Tag Archive for: Sexual Orientation

DHS Awards Anti-Terror Grant for LGBTQ Group to Indoctrinate 6-Year-Olds

/in , , , , , , , , , /by

The Biden administration has awarded an anti-terrorism grant worth more than half-a-million dollars to an LGBTQ activist group, which distributes condoms and “sex education” material, to expand its “in-school support for LGBTQ+ youth” as young as age 6. The manifesto of its school-based group — which is based on the Black Panthers — calls for the “abolition” of the police, the erasure of the U.S. border, and the “reclamation” of all “stolen lands” by indigenous people.

Joe Biden’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that the Sexual Minority Youth Assistance League (SMYAL) had received a $530,000 Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) grant late this week. Although the TVTP grant is intended “to prevent targeted violence and terrorism,” the grant synopsis explains that the SMYAL “will provide in-school support for LGBTQ+ youth, training for school staff and youth service providers, [and] resilience programming for LGBTQ+ youth ages 6-24.” The grant will address both “the risk of violence and negative mental health outcomes faced by LGBTQ+ youth” in Washington, D.C., and nearby Montgomery County, Maryland.

GSA Networks Seek to Abolish the Police, Borders, and ‘Cisgender Heterosexual Patriarchy’

SMYAL’s latest 990 form states that its members run the “DC Regional GSA,” or Genders & Sexualities Alliance (GSA) Network clubs, which aims to “lead the charge for LGBTQ rights and social justice.” Formerly the “Gay-Straight Alliance,” the group renamed itself the Gender & Sexualities Alliances Network in 2015 to signal that its leaders “have moved beyond the labels of gay and straight, and the limits of a binary gender system.” GSA boasts of 4,000student-run clubs operated by 40 state chapters.

The GSA Network’s “Truth Nine Point Platform” calls for “the Abolition of the Police, ICE, Borders and the Judicial System”; “an End of the Cisgender Heterosexual Patriarchy”; “Reparations for all Indigenous and Black Peoples,” including “Indigenous reclamation of stolen lands”; and “free and non-compulsory education for all ages.”

“The manifesto was inspired by and builds upon the Black Panther Party’s Ten-Point Program, the Young Lord’s 12 Point Program and Platform, and the Third World Gay Revolution,” GSA Network states, as it promises “to bravely and ferociously fight for our communal liberation.” The Black Panther Party “advocated the use of violence and guerilla tactics to overthrow the U.S. government,” according to the FBI.

“We invite our comrades in struggle who align with our principles, including those who have yet to self-determine their relationship to the struggle, to join us in solidarity, coalition, and liberation — remembering the revolution is a relationship,” the GSA Network platform concludes.

SMYAL activists “connect with and provide assistance to teachers, staff, administrators, community members and partners to start and grow local GSAs,” according to its tax filings.

SMYAL Distributes Condoms, Gives LGBT Adults Access to Children without Parental Supervision

The first item listed on SMYAL’s “sexual health” program is “condom distribution.” SMYAL operates a “Peer Health Fellowship” for children ages 13-24: “Fellows serve their their [sic] schools and communities as health educators. Fellows serve their community as role models, leaders, and trusted friends by distributing condoms and safer-sex information,” according to the group’s most recent tax filings.

SMYAL operates numerous youth groups for children who identify as LGBT or “who are exploring or questioning their identities.” The youngest group, known as Little SMYAL, combines children from 6 to 12, although teens may opt to continue attending. The next level includes programs for children from early adolescence through their mid-20s.

“Little SMYAL’s is a group for queer and trans 6-12 year olds to provide young people a safe(r) space hang out [sic] and meet new people,” its website states. “To best meet the needs of our youth, we have programs that are designed for 6 to 9-year-olds (who we call Unicorns) or 10 to 13-year-olds (who we call Rainbows),” the group explains. “If your child is 13, they may choose to continue attending Little SMYALs programs or age up into SMYAL’s drop-in programs for youth ages 13+.”

“Some programs are open to all youth within this 13-24 age range,” SMYAL notes.

SMYAL actively seeks to separate children or adolescents from their parents, asking for access to young children without parental supervision. “We invite caregivers to attend a ‘Welcome to Little SMYALs’ session to make sure their child is ready to participate in future programming. We then encourage caregivers to give their child some space to allow them to meet new friends and participate fully in this environment,” SMYAL’s website states. “[S]ome parents/caregivers have enjoyed getting coffee down the street together during in-person programs.”

SMYAL also offers “clinical services to LGBTQ youth ages 6-24,” including “trauma-enforced yoga, sound healing, and mindfulness.” Its Youth Leadership Development program holds workshops on topics ranging from “allyship” to “gender and sexuality 101.”

‘Beyond Ridiculous’

Giving an anti-terrorism grant to a child-focused LGBTQ activist group is “beyond ridiculous,” Meg Kilgannon, senior fellow for Education Studies at Family Research Council, told The Washington Stand. “Anti-terrorism and violence prevention money from DHS is supposed to prevent another 9/11 bombing — actual violent terrorism. It’s not supposed to impose sexual ideologies on children or adults. That’s child abuse and taxpayer abuse.”

“When people say they want to close agencies like the FBI, CIA, or DHS, programs like this one are part of the reason for that sentiment,” she said.

The taxpayer-funded DHS grant will greatly enhance SYMAL’s budget. The $530,000 TVTP grant represents 15% of the $3.6 million in revenue the group reported in 2021. (In all $2,061,623 of its $3,632,170 came from government grants.) SYMAL spent $351,123 promoting the GSA Networks’ agenda. It also spent $350,363 on its Peer Health Fellowship and $302,248 on its Youth Leadership Development Program.

Awarding SMYAL and other politically polarizing organizations DHS grants shows that “the national security industrial complex is too big and too focused on perceived threats to government from American citizens rather than on actual national security threats: cyberattacks on public schools and other organizations; lawlessness at the border; child trafficking rings; drug trafficking rings — all with international ties,” Kilgannon said.

“It’s not the job of DHS to make people feel good about their own sex lives and enforce societal endorsement of sex acts,” she concluded.

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

To Prioritize Equity DHS Anti-Terrorism Funds go to Groups Devoted to Underserved Populations

California to Create “Transgender History Month”

‘Public Education Needs to be a Site of Socialist Organizing’: ALA President

PEPFAR Is Subsidizing Abortion Advocacy, Say Lawmakers, Pro-Lifers, and African Leaders

Barna: Discipleship Is a Journey, Not a Destination

Why Every Christian Should Study the End Times

RELATED TWEET:

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Don’t Say Gay, Say Groomer Instead

/in , , , , , , , , /by

It’s easy for conservatives to think of the LGBT activist crowd as constantly crying wolf over pronouns and “deadnames,” but when self-described “queer” people try to describe who they are and what they do, pay attention. A prime example of this principle occurred just this week: participants in New York City’s annual Pride Parade chanted, “We’re coming for your children.” Others shouted, “Five, six, seven, eight, don’t assume your kids are straight.” Other scenes included nude adult men exposing themselves to children — both in New York City and in Seattle.

None of this is a novelty. Back in 2021, the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus faced backlash for writing and performing a song entitled, “A Message From the Gay Community,” which repeats the phrase, “We’ll convert your children.” Another startling line goes, “You think that we’ll corrupt your children if our agenda goes unchecked / Funny, just this once, you’re correct.” Yet another says, “Just like you worried, they’ll change their group of friends / You won’t approve of where they go at night.” And another exclaims, “Oh, you’ll be disgusted when they start finding things online that you’ve kept far from their sight.” The singers initially took the song off YouTube in the face of criticism, but restored it days later, announcing they stand by the message.

Although LGBT activists once went into hysterics at the suggestion of homosexuality inevitably being pushed on children, now that the movement is firmly entrenched in American society, they retroactively admit they were always coming for your children — they just don’t want parents to be up in arms over the fact. A recent spate of bills passed in Florida — and, more importantly, the alphabet mafia’s reaction to those bills — revealed this facet of LGBT ideology well before this past week, and confirmed the connection conservative Christians have long noticed between homosexuality and child-predation.

Grooming is the act of deceptively building a relationship of trust with a child, most often utilizing a position of authority, in order to take advantage of a child sexually. The LGBT ideology is predicated upon grooming. But don’t take my word for it, take theirs.

The first half of the grooming process involves building a relationship of trust with a child, most often utilizing a position of authority (such as the role of a teacher), and progressively pushing the child to the point where sexual acts are accepted. When Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) signed into law a bill last year forbidding teachers from telling elementary school students about gay sex, oral sex, gender fluidity, and a host of other homosexual propaganda, pro-gay activists were up in arms, labelling the legislation the “Don’t Say Gay Bill.” LGBT groups claimed that their very existence was being threatened simply because they weren’t allowed to talk to kids about anal sex. That law was recently expanded to ban all classroom promotion of the LGBT agenda, sparking further rainbow-colored outrage and claims that the ban on telling children about anal and oral sex is an attempt to “erase” the LGBT “community.”

We all know a man can’t impregnate another man, nor can a woman impregnate another woman. In other words, LGBT activists cannot reproduce — instead, they recruit. They groom. Children are taught that being gay or lesbian or bi or trans is not only acceptable but even cool, and, being but children, they believe it. This is grooming. The previous generation of LGBT activists were told (by the previous generation of groomers) that being gay or bi or trans isn’t acceptable but is cool and should be made acceptable. Now that same generation has taken up the groomer mantle and is telling children it is now acceptable, thanks to the hard work of previous generations, to be gay or lesbian or bi or trans — and it’s still cool.

Teaching children about sex is not the teacher’s role, ever. Although the teacher is, in theory, endowed with the parents’ authority to educate their children, there are certain things that only parents have the authority or right to discuss with their children: sex is chief among those things. A teacher violating that boundary and having those discussions with children usurps the role of parent, the ultimate physical manifestation of a trusted authority figure in that child’s life. In other words, by violating that boundary, an LGBT activist claims a child as his own. Remember, it’s not reproducing, it’s recruiting.

Banning LGBT activists from using the classroom to promote sexual abnormalities to children cuts them off from their most easily-accessible recruiting pool and makes grooming children more difficult; no longer are groomers put in a position of practically-unquestioned authority and given the role of mentor. When their capacity to groom children is taken from them, LGBT activists claim it’s an attack on their very existence. Why? Because they groom children. It’s how they carry on their lineage. Believe them when they say these things.

The LGBT activist reaction to Florida authorizing use of the death penalty for child rapists is even more disconcerting and even more revealing. This seemingly commonsense and surprisingly bipartisan piece of legislation is also, according to the activists, an attack on “LGBT rights.” The definition of grooming culminates in taking advantage of a child sexually. Raping a child would fit that definition. Yet LGBT activists are boo-hooing that legislation threatening child rapists with death “literally spells death” for them.

This time, the LGBT claim is backed up by studies. A 2013 study published by the Department of Health and Human Services stated, “Epidemiological studies find a positive association between physical and sexual abuse … in childhood and same-sex sexuality in adulthood …” A study last year by Vanderbilt University Medical Center found that adults identifying as homosexual reported childhood sexual abuse at more than twice the rate of their heterosexual peers. A 2001 report conducted by Judith Reisman of the Institute for Media Education estimated that adults identifying as homosexual are 40 times more likely to abuse a child than their heterosexual peers. While none of these studies prove causality, they do demonstrate a correlation that cannot be ignored.

Without grooming, the LGBT ranks are, if not generationally decimated, at least significantly diminished. Their own proclamations (“We’re coming for your children”) and actions, as well as their vehement responses to legislation limiting grooming tells us who they are. If we accept their own definition of themselves, we can only conclude that the LGBT “community” are, by their own admission, groomers.

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Weaponized HHS Takes LGBT Agenda on ‘Offense’

/in , , , , , , , , , , , /by

Biden’s Health Department is being weaponized to promote homosexuality and the transgender agenda. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra launched the department’s “Pride Summit” on Monday, stressing the importance of normalizing the LGBT agenda. He quipped, “Supporting the LGBTQI+ community is a top priority for me and HHS. Equity runs at the heart of every initiative we take on here.”

Numerous Biden administration officials participated in the event, including White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who identifies as a lesbian, and HHS Assistant Secretary Rachel Levine, a biological man who identifies as a woman. Several other non-governmental LGBT activists were present too, including American Civil Liberties Union “Trans Justice Strategist” Arli Christian and Casey Pick, director of Law and Policy for the Trevor Project, which has hosted sexually explicit online chatrooms for children and teens.

The Pride Summit served dual purposes: the first was to laud, in the words of an HHS press release, “the historic actions taken by the Biden-Harris Administration to ensure that LGBTQI+ communities … have the resources and support they need and deserve.” Under Biden’s tenure, the HHS has turned into a veritable LGBT cheerleading squad, with both Becerra and Levine marching in Pride parades and vociferously promoting gender transition procedures (including genital mutilation surgeries) for minors, flying the “Progress Pride” flag outside HHS headquarters, and hosting a pro-trans roundtable discussion — and that’s just this month’s activities.

The second purpose of the Pride Summit was to showcase future HHS endeavors to promote LGBT ideology. Among them are the planned release of a “Behavioral Health Care Advisory on Transgender and Gender Diverse Youth” for mental health experts to use in advocating for harmful gender transition procedures, mandating state child welfare agencies use federal funding to promote gender transition procedures, and efforts to force health care providers to violate their consciences and commit gender transition procedures.

Becerra said of the HHS’s efforts, “This game of defense can get tiring. We want offense. Let’s play on the offensive and let’s grow.”

The sentiment was echoed by Levine, who tweeted last week, “All summer long we will be celebrating the ‘Summer of Pride.’” He repeated the slogan at the Pride Summit, calling for not just a whole month dedicated to the LGBT agenda but a whole season: “Happy Pride Month, and actually — let’s declare it a summer of Pride.”

Speaking on gender transition procedures for children — including puberty blockers, hormone drugs, medically-unnecessary double mastectomies, and genital mutilation surgeries — Levine declared, “We often say that gender-affirming care is healthcare, gender-affirming care is mental healthcare, and gender-affirming care is literally suicide prevention care.” There is no evidence to support Levine’s claims, and there is actually evidence which contradicts it.

In fact, Dr. Jennifer Bauwens, Family Research Council’s director of the Center for Family Studies, told The Washington Stand that “this is the most invasive ‘intervention’ that exists to treat any psychological condition and yet it has the least evidence to recommend it.” In a 2021 study authored by Bauwens, she noted that “despite the years of empirical study, there is no clear understanding of etiology in the suicide literature. In other words, there is no clear understanding of the individual and combined risks that cause a person to commit suicide,” yet transgender advocates consistently claim to know definitively, after a cursory period of usually inconsistent research, exactly why teens and adults identifying as transgender commit suicide.

Most U.S. studies on the link between gender transition procedures and suicide are largely inconclusive, admitting that there is not enough data available over a long enough period of time. The most thorough study on the subject comes from Sweden. The 30-year-long study found that the suicide rate amongst those who identify as transgender increased after gender transition surgeries, rising to at least 20 times the suicide rate of peers.

Back in 2016, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services refused to mandate coverage of gender transition procedures, citing an absence of evidence that such procedures are actually beneficial. That was undone by the Biden administration last year, and health insurance providers are now required to cover gender transition procedures. Conservative author and commentator Matt Walsh’s documentary “What Is a Woman?” also explores the question, highlighting the experiences of those who regret their gender transitions and the increased risk of suicide, especially since underlying psychological issues aren’t addressed by gender transition procedures.

Quena Gonzalez, Family Research Council’s senior director of Government Affairs, told The Washington Stand, “How much more aggressive can the Biden administration possibly get? We may be about to find out. Buckle up: Biden has another year and a half in this term.”

Monday’s Pride Summit doesn’t just mark the ideological weaponization of yet another federal agency under Biden’s guidance: since his appointment to head HHS in 2021, Becerra has turned the department into arguably the largest pro-abortion activism arm in the U.S. It should be no surprise that a man who considers the brutal, broadscale killing of unborn babies to be “health care” should also advocate for the sexualization and mutilation of children who aren’t killed in the womb.

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Republicans Gut Biden’s Trans Extremism in Woke-Crushing Military Bill

UN Expert Argues Religious Beliefs Must Change to Accommodate LGBT Ideology

Rep. Mark Green to Introduce Bill Combatting ‘HHS Weaponization’ of Title X

BlackRock Abandons Term ‘ESG,’ Rebrands Due to Red State Boycott

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Top Reasons to Dump the ‘Fag Flag’ and Restore ‘Old Glory’ from the school house to the White House

/in , , , , , , , , , , /by

I remember that each and every single day that I was in elementary, middle and high school holding my hand over my heart with my teacher and classmates reciting the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

I grew up loving my country. Each and every day I grew to love her more and more. Until the inauguration of Joseph Robinett Biden Jr.

Today young people seem to have forgotten America’s history, the basics of biology, and the science of DNA. It seems they feel comfortable, even devoted, to embracing myths like: America is racist, whites are supremacist, mankind can control the weather if we the people just submit to big government mandates, laws and regulations that take away our freedom of choices bit by bit and a male can identify as a female.

This has led to Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. flying the “Fag Flag” in front of the White House along with the American flag honoring pride month. BTW, remember that pride is one of the seven deadly sins.

Title 4, United States Code, Chapter 1, Paragraph 7 reads (c),

No other flag or pennant should be placed above or, if on the same level, to the right of the flag of the United States of America, except during church services conducted by naval chaplains at sea, when the church pennant may be flown above the flag during church services for the personnel of the Navy. No person shall display the flag of the United Nations or any other national or international flag equal, above, or in a position of superior prominence or honor to, or in place of, the flag of the United States at any place within the United States or any Territory or possession thereof: Provided, That nothing in this section shall make unlawful the continuance of the practice heretofore followed of displaying the flag of the United Nations in a position of superior prominence or honor, and other national flags in positions of equal prominence or honor, with that of the flag of the United States at the headquarters of the United Nations.

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. has violated U.S. Code by flying the Fag Flag on the same level as the American Flag at the White House.

Reasons to Dump the Fag Flag

There are many reasons to dump the Fag Flag, including but not limited to:

  1. Remove the Fag Flag from the White House in accordance with Title 4, United States Code, Chapter 1, Paragraph 7 (c).
  2. In a video recently unearthed from 2019, Chasten Buttigieg, “husband” of Department of Transportation diversity hire Pete Buttigieg, is seen leading children in a pledge of allegiance to the Gay Pride flag. Buttigieg had the young children recite: “I pledge my heart to the rainbow of the not so typical gay camp, to the gay agenda for which it stands. One camp, full of pride, indivisible, with affirmation and equal rights for all.” Doing this harms children and grooms them for pedophiles and pederasts.
  3. The U.S. Air Force Twitter account posted a tweet celebrating pride month with an image of a soldier saluting the alphabet rainbow flag. Read some of the comments WOKE Air Force received on this official tweet they sent out. So bad that the U.S. Air Force shut off  all comments. This harms the health, welfare and morale of our men and women in the armed services. It is an existential threat to our national security.
  4. A Colorado school district encouraged its physical education (P.E.) teachers to don LGBT pride gear and use preferred pronouns in an effort to display their support for the LGBTQ community, according to documents obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation through a public records request. On March 8, a group of Jeffco Public Schools high school teachers were trained on how to make the district’s P.E. programs “even more inclusive,” where all students feel welcome regardless of their “race, ethnicity or sexual orientation,” according to a presentation obtained by the DCNF through a public records request. Teachers were trained to engage in “public visibility” by sporting some sort of rainbow pride gear such as a pin or t-shirt, plan or participate in pride events and practice using preferred pronouns. Having any teacher forced to don Fag Wear is both demeaning and a threat to the emotional health and well being of students.
  5. Bosch Fawstin wrote, “It might be news to some, especially to the left’s useful idiots on the left and the right, but the “LGBT Pride movement” is a communist movement. Same with the “Black Lives Matter movement,” the “Feminist movement,” etc. Because a naked communist movement might wake up too many Americans, and leftists know that, they hide behind race, sex and sexuality to push communism…In sum, the LGBT movement is a gay communist movement that now expresses a triumphalist attitude about their position in 2023, where they moan about how “marginalized” they are, while shoving their lifestyle in our children’s faces. As one of these gay supremacists put it the other day, ‘Straight sex is just not natural. Those are biological facts.’ I would tell this gay supremacist that without natural straight sex, he and billions of people wouldn’t exist.” Communism is anti-American.
  6. Jim Hoft, on September 24, 2022 reported, “Earlier this week investigative journalist Christopher Rufo reported on the teacher’s union promoting how-to guides on ‘anal sex’ and ‘fisting’ to children. This is shocking news to most Americans that the nation’s largest teachers’ union is promoting such material to America’s children. “It All Started with Obama: Barack Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar” Pushed Books that Encouraged Children to Meet Adults at Gay Bars for Sex”>But this trend of perversion did not start during the Joe Biden regime. Back in January 2010, The Gateway Pundit reported on Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar” Kevin Jennings. “Safe Schools Czar” Kevin Jennings and his organization GLSEN was encouraging children to meet adults in gay bars for sex. From our 2010 report: This story just gets freakier and weirder and the fact that the mainstream media completely ignores this dangerous man working in the Office of Safe and Drug-free Schools makes the story even more scandalous. You’d think the AP could peel away a few of its reporters from Going Rogue to investigate this radical czar. This avoidance by the democratic-media complex won’t keep us from reporting the truth. Our goal of protecting children is greater than our desire to protect a political party. Kevin Jennings’ was the founder, and for many years, Executive Director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) until he left his post in 2008. GLSEN maintains a recommended reading list of books for children that the radical organization believes all kids should be reading. The books on the list promote all kinds of radical ideas from child rape, to first graders having sex to the joys of prostitution. Recently it was discovered that these books were not only on GLSEN’s reading list but that Kevin Jennings personally promoted several of these books during his career. One of the books he promoted encouraged children to go to gay bars for sex with adults to see if they like it.
  7. One of the queerest myths is the use of the Fag Flag by the LGBTQ+ community to symbolize pride and equality. The truth is that the Fag Flag rainbow was created by God after the great flood and first seen by Noah and his family. The rainbow in the clouds was a symbol of hope that civilization would begin anew in His Image. Genesis 9: 15-17 read, “[A]nd I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth.” Then God said to Noah, “Yes, this rainbow is the sign of the covenant I am confirming with all the creatures on earth.”
  8. A Professor from Bethlehem College & Seminary named Dieudonné Tamfu wrote in a July 18th, 2015 article titled What Does the Rainbow Mean for Gays?, What do you think of when you see the rainbow flag? Most likely, you think of homosexuality or the wider LGBT movement. Gilbert Baker, the man credited with pioneering the celebratory rainbow flag flying over the gay movement, recently lauded his craft, noting that it’s something beautiful. He answers those who think it’s not, saying, “The rainbow’s in the Bible. It’s a covenant between God and all living creatures.” According to Baker, the God of the Bible knows the struggle of gays and lesbians, and that is where he finds hope. God does indeed know the internal and social battles of gays and lesbians, but the question is, Does he approve of their practice? Would God approve of their use of the rainbow to symbolize this movement? The Supreme Court’s decision on gay “marriage” has made the rainbow symbol ubiquitous. Those who celebrate so-called same-sex marriage are painting social media with rainbow colors. Even the White House was lit up the with red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. God designed the rainbow to symbolize something far greater and far more glorious than homosexuality, and if those in the homosexual community truly understood and embraced the symbol they are waving in their hands, they would experience true freedom and peace. [Emphasis added] Read more. The Fag Flag is anti-Muslim, Christian and Jew.

But there are rays of hope.

The Bottom Line

ChurchMilitant.com reported,

The U.S. ambassador to Poland has become embroiled in the battle between militant homosexual campaigners and traditionalist Catholics after tweeting her support for the gay lobby on Thursday, as anti-Catholic blasphemy by LGBT activists continues to escalate before the fall general elections.

Over 30 town councils in Poland declared themselves “free from LGBT ideology” after anti-Catholic LGBT parades blasphemed the Blessed Sacrament and the icon of the Black Madonna and Warsaw’s mayor signed a pro-LGBT declaration in February calling for gay sex education in schools.

[ … ]

Swidnik councillor Radoslaw Brzozka said his town issued its anti-LGBT statement in response to Warsaw’s declaration, which was “against good moral values.”

“Let children have a father and a mother, not such deviations. Otherwise there will be fewer and fewer children, and Poland will shrink,” 83-year-old Teresa Drzewiecka, who witnessed Nazis and Communists battling for control of her town Swidnik, told Reuters.

Tom Perkins, from the Guardian on June 17, 2023 reported,

In 2015, many liberal residents in Hamtramck, Michigan, celebrated as their city attracted international attention for becoming the first in the United States to elect a Muslim-majority city council.

They viewed the power shift and diversity as a symbolic but meaningful rebuke of the Islamophobic rhetoric that was a central theme of then Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s campaign.

This week many of those same residents watched in dismay as a now fully Muslim and socially conservative city council passed legislation banning Pride flags from being flown on city property that had – like many others being flown around the country – been intended to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community.

Muslim residents packing city hall erupted in cheers after the council’s unanimous vote, and on Hamtramck’s social media pages, the taunting has been relentless: “Fagless City”, read one post, emphasized with emojis of a bicep flexing.

The Washington Stand’s Ben Johnson on June 20, 2023 reported,

In the latest sign the LGBT agenda is losing support, the number of people who view same-sex relationships as “morally acceptable” tumbled last year — a sign “people are beginning to connect the dots” between legalizing same-sex marriage and indoctrinating schoolchildren in the LGBT agenda, a prominent pro-family leader says.

Overall, support for homosexual relationships fell this year by 7%, the largest decrease of any of the moral issued posed by Gallup pollsters in their annual Values and Beliefs poll, conducted each May. In 2023, 63% of Americans say they see nothing wrong with “gay or lesbian relations.” Fewer Republicans and Democrats said they found homosexual relations morally neutral this year.

“People are beginning to connect the dots between these agendas,” said Family Research Council President Tony Perkins on “Washington Watch” Monday. “We were told all this is just about live and let live, just being able to marry the one you love.” Disengaged voters “didn’t realize that it was going to involve the indoctrination of their children, the infiltration of every media outlet in America,” or that “different professions will be forced to affirm these same-sex unions” or go out of business.

It’s time for America like Hamtramck, Michigan to become a “Fagless” nation.

The first step on the road to reality would be taking down every Fag Flag in every classroom, board room, and from the school house to the White House.

Then purge media centers and school curriculum K-24 of all references to Fags and their Communist ideology.

Finally, The Washington Stand’s Ben Johnson reported,

Americans who identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual are far more likely to suffer from major depression, abuse illegal drugs, and are up to six times as likely to attempt suicide, according to a new report from the Biden administration. Although the report admits it cannot “explain the reasons” for these differences, it opens by blaming LGBT “invisibility and erasure” — a leap critics say is “just bad science” that obscures the real causes for their mental distress.

Adults who have sex with members of the same sex, or both sexes, experience a dramatically lower quality of life across numerous measures, the Biden administration reveals. Women who have sex with members of both sexes (bisexuals) were six times as likely to have attempted suicide within the last year as women who identify as straight, and three times as likely to abuse opioid drugs. Bisexual men were three times as likely to have had a serious mental illness in the last year, according to the survey from the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

“A higher prevalence of substance use and mental health issues has been well-documented among people who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (also referred to as sexual minorities) than among those who identify as heterosexual or straight,” notes the report, which focuses on American adults’ behaviors during the 2021-2022 year.

Time to save the children before they become fags to keep them from abusing drugs, preventing their mental illnesses and stop the suicides.

As for corporate CEOs across America warning, go Fagless or your company goes broke. Hey, Bud Light did you get the message to go Fagless?

©2023. Dr. Rich Swier. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLES:

White House accused of US Flag Code violation over Pride Month display

‘Really Bad Science’: Biden Admin Admits LGBT Lifestyle Produces Worse Mental Health and Addiction

Glenn Youngkin Slams School Board For Promoting Gender Ideology In ‘Pride Month’ Resolution

Conservatives React To NPR Father’s Day Article About ‘Pregnant Dad’

Mayor thrown out of office after objecting to Pride flag raising outside township hall

RELATED TWEET:

Biden State Dept. Engaging in ‘Ideological Colonialism’ with Worldwide LGBT Agenda: Report

/in , , , , , , , , , /by

President Joe Biden ramped up his LGBT advocacy this week with the largest celebration of Pride Month in White House history. Biden reiterated his unabashed support of the LGBT community, stating the community brings “hope and light” to society, and that its members “set an example for the nation and, quite frankly, for the world.”

According to a new Family Research Council white paper, Biden is certainly the LGBT community’s biggest cheerleader around the world. “The [Biden] administration has systematically elevated the importance of LGBT ideology in American foreign policy,” reads the report, “Exporting LGBT Ideology: The Biden Administration’s Foreign Policy Priority.” The paper, authored by Arielle Del Turco and Chris Gacek, notes the administration’s activist stance is reflected in the use of the “resources and platform of the U.S. government to promote LGBT policies abroad.”

“The mark of this ideological push is widespread, and the harms will be as well,” writes Del Turco, director of the FRC’s Center for Religious Liberty, and Gacek, director of Regulatory Affairs at FRC. “The Biden administration is choosing to use the institutions and mechanisms of U.S. foreign policy to promote sexual orientation and gender identity as human rights issues,” the paper notes.

“President Biden and his State Department are using your tax dollars to force this ideology on poor nations who are desperate for American aid dollars,” FRC President Tony Perkins said June 13, accusing the Biden administration of “engaging in cultural imperialism against countries that have no interest in flying the Pride Flag or redefining marriage or human sexuality.”

More often than not, these nations have traditional values, Perkins stressed, noting this blatant advocacy “flies in the face of what they believe and what they want for their children and for their country.”

An FRC assessment of the websites and social media platforms of U.S. embassies revealed the State Department actively advocates LGBT ideology. “In 2022 at least 132 U.S. embassies released Pride Month statements via social media or their website, at least 99 U.S. embassies flew Pride or Progress flags, and at least 49 embassies had staffers who participated in Pride parades,” according to the report.

In an appearance on “Washington Watch,” Del Turco said the contrast between the State Department under Biden and former President Trump is sharp. Under Trump, the State Department was focused on pushing tenets of religious freedom around the world, including speaking up for those being persecuted for their faith, she noted. “After President Biden came into office, I just saw all of that fall off,” Del Turco said, noting the emphasis flipped to pushing LGBT policies on countries around the world who have no interest in it.

The Biden administration is using the nation’s human rights apparatus to condemn other countries that have not embraced pro-LGBT policies like marriage and legal gender recognition, Del Turco said. “[The U.S. government] is being hypocritical by taking many of these policies the [U.S.] adopted very recently,” she added, noting different cultures do not appreciate this “ideological colonialism.”

Del Turco suggested the Biden administration is using these nations’ reliance on America’s foreign assistance as leverage “to coerce countries around the world to start adopting some of these radical LGBT policies.” In their research, she and the study’s co-author, Chris Gacek, discovered a “systematic effort to infect all aspects of American foreign policy with LGBT policies.”

There are policies equally offensive to many people of faith that might rival LGBT activism for the top spot in the Biden administration’s agenda, the pair acknowledged, citing the promotion of abortion and population control.

The white paper states it was during the Obama administration that LGBT principles began to be woven into America’s foreign diplomacy. The report notes that in December 2011, then-President Barack Obama issued a memorandum to cabinet and agency heads entitled, “International Initiatives to Advance the Human Rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Persons.” The memo begins with this statement: “The struggle to end discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons is a global challenge, and one that is central to promoting human rights.”

According to Del Turco and Gacek, the presidential memorandum required all U.S. agencies working overseas “to ensure that U.S. diplomacy and foreign assistance promote and protect the human rights of LGBT persons.” The duo’s groundbreaking report provides ample proof that “LGBT rights are at the pinnacle of the administration’s State Department agenda.”

The report details the State Department’s seeming obsession with the promotion of LGBT ideology, noting at least nearly 50 embassies had staffers participate in Pride parades or marches last year, while U.S. embassies hosted Pride receptions, roundtable discussions, LGBT movie nights, or webinars with local LGBT activists. On National Coming Out Day, the Deputy Chief of Mission to the U.S. embassy in Luxembourg made a video telling his own coming out story. The U.S. embassy in India promoted a video of a young transgender-identifying activist.

As further evidence of the State Department’s commitment to promote LGBT ideology in other nations, Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a “first-of-its-kind” briefing to LGBT reporters in June 2022, telling the group he had consistently raised concerns about human rights conditions for LGBT-identifying people with Saudi diplomats.

Since Obama’s actions — and through each of the three most recent presidential administrations — the research reveals “permanent foreign policy bureaucracies appear to have become committed to advancing LGBT ideology and other social justice agendas under the guise of development and human rights policy.”

Yet the study’s authors state the Biden administration ramped up the promotion of the ideology. In issuing a memorandum entitled, “Advancing the Human Rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex Persons Around the World” in February soon after his inauguration,” President Joe Biden raised the prominence of the issue by tying it to “national security.”

The authors summarize the memorandum: “It shall be the policy of the United States to pursue an end to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or sex characteristics, and to lead by the power of our example in the cause of advancing the human rights of LGBTQI+ persons around the world.”

More recently, the U.S. State Department applauded its own work in “promoting and protecting the human rights of LGBTQI+ people around the world through our diplomacy and foreign assistance” by releasing a 130-page document in April 2022, the white paper notes. The report, which the State Department labeled as a “first of its kind progress report,” acknowledged the U.S. government’s efforts to date, but insisted more needed to be done in this area: “It is clear we must be doing more, and we will continue to strive for additional progress.”

Del Turco told Perkins that she and Gacek know pro-family activists who are very disheartened when they see the U.S. embassy participating in Pride marches in their countries. “It sends a message that the strongest country in the world is marching through their capital city and supporting an agenda that condemns their laws,” she continued.

“It’s really, really condescending,” Del Turco lamented.

They note the push by the Biden administration is much more than an indication of the president’s concern for the rights of citizens in other nations: “LGBT-identifying persons are already, rightly, protected by international human rights treaties by virtue of their personhood, not their sexual orientation or gender identity. Pushing LGBT-specific policies around the world is a coercive attempt to change foreign cultures and laws from afar and displaces human rights like religious freedom.”

AUTHOR

K.D. Hastings

K.D. Hastings and his family live in the beautiful hills of Middle Tennessee. He has been engaged in the evangelical world as a communicator since 1994.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Study: LGB+ Sexual Orientations Are Fluid

House Bill Would Notify Parents When Underage Girls Seek Abortion

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Far-Left Jurisdiction Appalled When Middle Schoolers Revolt against Pride Day

/in , , , , , , , , /by

Two hundred and fifty years after the Boston Tea Party, middle schoolers in a Boston suburb channeled its spirit against a new form of tyrannical oppression, LGBT Pride. Teachers, parents, and even administrators of the far-Left jurisdiction were “shocked,” “horrified,” and “extremely disheartened” by these middle schoolers’ solid grasp of basic biology, and naturally they retreated into platitudes of unity to justify their preferring a divisive principle to a unifying one.

Marshall Simonds Middle School (MSMS) in Burlington, Massachusetts approved a Pride Month Spirit Day on June 2 (their school year ends on June 16), which was requested and sponsored by Spectrum Club, a student organization “for LGBTQ+ students and allies,” as The Boston Globe described. Spectrum Club decked the school out in full-blown carnival regalia — rainbow streamers, Pride flag banners, handmade Pride Month signs, and “educational” — a.k.a. emotionally badgering — posters with messages like, “Why it’s not ok to say ‘That’s so gay’” and a quote by gay playwright Tennessee Williams implying that no human heart is straight. Spectrum Club members handed out rainbow stickers, and school personnel invited all students and faculty to wear rainbow clothing to demonstrate their support.

Some students not only refused to bow to the rainbow idol, but also organized a counterprotest. “This became evident in the lunchroom, where several groups of students wore red, white, blue, or black, including face paint,” wrote school principal Cari Perchase, in a letter to parents. “Groups of students were heard chanting, ‘U.S.A. are my pronouns,’ and students glared intimidatingly at faculty members showing pride.”

Although no hard numbers have been cited, the insubordinate faction seemed to include no insignificant portion of students. “Students were shamed into removing their stickers or covering their clothing with rainbows,” Perchase complained (although the sentence is ambiguous, “with rainbows” must modify “clothing,” not “covering” to make sense). In other words, the middle schoolers responded to peer pressure to celebrate LGBT Pride with peer pressure against celebrating LGBT Pride — and they succeeded. Peer pressure doesn’t work unless nearly “everybody is doing it.”

With costumes, face paint, and the resolve to agitate for liberty, the only element these middle schoolers needed to completely imitate the demonstration’s 1773 precedent was a little tea unboxing. In fact, at least some of the miffed middle schoolers performed an equivalent act by destroying the symbols of an imperious policy foisted upon them without their input — tearing down decorations, ripping them up, and stuffing them in water fountains.

Perchase was “extremely disheartened” by this behavior, she wrote. “I fully respect that our diverse community has diverse opinions and beliefs. I also respect individuals’ right to express their opinions through clothing choices and freedom of speech. When one individual or group of individuals’ beliefs and actions result in the demeaning of another individual or group, it is completely unacceptable.” Thus began the theme of Burlington adults rebuking the rebellious middle schoolers by wrapping affrontive Pride displays in the language of tolerance and inclusivity.

Middle schoolers are not widely known for knowing where to draw the line of acceptable behavior, and destroying the property of others crossed it. But, if that’s what Perchase meant by the three sentences above, that’s not what she said. Instead, Perchase undermined her lip service to free opinion and expression when she said that even beliefs are “completely unacceptable” if they demean others.

The problem is, the boundaries of “demeaning” beliefs have become exceedingly blurred with regard to LGBT+ identities. Earlier this year, another Massachusetts middle schooler was suspended for wearing a shirt that stated a biological fact, “there are only two genders,” because it allegedly made some people at his school feel “unsafe.” If middle schoolers don’t know where to draw the line for acceptable behavior, Massachusetts schools sure aren’t helping to clarify it for them.

Perchase then apologized to Marshall Simonds students who identify as LGBT. “I am truly sorry that a day meant for you to celebrate your identity turned into a day of intolerance,” she said, groveling as if she had torn down the decorations herself. “Schools are supposed to be a safe place for ALL students and faculty. Some community members’ actions created an unsafe environment for many of our students, caregivers, and faculty.”

There’s that word “unsafe” again. But what safety incident provoked its use? Did a student arrive at school with a gun, or at least a knife? Did a counterprotesting student threaten, push, or even slap any LGBT-identifying classmate? If such an incident had occurred, surely that lede would have headlined every news report. Yet, based on available news reports, the school did not even call the police.

Thus, the available facts lead us to conclude that Principal Perchase was implying that language — and even opinions — critical of excessive Pride celebrations amounts to violence against people who identify as LGBT. This untenable philosophical position was echoed in a letter by Burlington Public Schools (BPS) Superintendent Eric Conti, who insisted that “The rise in anti LGBTQ+ violence across the country is unacceptable and has no place in our schools.” Burlington Equity Coalition also peddled the “violence” mantra in a statement expressing solidarity with “members of the school community who were harmed by these acts of intolerance.”

Conti’s June 4 letter to parents was the second berating the protesting middle schoolers. He made a few good points, such as noting that spirit day “participation is optional,” but “respectful behavior … is non-negotiable.”

But Conti’s letter made clear that the school system insisted upon overtly favoring certain perspectives, while denying that they were showing favoritism. “We embrace everyone for who they are and for what they bring to our schools and larger community,” said Conti, but then he promised to train staff to “identify and respond to identity bigotry and discrimination.” Suddenly, the “embrace everyone” platitude is superseded by an “except bigots” caveat. In case any reader was uninitiated as to which identities and opinions are unquestionable, and which ones make you a bigot, Conti invited all readers to “join us in taking a stand against homophobia.”

Conti expressed no reservations about choosing a side, even as a public employee of a diverse community. “I recognize that discussions and celebrations of individual identity are complex and impacted by individual values, religions, and cultural norms, the result of which may include expressions of racism, anti-religious hate, ableism, and in this case homophobia,” he warned. Instead of respecting those values, religions, and norms, he intolerantly insisted that they stand aside if they opposed his sacred ideal of toleration.

Conti knows who butters his bread, because community members overwhelmingly endorsed his intolerance of any LGBT+ criticism at two snowflake struggle sessions this week — a Burlington Select Board meeting on Monday and a BPS School Committee meeting on Tuesday.

“I thought Burlington was a safer place than Texas or Florida. Obviously I was wrong,” complained parent and former school committee member Cara Foss. She called on local officials to suppress the middle schooler revolt head-on, “there’s some undercurrents in Burlington that town administration and school administration need to address more directly and more firmly.”

“The issue of Pride at schools is very controversial, I understand that,” Foss continued. “I think we need to start at a place of commonality.” But she urged officials to stamp out any LGBT skepticism, no matter how long it took. “I think it will take some time. It takes a lot of hard work and conversation, but I believe in Burlington, I believe we can get there.”

Other public commenters expressed concern over the organization the middle schoolers demonstrated. “It was an unruly disruption that was organized ahead of time,” noted Burlington resident Joanne Frustaci. “I was shocked and horrified,” said parent Nila Almstrom. “They organized themselves; they came to school wearing outfits and face paint. And if they’re big enough to do that, then they’re big enough to have this conversation.” By “big enough to have this conversation,” Almstrom apparently meant that middle schoolers should allow the adults to dictate their opinions for them, and that they should lie down and accept their verbal lashing like good little sheep. Her objective, she said, was that the students could “take responsibility for their actions and still become allies” of the LGBT community.

“How many children felt power yesterday by committing an act of intimidation?” intoned librarian and former high school teacher Andrea Bono-Bunker Monday. “How many children had a seed of homophobia planted in them yesterday? How many children now feel worse about themselves because of what they witnessed or experienced yesterday? How many children now think that being part of or supportive of the LGBTQIA+ community is un-American?”

What psychobabble! She tacitly admits the former powerlessness felt by middle schoolers uncomfortable with in-your-face Pride celebrations, while at the same time wrongly asserting a child’s self-worth should be the most important consideration. She feigns surprise that force-feeding middle schoolers — now beginning to think for themselves — such undigestible fare would cause them to spew forth a putrid yet instinctive response. She seems unable to comprehend the Left’s campaign to turn young people into political activists had already sown every “seed” necessary for the outburst, or that the LGBT ideology’s intolerance of free speech or criticism — not to mention its adherents’ disdain for America itself — had already driven into these middle schoolers’ minds a mental wedge between supporting the “LGBTQIA+” community or supporting America.

“While these students are culpable, the underlying issue is where did they get the idea to do this in the first place?” said Bono-Bunker. Other speakers also held the parents responsible for their children’s rejection of LGBT Pride. “This type of intolerant rhetoric starts in the home,” insisted one father intolerantly.

Others demanded action. “It would be naïve of us to think that what happened at the middle school won’t escalate to something more tragic in the future. It isn’t going to go magically away; it will get worse,” parent Jessika Dubay-Dang forecasted. Apparently, wearing red, white, and blue to school on Pride Day is “tragic” now. If the adults don’t intervene immediately, such malformed children might grow up standing for the Pledge of Allegiance, living productive and happy lives focused on others, and even — perish the thought! — owning a gun.

In all seriousness, Dubay-Dang likely meant that these middle schoolers would move from lesser violence to greater violence. Again, this presumes the middle schoolers committed violence, which, apart from trashing decorations, they didn’t. But to take her argument on its own terms for a moment, Dubay-Dang argues that their violent thoughts and words show that these young students have been radicalized, and that they will progress to further violence as their radicalism develops. If that’s true, the proper cure would be identifying the source of the radicalization and removing it. To the extent that these youngsters were radicalized — again, only in the terms of her argument — they are reacting to the oppressive, suffocating celebration of LGBT ideology, with no dissent tolerated. What do Dubay-Dang and other parents propose? More of the same!

Dubay-Dang wasn’t alone in calling for action. Burlington Equality Coalition also called on school administrators to “provide consequences” for counter-protestors and “take an active stand against hate under the guise of ‘free expression.’” (Where did those students get the notion that supporting the LGBT agenda is un-American?) “Without any direct and concrete action, these incidents will occur again and increase in severity,” they warned. Shutting down the free expression of students was “a chance to remind residents that every person is important and welcome in our town,” said the LGBT advocacy organization.

In addition to punishing demonstrators, Burlington Equality also demanded school administrators fill a DEI director position that has been “unfilled for almost a year” and that the town board “reinstate the recently disbanded Diversity, Equity and Inclusion subcommittee” (its funding was redirected to other DEI training initiatives). Additionally, Perchase said they would hold listening sessions to hear students’ concerns, create a form whereby students could anonymously report each other for hateful conduct (does anyone else see a problem with this?), and prepare additional curriculum to teach students tolerance, acceptance, and respect (which rings of the SPLC’s Teaching Tolerance curriculum).

Town officials responded to community gripes by affirming them. “A bad light has been cast over our town,” agreed Select Board member Mike Espejo. “I was very upset. I’ve lost sleep over it. It kind of shocked me to my core. I didn’t think something like that could happen in Burlington.” At least two other board members agreed with the sentiment, and the board promised to consider how to address the issue over the summer.

For their part, school officials seem reluctant to discipline students for the disruption. At the Tuesday meeting, Burlington School Committee Chair Martha Simon stressed that the offenders were only middle schoolers. “Middle school should be a safe place for all students to express themselves, to make mistakes, and to learn from each other,” she said.

School officials may also not relish the responsibility of sniffing out which protesting students had actually destroyed property. “Some of the kids threw the stickers on the ground,” said Christine Steiner, mother of one girl who protested. “But I can only speak for my daughter, she just didn’t want to wear that to school. It’s not that she wanted to hurt anybody’s feelings.” Such a remark suggests the students may have felt more pressure to wear rainbow attire beforehand than school officials have admitted to after the fact. Steiner added that her daughter felt coerced to join the celebration of Pride and was offended by some of the messages, such as the Tennessee Williams poster implying no one is straight.

Conti had taken a position similar to Simon in his earlier letter, “The Burlington Public Schools are obligated to provide a safe environment for all students to feel safe, seen, and respected without retaliation.” But school officials making not-so-subtle digs as politically incorrect ideas is totally cool.

The more thoughtful responses preferred discussion to punishment. “It is not enough to publicly denounce these incidents,” said Conti. “As a school system we have a unique opportunity to educate our community on the nature of these events.” He probably means indoctrination, but at least he isn’t punishing students as the local LGBT coalition demanded.

“I think what we need to do is turn down the temperature,” said Espejo, “and instead of talking at each other, look each other in the face and talk to each other, hear each other’s concerns, complaints and try to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes and I think that would go a long way.” As Conti put it, “Let us all work on being kinder to each other.”

It didn’t take much listening to locate the source of student anger. “Perchase said she received some feedback that the counter message was in response to the school not recognizing the observance of Memorial Day,” reported local news station WHDH. Perchase said the lack of recognition was an “oversight” and reiterated, “respect for the observance of Memorial Day and respect for the LGBTQ community are not mutually exclusive.”

Kind of a big oversight, no? The school ignored a federal holiday, for which classes were cancelled, but foamed at the mouth to convert their building into a temple to LGBT Pride. So, in theory, Perchase is correct that respect for the official holiday and the unofficial debauchery month are “not mutually exclusive.” But in actual practice, the school got so excited about celebrating a divisive niche that they completely overlooked a generic and unifying American institution in the very same week. No wonder the students wore red, white, and blue. Instead of correcting this grave error, the school district responded to the incident with more DEI programs, not more American unity.

The incident reached such a pitch that it attracted the attention of Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey (D), who identifies as a lesbian. “I hope it becomes a teaching moment for the young people who were involved in that,” said Healey. “It doesn’t represent who we are as a state.” That may be true for today’s voting populace, but these middle schoolers — the next generation — are recalling an earlier Massachusetts tradition that responded to oppression and tyranny by dumping tea in Boston harbor.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Republicans Gun for Biden’s Pride Flags

/in , , , , , , , , /by

While the White House races to distance itself from the impromptu strip show on its South Lawn last Saturday, the bare-breasted trans display was only one part of the taxpayer-funded circus that Joe Biden brought to the most sacred residence in America. “Add this to the list of ways Biden has degraded the prestige and decorum of the office of president,” Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) fumed. A list that also includes his decision to make the controversial Progress Flag the balcony focal point during his Pride fest, centered in a place of honor that should be reserved for our nation’s colors.

Most Americans still can’t get over the image of the transgender baby blue and pink draped over one of the most symbolic buildings in America. The president’s brazen endorsement of a movement that’s mutilating children and splitting up families was like a slap in the face to a country already burning with rage over the Democrats’ trans fixation.

“The flag of the United States of America placed in equal stature on the flank of the alphabet cult battle flag,” Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) seethed. “The Biden administration is a disgrace.” Others pointed out the flagrant violation of the U.S. Flag Code, which White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre brushed off. “Did anybody notice that or fail to notice that,” a reporter asked, “or was it an intentional statement?”

Jean-Pierre was defiant, insisting the president was “proud” to display the Progress Flag, even calling it a “historic” moment for a day “centered around love and family.” “… [W]e’re not going to let anyone distract us from that, what was the meaning of the day. … I’m certainly not going to get into protocols from here. … I’ll leave that to others.”

Those “others” may soon be House Republicans, who’ve wasted no time putting the Biden administration on notice for its anti-American displays. On Wednesday, Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.) used Flag Day “to remind everyone that the Stars and Stripes is the ONLY flag that displays our nation’s shared values.”

His Senate colleague, Roger Marshall (R), introduced a bill called the One Flag for All Act Wednesday to make it illegal to “fly, drape, or display any flag other than the American flag on federal buildings or properties, with limited exceptions.” “We have a duty…” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) agreed, “[to stand] up in defense of this country instead of a radical Leftist ideology that results in a pride flag being hung at the same level as the US flag on the front of the White House.”

Together, Republicans refuse to sit by and let the president insult the brave men and women who’ve fought and died under the colors our leaders should be flying. They’ve been especially irate over Secretary of Veteran Affairs Denis McDonough’s directive to fly the rainbow and Progress Flags above, beside, or even in lieu of the stars and stripes at VA facilities. The GOP’s Mississippi delegation fired off an indignant letter over the rainbow colors at Biloxi National Cemetery, which they say shows “deep disrespect” to our nation’s servicemembers.

“Replacing the United States flag with a flag that promotes a particular sexual or gender identity goes against the very mission of our national cemeteries. … Cemeteries should be places for reflection and respect, not public virtue signaling.

“This political stunt is yet another example of this Administration’s willingness to promote its political agenda rather than focus on its mission as the executive branch. Our veterans expect the Department of Veteran Affairs to provide services, not controversial ideologies.”

The controversy is one of several triggered by McDonough’s decision to allow the Pride flag at every VA facility — a move that’s sparked protests in cities like Fresno. One of the demonstrators, John Cline, a combat medic who served in Vietnam, told reporters, “That flag is now being flown in a spot that we hold very sacred, and no organization should be put above any other organization in that area.” Cline explained that he’d “even spoken with some of our gay veterans, and they also believe that the Walk of Honor is not the place where it should be flown.”

If the grassroots fury doesn’t get McDonough’s attention, maybe Congress will. On Tuesday, House Republicans raised the stakes — passing an amendment to the VA spending bill that would not only forbid the agency from flying the Pride flag, but also rolls back the administration’s outrageous taxpayer-funded abortions and gender transition surgeries for veterans.

“This is something that should be handled by Congress, not by the executive branch,” Rep. John Carter (R-Texas) argued about the president’s woke social policies. As of February, reports show the VA has taken 34 unborn lives — all at Americans’ expense and all in violation of the Hyde Amendment.

As for gender transition treatments, the VA has been plotting for two years to add “surgical procedures” and “hormone therapies” to its list of covered services, insisting it would “save lives.” Republicans voted 34-27 to strike the policy, a move that Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) called a waste of time. “This committee … should be focused on issues that face the veterans community every day: ending veteran suicide, decreasing the claims backlogs, ensuring the VA can attract and retain clinicians. But we are instead focusing on non-issues to bow down to the demands of the far-right wing of the Republican Party.”

These “non-issues,” as Wasserman Schultz calls them, are at the heart of a raging national debate that Democrats are soundly losing. At a time when backlash to Pride is at a fevered pitch, most Americans would agree it’s not too much to ask that our veterans aren’t exploited in Biden’s political games. Under this latest House amendment, the VA would be barred from flying any flag “other than the flag of the United States, the flag of a state, territory, or District of Columbia, the flag of an Indian tribal government, the flag of the department, the flag of an armed force, or the POW/MIA flag.”

It would guarantee that the “work and the message of the VA is not divisive,” Rep. Michael Guest (R-Miss.) insisted, “is not controversial, and is not promoting a particular gender ideology, but rather is respect[ful] of our veterans.”

As Family Research Council’s executive vice president, Lt. General (Ret.) William Boykin said, “So many Americans have given so much — including their lives — to give all Americans the right to be proud of who we are as a nation and not just a special sub-group. The actions by the Veterans Administration to put the LGBT flag on par with the American flag is an ill-conceived and disgusting action which cannot be justified. It leaves me wondering: Is anyone in charge of the VA?”

As Boykin emphasized to The Washington Stand, “It is important for us as a nation to continually remind ourselves of the sacrifices that have been made by these men and women in uniform in helping to preserve our liberties.”

In the meantime, he insisted, “Someone needs to be held accountable for this disgusting display of anti-American and anti-veteran behavior.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Pursuing His Twisted Agenda,’ Biden Puts Progress Flags on Par with Old Glory

/in , , , , , , , , , , , /by

People visiting Washington, D.C. this weekend probably expected to see a white house on Pennsylvania Avenue. Instead, the president’s residence was plastered in rainbow and transgender colors, an over-the-top display of the current resident’s LGBT fixation. It was a stark contrast to the mood in the rest of America, where the fury over Pride displays has reached a deafening roar.

That all seems lost on Joe Biden, who hosted the largest Pride event in White House history on Saturday. The South Lawn event came just two days after the president savaged the Americans opposed to his wildly irresponsible agenda of transgenderism. In a scripted response to a PBS reporter, the president unloaded on parents who are up in arms about the indoctrination of their sons and daughters, calling the opposition to child mutilation “hysterical” and “cruel.”

In a coordinated exchange, PBS News White House correspondent Laura Barrón-López framed the conversation this way: “All over the country … Republican led states are passing laws — passing anti-LGBT, anti-transgender laws that restrict rights and medical care. Intimidation is on the rise. This week, anti-LGBTQ protesters turned violent in California.” She claimed to have spoken to parents who are considering leaving the U.S., because local governments are cracking down on barbaric child sex change procedures.

“Sir,” she asked Biden, “why do you think this is happening? And what do you say to parents like the ones that I spoke to — to those families who are contemplating leaving the country because they don’t feel safe anymore?”

The president replied by proudly ticking through all of his LGBT activism, like throwing open the military to people who identify as the opposite sex and signing the sweeping same-sex marriage law earlier this year. But, he pivoted, “our fight is far, far from over because we have some hysterical and, I would argue, prejudiced people who are engaged in all that you see going on around the country. It’s an appeal to fear, and it’s an appeal that is totally, thoroughly unjustified, and ugly.”

“It’s wrong,” Biden ranted, “that extreme [GOP] officials are pushing hateful bills, targeting transgender children, terrifying families, and criminalizing doctors. These are our kids. These are our neighbors. It’s cruel and it’s callous. They’re not somebody else’s kids, they’re all our kids. They’re the kids, and our children are the kite strings that hold our national ambitions aloft. It matters a great deal how we treat everyone in this country.”

The “they’re all our kids” line drew a unique kind of scorn, since it marks the third time the administration has tried to claim Americans’ children as their own. Biden himself argued, “There’s no such thing as someone else’s child” in April, which was encored by White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in May who said the country’s trans-identifying children “belong to all of us.”

Outraged Republicans like Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.) fired back that “Contrary to President Biden, the nation’s children do not belong to him, and it’s good to oppose unnecessary and irreversible medical procedures for kids. If Joe Biden wants to see an extremist, there are mirrors all over the White House.”

Other conservatives can’t understand why the president is leaning into an issue that’s sparked such a nationwide uprising. Even last week, polling showed just how far outside the mainstream the Democratic Party is when it comes to this hot-button debate. An astonishing 71% of Americans reject Biden’s suggestion that there are more than two genders in the latest Rasmussen Report — including 67% of his own party. To strategists like Matt Whitlock, the Democrats’ 24/7 Pride parade is a “[h]uge political miscalculation,” because “the overwhelming majority of Americans support banning transgender surgeries for kids. … This is such a bizarre hill for them to fight on,” he told Fox News.

That political divide has never been more obvious than the two camps’ approaches to 2024. While Democrats use drag queens to rally voters, every declared GOP presidential candidate is united in their opposition to harmful, irreversible gender treatments for children. “It’s sad we even have to say this,” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) said in last week’s tour of Iowa, “but it is wrong for physicians to perform sex change operations on minors. That is mutilation and physicians who commit such acts in Florida not only lose their medical license, they go to jail.”

Meanwhile, at the Biden White House, contestants on “RuPaul’s Drag Race” performed (presumably on the taxpayer dime) and the radical progress flag flies in equal footing with Old Glory. “We need to push back against the hundreds of callous and cynical bills and laws introduced in states, targeting transgender children terrifying families, and criminalizing doctors and nurses,” the president insisted Saturday. “These bills and laws attack the most basic values and freedoms.”

Biden’s backwards logic continues to incense everyday Americans, who are sick of the administration demonizing parents and voters who don’t share his fanatical, unhinged ideology. “The default position for the Left,” Congressman Bob Good (R-Va.) argued on “Washington Watch” Thursday, “… is whenever you disagree with them or you challenge their narrative, you challenge their agenda, you challenge their position, then you’re a racist, you’re a homophobe, you’re a transphobe — and they target you.”

Right now, he argued, people who “dissent or disagree” with the radical agenda of the Biden administration, those who “dare to question the efforts to indoctrinate our children in schools with anti-American ideology, with racist ideology, with transgender ideology … [t]hose are the people that this administration considers to be the greatest threat to the country. [They are] to be threatened, intimidated, harassed, arrested, even imprisoned for standing up for what they believe in, for exercising, frankly, their First Amendment protected rights to petition their government with their grievances, to protest peacefully and just to stand up for the protection of their own children.”

In the meantime, Biden’s flagrant allegiance to the LGBT progress flag is not only putting him at odds with most Americans but potentially, critics argue, with the U.S. Flag code. “The flag of the United States of America should be at the center and at the highest point of the group when a number of flags of States or localities or pennants of societies are grouped and displayed from staffs,” Judicial Watch’s Tom Fitton said. More than that, he insisted, “To advance revolutionary transgender agenda targeting children, Biden … disrespects every American service member buried under its colors.”

Members of Congress were equally disgusted. “Pursuing his twisted agenda, Biden dishonors the flag and breaks American law,” Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) posted. “Shameful that our flag is being replaced by leftist imagery at the White House,” Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.) tweeted. “Anyone wondering why drag shows and other woke nonsense dominate our government? Here it is: orders are coming directly from the top.”

“This is a disgrace,” Senator Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) agreed. “Not only is it in breach of US Flag Code, but it’s a glaring example of this White Houses’ incompetence and insistence on putting their social agenda ahead of patriotism.”

If Biden thinks flaunting his obsession with LGBT extremism will help him at the polls, someone in the White House might want to check the value of Bud Light and Target stocks. If people will vote against this agenda with their dollars, how much more will they vote with their ballots?

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

10 Things for Christians to Remember during Pride Month

/in , , , , , , , , /by

We all know it’s coming and in various ways we are bracing for it. You’ll be navigating workplaces, city streets, social media feeds, and corporate events celebrating it. The first thing to understand is that “Pride month” does not mean the same thing to everyone.

For many, Pride month is seen as a month of inclusivity and tolerance where people are seen and reminded that they matter. In significant ways, these are values that Christians share. But there’s so much more to it.

The message of Pride is not that you matter because you are created in the image of God, a message Christians not only agree with but started. No, Pride is a declaration of independence against nature and nature’s God. It is a claim that we can do whatever we want and no one can stop us. Live your truth. Live authentically.

In addition, for many, the symbolism has come to represent oppression, intolerance, and hate. The rainbow flag, which has now become much more than a rainbow, represents a movement that is pushing speech codes, that has closed businesses, and harassed people because they did not share a commitment to the sexual revolution or would not affirm that men can become women and get pregnant.

It’s interesting that Pride month falls right in the middle of Memorial Day and the Fourth of July. On Memorial Day, we celebrate those who gave their lives for our freedom. On the Fourth of July, we celebrate our independence from tyranny and those who pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor so we could live as free people. Our nation, and those who died for it, get one day. But the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence get an entire month. If that doesn’t seem right, it’s not.

But let’s not get angry or panic. How do we think soberly, act biblically, and maintain our joy as we wade through this month-long celebration of sin?

Here are a few things to remember.

1. Pride celebrations are not new.

Although pride parades down the streets of America’s cities are a relatively recent development, people making a declaration of independence from God is so old it is almost cliché.

In the Garden of Eden, God told Adam and Eve not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:16-17; 3:2-3). However, Eve, with Satan’s help, convinced herself that doing things her way would help her become like God. Perhaps she decided she was spiritual, not religious.

She observed that the tree was good for food, that it was a delight to the eyes, and that it was desirable to make one wise (Genesis 3:6). She convinced herself that her rebellion would not be rebellion at all but virtue. She had followed the old rules long enough and found them to be stifling of her individuality. She was ready to chart a new path and live her truth and even convinced her husband to join her celebration. They may have even felt a sense of pride as they freed themselves from the bondage of God’s rules.

Basically, Adam and Eve started these parades and we’ve all participated in various ways and with varying degrees of enthusiasm.

2. You can love the way God wants you to or the way the world wants you to, but not both.

Much will be said about love this month. T-shirts, memes, and parade signs will declare that “love is love” and that “love wins.” Whether Christians can agree with these sentiments depends on how “love” is defined. Proponents of the sexual revolution would have us believe that we show love for someone by affirming identities, indulging desires, and encouraging each other to “live your truth.” But God’s definition of love is very different.

Scripture reminds us that “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful” (1 Corinthians 13:4-5). But then it goes on to remind us that love “does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth” (1 Corinthians 13:6). This crucial verse is where God’s understanding of love and the world’s understanding of love diverge. God’s love forbids the celebration of things God does not celebrate. The world’s understanding of love requires it.

This means that a Christian’s unwillingness to celebrate Pride month will be seen by the world as an act of hate and by God as an act of love. Christians must choose whose definition of love they will accept.

3. No one is beyond the love or reach of Jesus.

While Christians are right to separate themselves from celebrations of sin, we should be equally careful to avoid a different but equally bad kind of pride — self-righteousness. If Christians have any goodness within ourselves, we do not deserve the credit. After all, “[God] saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5).

Rather than a sense of self-righteousness, Jesus modeled how our hearts should respond to people who are lost:

“When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest’” (Matthew 9:36-38).

When we see crowds who are lost, we should be moved to compassion, not self-righteousness.

4. Don’t be afraid.

This month, some will encounter a city street lined with rainbow flags or unwittingly expose their child to sexual revolutionary propaganda on “Blues Clues” and be prone to despair. Don’t despair.

Fear is never from God. (2 Timothy 1:7). Whatever situation you are dealing with, God is not surprised by it, nor is it beyond His control. However, He knows we are prone to worry, which is why Peter encourages us to cast all our anxieties on him (1 Peter 5:7). The same God who formed the mountains and put the planets into orbit is aware of the situation and handling it.

The good news is that our moments of weakness are the moments God does His best work in us. While the culture takes pride in their independence from God, we should boast in our dependence:

“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Corinthians 12:9).

Maybe we should start our own pride parade; it would be kind of the same but also very different.

5. Being a Christian is supposed to feel weird.

One of the challenges of Pride month is that Christians often feel different. Most of us would prefer not to feel different. We want to blend in and be noticed only for how nice we are to people. But when someone at work is going from office to office asking people if they want a rainbow sticker for their window, the only way to blend in is to conform. So now you feel different.

But that’s how it’s supposed to feel. This is not our home. “Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul” (1 Peter 2:11). We aren’t supposed to do or love the same things as the world around us. “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). If being a Christian makes you feel different than other people, good. You are different. The real problem would be if you never felt different.

6. Don’t give an inch.

It’s possible to avoid feeling different, just do what everyone else is doing. Just provide your preferred pronouns or tolerate a rainbow flag in your office window. Other times, all you must do is keep your mouth shut. But don’t do it. The path of compromise only seems easy, but it’s not. After all, “The fear of man is a snare. But whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe” (Proverbs 29:25).

It’s easy to rationalize seemingly small compromises. All Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego needed to do to avoid being thrown into a furnace was bow (Daniel 3). Surely, God would understand that they weren’t actually worshipping the idol. Right? They could have easily told themselves they needed to stay alive and maintain a good relationship with the king who had shown them so much trust. After all, God couldn’t use them if they were dead. But remember, it’s not you who is going to do the work, it’s God. God did change the heart of the King, but he did not use their influence, he used their obedience. Give Him your obedience.

7. Remember what you’re saying “YES” to.

During Pride month, Christians are required to say no to some things. We can’t participate in sin (Ephesians 5:11) nor can we celebrate evil (1 Corinthians 13:6). So you may be accused of being “anti” everything. These are moments it’s helpful to remember that anytime you say “no” to one thing its because you’re saying “yes” to something else. Something better.

When we say “no” to doing whatever you want sexually, it’s because we are saying “yes” to virtue, discipline, delayed gratification, and the satisfaction and intimacy that comes from forming relationships God’s way. When we say “no” to the idea that boys can become girls, we are saying “yes” to finding our created purpose. When we say “no” to surrogacy so that a child can be placed with two dads, it’s because we are saying “yes” to each child being known and loved by both their parents. When we say “no” to bad ideas, it’s because we’re saying “yes” to better ideas. Every time.

8. Pray for those who curse you.

One reason Christians shouldn’t be surprised when we are misunderstood or mistreated is because Jesus spent significant time telling us what to do when it happens. “Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (Luke 6:28). Our responsibility is not to avoid every conflict, but to respond to it correctly when it happens.

That means we have to pray for those who treat us poorly. “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you” (Luke 6:27). Praying for those who treat us poorly helps us love people, even if they don’t love us back. “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” (Matthew 5:46) This is the goal of every day of every month. Pride month changes nothing, it just gives us more opportunities to love people the way Jesus does.

9. Pride comes before a fall.

It’s ironic that those who started “Pride” events used the term “pride” to describe them. They named their entire movement after one of the seven deadly sins; a sin that Proverbs assures us is the prelude to our destruction: “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18). It is almost as if God was looking to make it obvious what was actually happening here. Just as we would be wise to avoid celebrating “Wrath Month” or a “Lust Parade,” Christians should be wary of celebrating pride. After all, we know what happens next.

10. God will have the last word.

In Daniel chapter 5, Belshazzar, the king of Babylon, throws a party while an invading army is gathering around the city. He was so confident that the walls that had protected him his whole life would continue to protect him that he mocked an invading army by inviting his military to party rather than prepare for battle. Belshazzar was very confident, or at least he wanted to project confidence. Then God interrupted his party.

In a scene that gives us the phrase “the writing on the wall” the hand of God showed up and wrote a message on the wall. The interesting thing about the message is that Belshazzar was not able to read it, after all, he summoned Daniel to interpret it for him. Nevertheless, “the king’s face grew pale, and his thoughts alarmed him; and his hip joints went slack, and his knees began knocking together.” What we see here is what happens when fake power meets real power. The world is filled with people who have some form of cultural or political power, but when they are confronted with real power, their confidence disappears immediately.

Pride month is fake power celebrating its fake power, and it will survive only until God decides He has had enough. And that moment is coming. Our job is to make sure we’re doing what we can to remind people where the real power is and that opposing Him will never be a good decision — which is the opposite of pride.

AUTHOR

Joseph Backholm

Joseph Backholm is Senior Fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement at Family Research Council.

RELATED TWEET:

RELATED ARTICLES:

Suspended Coach and Daughter Reinstated after Protesting Boys in the Girls’ Locker Room

Louisiana Senate Resuscitates Stop Harming Our Kids Act

Why the Newest Horror Movie ‘Nefarious’ Is One of the Clearest Presentations of the Gospel Hollywood Has Ever Seen

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Woke Brands Back Off Pride Month as American Fury Grows

/in , , , , , , , , /by

For most CEOs, Pride Month couldn’t have come at a more inopportune time. As companies like Target, Bud Light, and others desperately try to control the flames burning down their brands, this annual test of LGBT loyalty is putting most businesses in a position they’d rather not be in: outraging an already agitated consumer base or ticking off the lobby they’ve worked two decades to appease. Faced with the choice of becoming unprofitable or politically unacceptable, what will the big companies do?

Already, Newsweek is pointing out the surprising hesitancy of otherwise woke brands to go all in on June 1. After plastering the rainbow and progress flags across their platforms last year, North Face, Lego, and Miller Lite were unusually quiet on the social media front this time. “Other brands — such as Target, Bud Light and Adidas — have yet to post, despite doing so in June of last year,” reporter Aleks Phillips points out. Not surprisingly, all three are facing blistering criticism after either replacing women with trans-identifying men or aggressively marketing gender confusion to kids. “Of the accounts reviewed by Newsweek, only Kohl’s and PetSmart had defied critics so far in posting Pride Month content.”

“They’re feeling the pinch,” Family Research Council President Tony Perkins acknowledged on “Washington Watch.” Target and Bud Light are significantly cratering, with Anheuser-Busch scraping and clawing for any idea that would bring them back to solvency. Target CEO Brian Cornell, who bragged that the stores’ controversial “tuck-friendly” swimwear and other trans merchandise was “great for our brand,” is eating those words this week after their stock was officially downgraded by JP Morgan after an astonishing $12.4 billion in losses. “I really think we should help them out and downgrade [the stock] even further by refusing to shop there,” Perkins insisted.

“I do think we’re at a tipping point,” he said to Dr. Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, on Thursday. “It’s one thing to push the whole LGB [agenda],” Perkins insisted, “But this transgender thing … [is] a bridge too far. … [Americans are] seeing their children and grandchildren transformed by this ideology. And it’s frightening. … And when you have corporate America jumping on the bandwagon, pushing this, and it’s in your face at every turn, [then this becomes] a different moment.”

Mohler, like most people, can’t understand why major American corporations aren’t counting the cost of their social extremism. Everyday people “aren’t buying … the revolutionary stuff they’re selling,” he insisted. And yet, even Anheuser-Busch, who’s taken an absolute beating on Wall Street since its partnership with Dylan Mulvaney, can’t bring itself to cut those controversial ties. Just last week, in the midst of one of the biggest PR scandals of the century, leaders poured gas on the fire with another $200,000 donation to the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce. This, after losing an eye-popping $27 billion since April.

“That’s a huge number,” Stephen Soukup shook his head. “I saw a story earlier today that Bud Light is selling for $.14 a can. …You have distributors … who are turning in their franchise credentials because they can no longer make a living distributing Anheuser-Busch products. … This is pretty much unprecedented in American consumer behavior,” he said, “and it’s really caught a lot of people off guard and has done a lot of damage to some of these companies.”

“Target is struggling as well,” “The Dictatorship of Woke Capital” author told Perkins on “Washington Watch” last week. “[They’ve] had their roughest week in the markets in probably a decade. You know, shareholders are selling saying that we don’t want to be part owner of a corporation that cares less about us than it does about pressure groups.”

Soukup believes brands need to take a much more cautious approach to their activism, especially on this issue. “My advice to businesses would be eschew the entire woke capital complex [and] say, ‘Look, we’re not playing that game anymore. We’re not political. What we want to do is make the best widgets we can. We want to be the best business that we possibly can, do the best for our employees, do the best for our customers, and especially do the best for our shareholders.’ They should be getting out of the game of politics all together.”

Amazingly, though, even brands with deep Christian roots seem content throwing their values overboard. News that Chick-fil-A, a favorite chain of conservatives, had embraced the diversity, equity, and inclusion fad, came as a big blow to families, who’d believed that this longtime holdout could weather the cultural storm.

“Their woke roosters have come home to roost,” Perkins warned about the Cathys empire. “But this is not new,” he pointed out. “… Over the last decade, [they’ve been] backing further and further away, even to the point of funding groups that have Drag Queen Story Hours. [They’ve] funded the Southern Poverty Law Center and cut off all Christian organizations like Salvation Army because their views on marriage were too ‘radical.’”

Of course, Perkins said, “[I]t’s even more offensive when an organization that has prospered off of its Christian holdings and drawn in Christians then walks down this same path. Maybe [it’s] not as bad as Target. I mean, you’re not blinded by rainbow flags when you walk in, but it’s a betrayal, quite frankly.”

Mohler agreed, hoping that “sounder policies will prevail [at Chick-fil-A].” But until then, he urged, “Christians [need to say], ‘We really are not going to do business with a company that violates and flaunts its violation of what we believe is Christian morality.”’ And while we “don’t have a choice as to whether we pay our taxes [which finances plenty of objectionable things] we do have a choice about where we buy our socks,” the seminarian insisted. “And it turns out that, these days, that can be a pretty powerful moral question. And so I want to affirm what you’re saying here. We are stewards, and it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. And that means that we can’t live in willful ignorance of what these companies are putting right in our face.” That’s why, he believes, “We’ve reached a really crucial moment.”

A moment, Perkins believes, that the church’s years of silence and acquiescence has led to. “I wish we didn’t have to be at this point, [but] I am somewhat encouraged that people still have enough resolve to push back.”

And push back they have, running from brands like Anthropologie, Adidas, Anheuser-Busch, Calvin Klein, Disney, Hershey, Jack Daniels, Kohl’s, Lego, Levi Strauss, Maybelline, Nike, North Face, Sports Illustrated, Starbucks, and Target, whose in-your-face transgender advocacy has millions of Americans taking their business elsewhere. It can be morally complicated, Mohler agreed, since no national corporation is probably “pure” in this area. “[But] at the very least,” he said, “these companies that are so aggressive [are hearing from Christians], ‘That’s the last product I’m going to buy from them.’”

Personally, Mohler said, “I believe all kinds of people will lie to me. But when they put the pride flag out front, I take them at their word. I think we know exactly what that means.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: 10 Woke Offenders: These Companies Push Radical Left Agenda, Fire Conservative Staff

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

When Corporations Act Like Politicians

/in , , , , , , /by

As the 2024 presidential primary begins to take shape, pundits of all descriptions treat their readers to theories of whether this or that candidate can hold onto the partisan base or persuade independents. Strangely, many corporations — all Democrats, apparently — are behaving in the same, partisan way. Their unbusinesslike behavior is hurting their bottom line.

The gravest recent example is Anheuser-Busch, manufacturer of Bud Light, who sponsored an Instagram post by Dylan Mulvaney, a man who pretends to be a girl, during March Madness. Even though senior management apparently never signed off on the decision, the backlash was furious, rapid, and sustained. Bud Light sales fell 21.4% in April and continue to drop, sinking 28.4% lower in the boycott’s sixth week, according to Beer Business Daily, which noted, “nobody imagined it would go on this long. … It struck a nerve.” This, despite Anheuser-Busch’s attempts to re-entice former customers, including a patriotic ad campaign, camo-print bottles, and a statement from the CEO admitting that they “never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people.”

Now, Bud Light is basically giving beer away and buying back expired beer from wholesalers in efforts to boost sales. Shares in the company have plummeted nearly 15% since the end of March, a loss of nearly $20 billion (with a “B”) in market value. Oh, and left-wing pundits are attacking Anheuser Busch for its weak attempt at an apology, which NBC News’s Ben Collins characterized as, “Bud Light caves to a mob.” Bud Light was last seen sponsoring Pride parades for the upcoming Pride Month, with all of the revenue they aren’t making.

In the last week of May, retail giant Target joined the fun, rolling out a 2023 “PRIDE” collection that featured Satanic symbolism and trans-specific items like a “tuck-friendly” swimsuit, prompting some conservatives to call for a boycott. Target responded by relocating the unsightly Pride displays from the front of some stores and removing some offensive items from its website, but CEO Brian Cornell doubled down on the decision, claiming that partnering with a Satanist to design pro-trans merchandise was “just good business decisions” and “a great thing for our brand.”

It’s too early to tell if Target’s sales numbers have been affected, but its stock has crashed more than 13% since last Wednesday, a loss of more than $10 billion in market value (for perspective, Target saw a “full-year operating income of $3.8 billion in 2022”). Leftists rewarded Target for its transgressive Pride display and non-apology by slamming it. California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) complained that Cornell was “selling out the LGBTQ+ community,” while National Black Justice Coalition executive director David Johns said Target’s allyship with the LGBTQ community was merely “superficial.” For their part, Target rebounded from the Pride boycott with an email to their employees to “remember the anniversary of the murder of George Floyd.”

The corporate flip-flop is not only for manufacturers and retailers. The Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team planned to award an anti-Catholic group of “queer and trans nuns” — whose D.C.-based chapter was formerly led by former Biden nuclear official Sam Brinton — with their annual “Community Hero Award” at their Pride Night on June 16. Not surprisingly, this provoked Catholics to call for a boycott of the Dodgers. The Dodgers rescinded the group’s invitation, acknowledging their controversial nature. But when they did so, LA Pride, which produces the city’s Pride parade, also dropped out, “forcing” the Dodgers to “offer our sincerest apologies” and reinvite the drag troupe.

You might have noticed a pattern developing here: Company X tries to promote the LGBT agenda without generating any controversy — and generates controversy. First, conservatives get mad at the promotion, leading the company to publish a half-hearted apology or half-step back. Next, progressives get made at the company’s supposed capitulation to conservatives. The company winds up angering both sides. Its effort to boost its image winds up backfiring. From this pattern, other companies should learn to ask: if we proceed with this marketing campaign, what’s the end result? Will there be backlash among our customers?

You also might have noticed that the products for sale — baseball, home furnishings, beer — appeal to broad, diverse customer bases. Everyone needs a rug or lamp or articles to fill their domicile. A large swath of American society drinks beer aplenty. And baseball is an American classic. This makes the promotion of trans ideology — a polarizing and un-inclusive issue — wholly unfitting for these brands. Not only does the ideology alienate religious Americans, but it is so unnatural — to a degree surpassing same-sex marriage — that it even alienates people who haven’t thought deeply about it, but who instinctively abhor transgenderism nonetheless.

The point of marketing campaigns is to make your product appealing to your customer base. If that customer base is broad, the marketing campaign should have broad appeal: lovable characters (Geico), memorable slogans (Capitol One), catchy jingles (Liberty Mutual), enticing visuals (anyone selling a burger). Statistically speaking, the percentage of the population who identify as transgender is tiny, even smaller than the percentage that might be turned off by overt appeals to them. Even if they sell such products, Nike doesn’t advertise shoes over size 20, Allstate doesn’t advertise insurance rates for Lamborghinis, and Chick-fil-A doesn’t advertise the vegan options on their menu. Such niche promotion is not worthwhile — unless the product being marketed is also niche.

Furthermore, these products — baseball, home furnishings, beer — are inherently nonpartisan and are in no way enhanced by association with the Pride agenda. A father-son outing to the ballpark is in no way improved by drag performers competing to disgust Catholics. Men drinking at a bar actually prefer that their beverage of choice not be marketed by a TikTok influencer caricaturing an underage girl. A store’s embrace of transgender ideology adds nothing to the take-home value of a shower curtain or candle or desk lamp purchased there. Even the sliver of the population to whom they’re trying to appeal are already as likely to purchase these ubiquitous products and brands as anyone else.

Way back in the 1990s, basketball great-turned-entrepreneur Michael Jordan resisted pressure to endorse Democrat Harvey Gantt in his challenge to Republican Senator Jesse Helms. “Republicans buy sneakers, too,” he reasoned. More corporations today would be wise to heed his advice.

Somewhere along the way, America’s major corporations have stopped behaving like businesses and started behaving like politicians. A politician succeeds by winning votes — which increasingly involves performative virtue-signaling in our culture obsessed with performative identity. A business succeeds by producing the best product and selling it for the lowest price. But investing in pride campaigns is a dubious method for improving a product, and by raising costs it actually increases the price.

Corporations are busy trying to win votes by performative virtue-signaling, but it turns out that is a horrible way to deliver the best product for the lowest price.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Chick-fil-A Embraces Woke ESG, Sparks Boycott Call

Johns Hopkins Medicine gives staff ‘inclusive’ guide containing 50 pronouns employees can use on their ID badges

The Body Reveals the Person: Moving Beyond Sexual Identity Obsession

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

New Documentary Sheds Light on Disney’s Sexual Engineering

/in , , , , , , , , /by

A new documentary on the Walt Disney Company is making crystal clear how the once family-friendly company is today one of the most serious peddlers of radical ideology in America.

Released last week by the Catholic League, “Walt’s Disenchanted Kingdom” is a 50-minute film that highlights how Disney went from entertaining and inspiring kids to indoctrinating and grooming them as it embraces and advances the radical agenda of a very small yet vocal minority that even a growing number of liberals feel have gone too far.

“They want to go after the little kids,” Catholic League President Bill Donohue said during an interview Tuesday on “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins.” “As I pointed out in the movie, they just got off their tricycle. And now they’re trying to sexually engineer them.”

The idea for the documentary came after Donohue and Family Research Council President Tony Perkins were unable to arrange a meeting with then-Disney CEO Bob Chapek to speak on behalf of conservative Catholics and evangelicals in America amid the tumult over Florida’s Parental Rights in Education bill last year.

Opponents of the legislation labeled it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill because it prohibits classroom “instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity … in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”

More broadly, the legislation reinforces the fundamental right of parents to make decisions regarding the upbringing and control of their children.

Though Disney initially chose not to take a public stance on the bill, its CEO later condemned the legislation following an outcry from pro-LGBTQ+ activists.

“You listened to one side. Will you listen to our side?” Donohue recalled asking Chapek, paraphrasing his joint letter with Perkins to the Disney CEO. “I’m a Catholic leader. Tony’s an evangelical leader. We represent a good swath of the country.”

“Well, they blew us off,” Donohue said.

So Donohue ran with the idea of a documentary, enlisting Jason Killian Meath, CEO of Meath Television Media LLC, who wrote and directed the film. They also brought in an all-star cast, including Perkins, renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson, conservative columnist Miranda Devine, media watchdog Brent Bozell, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, Jewish activist David Horowitz, film critic Christian Toto, media personality Will Witt, and conservative political commentator Mercedes Schlapp, who hosted the documentary.

“I want to get the word out — to disseminate it to Christians and to observant Jews, Muslims, Mormons, people of no faith, people who are concerned this has gone too far,” Donohue said.

“I also would like to persuade at least some of the shareholders and other people at Disney to say, ‘Wait a minute! Maybe we have gone too far.’ ‘Can we get back to our roots?’ ‘Can we have a family-friendly institution?’ ‘Why are we trying to do this to kids?’”

“There are aspects of this movie — when the viewers take a look at it … your head’s going to spin at certain points. But it’s something that needs to be said,” Donohue said.

Among the concerning revelations about Disney highlighted by the documentary is how members of its entertainment producing teams are injecting “queerness” anywhere and everywhere they can.

“Our leadership over there has been so welcoming to my not-at-all-secret gay agenda,” Disney child programming producer and writer Latoya Raveneau said in leaked virtual meeting footage that is highlighted in the documentary.

“I don’t have to be afraid to like, ‘Let’s have these two characters kiss … in the background,” she said. “I was just wherever I could — just basically adding queerness.”

“No one would stop me,” she recalled.

And with radical gender ideology being thrusted upon children through media and in classrooms at increasingly younger ages, critics of the harmful crusade say there should be no surprise when there is a rise in cases of gender dysphoria — the clinical term describing the conflict some experience when they feel as if their biological sex doesn’t seem to conform with their sense of identity.

“The reason you see gender dysphoria rates now skyrocketing is in part because kids are impressionable,” Ramaswamy points out in the documentary. “They are going to respond to their adults and their cultural leaders in their schools and so it’s no surprise that we are creating the very problem that supposedly the companies like Disney were aiming to solve.”

“And it’s much worse than that,” adds Donohue in the documentary, “because, as we know in these elementary schools, they’re taking kindergartners and first graders, teaching them that they’re ‘gender fluid,’ encouraging them to be chemically castrated, to have puberty blockers — pre-puberty kids — to alter their lives forever.”

“This is an atrocity against children and Disney has allowed itself to become part of it,” he adds.

During his interview with Perkins on Tuesday, Donohue noted that even Erica Anderson, a transgender psychologist who has worked with hundreds of transgender teens, has acknowledged, “This has gone too far. It’s going to get worse. I don’t want any part of it.”

“I’m hoping, at the very least, Disney will tap the brakes and rethink this whole idea of going down the lane of the woke agenda,” Donohue added.

To get the message out, the Catholic League has made the documentary free to view on public platforms such as YouTube and Rumble. It is also accessible on SalemNOW and Amazon Prime.

Notably, on Tuesday, Catholic League was informed that its video has been marked by YouTube as “age-restricted” and not appropriate for viewers under 18. Types of content that is considered “age-restricted” include content with harmful or dangerous activities, nudity and sexually suggestive content, violent or graphic content, content with vulgar language, and content “that endangers the emotional and physical well-being of minors.”

While Donohue noted that the documentary doesn’t contain any of YouTube’s categories of “age-restricted” content, Perkins suggested that it may be in violation of the Left’s terms and conditions.

“You told the truth and you put the information out. Now that violates the terms of the Left these days — when you tell the truth,” Perkins said.

In response, Donohue said, “I couldn’t agree more. And I want to punctuate that. That’s what this is all about. A man can’t become a woman. A woman can’t become a man. We need to tell the truth and stop with the fiction.”

AUTHOR

Kenneth Chan is Director of Communications at Family Research Council and serves as an editor at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Christian Charity Worker in Malta Prosecuted for Sharing Testimony About Rejecting Homosexuality

/in , , , , , , /by

A Christian charity worker in Malta faces prosecution for sharing his personal testimony about rejecting homosexual activity on the radio.

Matthew Grech, 33, a trustee of the Christian nonprofit Core Issues Trust, will face trial on Feb. 3, 2023, at the Court of Magistrates in Valetta, along with the presenters of a media outlet, PMnews Malta. Prosecutors claim Grech and the presenters violated Chapter 567, a Maltese law banning “conversion practices.”

Grech told The Daily Signal that Maltese authorities are targeting “ANY DISSENTING OPINION about LGBT” issues, threatening free speech in the name of suppressing “conversion therapy.” He insisted that “there is no proof that people are being forced to ‘become straight’ anywhere on the island” of Malta, which became the first European country to ban “conversion therapy” in 2016.

“You advertised conversion practices and this breaking article 3 (a) (iii) of Chapter 567 of Maltese laws,” the police wrote in a summons on June 29, 2022. The police wrote that Grech violated the law on April 6, 2022. The law defines “conversion practices” as “any treatment, practice or sustained effort that aims to change, repress and, or eliminate a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity and, or gender expression.”

Grech did not advertise any form of “conversion therapy” on that date, according to the transcript. Rather, he told his personal story and advocated for a therapist’s freedom to counsel clients as they would direct, without government intervention.

Grech said he was confused about sexuality during his teenage years, and he started a same-sex relationship when he moved to London, keeping that relationship secret from his family. “When I was in London, a woman came up to me and began to share the gospel with me, and she started telling me about Jesus and what He did for us on the cross,” he said. “I went into a church, and I can say that I loved it. I felt accepted. I felt loved.”

“Jesus consumed my life,” he added. “His presence brought a freedom, a freedom that I never had, joy and continuous peace in my life.” He read the Bible and saw clear condemnations of homosexual activity. “This is the basic gospel, that one needs to repent from sin, and homosexuality is not the only sin.”

Then Grech spoke out against the law banning “conversion therapy.” He noted certain forms of therapy to address underlying trauma that may, as a byproduct, deal with some unwanted same-sex attraction or gender dysphoria.

“Many forms of therapy involve that you control one aspect of yourself,” he said. “To control yourself is not a bad thing, to an extent. One of the fruits of the Holy Spirit from a biblical perspective is self-control.”

“Many times, they discover that when someone helps them overcome trauma and pain that was behind their homosexual attractions, or their transgenderism… they find that they no longer look at the same-sex in the same way,” he explained. “Nobody said to them, ‘If you do this, or hear this, or stop doing this, you will become straight…’ These were genuinely in emotional crisis and looked for help.”

Grech laid out the police’s claim against him. According to policeman Neil Farrugia, and confirmed by Inspector Roderick Attard, who wrote the summons, PMnews Malta published on its website and Facebook page an advertisement for the interview regarding “conversion practices.” The news outlet went on to broadcast the interview on April 6 on Facebook Live, where the presenters introduced Grech as secretary general of the Christian conservative political party ABBA and a representative of International Federation for Therapeutic and Counseling Choice (IFTCC), which the police characterized as a group promoting and providing “conversion practices.” (Grech does work with IFTCC, though he disputes the characterization.)

Police also claim Grech advertised “conversion practices” and promoted their efficacy. “They claim that both the programme as well as the ‘advert’ come against provisions of article 3aiii of Chapter 567 in Maltese law,” he told The Daily Signal. Authorities are also charging the presenters for providing a platform for the “advertisement.”

“Evidence clearly shows that Matthew Grech did not violate the statute,” Jeanise Dalli, Grech’s attorney, told The Daily Signal. She also claimed that “this prosecution undermines Matthew’s freedoms under Malta’s constitution and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, particularly his Fundamental Human Right to freedom of expression and his Fundamental Human Right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.” The Christian Legal Centre is also assisting in Grech’s defense.

Grech said Malta’s legislature began working on an amendment for the law on Monday. He said the amendment “will aim to redefine the advertising clause of the law to include the publishing, advertising, displaying, distributing, referral and circulation of any material promoting the practice. This is very concerning for all Christians in Malta, as it is clear that what they are after is ANY DISSENTING OPINION about LGBT.”

Even if the legislature expands the law, this will not affect Grech’s case, Dalli said, since Maltese criminal law cannot be applied retroactively.

Grech also noted that the government’s move to amend the law comes shortly after Grech’s pastor reported to the police a satirist who posted on Facebook that Grech’s church, River of Love, should be carpet-bombed. The satirist also compared the church to the Islamic State (ISIS).

Maltese police declined to comment on this story for The Daily Signal. The attorney general’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

This article was originally published by The Daily Signal.

AUTHOR

Tyler O’Neil

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Team Biden Joins the School Library Wars, Launching Federal Investigation

/in , , , , , , , , , , /by

UPDATE:

“Whoever succeeds in telling the stories to the children gets to control the future.” That was Kirk Cameron’s answer to people wondering why he’s joined the debate over America’s libraries. As parents everywhere fight to keep graphic content out of their children’s hands, Texas officials are warning the battle is taking an ominous turn. It’s not just the forces of the Left that communities will have to contend with. It’s the federal government, whose new investigation into a local school district could upend every grassroots effort to protect kids.

For leaders in Texas’s Granbury School District, the bomb dropped shortly before Christmas. Officials in the Civil Rights Division of Biden’s Department of Education (DOE) said they’d received a formal complaint from the ACLU that the small community outside Fort Worth was somehow violating the government’s definition of “sex” by pulling books from school library shelves.

The ACLU’s beef dates back to November 2021 when Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) urged the state’s association of school boards to “ensure no child is exposed to pornography or other inappropriate content in a Texas public school.” His letter, which keyed off parents’ growing outrage about the material on school shelves, insisted on greater transparency about the content students can access. Abbott said his office had been contacted by a number of moms and dads who were “rightfully angry” about the “pornographic and obscene” content.

Granbury officials took the governor’s directive to heart, ordering a review of the district’s book titles. But what ultimately landed the district in hot water was a candid conversation Superintendent Jeremy Glenn had with the schools’ librarians — which was eventually leaked to the press. He talked about the conservative make-up of the community and insisted that they would act accordingly. “We do have a very conservative board,” Glenn said in a reference to the two new school board members. “They are elected, and recently more conservative. And so that’s what our community is. That’s what our job is.”

At the end of the day, Glenn insisted, “I don’t want a kid picking up a book, whether it’s about homosexuality or heterosexuality, and reading about how to hook up sexually in our libraries. … And I’m going to take it a step further with you,” the superintendent went on. “There are two genders. There’s male, and there’s female. And I acknowledge that there are men that think they’re women. And there are women that think they’re men. And again, I don’t have any issues with what people want to believe, but there’s no place for it in our libraries. … I’m cutting to the chase on a lot of this,” Glenn insisted. “It’s the transgender, LGBTQ, and the sex — sexuality — in books. That’s what the governor has said that he will prosecute people for, and that’s what we’re pulling out.”

Over the next two weeks, Granbury embarked on what the Texas Tribune called “one of the largest book removals in the country, pulling about 130 titles from library shelves for review.” Two months later, the volunteer review committee inexplicably voted to return all but three books that they’d permanently banned.

By then, the audio of Glenn’s meeting had made its way to the media, and liberal news outlets like the Texas Tribune, ProPublica, and NBC News pounced, accusing Glenn of anti-LGBT bias. That’s when the local chapter of the ACLU got involved, demanding an apology and calling for every book to be reinstated.

Glenn didn’t oblige, conveying through district spokesman Jeff Meador that all the titles they’d pulled from shelves are “sexually explicit and not age-appropriate.” That said, the libraries “continue to house a socially and culturally diverse collection of books for students to read, including,” he pointed out, “books that analyze and explore LGBTQ+ issues.”

Naturally, that didn’t satisfy the ACLU, whose lawyers decided to involve the federal government in a local dispute that could have a chilling effect nationwide. “If the government finds in the ACLU’s favor,” The Washington Post cautioned, “the determination could have implications for schools nationwide, experts said, forcing libraries to stock more books about LGBTQ individuals and requiring administrators — amid a rising tide of book challenges and bans — to develop procedures ensuring student access to books that some Americans, especially right-leaning parents, deem unacceptable.”

Of course, the heart of the ACLU’s allegation — that Granbury (and Glenn, especially) is violating the Left’s new definition of “sex” — is a stretch by almost every legal standard. The Biden administration may have twisted the word “sex” to mean “gender identity” and “sexual orientation,” but that interpretation has never been passed into federal Title IX law.

And yet, the ACLU’s Chloe Kempf maintains (unconvincingly) that the “book removals and also the comments create this pervasively hostile environment.” “Both send a message to the entire community that LGBTQ identities are inherently obscene, worthy of stigmatization — and the book removals uniquely deprive LGBTQ students of the opportunity to read books that reflect their own experiences.”

Conservatives pushed back, insisting that this isn’t about LGBT hostility but age-appropriate content. Meg Kilgannon, senior fellow for Education Studies at Family Research Council, insisted that this whole controversy amounts to a leftist intimidation campaign. “The ACLU is bullying school districts who have responded to parental concerns about pornographic library books offered to children. Access to pornography at school is not a civil right.” Even if the law had been changed to include “sexual orientation and gender identity” in Title IX, “children still do not have a right to sexually explicit or violent content in public school library books. And school systems are under no obligation to support a publishing industry who can’t sell these books to parents and so sells them to librarians instead.”

Frankly, Kilgannon argued, “This is federal overreach into the education system, which is supposed to be a state issue.” Not to mention that “Biden is weaponizing another government agency: the DOE.”

If the president does intervene, dictating how school libraries handle certain book titles, the issue will almost certainly end up in court. “This isn’t the sort of civil rights issue that requires federal intervention,” Will Flanders of the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty argued. “It’s a question about books in schools, not about individual rights being violated.”

Either way, it does show one thing: the potency of the parents’ movement. Cameron, who’s in his own fight to host story hours in the same libraries that allow drag queens, is witnessing the momentum firsthand. As many as 1,000 people turned out in Placentia, Calif. to hear the “Growing Pains” actor read his new book, “As You Grow.”

“I know why parents and grandparents are coming out of the woodwork,” Cameron told The Federalist. “They understand there is a war on children — and nobody’s going to stop it but us.” So if there’s one thing Americans can do, he told the crowd, it’s this: “Don’t just talk about what’s going on. Change what’s going on.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED VIDEO: Frederik Jansen on the link between LGBTQ+ and the Frankfurt School – The Laughland Report

RELATED TWEET:

EDITORS NOTE: This The Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Religious Freedom for Christian Colleges: A Victory in Federal Court

/in , , , , , , /by

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit by the LGBTQ-sponsored “Religious Exemption Accountability Project” (REAP) asserting that “young and vulnerable” LGBTQ+ persons are “at the mercy of religiously affiliated, taxpayer-funded social service and educational institutions that often turn them away or force them into the closet.”

The students who litigated against the U.S. Department of Education and the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU) wanted to overturn “a provision of Title IX that allows religious colleges to seek exemptions” from a law barring “sex-based discrimination.” Title IX is part of a 1972 measure and states, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”

However, there is a federal statute stating that Title IX “does not apply to an educational institution that is controlled by a religious organization to the extent that application of Title IX would be inconsistent with the religious tenets of the organization.” In other words, if a school believes that sexual intimacy is reserved for one man and one woman in the covenantal bond of marriage, and thereby adhering to 3,500 years of Judeo-Christian teaching, it can receive federal resources without penalty.

So, in October 2021, “the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon allowed three Christian post-secondary schools represented by Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys — Corban University, William Jessup University, and Phoenix Seminary — to intervene in the lawsuit and defend the relevant provisions of Title IX, the federal law under attack.”

The judge who issued the ruling, U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken, was appointed to the federal court by Bill Clinton. “Exempting religiously controlled educational institutions from Title IX,” she wrote in her decision, “is substantially related to the government’s objective of accommodating religious exercise.”

The judge also “rejected (REAP’s) argument that the exemption ran afoul of the First Amendment’s prohibition against the establishment of religion by Congress, saying they failed to show how the federal government, in contrast to the schools, advanced religion.”

Throughout the country — in workplaces, businesses, and other venues — LGBTQ-identifying persons can be subject to verbal cruelty and personal harassment. These are affronts to the God-given dignity enjoyed by every image-bearer of our Creator. Followers of Jesus should not only oppose them but defend those attacked when able.

With that said, I cannot help but wonder why the students who filed the lawsuit attend Christian colleges and universities whose faith commitments state clearly what they believe about human sexuality. Did they apply to and enter these schools under false pretenses — affirming the institutions’ doctrinal standards while intending to fight them once enrolled? Or upon attending, did they decide they were LGBTQ and choose to remain in order to overturn the schools’ commitments to biblical teaching?

Perhaps they felt they have a strong precedent for such initiatives as the REAP lawsuit. This past fall, the Christian Reformed Church, even though affirming the Bible’s teaching about men, women, and sex, decided to let the faculty at its flagship college, Calvin University, “dissent from a clause in (the CRC) confession of faith that regards sex outside of heterosexual marriage as sinful, enabling them to continue to work at the Christian school while also respecting their convictions.”

In other words, a college founded to uphold scriptural standards allows professors who disdain some of those standards to teach and, thereby, influence the young people who attend the institution. This is like saying that although my car uses diesel fuel I’m going to fill it up with low-octane gas. Hey, I’m filling it up, right? Why judge me for my tolerance of and even compassionate sympathy for diverse fuel types?

Similarly, some churches have abandoned the Bible’s clear teaching about human sexuality after intense and unrelenting pressure from LGBT-identifying activists and their allies. Even though the worldwide Methodist communion uniformly opposes any sexual intimacy outside of traditional marriage, American Methodist advocates of complete sexual autonomy have insisted on violating their church’s stated beliefs and are now dividing the United Methodist Church.

With precedents like these, it is understandable that the insistent and relentless demands of LGBTQ activists and their supporters would try to erode those institutions retaining fidelity to “the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ” (Revelation 1:2).

Anyone who agrees with a school’s doctrinal statement or at least agrees to abide by its standards is welcome at a Christian college or university, depending on the individual institution’s rules. Yet no one is compelled to remain at a school whose standards are repellent to him or her. To do so speaks of a lack of moral courage and personal dishonesty as well, perhaps, of a certain desperation for affirmation that the student himself or herself does not possess within.

My heart goes out to those wrestling with issues of sexual identity. But this court case hasn’t been about any student’s view of his or her sexuality. It’s about standing for the truth of the Word of God and allowing those who follow it to do so without penalty. Continuing to stand without compromise is one of the great and ongoing challenges for the believing church today. May we be found faithful.

AUTHOR

Rob Schwarzwalder

Rob Schwarzwalder is Senior Lecturer in Regent University’s Honors College.

RELATED VIDEO: Frederik Jansen on the link between LGBTQ+ and the Frankfurt School – The Laughland Report

RELATED ARTICLE: ‘Insidious’: Parents, Experts, and Lawmakers Speak Out on the Dangers of TikTok

EDITORS NOTE: This The Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.