By J. Matt Barber

Posted by Concerned Women for America, Sept. 14, 2007

“They feel kind for a season, but remain blind to all reason.” — Matt Barber, just now

Such is the nature of political correctness. And in that spirit, lawmakers — who are purportedly sane — plan to take us all on a “long strange trip” through a mystical fantasyland where the impossible is possible and the objectionable is obligatory.

A vote is expected soon on H.R. 2015, the so-called “Employment Non-Discrimination Act” (ENDA). If passed, the bill would grant special employment rights and protected minority status to individuals who define themselves based upon chosen sexual behaviors and others who — among other things — suffer from clinical self-delusion. It would force employers to abandon their First Amendment civil rights at the workplace door.

More on that later…

In the meantime, two stories. One is fiction, the other is real. Both are fantasy:

Sean was a redheaded, freckled lad of pure Irish descent. Growing up, he always felt something was wrong. He didn’t like green beer, corned beef hash or any of the other things the Irish were supposed to like. Rather, he was fascinated by African-American culture and eventually made the self-determination that he was, in fact, a black man trapped in a white man’s body. No, not like Vanilla Ice, Eminem or other posers; Sean actually believed it.

There were others who felt the same way, and a movement was formed. They called themselves “transracial.” They made up fancy, official sounding terms like “race identity” and “race reassignment surgery.” They demanded special rights and government-mandated benefits such as affirmative action and reparations.

Okay, that hasn’t happened yet (that I know of). The whole idea is pretty ridiculous, right?

Try this on for size:

Sean was a burly truck driver. Growing up, he always felt something was wrong. He preferred Barbie to G.I. Joe and didn’t like football or the other things boys were supposed to like. Rather, he got twitterpated by the way pantyhose felt against his skin and eventually made the self-determination that he was, in fact, a woman trapped in a man’s body.

There were others who felt the same way, and a movement was formed. They called themselves “transgender.” They made up fancy, official sounding terms like “gender identity” and “gender reassignment surgery” and demanded they be granted special rights and government-mandated benefits.

Get the picture?

… It’s Not a Joke Anymore!

  Should transsexual and transvestite (cross-dressing) men get legal “rights” based on their gender-confused “identity” and behavior? Above, a man who has become a “she-male” using female hormones rides “topless” for blocks atop a float in this year’s Chicago’s “gay pride” parade. Police did nothing. Photo: Americans For Truth.

When [CNN’s Larry] King asked [male-to-female transgender activist Steve Stanton] if he stands up when he goes to the bathroom in a woman’s restroom, he replied: “No, I don’t. No, I sit down in the woman’s bathroom.” — Traditional Values Coalition report

By Peter LaBarbera

Remember that joke about a lesbian trapped in a man’s body? … It’s not a joke anymore! Folks, it just doesn’t get any stranger than the “transgender” movement. We pity the men and women who struggle with gender issues and rebel against their God-given sex, but the gender-bending warriors (activist groups like GenderPAC) are serious about radically changing our culture. They’re even promoting “gender nonconformity” among our youth. Do not underestimate them.

The “transgender” lobby has copied aggressive “gay” activist tactics and is on the verge of creating federal “civil rights” based on gender confusion. Their top goal? Passage of the “Thought Crimes” and “ENDA Our Freedom” bills. If these become law, we’re talking about federal “rights” — and that means federal lawsuits — for “she-males” — biological men who act as if they are women and even demand to use female restrooms (see our story, “The Transg-ENDA: Man in Purple Suit Invades Ladies’ Restroom in Md.”). 

When gender-twisting groups are publishing papers titled, “Peeing In Peace: A Resource Guide For Transgender Activists And Allies” (click HERE for TVC’s analysis of the paper), you know “civil rights” is being contorted beyond recognition.

TAKE ACTION:

1. Read the reports at bottom by this message by Traditional Values Coalition — a leading pro-family group on Capitol Hill opposing the homosexual- and transsexual activist movements. See the related the AFTAH links as well.
2. Contact your U.S. Senators and U.S. Representative (e-mail: www.congress.org; phone: 202-224-3121). Tell them to oppose the ENDA (Employment Nondiscrimination Act), which would subject businesses to lawsuits by homosexual and “she-male” (“transgender”) activists;
3. Also ask your senators to vote against the S. 1105, the so-called “Hate Crimes” bill, which passed the House and is expected for a vote in the Senate soon. This “thought crimes” bill will make it easier for homosexual- and transgender activists — working hand-in-hand with liberal prosecutors — to harass conservative businessmen and Christian/pro-family advocates by falsely claiming themselves as victims of “hate.”

______________________________  

TVC reports:

Larry King Shills For Transgender Movement

Traditional Values Coalition website

August 14, 2007 — Larry King’s August 10 show featured a panel of men and women who think they’re the opposite sex. Some have already undergone so-called “sex reassignment” surgery, while others have not.

King let them tell their stories about feeling like they were the opposite sex, and he interviewed two sons of a father who decided he was a woman. The teens expressed support for their father, even though he now looks like a Hollywood actress. Their father, who now calls himself Jessica, told King that he’s a lesbian and dates women. He told King, “I identify as lesbian, yes, absolutely.”

King also interviewed Steve Stanton, the former city manager of Largo, Florida. Steve decided he was a woman and currently dresses like one. He has not had a sex-change operation but is scheduled for one. When King asked him if he stands up when he goes to the bathroom in a woman’s restroom, he replied: “No, I don’t. No, I sit down in the woman’s bathroom.”

TVC’s reports, “A Gender Identity Disorder Goes Mainstream”  and “Will Transgender Activists Come To Your School?” explain how the transgender activist movement is seeking to destroy the idea of male and female.  In addition, transgender activists are seeking to have their “gender identity” given federally protected class status under three key bills being considered in Congress: ENDA, Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act, and the Clarification of Federal Employment Protections Act.

There are many practical, secular-oriented arguments against creating legal rights based on aberrant sex and gender-confused “identity.”  I encourage you to read my friend John Biver’s excellent series, “Bad News for the Gay Rights Movement,” on the Family Taxpayers Network (FTN) website.  John (info@familytaxpayers.net) is FTN’s president, and a very smart guy who is not religious but would risk going to jail to defend my religious freedom to oppose homosexuality.  I’d do the same for him.

We who are religious should understand that you do not have to be a Christian, or a Muslim, or a Jew, to see the absurdity of revolutionizing civil rights law to accommodate historically taboo and destructive sexual behaviors that can be changed.  Please share these articles with your friends. — Peter LaBarbera 

Click on the individual links below for each article:

Bad News for the “Gay Rights” Movement

 

Get over your Moralityphobia

 

Right and Wrong isn’t Dead Yet

 

Privacy v. Revolution

 

Successes, Parades, and Leaven

 

The Broken Window Theory

 

Psychology and Morality

 

The Plight of the TriSexual  (A Parody)

 

Gender Identity Disorder

 

Friends, Family, and Children

 

Health Realities

 

Resetting the Proper Context

 

Morality and the “Gay Rights” Debate

 

Fox News reports the following:

Deductive Reasoning

 

A 63-year-old Boston resident is suing the IRS because it is refusing to allow a $25,000 deduction — for a sex-change operation.

 

Rhiannon O’Donnabhain was a married father of three — when he underwent the operation at age 57. The IRS rejected the write-off — saying the tax code does not allow deductions for cosmetic surgery unless it is medically necessary. O’Donnabhain says the surgery follows a medical diagnosis of gender identity disorder, and advocates say it should be treated like other medical procedures. They say the IRS ruling is motivated by politics and prejudice.

 

O’Donnabhain’s case could set a precedent for the up to 2,000 people a year who undergo sex-change surgery in the U.S.

 

—FOX News Channel’s Martin Hill contributed to this report.

Reprinted with permission from Illinois Family Institute’s website: 

By Thorin Anderson, July 5, 2007 
 
These are confusing days in which we live, and the area of greatest confusion is that of the roles of gender in society.

If I understand it correctly, it is not only acceptable, but preferable for women to act like men. Is this not the essence of contemporary feminism? Women are expected to desire and seek jobs that have been traditionally limited to men, whether it be truck driving, politics, construction, or police work. Why it is that traditional men’s jobs are more desirable I do not know. Has someone said that men’s work is more important than traditional women’s work?

If so, who? Hmm, men, right?

Regardless, it is clear that the current thinking is that women are served best by a culture where they can act like men. This is so accepted that no one bats an eye to hear women swear like sailors and dress like construction workers.

Drag Queens as Role Models? This is a man, but he goes by “Raquel Blake” and served as the Master of Ceremonies at the Boston homosexual “youth pride” event–subsidized by the taxpayers through the Massachusetts “Commission on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Youth.” One leader celebrated how, for the first time, the (Democratic) Massachusetts governor’s proclamation in support of “youth pride” mentioned “transgender and bisexual” youth.

Porno PFLAG: Another wholesome role model for children….The shirt worn by this man reads, “I [Heart sign] Penis; PFLAG: We Are Family”; PFLAG (Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays) is a national parents group that erroneously believes that the way to properly love a “GLBT” child is by affirming his or her choice to live in a homosexual, bisexual or transgendered lifestyle. Why are PFLAG and other homosexual groups so reckless in exposing children to promiscuous and perverted sexual messages?

Faces of Lesbian Youth Pride: Remember when kids “hamming it up” meant making funny faces? Here’s the modern, Massachusetts homosexual “youth pride” version: three girls act out lesbian lust for the camera. Yes, children are corrupted when educators and the state promote the acceptance of homosexual behavior and gender confusion.

Is it really “loving” to confirm teenagers (or even pre-teens) as “gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered” — without, of course, informing them about the ramifications of those lifestyles? Should the government promote transsexualism (cross-dressing) and bisexuality to young people as normative behavior? On THIS LINK, MassResistance exposes the annual homosexual/bisexual/transgender “youth pride” event in Boston.

You need to see this, even if it takes you FAR from your “comfort zone”! This is where self-styled “queer” activists and their liberal allies want to take the nation: full governmental support for the promotion of radical and dangerous sexual/gender behaviors to impressionable children, organizing through the public schools. Please take the time to view the video and photos on my friend Brian Camenker’s MassResistance website (scroll down a tad for the video), then pass this on to a friend. Get informed, then get involved to stop the corruption of our young people.– Peter LaBarbera

MassResistance writes:

=== 1.  View the photos (and video): Homosexual “Youth Pride” event in downtown Boston was worse than you could imagine.  Your state government at work. (No wonder the Governor wouldn’t be there!)  ===

“Love, simply love. Love, simply love.”  That’s the message that was pumped over the loudspeakers at the homosexual lobby’s annual “Youth Pride” Day, May 12. And that was just the beginning.

The annual “Youth Pride” event is a kind of “meet and greet” for the homosexual “Gay Straight Alliance” clubs in high schools (and middle schools) across Massachusetts. It’s where the adult activists bring all the kids to one place for an entire day each year. They mingle with all kinds of very weird adults, many apparently quite disturbed.  As in past years, it started with speeches and a carnival of sorts at noon. Then a parade of the kids and adults through the streets of Boston. Later, they all went to the “transgender prom” in the main interior of Boston City Hall, compliments of Mayor Menino.

It’s pretty ghastly to look at. To say this was a sex offender’s candy store is not an exaggeration. This year there were more weird adults mingling everywhere — lots of them official guests of the organizers.  The “transgender” element was everywhere — cross-dressing men and women trying to become men. And you could tell that many of the kids were very confused and vulnerable. Kids were encouraged to act out their “gayness” and feel “safe” doing it.

Gov. Deval Patrick, a public supporter of the homosexual movement in Massachusetts, declined to attend this event because of its reputation for depraved activity with children. That turned out to be a good choice for him (tho not for the kids).

But official state support was everywhere. The Governor released an official state proclamation, which was read over the loudspeakers. The new head of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (a man “married” to another man) gave a speech. The police were there for “security” and cleared the streets for the parade. And it was organized by the new super-charged “Massachusetts Commission on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Youth” created by the Legislature last year.

Take a look for yourself at our report [this link takes you to several others about “youth pride”]: http://www.massresistance.org/docs/events07/youthpride07/index.html

Excerpted from AnnCoulter.com; read the whole column HERE. Note the part about Tinky Winky: yes, Virginia, there is a conspiracy — a conspiracy in the liberal, pro-“gay” media to make good people committed to Biblical values look stupid — and Falwell was a victim: 

JERRY FALWELL — SAY HELLO TO RONALD REAGAN!
May 16, 2007

No man in the last century better illustrated Jesus’ warning that “All men will hate you because of me” than the Rev. Jerry Falwell, who left this world on Tuesday. Separately, no man better illustrates my warning that it doesn’t pay to be nice to liberals.

Falwell was a perfected Christian. He exuded Christian love for all men, hating sin while loving sinners. This is as opposed to liberals, who just love sinners. Like Christ ministering to prostitutes, Falwell regularly left the safe confines of his church to show up in such benighted venues as CNN.

He was such a good Christian that back when we used to be on TV together during Clinton’s impeachment, I sometimes wanted to say to him, “Step aside, reverend — let the mean girl handle this one.” (Why, that guy probably prayed for Clinton!)

For putting Christ above everything — even the opportunity to make a humiliating joke about Clinton — Falwell is known as “controversial.” Nothing is ever as “controversial” as yammering about Scripture as if, you know, it’s the word of God or something.

From the news coverage of Falwell’s death, I began to suspect his first name was “Whether You Agree With Him or Not.”

Even Falwell’s fans, such as evangelist Billy Graham and former President Bush, kept throwing in the “We didn’t always agree” disclaimer. Did Betty Friedan or Molly Ivins get this many “I didn’t always agree with” qualifiers on their deaths? And when I die, if you didn’t always agree with me, would you mind keeping it to yourself?

Let me be the first to say: I ALWAYS agreed with the Rev. Falwell. ….

… I note that in Falwell’s list of Americans he blamed for ejecting God from public life, only the gays got a qualifier. Falwell referred to gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle. ….

… Also the ones who promote the gay lifestyle in a children’s cartoon.

Beginning in early 1998, the news was bristling with stories about a children’s cartoon PBS was importing from Britain that featured a gay cartoon character, Tinky Winky, the purple Teletubbie with a male voice and a red handbag.

People magazine gleefully reported that Teletubbies was “aimed at Telebabies as young as 1 year. But teenage club kids love the products’ kitsch value, and gay men have made the purse-toting Tinky Winky a camp icon.”

In the Nexis archives for 1998 alone, there are dozens and dozens of mentions of Tinky Winky being gay — in periodicals such as Newsweek, The Toronto Star, The Washington Post (twice!), The New York Times and Time magazine (also twice).

In its Jan. 8, 1999, issue, USA Today accused The Washington Post of “outing” Tinky Winky, with a “recent Washington Post In/Out list putting T.W. opposite Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche, essentially ‘outing’ the kids’ show character.”

Michael Musto of The Village Voice boasted that Tinky Winky was “out and proud,” noting that it was “a great message to kids — not only that it’s OK to be gay, but the importance of being well accessorized.”

All this appeared before Falwell made his first mention of Tinky Winky.

After one year of the mainstream media laughing at having put one over on stupid bourgeois Americans by promoting a gay cartoon character in a TV show for children, when Falwell criticized the cartoon in February 1999, that same mainstream media howled with derision that Falwell thought a cartoon character could be gay….

Click HERE to read Coulter’s entire column

H.R. 2015 Would Force a Gender Confusion Revolution on U.S. Businesses

By Peter LaBarbera

For once we agreed with Barney Frank (sort of), at least before he sold out to the “transgender” lobby. 

“There are workplace situations — communal showers, for example — when the demands of the transgender community fly in the face of conventional norms and therefore would not pass in any Congress. I’ve talked with transgender activists and what they want — and what we will be forced to defend — is for people with penises who identify as women to be able to shower with other women.”

—Homosexual Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.), BEFORE he changed his mind and embraced including “transgenders” in the Employment NonDiscrimination Act (ENDA)  

“Technically, you cannot truly change one’s sex. That’s why the procedure is not really called ‘sex change surgery’ but ‘sex reassignment surgery.’ The idea is to alter the physical appearance of a person’s anatomy to approximate as nearly as possible the anatomic arrangement of the other sex.”

— Melanie, “Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS), the Nuts & Bolts,” a “Transgender Support Site” 

*          *          *

Employment NonDiscrimination Act (H.R. 2015) Language: 

“EMPLOYER PRACTICES.—It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer—

(1) “to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise discriminate against any individual with respect to the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment of the individual, because of such individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity; or

(2) “to limit, segregate, or classify the employees or applicants for employment of the employer in any way that would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment or otherwise adversely affect the status of the individual as an employee, because of such individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.”

*          *         *

TAKE ACTION:  Call the Congress (202-224-3121) or use e-mail to urge your Representative and Senators to reject ENDA (H.R. 2015) and the insanity of forcing business across the nation to accommodate and subsidize gender confusion in the name of “civil rights.” Also, call President Bush (202-456-1414) or e-mail him at comments@whitehouse.gov to urge him to veto the “trans”-affirming ENDA, along with the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1592) that his aides have indicated will likely be vetoed. 

Fast on the heels of the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1597, recently passed by the House) is the second of two top homosexual activist priorities: ENDA, the “Employment Nondiscrimination Act,” H.R. 2015, recently introduced by homosexual Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.). Please read at the bottom of this story the homosexual newspaper Washington Blade’s analysis of the “transgender” provision of this radical bill.

To read about ENDA’s dubious “religious exemption” provision, click HERE.

Veteran observers of the “gay” movement will recall that Frank himself once strongly criticized the idea of including transsexuals in the ENDA bill (see above quote). But like most “progressives,” Frank has seen the light, or maybe he just heard the shouts — from radical “trans” activists who have skillfully adapted militant “gay” tactics to their own misguided cause, including calling their outspoken critics “transphobes.”

Several giant corporations have already settled on pro-“transgender” bathroom and dress policies — probably the same companies who would subject their employees to biased, pro-homosexual “diversity” lectures — but can you imagine inflicting these “transgender” regulations on small and mid-level companies through federal law via ENDA?

This is one of the most perverse applications of “civil rights” to date — and it’s headed straight for your business if you have 15 or more employees. What female employee wants to share the company restroom with a big-boned man claiming to be “transitioning” to “womanhood”? Will companies have to build “transgender male” and “transgender female” restrooms (or “Designated GLBT Restrooms”) to accommodate the various “orientations” and avoid government prosecution?

 

Churches and religious-oriented groups are quasi-exempt under ENDA but secular businesses owned by Christians or religious Americans are not. ENDA is a “gay” and “trans” lawyer’s dream. What about jobs such as a teacher in which the employer might not want the “transitioning” employee to model his newfound “gender identity” to children? Or service jobs (say a maitre d’) in which the employer may not want the newly “gender variant” employee to be in such a public role?

Imagine a male employee, John, who since he became employed at XYZ Corp., about a decade ago, has used the men’s restroom. Then one day he informs his boss that in a week he will come to work in a dress as “Joanna” and begin his MTF (“male-to-female”) metamorphosis into “womanhood.” (According to widely accepted regulations within the “transgender” world, he must “live” full-time as Joanna, taking female hormones, for a full year before he becomes eligible for “sex-reassignment surgery,” which will turn his healthy sex organ into a makeshift female sex organ. If you have the stomach to read what is actually done to a man’s body in “sex reassignment surgery,” click HERE, but be warned: it’s horrifying stuff. We must pray for these poor souls who are so confused that they would destroy their healthy, God-given bodies to assuage their inner conflict.)

Isn’t it a bit much to expect of normal, female XYZ employees to all of the sudden welcome “Joanna’s” presence in the ladies’ restroom? In fact, as I read the Blade account below, under ENDA’s proposed regulations, John/Joanna would be able to use the female restroom BEFORE his “sex reassignment” surgery. Indeed, the website “e-transgender,” quoting the homosexual/transgender group Human Rights Campaign, advises corporate human resources managers as follows:

“Employers should grant restroom access according to an employee’s full-time gender presentation.”

Read: if John “lives” (identifies) as Joanna full-time, he should be able to use the female restroom. Biologically-born ladies, beware!

What about the privacy rights of John’s female co-workers? Don’t they have the right not to feel personally invaded as they go to the restroom at their job? Will businesses have to put out new bathroom policies and undergo company-wide bathroom-usage training to explain the new policies?

 

But the situation becomes a crisis when the federal government — aided by politically correct activist judges — forces businesses to advance this Gender Confusion Revolution in the name of “civil rights.”

Is this really an area in which the federal government should even be involved? It’s bad enough that big business is rolling over to the bizarre “T” (Transgender) agenda — with some even subsidizing horrifying “sex-reassignment surgeries” that destroy men’s and women’s healthy bodies. (I once attended a conference for FTM (“female to male”) “transgenders” in which young women proudly showed off their flat chests — the result of “chest surgery” operations in which their healthy breasts were removed to make them look like the “men” they wanted to be.)

Of course, the larger goal here — shared by the “gay” and “transgender” lobbies — is to change your mind and heart regarding gender-confused conduct. The law is merely a tool in their never-ending quest to overturn America’s Judeo-Christian norms regarding family, sex and marriage.

We predict that businesses will deal with this very sad and strange “transgender” issue by building special restrooms and/or shower facilities for their “transgender” or alternatively “gendered” employees — spending countless millions to subsidize mentally disordered, deviant behavior. (Gender Identity Disorder, or GID, is a recognized mental disorder.) This corporate spending would accelerate dramatically should ENDA become law, as businesses would fear lawsuits if they failed to honor “trans” rights.

Call Congress (202-224-3121) or use e-mail to urge your U.S. Representative and Senators to reject ENDA, H.R. 2015. Also, call President Bush (202-456-1414) or e-mail him at comments@whitehouse.gov and ask him to veto the pro-“trans” ENDA, along with the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1592) that his aides have already indicated will likely be vetoed.