Speak Compassion

Stephen Bennett Ministries, along with its radio program “Straight Talk Radio” have called gay unions a stench in god’s nostrils.  He has advised parents of gay children to not allow them to bring their partners home for holiday dinner.    He has compared gays to alcoholics and drug users, and claims gays can be cured.   These claims defy every mainstream psychological and medical association in the world.

He claims he lived for 11 years as a homosexual.   He tells people that he has the inside scoop on being gay, now that he is “ex-gay” and married to a woman.   His radio program has featured topics such as, “The Medical Dangers of Homosexuality” or “A heart for the Homosexual”.  His shows have painted an image that gays are child predators, drug addicts, sexual maniacs, all bound to die of AIDS.   He uses the bible to back up his hateful messages and claims he is protecting children.

He thinks in his mind that he is helping people, but reality is he is hurting more people than he helps.  He needs to know who it is he hurts with this message.I urge you to join with me in speaking out against these words of violence.  Sign the Stop Stephen Bennett petition today, Let him know that you don’t approve of words being used as violence against gays and lesbians or their families.   Be sure to be nice in your comments.  Don’t sink to his level, be kind in your words but let him know he is WRONG.

Another edition of laughs with Stephen.   Today’s topic was "Home for the Holidays".   Really it is just more yammer of Stephen telling parents not to allow their sons and daighters gay partners to holiday dinners.   What a horrible thing to advise people to do.  

On his Thanksgiving show he utter a similar line of thinking.  when he said

you should show that unconditional love, allow your child to be there, have the whole family together. That doesn’t mean you have to be forced by your child in having the partner come. Let your child come by himself or herself.

What mean and horrible advice this is, not that I am surprised coming from him.   Sure lets just break up the family even more by starting another fight about the boyfriend.   What killed me the most in topday’s show is towards the end Stephen talks about inviting people to your home for dinner on the holiday who don’t have anyplace else to go….like maybe all the boyfriends who had to stay home because their partners parents heard your goofy fucking advice? 

So I got one of those email alerts from the Americal Family Association today freaking out about this show Book of Daniel.   Personally, I think the show sounds like a hoot.   People love to see other people lives on TV to be more fucked up than their own and when they do, it is a hit.   Look back at all the shows that stayed on television for years

• Married with Children (very fucked up family, how long was that on? 15 years?)
• Soap (everybody had issues on this show and it had one of TV’s first gay men…played by Billy Crystal)
• Dynasty (Oh come name me someone on this show that wasn’t drunk and sleeping around)
• Rosanne (need I say more on this one)

So what is so messed up about this Book of Daniel Show that the AFA has their panties in a pinch?  The show is described by the AFA as:

The network is promoting "The Book of Daniel" as a serious drama about Christian people and the Christian faith. The characters include: Daniel Webster, a drug-addicted Episcopal priest; his alcoholic wife; his son, a 23-year-old homosexual Republican; his daughter, a 16-year-old drug dealing daughter; a 16-year-old adopted son who is having sex with the bishop’s daughter; his lesbian secretary who is sleeping with his sister-in-law; and a very unconventional white-robed, bearded Jesus who talks to the priest.

Sounds like a blast to me! 

Below is the text of the online petition I am doing on Stephen Bennett Ministries and Straight Talk Radio. I would love many people to sign it and pass the word about it. When you sign, leave him a message that lets him know you and your family are hurt by his messages of violence. DON”T BE RUDE or MEAN. Just polite and kind. Remember the Soulforce principals of non-violence which include speech. It makes no sense to condemn what he is doing if we are doing it too!

Here is the petition and the link to sign.

To: Stephen Bennett Ministries
Dear Stephen and Irene Bennett of “Straight Talk Radio” and “SB Ministries”:

We, the undersigned, respecting your first amendment right to free speech, ask you to stop your violent message against gays, lesbians and their families. Many people are hurt and dehumanized when you call the lives of gays and lesbians destructive, call their marriages fake, and refer to gay unions as the putrid stench in god’s nostrils. While your message may be well intentioned, it is misguided and misinformed.

The Indian philosopher, Mahatma Gandhi internationally esteemed for his doctrine of nonviolent protest once said:

“I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.”

Dehumanizing speech is violence. We ask that your stop your violence against gays, lesbians, their friends and families by considering the following:

- It is our belief that your campaign to change gays and lesbians into heterosexuals uses fear tactics, lies, misrepresented facts and flawed research. It is the belief of the undersigned that you are hurting more people than you help.

- Stop claiming since you lived as a gay man for 11 years, you have been there, thus claiming you can speak for all gays and lesbians. Your experience as a gay man was filled with poor choices and self-loathing. It is not a reflection of all gays and lesbians or their personal experiences.

- Stop generalizing gays and lesbians as child predators, pedophiles, bad parents, diseased or destructive. No mainstream medical or psychological association supports your claims. No credible, peer-reviewed research exists to back up your claim and much is available to refute it.

- Stop claiming homosexuality is curable disorder. There is no mainstream medical or psychological organization which concurs with the belief that homosexuality is a disorder and all agree that any attempt to change one’s sexual orientation is dangerous.

- Stop claiming that gays and lesbians have a “lifestyle”. Gays and lesbians have many different lifestyles and come from all walks of life. There is no one gay lifestyle and grouping us all together into your mold of destruction is inaccurate as well as insulting.

- Stop engaging in deception by omission. Your message only focuses on the poor choices of some gays and lesbians while ignoring all the well adjusted, healthy people successfully living their lives who happen to be gay or lesbian. If one were to do this with heterosexuals, the same violent message you spread about gays would become true of them.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

Click to sign the petition

On this week news edition of Straight Talk Radio (Tuesday’s edition), Stephen informed us how BrokeBack Mountain isn’t doing that well at the box office, but yet Chronicles of Narnia was just kicking it out. Well sorry Stephen you were either lying again or misinformed according to this AP article. It appears the the gay flick is pulling in $13,599 per theater, compared with $9,305 for weekend winner “King Kong” and $8,225 for “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.”

Lies are only good when you don’t get busted telling them.

It seems like every time I have blogged about the rules on STR, they change the following day. After yesterday’s post about how hard it is to register and post, now they again changed the rules to make it easier (?) or so they think. I still don’t see a whole lot of people posting. At this point it is one person commenting, who may be one of the few listening to this show in the first place, but we don’t know that for sure. Stephen claims thousands are listening, but he also claims thousands have changed their sexuality and we can’t prove that either.

One of the rules I find to be rather silly is this one:

All IP Addresses, visits and session times are logged for security purposes (registered and NON-registered visitors.) Individuals who register under multiple e-mail addresses or users logging in under multiple IP addresses will result in the user being banned without any notice.

So, let me get this straight “no pun intended”, If one joins the board and decided to post at night from home and then maybe from the office the next day, they get banned without warning. Yeah, that makes people want to post (yes, I am being sarcastic)

Next rule I want to make fun of today:

Please limit your comments to 200 words or less and one comment per show. Excessive or multiple comments will be removed by the Staff / Moderator(s.) G. If you agree to the terms herein of this Discussion Forum, please click the above link to activate your Posting privileges.

So how much of a discussion is it really if you can’t get on there and post more than once a day. So you can’t sign in and have a discussion. Really this sounds more like a guest book where you go and stroke Stephen’s inflated ego. He should just tell the truth, he wants you come post a message telling him how great and hetero he is and leave…come back tomorrow and do it again! Doesn’t sound like a discussion but oh well, no one is really posting either way.

I suggest to people the same thing I have said before, register and post a polite, respectful message. Don’t be mean, just let STR and his listener base know that “WE DO EXIST” happy, healthy gays in committed and faithful relationships, some raising really great kids! Remember to be nice as nice can be, do not sink to their level of hate. We are above that. Sign up and post today!

It seems today’s show is a 2 part about the ‘Heart for the Homo” (another change to the schedule, it seems they do not do well with the schedule it keeps changing) We will see tonight when I listen if it really has a heart or if it is just a cover to tell people our lives or “lifestyle” is destructive (lies).

Yesterday’s show about Brokeback was filled with “deception by omission” about the movie. Stephen babbled about how the movie isn’t doing well. He omitted the fact it isn’t open in theaters nationwide yet and won’t be until January 16th. Funny how he left that out. He failed to point out a movie only playing in 200 some theaters is 14th at the box office. That is bad? On what scale is he using. That CS Lewis thing (which I want to see) is doing better because it is in more theaters. DUH!

Thought since the crazy right wing seems to be quiet today, I would just post a reminder today to sign up and post some respectful, polite, pro-gay messages at the STR web discussion Board.

Of course I remind you too, that I am very much about non-violence and not sinking to the level of my adversary. It is in the best interest of this effort that you are nicer to them than they are to you. Let them call you a heathen and a sinner. Don’t bite back, remain polite and calm. I know that can be hard sometimes but they are the ones filled with hate under the guise of love. I myself feel sorry for them that they are so misinformed. I feel sorry they feel the need to twist the truth. I hope when and “if” you do get a chance to post to his boards you just let him know his message it hurtful to others. He is hurting more people than he helps. When he has a show about lies, Google for the real science and post it!

Spread the word about this effort. Email your friends and ask them to join on with the effort to bring the “truth” to the Straight Talk Radio Web Board.

I guess I will also point out the observation since I check the STR web board a couples of times a day to see who has signed on, none of the newest members have posted anything. I can only speculate the reason for that is that STR has made it impossible for either pro-gay or ex-gays to post on his board. Really shoots himself in the foot a lot. The way it is set up, it is too much work to get on the board to either praise or spread truth. No matter what side of this issue you fall on, it doesn’t look like Stephen wants to hear your feedback. I would suggest you email him and tell him how his message doesn’t reflect you. Tell him that you are happy, healthy and not out looking to recruit children. Remind him that you do not live up to the stereotypes he creates or allows to fester.

From the AFA online we have this juicy tid bit with warnings that itshould be for young readers (of course kids see that and jump to read it)

Top Stories of 2005: Cable Biggies Bringing Homosexual Networks into America’s Homes
Year in Review: Entertainment Industry

CAUTION: The following article contains descriptions that are unsuitable for young readers.

By Allie Martin and Jody Brown
December 23, 2005
(Originally published on April 13, 2005)

(AgapePress) - Officials with the American Family Association say they expect a massive public outcry to erupt over the recent announcement that two homosexual cable networks will soon be widely available, compliments of some major cable carriers that provide services to millions of American homes. As a result, homosexual-oriented programming will be available around the clock for the first time.
Read the rest of the article

This is every fundementalist right wing conservatives worst nightmare or perhaps a dream come true. Now in the comfort of their own home, late at night they can enjoy their closeted life on TV. No more wishing they could watch gay TV afraid of being snagged. Now they can watch at 3AM without fear of the press finding out. I can see Rick Santorum right now in his bathrobe cuddled on the couch watching epic gay romance movies with a bowl of popcorn and a scotch on the rocks.

I also wonder what kind of programs will the right wing find on LOGO. Perhaps Sponge BOB will do a christmas special in drag, Maybe the teletubbies will do a home decor show. I just can’t wait to see this one!

So what if a guy whose career isn’t really going anywhere decideds one day to claims to be gay, then claims to be cured for the money. He sells tapes, CDs, videos, bookdeals, all explaining how he has been cured of something he never was in the first place, gay. We could count the number of men like this, not naming anyone in particular but this scenario could be playing right before our eyes. Think about the money to be made in public speaking, DVDs, radio spots, etc….. by claiming you were once gay then got cured by Jesus. You could make a killing on this. How can they really prove you were gay and then not. How could they prove you had tons of lovers that dies of Aids. It would be the perfect scam. I could really wake up tomorrow and suddenly be an ex-gay. Say I had tons of lovers, how could it be proven? Then I could start charging a large fee to speak on my transformation, even if I wasn’t gay, I was never gay. I could get some woman to say she is my wiife, pay her with the profits and have some babies! WOW! I am rich, she is rich, everybody wins but those silly gays nobody likes anyway!

Is this happing out there today? I have no clue, but I wonder.

Well, it has been a rather boring day. I spent an hour of it trying to get out of a mall pakring lot. Fun, Fun, Fun! Love that last minute shopping. Unfortunately, my partner and I will brave a very busy shopping area tonight to shop for our friend Bea, a very tough person for whom to shop.

I did spend my afternoon reading the Stephen Bennett blog and comments. It is hard to believe that as nice as he is in his comments to others, he could have the radio show that he does. He seems like such a nice guy and yet he is so misguided and wrong in what he is doing. The same guy that seems to have been a hate crime victim is against hate crime laws. That one really puzzles me. I can’t understand the things people do sometimes, but understanding that it is wrong is a reason to fight it!

I am not really against his ministry so much anymore, but I am very against his radio show and would love to hear it was cancelled. The guest list has been more than disturbing to me. I guess between Dr. John Diggs and the Matt Barber guy he had on, I can’t decide which is worse or more homophobic. The lies are incredible, and the flawed research is plentiful! The show is just a venue for people to discuss how evil gays are. That is all they really discuss. The homo agenda, protect your children from those evil homo’s. It is the 1/2 hate brigade. He say that he is out to help people but how is this show helping anyone?

I am still drafting my letter to Stephen and Irene requesting that we start a dialog. I would love to meet with them and discuss these horrid guests and the point of the radio show. I would love to do coffee with Stephen and figure out how he can be so anti-gay and yet have been gay all in the same breath. He constantly claims on his website and other places how he was gay for 11 years, then goes on to become ex-gay. Then he gets the silly radio show where he paints the picture that gays are all child predators. It really begs the question of whether or not Stephen himself was attracted to children when he was gay? He seems to think gays are a threat to children and at one point he was gay…so put two and two together and one can only wonder. I am making no accusation or claim, but oh I am making a point. If Stephen wasn’t attracted to children as a gay man, then why on earth would he paint the picture that gays are after your children. I for one, am not after anyone’s kids. It is a sick claim for him to make, but that is what he does. His web board even had a poll asking if people thought gays should be allowed to adopted or raise children. Of course all his little cronies are voting “no”. Then everyone that reads his board gets the message gays make bad parents and that is bull!

His discussion board is filled with people discussing the “bondage” of homosexuality. For many of us the bondage was trying to be heterosexual when we were not. I spent years trying so hard to be “straight”, I was pretty much set I would marry this awesome girl named Deb and have kids. The catch is it was a lie and it was wrong. I was miserable hiding my secret life. The I came out, and it was a struggle to find myself, but in the end, I found a great peace just being myself.

Well that is enough ranting and rambling for today!

Please, just check this out, it is so fucking funny, I pissed myseld laughing!

http://www.illwillpress.com/xmas.html

A Soulforce Credo About My Adversary

I have been so moved by this creed about fighting the Stephen Bennett Ministies that I just had to post it. I really believe this is the way to get through to him, or so I hope.

This is the creed of the SoullForce groups on confronting your advasary. It is just poetry to me. I hope all will take this stand.

#1

I believe that my adversary is also a child of the Creator, that we are both members of the same human family, that we are sisters and brothers in need of reconciliation.
#2

I believe that my adversary is not my enemy, but a victim of misinformation as I have been.
#3

I believe that my only task is to bring my adversary truth in love (nonviolence) relentlessly.
#4

I believe that my adversary’s motives are as pure as mine and of no relevance to our discussion.
#5

I believe that even my worst adversary has an amazing potential for positive change.
#6

I believe that my adversary may have an insight into truth that I do not have.
#7

I believe that one day my adversary and I will understand each other and that if we conduct our search for truth guided by the principles of love, we will find a new position to satisfy us both.

I have started a page of Quotes from Stephen and Irene Bennett. This will help those who may not understand why I am working to change their message. Also, I am working on a letter for Stephen and Irene to perhaps start a dialog between us, to date I have never spoken to Stephen or Irene, but I am hoping that will happen soon. Although I doubt I will be able to convince him that his message is terribly hurtful and spiritually violent to others, It is always worth a try. I have been reading much of the info at the SoulForce site and love their words about dealing with adversaries.

Here is the new page of Quotes, feel free to help me add some more.

Todays Quote comes from Miles Christian Daniels a New York Based columnist and documentary-film maker.

Now, through movies such as Brokeback Mountain, Hollywood is shedding light on the fact that not all gay men are fashion gurus, hairdressers, interior designers, and superior in the arts, but that some might — God forbid — be cowboys, herding sheep in Wyoming. And, more important, capable of love-based relationships.

Not all of us gay folk are comfortable with the flamboyance of gay-pride parades. And many would rather sip a Killian’s in an Irish pub than dance to techno in a noisy gay bar. “Gay” has nothing to do with lifestyle. And rather than coming out of the closet to make a declaration of individuality or identity, most of us “come out” so that we can share the gift of love openly with another individual.

I realize many may not care, but it really would be great if we could start sending the Bennett’s some letters from happy, well adjusted gays and lesbians and their supporters, that show him that his potrayal of us is far off the mark. Below is my sample letter that I will be emailing Mr. Bennett and his wife, Irene. I have sent things like this to them before with no repsonse (like I really expected one). Anyway I URGE you all again, join his web discussion board and refute his lies, write Stephen and his wife and let them know in a polite and respectful way that the lies need to stop. Take action, SPEAK UP. Remember that if we don’t speak up, history can repeat itself. Make a change in the world today!

Here is the letter I am sending, I don’t expect a response, but I will send it anyway. Please, write one and send it today!

Dear Stephen and Irene,

I am a 36 year old gay male. I have a great partner, who I love with all my heart. We have been together for almost 7 years. We had a beautiful commitment ceremony on September 24th of this past year; although not legal we pledged our eternal love for one another and exchanged rings. We have two wonderful dogs, named Cody and Nikita. Both of our dogs were rescued from abusive homes and now are safe and happy with us in our lovely New England home

I am saddened and disappointed with your new radio show where with each show, you have painted a picture of gays and lesbians as unhealthy, diseased, drug addicted child molesters. Not only is it sad, but it goes against the work of most respected child advocacy groups in the United States. Children of lesbians and gays everywhere is a non-profit group of children raised by gay and lesbian parents. Their statistics and message seem to contradict just about everything that you have ever said about gay parents. Can you explain to me, why you would continue to paint a picture of gays as child predators when most every Medical and Psychological Association has proved you wrong? Why would you want to send that message when you know that the children of gay and lesbian parents will hear it and be hurt? Why would you want to hurt children like this?

You have also had Dr. John Diggs on your show, who has used old and refuted research to again, demonize gays and lesbians with lies and made up diseases that have no basis in science. Much of Dr. Diggs research is based on the now debunked researcher named, Paul Cameron. Cameron has gone as far as to call for the extermination of gays and by allowing someone as a guest on your show that uses Cameron’s research; you also must support his call for extermination. How horrid that you would give support to someone who calls for the murder of people based on their sexual orientation.

Your constant use of flawed research, you claim to no longer be gay, when no one can prove you were ever gay in the first place is just dishonest and mean spirited and far from a any real Christian action. Words can incite action, studies show that many of the people who have committed hate crimes against gays and lesbians had a lifetime of listening to messages just like yours. You are not telling people the truth about homosexuality as you claim you are and you are certainly not “helping” anyone.

I would ask that you change your message. If you want people to change their sexuality based on biblical teachings then do that, but stop using fear, stereotypes and debunked research to spread a message that is paid for with the blood of gays and lesbians like Matthew Shepard.

Sincerely,
Joe Brummer