Monday, April 30, 2012

Wait A Sec ..... THIS Is Tennessee, Too


Brian Moran, a Knoxville, Tennessee police officer wasn't working last Tuesday, so he decided to attend a City council meeting, where there was going to be a debate over adding ethnic origin, disability, sexual orientation, and/or gender identity in hiring city employees.
And Moran came armed with passages from Leviticus.
Oh, no, not Those passages. Moran, who was brought up in the Baptist Church, says, “I’m here for human rights. I’ve been doing my research. And if somebody’d brought up Leviticus, I was going to hit them with these.”
He flashed a list of Bible verses enumerating human acts that are sanctioned—burning a bull on an outdoor altar as a sacrifice, selling a daughter into slavery, owning slaves as long as they’re not from neighboring states.
“But I didn’t need to do it,” he said.
And he didn't need to do it, because the Knoxville City Council voted unanimously, and without discussion, to approve that ordinance to prohibit discrimination on the basis of ethnic origin, disability, sexual orientation, and/or gender identity in hiring.
This means, and i quote from the article, "that the legislative body of this scruffy little burg on the reddest end of the state the punditocracy has dubbed 'Talibanessee' is halfway to adopting an anti-discrimination ordinance."
All that's left is for it to pass on second reading tomorrow.
And, as often happens, Paul Berney, one of the most active supporters of the non-discrimination ordinance is a first cousin to state Senator Stacey "Don't Say Gay" Campfield, who is notorious for his gay-bashing proposals, and his inane ramblings on the origin of AIDS: "[S]ome guy screwing a monkey."
Cousins. One smart, one Stacey Campfield.
Berney isn't sure if Campfield knows how hard he's worked for this new anti-discrimination policy and, frankly, doesn't care much: "I don’t know [what he’ll say]. My family’s Catholic, and like Stacey I have a lot of love and respect for the church … What I was taught was that the church looks at sex not between a husband and a wife as a sin. Masturbation is a sin; sex outside marriage is a sin. If we’re going to deny people privileges and rights based on homosexuality, maybe we ought to look at all that other stuff, if we’re going to legislate morality. Bottom line, I don’t think it’s for the government to decide. As a taxpayer, I want the most qualified person doing the job, period. I don’t care what they do on their own time.”
Wow. Maybe Stacey Campfield ought to spend a little more time with his relatives, and little less time worried about The Gays. He might actually learn something useful.
Way to go, Knoxville. Way to tell the rest of Tennessee that you won't play that game.

Another One: Jack Reese

Last Monday, Alex Smith, an 18-year-old openly gay Ogden, Utah resident spoke to a community panel about the dangers of bullying. Alex talked about the bullying his own boyfriend, Jack Reese, had endured as a result of living his life as an openly gay youth.
But, what no one listening that day knew, in fact, what Alex Smith himself did not know, was that Jack Reese had decided the bullying must end, and he took his own life the previous weekend.
The death of Jack Reese is the latest known suicide of a gay teen in Northern Utah, and one official told Ogden OUTreach director Marian Edmonds, off the record: “It happens here about once a week, but officially, you know, it doesn’t happen here.”
They keep it a secret so no one knows that gay kids are being bullied to death in Utah.
OUTreach will be hosting a community panel and discussion, A Community Stands up – Northern Utah Addresses LGBT Bullying and Suicide on May 1st. The purpose of the event is for the community to stand in solidarity with queer youth, to speak out and express grief and outrage at yet another loss of life in Northern Utah, and to witness for the need for immediate change in schools, churches and society.
Because we don't need another Jack Reese story.


Eric Unger Was Beaten For Being Gay


Eric Unger went to a party one night and, at about 2:30 AM he decided to leave and head home. He was walking alone when a group of men came around him from behind and one of them knocked Eric's phone out of his hand.
As many people might do, Eric asked if they had a problem.
And, apparently, that was all it took.
Eric, who is openly gay, said they began taunting him with anti-gay slurs and began to surround him, He told them he just wanted to go home, but the group--five to eight men--began to beat him, and call him all sorts of offensive names.
Eric called the police after the attack and was  taken by ambulance to Advocate BroMenn Medical Center.
Eric Unger: “I don’t know why people like that go out to do that to people, to single someone out and attack them for no reason.”
He suffered scrapes and bruises on his face, and some of his teeth were broken; he also had a fractured jaw. All for walking home alone, and, i guess, for being gay.
Normal, Illinois Police Sgt. Adam Kapchinske confirmed that officers found Unger after the beating, but say no one witnessed the attack. Eric, at that time, did not mention that the believed the attack to be a Hate Crime because he was singled out as a gay man.
Eric admits that he was "frazzled" after the attack--remember, broken teeth and a fractured jaw--and may not have mentioned his belief the attack was a hate crime in a police report. 
Kapchinske says fights on and around the ISU campus are common on the weekends when many students are partying and but one person being beat by such a large group is “rare.” And he says there isnm';t enough evidence to classify it as a hate crime.
Which leads me to wonder, as often happens, why would Eric Unger say the attack was motivated by hate if it wasn't? I mean, assuming he did not know the men who beat him, why would he say it was hate if it ALLEGEDLY  wasn't? It seems to me he would want the people responsible for the crime brought to justice, even if they just beat him for his wallet--which they did not take--or his phone--which they also did not take.
And, it seems to me, if you're beaten, for any reason--theft, marauding brawlers, drunken college kids with nothing productive to do--you wouldn't need to call it a hate crime. It's a crime.
But, if you are called any number of anti-gay slurs before and during the beating, and you say the name-calling and the beating went hand-in-hand, then that would be a Hate Crime.
Beating Eric Unger for some misguided sense of fun, or for the purposes of robbing him is a hateful crime.
Beating Eric Unger because he's a gay man is just plain hate.


Top Ten Outstanding Guest Comments of the Week

Here we are, another week gone, and more outstanding guest comments. So, in random order, here are the ISBL Outstanding Guest Comments of the Week.....
#1 RuPaul threw a monkeywrench at us last week; The Drag Race ... Was It Really A Drag?:
KDNA said...
If that snaggle-toothed bitch wins I will CUT someone! 

#2 I think that many in the Catholic Church are turning away from its policies of intolerance and self-destruction, and, in one place at least, those turning away ar at the top; Catholic Pastor Applauded For Shunning Anti-Gay Marriage Drive:
Ron said...
Every now and then there is a brave man (or woman) who takes a stand on principal. Bravo for Rev. Tim Clark. He is a rarity in today's risk adverse world. 

#3 Maybe he will be president one day....of his homeowners association; Random Musings:
Ask the Cool Cookie said...
In Newt's mind, he is a hero, not for winning, but because he wanted to save us from ourselves. And that, in his mind is what makes Newt Newt's number one fan. 
#4 With all the problems it faces --see stories about priests defying orders, pedophile priests and lawsuits--this story makes no sense; The Vatican Tries To Bitchslap Nuns:
Orice said...
All I can think of, as the Patriarchs point fingers at the nuns, is how they use women/nuns as scapegoats for their own pedophilia. 

#5 Bullying is bullying is bullying, and when you omit protections for one group, you make them a target; Louisiana Legislators Shelve Anti-bullying Bill Because It Protects LGBTQ Students:
kathy said...
*aren't well trained to recognize bullying*
It can be so subtle and right under your nose.
I was with a sixth grade English class. We went to the library. A bunch of boys were all excited about a book - well, that's good, right. We got back to class. They placed the book in the middle of their table (kids sat four to a table) and made sure the cover was facing the boy at the corner of the desk. The boy was extremely overweight and the book was about the dangers of obesity. The teacher was in charge of 25 students and had to get thru that day's lesson and didn't see it. I did. I was able to remove the book, tell them to grow up but the damage was done for that day. 
#6 I was a Cub Scout many moons ago, but I never wanted to be a Boy Scout; maybe now i know why. More Anti-gay BS From The BSA:
Bill Dameron said...
Even their response was so condescending and full of bigotry. I have known for a while that they were very anti-gay, but now they don't even try to hide it. 
mrs.missalaineus said...
a boy scout tried to sell me popcorn once. i told him, 'no thanks, i support the homosexual agenda.......'
xxalainaxx 
Miss Lisa said...
Every time I see a kid in our neighborhood in his Boy Scout uniform, I can't help but think the parents are uninformed, at best; thoughtless, not compassionate, and possibly bigoted at worst. 
If my kid wanted to join the Boy Scouts, I'd say no. And once I explained why, I know my son would completely agree with me. Little kids know what's fair and right. 
#7 I was a couple of days late with this one, but still y'all had lots to say; I Didn't Say It....Monday Edition:
mistress maddie said...
Matthew Mitcham should be applauded for speaking his mind...and not caring who likes what he says!!! Now on another note, since I can't swim, is he available for private swim lessons? 
Wonder Man said...
Ken and Harry can vanish now 
#8 I know it's all about the architecture and the design, but sometimes an ugly piece of furniture steals the show; Architecture Wednesday: Gramercy Park Redesign:
mrpeenee said...
Love the house, hate the hemorroid couch. 
#9 I could say I'm not suprised by what they're trying to do, but I just can't; The Tennessee Senate Is At It Again:
Joy said...
This is driving me crazy! I thought the "don't say gay" thing was over. But no!! Some of these hateful wingnuts elected to what once was a fairly reasonable state legislature now want to make abortion murder. Legally murder. Yes. Just when we think it can't get worse! 
....
Oh, and you are right about what will happen now. This is giving carte blanche to gay bashing and bullying and worse! I can't stand it. Many of us are appalled.
#10 Like he needs more issues to make the voters wonder WTF he's doing, MIttsy's Got A Problem .... And It Goes By The Name Richard Grenell:
twunty mcslore said...
That's over 800 offensive tweets! 
Who does he think he is, Gilbert Gottfried?  
Will J said...
Yeah, just sorry that he got caught. But, nevertheless a good fit for the RMoney "tell me what you want to hear" campaign in which there is no moral compass except expediency and self promotion. 
Thanks again for all the fabulousness,
What was your favorite comment this week?
 

Saturday, April 28, 2012

I Ain't One To Gossip, But....


Remember when Marc Anthony and Jennifer Lopez were soooo in love? Yeah, it was just about long enough to make a couple of babies and then it was over.
Rumors swirled that JLo was banging her music video co-star William Levy, while rumors swirled that Marc was banging his HawthoRNe costar Jada Pinkett-Smith, while rumors swirled that Will Smith was banging a couple of dudes....
But I digress. Marc and JLo.
Marc Anthony has finally filed for divorce from Idol judge and cradle-robber Jennifer Lopez. And now he's making like JLo was the big cheater all along. But not with Levy. Nope, Marc is making sounds like JLo was banging her first ex-husband Ojani Noa, and Marc's lawyers want to talk to him.
Anthony’s attorney is reaching out to Ojani Noa as there is speculation that she was spending time with him while married to Anthony.
A source--and, by source, it's gotta be Miss Ryan Seacrest--says, “Marc Anthony’s lawyers are following up with allegations that Jennifer was seeing Ojani while married to Marc, before and after the twins were born. Jennifer allegedly would go to Ojani’s Hancock Park house and spend time with him, without Marc’s knowledge.”
And, if that wasn't enough, Marc Anthony is also looking for financial records of Jennifer Lopez’s because he, and his attorney, believe that she has hidden her money in offshore accounts shortly before the two separated.
I'm not sure about this. JLo cheating? JLo so greedy that she would hide money? I just can't....oh, who am I kidding. This is Typical JLo style. Screw everyone and then act all sweetness and light.
And Ojani Noa may have something to say about that. See, Noa is ALLEGEDLY jobless, and unable to find any work because of Jennifer Lopez: “her lawyers have threatened to sue anyone who has hired or wants to hire Ojani, claiming that any public mention of Ojani being married to her in any form of publicity is a violation of their marital settlement agreement.”
Ouch. So, maybe Noa and Anthony will team up in the Battle JLo.

After her, okay, I'll say it, ALLEGED assault on a woman at The Standard Hotel  a few weeks back, Lindsay Lohan is once again playing the victim. She was attacked, dammit, because nothing she does, or nothing that ever happens to her, is her fault. It's a conspiracy.
Nope, it sounds better when you say it like Daffy Duck: "It'th a conthpirathy."
Some reports claimed that Lindsay Lohan was the victim in another Standard bar brawl that left her soaked in someone else’s cocktail. Unfortunately for the wacktress, it doesn't seem like her version of victimization is true because the only person backing up her story is her serial liar father, douchebag Michael Lohan.
So, with no one on her side and no one to believe that she's a good girl who just got caught up in drugs and booze and kidnapping and car theft and jewelry store robbery, Lindsay has announced that she will no longer go to The Standard; because it's the hotel';s fault she brawls there.
Yes, Lohan is “banning” herself, except......
The folks who run The Standard are saying that they barred Lindsay from bringing her cracked-ass troubles into their establishment. In fact, The Standard has also barred Lohan 2.0, AKA DUI-arrestee Amanda Bynes, from the premises.
So now I’m imagining Original Recipe Lohan and Lohan 2.0 standing outside a 7/11 drinking from paper bags and smacking each other in the face.
Stay tuned.

America’s Next Top Model.
Is it still on? I'm guessing the answer is yes because ANTM headmaster Tyra Banks is peaking out about the upcoming season and a massive revamp of the show, which has become a parody of itself.
See, Tyra has gone ahead and fired everyone from the show next season.
Well, everyone except herself, I mean.
She tossed Miss J to the curb. She took Jay Manuel, and his over-acting hands, to the side and then crushed him. She told British judge Nigel Barker that his visa had expired.
All gone. But.....if you're trying to fix a tired show, wouldn't you look at the one constant, season after season, and tell that Amazon with the five-head that she was fired?
Oh, but she's the boss. And the ego. So, she's gonna be the runway coach, the photo-shoot coordinator, the photographer, and the judge. So she stays.
But, she might not like what former, and also fired, judge, Janice Dickinson has to say about ANTM. Appearing on the Derek and Romaine show on SiriusXM last week to talk about her upcoming one-woman show at XL Nightclub in NYC, Dickinson reacted swiftly to the news that Tyra canned her team: “She’s one selfish greedy woman....She doesn’t have a creative bone in her body, so someone else is pulling the strings on this one.”
She was, however, upset about Miss J's firing, but she questioned Barker's sexually and finished up by saying, “I don’t like any of them. Fact. And they don’t like me.”
But she wasn't finished. At the end of her interview, she dropped one last bomb: “Okay. I’m just going to say it. COVERGIRL chooses the model. It’s not the judges. It’s not Tyra.”
The Five-head will not be amused. 

More on Lohan, the cracktress.
After all the brouhaha about Lohan's chemically altered face, and how Lifetime wasn't sure she could pull off playing Rip Taylor, oops, I mean Liz Taylor, because Lohan could totally do Rip Taylor, news has come that Lifetime has signed Crazy to a contract.
And Rosie O'Donnell is none too happy about it.
Rosie was on the "Today" show with Matt Lauer and Donny Deutsch when it was announced that Lohan will play Taylor in "Liz and Dick" and, as Rosie is apt to do, she made her feelings known: "I feel very sorry for her....I think she needs a lot of time away....She's had a lot of trouble doing every single movie, including SNL. She was out and not in rehearsal. I think she's not in a place to work."
Okay, everyone has a right to her opinion, but then Donny Deutsch actually suggested, "She's our generation's Elizabeth Taylor."
And Rosie lost it.
"You're out of your mind! You're a crackhead! The last thing she did good she was sixteen....I don't think she's right for the role and I don't think she's capable at this point to portray that character."
Well, like I said, Rip Taylor is right up her alley.


Poor Miley Cyrus and, to some extent, Dinty, er, Demi Moore..
Miley's trying to grow up from Disney ingenue to real life woman, and one step in that arduous process was starring in LOL opposite Demi Moore. Miley would be Lola, who is called Lol--yeah, that is a stretch. Demi, of course, is trying to prove she isn't a narcissistic, surgery loving, huffing, nutjob
But now comes word that LOL will not be getting the red carpet treatment from Lionsgate because, they ALLEGE, they couldn’t find a place for the film in their schedule. Or it was just too awful. I mean, Demi and Miley. That's Hollywood for trainwreck.
Lionsgate executives lost their enthusiasm for the picture and began focusing on several higher-profile projects, including flops like Abduction and the rebooted Conan the Barbarian, but now that The Hunger Games is making them all sorts of money, they don't want to release another God-awful Miley-Demi-hot-mess movie.
Execs are spinning the story that the weren't confident they could successfully sell LOL, which centers on Cyrus’ character, but features a series of interwoven tales involving teenagers, so LOL seemed destined for Direct-To-DVD hell, except.....
A clause in the contract that says it must be released domestically in at least 100 theaters.
Look out, Bismarck and Pocatella. I see a LOL in your future.
Trouble is, I don't see a film career in Miley's or Demi's.

It’s hard to break into the upper echelon of the social scene.
If you’re a Kardashian, I mean. It seems that Beyoncé wants nothing to do with the Kash Kow even if she’s Kanye’s latest bedtime whorey.
The Bey-Z don’t like the Kimye.
Seriously? A new language?
Anyway, ever since Kash Kow hooked her large posterior to Kanye’s ego, she’s been dreaming of joining that Beyoncé/Jay-Z inner circle.. But Beyoncé is apparently as turned off by Kash Kow as is most of America, and she is ALLEGEDLY icing Kardashian out of the group.
It’s high school all over again!
But apparently it has to do with the way they live their lives. Beyoncé's marriage to Jay-Z was extremely private, and neither of them confirmed it until long after the event, while Kim’s, for lack of a better word, marriage was a whore-fest media circus, with elephants—Hi Khloe—and circus clowns—Hi Bruce—and then filmed for TV.
Now, I am not the biggest fan of Beyoncé and Jay-Z, who never met a market they didn’t want to tap into—do not make me rehash the Beyonce coockbook—but I am loving the ice-out of Kimye.
Get to steppin’, whores.

And even more on Lohan.
Now, to be fair, there are all kinds of stories out there about the wactress, and sometimes even I have a hard time believing them. Like this one: Rumor had it that Lohan was late to the set for the first day of her first acting job in a few years.
Late.
Now, that seemed like it was just gossip, until…… one irate cast member, Dot Marie Jones, who plays Coach Beiste, Tweeted: “Gonna be a long day!! Some ppl show up late and just throw a wrench in things. Not cool!”
Jones also Tweeted [and later deleted]. “I’d rather be an hour early (I was) than 5 minutes late.”
Trouble is, Lohan wasn’t five minutes late—I mean, that would have given her enough time to fill her water bottle with vodka—but was six hours late. And this was after producers sent a car to pick her up from under a bar at the Chateau Marmont.
And then she went all diva on the set, and demanded a large, extra pimped-out trailer for her to use on the two days she was supposed to work.
A set insider—and I’m guessing it’s Lea Michele, who wants to be the only diva on that set—says  “She came to set with a million demands and was not prepared to work. The cast is already worked to death and then she puts everything behind. She is a diva!”
Yup, six hours late, she hasn’t yet read the script, and she wants to be treated like a star! But her lapdog, spokesmonkey, Steve Honig, spoke out, saying, “I am on the set with Lindsay right now, and everything is going well and on schedule.” 
Uh huh.
That ‘source’ also said, “Lindsay was a total nightmare. She was three hours late in the morning, and when she did finally arrive, she just didn’t want to be there. She did not want to work. She had not memorized her lines, and she kept disappearing so no one could find her.” 
In fact, the cast was so displeased with Lohan they began calling her “That girl” as in That girl is a crack head. Or That girl stole my necklace.
And with all that trouble on the set, Honig finally had to admit Lindsay wasn’t the professional cracktress they make her out to be. He claimed her tardiness was a “misunderstanding” about her call time, and said all the gossip was “a classic example of people trying to bash Lindsay. She busted her ass yesterday and is back on set again today.” 
Oh Steve, you do earn your paycheck, don’t you.
I mean, if Lindsay actually pays you.