Heather Barwick.

The following open letter by Heather Barwick, a happily married mother of four, was originally posted on The Federalist website March 17, 2015:

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Dear Gay Community: Your Kids Are Hurting

I loved my mom’s partner, but another mom could never have replaced the father I lost.

Gay community, I am your daughter. My mom raised me with her same-sex partner back in the ’80s and ’90s. She and my dad were married for a little while. She knew she was gay before they got married, but things were different back then. That’s how I got here. It was complicated as you can imagine. She left him when I was two or three because she wanted a chance to be happy with someone she really loved: a woman.

My dad wasn’t a great guy, and after she left him he didn’t bother coming around anymore.

Do you remember that book, “Heather Has Two Mommies”? That was my life. My mom, her partner, and I lived in a cozy little house in the ‘burbs of a very liberal and open-minded area. Her partner treated me as if I was her own daughter. Along with my mom’s partner, I also inherited her tight-knit community of gay and lesbian friends. Or maybe they inherited me?

Either way, I still feel like gay people are my people. I’ve learned so much from you. You taught me how to be brave, especially when it is hard. You taught me empathy. You taught me how to listen. And how to dance. You taught me not be afraid of things that are different. And you taught me how to stand up for myself, even if that means I stand alone.

I’m writing to you because I’m letting myself out of the closet: I don’t support gay marriage. But it might not be for the reasons that you think.

Children Need a Mother and Father

It’s not because you’re gay. I love you, so much. It’s because of the nature of the same-sex relationship itself.

Growing up, and even into my 20s, I supported and advocated for gay marriage. It’s only with some time and distance from my childhood that I’m able to reflect on my experiences and recognize the long-term consequences that same-sex parenting had on me. And it’s only now, as I watch my children loving and being loved by their father each day, that I can see the beauty and wisdom in traditional marriage and parenting.

Same-sex marriage and parenting withholds either a mother or father from a child while telling him or her that it doesn’t matter. That it’s all the same. But it’s not. A lot of us, a lot of your kids, are hurting. My father’s absence created a huge hole in me, and I ached every day for a dad. I loved my mom’s partner, but another mom could never have replaced the father I lost.

I grew up surrounded by women who said they didn’t need or want a man. Yet, as a little girl, I so desperately wanted a daddy. It is a strange and confusing thing to walk around with this deep-down unquenchable ache for a father, for a man, in a community that says that men are unnecessary. There were times I felt so angry with my dad for not being there for me, and then times I felt angry with myself for even wanting a father to begin with. There are parts of me that still grieve over that loss today.

Mat Staver of Liberty Counsel.

Liberty Counsel issued the following press release:

Alabama Supreme Court Ruling on Marriage Stands Firm

Montgomery, AL – A week after the Alabama Court issued its ruling informing all Probate Judges that they must comply and cease issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, the federal judge who purported to overturn Alabama’s marriage laws in January has turned down the opportunity to challenge the statewide ruling of the Alabama Supreme Court. Federal Judge Callie Granade’s new order recognizes that her prior ruling only required Alabama Probate Judge Don Davis to issue marriage licenses to four same-sex couples who were plaintiffs in the federal case. The Alabama Supreme Court’s statewide ruling now prohibits all Alabama probate judges, including Judge Davis, from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Judge Davis had requested a stay of Judge Granade’s prior ruling because of the statewide Alabama Supreme Court order. The plaintiffs in the federal case, although they had already received the licenses they sought, urged Judge Granade to order Judge Davis to disregard the Alabama Supreme Court and issue marriage licenses to all same-sex couples who may ask. Judge Granade denied the stay requested by Judge Davis, but also declined to order him to disregard the Alabama Supreme Court.

“We are pleased that the Alabama Supreme Court’s order is being respected and followed throughout the State of Alabama,” said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel, which filed the suit leading to the statewide ruling. “The federal court has no authority to force the Alabama Probate Judges to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, and that lack of authority has been admitted by the federal court. The law in Alabama is clear. Marriage is only between one man and one woman. Other states should follow the lead of Alabama,” Staver concluded.

Liberty Counsel represents Alabama Policy Institute (“API”) and Alabama Citizens Action Program (“ALCAP”) in the Alabama Supreme Court case.

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Liberty Counsel is an international nonprofit, litigation, education, and policy organization dedicated to advancing religious freedom, the sanctity of life, and the family since 1989, by providing pro bono assistance and representation on these and related topics.

Not a Hater: Austin Ruse of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-FAM). Ruse’s group has been slandered by the leftist SPLC as a “hate group.”

By Peter LaBarbera

The pro-LGBT Left’s “hate” game is a cynical exercise in demonization and manipulation: by smearing people and organizations that oppose homosexual “marriage” or “gay” activism as “haters,” they seek to establish a narrative that delegitimizes any opposition to homosexualism as the moral equivalent of racism. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has turned this spurious tactic into a money-making machine–see the current issue of WND’s Whistleblower magazine, “The Hate Racket.”

Finally people of faith are fighting back: American Family Association has created an “[Anti-Christian] Bigotry Map” in response to the heavy-handed SPLC’s farcical “Hate Map,” on which AFTAH and more than a dozen other pro-family organizations are listed.

Below is an example of how homosexual activists like Joe Jervis, creater of the Joe.My.God blog, play the SPLC hate card against pro-family advocates. Note Jervis’ headline:

“Haters Are Thrilled that Italian Designers Dolce & Gabbana Oppose LGBT Rights”:

The alleged “hater” to which Jervis refers is not hateful at all. Austin Ruse is a Breitbart writer, a dedicated Catholic family man and the president of Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, which fights for pro-life and pro-family values at the United Nations. Ruse is a smart and capable guy–but his organization, like AFTAH, has been slandered by the SPLC as a “hate group” [see the map’s New York listings; AFTAH is found in the map’s Illinois listings].

Join Pro-Life and Pro-Family activists at the Defense of the Texas Marriage Amendment Rally

WHEN & WHERE: Monday, March 23rd at 1:00 PM on the south steps of the State Capitol in Austin. Below is a video and letter by Dr. Steven Hotze, president of Conservative Republicans of Texas:

It’s time for Christians and conservatives to rise up and take a stand for God’s truth about marriage! We must draw a line in the sand.

This is a call to action. I am asking you to make whatever sacrifices necessary to attend the Defense of Texas Marriage Amendment Rally scheduled for Monday, March 23rd at 1:00 pm on the south steps of the Texas Capitol.  Please encourage your family, friends and fellow church members to attend. You might consider taking busloads of people to the rally.

We have over 100 elected State Officials who are sponsoring this event. They are coming under attack by militant homosexuals. That is why Christians and conservatives must have a show of force to let these legislators know that we support them.

Marriage is a God ordained institution between a man and a woman and it is the fundamental foundation of families and of ordered societies: “For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh” (Gen. 2:24, Matt. 19:5).

In the November 8, 2005 General Election, the citizens of Texas passed, by an overwhelming margin of 76% to 24%, a Marriage Amendment to the Texas Constitution, Article 1, Section 32, which provides that “Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman.”

A fierce battle for the soul of Texas has begun.  The liberals and their pro-homosexual allies want to force Texans to redefine marriage and accept ‘homosexual mirage’ as morally right.

Read the rest of this article »

Like Anorexia? Transgendered (gender-confused) individuals like Bruce Jenner suffer from a mental disorder of “assumption”–says psychiatrist Dr. Paul McHugh–much like anorexics who, though unhealthily thin, believe they are “fat.” Click on graphic to enlarge.

This essay was first published in The Public Discourse, which I highly recommend. To receive Public Discourse e-alerts, go HERE. — Peter LaBarbera, AFTAH; Twitter: @PeterLaBarbera
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The Absurdity of Transgenderism: A Stern but Necessary Critique

By Carlos D. Flores

We should make public policy and encourage social norms that reflect the truth about the human person and sexuality, not obfuscate the truth about such matters and sow the seeds of sexual confusion in future generations for years to come.

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By now we are all undoubtedly familiar with the tragic suicide of Joshua Alcorn, the transgender teenage boy who, in late December, walked onto a freeway with the intention of ending his life. In an apparent suicide note, Joshua cites a host of reasons for why he was led to end his life, most prominent of which were his parents’ attempts to discourage his identifying as a girl and his being sent to therapists in an attempt to relieve these feelings. All of the problems that ultimately culminated in his suicide, writes Joshua, stem from the fact that, from the time he was a small child, he felt like a “girl trapped in a boy’s body.”

No sooner had Joshua’s heart stopped beating than the story of his suicide was seized by LGBT activists and pruned to advance a familiar narrative of a sexual minority fighting cultural oppression. Joshua’s parents immediately began to be chided as “repressive” and “bigoted” and even began to receive various threats from LGBT internet crusader-activists.

Transgenderism and Gender Identity

I have not referred to Joshua by using female pronouns or by using his self-invented female name of “Leelah.” The reason I am not doing this is simple: Joshua was not a girl—he was a boy—and to address males with female pronouns or females with male pronouns is to contribute to our culture’s confusion about sexuality and the nature of the human person, which is literally leaving casualties in its wake. No amount of surgical mutilation of body parts, effeminate behaviors, or artificial female appearances can make a man a woman.

LGBT activists will respond in various ways to this. They might first respond by saying: “Okay, true enough: Joshua was biologically a male. But you have misunderstood our claim: we contend that his sex was male, yes, but his gender was female because he ‘identified’ as female.” The idea here is that people have a sex, which is either female or male and which one cannot choose. In addition to this, however, there is “gender,” or what sex one is more comfortable “identifying” as. The response to this is simple: Why think that what one “identifies as” is significant at all, especially to the extent that others should actively recognize or cater to such an identity, and especially when the identity one adopts is contrary to reality?

Homosexual leftist sends vulgar tweet to Dr. Ben Carson; Savage tells Duggars (and many others including AFTAH’s LaBarbera) to “F–k Off”

WARNING: Although we have blocked most of Dan Savage’s hateful profanity, this article contains offensive words and images as evidence of “gay” activist hate

LEFT-WING HATE GETS AN SPLC PASS: Only an absurdly biased “hate” arbiter like the SPLC would call Dr. Ben Carson an “extremist” yet ignore “gay” activist and anti-Christian bigot Dan Savage’s long record of viciously hateful antics. Savage (right) recently sent a vulgar, crude tweet to Dr. Carson (see below) because he was upset that Carson opined that homosexuality is a choice. The “Google Santorum” image on Savage’s t-shirt from this dated photo refers to the despicable “Santorum.com” campaign that Savage launched “redefining” Sen. Rick Santorum’s name as a disgusting byproduct of sodomy (see below). Despite Savage’s contemptible antics–he once intentionally tried to give a cold to then-GOP presidential candidate Gary Bauer by licking the doorknobs of Bauer’s campaign office–he has NEVER been cited for “hate” or “extremism” by the “anti-bias” Southern Poverty Law Center. Meanwhile, the SPLC called Dr. Carson an “extremist” and carefully monitors Carson’s public remarks for evidence of “hate.”

AFTAH is working to expose the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and other “anti-bias” and “diversity” charlatans on the Left. We are in an information-gathering stage of a project to expose and confront the SPLC’s wicked and bigoted “hate” narrative. (The SPLC has smeared AFTAH and many other pro-family organizations as “hate groups.”) The SPLC’s magazine, “Teaching Tolerance,” is sent at no charge to more than 450,000 educators–many in taxpayer-funded public schools–across the United States and Canada. The SPLC boasts that in addition, “tens of thousands of educators use our free curricular kits.” Contact your local K-12 schools–elementary, middle and high schools (public and private) — and inquire about the the use of “Teaching Tolerance” and other SPLC resources such as their new “anti-bias” curriculum, “Perspectives For a Diverse America.” Convey your concern about the SPLC’s egregious bias and please share your findings with AFTAH at americansfortruth@gmail.com or to Brad Wallis at connops@yahoo.com. Phone AFTAH at 312-324-3787.

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Why Hasn’t the SPLC Designated Dan Savage a Hateful “Extremist”?

By Peter LaBarbera

It says all you need to know about the Southern Poverty Law Center’s warped, arbitrary and maliciously unfair “hate” labeling system that the SPLC has never designated vulgar homosexual activist Dan Savage (or any homosexual activist, for that matter) as a hateful “extremist.” On Wednesday, after reports that Dr. Ben Carson affirmed that choice is involved in homosexuality (citing homosexual behavior by “straights” in prison), Savage tweeted this to Dr. Carson (blocked with a rainbow flag for decency here):

Here is a tweet where Dan Savage says “[F–k] the Duggars” because he was upset at the Christian family’s role in helping to pass a Fayetteville, Arkansas referendum preserving religious liberty (again, we blocked the F-word):

Here is Savage’s evil “Google-bomb” creation to redefine Sen. Rick Santorum’s last name as the byproduct of sodomy. This graphic is still found when you enter “Santorum.com” (as of March 6, 2105); Savage’s parallel “SpreadingSantorum” site–which comes up when you click the link in the nasty graphic below–comes up fifth on a Google search of “Santorum.” The graphic reads:

“santorum (san-TOR-um) n. 1. The frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the by-product of anal sex.”

Here the hateful Savage uses his standard F-bomb line against Josh Duggar:

This was a tremendous speech by talk show host and author Mark Levin at CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) on Saturday (Feb. 28, 2015). Note Levin’s disdain for unprincipled Republicans. CPAC is sponsored by American Conservative Union, which this year (finally) was more inclusive of social conservatives than in past years. Thanks to Breaking News & Political Videos for this video:

LGBTQ Task Force gave “Leather Leadership” award to owner of Dallas homosexual bar that hosts monthly gathering for men who play-act as “dogs” in bizarre BDSM “puppy” fetish

Human Degradation 101–Men as “Dogs”–Celebrated by the LGBTQ Task Force: Men play-acting as dogs in the twisted world of BDSM (Bondage, Discipline, Sadism, Masochism). The above graphic (click to enlarge) is from the website of a homosexual “leather bar,” the Dallas Eagle, co-owned by Mark Frazier. The “DFW ” in “DFW Pups” stands for “Dallas-Ft. Worth.” The recent LGBTQ Task Force “Creating Change” conference honored Frazier with its “Leather Leadership” award [see p. 40 on the CC  program PDF]. Southwest Airlines (SWA) is a “National Corporate Partner” of the Task Force, which puts on Creating Change every year. So far SWA is refusing to distance itself from CC or the LGBTQ Task Force. Contact SWA HERE or by phone at 214-792-4000.

SWA is proud to sponsor THIS?! View the extreme “Creating Change” program: [click here]

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“We will not support Southwest or any sponsor of this conference until they apologize to all Christians and change their stance on this situation.  Southwest and other corporate businesses chose to support a segment of the U.S. population that comprises less than 2% while managing to offend no less than 20% of the population.” – Kim Eith, AFTAH Reader

Folks, we have heard back from a few of you who have contacted Southwest (and other major corporations) that sponsored a radical LGBTQ conference in Denver February 4-8. The “Creating Change” conference for homosexual, transgender and other sexual activists screened the documentary, “Corpus Christi: Playing with Redemption,” celebrating a play in which the Jesus Christ character is cast as a homosexual who once committed sodomy with Judas and who performs a homosexual “marriage” between two of his male “disciples” [see AFTAH story HERE].

Apparently, Southwest representatives are telling people that AFTAH gave out false information and that SWA did not (directly) sponsor the “Gay Jesus” documentary, only the larger “Creating Change” conference. This is a classic dodge, although it is also a tacit admission by SWA that the “Corpus Christi” documentary is highly offensive to people of faith.

Of course, as AFTAH wrote earlier, the blasphemous film was just one item in a conference filled with the celebration of extreme behaviors—ranging from “polyamory” (multiple-partner sexual unions); to “kink” (sadomasochism); to extreme gender confusion; to the “queering” of Christianity (including a talk on the “biblical case for same-sex marriage”). You can read for yourself the full “Creating Change 2015” program HERE.

AFTAH reader Kim Eith (read her excellent correspondence with SWA below) has it exactly right: “sponsorship of that conference equates to sponsorship of all activities occurring at that conference.” Southwest needs to own their role in the “Creating Change” event in all its perverseness–including “Creating Change’s” honoring of a sadomasochist (Mark Frazier), who owns a “gay leather bar” in Dallas that caters to a perversion known as “puppy play” (see graphic above). Below is one of those weird, nonjudgmental descriptions in left-biased Wikipedia of “Puppy Play”–a perversion which, by the way, I witnessed firsthand last year at the San Francisco “Dore Alley” street fair:

In puppy play, or dog play, at least one of the participants acts out canine mannerisms and behaviors, which is sometimes associated with leather culture. If there is a dominant role it can be taken by a “handler”, “trainer”, “master”, or in the case of someone who still identifies as canine, an “alpha”. If there is a submissive this may be considered by a “pup” or a “dog”. …Other elements rooted in BDSM play involve bondage and restriction with collars, leashes, cages, and hoods, the pups hands are often covered in mitts, both sexual and non-sexual services are requested, and “training” may take place in order to teach commands. [Wikipedia entry on “Animal Roleplay”]

Sick stuff, to be sure–and glorified by the same National LGBTQ Task Force that proudly screened the “homosexual Jesus” documentary. Sadly, Southwest Airlines, based in Dallas, has not even come close to apologizing for its role in this uber-perverse, Christianity-bashing conference. Do the execs at SWA think we’re stupid, that we can’t read? Do they even know what sort of radical “Change” is advocated at the Task Force conferences? We must keep up the pressure on Southwest, Comcast/NBC, Wells Fargo and the other sponsors [contact info HERE].

We are indebted to Kim Eith for her smart advocacy below. Please read this correspondence and contact Southwest Airlines yourself using the contact info above. Thank you. – Peter LaBarbera, AFTAH; americansfortruth@gmail.com.

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Kim Eith’s Letter of AFTAH Describing her Complaint to Southwest Airlines [SWA online contact form HERE]:

To whom it may concern,

My husband and I sent separate emails to Southwest today. We also cancelled an upcoming flight with this airline today. I called Southwest on this date and received this response from the lady I spoke to:  ” There has been a misunderstanding. A Southwest corporate officer informed us today that there has been false accusations about Southwest and the LGBTQ conference. Southwest did not sponsor the documentary or film shown at the conference.”  My reply; “Southwest is a corporate sponsor, which is clearly indicated on the Create Change LGBTQ conference materials and therefore, any sponsorship of that conference equates to sponsorship of all activities occurring at that conference.”

As we stated in our email, we will not support Southwest or any sponsor of this conference until they apologize to all Christians and change their stance on this situation.  Southwest and other corporate businesses chose to support a segment of the U.S. population that comprises less than 2% while managing to offend no less than 20% of the population. People’s sexual preferences are personal and while my love of my fellow citizens, family and friends is not based upon personal views and practices, I will not stand by and watch others attempt to obliterate my Christian values, and especially my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. This was absolutely vile and despicable.

Kim Eith

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