How ‘non-discrimination’ laws are used to discriminate against people of faith

First published by WorldNetDaily, June 15, 2012; this is the first half of Linda’s column; read the whole column on WND HERE:

Relatively few self-identified homosexuals get “married,” even when same-sex unions become legal. But perhaps that was never the main point anyway.   Respectability is what they are seeking. But to achieve this goal for behaviors that never can be intrinsically respectable, the power to massage the truth and to silence opponents is critical. How do you gain power? Restrict the rights of your enemies to express an opinion opposing homosexuality and same-sex “marriage.”

The most destructive weapons deployed to this end are sexual-orientation and gender-identity “non-discrimination” laws. The Senate just held its first hearings on ENDA, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, and many states and municipalities continue to be confronted with this unneeded legislation. As they hear the pleas about someone being fired “just for being ‘gay’ or ‘transgender,’” politicians would be wise to review the history.

Such policies routinely clobber people of faith who don’t agree with same-sex “marriage” or with the open expression of this behavior in the workplace, in schools and in public accommodations, by people who often lack good sense and good judgment. The cost of disagreement? Just your job, your reputation, your bank account and/or your religious liberty.

And we know where the “Gay”-Activist-in-Chief stands on religious freedom, right? Obama is leading the charge on restroom rights for radicals as well. June is once again “Pride” month, and the White House issued a glowing proclamation of support for this noble cause, which Obama thinks is “stronger than hate.” So there you have it.

TAKE ACTION: Contact General Millis through their online form HERE or:

By Phone: call 1-800-248-7310 between (7:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. CT, weekdays)
By Fax: 1-763-764-8330.
By Letter: their mailing address:

General Mills, Inc.
P.O. Box 9452
Minneapolis, MN 55440

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Remember when Big Business was conservative and was protested by hippies and leftists? Well now, socially speaking, corporate titans are siding with the Left against historic Judeo-Christian values — and God-fearing Christians and Jews are chiding the soulless, capitalist sellouts. The latest Behemoth to kick the Creator to the curb is General Mills — seemingly right up there with apple pie and motherhood as a symbol of American wholesomeness, but no more.

General Mills is maker of these iconic breakfast cereals:

Cheerios
Chex
Cinnamon Toast Crunch
Fiber One
Kix
Lucky Charms
Monsters
Total
Trix
Wheaties

In bowing to the revolutionary, homosexualist redefinition of marriage, the cereal giant has had to re-invent morality itself. Thus it employs the same sanctimonious Diversity Doublespeak as all social leftists who — no matter what destructive policies they pursue — pat themselves on the back for being on the side of “progress.” How telling that a company like General Mills is now serving up the pablum of “inclusion” to justify its immoral turn.

AFTAH in the News: Why would a major ‘family-oriented’ corporation back foes of natural marriage in the middle of a ballot campaign?

Folks, it’s up to us to hold soulless corporations who back immorality accountable. The item below appeared in AFA’s “One News Now” news service. [Sign up for their Daily News Briefs HERE and their Alerts HERE.] Clearly, Big Business is gambling that opposition to homosexuality is dying out in the USA. I hope they are wrong, because if they are correct and America is jettisoning its Christian roots to embrace sexual sin and the trivialization of “marriage” to accommodate it, we will continue to decay like all once-great civilizations before us. (In that sense, there is no American “exceptionalism”….)

God will not be mocked, and it is difficult for God to “Bless America” if America blesses sodomy and sexual sin.

TAKE ACTION:  To reach Target, call 1-800-591-3869 and hit “0” at the prompt to get an actual person. Click HERE to give your feedback online. When I called, the operator told me that the “pride” t-shirt donation campaign was consistent with the company’s longtime support of “diversity,” including the “LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender] community.”  

As the 61-39 vote for REAL marriage in North Carolina showed, Sodomy-Based “Marriage” (SBM) is NOT inevitable. Thank you for taking a stand, and have a terrific weekend.

— Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org

PS.  Madrid and the World Congress of Families conference were both wonderful, as AFTAH Board Member John McCartney and I had many opportunities to meet and network with pro-family activists from all over the world! We’ll have more on that next week.

PPS.  Please “re-sign” up for AFTAH e-mails HERE (the “Join Our E-Mail List” button at the top of the site), as we prepare to switch to “MailChimp” to improve our e-newsletter service to you. Signing up is quick and easy! Thanks for supporting AFTAH!

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Target taking ‘a big risk’

Read it online: http://www.onenewsnow.com/Business/Default.aspx?id=1606832

Charlie Butts – OneNewsNow – 6/1/2

Referring to the corporation pumping funds into the campaign to defeat Minnesota’s Marriage Protection Amendment, Peter LaBarbera says Target has missed the mark on moral issues.

The Americans for Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) founder reports that Target has pledged to donate 100 percent of earnings from “pride” T-shirt sales during June to the Family Equality Council, a group that is against the proposed constitutional amendment that will go to Minnesota voters in November (see earlier story).

“It’s unbelievable to me that Target would give $120,000 to the pro-homosexual marriage side, right in the middle of a ballot campaign [on traditional marriage],” he comments. “This will certainly have an impact on Target’s bottom line, as pro-traditional marriage Americans find out that Target is now a pro-same-sex ‘marriage’ company.”

Help defend AFTAH against latest example of homo-fascism

Click on graphic to enlarge. Homosexual web activist website "All Out" lobbies PayPal to drop AFTAH and other pro-family groups as alleged "anti-LGBT extremists." The petition reads, "PayPal must act immediately to shut down their accounts and ban all sites that promote anti-LGBT hate."

TAKE ACTION NOW: a new homosexual web campaign is urging the internet payment company PayPal to drop AFTAH and other pro-family organizations as so-called “extremists” that “promote anti-LGBT hate.” Please help defend Americans For Truth from being dropped by PayPal in response to this anti-Christian pressure campaign.

1) Go to PayPal’s website and make a much-needed gift to AFTAH to support our work. Or do so through the AFTAH website at www.americansfortruth.com/donate/. Mail a check to AFTAH, PO Box 5522, Naperville, IL 60567-5522.

2) Write or call PayPal and urge them to STAND FOR FREEDOM and NOT give in to this intolerant pressure campaign by homosexual activists; use PayPal’s online “Comment Card” HERE, or post a note to the PayPal blog.  Or use their Contact Page HERE (note, the latter seems to favor comments by people holding a PayPal account).  Here is the Contact Page for PayPal’s parent company, e-BAY Inc.

Please THANK PayPal for initially siding with religious freedom so far [as reported HERE by the homosexual website Pink News] and not abruptly caving to All Out’s demands.  Urge them NOT to punish Christian and pro-family advocates – which could potentially alienate millions of potential PayPal customers.

3) Also, sign the LifeSiteNews petition to PayPal defending AFTAH and other pro-family targets by going here: http://www.profamilyfreedom.net/

4) Send this message to your friends and contact list to educate them on the anti-Christian and censorious nature of the homosexual movement. “Gay” activists no longer want “Tolerance”; now they want Dominance even if it means smearing pro-family people as “haters” and destroying our cherished religious freedoms.  

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By Peter LaBarbera

Dear AFTAH Reader,

Every day brings more evidence that the Homosexual Lobby is all about kicking pro-morality people (mostly committed Christians) who disagree with homosexual behavior OUT of the public square. More and more observers are seeing this for what it is: homo-fascism. Last week we learned of a homosexual web campaign called “All Out” that is targeting the payment service company PayPal for doing business with Americans For Truth and nine other groups — which it smears as “extremists” who “promote anti-LGBT “hate.” Here is the wording of their All Out petition:

Illinois Department of Employment Security document affirming that Matt Barber was NOT fired for misconduct at Allstate Insurance Co. It states that Allstate fired Barber "because AN OUTSIDE ORGANIZATION HAD COMPLAINED ABOUT AN ARTICLE HE HAD WRITTEN WHILE ON HIS OWN TIME." Click on graphic to enlarge.

By Peter LaBarbera

Below is a longer version of an article I posted in Facebook responding to homosexual activist Alvin McEwen, who repeated an oft-used bit of “gay” misinformation about Allstate’s 2005 firing of pro-family advocate Matt Barber. (Barber sits on the Americans For Truth Board, is Associate Dean at Liberty University School of Law, and is Director of Cultural Affairs for the Liberty Counsel.) Alvin is a bitter fellow who — although purporting to factually correct alleged pro-family falsehoods — regularly dishes them out himself (go HERE to see him viciously slander me as “Porno Pete”). In posting a response to an AFA column by pro-family writer Jerry Newcombe (reprinted at bottom), McEwen writes:

Sorry but Mr. Newcombe is inaccurate about one part. Matt Barber used his company’s computer AND identified himself as an employee of the company [Allstate] in his column. That’s why he was fired.

Funny how I heard these same spurious “talking points” about Matt Barber’s firing from the mouth of Rick Garcia — formerly Illinois’ top homosexual activist before he was ousted by Equality Illinois. We were on a Chicago TV news program together and I was making the point that conservative Christians are now more likely to lose their jobs or face punishment on the job than homosexuals.

Of course, had Matt been a homosexual activist who was abruptly terminated after writing a column on his own time about “gay pride,” the liberal/”gay” outrage would have been through the roof — and Alvin would not be repeating Allstate’s misleading corporate “spin” as he does above.

Following is my correction of Alvin McEwen’s erroneous and tendentious “correction”:

Matt Barber is a good friend of mine, a Christian man of high integrity, and a Board Member for my organization, Americans For Truth. As one living in Illinois who was intricately familiar with Matt’s case, I want to set the record “straight” here and correct the lies that homosexual activists like Alvin McEwen repeatedly spew about his unjust firing.

Homosexual activist Alvin McEwen pushes a lie about the abrupt firing of Matt Barber by Allstate.

Barber was fired after writing a column (which was published by conservative websites) against the homosexual agenda — on his home computer, on a Saturday. He did NOT identify himself as an employee of Allstate, but a third-party blog publisher did so by mistake. A staffer with the homosexual lobby group Human Rights Campaign then “reported” Barber’s web article to Allstate’s HR depart, and Matt immediately was called in on a Friday afternoon. Ironically, he was told that Allstate “celebrates diversity,” and that his (traditional) values did not reflect those of Allstate. Barber was suspended and informed that he likely would be fired for writing the column. He was then escorted by Allstate security guards off the corporate grounds. Monday morning, Barber was canned over the telephone.

The Illinois Department of Employment Security [see graphic above] investigated the firing and found Barber innocent of misconduct; IDES made this judgment (emphasis theirs): “The claimant was discharged from ALLSTATE INS. CO. because AN OUTSIDE ORGANIZATION HAD COMPLAINED ABOUT AN ARTICLE HE HAD WRITTEN WHILE ON HIS OWN TIME.”

Read the rest of this article »

No “diversity” for stellar Christian vendor who opposes homosexual “marriage”

Frank Turek

Editor’s Note/Correction: our original story labeled Frank Turek as an “employee” of Cisco Systems. Turek was in fact a vendor with Cisco (with high marks for his performance). Thus he lacked the protections of an actual employee. This does not detract from the main story of Cisco’s hypocrisy and anti-Christian bigotry (we call it homo-fascism), which led Turek to be fired abruptly for his private, pro-traditional-marriage advocacy — by a company that champions “diversity.”  — Peter LaBarbera

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Below is a reprint of a Townhall.com column by Christian apologist Frank Turek, an eloquent defender of natural (i.e., real) marriage – who was recently fired as a vendor by Cisco Systems (408-526-4000) due to his off-the-job, pro-family advocacy. Turek’s sudden firing was instigated by a homosexual fellow-employee at Cisco who — acting like a homo-fascist — turned in Turek to the Cisco authorities (actually an HR exec), despite the latter’s stellar and completely professional work record.

Conservative columnist Mike Adams has written three terrific pieces about “diversity”-touting Cisco’s outrageous action. (Read them in order HERE, HERE and HERE.) Needless to say, if Turek were a practicing homosexual who had been canned, this would be a huge media story and Cisco would be contracting with the services of GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation).

I have never met Mr. Turek – I’ve only read some of his excellent columns – but I gather that he is a compassionate man who models the Christian ideal of speaking the Truth boldly, in love. One reason I deduce this is that while attending (undercover) the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force “Creating Change” meeting earlier this year, I listened as a homosexual activist described (to a room full of fellow “gay” activists) a church talk given by Turek that he had attended as a critic. The homosexual advocate described Turek’s presentation and demeanor as kind and bereft of malice. This particular LGBT activist works diligently to convert Christians to a pro-“gay rights” mindset, and yet – even as he opposed Turek’s ideas – he found no hatred for homosexuals in the man. (You can buy Turek’s book, “Correct, Not Politically Correct: How Same-Sex ‘Marriage’ Hurts Everyone” HERE; and watch him debate atheist Christopher Hitchens HERE; also see Turek’s outstanding Christian youth site here: http://crossexamined.org/.)

The bottom line for Christians and opponents of homosexuality who are not silent about their moral beliefs? If it’s OK to fire Frank Turek merely because he disagrees with homosexuality and “same-sex marriage,” then you, too, are vulnerable. Christians and all defenders of sexual normalcy: we have no other choice but to fight back against the emerging liberal homo-fascism — unless you are content to live as a muted serf in the land of the “free.” – Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org 

Write Cisco here:

Mr. John Chambers
Office of the President
Cisco Systems, Inc.
Mail Stop SJC10/5/4
300 East Tasman Drive
San Jose, California 95134

Phone: 408-526-4000; hit “0” for operator

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Politically correct media abets ‘homo-fascist’ drive to squelch Christians’ voice

Apple Inc. has dropped two pro-family "apps" from its iPhone following protest campaigns by homosexual activists.

TAKE ACTION: Contact Apple Inc regarding its open hostility to faith-based customers defending traditional morality and its capitulation to homosexual activists. Call 408-996-1010.

Apple Inc.
1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014
408-996-1010

By Peter LaBarbera

On Wednesday, Apple Inc. succumbed to a web-based homosexual lobbying blitz demanding that it drop an “app” for the ex-“gay” ministry Exodus International from its iPhone. This capitulation is only the latest to reward a creeping ‘homo-fascism’ that is spreading across America and the world — and which is integral to the wider LGBT activist strategy of demonizing and marginalizing religious people opposed to homosexuality. We don’t use this term lightly — the Homosexual Lobby’s hardball strategy is built on lies, intimidation and even bullying of well-meaning, compassionate Christians and religious people who simply disagree with the practice of homosexuality.

Incredibly, a tiny Sexual Sin Lobby–  purporting to represent perhaps 1-2 percent (or less) of any given population — presumes to dictate to the rest of us what is and is not acceptable speech, ideas, and conduct with regard to homosexuality and same-sex “marriage.” (They even claim to be the arbiter of what is “love” and “hate.”) The failure of the national media — stuck in “gays-as-victims” mode — to question the growing pro-LGBT intolerance, demonization, and oppression of adherents to Judeo-Christian  moral teachings, itself contributes greatly to the persecution of people of faith.

From today’s AFTAH e-newsletter; go HERE for contact info for Chili’s and parent company Brinker International — which is a “National Corporate Partner” of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force:

Dear Readers,

This is not just another e-mail about boycotting yet another irresponsible corporation.  It’s about educating the nation on the incredibly extreme and unhealthy agenda of the pro-Homosexuality-Bisexuality-Transsexuality Lobby — and holding company executives accountable for financing that agenda.  Last week in Minneapolis, I and a few other pro-family advocates went undercover at the annual “Creating Change” grassroots homosexual conference put on by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.  There were more than 2,000 LGBT activists in attendance!  Some of the “change” we heard advocated in the various workshops, and which we will document in the days and weeks ahead, was shocking.  Yet this agenda is one that the left-leaning media refuse to examine, much less expose. So AFTAH will do the media’s job for them by laying out the Gay Task Force’s extremist vision, which includes:

• Taxpayer-financed “sex change” operations for transsexuals (not to do so is “discrimination” against “transgenders”);
• Using polling, focus groups and emotional arguments to persuade evangelical Christians to ignore Scripture and accept homosexuality-based “rights”;
• Using the tragedy of homosexual youth suicides to shame Christians into stop calling homosexuality sinful;
• Celebrating sadomasochism (consensual sexual violence and degradation) and “kinky”/fetish sexual behaviors
• Pro-homosexuality lessons for grade school kids (because waiting until middle school is too late to reach them); 
• “Non-judgmental condom advocacy for young men in the name of HIV prevention — and even being non-judgmental in “safe sex” training when it comes to bizarre/disgusting “fetish” behaviors
• Predicting not just a future “gay” president of the United States but also a “bi” and a “transgender” president! (I’ll withhold the jokes…);
• “[F–k–g] with gender,” and celebrating bisexuality and “genderqueer” lifestyles (see this definition for latter: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genderqueer);
• Using “gender identity” laws to pressure businesses to bend to the transgender agenda of “Gender-Neutral Restrooms” — to replace the old-fashioned variety with an “M” or an “F” on the door.

There is much, much more — the homosexual Task Force puts the “D” back in “Deviance,” that’s for sure.  Stay tuned as we lay out the “change” that this high-powered organization and “Friend of Barack Obama” is promoting for America — with help from Chilis restaurants, Wells Fargo, Southwest Airlines, and other major corporations.  God bless you and thanks for standing with us! — Peter LaBarbera, Americans For Truth, www.aftah.org; americansfortruth@gmail.com.