From the “Queer Texas” website:

The Queer Texas Conference is an action-oriented, 3 day-long educational gathering of youth and students from across Texas…The conference will be held at the University of Texas at Austin April 13-15.

Workshops include:

The Drag King Workshop — Curious about drag kings? Who isn’t? Come and learn a little about the drag king community, our performance, and our politics. Then we’ll demo the basics of binding, packing, applying facial hair, and strutting your stuff – and you’ll have a chance to try it yourself! All genders welcome.

The Gender, Race, and Hip-Hop Workshop will screen segments of Byron Hurt’s new documentary film Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes that explores the director’s love of hip-hop culture and his simultaneous conflict with its marketing of hyper-masculine images of men of color, violence, materialism, homophobia, and misogyny. Using an intersectional approach,the workshop highlights the complicated connections between race, class, and gender in media and the larger American culture. Interactive role playing and skits challenge workshop participants to explore their own racialized and gendered stereotypes, followed by an open dialogue about ways to challenge these structures through petitions, targeted letter writing campaigns, and public education.

Trans and Gender Non-Conforming Caucus — This workshop will be an exploration of participants’ experiences with the language they use to talk about their gender experience, the longings in their lives, and their search and successes in finding legitimacy. Language is a powerful force in our lives. Finding the language that accurately describes our gender experiences can be difficult. Longing is a natural part of life. Giving voice to those longings can be a compelling way to find the means to fulfill them. Legitimacy is something many of us strive for in our families, in our communities, and in the world-at-large.

Among the speakers:  Tyrone Hanley of the Nov 2006 “Creating Change” panel on sex workers…which is probably fitting since, sadly, many “transgender” young people are relegated to prostitution in order to survive.  Is this the life into which our schools ought to direct confused and vulnerable young people?

A second full-page ad ran today:

D H S
WHAT’S GOING ON IN
FRESHMAN ADVISORY?
PART 2.

As more students and parents come forward with their experiences
relating to the gay students’ panel presentations, the poor judgment and
abuse of authority by school officials becomes even more astonishing.

• CONFIDENTIALITY AGREEMENT
Freshman students (14 year olds) were asked to sign a CONFIDENTIALITY AGREEMENT promising not to share what has transpired in the classroom. Presumably, this would include parents. This is unenforceable, probably illegal, and certainly poor judgment. [A portion of the confidentiality agreement was inserted — you can read the entire document HERE.]

• HIDING MATERIALS

1. A parent, a teacher and NSSA have all requested to see the pool of instructional materials offered to Freshman Advisory teachers. The requests were DENIED and, in fact, the materials are hidden behind a password-protected portal. Can you imagine any other class where materials are hidden from parents?
2. F.O.I.A. — NSSA filed a Freedom of Information Act request for complete instructional materials which was DENIED. Illinois State School Code, 105 ILCS 5/28-19.1 says: “Any member of the public may inspect all text and instructional material used in the public schools.”

• VIDEO TAPE
When a parent of a Freshman requested to observe the gay panel presentations, she was DENIED. A video of the class was offered but now that the panels have concluded, suddenly, there is no video available. What are they hiding?

• PROFESSIONAL PANEL
DHS students requested another panel presentation, this time including medical professionals — instead of teenagers — who could speak to the complex health issues surrounding homosexuality. DENIED.

• DANGEROUS ASSUMPTIONS
Students have revealed that during the gay panel presentations, a link is made to normal teenage struggles and homosexuality. For instance, gay students shared that they struggled with a number of emotional disorders but the real problem and solution was found when they realized they were homosexual. The teachers evidently allowed this dangerous assumption so that the students in the class inevitably wondered if their normal teenage problems could mean that they are gay. Students were encouraged to explore this possibility without mention of the obvious health and emotional risks.

If these issues concern you, please contact:
District 113 School Board — (224) 765-1000

Helene Herbstman HEHCUBS@aol.com — Ken Fishbain ken_fishbain@ghr.org
Jeffrey Annenberg jeff@monteropartners.com — Harvey Cohen HCohen4940@aol.com
Joel Hurwitz hurwitz4@aol.com — Marjie Sandlow Msandlow@aol.com
Bonnie Shlensky DBLBadger@aol.com — Supt. George Fornero gfornero@dist113.org

NORTH SHORE STUDENT ADVOCACY
NSSAdvocacy@aol.com

When you read this post, ask yourself: If “transsexuality” is a healthy lifestyle option, why is it necessary for the government (taxpayers) to extend grants for disease treatment and mental health counseling?

Excerpted from UCSF to Close Trans Programs, by Heather Cassell, published Mar 8, 2007, in Bay Area Reporter:

The University of California at San Francisco’s Transitions and Transgender Resource and Neighborhood Space projects are scheduled to close July 1 because grants that fund the programs are ending.

The only projects of their kind in the Bay Area, the closures will leave an estimated 1,300 transgender and gender variant people who have used the services during the past four years without anywhere to go.

The Transitions Project, housed under the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies at UCSF, has an annual budget of $450,000…

But on July 1, the three major grants that fund the programs – including those from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institute of Drug Abuse – will end, according to Susan Kegeles, co-director of CAPS.

Continue reading in Bay Area Reporter…

Note: We have a suggestion as to where these 1300 precious human beings should go: to a Bible-believing church where they can hear the gospel of Jesus Christ and be healed emotionally and spiritually.

Excerpted from Girls Will Be Boys, by Mary Roach, published Mar 18, 2007, by The New York Times:

Michael Dillon wanted nothing more than to be invisible, to be one of the guys. Problem: he was born with a woman’s body. Everything he did toward realizing his humble dream — the cross-dressing, the hormones and surgeries and the chimera that resulted — pushed it further from his grasp. He went through life as the most visible sort of human being: a physical anomaly. He was the first person on record to undergo surgery (13 operations between 1946 and 1949) to change his gender…

Happiness eluded Michael Dillon. Isolated, depressed, hounded by the press, he traveled to India and, bizarrely, to a series of ever more remote Tibetan monasteries. He could not speak the language of his fellow novices, but with his shaved head and robes, he felt he fit in someplace. Sadly, he faced prejudice in the monasteries too, and his visa ran out before he was allowed to become a full-fledged monk. In 1962, he died impoverished near the border of Ladakh. He was 47, and had been trying to get back to the monastery where he’d felt at home.

Continue reading in The New York Times… 

Will it go this far in America before we wake up?

From Quebec Readies All out Fight Against “Homophobia” with Pro-Gay Gov’t Ministry, Ads, Education, by John-Henry Westen, published Mar 16, 2007, by LifeSite News:

A report issued at the behest of the provincial government of Quebec directs the government to fight homopshobia and heterosexism in every sphere of public life and especially in schools.  Quebec’s Justice minister asked the Quebec Human Rights Commission to create a task force in 2005, and that group has published its report called “From legal equality to social equality: toward a national strategy to fight against homophobia.”

The report ascribes to homophobia negative consequences of what many acknowledge as problems associated with disordered sexuality.  The report says that homosexual, bisexual and transsexual persons are “a population at risk,” noting that they experience higher rates of psychological distress, depression, illegal drug use, alcoholism, and suicidal tendencies.  The report claims that these afflictions are the result of heterosexist “social stigmatization” and “homophobia.”

While psychologists who assist people to overcome disordered sexuality see many of the afflictions mentioned as symptoms of the homosexual disorder, the report uses the plight of the many people who find themselves in such heart-rending situations to urge for political action which will threaten freedom of religion and freedom of speech regarding the immorality and dangers of the homosexual lifestyle.  “The despair felt by too many young people of sexual minorities at the very significant stage of their coming out is alone enough to demand urgent action,” said Marc-Andre Dowd, vice-president of the Commission, in a press conference on the release of the document.

The report defines homophobia as “feelings of fear and aversion which certain people have toward homosexuality and people of homosexual orientation, or toward any person whose appearance or behavior does not conform to the stereotypes of the masculinity or of femininity.”

The report defines heterosexism as “the assertion that heterosexuality is the social norm or superior to other sexual orientations.”

The report calls for an all out assault on homophobia and herterosexism, going so far as to demand a separate government ministry be established to oversee the fight against homophobia.  It recommends that the new administration to fight homophobia be granted adequate resources to ensure development and implementation, and that the government engage in media campaigns to promote positive attitudes towards homosexuality and lesbianism.

By Peter LaBarbera

More homosexual activist lies: On Saturday on MSNBC, I debated Jason Cianciotto of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force. Cianciotto repeated the company line that groups like Americans For Truth contribute to “harassment and violence” against homosexual youth:

Watch the MSNBC segment HERE

Cianciotto alleged that:

“…Organizations like Mr. LaBarbera’s only contribute to this harassment and violence by pitting students against each other and that’s a tragedy. It’s also gravely immoral.”

We were debating the controversy over a pro-homosexual “Freshman Advisory” class at Deerfield High School in Illinois. Deerfield’s principal has now apologized for requiring students who attended the freshman class to sign a “confidentiality agreement” stipulating that they would not discuss what transpired in the class. (Congrats to my friend, parent Lora Sue Hauser for exposing the liberal shenanigans at Deerfield High.)

On MSNBC, taken aback by Jason’s reckless accusation, I said it was a “terrible thing to say.” Homosexual activists routinely conflate disagreement over their destructive lifestyle with violence and hate against homosexuals. It’s a dirty tactic, and totally irrelevant to the Deerfield story, which is about parents having the full right to know exactly what is being taught about homosexuality in their child’s classroom.

MSNBC aired a debate on Sat, Mar 10, 2007, between Matt Foreman of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force (Task Force) and Peter Sprigg, Vice President for Policy at Family Research Council (FRC) — and the topic was Deerfield High School’s “Freshman Advisory” which includes presentations by students who identify as homosexual, bisexual, or “transgendered.”

Watch the MSNBC debate HERE.

Matt Foreman suggested the “gay” panel was simply part of broader program that includes blacks, Latinos, etc. (We’re not sure how he knows that since District 113 officials have refused to release the curriculum to local parents.) He claimed that “gay” students are disproportionately the victim of bullying & violence.

Peter Sprigg said that FRC would prefer that the school do away with whole program, in part because they’re presenting only one side (which is viewpoint discrimination) which may encourage kids to prematurely label themselves as homosexual or bisexual. He pointed to studies that demonstrate younger kids are often unsure/confused but later heterosexual.

Matt Foreman asserted that only a small minority of parents object and claimed that opponents are spreading “lies & myths” about the panel — “this is part of gay agenda,” homosexual students are recruiting, etc.

Peter Sprigg suggested that anyone interested in learning about the homosexual agenda might go to www.frc.org.

Matt Foreman said to Peter Sprigg: “Your propaganda creates bullying and violence against gays — Why are you so obsessed with gays?”

Peter Sprigg said, and we agree: “We believe all kids should be protected against bullying & violence.” He went on to say that most bullying occurs because of appearance & body size and asked “Are we going to have a panel of obese students telling kids it’s good to be overweight?”

From Illinois Family Institute, where Lora Sue Hauser serves as School Issues Advisor:

Click HERE to read the confidentiality agreement
that Deerfield High School freshmen were asked to sign prior to being confronted with
a panel of students who identify as homosexual, bisexual, and “transgendered.”

WARNING: The pdf includes…

• The confidentiality agreement (2 pages), plus
• “Terminology Game Cards” used in Deerfield’s Freshman Advisory,”
• Excerpts from Alex Sanchez’s book Rainbow Boys which is replete with vulgar language and sexual content (Alex Sanchez was invited to speak at DHS in 2005),
• A list of “gay” bars linked (via the GLBT National Health Center) on Alex Sanchez’s website (which he promoted to students), and
• Objectionable excerpts from The Heidi Chronicles, which was perfomed for freshmen — without parental notice or consent — at DHS in 2001.