Via AmericaBlogGay:

Secret documents reveal NOM strategic goal "to drive wedge between gays and blacks"

It's not like we didn't think this was happening, but, wow, it's really ugly to see it in writing. As John notes on the main AMERICAblog home page, the religious right wanted to fan a race war, and they admitted it in writing.  Ben Smith at Buzzfeed calls the documents "explosive".

Earlier tonight, Alvin McEwen tipped me off about some court documents that revealed NOM's strategy. It's ugly. From Alvin:

The National Organization for Marriage's unsuccessful fight to skirt Maine's financial disclosure laws just backfired majorly on the group by revealing a distasteful part of its game plan to stop marriage equality.

According to a court document that was uploaded online, NOM specifically worked to drive a wedge between the black and gay community on the subject of marriage equality

Here's the key passage about gays and blacks (and there's also a strategy for Latinos):

The strategic goal of this project is to drive a wedge between gays and blacks - two key democratic constituencies. We aim to find, equip, energize and connect African American spokespeople for marriage; to develop a media campaign around their objections to gay marriage as a civil right; and to provoke the gay marriage base into responding by denouncing these spokesmen and women as bigots. No politician wants to take up and push an issue that splits the base of the party. Fanning the hostility raised in the wake of Prop 8 is key...

They mean hostility between African-Americans and white gays.

The full document is below. (John links to a second confidential NOM document that is similar to this one, but also includes the "fanning the hostility" phrase. There seem to be at least three different documents.)

Jeremy Hooper and HRC's NOM Exposed are on top of this, too.

And, as for NOM and Latinos, read the post from Dr. Gary Segura, who runs Latino Decisions polling firm -- and was an expert witness in the Prop. 8 case and several DOMA cases. He noted:

For starters, Latinos are far more liberal on marriage equality than stereotypes might suggest.

This has the potential to be a very big story. Ben Smith at BuzzFeed has already picked up the story.

Nom Depo Exhibit 28

Via JMG: Turkish Army Demands Proof Of Gayness

The Turkish Army grants a waiver of the mandatory service requirement if you are gay. But you have to prove it to them.

Ahmet, a young man in his 20s, told officials he was gay at the first opportunity after he was called up, as he and other conscripts underwent a health check. "They asked me if I liked football, whether I wore woman's clothes or used woman's perfume," he says. "I had a few days' beard and I am a masculine guy - they told me I didn't look like a normal gay man." He was then asked to provide a picture of himself dressed as a woman "I refused this request," he says. "But I made them another offer, which they accepted." Instead he gave them a photograph of himself kissing another man. Ahmet hopes this will give him what he needs - a "pink certificate", which will declare him homosexual and therefore exempt from military service.

Photo requirement: "The face must be visible, and the photos must show you as the passive partner." The above-linked BBC News report notes that civilian Turkish employers are allowed to ask the army about such waivers.

Labels: LGBT rights, military, Turkey

Reposted from Joe

"Join the Party!"

Via JMG: Herman Cain, WTF? (Part Two)

I hesitate to post this, but its so crazy, I think it needs to be shared...

Labels: crackpots, crazy people, GOP, WTF

Reposted from Joe

Via JMG: U.S. Customs To Recognize Gay Families

Homeland Security today announced a proposed rule change that will allow gay families to go through U.S. Customs together. Zack Ford notes at Think Progress: "Before, married same-sex couples had to go through customs separately because the policy referred to married couples, and thus fell under the purview of the Defense of Marriage Act." Yet another advance from the Obama administration.

Labels: gay families, Homeland Security, Obama administration

Reposted from Joe

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma March 26, 2012

Facing Challenges and Obstacles

When challenges or obstacles arise for us, we don’t have to get so intimidated; we can say, 'Yes, it’s an obstacle, but it is not intrinsically bad; it’s not going to destroy me.' To create a relationship with the obstacle, learn about it, and finally overcome it is going to be a helpful thing to do. It gives us a chance to cultivate wisdom and skillful means. It gives us confidence. We cannot eliminate all of the challenges or obstacles in life—our own or anyone else’s. We can only learn to rise to the occasion and face them.

- Dzigar Kongtrul, “Old Relationships, New Possibilities”
Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma March 25, 2012

An Innocent Mind

What can be described is the known, and the freedom from the known can come into being only when there is a dying every day to the known, to the hurts, the flatteries, to all the images you have made, to all your experiences— dying every day so that the brain cells themselves become fresh, young, innocent.

- Jiddu Krishnamurti, “A Still Mind”
Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection

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