Via JMG: Donations Pour In For Daniel Pierce

Early yesterday morning I posted the video of 20 year-old Georgia resident Daniel Pierce, who recorded his family as they verbally and physically abused him for being gay. Since then the clip has gone wildly viral with over 2 million views. The story has been picked up by the national press, fueling donations that stand at over $52K at this writing.

Pierce confirmed the video's details to the Huffington Post on Thursday, adding that he initially came out to his parents in October. But when his father, stepmother and grandparents attempted to stage a "delayed intervention" on Wednesday, things quickly went awry, which resulted in Pierce being attacked, disowned and thrown out of his house. "You're full of shit," Pierce's stepmother can be heard saying in the video. "You told me on the phone that you made that choice. You know you wasn't born that way. You know damn good and well you made that choice. You know that [your father] has done everything he can to raise you. ... He didn't need to blame himself." "Their reaction was pretty much expected [once] I chose to leave instead of pray because they have always been very vocal about not supporting the gay lifestyle," Pierce told the Huffington Post. "My [stepmother's] reaction was the most surprising and hurtful." Sadly, Pierce's story is not unique. While Pierce has confirmed that he is now safely staying with supportive friends and family members, there are many LGBT youths in America who face even more unfortunate circumstances. A 2012 study by UCLA's Williams Institute found that around 40% of homeless youths identify as LGBT, many of them having been rejected or abused by their family members over their gender or sexual orientation.

While Pierce appears to be in safe hands now, countless other LGBT youth remain in peril. Please consider supporting the Ali Forney Center or a similar organization near you.

 

Labels: Ali Forney Center, coming out, LGBT youth

Reposted From Joe Jervis

Flower of the Day: 08/29/14

"When you can look into the eyes of each member of your family constellation and sincerely thank them for everything, you will be ready to forget that you were ever born. This means that you will be ready to go beyond your personality and beyond human consciousness, and thus anchor divine consciousness. You will finally be able to remember your true identity, which is beyond your story, your body and your name."

Sri Prem Baba

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Far from Dharma | August 29, 2014

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At this moment in human history, the unrestrained extraction and burning of fossil fuels has brought us, in the industrialized nations, to the point where we are contaminating and pillaging the Earth to such an extreme that we are endangering all life on this planet. Nothing could be further from the intention and practice of dharma.

 

-Ven. Santussika Bhikkhuni, “Dharma in Action”

 

Via The Bilerico Project / FB:

PREACH. Holy double standards, Batman!

Here's why we shouldn't tolerate double standards for PDAs:

http://www.bilerico.com/2014/05/on_the_michael_sam_kiss_and_getting_a_room.php

Via The Bilerico Project / FB:

https://www.facebook.com/BilericoProject/photos/a.10151664296722855.1073741826.9288107854/10152674597032855/?type=1&theater

How not to react when your child tells you that he's gay

Fortunately, this mentality is slowly diminishing, but this video is proof it exists -- and in too many homes, as we know 40 percent of homeless runaways are LGBT kids, and 1.6 and 2.8 million youths run away each year.

Dan Savage writes:

That was hard to listen to. Jesus. Fucking. Christ. My heart breaks for that poor, brave, tough kid. What the fuck is wrong with these people?

We could have a fundraiser up and running for this poor kid by morning—if we knew who he was and where he was.

Please remember, if you are an LGBT child or teen in need of help, the National Runaway Switchboard at 1-800-RUNAWAY can help you. The Ali Forney Center has a local and national LGBT youth online resource guide. 

Hat tip: Joe Jervis

Via Daily Dharma

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Forget Language | August 28, 2014

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If you use a trap to catch fish, once you succeed you can forget the trap. And if you use language to find meaning, once you find it you can forget the language. 

 

-Bodhidharma, "The Snaggletoothed Barbarian"

 

Flower of the Day: 08/28/14

"Being alive is a miracle. If you are alive, it is only through the grace of God. If you can blink your eyes, it's through God’s grace. It is impossible to know when you are going to pass away, which is why it is so important to know what to do with the time you have been given. Perhaps the best use of your time may be to even meditate on immortality, since in the end the myth of death imprisons your mind. The truth is that when your body no longer serves you, you need to change bodies, but the one who inhabits the body never dies."

- Sri Prem Baba

Via Daily Dharma

We End Liberated | August 27, 2014 There is no permanent Hell, there is no permanent Heaven. Therefore, the suffering that we sense during this transition of life is not a permanent condition that we need to be afraid of. It's not where we're going to end up. We end liberated from the suffering either by death, or in life, by waking up to the nature of our situation and not clinging and grasping, screaming and being angry, resentful, irritable or insulted by our existence.    -Allen Ginsberg, "Negative Capability: Kerouac's Buddhist Ethic"

Flower of the Day: 08/27/14

"At some point in time, one must learn how not to identify with one’s lower nature, specifically with the games of lust, pride and revenge to name a few. But, in order not to get identified with these games, one must first recognize and identify them. This is the first stage of the awakening process. This identification or recognition is only possible through focused self-observation."

- Sri Prem Baba

Via JMG: Ecuador Recognizes LGBT Relationships

Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa has announced that LGBT citizens will be able to register their relationships with the federal government.

"The LGBT community have the constitutional right to register on their union," Correa said during his weekly report. Previously, the Ecuadoran Civil Registry did not recognize these unions because they had no legal status according to law, however Correa said that from now on this right has to be respected and if denied, the authorities will take action on the matter. However, Correa said that although he supports these unions, he don't support gay marriage, which according to him corresponds to the union between a man and a woman. But he said he is committed to guarantee the rights of all Ecuadorans. Correa, a Catholic leftist, has expressed his opposition to same-sex marriage and adoption of children by gay couples in previous occasions. The Ecuadoran Constitution grants equal rights to "cohabitation partnerships" regardless if they are civil or Catholic marriages, so the LGBT community gains more legal recognition with this legislation.

Same-sex marriage and adoption by gay couples or individuals remains banned in the national constitution.

Labels: Ecuador, LGBT rights, South America

Reposted from Joe Jervis

Via JMG: AP Reports On Seventh Circuit

Via the Associated Press:

Federal appeals judges bristled Tuesday at arguments defending gay marriage bans in Indiana and Wisconsin, with one Republican appointee comparing them to now-defunct laws that once outlawed weddings between blacks and whites. Judge Richard Posner, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, was dismissive when Wisconsin Assistant Attorney General Timothy Samuelson repeatedly pointed to 'tradition' as the underlying justification for barring gay marriage. "It was tradition to not allow blacks and whites to marry — a tradition that got swept away," Posner said. Prohibition of same sex marriage, he said, is "a tradition of hate ... and savage discrimination."

Posner frequently cut off Indiana Solicitor General Thomas Fischer, just moments into his presentation and chided him to answer his questions. At one point, Posner ran through a list of psychological strains of unmarried same-sex couples, including having to struggle to grasp why their schoolmates' parents were married and theirs weren't. "What horrible stuff," Posner said. What benefits to society in barring gay marriage, he asked, "outweighs that kind of damage to children?" The answer has to do with "procreation," Fisher answered. "All this is a reflection of biology," Fisher said. "Men and women make babies, same-sex couples do not... we have to have a mechanism to regulate that, and marriage is that mechanism."

The ACLU and Lambda Legal have essentially reiterated their equal protection arguments in appeals court filings, arguing that the bans deny gay couples state and federal legal protections and benefits that married straight couples enjoy. "The freedom to marry is a core aspect of personal liberty for all Americans," the ACLU said in its briefs. There was some levity during the hearing. As Samuelson struggled to offer a specific reason for how gay marriage bans benefit society, he suddenly noted a yellow courtroom light signaling his allotted time was up. "It won't save you," Williams told him, prompting laughter in court. Samuleson smiled, saying "it was worth a try."

Labels: Indiana, Seventh Circuit Court, Wisconsin

Reposted from Joe Jervis

Flower of the Day: 08/26/14

"True service is a fragrance of the Being. It is a light that emanates from your understanding. At a certain stage of the journey, you are able to practice service as an intelligent austerity, which is a spiritual practice that purifies selfishness. You choose to create some friction in order to provoke your ‘no's’ towards love. Since it is a choice, I call it an ‘intelligent’ austerity because it is born out of your intelligence and comprehension. It is bitter medicine, but it works, so you decide to try it out."

- Sri Prem Baba

Via Daily Dharma

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Give It Away | August 26, 2014

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Happiness is not happiness unless it is shared. For happiness is the one thing in all the world that comes to us only at the moment we give it, and is likewise increased by being given away. 

 

-Clark Strand, "The Wisdom of Frogs"

 

Via Daily Dharma

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Derived from Mind | August 25, 2014

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It is the various mental constructions that we hold, and hold dear, that appear as time and space, extension and duration. These—and all of the material world—derive from consciousness, which ladles out time and space from a timeless, spaceless sea. 

 

-Steve Hagen, "Time and Now"

 

Flower of the Day: 08/25/14

"Death is a myth that imprisons us, and what sustains this myth is forgetting about the spiritual reality. Death needs to be understood, as it is this myth that chains the soul to the body. At the time of your death, all of your unresolved fears and issues visit you, and this drags your awareness back to those places. Then, when you reincarnate, you are stuck at the same point."

- Sri Prem Baba

"Sometimes one’s addiction to blaming the other is so deeply ingrained that one doesn't even realize when one is accusing someone – it happens automatically. But if accusations exist, then so do comparisons and judgments, and this is what opens the doors to hell. With this, one awakens one’s lower nature and ends up losing all of the silence and love one has already gained."

- Sri Prem Baba

Via Daily Dharma

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The Single Thing | August 24, 2014

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I don’t envision a single thing that, when developed and cultivated, brings about such happiness as the mind. The mind, when developed and cultivated, brings about happiness.

-The Buddha, "The Single Thing"

 

Flower of the Day: 08/23/14

"I perceive the acute stages of mental disorder as spiritual emergencies. The soul is expanding faster than the body can keep up with. The energy centers are spinning at a frequency that is defined by the soul, but the body carrying all of its marks and scars cannot handle this movement. In other words, the soul is expanding, but the body is still committed to destroying itself and this creates an internal tug of war between opposing forces. This is the origin of suffering: two forces moving in the opposite direction inside of us."

- Sri Prem Baba