Culture shift re: homosexuality, bisexuality, etc.Events during 2009-FEB illustrating |
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2009-FEB-03: CA: California supreme court expedites hearing: The court has scheduled its hearing of oral arguments on the constitutionality of Prop. 8 for MAR-05. This is considerably earlier than expected. They are required to issue their ruling within 90 days of the arguments -- about MAY-04. 1 |
Prop. 8 eliminated equal marriage rights for same-sex couples. About 45 briefs promoting the unconstitutionality of Prop. 8 have been filed by municipalities, human rights agencies, liberal religious organizations, and gay positive groups. A small number of conservative religious organizations have filed briefs supportingd Prop. 8's constitutionality and have asked the state to forcibly divorce about 18,000 married same-sex couples against their will.
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2009-FEB-05: HI: Hearings held on HB 444: The first of two hearings
were held by the House Judiciary Committee on a bill to create a
system of same-sex unions in Hawaii with all of the rights privileges and
obligations of opposite-sex marriages in the state.
More details. |
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2009-FEB-06: WY: House defeats constitutional amendment:
The Wyoming House overwhelmingly defeated a joint resolution that would have
defined marriage as between one man and one woman in the state constitution.
3
More details |
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2009-FEB-06: NJ: Judge permits divorce of same-sex couple:
Mary Jacobson, a New Jersey state judge ruled that the state recognizes
same-sex marriages performed outside of the state for the purpose of divorce.
A lesbian couple had married in Canada and sought a divorce in New Jersey.
4 |
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2009-FEB-08: USA: Trends in polls on same-sex marriage (SSM): I stumbled across a fascinating graph on the "swimming freestyle" weblog by Jay McDonough. It is titled "Gay marriage will be legal by 2012." The graph is too tiny to read, but its message is clear: |
The vertical axis reads 0 to 100%. The horizontal axis ranges from to 1986 to 2006. The red line indicates opposition to SSM; the blue line shows support for SSM; the black line: don't know. In politics, momentum is everything. The dots are presumably from various polls of randomly selected American adults that did not give civil unions as an option. 2
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2009-FEB-09: UT: Governor supports civil unions:
Governor Jon Huntsman of Utah (R) announced that he is backing a proposal for
civil unions in the state. He also backs the Common Ground Initiative -- two
bills dealing with GLBT rights. Recent polls show 70% opposition among the
public on civil unions. 9 | ||||||
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2009-FEB-11: IA: Iowa Family Policy Center ACTION complains
about Civil Rights Commission: The Iowa Family Policy Center
promotes opposite-sex marriage, and denigrates same-sex marriage. They are
concerned about two bills in the Legislature which would expand the
enforcement powers of the Commission. They state that: "Instead of broadening
'civil rights,' these bills would further threaten to punish those who, for
conscience's sake, don't agree with giving special 'rights' to individuals who
engage in deviant sexual behavior." We suspect that they are referring to a
bill that adds sexual orientation to the existing civil rights legislation,
and thus would protect persons of all sexual orientations equally: whether
they be heterosexual, bisexual and homosexual.
9 | ||||||
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2009-FEB-16: North America: First lesbian wedding on a soap: ABC's "All my children" featured daytime soap's first same-sex wedding. Needless to say, a woman clergyperson officiated. She referred to the brides as establishing a new family. Bianca Montgomery (played by Eden Riegel) married Reese Williams (played by Tamara Braun). Riegel said:
Braun said:
There was the usual reaction:
PLEASE don't click on the arrow below if you don't want images coming into your home of two women playing the roles of a loving committed couple getting married.
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2009-FEB-17: USA: A Focus on the Family analyst complains about Hollywood: Caleb Price, research analyst at Focus on the Family, said some
writers in Hollywood are attempting to desensitize the public to
homosexuality and "transgenderism."
He said:
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2009-FEB-17: USA: Family Research Council's "Please send money"
mailing: Tony Perkins sent an Email to their mailing list raising
alarm at President Obama's "Agenda". Unfortunately, his description of
the agenda is unclear in places:
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2009-FEB-22: CA: "Milk" wins two Oscars: "Milk", the
movie about the life and assassination of Harvey Milk, won two Oscars.
According to the Reconciling Ministries Network: "Many of the stars wore white
ribbons to the Oscars to advocate for marriage equality in the wake of Proposition 8." Sean Penn won an Oscar for Actor in a Leading Role. During his acceptance speech he said:
Dustin Lance Black won an Oscar for Writing (Original Screenplay). During his acceptance speech, he said:
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2009-FEB-25: ON: Ruling by the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario: We stumbled across a ruling in a human rights case involving an evangelical group Christian Horizons (CH) and a former employee, Connie Heintz, a lesbian. CH operates a chain of homes for mentally disabled adults in Ontario, Canada. Their now discontinued Lifestyle and Morality statement referred to homosexual behavior as "unnatural," "immoral," and "contrary to the Scriptures." Adjudicator Michael Gottheil ruled on 2008-APR-15 that the evangelical group had created a poisonous work environment that forced Connie to leave. In his ruling, Gottheil wrote a rather powerful statement: |
"Christian Horizon's policy is discriminatory. While some elements of Canadian society may continue to debate whether gays and lesbians should be treated equally and entitled to equal rights and opportunity, from a legal perspective that debate has ended." 7
Site navigation:
References used:
The following information sources were used to prepare and update the above essay. The hyperlinks are not necessarily still active today.
- "Breaking news! California Supreme Court to Hear Oral Arguments in Prop 8 Legal Challenge on March 5," Equality California, 2008-FEB-03.
- "Gay marriage will be legal by 2012," Swimming Freestyle blog, at: http://www.swimmingfreestyle.net/
- "Wyoming House Kills Anti?Gay Marriage Bill," The Advocate, 2009-FEB-09, at: http://www.advocate.com/
- Michael Foust, "Wyo. House defeats marriage amendment," Baptist Press, 2009-FEB-09. at: http://www.bpnews.net/
- "Soap features daytime TV's first lesbian wedding," CNN, 2009-FEB-16, at: http://www.cnn.com/
- Matthew Morgan, "ABC Features First Lesbian 'Wedding' on Daytime TV," CitizenLink article, 2009-FEB-17.
- Michael Gottheil, "Decision," Heintz v. Christian Horizons, Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario, 2008 HRTO 22, 2008-APR-15, at: http://www.canlii.org/
- "Flashnet... 2/25/2009," Reconciling Ministries Network," 2009-FEB-25, at: http://www.rmnetwork.org/
- "Gov. Huntsman of Utah backs civil unions," UPI, 2009-FEB-10, at: http://www.upi.com/
Copyright © 2009 to 2017 by Ontario
Consultants on Religious Tolerance
Initial posting: 2009-FEB-03
Latest update: 2017-NOV-11
Author: B.A. Robinson

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