Via JMG: TEXAS: ExxonMobil Shareholders Vote Down LGBT Employee Protections

Despite facing years of protests including one outside of today's meeting, the shareholders of ExxonMobil have once again refused to grant employment protections to LGBT workers. The Dallas Voice reports:

Meeting at the Meyerson Symphony Center in the Dallas Arts District, the ExxonMobil shareholders voted 80 percent to 20 percent Wednesday morning against a resolution asking the corporation to amend “its written equal employment opportunity policy to explicitly prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and to substantially implement the policy.” The 80-20 margin of defeat was among the largest for the proposal, which has been introduced each year since Mobil and Exxon merged in 1999. The percentage of shareholders voting for the policy had increased steadily over the years to about 40 percent, before dropping off significantly after gender identity was added in 2008.

Before the two companies merged, Mobil had been one of the first major corporations to provide domestic partner benefits and workplace protections for gay employees. Those benefits were rescinded when Exxon came on board.

Read the full Dallas Voice report.

Labels: domestic partners, employment, LGBT rights, Texas

Reposted from Joe

All the dead people say yes By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist

Somewhere along a forgotten branch of your family tree, there she is.

Somewhere deep in your lineage, there's at least one, maybe two, maybe even quite a few more whom you know nothing about -- relatives who, when they were alive, never made a sound or ruffled any feathers, hidden like thwarted relics, long deceased but right now whispering at the top of their ghostly lungs straight into your most lucid, semi-hallucinogenic dreams: "Get the hell on with it, already."

Can you hear them? Can you possibly say there are no closeted gay or lesbian, radical or repressed relatives back in your family history -- people who, due to the times and constraints under which they lived, never in a million years could have lived the life you are now free to lead, never could have revealed their true selves in public, much less celebrated that self, much less (heaven forefend) married someone they actually loved, gender/kink/ideology regardless?

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2012/05/30/notes053012.DTL#ixzz1wO0TBUZE

Via AmericaBlogGay:

AP: Norwegian terrorist was a feminine momma's-boy who wore make-up, so maybe he was gay

I'm really surprised that AP didn't handle this story better. They have the nerve to do a story suggesting that the Norwegian mass-murderer terrorist might have been gay because - get this - he was kind of effeminate, lived with mom, and liked to sometimes put on make-up. And what gay man doesn't lisp, put on make-up, and live with mom. We're all Norman Bates, now. 

my note:

SHAME ON YOU AP!

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma

Tricycle Daily Dharma May 30, 2012

Breaking Through Resistance

Thinking and talking about practice are easy substitutes for the real effort that a practice life requires. We resist facing life as it is because that would mean abandoning our views of how we think it should be. The most basic form of resistance is wanting life to be other than it is.

- Ezra Bayda, "Breaking Through"
Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection

SF Gay Men's Chorus Celebrates Golden Gate Bridge 75th Anniversary

Did you hear that US Congress?

Via JMG: European Parliament Denounces Nations With Anti-LGBT Legislation

The 754-member European Parliament has approved a resolution denouncing nations with current or pending anti-gay legislation. The item specifically calls out Russia, Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukraine. The UK's Pink News reports:

The resolution was adopted with 430 in favour and 105 against, saying it was “gravely concerned by developments which restrict freedom of expression and assembly on the basis of misconceptions about homosexuality and transgenderism”. It added that EU Member States should be “exemplary in the application and protection of fundamental rights in Europe”. 14 Conservative MEPs voted in favour of the resolution with 12 either abstaining or being unable to vote. 9 Labour MEPs voted in favour of the move with 3 abstaining or unable to vote. All but two absent Liberal Democrat MEPs voted for the resolution. The resolution specifically addressed laws in several European countries, condemning laws against ill-defined ‘propaganda’.

Of the cited nations, only Latvia and Lithuania belong to the European Union.

Labels: European Parliament, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Ukraine

Reposted from Joe

Via JMG: RELIGION CENSUS: Fewer Than 50% Of Americans Are "Adherents" Of Christianity

According to a just-published analysis of the 2010 Religion Census, fewer than 50% of Americans are "adherents" of Christianity. The percentage who would self-identify as "Christian," regardless of church membership and attendance patterns, is presumably higher.

The researchers define adherents to be those with an affiliation to a congregation including children, members and attendees who are not members, and believe that the adherent measure is the most complete and comparable across religious groups. Congregations are defined as groups of people who meet regularly at a pre-announced time and location. More than 150.6 million Christian adherents and 344,894 congregations were reported across the country. It is noteworthy that less than 50 percent of of the nation's population identified as Christian adherents. With close to 15.8 million Christian adherents, California reported the highest number of Christian adherents, whereas Vermont reported the lowest -- only 200,000 identified as Christian adherents. Around 10 percent of the nation's Christians reside in California. With 27,248 congregations, Texas reported the highest number of congregations in a state, whereas District of Columbia reported the lowest with 566.

The above-linked reports offer no insight as the number of Americans who consider themselves atheist, agnostic, anti-theist, or merely "unchurched."

Labels: census, religion, United States

Reposted from Joe

Via JMG: Brown Vs Savage: Duel Accepted

Just posted to NOM's blog:

"Dan -- I accept and will look forward to debating you at your dining room table. As I said in my challenge to you, anytime, any place. While I appreciate the invitation that you have extended to my wife, she will not be able to attend. She is a full-time mom with seven beautiful children and an eighth on the way. I have no objection to Mark Oppenheimer from the New York Times covering the discussion, nor to you hiring your own video crew to film the event, provided that I am able to hire my own video crew to be sure there is no creative editing of the discussion. Not that a New York Times reporter would slant the news, mind you! :) This will be fun!" - Brian Brown.

Labels: Brian Brown, Dan Savage, hate groups, LGBT rights, NOM, religion

Reposted from Joe

Via George Takei

Arj Barker Sickest Buddhist