-so-ever to back that up with, but it’s still true, so you have to believe me.

Anyway OO, I don’t just love you now, I loove you. Do you get it? I’m playing on your acronym, isn't that funny?

Oh happy day. (or should I say OOh happy day? Silly me, Pfft!)

March 01, 2008 6:42 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Your points are so very…very…valid."

You didn't have to come out and say that, Mr. Emproph.

Just the fact that you go on for line after line without any saying anything else- well, I think that says it all.

March 01, 2008 7:39 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

OO @February 29, 2008 4:56 PM said...

Priya Lynn: "The right to religious freedom is not absolute."

OO: It is for Christians. This is because our society is based on Christianity.

--
Thus, only “Christians” should be allowed to decide the true meaning of “religious freedom.”
---
:::
---
And from the cutting room floor...

And is therefore also a right that exists above and beyond the equal protection for all freedom provided by the United States Constitution.

Religious freedom = absolute freedom for “Christians” alone.

Some religious freedoms are more equal than others.

How is it possible that religious freedom could be based on one religion?

Since when do non-Christian members of society base society on Christianity?

March 01, 2008 7:52 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

"You didn't have to come out and say that, Mr. Emproph.

Just the fact that you go on for line after line without any saying anything else- well, I think that says it all."


In psychology, psychological projection (or projection bias) is a defense mechanism in which one attributes to others one’s own unacceptable or unwanted thoughts or/and emotions. Projection reduces anxiety by allowing the expression of the unwanted subconscious impulses/desires without letting the ego recognize them.

March 01, 2008 7:58 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

Derrick said...
Anon- I have a great kite for you... may I give it to you as a gift?!

And I have a short pier, which I also too would like to give to our beloved Anon, as a gift...

March 01, 2008 8:10 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

"In psychology, psychological projection (or projection bias) is a defense mechanism in which one attributes to others one’s own unacceptable or unwanted thoughts or/and emotions."

Well, right or wrong, I said a number of things. You didn't so that blows your theory.

I assume you think you were trying to make some humorous statements, which I personally enjoy regardless of the point of view, but unfortunately you didn't project well. Humor requires at least some system of logic. You usually say things with no logic at all.

Work on projection of logic.

March 01, 2008 8:42 AM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

I still haven't heard from Theresa.

March 01, 2008 9:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Why should you? You've tried to associate her with comments she didn't make. This is a common tactic of the lunatic fringe.

She's smart not to take the bait.

March 01, 2008 9:21 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

OO said...
"Work on projection of logic."

Look, if you don't want the pier, just say so.

March 01, 2008 9:57 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

No one's walking off the pier, E. The public is rejecting TTF's worldview.

March 01, 2008 10:02 AM  
Blogger BlackTsunami said...

anonymous,

you mean the same way you all tried to associate the curriculum with things it didn't say? You lost there and sooner or later, you will lose here.

And OO,

I don't know how you figure you can speak for the PUBLIC.

March 01, 2008 10:14 AM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

I didn't associate her with comments she didn't make. I associate her with a group making comments in support of her attorney and her position.

She owes me the decency of an apology.

March 01, 2008 10:21 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

Do you owe the world an apology for every insulting remark made by a TTF supporter?

If so, get started. This will take a while.

I can only guess you are feigning this indignation because you believe the media is monitoring the blog. If that not it, what's going on?

March 01, 2008 10:29 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

And again, by the way and for the record:
--
"OO @February 29, 2008 4:56 PM said...

Priya Lynn: "The right to religious freedom is not absolute."

OO: It is for Christians. This is because our society is based on Christianity.

--
I do my best when it comes to logic OO, but if that's not good enough for you, and you have logic better than I, then please help me to understand.

Why don't we start with your very own notion that conservative Christians should be allowed to decide religious freedom for everyone else?

Why do you feel that conservative Christians own the rights to all religious freedom?

March 01, 2008 10:48 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

Ah, some actual substance from Mr E.

Conservative is a nebulous term. Traditional Christianity holds that every man is directly accountable to God. The church is not an intermediary. This is why Christianity is the basis for our Constitution. Alone among world faiths, Christianity seeks those whose heart has been converted- not those who have been compelled to feign faith. Every man is responsible for himself to God.

Remember, it was Jesus who first came up with the notion of a seperation of church and state. He said "My kingdom is not of this world" and "render unto Caesar what is Caesar's".

You see, basing our system of government on Christianity will protect everyone's freedom of religion because freedom of religion is part of the Christian belief system. You can't say that about other major world religions.

March 01, 2008 11:21 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

You see, basing our system of government on Christianity will protect everyone's freedom of religion because freedom of religion is part of the Christian belief system.

But America already has a basis of freedom of religion for all.

How is it that providing one religion with the power to regulate that freedom, then increase that freedom for all?

March 01, 2008 11:50 AM  
Anonymous OO said...

"But America already has a basis of freedom of religion for all."

Yes, it does. It was based, as I've explained to you, on Christian principles. Regognizing that is important.

"How is it that providing one religion with the power to regulate that freedom, then increase that freedom for all?"

I'm not suggesting any changes to entangle religion and government. That would be bad for Christianity. I'm just saying let's not go forward with a faulty concept of how we got here.

March 01, 2008 12:07 PM  
Anonymous svelte_brunette said...

If the CRG really wants to protect our children in bathrooms, why haven’t they gone after Catholic priests? I’m not asking that because the upper echelon of the Catholic Church runs around Italy in fancy silk dresses (I know, they call them “robes” or “vestments,” but they are topologically identical), and they want to keep “guys in dresses” out of the little girls’ room. I’m asking because the Catholic church is currently paying out millions of dollars from diocese around the country for unspeakable acts performed on children spanning at least several decades. This was aided by a church hierarchy which actively moved the pedophiles around to avoid damaging the “good name” of the church – in effect they were harboring fugitives (people who would have otherwise been convicted felons) from the law.

Given the history of the Catholic church (which includes terrorizing Europe with “inquisitors” and burning people at the stake) should we really let their priests mingle unencumbered with our innocent children?

(And for the record, I was born, raised, and baptized in the Catholic Church, and I went to Catholic schools. In fact, I am a by-product of the church’s ban on contraception.)

Peace,

Cynthia

March 01, 2008 12:18 PM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

Paraphrased said...
Me: "America has a basis of freedom of religion."

You: Based on Christian principles. Regognizing that is important.

--
If religious freedom is already recognized and held up as being one of the most important tenets of society, why then the need to recognize this principle as being of a particular religion?

Such freedom is based on the Golden Rule. What does Christianity have to add to the moral principle of the Golden Rule?

Or is it that you feel that the Golden Rule, and the application of it, did not exist before Christianity?

March 01, 2008 12:32 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

CRG doesn't need to "go after" Catholic priests. There are plenty already on that bandwagon.

The Catholics got into this mess because it tolerated gays in its clergy. Because of the vow of celibacy, the priesthood attracted large numbers of gays who found a lifestyle where they could be socially acceptable without having relations with women. The Roman church knew this but looked away out of a misguided sense of compassion. This again shows why we need a religious exemption in this discrimination bill.

Priests aren't, however, going into girls' rooms, as you suggest.

Robes are necessarily women's clothes.

Most of the abuse situations have involved homosexual not heterosexual activity.

The Roman churh's ban on sexual activity for clergy is unbiblical and a major contributing factor to this crisis they are in.

As for the inquisition, it was wrong and, again, an example of the Roman church going astray of biblical principles. This is why we had a Reformation.

Having said that, the horrors of the inquisition have been greatly exagerrated. It was limited to professed Christian believers. The worse excesses came in Spain where the royalty took over the proceedings and used it as a political weapon.

The inquisition lasted 300 years. Any idea how many total people were killed over that span of time? Check it out.

For the record, Cynthia, I'm not a Catholic. As a Calvinist, I have profound differences with the Catholic church. Still, I have to say, the charges against them have been greatly exaggerated.

March 01, 2008 12:52 PM  
Anonymous OO said...

E


Good discussion we're having but I need to get some work done. Hopefully tonight I can get back to you.

March 01, 2008 12:55 PM  
Blogger BlackTsunami said...

OO,

You made a bad fallacy there. A man who molests a boy is not necessarily gay. Sorry, but that is not true and the APA backs me up on that.

March 01, 2008 1:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I didn't make the remark Dana.
I don't believe I have said anything nasty about you, at all, though I have challenged that just because someone believes they are a different gender the rest of us need to automatically accept that - even to the extent of allowing persons with penises in ladies rooms. I feel this is an enormous infringement on my right to privacy.

I don't know anyone over at TVC.

And CRG has not used the kind of terminology that is on the TVC site or other sites....

I am a little shocked that after all the horrible things you have said about me over here that anyone would think I would be motivated to proactively go defend them.

theresa

March 01, 2008 3:02 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron, the united states is not was not founded as a Christian nation no matter how much religionists like you lie about it.

The Treaty of Tripoli, passed by the U.S. Senate in 1797, read in part: "The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion." The treaty was written during the Washington administration, and sent to the Senate during the Adams administration. It was read aloud to the Senate, and each Senator received a printed copy. This was the 339th time that a recorded vote was required by the Senate, but only the third time a vote was unanimous (the next time was to honor George Washington). There is no record of any debate or dissension on the treaty. It was reprinted in full in three newspapers - two in Philadelphia, one in New York City. There is no record of public outcry or complaint in subsequent editions of the papers.

The early presidents and patriots were generally Deists or Unitarians, believing in some form of impersonal Providence but rejecting the divinity of Jesus and the absurdities of the Old and New testaments.

George Washington, the first president of the United States, never declared himself a Christian according to contemporary reports or in any of his voluminous correspondence. Washington Championed the cause of freedom from religious intolerance and compulsion. When John Murray (a universalist who denied the existence of hell) was invited to become an army chaplain, the other chaplains petitioned Washington for his dismissal. Instead, Washington gave him the appointment. On his deathbed, Washinton uttered no words of a religious nature and did not call for a clergyman to be in attendance.

John Adams, the country's second president, was drawn to the study of law but faced pressure from his father to become a clergyman. He wrote that he found among the lawyers 'noble and gallant achievments" but among the clergy, the "pretended sanctity of some absolute dunces". Late in life he wrote: "Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!"

Thomas Jefferson referred to the Revelation of St. John as "the ravings of a maniac" and wrote:
"The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

James Madison, fourth president and father of the Constitution, was not religious in any conventional sense. "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise."
"During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution."

Ethan Allen, whose capture of Fort Ticonderoga while commanding the Green Mountain Boys helped inspire Congress and the country to pursue the War of Independence, said, "That Jesus Christ was not God is evidence from his own words." In the same book, Allen noted that he was generally "denominated a Deist, the reality of which I never disputed, being conscious that I am no Christian." When Allen married Fanny Buchanan, he stopped his own wedding ceremony when the judge asked him if he promised "to live with Fanny Buchanan agreeable to the laws of God." Allen refused to answer until the judge agreed that the God referred to was the God of Nature, and the laws those "written in the great book of nature."

Benjamin Franklin, delegate to the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, said:
As to Jesus of Nazareth, my Opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the System of Morals and his Religion...has received various corrupting Changes, and I have, with most of the present dissenters in England, some doubts as to his Divinity; tho' it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the Truth with less trouble." He died a month later, and historians consider him, like so many great Americans of his time, to be a Deist, not a Christian.

Speaking of the independence of the first 13 States, H.G. Wells in his Outline of History, says:

"It was a Western European civilization that had broken free from the last traces of Empire and Christendom; and it had not a vestige of monarchy left, and no State Religion... The absence of any binding religious tie is especially noteworthy. It had a number of forms of Christianity, its spirit was indubitably Christian; but, as a State document of 1796 expicity declared: 'The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.'"

March 01, 2008 3:20 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red baron we've heard your lies about gays being central to the rise of naziism before and they don't carry any more weight now.

The fact is that prior to the Nazis comming to power there was a flourishing gay communitiy in germany. Within weeks of taking over, the Nazis had destroyed community institutions, expunged books and organised activities designed to instill terror.

The Nazi party from the outset was ideologically hostile to gays. For instance, in 1930 the Volkischer Beobachter, its official newspaper, wrote that "all foul urges of the Jewish soul" come together in homosexuality, and "the law should recognise [them] for what they are - utterly base aberrations of Syrians, extremely serious crimes that should be punished with hanging and deportation".

After the Nazis had secured power in 1933, repression against gays and their collectives increased dramatically. Raids by police and Gestapo throughout the country led to the arrest of significant numbers of gay men. Lists of "homosexually active" persons were established by the police (Reich Office and Gestapo records of "suspects" for just the three years 1937-1940 include the names of over 90.000 individuals). Most bars known as meeting places for gay men and lesbians were closed throughout the country and the few remaining ones served as sources of information for the police and the Gestapo. Libraries and bookshops were purged of "indecent" scientific and literary materials relating to gayness. Emancipatory organisations had to cease their activities, including the publication of their magazines; publishers' stocks were confiscated, forcing them into bankrupcy. The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, a driving force behind the campaign for law reform, was destroyed on 6 May 1933. The writings of its President and Founder, Dr Magnus Hirschfeld, and other scientists were publicly burned on 10 May 1933.

Historians estimate that some 50,000 men were sentenced to severe jail sentences by Nazi judges on the basis of §175. Between 1937 and 1939 alone, 24.447 men were sentenced to jail sentences under §175; no reliable data exist for the years after 1943. Rates of acquittal declined sharply after 1933 and fines were increasingly replaced by imprisonment or penal servitude; clear indications of the heightening of repression.

Up to an estimated 15,000 gay men were deported to concentration camps for "re-education through labour". In the camps they were often subjected to the harshest regime and assigned the most hazardous work duties. As a result, an unknown but large number of these Pink Triangle detainees died in the camps, often from exhaustion. Many were castrated and some subjected to so-called "medical experiments". Instances of collective murder actions against gay detainees, in which hundreds were exterrninated at a time, are well-documented. An as yet undetermined number were forced into military service in so-called punitive battalions, whose high-risk duties included clearing mine fields.

March 01, 2008 3:35 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

Theresa,

I appreciate that you say you didn't make the remark. I never said that you did, only that your organization is linked to TVC and your attorney, Mr. Garza, is quoted by them.

The fact of the matter is that your people, i.e., those whom you've trained, did make those remarks about me and to me on multiple occasions, and in the presence of others. You are personally responsible for their behavior. I would appreciate an apology for their words, since they reflect brightly on you and your organization.

I do not "believe" I am a different gender that the one to which I was assigned in error at birth -- I am, and always was, that different gender. That is a medical fact, and your wishing it were not so is irrelevant. You don't have to like it, you don't have to like me. You do, however, in civil society have to refer to me by my legal designation, and it behooves you as well to treat everyone as they choose to be treated. You may think us deluded, as many of us think your friends are, for other reasons, but this country functions because we live and let live.

As I have made clear, again and again, the odds of you ever encountering a penis in the women's locker room is less than being struck by lightning. You are much more likely to see a woman with an enlarged clitoris that looks like a penis. Be that as it may, no pre-op trans woman would expose herself to you or anyone else. It has simply never happened in these United States. To imply otherwise is dangerous.

And the fact is that the extremely low probability of that occurrence happening to you is the same today as it will be when the bill becomes law, because the bill does nothing to change that. We've been transitioning for decades, before such laws and since, and, as I've reported, there has never been such an incident. It didn't even happen in the incident you staged over at Rio.

The problem is your obsession with the hypothetical, and you do lasting damage to those whose lives are at risk every day because of such fear mongering -- note the three gender variant individuals murdered over the past three weeks -- as well as to those who are swayed by you into developing their own fears. They were fine before they ran into you, and they no longer are. You have not done them any favors.

And your organization's ability to read the minds of pedophiles, remarkable as it may be, also only serves to associate trans women with pedophiles in the minds of the uninformed.

Anyway, as far as TVC is concerned, Rick Bowers managed to get the webpage removed. You might want to speak with him -- he heard me, he LISTENED to me, and now we're friendly colleagues, even though we disagree politely on other issues. You can do the same.

March 01, 2008 11:28 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Way to try to shift the focus off your own words and actions, Dana.

No one's fooled.

Theresa did not insult you. Didn't train anybody else to. Doesn't have any connection to TVC.

Your advisors should not be telling you to do this. It's not improving your position to tell more lies.

Hopefully, Theresa won't make ny more responses to you.

March 02, 2008 6:05 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Red baron we've heard your lies about gays being central to the rise of naziism before and they don't carry any more weight now."

I will have mercy on the readers and won't copy and refute your post word for word. Truth is you don't know what you're talking about and doing even a little research could uncover the truth for you. Gays were indeed central to the rise of Nazism. Here's what happened:

When Hitler was in prison, he became close to a known and open homosexual, Ernst Rohm. During the time he was writing his book, "Mein Kampf", Hitler's closest friend was this homosexual.

When Hitler got out of prison and began forming the Nazi party, he asked Rohm to head up the SA, also known as the stromtroopers, the militant wing of the Nazis. Rohm appointed another gay, Edmund Heines, as his deputy. They promoted and advanced those in the SA who had liaisons with them until the leadership of the SA was dominated by gays. These gays supported Nazism by going around and raising a ruckus whenever a protest against Nazism was taking place. It is arguable that the Nazis wouldn't have succeeded in gaining power without the harassment these gays directed toward peaceful political opponents of the Nazis.

Hitler appreciated the help of his gay friends and has been quoted as telling his leadership not to be judgmental of those with alternative sexual practices as long as they were supporters.

After a few years, however, the extreme tactics of these gays began to become a political liability for Hitler and threatened his standing in the business community. He had to do something to protect his position. Hitler invited the mostly gay leadership of the SA to a hotel for a strategy conference. There he had them rounded up and taken to nearby prison and executed. Because of his personal affection for Rohm, Hitler offered to let him kill himself but Rohm refused and was shot. Heines, btw, wasn't taken to the prison. When soldiers went to his room to arrest him, they found Heines in bed with an underage teen boy and shot him on the spot.

Hitler used an old German law against homosexuality as the rationale for this incident, which became known as the Night of the Long Knives. Hitler, thus, became publicly committed to enforcing this law and it was after this time that the atrocities cited by you, Priya, occurred.

All of the above is historical fact. In addition, while not verifiable, certain other things are strongly suggested circumstantially. Many strains of gay thinking seem to influence Hitler's Mein Kampf because of his close contact with Rohm during the time he was writing it. Hitler probably had sexual relations with Rohm in prison since this was socially acceptable in their society in general and a regular part of prison life. Hitler was probably a closeted gay since he didn't marry until six hours before he comitted suicide. Eva Braun, his bunker bride, had lived at Hitler's palace for years but never shared a bedroom with him. Likely, she was a prop to distract from his true nature and the marriage shortly before his death was an attempt to distract posterity.

As I said, the last paragraph is speculation. The clear fact, however, is that a group of militant gays was key to the rise and consolidation of power by the Nazis. While you can find some anti-gay writings before 1936, how bad could it have been when this group of gays was so fanatically dedicated to Hitler?

March 02, 2008 6:58 AM  
Anonymous Emproph said...

Anonymous said...
"Way to try to shift the focus off your own words and actions, Dana.

No one's fooled."

--
Apparently you are.

March 02, 2008 8:14 AM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

I don't lie, and I don't have anyone advising me. Theresa trained her signature gatherers, so she is responsible for their words and behavior, some of which was reprehensible. It is to that which I am referring, and I made that clear.

March 02, 2008 12:44 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron, your fairytale about Naziism and gays is totally devoide of any evidence and totally removed from reality. The Nazi party becan persecuting gays from the moment it took power in 1933 and did so until the end of the regime. As we can see any society that persecutes gays never lasts. Hitler had a long relationship with Eva Braun and once again the idea that he never shared a bed with her is a lie promoted by anti-gay christians who are shamed by the fact that Hitler and the Nazis were devout Christians.

March 02, 2008 1:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Red Baron,"

You know, you recently changed your name and I've been polite enough to refer to you in that way. Yet, you persist in calling me something I haven't designated myself.

Did it ever occur to you that you are rude?

"your fairytale about Naziism and gays is totally devoide of any evidence and totally removed from reality. The Nazi party becan persecuting gays from the moment it took power in 1933 and did so until the end of the regime."

Everything I said about gays and the rise of Nazism is a fact. You may not have known about it because you are not well educated but it is common knowledge among historians. Do a web search on Ernst Rohm and Edmund Heines and you find volumes of information about this.

Post WWI Germany was the first place in history where exclusive gays, as opposed to bi's, were a tolerated and openly accepted element of society. Within a generation, the result was the most evil society in the history of the world.

Not only were gays part of this society, they dominated a group that was an indispensable part of the Nazi power structure. Indeed, it is not an exaggeration to say the Nazis probably wouldn't have gained power without the repression of opposition groups that was conducted by this gay-dominated organization.

If the Nazis were so anti-gay at this point, as you say, why did they allow a group of open gays to serve in this key and powerful role? And why did these gays so fanatically serve the party that was seeking to destroy them? It doesn't make sense.

Look back yourself at your first post, Priya. All the statistics you quote were from 1937-1940, after Hitler felt he had to get rid of the stormtroopers to protect his position. The fact that Hitler turned his back on them when they became a political liability doesn't change the fact that they were key to helping him gain power.

"Hitler had a long relationship with Eva Braun and once again the idea that he never shared a bed with her is a lie promoted by anti-gay christians"

Sorry, Priya, you are again ignorant of commonly known historical facts. Braun lived for years in Hitler's palace. She had a seperate bedroom. It's possible that despite this that they had a sexual relationship but, if so, why didn't they marry and have children? Doesn't make sense. Adding this in with other facts like Hitler's close relationship with an openly gay man during his young adult years makes it look suspicious. Again, Hitler's homosexuality is not a established fact but it is a compelling theory.

"who are shamed by the fact that Hitler and the Nazis were devout Christians."

Do you not know who Hitler's favorite philosopher was? Nietzche. The guy who said "God is dead" and wrote a book called "the Anti-Christ". Nietzche believed man had moved beyond the need for religion and morality and was moving back to a natural state where the strong would rule and would rightly act only according to their own best interests. Hitler combined this with Darwinist ideas of survival-of-the-fittest to formulate his master race theories.

I know people are capable of compartmentalization but this is ridiculous. To call Hitler a devout Christian is absurd. He sometimes would throw in a few Christian sounding phrases into his speeches in attempt to manipulate the masses but "devout Christian"? Please. He didn't even regularly attend church after he left his parents home.

March 02, 2008 11:11 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

Just to drop in here, Anon, for a moment. So who are the devout Christians?

Maybe the Popes who instigated anti-Semitic violence, up to and including the Second World War? Their cardinals and bishops who fanned the flames of hatred and ended up hiding Nazis and shipping them off to South America? How about all those devout Protestants and Eastern Orthodox who would leave their churches on Sundays throughout eastern Europe and slaughter a few dozen Jews on the way home for dinner? Or those who functioned in the extermination camps, ratted on their neighbors, stole their homes and property, raped their wives and daughters, and marched them into the gas chambers and killing fields?

Your co-religionists have oh so much of which to be duly proud. And now they direct similar language and hate at me. How precious.

March 03, 2008 12:29 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Just to drop in here, Anon, for a moment. So who are the devout Christians?"

Few and far between. Post WWI Germany with its "anything goes" theme was hardly a devout Christian society. Neither did the secularist Hitler lead a religious revival.

If the 1920s Germany, devoid of any moral compass and tolerant of all types of perversion led to the most evil society in world history, where, Dana asks, do we see a devout Christian society and watch its results?

Look at the 1830s and 1840s in colonial America. A "Great Awakening" swept the colonies which become the first biblically based society in the world. Protected from outside influence by a vast ocean, they were able to establish a culture mirrored on the ethos of first century Christians.

Within a generation, we had the first biblically based government in the world. It has since became the model the rest of the world imitates.

Our government is based on at least four principles which were introduced to the world by Jesus Christ:

1. The equality of all men before God

2. The idea of servant leadership

3. The idea of fallen man that cannot be trusted to act virtuously

4. The separation of church and state

The founding fathers lived and grew up in the world created by the Great Awakening. They produced the first government based on Christian principles. It has since become the model even the worst dictators of the world at least pretend to follow. Putin has elections and China is a "People's Republic".

Opposed to Priya's unreferenced quotes a few days ago, here's the words of George Washington's farewell address:

"Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion."

I'm off the rest of the day.

Later.

March 03, 2008 7:55 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lovely GW quote, taken directly from the Traditional Values Coalition's definition of Traditional Values. Perfect.

March 03, 2008 8:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's actually from his farewell address to the nation. Look it up.

March 03, 2008 10:33 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron said "You know, you recently changed your name and I've been polite enough to refer to you in that way. Yet, you persist in calling me something I haven't designated myself.".

You've tried to hide your identity and the flow of your posts by repeatedly posting under different names, including Jimic, FTB, [un]objective observer, anonymous, and several others. You don't like people making educated guesses as to who you are then pick one pseudonym and stick with it.

Red Baron said "Everything I said about gays and the rise of Nazism is a fact.".

No, everything you said about gays and Naziism are lies taken directly from Christian recosnstructionists who are trying to raise support for putting gays to death. They, and you, have started out with the goal of making gays look as bad as you can and have fabricated stories to assist you in doing that.

Red Baron said "Post WWI Germany was the first place in history where exclusive gays, as opposed to bi's, were a tolerated and openly accepted element of society. Within a generation, the result was the most evil society in the history of the world....Look back yourself at your first post, Priya. All the statistics you quote were from 1937-1940, after Hitler felt he had to get rid of the stormtroopers to protect his position."

Again, more lies.

Under paragaraph 175 of the German penal code gay sex was punishable since 1871 and that wasn't repealed until 1969.The Nazi party from the outset was ideologically hostile to gays. For instance, in 1930 the Volkischer Beobachter, its official newspaper, wrote that "all foul urges of the Jewish soul" come together in homosexuality, and "the law should recognise [them] for what they are - utterly base aberrations of Syrians, extremely serious crimes that should be punished with hanging and deportation". Contrary to your lie that the persecution of gays didn't happen until 1937 it began immediately after the Nazis took power in 1933. Rates of acquittal under paragraph 175 declined sharply after 1933 and fines were increasingly replaced by imprisonment or penal servitude; clear indications of the heightening of repression. Lists of "homosexually active" persons were established by the police. Most bars known as meeting places for gay men and lesbians were closed throughout the country and the few remaining ones served as sources of information for the police and the Gestapo. Libraries and bookshops were purged of "indecent" scientific and literary materials relating to homosexuality. Emancipatory organisations had to cease their activities, including the publication of their magazines; publishers' stocks were confiscated, forcing them into bankrupcy. The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, a driving force behind the campaign for law reform of paragraph 175, was destroyed on 6 May 1933. The writings of its President and Founder, Dr Magnus Hirschfeld, and other scientists were publicly burned on 10 May 1933.

The nazis never allowed gays to openly serve and gays as a group most certainly played no part in oppressing opposition groups - you're just repeating lies from the Christian reconstructionists. Within weeks of taking over, the Nazis had destroyed community institutions, expunged books and organised activities designed to instill terror.

Your absurd suggestion that Eva Barun was a prop to distract from his gayness is disproven by the fact that Eva was kept a secret by Hitler, they never appeared together in public and the German public didn't know of her until after the war. Hitler at the time was seeing other women, such as actress Renate Müller and he kept Braun a secret because he didn't want to lose popularity amongst his female supporters. If Hitler were gay he wouldn't have had a secret relationship with Braun he would have made it public. Hitler was a devout heterosexual Christian and that is well documented irrefutable history.

March 03, 2008 3:01 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron said "Our government is based on at least four principles which were introduced to the world by Jesus Christ:

1. The equality of all men before God

2. The idea of servant leadership

3. The idea of fallen man that cannot be trusted to act virtuously

4. The separation of church and state".

The Jesus character most certainly didn't introduce these concepts, they were readily apparent to people long before the fiction of Jesus was created. Just like the Aesop's fables quotes "Jesus" uses in the New Testament, the writers of the bible took well known ideas and attributed them to the Jesus character.

1. The equality of all people idea occurred to the very first people there were, thousands and thousands of years before the Jesus fiction.

3. The idea that people can't be trusted occured once again to the earliest peoples 10's of thousands of years before Jesus.

4. The idea that religion should be kept out of politics appeared long before the writing of the new testament.

March 03, 2008 4:30 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Priya says: The nazis never allowed gays to openly serve and gays as a group most certainly played no part in oppressing opposition groups - you're just repeating lies from the Christian reconstructionists.

Anon says: I don't know any Christian reconstructionists. The account I gave of gay participation in the rise of Nazism in Germany is fact. To deflect Priya's baseless charge of only reading biased accounts, I will quote from an online encylclopedia designed for gays: glbtq.org. That's about as pro-gay as you can get. Even they aren't willing to deny historical facts as Priya apparently is:

"Ernst Röhm was both an avid supporter of the national socialist movement in Germany and a homosexual. Despite having been crucial to Hitler's rise to power, Röhm, at Hitler's behest, was assassinated soon after the infamous "Night of the Long Knives," June 30, 1934, when the German leader consolidated his hold over the military and "cleansed" the party of homosexuals.

Röhm was born in Munich, Germany, on November 28, 1887. He joined the German army in 1906, was wounded in World War I, and became an original founding member of the Nazi party in 1919. He helped Hitler secure the support of the Baviarian regional army and was imprisoned for his role in the failed Beer Hall Putsch of 1923.

Röhm represented the militant left wing of the Nazi party, and considered the elderly top brass of the German military too stodgy to lead the socialist revolution in Germany and too aristocratic to exemplify Nazi ideals.

In 1931 Hitler chose Röhm to head the Sturm Abteilung, or SA, also known as the Brown Shirts, a paramilitary group of specially trained, emblematic male soldiers who swore oaths of loyalty to the Nazi party.

In its heyday Röhm's SA had over four million members, and purportedly eclipsed the regular army in size, impact, effectiveness, and ideological purity. Its mission was to destroy opposition to Hitler and the Nazi party, its specialty being the break-up of meetings of rival political organizations.

The underside of the SA was the reputed homosexuality of many of its members, including Röhm. Interestingly, Röhm's homosexuality was not veiled, but widely known, even to Hitler, according to Shirer's The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1959): "And yet Hitler had known all along, from the earliest days of the party, that a large number of his closest and most important followers were sexual perverts. It was common talk . . . . These things Hitler had not only tolerated, but defended; more than once he had warned his party comrades against being too squeamish about a man's personal morals if he were a fanatical fighter for the movement."

By the early 1930s, however, the sexual profligacy and indiscretion of Röhm and his SA were sources of embarrassment for Hitler, having been an issue in the parliamentary elections of 1931. Moreover, their growing voice in military matters and desire to foment a more thoroughgoing socialist revolution aroused the fear, ire, and consternation of senior military and Nazi leaders, who tried repeatedly to convince Hitler to absorb the SA into the SS and eliminate its leader.

Although not eager to betray an old friend, Hitler finally agreed with the anti-Röhm conspirators (among them, Himmler, Hermann Göring, and Richard Heydrich) that Röhm had become disloyal and moved to eliminate him and reorganize the SA.

During the night of June 30, 1934, over 2,000 members of the SA were massacred across Germany. Those present at a gathering of its leaders at Lake Wiessee in Bavaria were either killed straightaway, or arrested, taken prisoner, and then summarily killed. Röhm was among this latter group. He was personally arrested by Hitler with revolver in hand and initially spared; then, the following afternoon, July 1, he was executed on Hitler's orders.

Although this purge garnered Hitler the support of the regular German army, it created a political problem for him to finesse: how to explain to the German people the extensive purge of the organization whose members swore allegiance to the party and whose leader had been essential in Hitler's rise to power?

The events of June 30 were kept secret until Hitler's speech on July 13, in which he described the Röhm Putsch as the "Night of the Long Knives."

Tellingly, he explained the massacre as a purge of homosexuals and a cleansing of the party: "I expect all SA leaders to help to preserve and strengthen the SA in its capacity as a pure and cleanly institution. In particular, I should like every mother to be able to allow her son to join the SA . . . without fear that he may become morally corrupted in their ranks. I therefore require all SA commanders to take the utmost pains to ensure that offenses under Paragraph 175 are met by immediate expulsion of the culprit . . . .""

Not a biased account, Priya, but the truth. Hitler knowingly placed a gay in a most powerful position within the Nazi party. This gay was a fanatical Nazi who attacked the political opposition and was "crucial" to the rise of the Nazis. This filled the top ranks of these stormtroopers with other gays and Hitler had to have them killed when their activities embarassed him and threatened his power. Paragraph 175, which was in the German code well before the
20th century was merely the excuse.

March 03, 2008 4:44 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon says: Our government is based on at least four principles which were introduced to the world by Jesus Christ:

1. The equality of all men before God

2. The idea of servant leadership

3. The idea of fallen man that cannot be trusted to act virtuously

4. The separation of church and state.

Priya says: The Jesus character most certainly didn't introduce these concepts, they were readily apparent to people long before the fiction of Jesus was created.

Anon says: Oh, really? Could you show us an example from literature of each of these four principles being articulated by anyone before Jesus Christ?

March 03, 2008 5:17 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron, your lies about Nazis and gays from the Christian reconstructionists don't hold any water. No matter how much you repeat them it won't make it true. The Nazi's began persecuting gays from their rise to power in 1933 and stated their ideological opposition to gays prior to that.

The Bible most certainly didn't teach the equality of all men. Slavery is sanctioned throughout both the old and new testament. Paul ordered a runaway slave to return to his master and obey him. Jesus never condemnned slavery. The bible emphasized the second class nature of women throughout.

Leviticus 12:2 and 12:5
Women who gave birth to girls were considered unclean for twice as long as women who gave birth to boys.

"But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God." (I Corinthians 11:3)

"For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man." (I Corinthians 11:8-9)

"Let the women learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression." (I Timothy 2:11-14)

"Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything." (Ephesians 5:22-24)

"Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church." (I Corinthians 14:34-35)

"Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." (Genesis 3:16)

"Give me any plague, but the plague of the heart: and any wickedness, but the wickedness of a woman." (Eccles. 25:13)

"Of the woman came the beginning of sin, and through her we all die." (Eccles. 25:22)

Leviticus 27:6 A child aged 1 month to five years of age was worth 5 shekels if a boy and 3 shekels if a girl. "And if it be from a month old even unto five years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male five shekels of silver, and for the female thy estimation shall be three shekels of silver."

Numbers 3:15 shows that a census counted only male infants over the age of one month, boys and men. "Number the children of Levi after the house of their fathers, by their families: every male from a month old and upward shalt thou number them." Females were not considered worthy of being included.

The idea that the principles of equality, seperation of church and state, and that people can't be trusted didn't occur to people prior to the bible is as preposterous as the idea that it never occured to people prior to the bible that theft, rape, and murder were wrong.

March 03, 2008 6:20 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Red Baron, your lies about Nazis and gays from the Christian reconstructionists don't hold any water. No matter how much you repeat them it won't make it true."

I guess when all the historians keep repeating it, including the pro-gay encyclopedia I posted an excerpt from, well, that won't make it true either. It will only become true when it fits in with Priya's worldview.

"The Nazi's began persecuting gays from their rise to power in 1933 and stated their ideological opposition to gays prior to that."

Priya, prior to the Rohm Putsch, the attitude of the German government was no worse than that of any other government in the world. This is the only explanation for why this group of gays was so dedicated to the Nazis. It's because, relatively, they were no different than any other government.

What was exceptional was the toleration displayed by the doomed Weimar republic. I've explained to you how it went bad. It's common knowledge among those who have studied the history of the twentieth century.

I'm sorry if you weren't aware of it before but a group of gays were instrumental to the rise of Nazism. They weren't only supporters, they were instigators of some of the nastiest stuff in the early Nazi party. Their behavior was so extreme in fact that even the Nazis eventually felt compelled to distance themselves from these gays. When the behavior of a group was so horrid that even the Nazis didn't want to be associated with them, that's remarkable.

Well, only fools will go on and keep talking to a wall and I can't fool around forever. Go ahead and live in your delusions.

"The Bible most certainly didn't teach the equality of all men."

Interesting. Earlier you were saying that Jesus Christ wasn't the first to say that all men are equal before God. Now, you say he didn't think it at all.

Before we address this, let me just check: You are conceding that Jesus articulated the ideas of servant leadership, church-state separation and the fallen nature of all men, right? And on these three principles, you've found no example of anyone who introduced these concepts prior to Jesus, right? Let's get those three points out of the way and then we can show you how fallacious your idea is that Jesus didn't consider all men to be equal before God.

March 03, 2008 9:54 PM  
Blogger Jason said...

1) the fact that gay nazi's exist does not mean that gays are nazis, gays will become nazis, or that being gay makes you a nazi. The majority of Nazi's were NOT gay -- so does that mean that the majority of heterosexuals are nazis, or that heterosexuality leads to nazi-ism?
A good deal of serial killers are straight, white men, does that mean straight white men are serial killers, or become serial killers?

2)To suggest that because post WWI Germany was tolerate of gays and then became an evil empire--- that being tolerant of gays = evil is spurious and anti-intellectual. Correlation is not causation. You ignore everything else that happened in Germany in that time period. It's the classic "they tolerated gays, and then something bad happened!" Just because something happened right after something else doesn't mean they are connected. I sleep on the right side of the bed and the sun comes up every morning. These two things, however, are not connected.


3)And on a different note: The lax policy on gays in Catholic priesthood has NOTHING to do with pedophilia.
I have absolutely no problem telling the difference between my partner and an 8 year old boy. But for some reason, bigots can't tell the difference. If you can't tell the difference between the love and support that two adult male humans give each other in a trusting relationship and a man who wants to have sex with a kid, a goat, or a corpse --- you have no moral compass, and have no business telling me anything about morality.

March 04, 2008 11:57 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron, contrary to your lies it is well documented fact that the Nazi party was hostile to gays from the very beginning. In 1930 its official newspaper, wrote that "all foul urges of the Jewish soul" come together in homosexuality, and "the law should recognise [them] for what they are - utterly base aberrations of Syrians, extremely serious crimes that should be punished with hanging and deportation". Immediately after the Nazis took power in 1933 rates of acquittal under paragraph 175 declined sharply and fines were increasingly replaced by imprisonment or penal servitude. Lists of "homosexually active" persons were established by the police. Most bars known as meeting places for gay men and lesbians were closed throughout the country and the few remaining ones served as sources of information for the police and the Gestapo. Libraries and bookshops were purged of "indecent" scientific and literary materials relating to gayness. Emancipatory organisations had to cease their activities, including the publication of their magazines; publishers' stocks were confiscated, forcing them into bankrupcy. The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, a driving force behind the campaign for law reform of paragraph 175, was destroyed on 6 May 1933. The writings of its President and Founder, Dr Magnus Hirschfeld, and other scientists were publicly burned on 10 May 1933. From there, as with the oppression of the Jews it gradually got worse until 10's of thousands, if not more gays were put to death in concentration camps. The Nazi party NEVER tolerated gays.

Red Baron said "You are conceding that Jesus articulated the ideas of servant leadership, church-state separation and the fallen nature of all men, right? And on these three principles, you've found no example of anyone who introduced these concepts prior to Jesus, right?".

I'm conceding nothing of the sort. For starters I don't know what you mean when you refer to servant leadership and just because the Jesus character said something by no means suggests that that is the first place the idea occurred. The ideas of the equality of all people, church and state seperation, and that people can't automatically be trusted are all simple ideas that beyond a shadow of a doubt occured to the earliest civilizations long before the bible. The idea that they didn't is as preposterous as the idea that it never occurred to people prior to the bible that theft, rape, and murder were wrong. I haven't looked for historical examples of this because its obvious that they existed before and I'm not going to waste my time searching through all of history prior to the bible to establish the obvious. What I do know off the top of my head is that the concept of equality, the golden rule most certainly was recorded by Confucius and in the motto of the Babylonian Rabbi Hillel, who long predate the Christian era. As is typical of the bible, the so called "teachings" of Jesus were long recorded elsewhere and Christians regularly and dishonestly claim they were first recorded by the author's of the Jesus character's words - they weren't.

March 04, 2008 2:54 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"The Nazi party NEVER tolerated gays."

Neither did any country in the first half of the twentieth century. Homosexuality was illegal everywhere. You think they were unusual because they sometimes enforced laws against homosexuality and closed gay bars? Most countries at the time would have done the same.

How can you say that a country that allowed a group of open gays to command the largest branch of its military was especially intolerant of gays? The persecution of gays started after the need for an excuse to destroy the SA. Before that Hitler was fine with gays. I posted a quote from a pro-gay website yesterday that Hitler urged his followers to tolerate gays.

These gays who ran the SA, most historians believe, played a vital role in the rise of Nazism.

"For starters I don't know what you mean when you refer to servant leadership"

It's the idea that leaders should serve their constituents rather than the other way around.

"and just because the Jesus character said something by no means suggests that that is the first place the idea occurred"

No, it doesn't, but for the four principles I mentioned, he was the one to introduce them.

"The ideas of the equality of all people, church and state seperation, and that people can't automatically be trusted are all simple ideas that beyond a shadow of a doubt occured to the earliest civilizations long before the bible."

For the first two, that's not true. He was the first to advocate these ideas. The third: "that people can't automatically be trusted" is not what I said. I said he was the first to say that all men are fallen and can't be trusted to act virtuously.

"The idea that they didn't is as preposterous"

You think that because you live in the civilization that Jesus Christ created and, thus, you take these things for granted. Civilizations didn't hold these ideas before Jesus articulated them.

"I haven't looked for historical examples of this because its obvious that they existed before and I'm not going to waste my time"

Oh, please. We all know you feverishly searched for such evidence after you read my post and couldn't find it.

"Rabbi Hillel, who long predate the Christian era. As is typical of the bible, the so called "teachings" of Jesus were long recorded elsewhere and Christians regularly and dishonestly claim they were first recorded by the author's of the Jesus character's words - they weren't."

The golden rule predated Hillel too. Jesus and Hillel both were citing Hebrew scriptures.

For the four principles that I cited as a basis for our government, Jesus was the one who introduced them.

March 04, 2008 11:51 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron said "How can you say that a country that allowed a group of open gays to command the largest branch of its military was especially intolerant of gays? The persecution of gays started after the need for an excuse to destroy the SA. Before that Hitler was fine with gays".

It NEVER allowed open gays to command the largest branch of the military, that is a lie by Christian reconstructionists seeking to build support for killing gays by demonizing gays. Hitler was never fine with gays, the persecution of gays by the Nazi party began in 1930 with their publishing a call for the death of gays in their party newspaper. In 1933 when the Nazis took power persecution of gays was immediately stepped up with increased convictions under paragraph 175 and the replacement of fines with imprisonment and penal servitude. Gay bars were closed and those remaining used for surveillance on gays to catch more to punish under paragraph 175. The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, a driving force behind the campaign for law reform of paragraph 175, was destroyed on 6 May 1933. The writings of its President and Founder, Dr Magnus Hirschfeld, and other scientists were publicly burned on 10 May 1933. You are quite simply lying about gays being in charge of the SA and persecution not being started until those supposed leaders were opposed. Gays were being fairly well accepted in Germany prior to the appearance of the Nazi party and that ended immediately with their taking power in 1933 - much as the Christian reconstructionists who support Huckabee would do if they gained power.

Red Baron said "for the four principles I mentioned, he was the one to introduce them.".

Nonsense. The Jesus character created nothing new, the authors of those words were simply repeating well known ideas.

Red Baron said "The third: "that people can't automatically be trusted" is not what I said. I said he was the first to say that all men are fallen and can't be trusted to act virtuously.".

That is the same thing and an obvious idea that occurs to every individual early in life after they are familiar with dealing with a number of people. The idea that it never occurred to anyone until the Jesus character said it is absurd.


Red Baron said "You think that because you live in the civilization that Jesus Christ created and, thus, you take these things for granted. Civilizations didn't hold these ideas before Jesus articulated them.".

Imaginary characters don't create societies and neither do individuals. Societies are created by the cooperation of throngs of people working together - to attribute any society to any one person is absurd. "Jesus" never created any society and everything quoted in the new testament is nothing new.
Red Baron said "Oh, please. We all know you feverishly searched for such evidence after you read my post and couldn't find it.".

Nonsense, I didn't spend one second searching for what is blatently obvious - the ideas that you espoused are simple and occurred to the earliest peoples long before the start of recorded history and obviously have been included in recorded history long predating the Jesus character.


Red Baron said "The golden rule predated Hillel too. Jesus and Hillel both were citing Hebrew scriptures."

Of course it predated confucious and Hillel and the Hebrew scriptures as well. Once again such ideas are inherently obvious and the idea that they didn't occur to the earliest of civilizations (which long predate the Hebrew scriptures) isn't credible.

Red Baron said "For the four principles that I cited as a basis for our government, Jesus was the one who introduced them.".

Nonsense. Any reputable historian will tell you that the bible is merely a recycling of earlier religious myths and knowledge. It contains nothing new, it is merely a plagerization of other's work.

March 05, 2008 3:21 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"It NEVER allowed open gays to command the largest branch of the military,..."

Yes, they did. It's a documented fact. I've showed you where to look it up.

"Hitler was never fine with gays..."

According to lbgtq.com, the pro-gay encyclopedia, he made statements supporting tolerance for homosexuals in his early days in power. I even pasted a quote from this pro-gay site.

One of Hitler's best friends until 1934 was an open gay.

"You are quite simply lying about gays being in charge of the SA and persecution not being started until those supposed leaders were opposed...."

No, I wasn't. The are simply volumes of information available on this.

The SA was the largest military branch in Nazi Germany when the gay Rohm and his gay assistant, Heines ran this vicious unit. It had 4 million stormtroopers.

No other country on Earth had an open gay in such a powerful position.

"Gays were being fairly well accepted in Germany prior to the appearance of the Nazi party and that ended immediately with their taking power in 1933"

All that happened then was a repudiation of the "anything goes" ethos of the Weimar Republic. Until the Rohm Putsch, the treatment of gays in Nazi Germany wasn't any different than in London, Toronto or Chicago. Gay bars were closed down and anti-sodomy laws were enforced in many places.

March 05, 2008 7:13 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Yes, Red Baron, I've heard all those lies before and they remain lies. The fact is that in 1930 the Nazis printed in their party newspaper a call to have gays put to death. When they took power in 1933 they immediately began a campaign against gays to increasingly punish and persecute them just as they did with the Jews. As time went, just as with the Jews the persecution became increasingly harsh. The Nazi party never tolerated gays and gays played no role in the atrocities undertaken by the party. The nazi party was virtually exclusively devoute heterosexual Christians.

March 05, 2008 7:33 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"I've heard all those lies before and they remain lies."

Priya, very slowly now:

Ernst Rohm was one of Hitler's closest friends through the 1920s until his death in 1934.

Rohm was openly gay.

Rohm led the SA, the largest military branch in the Nazi party.

Which of these statements do you think is untrue?

"The Nazi party never tolerated gays and gays played no role in the atrocities undertaken by the party."

The organization, the SA, led by Rohm, was responsible for breaking up any gathering or meeting of any group opposed to the Nazis.

Do you think this is untrue?

"The nazi party was virtually exclusively devoute heterosexual Christians."

Hitler was a devotee of the works of Nietzche who argued that "God is dead."

Do you think this is untrue?

March 05, 2008 8:44 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Yes, Red Baron I've heard those lies several time and your repeating them ad infinatum doesn't make them true. The Nazis called for the death of gays in 1930 in their party newspaper. When they took power in 1933 they immediately set about undoing the acceptance gays had achieved in Germany, they greatly stepped up convictions under paragraph 175, replaced fines for those convictions with imprisonment and penal servitude. The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, a driving force behind the campaign for law reform of paragraph 175, was destroyed on 6 May 1933. The writings of its President and Founder, Dr Magnus Hirschfeld, and other scientists were publicly burned on 10 May 1933. From there, as with the oppression of the Jews it gradually got worse until 10's of thousands, if not more gays were put to death in concentration camps. The Nazi party NEVER tolerated gays.


And contrary to your lies about Hitler it is well established that he was a devout heterosexual christian. Don't take my word for it look at the tons of evidence yourself -its indisputable:

http://www.nobeliefs.com/Hitler1.htm

March 05, 2008 10:20 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Let's be clear, Priya:

You think those five statements that I asked you about are untrue, right?

They are all true, nonetheless. I'd be happy to provide you with references on request.

BTW, you have quite an expansive definition of "devout Christian" when a guy who doesn't go church and says he loves Nietzche is considered by you to be a "devout Christian".

Beside his religious convictions, I think his sexuality is also questionable. No definitive proof exists but the circumstantial stuff is pretty strong.

I don't get you though. You make great extrapolation about Larry Craig sexual desires over a foot tap but won't even consider the possibility for Hitler who didn't marry until a couple of hours before he committed suicide and had a close gay friend during his most vigorous years.

March 06, 2008 12:18 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Red Baron, the Nazi party called for the death of gays from day one. From the moment they got into power they started a crackdown on gays that as with the Jews only got worse with time. The Nazis NEVER tolerated openly gay men. The idea that gays were key to the development of the Nazi party is as absurd as the idea that Jews were key to the Nazi party. In fact the Nazis treated gays worse then they treated Jews. Gays were sent to the worst concentration camps where they were placed under "triple camp discipline," which meant that they were subjected to harder work, less food, and stricter supervision than the other inmates. When they fell sick they were not allowed treatment in the clinics, and were left to die or were killed with large injections of morphine.


Contrary to your lie that the Nazis were treating gays the same way every other country did, in 1917 the Soviet Union abolished all anti-gay legislation and the German Communists supported Hirschfeld's Law Reform Proposal of 1927.

Showings of Hirschfeld's first pro-gay movie were regularly disrupted by the Nazi party. In one such incident in Vienna in 1923 they shot and wounded several members of the audience. The National Socialist Party issued their offical view of gays on May 14, 1928:

"It is not necessary that you and I live, but it is necessary that the German people live. And it can live if it can fight, for life means fighting. And it can only fight if it maintains its masculinity. It can only maintain its masculinity if it exercises discipline, especially in matters of love. Free love and deviance are undisciplined. Therefore, we reject you, as we reject anything which hurts our people.
Anyone who even thinks of homosexual love is our enemy."

Contrary to the lies of Christian reconstructionists such as yourself the vast majority of Nazis associated with atrocities were confirmed heterosexuals and all were devout Christians.

You've insanely asserted that Hitler had a relationship with Eva Braun to hide his sexuality. That is obviously disproven by the fact that Hitler kept his relationship with her a secret and the german public didn't know about it until after the war. Obviously if a man has a relationship with a woman to hide his gayness he doesn't keep that relationship a secret - clearly Hitler was not gay. He also was involved with other women at the time such as actress Renate Müller.

Contrary to your lies Hitler was a church goer and he can be seen leaving church in the pictures in the link I posted. Those pictures also show the tight ties between the Nazi party and the vatican with priests and bishops giving the Hitler salute in honour of Hitler, the Nazis and the vatican signing the Concordat, the prominent placement of Hitler and his armies in front of a popular church showing that the church was the heart of the party, priests marching in Nazi parades, and so on. It is no coincidence that the Nazis all had belt buckles with "god with us" on them. The regime was true to the genocide that was rampant in the bible.

March 06, 2008 2:02 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded only by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God's truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before in the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow myself to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice.... And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows. For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people.... When I go out in the morning and see these men standing in their queues and look into their pinched faces, then I believe I would be no Christian, but a very devil if I felt no pity for them, if I did not, as did our Lord two thousand years ago, turn against those by whom to-day this poor people is plundered and exploited.
-Adolf Hitler, in his speech in Munich on 12 April 1922

Not the sort of thing a non-christian says and Hitler repeatedly made this sort of affirmation throughout his life. As much as you detest the fact that he was a Christian reality won't change for you - he was one of your very own.

March 06, 2008 2:09 PM  
Blogger David said...

One of the most watched events in recent television programming was the presidential debate, “town hall” style. Like many other Americans, I tuned in to watch despite my disillusionment with American government over the last couple of decades. I watched it without many expectations, knowing that no matter how direct a question was asked, the responses would be somewhat non-committal, and sound bite ready. The major news journals in the United States were certainly taking notes, as the New York Times depicted the debate as “90 minutes of forced cordiality” and the Boston Globe stated that it was “mercifully free” from the personal attacks I was beginning to get used to and tired of. It certainly was full of tension and made for good T.V., to say the least. McCain continues to pursue policies nearly identical to George W. Bush despite his “maverick” status, such as off shore drilling and staying the course in Iraq. (The irony is astounding: what makes him a maverick is that he wants to do the same things as one of the most unpopular presidents in living memory. The BIG joke is that he is rebelling against the American public.) Obama relied heavily on criticizing the Republican Party, stating that they were the ones that created this mess and he’s going to get us out of it. If we had to go by what they actually said, there’s no telling just which one is the best for getting our economy out of these turbulent times. Obama’s position on “predatory lending” is not a good solution – it’s sure to lead to more unemployment - is more a declaration of intent to appease the banking industry.
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October 15, 2008 4:51 AM  

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