Wingers Set Their Hateful Sights On Hallmark

When your entire being and motivation in life is to hate those different from you (or not) and to hate them as much as you can, new targets must be found all the time. Lovable Barney the Dinosaur can only be ripped apart for so long, ya know? So the religious right has found a new icon, Hallmark greeting cards. What could the card makers have possibly done? Well, growing their business to an undeveloped market...in a financial sense that is.

From ThinkProgress:

Today, the right-wing American Family Association (AFA) announced a protest of Hallmark for its decision to start selling gay marriage greeting cards. AFA wants Hallmark to “stop promoting a lifestyle that is not only unhealthy, but is also illegal in 48 states.” From the protest site:

We’ve all given or received Hallmark Cards – remember their slogan – “when you care enough to send the very best.” But promoting same-sex marriage for profit is not the very best for families or our nation.

Hallmark is a private company obviously driven by greed. Let them know you do not appreciate Hallmark promoting a lifestyle which is illegal in 48 states. American Greeting Cards, Hallmark’s competitor, does not offer same-sex marriage cards.

AFA also criticized Hallmark for having the secret purpose of “pushing[ing] same-sex marriage.” More on AFA’s previous boycotts here.

Yeah, buying websites and signing petitions won't get Hallmark to pull the cards, but it will certainly keep the right wing radicals' donations coming in to AFA. And of course these hateful human beings can always patronize their competitor, meanwhile Hallmark will diversify their business and be all-encompassing in one shot.

If these nuts express this much outrage over a greeting card, I can't wait to see their reaction if McCain picks Tom Ridge or Mitt Romney next week!

Religious Right Group Filters News To Turn "Gay" Into "Homosexual"

An interesting discovery came from the crazy world of the religious right. Olympian Tyson Gay won the 100 meter semifinal this weekend, but not according to OneNewsNow, owned by the American Family Association. Instead, it was Tyson Homosexual that won the race, not Gay. If that sounds confusing then you do not know what limits the religious right goes to to instill fear and hatred in their flock.

From PageOneQ:

OneNewsNow, the "Christian news service" covertly owned by the AFA, receives syndicated content from providers like the Associated Press and edits instances of the word "gay" to read "homosexual." Although the site is registered to the conservative, anti-gay organization, the fact is not disclosed anywhere on the site.

An article posted Sunday night about Olympic track and field star Tyson Gay was no exception.

"Tyson Homosexual easily won his semifinal for the 100 meters at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials," the article read, "and seemed to save something for the final later Sunday." The headline read "Homosexual eases into 100 final at Olympic events."

"On Saturday," it went on, "Homosexual misjudged the finish in his opening heat and had to scramble to finish fourth, then in his quarterfinal a couple of hours later, ran 9.77 to break the American record that had stood since 1999."

"Asked how he felt, Homosexual said: 'A little fatigued.'"

What tires me out is the overt and covert hatred groups like the AFA has for the GLBT community. At first glance one might wonder what the big deal is if they use the word 'gay' or 'homosexual' when covering gay issues (obviously they need an extra filter when the word is someone's last name or an article makes a reference to the word circa 1950).

Well in my view, semantics is always a powerful game to be played, whenever a political issue is at stake. 'Gay' also means happy and perhaps these right-wing wackos do not want to think that gay people can be 'gay'. Remember, it goes against G-d and all that junk. If you ever take the time to hear their comments and sermons from the AFA and others in their cause, they use 'homosexual' in a far more derogatory way than they could with 'gay.' Is this all nuts? Yes of course it is, but we need to engage and uncover this type of garbage wherever it oozes out from the ground.

Right Wingers Are Warning Us About Gays Coming To Take Over Our Towns!!!

What would we do without those crazy wingers? How would we know who was evil and who was super-evil? Who will be raptured and those left to spend eternity in hell on Earth and when will it happen? Who hates America? Why do natural disasters happen? You know, all the important things we need to know. Well now we are being prepared to tackle the nation's biggest problem, infiltration of city councils to allow gay people the chance to experience marriage just like the rest of us.

From Think Progress:

Recently, Oklahoma State Rep. Sally Kern (R) came under intense criticism for making a host of incendiary remarks toward gays. For example, she said gays are a “bigger threat” to our nation than terrorism. She also warned, “Gays are infiltrating city councils.” As an example, she cited the town of Eureka Springs, AR, whose city council she claimed is now “controlled by gays.”

The American Family Association (AFA) has joined in promoting this myth of the evil gay agenda in a new video called “They’re Coming To Your Town.” The poster advertising the DVD appears to have a menacing rainbow-like lights in background. PageOneQ summarizes the trailer for the video:

The presentation in the AFA trailer…”They’re Coming to Your Town,” tells the tale of an uncharacteristically diverse resort town’s government infiltrated by “a handful of homosexual activists” and bent to their will through the enactment of the town’s domestic partner registry on June 22, 2007.

“Watch, and learn,” says the trailer, “how to fight a well-organized gay agenda to take over the cities of America, one city at a time.”

Watch the trailer here.

Eureka Springs is not pleased with people such as Kern, who claim that they have the city’s best interests at heart. Responding to Kern, Eureka Springs’s mayor said the city is “welcoming to all visitors and residents without regard to their race, color, sex, age, sexual orientation, disability or national origin. It is our hope that all people would aspire to this ideal.”

This what these "religious" people spend waste their time with. It isn't about helping their fellow man, it is about destroying anyone that might not look or sound or feel the same way as them. When you have that much fear and loathing inside of you, there must be a lot of people on the list to attack. Gays may be a current topic, but give them a chance to succeed at what they're doing, we'll be burning books within no time.

American Family Association Get Slammed By Ex-Lawyer

When I think of the American Family Association, the last thing that comes to mind is 'family.' Words like 'bigotry,' 'racism,' and 'hypocrisy' are much farther up on the list. Though what does my opinion matter on the issue. It isn't like I worked there or anything, I am just an outsider to the AFA. Joe Murray is an insider, more accurately an ex-insider who used to represent the AFA as legal counsel. His opinions on his former employer are damning to be sure.

From The Bulletin (penned by Joe Murray)

The American Family Association, a pro-family organization and former employer of this writer, sprung into action sending out this "action alert": "Homosexuals working to get Marine general punished for comments calling homosexual act immoral."

AFA then warned that the homosexual lobby "already forced [Pace] to back down a step," and urged supporters to defend Pace and "take a stand for our troops who cannot get involved in this political situation." AFA, like others, had pulled out its red herring.

This is not a political situation, but instead it is a situation where a high ranking official made comments that judged individuals, not ideas. Pace singled out gay soldiers during a time of war and told these men and women that they were immoral. His comments, as a military official, were over the line and not defensible.

AFA, like other "Christian" groups, chose to run to Pace's aid and such an act suggests borderline bigoted behavior from an organization claiming the mantle of Christianity. This is disturbing.

If troop safety is AFA's primary concern, and not fear-mongering, why hasn't AFA demanded Bush bring these soldiers home? Does it really think the "political situation" of gays in the military presents a greater harm to soldiers than the bullets flying in Baghdad or are other motives being subtly conveyed to an America populace who are already fearful, thanks to past action alerts, of the "homosexual agenda?"

Conservative groups had an opportunity to bring a sense of Christian compassion to this debate, but opted instead to scare supporters into believing homosexuals were trying to raise the rainbow flag over the Pentagon. This is not political activism based upon Christian principle; it is fear mongering based on the politics of man.

Murray nails it right on the head. Thankfully this compassionate Conservative actually believes in being compassionate. It isn't about rhetoric for the guy like his former employers use quite frequently. It is wonderful to see decent people that have worked for hateful organizations like AFA finally see the light and fight against bigotry and hypocrisy. Cheers to Joe Murray!