Speak Compassion

Update 4: My recent check in with Stacy’s blog shows that she somehow thinks my “myspace” account was set up because of her and calls it an obsession with her. Just for the record, and to point out the truth behind the lies, my myspace account was set up back in September of 2005 so I could keep up with my niece. It has nothing to do with Stacy. Funny how she implies on her latest blog post that I set it up as part of an obsession with her. My obsession is to stop hate speech against gays and lesbians.  I do in fact know a bit about Stacy, my interest is in what she is doing, not her at all.  Remember the principles of nonviolence, attack forces of evil, not the person’s doing the evil.

While the First Amendment affords her the right to free speech, it does not afford her the right to a venue for that speech outside the public platform. Last I checked, Typepad is not an arm of the government and has every right to censor hate speech on their servers.

Update 3: After sleeping on this issue, I have decided shutting down the hateful blog is not a violent action? Why, because it protects innocent people from being slandered day after day by Stacy’s untruths about gays and lesbians. While she does this all under the guise of God, it is still wrong. I would suggest people read the quotes from Stacy’s blog and familiarize yourself with her untruths, then contact Typepad at the link on the bottom of this post and let them know she is in direct violation of her terms of service.

Update 2: It seems Stacy is not completely in understanding about me, I am not trying to shut her blog down. Obviously she didn’t read my email to the typepad people or she would know I see no purpose in that. It would be nice if she apologized to the gay community for all her hateful comments about them, but I won’t be holding my breath. She also thinks I want her reprimanded or shut down for her crusade against pedophiles. Not so, I am all in favor of her crusade against pedophiles and boy love sites. I do not support them, nor do I think they are free speech. I do want Stacy to stop equating gays with pedophiles. I would like her to stop calling gays “terrorist” because we are not. I expected some attack from her and that is fine. Doesn’t change the truth, she is writing hateful and untrue things about gays and lesbians. That hate needs to stop.

UPDATE: I have added a page of quotes from Stacy’s Blog. I haven’t finished reading all of her posts, but have read enough to know she is in vioaltion of her terms of service with typepad.

The blog, “writingright” run by Ms. Stacy Harp has been known to bully and dehumanize gays and lesbians, but did you know that is against the Terms of Service for Typepad, her blog host? Their terms clearly read:

You agree that you will not:

(a) upload, post, transmit or otherwise make available any Content that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, tortuous, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libelous, invasive of another’s privacy (up to, but not excluding any address, email, phone number, or any other contact information without the written consent of the owner of such information), hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;

Thankfully, a nice reader of mine and hers sent a notice to typepad and notified them of this observation. They replied that they would need to hear from me about the slanderous and hateful comments she has made about me. This is a copy of the email I sent to them regarding Stacy’s blog.

Good Evening,

I have been made aware that Stacy Harp over at the writingright typepad is in violation of her TOS with typepad. While I feel these attacks are unwarranted and basically violence of speech. I am a firm believer in nonviolence as taught by King and Gandhi. Taking actions against Ms. Harper will do nothing to change her mind about gays and lesbians. Her site is nothing short of violence of speech, but she would just find another venue for her hate. She did in fact call me an “homosexual terrorist” and she also suggests I am a child molester with is nothing short of slander.

Her exact words cut and pasted from here blog post dated March 27th, 2006 states: So here’s what I say to you Joe, cry me a river, build a bridge and get over it. The FACTS are that many homosexual terrorists, such as yourself, do molest children, do stalk children, and do rape them. So whether you like it or not, my opening paragraph does fit with my article. You just don’t like the truth.

While I feel that Ms. Harp would just close up her blog and start another spewing even more hate if you should close this one for her, I also feel a warning to her about the terms of service would be good. If you should feel that her blog should be closed, please do not do it on my behalf, but on the violation of the terms of service. Personally, I feel closing her blog with do nothing but aggrivate her hate and cause her to have new material to hate gays even further. Should you have any questions, please feel free to reply to this email.

Sincerely,
Joe Brummer

We shall see what happens from here, I myself do not know. What I am not sure of is what the nonviolent thing to do would be. Having her blog taken down for a violation of the TOS would not turn an adversary into an ally as nonviolence would ask us to do. On the other hand nonviolence also reminds us that if we don’t not try and stop the violence and evil, then we are in cooperation with violence and evil. This reminds my soul that the journey to nonviolence is just that…a journey.

If you too would like to make a complaint about the violent speech of Ms. Stacy Harp, you may send an email to typepad:

Please report any violations of the TOS to our Content Violation Reporting Form.

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Just some late might ramblings after reading “The Mind of Gandhi”

Whenever we remain silent, and just go with the flow, never speaking out on the things that are unjust, never objecting to injustice, we are silently nodding our heads in approval. To allow it to continue is to cooperate with the injustice.

When we see that the laws are unjust and do nothing to change them, we are in cooperation with injustice. When we seen others being mistreated, and do nothing, we are cooperating with injustice because we are allowing it to happen.

If I am to feel that the rules of my job are unjust, then I need to find a new job, rather than cooperate with the injustice.
If I am working for a company that promotes injustice, then it is my duty to find a new job rather than cooperate with the injustice.

If I am part of a club or group that promotes intolerance of others and oppression, then it is my duty and obligation to leave that group and speak out on their support of injustice.

If my government applies laws to some but not others, there is injustice. If I do not speak out on this injustice then I am cooperating with it.

If suffering lives and I do nothing, I am cooperating with the cause of that suffering since I did nothing to stop it, and I could have.

To cooperate with injustice is to not stop it, to allow it, to aid it,

To speak out against injustice is the only real method of non-cooperation that exists.

So why do some of us take a position against injustice on our speech, our comment, our blogs…than go to work at a job that promotes injustice and oppression?

Why do some of us put on a face of nonviolence, yet spew direct violent words or actions against others?

I so wish I could answer these question, but I can never be in the mind of others.

Permission to reprint is granted to all.

From Alan Sears, president of the Alliance Defense Fund:

“Day of Truth” participants will hand out cards of their own, offering to share a candid, loving, fact-based counterpoint to the unspoken assertions of the advocates for homosexual behavior. While making their case from a Christian perspective, the “Day of Truth”ers will confront with compassion — not condemnation — and restrict their discussions to the periods before, after and between classes. [emphasis added]

The t-shirt pictured above was made by Tyler Chase Harper and worn to school in response to the Day of Silence. The school reacted and Harper quickly became the poster-twink for the Day of Truth and his photo is plastered on their website. Let’s contrast Sears’ message with that of Harper’s shirt. On the front:

BE ASHAMED
OUR SCHOOL EMBRACED WHAT GOD HAS CONDEMNED

On the back:

HOMOSEXUALITY IS SHAMEFUL

To top it all off, the Exodus Live Out Loud blog has linked to Sears’ article over at Baptist Press.

Today, a large group of conservative Christian groups has released their new “School Risk Audit Tool”. This document is suppose to help parents evaluate how gay friendly their child’s school is. If the tool were not filled with such lies about homosexuality, this could be used for gay parents to choose the right school for their kids. The tool itself makes claims that are so outrageous, I am not sure any sound minded individual would really buy into it in the year 2006, but you never know. What has struck me as odd are the claims about recruiting in the schools.
The American Family Association’s (a support of the new tool) main writer about homosexuality is Stephen Bennett who says:

Homosexuality is an outward expression of an inward conflict. In most cases, no one chooses to struggle with same-sex attractions, but they develop early on in the childhood for a variety of different reasons.

Well how can teens be recruited into homosexuality if it is a disorder of some sort. Does that mean it is contageous? Can teens catch it?

They are also claiming in this press release that teens might be taught that homosexuality is a normal acceptable “lifestyle”.   Well actually, gays and lesbians have many lifestyles.   Considering we come from all walks of life, we are found in every country.   We don’t have lifestyles anymore than heterosexuals have a heterosexual lifestlye.   This is a buzz word created by the religious right to continue their dehumanizing of gays.   We have lives, not lifestyles.

Religious right organizations go overboard with plan to gut school gay support clubs

April 25, 2006– In a move designated to declare war on gay support organizations in schools, several religious right organizations have bonded together in order to unveil a “risk audit plan.” The organizations involved (i.e. Mission America, Concerned Women for America, Family Research Council, etc.) claim that the plan is created in order to warn how the “gay agenda” has infiltrated America’s schools.

But from top to bottom, their plan is filled with lies, innuendoes, and bad studies designed not only to cater to fear tactics concerning the gay community but also to make the incorrect case that gay support clubs are a danger.In the section called Why Homosexual Activism in Schools Endanger Students, the organizations list several reasons why they think homosexuality is a danger including:

“reduces life expectancy at age twenty by at least 8 to 20 years; increases by at least 500% the risk of contracting AIDS; increases the risk ofcontracting a sexually transmitted disease by nearly 900%; increases by 4,000% the risk of developing anal cancer; substantially increases the likelihood of smoking, having mental health disorders (other than same-sex attraction), being the victim of “domestic” violence, and being involved in alcohol and drug abuse; substantially increases the likelihood of contracting hepatitis and other gastrointestinal infections; substantially increases the risk of contracting bacterial vaginosis, breast cancer, and ovarian cancer; andhas high levels of participation in sadomasochism, coprophilia, sadomasochism, fisting, and other dangerous, deviant sex practices involves extraordinarily high levels of promiscuity.”

Researcher Alvin McEwen claims that this list is nothing but propaganda. McEwen has spent over a year analyzing religious right distortions pertaining to the gay community. McEwen said that the “risk audit plan” is more of the same lies. He points to the two studies where the religious right organizations claim to have received the data for these charges (The Negative Effects of Homosexuality by Timothy Dailey of the Family Research Council and The Health Risks of Gay Sex by John R. Diggs) claiming that they are bad studies. “First of all,” McEwen said, “both of the studies use data from Paul Cameron.” Paul Cameron is a researcher who was kicked out of the American Psychological Association in 1984 for misuse of his colleagues’ studies. Since then, he has received much criticism for studies some say unfairly demonize the gay community. (more…)

It appears the right wing conservative group, “Operation Save America” is claiming victory over the cancellation of a gay pride event in North Carolina. Their leader, Flip Benham is saying:

“For the past five years, Charlotte Pride has been parading its sin, like Sodom, right here in this public park,”

The truth is that the event was cancelled because the leaders of Charolette Pride didn’t have the energy to do it this year. Their leader is saying:

“I know (Benham) is taking credit for the ‘downfall’ of Charlotte Pride,” Witkowski said Monday. “But the reason why Charlotte Pride is not happening at the time planned and in Marshall Park is because the former organizers decided, for whatever reason, that they just don’t have the time or energy to do it this year.”

The big catch is that another group is planning to hold a bigger, more extravagant event later this year. So it would appear that Operation Save America didn’t really save anything… You shoudn’t claim victory until you have really done something and this group hasn’t done anything.

If you are looking for one page to pile up all possible lies, distortions and omissions when it comes to same-sex marriage: look no further. The Concerned Women for America have compiled the “Top 10 Reasons to Support the Marriage Affirmation and Protection Amendment”

This page goes all the way, from quoting studies “proving” gays and lesbians are more prone to domestic violence to stating that all proponents of equal marriage rights are out to destroy marriage itself. Over the course of time I shall quote particular “reasons” and attempt to logically refute them, with proper argumentation instead of the “they just are!” and “look at this Paul Cameron study!” arguments.

1) “Christians, Jews and Muslims would be forced to endorse behavior that they recognize as contrary to their beliefs.”

This one is so self-righteous it’s beyond even the scope of sanity the Concerned Women must surely have stashed away somewhere in a dark corner. Do they really presume to speak for every christian, jew and muslim in the world? I know people of a wide-range of denominations and none of them thinks equal rights to marry force them to endorse behaviour - rather, they accept that people are all different. As an atheist myself, am I complaining that through “regular” marriage I should endorse behaviour I find contrary to my beliefs because I’m gay and they’re not? It’s ridiculous.

2) “If homosexual “marriage” is permitted, there is no logical stopping point at which to deny marriage to any combinations of people who want to “marry.””

Wrong again. As I referred to in an earlier post, this slippery slope argument really doesn’t fly. As keen as right-wing distorters are to quote studies referring to the destruction of marriage in the Netherlands and Scandinavia - even going so far as to lie and state that three Dutch persons who signed a cohabitation contracted had entered into a legal state of polygamy - they fail to mention that laws here in Europe still define marriage as a bond between two persons (whether these are two hetero’s or homo’s is, of course, subject to a particular country’s law). Neither in the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Canada or South Africa (where equal marriage rights should be granted by December 2006) has any proposal yet been put forth to broaden marriage to allow any number of partners to enter into matrimony. Why? Because that’s not what marriage is. Marriage is ‘legally recognized relationship, established by a civil or religious ceremony, between two people who intend to live together as sexual and domestic partners‘; some dictionaries still have seperate entries under the article “marriage” to differentiate between marriage as it was everywhere before 2001 and what it might be since then, but nonetheless both meanings are defined under the same caption: marriage.

Claiming that extending full marital rights to two people regardless of either party’s gender will lead to people marrying three others and eventually their pets is just not a reality. I have yet to hear a single Dutch MP direct attention to the matter. It’s just not an issue because it’s not going to happen - marriage here has become gender neutral, but it’s still inherently and vehemently something two unite TWO persons. Not three. Or fifty-four.

There are many groups out there claiming that homosexuality is caused by some type of Father-son estrangement, or not enough mascualine influence in a child’s life. The science doesn’t stand on this the way the right wing would like! Give me your thoughts.
Here are some talking points:
Side A:

Is Homosexuality Caused by Son-Father Estrangement?

Side B:

Father Hungry and homosexuality 

This is a cut and paste from and email I received, please direct comments to the author….

‘Day of Truth’ or ‘Day of Lies?’
Religious right organizations continue to lie in order to demonize the gay community
April 20, 2006 –According to the Allied Defense Fund and other religious conservative organizations, the “Day of Truth” is created to counter the success of GLSEN’s “Day of Silence” and to tell supposed truths about homosexuality.
Apparently truth to the Allied Defense Fund means passing out incorrect information about the gay community. “The information they are giving out that supposedly tells the truth about homosexuality are nothing but lies,” said researcher Alvin McEwen.

For over a year, McEwen has studied religious right studies and research papers pertaining to the gay community. He claims to have found a pattern of deception. According to him, the information those supporting “Day of Truth” are giving out is no different. He points to a handout offered on the “Day of Truth” webpage entitled The Ten Big Myths of Homosexual Behavior:
“homosexual behavior are at much higher risk for many sexually transmitted diseases, including not just HIV, but also syphilis, gonorrhea, human papilloma virus (HPV), hepatitis, chlamydia, and a whole group of infections called “gay bowel syndrome.”
“Gay bowel syndrome” is an obsolete medical term that is no longer used by any credible physician. According to an April 8, 2005 edition of the Washington Blade, the Centers for Disease Control does not even recognize the term.

Awhile back I had an email conversation with a rather notable ex-gay representative of Exodus who couldn’t figure out how or why I was angry with Exodus’ constant portrayal of gays as child molesters and monsters.   Well here is the example of it (of course I could produce hundreds of examples of how this is done, it is the why it is done no one from this group will answer).

This women’s story is awful, but what she is doing with her story is even more awful in my eyes.   She cannot see past herself well enough to understand that her experience is not the experience of thousands of children who have been adopted and/or raised by gay parents.  She has one story, that she is coming into another country and saying to the public: “look, this is what all gays are like, don’t let them near your kids, don’t let them marry”

Okay, lets have a closer look at deception by omission.  What isn’t she telling you.  What isn’t Exodus telling you as they have posted this deception on their site without all the facts.   What if I was to list all the similar horror stories of children who were mistreated even worse than this women’s story by heterosexual adoptive parents.  What about the ones who were killed, by heterosexual adoptive parents.  

She and Exodus also didn’t tell you about the million children raised by homosexuals who might otherwise would not have parents at all.    What about the thousands of children who did just fine or better by being adopted by gay parents.   The studies prove it over-and-over-and-over that children raised by gays and lesbians are fine.   They are no more likely to be gay. They have no bizarre emotional scars.   They are fine.   Why is Exodus not telling you that?   Why are the Straight Talk Radio programs not telling you about that?   Why are the not so Concerned Women for America not telling you this……DECEPTION BY OMISSION!  They are lying to you.  They are lying to the world because they don’t like gays and lesbians.   I find it sad.  When will this war of lies end?   Why is it that the Exodus blog doesn’t allow comments, regardless how well written that disagree with them.  

The latest updates from the American Family Association are claiming that Ford’s stock has fallen 7% and that Ford is reporting a  5% loss for March.   They exact words used in their press update say:

It appears that Ford is more willing to face bankruptcy than ending their support of homosexual groups and causes.

What the American Family Association is failing to tell you is that putting Ford into financial straights directly hits home for their own members.   Many people who support the AFA also may work for Ford, or for dealerships that sell Ford cars.  While the AFA is sending hard working Auto workers to the poor house, Ford is not backing down on their support of gay families.   Yeah FORD!   It is about time that somebody stood their ground in dealing with these pseudo family oriented groups.   

On the other side, Ford is sponsoring the Family Area at Motor City Pride.  To support gay families with loving events like “face painting” “Story Hour” and “Bubble making”.   So we get to choose who really supports families: Ford who does family stuff or the AFA who promotes bigotry and hate?    I guess we all of have our way of defining “support”.