One Young Man's Emotional Story about Gay Conversion Therapy and Self-Acceptance

by Nomad

Under the influence of the evangelicals, the Republican party has for years now endorsed the practice of attempting to alter or reverse an individual's sexual orientation using psychological or spiritual interventions. Otherwise known as gay conversion therapy.
Some have compared it to Victorian efforts to impose conformity by converting left-handers into "normal" right-handed socially-approved human beings. However, as the linked video below suggests, the implications for this kind of forced suppression/inhibition of sexual orientation can be psychologically-devastating to the individuals.

More fundamentally, perhaps, the majority of medical professionals strongly doubt that the "corrective" techniques are ever successful.

A Wall So High: Senator Sam Ervin and North Carolina's Controversial Potty Police Law

by Nomad

With his Southern drawl, dry wit, and country-lawyer persona, Senator Sam Ervin became a national hero to many during the Watergate hearings. Yet, here was a staunch conservative Democrat- a Dixie-Crat.
Today he very likely would be disgusted by what's going on in his state. 

Remembering Senator Ervin

Most of us of a certain (unspecified) age recognize the name, Sam Ervin. During the long painful summer of 1973, Congress convened a special session in order to get down to the bottom of an extraordinary White House scandal, involving a contracted break-in of opposition offices and a badly-handled coverup by the president.

Starting from May 17, 1973, the Senate Watergate Committee began its nationally televised hearings and throughout that summer, the nation stood witness to every detail of Nixon's dirty tricks and his vain attempts to keep them from wrecking his presidency. 

At the helm of that committee was a flabby-jowled Democratic Senator named Ervin.

Ervin was a treat for those of us- like me- incapable of understanding the Washington proceedings or of appreciating history in the making.

As I recall, he came across initially as a rather slow, rather amusing grandfatherly type. It was easy enough to dismiss him as a bumbler or cartoon character.
In fact, it was soon understood that Ervin was sly fox and resolution determined to get the facts.

Some 319 hours were broadcast overall, and 85% of U.S. households watched some portion of them. The audio feed also was broadcast gavel-to-gavel on scores of National Public Radio stations, making the hearings available to people in their cars and workplaces...

Over a year later, the president- who had assured the American public he was not a crook- was forced to step aside, unable to clear his name and unwilling to be held accountable. On August 8, 1974, Nixon, with a weary salute from the steps of his presidential helicopter, became the first president in US history to resign from office.

Ervin took a lot of heat during the Watergate hearings. Rolling Stone noted at the time:

Jim Fuller of the Charlotte (N.C.) Observer reports his newspaper gets calls at all hours of the day and night, some from as far away as Houston, demanding that "that fat, senile old man" lay off the President. "The most common threat," Fuller says, "is castration." Ervin doesn't look worried.

Why Rand Paul's Remarks about Gay Discrimination by Employers Exposes his True Character

by Nomad

While Rand Paul claims to be against all forms of discrimination when it comes to discrimination against gays in the workplace, Paul is willing to look the other way.

In Iowa on Wednesday, Presidential candidate Rand Paul exposed himself. 
Not literally. 

Today MSNBC reports noted that during his 3-day tour in Iowa, Paul was asked whether there was a need for hiring. He didn't think discrimination against gay and lesbians was a matter for the courts. He came out against any employment protections for LGBT citizens, saying:

"I think society is rapidly changing and that if you are gay, there are plenty of places that will hire you."

Discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation by employers was something that all gay and Lesbian Americans should just put up with. They had no right to expect any protection under the law.

Paul said that designating the LGBT community as a protected class, like race, gender, and ethnicity, would create a new group "who can now sue." 

Demanding equality is not, and has never been, seeking to become a "protected class."

And the same argument used by Pand could be applied to every other group presently covered by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of race, color, sex, or ethnic origin.

Once you open the doors for discrimination in labor practices, it can easily spread to other areas, like the public sphere. 

Indeed, Rand Paul's reply could have been used for anti-discrimination laws in the past. The owners of "whites-only' restaurants or swimming pools could easily have made the same arguments. "There are other restaurants for blacks to eat at. Other swimming pools that black children can swim in. If they don't like sitting at the back of the bus, then let them walk."

If you think that comparison is an exaggeration, it's just not true.
Five years ago, that very question was brought up and Paul stumbled and fumbled for an answer.

Have Republican Candidates Huckabee and Cruz Just Committed Treason in the Kim Davis Case?

by Nomad

Statements made by two Republican candidates regarding the Kim Davis case may have crossed a line by encouraging rebellion against the authority of the Supreme Court. And it's called treason.

Committing treason in a nation which prizes the right of free speech has always been tricky business. Unlike many other countries in the world, in the US, people are allowed to say pretty much whatever they want. 

However, the freedom of expression has, contrary to conventional wisdom, never been absolute or unlimited. There are slander and libel laws, for example. Calling for insurrection is also proscribed as a abuse of freedom of speech. 

The  U.S. Code Chapter 115  defines treason like this:,

“Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.”

Gay Cure Therapy and How the GOP in Texas Officially Endorses Consumer Fraud

by Nomad

Try to picture this. The official party platform of a key state giving its stamp of approval for consumer fraud, namely a kind of therapy which has been thoroughly discredited by professionals and is possibly dangerous.

What does this say about the ethics of that party?

Quackery Therapy

This week, New Jersey Superior Court Judge Peter F. BarsioJr. ruled  against the gay conversion therapy provider Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing (JONAH). His official ruling in the case filed by Southern Poverty Law Center against the company states:

It is a misrepresentation in violation of [New Jersey’s Consumer Fraud Act], in advertising or selling conversion therapy services, to describe homosexuality, not as being a normal variation of human sexuality, but as being a mental illness, disease, disorder, or equivalent thereof.

David Dinielli, SPLC deputy legal director, commenting on the court decision,

“For the first time, a court has ruled that it is fraudulent as a matter of law for conversion therapists to tell clients that they have a mental disorder that can be cured. This is the principal lie the conversion therapy industry uses throughout the country to peddle its quackery to vulnerable clients. Gay people don’t need to be cured, and we are thrilled that the court has recognized this.”

Over the years, organizations, mostly religion-based, were set up  to push  conversion therapy. The idea was that homosexuality was something that could, or needed to be fixed.