A student has been suspended from school in America for coming to class dressed as a pirate.

But the disciplinary action has provoked controversy – because the student says that the ban violates his rights, as the pirate costume is part of his religion.

Bryan Killian says that he follows the Pastafarian religion, and that as a crucial part of his faith, he must wear ‘full pirate regalia’ as prescribed in the holy texts of Pastafarianism.

The school, however, say that his pirate garb was disruptive.

Pastafarianism gained wide attention when its key prophet, Bobby Henderson, wrote to the Kansas School Board during the height of the controversy over ‘Intelligent Design‘ being taught in science classes. His letter, also published on his website, demanded equal time be given to the teachings of the Flying Spaghetti Monster as was given to ID and evolutionary theory.

Since then, the Flying Spaghetti Monster has gained countless followers worldwide, although there are those who remain spagnostic.

The school, in North Buncombe, North Carolina, remains adamant that their decision to suspend Killian for a day has nothing to do with his religion, and quite a lot to do with his repeated refusal to heed warnings against wearing pirate outfits. (Source-Sunday Metro)

Pirates, unite! We must stand by our fellow Pastafarians when they are oppressed. AAAARRrrrrggggg.

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India decriminalized homosexuality today, marking a major victory for gay rights activists worldwide. But there’s still a long way to go, according to international watchdog ILGA.

Being gay in India carried the risk of a lifelong prison term, reports the ILGA’s May 2009 world map of gay rights. At least five other countries — Mauritania, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Iran — substitute the death penalty in place of imprisonment. Only six countries afford gay couples marriage with full legal rights: South Africa, Spain, Belgium, Norway, Sweden and Canada.

Harvey Milk

“I cannot prevent anyone from getting angry, or mad, or frustrated. I can only hope that they’ll turn that anger and frustration and madness into something positive, so that two, three, four, five hundred will step forward, so the gay doctors will come out, the gay lawyers, the gay judges, gay bankers, gay architects … I hope that every professional gay will say ‘enough’, come forward and tell everybody, wear a sign, let the world know. Maybe that will help.” Harvey Milk, 1978

“I fully realize that a person who stands for what I stand for, an activist, a gay activist, becomes the target or the potential target for a person who is insecure, terrified, afraid, or very disturbed with themselves.”

“It’s not my victory, it’s yours and yours and yours. If a gay can win, it means there is hope that the system can work for all minorities if we fight. We’ve given them hope.”

And perhaps the statement of his I love the most:

“All young people, regardless of sexual orientation or identity, deserve a safe and supportive environment in which to achieve their full potential.”

If you’re a member of the LGBT community, celebrate today be being yourself, openly and honestly. Peace, love and long life to all my brothers and sisters.

(Thanks to Queer Vision for the quotes)

The Obama administration has held “preliminary discussions” with Pentagon leaders about lifting the ban on open military service by gays and lesbians but is not rushing into a legislative battle to repeal the Clinton-era policy known as “don’t ask, don’t tell,” retired Marine Gen. James Jones said May 10.

Jones, Obama’s national security adviser, appearing on the ABC News program “This Week,” would not predict the outcome of the hotly contested policy issue, and even supporters of repeal in the House of Representatives are warning they would be unlikely to prevail in a vote on the issue if one was held today, which is part of the reason why the administration has been moving slowly and trying to build more momentum for change.

In a personal note sent to former Army 2nd Lt. Sandy Tsao, discharged earlier this year after announcing she was a lesbian, Obama said he still plans to push for change.

“It is because of outstanding Americans like you that I committed to changing our current policy,” Obama said in the undated, handwritten note to Tsao, a copy of which was posted on www.glaadblog.org, the Web site of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Discrimination.

“Although it will take some time to complete (partly because it needs congressional action) I intend to fulfill my commitment,” Obama said in the note. (Source-Air Force Times)

I know the LGBT community is focused on the gay marriage issue these days, and I know that the community does not always feel that the military is a suitable place for LGBT people to be. Still, this is an issue which requires the vocal and visible input of every community member.

Thousands of us have served honorably throughout history. We have been on the front lines and we’ve served in support. We’ve flown planes and treated the wounded. We’ve been held prisoner and we’ve been in foxholes.

The fear-mongering that the conservative right is engaged in is transparently nonsensical. “They’ll never be able to restrain themselves in the barracks“. Then why aren’t you equally opposed to gays in school or your local health club? Because you know that you’re spreading lies. We have “restrained” ourselves for years, in many venues, and most likely you never even knew the guy or gal changing clothes next to you was gay. If sexual attraction can’t be controlled or suppressed when necessary, why do we allow men to be gynecologists?

Those opposed to gays serving in the military, as well as those intent on keeping the dishonest DADT policy in force, have no reasonable objections, provide no research, can cite no studies supporting their position. Their only interest is in spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt. They ignore the hundreds of years of honorable service already performed by members of the LGBT community.

They get away with this because too few of us veterans are willing to speak up and openly confirm our service. We allow them to make it appear this is a small matter concerning only a few members of the military. We have given them the opportunity to parade their lies as reality.

If you are a LGBT veteran of the U.S. military, let people know. Talk about it, blog about it, write your congress person about it. Hell, write Obama and let him know that this DADT policy is absurd. It’s unworkable and an insult to every proud military person who happens to be gay. It needs to be done away with and LGBT folks need to be allowed to serve openly and honestly. It wasn’t easy for Truman to integrate the military, yet now we think nothing of whites and blacks serving together in the same units defending this nation formed on the premise of e pluribus unam, out of many, one. We are one, we are all American citizens. Obama needs to do what is right, not always what is popular.

They were dismissed for the sole reason that to the military the act of honestly stating your personal sexual orientation as a homosexual is a homosexual act. They have not, in the vast majority of cases, been accused of sexually assaulting another person or for engaging in sexual behavior with another person. They were not even accused of flaunting their sexual orientation.

Gays have served honorably in the U.S. military for decades, for the most part undetected and unnoticed. If gays serving in the military is sure to lead to disruptions in the barracks and a lowering of overall moral, as many opposed to their service contend, where’s the evidence of this? Surely with the thousands of gays who have served there must have been hundreds of incidents of assault and homosexual rape, since we are told by those who oppose their service that they cannot possibly control themselves and would be a real and present danger to heterosexual troops.

There is a historical precedent for refusing to allow discrimination in the military.

When President Truman ordered the military to desegregate in 1948, the vast majority of the military — not to mention the population in most of the countries from the South where a big portion of the members of the military come from — had sharply racist tendencies against the blacks. When he sent his 10-point program to Congress on February 2, 1948, instructing “the Secretary of Defense to take steps to have the remaining instances of discrimination in the armed services eliminated as rapidly as possible,” he endured a storm of criticism from Southern Democrats in the run-up to the national nominating convention. But even when support for discrimination spread so far beyond the military and political stakes were so high, his response was not to postpone doing what was right. Instead, he responded by saying “My forebears were Confederates….But my very stomach turned over when I had learned that Negro soldiers, just back from overseas, were being dumped out of Army trucks in Mississippi and beaten.” President Truman ordered the military’s desegregation because he understood that the traditional culture of the military and appeasement to any biases and racism that may have been associated with it was not a condition that he had to accept as the price of having a strong army.

(Source)

How hard would it be for President Obama to end the practice of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell? Not hard at all.

A new study, about to be published by a group of experts in military law, shows that President Obama does, in fact, have stroke-of-the-pen authority to suspend gay discharges. The “don’t ask, don’t tell” law requires the military to fire anyone found to be gay or lesbian. But there is nothing requiring the military to make such a finding. The president can simply order the military to stop investigating service members’ sexuality.

An executive order would not get rid of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” law, but would take the critical step of suspending its implementation, hence rendering it effectively dead. Once people see gays and lesbians serving openly, legally and without problems, it will be much easier to get rid of the law at a later time.

(Source)

Dan Choi, a West Point graduate and officer in the Army National Guard who is fluent in Arabic and who returned recently from Iraq, recently revealed on the Rachel Maddow show that he was gay. He has now been informed that he is to be dismissed from the National Guard. This is Obama’s first chance to act on his stated goal of repealing DADT.

During a presidential forum held by the Human Rights Campaign in August of 2007, candidate Obama said, “I will task the Defense Department and the senior command structure in every branch of the armed forces with developing an action plan for the implementation of a full repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell…. America is ready to get rid of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. All that is required is leadership.”

Until recently, on the White House Web site’s Civil Rights page, the following was posted.

Repeal Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell:
President Obama agrees with former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff John Shalikashvili and other military experts that we need to repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. The key test for military service should be patriotism, a sense of duty, and a willingness to serve. Discrimination should be prohibited. The U.S. government has spent millions of dollars replacing troops kicked out of the military because of their sexual orientation. Additionally, more than 300 language experts have been fired under this policy, including more than 50 who are fluent in Arabic. The President will work with military leaders to repeal the current policy and ensure it helps accomplish our national defense goals.

This has since been altered to read, “He supports repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in a sensible way that strengthens our armed forces and our national security“, a change that worries some that he is weakening in his resolve.

This is not the time to let old and irrational fears destroy the lives of so many young men and women proudly and voluntarily serving their country in the military. Now is the time for President Obama to disallow the termination of Lt. Choi and take a stand against the worthless DADT rule.

Those who oppose marriage equality want to make us afraid.  There is nothing to fear when loving, committed couples gain legal recognition for their marriages and their families.  As more states recognize this, it will become even clearer, perhaps even boring.  This is simply a question of people who want to be happy, who want to protect their families, and want to live their lives with the person they love.  We all share these goals.  The fight for marriage equality may be teaching us that we lesbian, gay, and straight people have far more in common than we thought.

Read his full article at the Seminole.

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I am Gay.

I went to go see the movie Milk today. I was seven when Harvey Milk and George Moscone were shot and killed by Dan White, who was crazy on Twinkies.

Its amazing how powerful those three words are, even today. I am Gay.

Parents would disown their own children; friends would walk away. I am Gay.

In some cases entire lives would be wrecked. Destroyed.

I am Gay.

Think about what you thought when you saw the title of this post. How would it change how you think of me, if I were gay? Would it change it at all? Really?

Click on over and read the rest of his excellent comment.

North Carolina Town Votes to Support Same Sex Marriage Rights

On Tuesday the town of Carrboro, NC, population approximately 19,000, made a significant step in civil rights: The Carrboro Board of Aldermen voted 5-0 to support civil marriage for same-sex couples.

Earlier in the month, in response to California’s Proposition 8 which eliminated same-sex marriage, and Arizona’s prop 102 and Florida’s Prop 2 prohibiting same-sex marriage, board member Jackie Gist proposed a resolution of the board’s support of civil marriage for same-sex couples. The resolution reads:

The Election Day victories by anti-gay activists in California, Florida, Arizona and Arkansas were a painful reminder that the gay rights movement still faces many challenges. Civil marriage for same-sex couples must include all the benefits commonly bestowed upon opposite-sex couples, including, among other rights, health care coverage and related decision-making, privileges under immigration and naturalization law, survivor benefits, inheritance rights and child custody.

Carrboro–located close to Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina– likes to refer itself as the Seattle of the South or Paris of the Piedmonts. The town boast a lively arts community and lots of live music, a poetry festival and an annual Community Dinner to celebrate the county’s diversity, plus a fishing rodeo! Carrboro’s move to support same sex marriage will hopefully inspire other communities around the country, not just in affected states, to speak up and take similar action.

…this week the Vatican’s permanent observer to the United Nations, said the Holy See would oppose a resolution that would protect gays from being killed just because they are gay, because it would “add new categories of those protected from discrimination” and could lead to reverse discrimination against traditional heterosexual marriage.

The French resolution, scheduled to be proposed this week, recommends protecting Gays and Lesbians from being jailed or killed because of their sexual orientation and is being introduced to the UN on behalf of the European Union.

But Archbishop Celestino Migliore said, if adopted, the resolution would create “new and implacable discriminations,” and also said that states which do not recognize same-sex unions as ‘matrimony’ will be pilloried and made an objects of pressure.

However, the French resolution, which is supported by all 27 members of the European Union, says absolutely nothing about gay marriage; it is about ending jail and death penalty sentences gays yet face in more than 85 countries including Afghanistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Yemen where you can still be killed for being gay.

An editorial in Italy’s mainstream La Stampa newspaper said the Vatican’s reasoning was “grotesque.” Another editorial in Rome’s La Repubblica newspaper said the Vatican’s position “leaves one dumbstruck.”

Gay rights activist’s in Italy and in other European Union countries fear that the Vatican is calling for another “Holy Alliance” between the Vatican and Islamic states in the United Nations to oppose the proposed resolution, just as they did in 1994, when the Vatican teamed up with Islamic and Latin American countries to defeat an abortion rights proposal.

They have also said that the Vatican’s reasoning smacked of “total idiocy and madness” and what the Vatican really feared was a “chain reaction in favor of legally recognized homosexual unions in countries, like Italy, where there is currently no legislation.”

A Vatican spokesman said yesterday “no-one wants the death penalty or jail or fines for homosexuals”, he however did defend Archbishop Migliore’s comments, adding that the Vatican was in the majority on the issue, pointing out that 50 member states of the United Nations have adhered to the proposal in question while more than 150 have not. (lezgetreal.com)

This would be simply sad if the result of this decision didn’t result in the killing of gay men and women in over 85 countries around the world simply for being gay.

Once upon a time the church was seen as a refuge for the world’s oppressed and downtrodden. It was the champion of the weak, the meek and the disadvantaged. It told us the meek would inherit the Earth. It implored us to treat others as we would want to be treated. The church offered hope to those without hope, love to the unloved, peace to all.

Now the Catholic church has exposed its true nature. It’s nothing more than a repressive government, much like those it supports in the 3rd world.

The killing of gays for being gay is on par with the killing of Jews for being Jewish, which was once done by another government the Catholic church was comfortable allowing to practice genocide. To be sure, they don’t actually kill the gays themselves. They can pretend their hands are without stain. But they will be judged by the rest of humanity by their actions, their spineless refusal to actually practice what they preach.

Not accepting gays in the fold is one thing; to stand by without objection while they are being killed is unconscionable.