Don’t Upset Iraq By Repealing DADT

This is classic right wing lunacy if I’ve ever heard it!

According to a post on Wonk Room:

On Tuesday, the Missouri State Senate debated President Obama’s call to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) with dueling “non-binding resolutions alternately calling for the repeal and preservation of the military policy.” Both sides regurgitated familiar arguments but State Senator Gary Nodler, who is running in the Republican primary for Rep. Roy Blunt’s (R-MI) seat, carved out a new reason for maintaining the current policy.

Nodler said that “being openly gay in the military ‘in and of itself‘ could be grounds for a sexual harassment complaint by another serviceman, and characterized Don’t Ask Don’t Tell as a way to accommodate gays’ service ‘in a way that doesn’t create a hostile workplace.’” Then, Nodler suggested that allowing openly gay soldiers in the military “could represent a ‘cultural affront‘” to terrorists intent on killing American troops.

To which Nodler responded:

I never said that this would be a cultural affront to terrorists. I don’t care what they think. I said it would be a cultuaral affront to the Muslims in who’s country we are operating. We can not win the hearts and minds of the people by insulting them and ignoring the standards of their culture. This is about the people who live there and the armies we are serving with. Your comment makes the common mistake that all Muslims are terrorists.

So, a Republican admitting that not all Muslims are terrorist…I do believe that’s a first. But this is common right wing lunacy…”win the hearts and minds of the people by insulting them.” Wow, since when has a Republican been concerned about winning the hearts and minds of any one outside of their party…especially Muslims? What about the hearts and minds of the tax-paying American citizens you want to keep locked in a closet. Shouldn’t you be worried about what’s going on in your house before you worry about your neighbors?

Nodler, thank you for providing me with a hearty laugh, you’re definitely the “right wing tool of the week” in my book!

The Blight of Moral Cowardice

“The Vice Chancellor of City University London, Julius Weinberg, should resign. He is refusing to take any action after the Islamic Society hosted a fundamentalist preacher, Abu Usamah, who advocates the murder of gay people and of Muslims who give up their faith,” said human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell.

Abu Usamah was recorded on Channel Four’s television documentary, Undercover Mosque, as saying: “Do you practice homosexuality with men? Take that homosexual man and throw him off the mountain….”

Another speaker given a platform at the same City University event on 4 November, Murthadah Khan, was also caught on the Undercover Mosque documentary calling Jews and Christians “enemies” and “filthy”.

[For the full article, see here]

I strongly urge you to read the full article, as it not only shows the vile hatred that is spewed in the public arena but, more to the point of this post, shows the moral cowardice of people like the Vice Chancellor of City University London.

Having been a professor, and serving in assorted administrative capacities, for forty years, I’ve never ceased to be amazed at the moral cowardice of most faculty and administrators who inhabit universities!

As we see in the above cited article, even the most egregious, hateful, rhetoric is spewed without the Vice Chancellor condemning that rhetoric that affirms both hatred and hateful acts perpetrated against others in the name of “free speech.”

As Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes succinctly stated, free speech does not entitle one to shout “fire” in a crowded theater!

“Fire” is being shouted by assorted homophobic (and other xenophobic) clergy who are given a platform that enhances their undeserved credibility to help cause untold harm, suffering, and even deaths to others, and they do so in the name of God, no less!

If we don’t confront this hatred, be be that hatred expressed in rhetorical form or in actions, the bullies win!

As every schoolchild knows, when a bully confronts you, if you tolerate that confrontation, he/she will escalate his/her bullying. If you fight back, he/she is likely to climb back under the rock from which he/she emerged.

Bullies are basically cowards! So, in this case, we have one coward allowing other cowards to have their way, and the bullies win because of this lack of confrontation!

It is unfortunate that Christians are expected to be milquetoasts! We are, indeed, called upon to suffer all types of indignities for the sake of God!

The tragedy is that if we stand for the bullying of others, we are behaving diametrically opposite to what God expects of each of God’s disciples, because we are allowing evil to prosper at the expense of others’ well-being.

Turning the other cheek is relevant to one’s own cheek! It is not up to us to turn the cheek of those who are being victimized, and that is what we precisely do when we keep silent amidst hate-speech and discrimination directed against others!

It is moral cowards like Weinberg seems to be who have allowed hate to prosper; discrimination to endure; suffering to escalate; suicides, assaults, and murders to occur!

I imagine Weinberg is not a Christian, but his silence amidst this atrocity mimics so much of what I have seen within universities and by clergy and their followers within churches that comprise most of the institutional Church!

Those who remain silent amidst the oppression of others leave a hateful legacy that further erodes the civility of society; escalates the hatred evinced by the bullies among us; terribly hurts our fellow human beings; despite rhetoric to the contrary, defames God!

More from the Rev. Dr. Jerry Maneker at: ChristianLGBTRights.org!

French Muslim Team Will Play Against Gay Team

Paris Foot Gay (PFG), of the Parisian suburb Creteil, were due to play against predominantly Muslim side Bebel but the latter called the match off the evening before it was scheduled.

According to PFG president Pascal Brethes, they were sent an email from Bebel saying the match was “against their principles”.

Brethes said the email added: “Sorry, but because of the name of your team and in keeping with the principles of the team, which is a team of practising Muslims, we cannot play against you.

“Our convictions are stronger than a game of football. Sorry to have informed you so late.”

PFG said the communication was homophobic and that they were considering pressing charges.

Now, Bebel say they will play against the gay side.

In a statement, Bebel director Zahir Belgharbi insisted there had been “a misunderstanding” and said his team were ready to play against PFG.

He told AFP: “We had rejected playing this match not on the grounds of homophobia, as we have been accused of doing, but simply because the name of the club did not seem to us to reflect our vision of sport.

Read more at: pinknews.com!

Various Forms of Weapons of Mass Destruction

I found this post on Andrew Sullivan’s The Daily Dish…and this is too is right wing terrorism, in another country. This is no different than what Hitler did to the Jews during WWII, except for on a smaller scale.

Sitting on the floor, wearing traditional Islamic clothes and holding an old notebook, Abu Hamizi, 22, spends at least six hours a day searching internet chatrooms linked to gay websites. He is not looking for new friends, but for victims.

“It is the easiest way to find those people who are destroying Islam and who want to dirty the reputation we took centuries to build up,” he said. When he finds them, Hamizi arranges for them to be attacked and sometimes killed.

Hamizi, a computer science graduate, is at the cutting edge of a new wave of violence against gay men in Iraq. Made up of hardline extremists, Hamizi’s group and others like it are believed to be responsible for the deaths of more than 130 gay Iraqi men since the beginning of the year alone.

Read more by clicking here!

Action Needed: Gay Iraqis to be Executed

Urgent action is needed to halt the execution of 128 prisoners on death row in Iraq. Many of those awaiting execution were convicted for the ‘crime’ of homosexuality, according to IRAQI-LGBT, a UK based organisation of Iraqis supporting gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in Iraq.

According to Ali Hili of IRAQI-LGBT, the Iraqi authorities plan to start executing them in batches of 20 from this week.

IRAQI-LGBT urgently requests that the UK Government, Human Rights Groups and the United Nations Human Rights Commission intervene with due speed to prevent this tragic miscarriage of justice from going ahead.

“We have information and reports on members of our community whom been arrested and waiting for execution for the crimes of homosexuality,’’ said Mr Hili. “Iraqi lgbt has been a banned from running our activities on Iraqi soil.”

“Raids by the Iraqi police and ministry of interior forces cost our group the diapering and killing of 17 members working for Iraqi lgbt since 2005,” added Mr Hili.

“Death penalty has been increasing at an alarming rate in Iraq since the new Iraqi regime reintroduced it in August 2004.
In 2008 at least 285 people were sentenced to death, and at least 34 executed. In 2007 at least 199 people were sentenced to death and 33 were executed, while in 2006 at least 65 people were put to death. The actual figures could be much higher as there are no official statistics for the number of prisoners facing execution,” he said.

IRAQI LGBT is concerned that the Iraqi authorities have not disclosed the identities of those facing imminent execution, stoking fears that many of them may have been sentenced to death after trials that failed to satisfy international standards for fair trial.

Most are likely to have been sentenced to death by the Central Criminal Court of Iraq (CCCI), whose proceedings consistently fall short of international standards for fair trial. Some are likely to have. Allegations of torture are not being investigated adequately or at all by the CCCI. Torture of detainees held by Iraqi security forces remains rife.

Iraq’s creaking judicial system is simply unable to guarantee fair trials in ordinary criminal cases, and even less so in capital cases, with the result, we fear, that numerous people have gone to their death after unfair trials.

The Iraqi government must order an immediate halt to these executions and establish a moratorium on all further executions in Iraq, particularly since due process cannot be guaranteed. The state executing people for ‘morals’ crimes is also obviously unacceptable and deplorable.

Amnesty International has called on the Iraqi authorities to make public all information pertaining to the 128 people, including their full names, details of the charges against them, the dates of their arrest, trial and appeal and their current places of detention.

The immediate urgent priority is to Support and Donate Money to LGBT activists in Iraq in order to assist their efforts to help other Lesbians, Gay, Bisexuals and Trans gender Iraqi’s facing death, persecution and systematic Targeting by the Iraqi Police and Badr and Sadr Militia and to raise awareness about the wave of homophobic murders in Iraq to the outside world.
Funds raised will also help provide LGBTs under threat of killing with refuge in the safer parts of Iraq (including safe houses, food, electricity, medical help) and assist efforts help them seek refuge in neighboring countries.

Iraqi Lgbt
22 Notting Hill Gate
Unit # 111
London , W11 3JE
United Kingdom
Mob: ++44 798 1959 453
Website : http://iraqilgbtuk.blogspot.com/

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