Speaking of SPLC: Holy War- The religious crusade against gays- MUST READ

[Ian David]

(If I may toot my own horn for a moment, for the past year, I have been sending Mr. Moser articles and documentation on anti-gay groups that he said he found "very helpful.")

Holy War
The religious crusade against gays has been building for 30 years. Now the movement is reaching truly biblical proportions
By Bob Moser, Southern Poverty Law Center


The audience erupts during Pat Buchanan's prime-time speech at the 1992 Republican National Convention. 'There is a culture war going on in our country for the soul of America,' Buchanan famously declares.
(Jennifer Warburg)

On June 26, 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the convictions of two Texas men arrested for having sex. Writing for the majority in Lawrence v. Texas, Justice Anthony Kennedy said that the two men were "entitled to respect for their private lives." The state, he declared, "cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime."

The decision was unusually popular. A national survey found that 75% of Republicans and 88% of Democrats wanted to see sodomy laws struck down. But not everyone cheered.

<snip>

For anti-gay crusaders, who have been fighting gay rights for three decades, Lawrence was the most unsettling court decision since Roe v. Wade. Fundamentalist groups had filed 15 briefs supporting Texas' sodomy laws, only to see their arguments — that gay sex was a threat to public health and "traditional family values," and that gay people do not deserve equal rights — shot down.


<snip>

In 2002, Moore wrote a lengthy concurrence in a custody case involving a lesbian mother. After describing homosexuality as "abhorrent, immoral, detestable, a crime against nature," Moore asserted that "he State carries the power of the sword, that is, the power to prohibit conduct with physical penalties, such as confinement and even execution. It must use that power to prevent the subversion of children toward this lifestyle."

More:
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=522


See related thread:

Ask Southern Poverty Law Center to classify anti-gay groups as Hate Groups
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=221&topic_id=10811&mesg_id=10811


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[OneBlueSky]

1. what "compassionate conservatives" say about gays . . .

Rev. Jerry Falwell
Founder of the Moral Majority

"Brute beasts ... part of a vile and satanic system will be utterly annihilated, and there will be a celebration in heaven."
— On homosexuals, as quoted in The Bible Tells Me So, 1996

"ur poor boys on the front lines will have to face two different enemies, one from the front and one from the rear."
— On President Clinton's proposal to lift the ban on gays in the military

Rev. Jimmy Swaggart
Founder, Jimmy Swaggart Ministries

"I've never seen a man in my life I wanted to marry. And I'm gonna be blunt and plain: if one ever looks at me like that, I'm gonna kill him and tell God he died."
— In a September 2004 evangelism television broadcast

Phyllis Schlafly
Founder of the far-right Eagle Forum

"The feminists' longtime, self-proclaimed goal is an androgynous society. Repudiating constitutional intent, history, tradition and human nature, they seek to forbid us, in public or private life, to recognize the differences between men and women."
— In "The Phyllis Schlafly Report," December 1996

Rev. Pat Robertson
Christian Broadcasting Network and Christian Coalition founder

"The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians."
— In a 1992 fundraising letter

" preferred status to evil."
— Commenting on lifting the ban on gays in the military on the 700 Club

Roy Moore
Removed Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice, Ten Commandments monument crusader and favorite on the ultra-conservative lecture circuit

"The State carries the power of the sword, that is, the power to prohibit conduct with physical penalties, such as confinement and even execution. It must use that power to prevent the subversion of children toward this lifestyle."
— 2002 concurrence in a custody case involving a lesbian mother

Lou Sheldon
Founder of the Traditional Values Coalition

"They want our preschool children. ... They want our kindergarten children. ... They want our middle school and high school children."
— In a recent direct mail appeal

"Homosexuals are dangerous. They proselytize. They come to the door, and if your son answers and there is nobody there to stop it, they grab the son and run off with him. They steal him. They take him away and turn him into a homosexual."
— In 1992, as reported by journalist Jimmy Breslin

Anita Bryant
Save Our Children founder and former Miss America runner-up; widely credited as having launched the modern anti-gay movement

"Homosexuals cannot reproduce, so they must recruit. And to freshen their ranks they must recruit the youth of America."
— From a 1970s Save Our Children statement

Pat Buchanan
Author and sometime ultra-conservative presidential candidate

"The left is now using Mr. Shepard's murder both to diabolize Christian teachings on homosexuality and to impose on society its own moral code."
— On the political aftermath of Matthew Shepard's brutal murder

" nature's revenge on gay men."
— A 1982 statement on AIDS