While obviously we disagree with Al on some major points, we agree with him on the outrage that is the annual Folsom Street Fair — and the even greater outrage that this perverse spectacle was welcomed by San Francisco leaders including Mayor Gavin Newsom. (House Speaker Nancy Pelosi so far has refused to criticize the event, which occurred in her district, and which featured rampant full nudity and even orgies in the streets as San Francisco police stood by and did nothing.)

Al writes via the AFTAH website: 

I cannot believe the city of San Francisco allows that Folsom Street public lewdness to take place. While I am a Christian man who also identifies as “gay,” I cannot agree with you more about that kind of behavior being allowed anywhere in this country. Certainly, no gay Christian man who loves the Lord would approve of that crap going on. While I don’t agree with you on some things, I heartily agree with your outrage on this most disgusting and shocking event. Get these numbskulls to keep their damned clothes on or else get arrested for indecent exposure. Damned fool idiots!

More evidence that homosexuality is a public health hazard

SAN FRANCISCO — A new variety of staph bacteria, highly resistant to antibiotics and possibly transmitted by sexual contact, is spreading among gay men in San Francisco, Boston, New York and Los Angeles, researchers reported Monday. …

 

The risk of contracting this difficult-to-treat bug is 13 times greater for gay men than for the rest of the city’s population, researchers found….

 

What is unusual in this case is the high percentage of infections – up to 40 percent – occurring in the buttocks and genitalia. — San Francisco Chronicle story on new staph bacteria spreading among homosexual men

What a mystery … How could it be that so many infections are occurring in the “buttocks and genitalia” of San Francisco men (who have sex with other men)? …

Is this not an eerie reminder of the initial stories about AIDS — then called GRID (Gay-Related Immunodeficiency Disease) — 25 years ago? It is unfathomable that after that plague, disease specialists and the media are now surprised at the correlation of new infections with homosexual behavior.

Wake up, medical and political establishment: homosexual behavior is unhealthy — no matter how many secular sermons you preach against “homophobia.”  Due to liberal political correctness, which insists on treating aberrant — even deadly — behaviors and lifestyles as a “civil right,” we as a society don’t seem to have learned much from the AIDS pandemic.  This latest news begs some serious questions:

• Why aren’t all schoolchildren being taught that there are special health risks associated with homosexual behavior and that they should “just say no” to homosexuality? (Instead, schools are willy-nilly working to spread the PC idea among youth that certain people are naturally “gay,” and that this is a harmless identity);
• Why won’t the news media make the common-sense connection between these frequent stories about (male) homosexual behavior and disease — to the idea that perhaps it’s probably not smart for society and pop culture to celebrate homosexuality and bisexuality?;
• Why isn’t there a concerted government effort — akin to the current anti-smoking campaigns — to reign in homosexual promiscuity — beginning with closing down all sex businesses (bathhouses) that facilitate homosexual perversion?  (Of course, we favor closing down straight prostitution businesses as well.)  We know that bisexual behavior (men on the “down low”) help spread dangerous diseases to the general population: how many deaths and illnesses have to result from “second-hand sodomy” before authorities take corrective action? (Curiously, even President Bush’s White House spokeswoman, Dana Perino, recently abruptly cut off a question by reporter Les Kinsolving critical of homosexual bathhouses);
• If any other behavior were as closely linked to death and disease as male homosexuality, would we be so careful not to criticize it — or would we offer healthy alternatives to it like abstinence and the ex-“gay” movement?

Here is just one Reader Comment to the Chronicle piece that makes a lot of sense:

luvgabe wrote:
We as a species just don’t seem to get it: There are consequences to behavior! We no longer take AIDS seriously anymore because of drug treatment, so we go back to doing the same behavior, which brings on a new epidemic that now threatens to jump the boundary to become a hetero scourge as well.

I have already heard a few horror stories from people who knew someone who has contracted MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) at a hospital, or who has tried to take extraordinary measures to get explicit assurances from doctors that their facilities are MRSA-free (I don’t know if this is possible). A friend writes: 

I have an older lady friend who has been battling MRSA since October when she had a knee replaced.  It’s just horrible — even though she got prompt treatment, the infection will ebb, but then surge again.  The doctors thought she was on her way back to health, but she’s back at the infectious disease specialist this month with increased sed rate and a hot knee. Very scary!

Be careful to ask questions about MRSA before you go in for an operation!  We’ll be watching this story carefully. Now watch as “gay” activists blast me and AFTAH for pointing out the obvious link between homosexual behaviors and the spread of diseases, new and old. — Peter LaBarbera

__________________________

As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle‘s medical writer, Sabin Russell; to read more Reader Comments to the Chronical story (some very interesting), go HERE (emphasis added): 

S.F. Gay Community an Epicenter for New Strain of Virulent Staph 

SAN FRANCISCO (Jan. 15) — A new variety of staph bacteria, highly resistant to antibiotics and possibly transmitted by sexual contact, is spreading among gay men in San Francisco, Boston, New York and Los Angeles, researchers reported Monday.

The study released online by the journal Annals of Internal Medicine found the highest concentrations of infection by the drug-resistant bug in and around San Francisco’s Castro district and among patients who visit health clinics that treat HIV infections in gay men in San Francisco and Boston.

The culprit is a form of MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, a bug that was once confined to hospitalized patients but, since the late 1990s, has been circulating outside medical settings, afflicting anyone from injection-drug users to elementary school students. A strain called USA300 has been a leading cause of MRSA infection in this decade, and an exceptionally drug-resistant variant of it is now on the loose, researchers say.

The study estimated that 1 in 588 residents living within the Castro neighborhood 94114 ZIP code area [San Francisco’s famed “gay” center] is infected with that variant, which is resistant to six types of commonly used antibiotics. The risk of contracting this difficult-to-treat bug is 13 times greater for gay men than for the rest of the city’s population, researchers found.

“We probably had it here first, and now it is spreading elsewhere,” said Binh An Diep, a researcher at San Francisco General Hospital and lead author of the report. “This is a national problem, and San Francisco is at the epicenter.”

The germ typically causes boils and other skin and soft-tissue infections and, despite its resistance to some drugs, is still treatable by surgical drainage and several classes of antibiotics. What is unusual in this case is the high percentage of infections – up to 40 percent – occurring in the buttocks and genitalia.

Although researchers have stopped short of declaring this form of staph a sexually transmitted disease, the infections are found where skin-to-skin contact occurs during sexual activity.

 From the book, The Gay Gospel: How Pro-Gay Advocates Misread the Bible, by Joe Dallas (Harvest House Publishers, 2007). To order The Gay Gospel ($14) or other Biblically-oriented resources by Joe revolving around sexual purity, go to his website at www.joedallas.com.

Note that Joe’s life as a former homosexual gives the lie to the second tactical approach of the aggressive “gay Christian” movement, which he discusses below:

As the gay Christian movement continued finding allies in churches and secular circles, it also continued to follow the trends of the larger gay-rights movement. And the gay-rights movement’s most noticeable trend, from the mid-1980s into the 1990s, was aggression.

 

The AIDS epidemic, in full bloom by the mid ’80s, fueled a strident form of gay activism. Groups such as the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP), Queer Nation, and the Lesbian Avengers caught the public’s eye as they staged boisterous demonstrations and invaded churches and corporations they considered to be “enemies.”

 

The gay Christian movement did not take long to develop its own style of aggression. Fundamental to its identity were two beliefs: Homosexuality is not unbiblical; and homosexuals can’t change, even if they want to. … 

  

   — The Gay Gospel, Joe Dallas p. 88; To order The Gay Gospel ($14), go to www.joedallas.com. Dallas is founder of Genesis Counseling, which seeks to “Reclaim Godly Sexuality through the Saving Work of Jesus Christ, The Sanctifying Work of the Holy Spirit and the Body Ministry of the Christian Church.” See their “Frequently Asked Questions About Sexual Addiction and Recovery from a Biblical Perspective.”  

 C-SPAN helped homosexual Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire Vicky Gene Robinson — he was named such because his parents wanted a girl — plead his heretical case to America by airing his speech twice on Christmas Eve night. In the speech, Robinson discussed his plan to enter into a “civil union” with his homosexual lover, saying he always wanted to be a “June bride.” The bishop claimed (against all evidence in Scripture) that the Holy Spirit is involved in the crusade for more open homosexuals like him in the clergy. Write C-SPAN CEO Brian Lamb (viewer@c-span.org) or call him (202-737-3220) to protest this holiday programming choice that was deeply offensive to Bible-believing Christians. Urge C-SPAN to balance Robinson’s lecture by covering a presentation by evangelical Dr. Michael Brown in Charlotte, North Carolina next month titled, “Can you be gay and Christian?”  Photo by C-SPAN.

By Peter LaBarbera

TAKE ACTION: Write (viewer@c-span.org) or call C-SPAN (202-737-3220) CEO Brian Lamb today or tomorrow to object to their airing of a speech by a controversial homosexual-clergy activist and Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire, Vicky Gene Robinson, twice on Christmas Eve.  Politely urge C-SPAN to compensate for this offensive, pro-homosexual coverage by sending their cameras to cover evangelical apologist Dr. Michael Brown and his upcoming conference, “Can you be gay and Christian?” to be held Feb. 11-15 in Charlotte, N.C. 

________________________

I’m wondering why C-SPAN chose to re-air a long speech by homosexual activist and Episcopal Bishop Vicky Gene Robinson on Christmas Eve, one of the most sacred days on the Christian calendar. In his speech Nov. 27 at Nova Southeastern University in Ft. Lauderdale, “How Morality Plays a Role in Legal Rights, Especially for the Gay Community,” which had already been aired on Dec. 8, Robinson claimed that the Holy Spirit was involved in the crusade for homosexual “inclusion” in the clergy.

First things first: did you know that the infamously “gay” bishop’s first name is “Vicky” (as you can see above, C-SPAN only put “Gene Robinson” on the screen). Apparently his parents really wanted a girl and — when they doubted their sickly newborn would even live — they named him accordingly: Vicky Imogene (middle name after the mother) Robinson. In 2003, the Concord Monitor reported matter-of-factly (as only the agnostic media can) on the birth of the baby who would become Episcopal “Rev. V. Gene Robinson” as follows:

Robinson was born in Lexington, Ky., in 1947, in a delivery that went so wrong the doctor told his father he needed a name for the baby’s birth and death certificates. Charles and Imogene Robinson had counted on a girl, so Robinson’s father named the baby Vicky Imogene Robinson.

Now, common sense dictates that if you do not want your boy to struggle with masculinity or gender issues, perhaps it is not a good idea to name him “Vicky,” or Susan, or Linda. In this BBC video interview, Robinson calls his father’s decision to give him a girl’s name “a terrible thing to do to a boy child.” 

Indeed, but it gets worse.

 Homosexual “conservative” pundit Andrew Sullivan wrote sympathetically aboug “gay” male couples’ ‘understanding of the need for extramarital [sexual] outlets” and suggested such “honesty” and “flexibility” could “undoubtedly help strengthen and inform many heterosexual bonds.”

____________________________

Emphasis in bold is added to all quotations below: 

‘Extramarital Outlets’ and Homosexual ‘Monogamy’

“The mutual nurturing and sexual expressiveness of many lesbian relationships, the solidity and space of many adult gay male relationships, are qualities sometimes lacking in more rote, heterosexual couplings.”
–Andrew Sullivan, Virtually Normal: An Argument about Homosexuality, p. 202, (1995)

“Some of this is unavailable to the male-female union: there is more likely to be greater understanding of the need for extramarital outlets between two men than between a man and a woman; and again, the lack of children gives gay couples greater freedom. Their failures entail fewer consequences for others. But something of the gay’s relationship’s necessary honesty, its flexibility, and its equality could undoubtedly help strengthen and inform many heterosexual bonds.”
–Andrew Sullivan, Virtually Normal, pp. 202-03.

Radically Alter an ‘Archaic Institution’

“A middle ground might be to fight for same-sex marriage and its benefits and then, once granted, redefine the institution of marriage completely, to demand the right to marry not as a way of adhering to society’s moral codes but rather to debunk a myth and radically alter an archaic institution.”
–Michelangelo Signorile, “Bridal Wave,” OUT magazine, December/January 1994, p. 161.

Ending Marriage’s ‘Sexist Trappings’

“[E]nlarging the [marital] concept to embrace same-sex couples would necessarily transform it into something new….Extending the right to marry to gay people — that is, abolishing the traditional gender requirements of marriage — can be one of the means, perhaps the principal one, through which the institution divests itself of the sexist trappings of the past.”
–the late homosexual activist Tom Stoddard, quoted in Roberta Achtenberg, et al, “Approaching 2000: Meeting the Challenges to San Francisco’s Families,” The Final Report of the Mayor’s Task Force on Family Policy, City and County of San Francisco, June 13, 1990, p.1.

Transform the Definition of Family 

“[Legalizing “same-sex marriage”] is also a chance to wholly transform the definition of family in American culture. It is the final tool with which to dismantle all sodomy statutes, get education about homosexuality and AIDS into public schools, and, in short, usher in a sea change in how society views and treats us.”
–Michelangelo Signorile, “I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do,” OUT magazine, May 1996, p. 30.

‘Being Queer Means Transforming the Very Fabric of Society’ 

“Being queer is more than setting up house, sleeping with a person of the same gender, and seeking state approval for doing so. … Being queer means pushing the parameters of sex, sexuality, and family, and in the process, transforming the very fabric of society. … As a lesbian, I am fundamentally different from non-lesbian women. …In arguing for the right to legal marriage, lesbians and gay men would be forced to claim that we are just like heterosexual couples, have the same goals and purposes, and vow to structure our lives similarly. … We must keep our eyes on the goals of providing true alternatives to marriage and of radically reordering society’s view of reality.”
–Paula Ettelbrick, “Since When Is Marriage a Path to Liberation?” in William Rubenstein, ed., Lesbians, Gay Men and the Law (New York: The New Press, 1993), pp. 401-405.

New Gay Model: Monogamy Not Essential for Marriage

“Gay life, like black culture, might even provide models and materials for rethinking family life and improving family law. I will now chart some ways in which this might be so — in particular drawing on the distinctive experience and ideals of gay male couples.

“Take sex. Traditionally, a commitment to monogamy — to the extent that it was not simply an adjunct of property law, a vehicle for guaranteeing property rights and succession — was the chief mode of sacrifice imposed upon or adopted by married couples as a means of showing their sacred valuing of their relation. But gay men have realized that while couples may choose to restrict sexual activity in order to show their love for each other, it is not necessary for this purpose; there are many other ways to manifest and ritualize commitment. And so monogamy (it appears) is not an essential component of love and marriage. The authors of “The Male Couple” found that:

[T]he majority of [gay male] couples, and all of the couples together for longer than five years, were not continuously sexually exclusive with each other. Although many had long periods of sexual exclusivity, it was not the ongoing expectation for most. We found that gay men expect mutual emotional dependability with their partners [but also believe] that relationship fidelity transcends concerns about sexuality and exclusivity.

Both because marital sacrifices must be voluntary to be meaningful and because sexual exclusivity is not essential to marital commitment, the law should not impose monogamy on married couples. And indeed, half the states have decriminalized adultery.
–Homosexual academic Richard D. Mohr, The Case for Gay Marriage, 9 NOTRE DAME J.L. ETHICS & PUB. POLICY 215, 233 (1995)

Churches: Homophobic, Antiquated Backwaters

“We can undermine the moral authority of homophobic churches by portraying them as antiquated backwaters, badly out of step with the times and with the latest findings in psychology. Against the mighty pull of institutional religion, one must set up the mightier draw of science and public opinion…. Such an unholy alliance has worked well against churches before, on such topics as divorce and abortion.”
–Marshall K. Kirk and Erastes Pill, “The Overhauling of Straight America,” homosexual magazine The Guide, November 1987.

Make Anti-Gays Look Nasty

“We intend to make the anti-gays look so nasty that average Americans will want to disassociate themselves from such types.”
–Marshall K. Kirk and Erastes Pill, “The Overhauling of Straight America,” The Guide (homosexual) magazine, November 1987.

 University of Pennsylvania History Professor Alan Kors defends freedom against the camps Left.

Click this link: http://www.isi.org/lectures/flvplayer/lectureplayer.aspx?file=v000114_cicero_050807.flv, or go to this Intercollegiate Studies Institute web page and chose the video (or audio MP3), “Have Universities Become the Enemy of a Free Society?” The debate is between Alan C. Kors, Professor of History, University of Pennsylvania, and William Galston, Professor, School of Public Affairs, University of Maryland. It occurred at the University of Delaware, Trabant Theater, on May 8, 2007.

Kors is brilliant. Our condolences to Professor Galston. 

I was greatly encouraged by the many letters AFTAH received responding to 14-year-old “Joe,” who wrote via our website explaining that he is a gay atheist who hates Americans For Truth. I will be passing on all the notes to Joe, and publishing a few, including this from suburban Chicago writer Laurie Higgins (emphasis added)–Peter L.:
_________________________________________________________________________
 
Dear Joe,
 
What you have said, what you feel, and what you think break my heart. All reveal the deception that our culture has taught our children. Mr. LaBarbera doesn’t hate you or homosexuals. And even though I firmly believe that homosexual conduct is not moral, I do not hate you either.
 
I no more hate you than I hate those who engage in other behaviors that I consider immoral, and those would include me, my husband, and my children. Every single human who has ever lived, save one, engages in immoral behavior. Our task is figuring out what constitutes moral and immoral behavior. You have appropriated one philosophical perspective on what determines right and wrong: you believe that if a behavior doesn’t directly harm another person physically, then it’s moral. But some of the greatest thinkers who have ever lived define morality differently. Defining morality as you have would permit adult consensual incest, lying, selfishness, polyamory, and apotemnophilia.
 
Neither Mr. LaBarbera nor I believe that homosexuals choose the feelings they have anymore than those who are attracted to adolescents or children or their siblings choose their powerful attractions, or those married men who are attracted to other women choose those attractions, or those who are powerfully drawn toward gambling or alcohol or drugs choose those attractions. We do believe, however, that those who experience same-sex attraction choose how they will respond to their desires, just as I choose how to respond to my selfish, or greedy, or angry, or lustful desires. Some in society tell you that acting on same-sex impulses is legitimate and good. They have lied to you, and it is a cruel lie.
 
You ask why someone would care about the sexual practices of others. I care that others are teaching children lies. I care that others are teaching kids that homosexual conduct is morally equivalent to heterosexual conduct when it’s not. I care because that lie carries devastating emotional, psychological, physical, and spiritual consequences. I care because I care about truth and its impact on the lives of individuals and on society.
 
Joe, homosexuals do have the full complement of civil rights.  They even have marital rights. Every homosexual can get married; they simply can’t redefine marriage. They can’t eliminate the criterion of complementarity, just as those who “love” children cannot eliminate the minimum age criterion, and those who love relatives cannot eliminate the consanguinity requirement, and those who love multiple partners cannot eliminate the binary requirement. The fact that homosexuals cannot redefine the institution does not mean the institution is unavailable to them.
 
As to your comment that homosexuals can think logically: You’re absolutely right, Joe; you were created in the image and likeness of God, and, therefore, you possess the gift of reason. It is not just religious traditions that inform us that homosexual conduct is wrong. Natural law tells us that. You are heterosexual, Joe. All humans are. Species cannot procreate homosexually. Our bodies are not designed for homosexual sex. They are exquisitely designed for heterosex. Desires do not define identity. And the male sex drive is so powerful, it can be misdirected to a whole host of inappropriate objects and activities. Don’t allow the unbidden presence of desires, impulses, or attractions define who you are. None of us should.
 
Please, do not dismiss arguments that emerge from religious tradition. Speaking as one who deeply values logic, evidence, and intellectual argument, I can attest that Christianity holds up intellectually. And remember, atheism too is based on faith. You are no more able to prove the non-existence of God than I am able to prove unequivocally God’s existence. But search out some “apologetics.” I would recommend the website of Ravi Zacharias. And read about the conversions of atheists like Mortimer Adler who was a famous University of Chicago philosopher, or British journalist Malcolm Muggeridge, or more recently the physicist Anthony Flew. And it’s not just the Christian Bible that teaches that homosexuality is wrong; the Old Testament does also, as does the Koran.
 
By the way, there are no scientific studies that prove that homosexuality is genetic. In fact, most scientists, even those who identify as gay and whose studies are most often cited, believe that at most, biology may play a part in desire, but that environmental influences are significant. In addition, the presence of biological influences tells us precisely nothing about morality.
 
Joe, there is freedom, truth, beauty, joy, and peace available to you. Seek them relentlessly, and know this, except for a very few fringe wackos, those who hold traditional beliefs do not hate you. On the contrary, they grieve for the lies you’ve been taught and desire nothing but that which is truly good for you.
 
If you would like to talk more, and your parents are agreeable to us talking, I would love nothing more. You can contact me through AFTAH. 
 
Laurie

NOTE: we have already received many responses to this item that was e-mailed out by AFTAH on New Year’s Eve. We will be posting some of these responses: 

Please read the letter below, which we received Saturday from a 14-year-old atheist boy who hates Americans For Truth.  Nothing makes my heart grieve more than a confused young person rejecting God and embracing an unnatural sexual identity (“gayness”) built around ungodly behavior that up until a few decades ago was viewed as so immoral that it wasn’t even discussed in public.  I don’t know Joe, but I can safely say that his tragic life choice was made easier by the organized homosexual movement.  This is the saddest end result of “gay pride” — corrupting the hearts and minds of young people and helping to put them in grave physical, emotional and spiritual danger:

________________________

The following message was sent from the Americans for Truth Website:
From: Joe [name withheld]  
Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2007 10:52 AM
To: americansfortruth@comcast.net
Subject: [AFT Web Site] Homosexuality.
________________________

To put it bluntly, I probably hate you more than anything else in the world. Like many others, I believe you have the moral equivalent of a modern-day KKK: hating people for being different and having opposing beliefs. I am a liberal, gay, atheistic 14 year old boy, and I believe I have more morals than you. You are a disgrace to humanity. I\’m sorry that I am being so childish in my \”argument\” which is turning out like hate mail, but I just cannot put in words how much I disagree with you. Homosexuals should have rights because they are humans, capable of thinking logically and making decisions, just like you and me. And why does what other people do sexually concern you at all? I want you to tell me, from a non-religious standpoint, exactly how homosexuals are hurting you? Because if they are not negatively affecting you in any way (which is what a suspect) then you should have no problem with them. Most of America knows the truth about homosexuality, which is that it is a preference, not a choice, just like a favorite food to put it in simple terms. You like it, because it pleases you, not because you choose to like a certain food. I\’m sorry that this message has stretched so long, and I would like a reply and a rebuttal to my claims. USING LOGIC, not religion. -Joe [————-]
________________________

I have yet to respond to young Joe, but let us all pray for him.  If you would like to send a message to Joe, send it to AFTAH at americansfortruth@comcast.net, and I will pass it on to him.  But I won’t be relaying any notes from our homosexual activist detractors, for it looks like Joe is getting enough bad advice already from the “gay” side. 

I hope and pray that the God whom Joe rejects will intervene in his life to take him off this course that can only lead to destruction: “There is a way that seems right to a man [or in this case, a boy], but in the end it leads to death.” (Proverbs 16:25)  Yes, there is a “culture war,” and a spiritual one, and lives hang in the balance.

Sincerely,

Peter LaBarbera

www.americansfortruth.org

Thank you to all who have stood with Americans For Truth in 2007.  Your generosity keeps us in the battle for Truth!