Dennis Prager: “Many Slaveholders Were Nice People”

Prager is a paid by the right wing normally by the Mercer family to the tune of 36 million dollars to push on YouTube the conservative whatever Republican party wants push is.   Sometimes it is very painful to see the positions they push to forward to advance the republican points.    The bad part is the republicans are funding this.  Yet there is no left democratic alternative paid for by left wing billionaires.    The right wing has been doing this for decades.   The Mercers are White power white Christian supremacy’s who have founded and pay for many right-wing media outlets.   Including Steve Bannon.   The left seriously need to up their game on this.   The point is these people want to change the world to have only their accepted ones in charge of everything and the left wants everyone to have a say in how everything is run.   But our side either doesn’t have the money or won’t spend it on these issues.    Hugs

Dennis Prager: “Many Slaveholders Were Nice People”

 

“One of the confusing things about life is how many nice people help destroy societies. This is not meant at all facetiously. It is meant literally.

“We think that people who do bad things, either think they’re doing bad and so they’re truly evil or they will be obviously bad in interpersonal relations, but it doesn’t work that way.

“Nice people can support vicious things. The human being is a macro and a micro being among the many, many differences within each of us. There were undoubtedly many nice slaveholders in the South. This is not meant facetiously again, it’s meant literally.

“If you had been invited to one of their homes, you would have been treated beautifully, but they supported a vicious system. The left is a vicious system. It’s not slavery.

“Although the end result of all leftism is the enslavement of populations, not as in transatlantic slave trade or chattel slavery, but in the diminution of human rights and liberties, which is a form of enslavement.” – Dennis Prager.

PREVIOUSLY ON JMG: Prager declares he’d tell grieving parents that that they’re “wrong” to oppose gun control. Prager claims Trump “has never made any bigoted remarks.” Prager says most gay people “cannot think as a person.” Prager claims that if the US were to split, “the Christian side would prosper.” Prager declares the Capitol riot to be a “Reichstag fire.” Prager defends anti-vaxxers by claiming that gay men were not “pariahs” during the 80s height of the AIDS epidemic. Prager declares that doctors “know nothing” about COVID and that everybody should stock up on horse paste. Prager declares that President Obama has “zero masculinity.” Prager rages that if the left really cared about black people, they’d tell them to “elevate their moral standards.” Prager laments that nobody says “Negro” anymore and that he can’t use the N-word.

K Elmquist • an hour ago

“Many Slaveholders Were Nice People”

And Adolph Hitler liked dogs. So what? It doesn’t excuse the abuses.

Fearsome Beard • an hour ago

So Mr Prager, would you feel the same way if the slave owners were black and the slaves were white?

You’re Tedious & Boring • an hour ago • edited

One cannot be a nice person and support horrid people or vicious things.
They are mutually exclusive.
Always.

BensNewLogin • an hour ago

Every Catholic priest ever is a nice person until he gets caught with his hands down the cookie jars pants. Hitler was a vegetarian who love dogs and children, but didn’t like Jews at all.

Slavery had nothing to do with left and right. It had only to do with right and wrong

Rebecca Gardner • an hour ago

Does his word salad come with a Bullshit to English translation?

Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️ • an hour ago

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BeccaM • an hour ago

‘Slaveholder’ is a term which vastly understates the vicious brutality of human enslavement.

The practice of enslaving someone always included torture and dehumanization. There was quite literally a profession known as “slave breakers”—men who would travel the slave states offering services to ensure that children or newly enslaved adults were physically and psychologically broken.

When Dennis here talks about visitors being treated kindly and generously by slave owners, he’s referring only to white people. But y’all already knew that.

Houndentenor • an hour ago

No, they weren’t nice. They enslaved other human beings. That’s not nice. Many of them (like Thomas Jefferson) were well aware that it was immoral but kept doing it because it was so financially advantageous. (Too many obvious parallels to our own times to bother with specific examples here.) No, they weren’t nice.

Now were some better to the people they were enslaving? Obviously. But if there were that many “nice” slave owners why did so many risk death and torture to escape? I’ve had some shitty jobs but none so bad I’d have risk death or flogging to escape! Not even close to that. Were some so beat down from a lifetime of abuse that they didn’t try to escape? Sure. That’s a whole field of psychology. but there lives were still horror shows.

Many thanks to the scholars who are researching and writing about this topic. I’ve been reading a lot of their work over the past five years or so and I have learned so much, all of it horrifying. The fact that we have white people trying to minimize 250 years of horrors (longer on other continents) is infuriating. (I can only imagine how much that angers the descendants of enslaved people. I’m white and I’m livid.) There’s no reason to excuse slavery. It should never have happened and it’s disrespectful to the people abused in that system to pretend that it wasn’t that bad.

Real-life angels protect queer students from ‘armed’ anti-LGBTQ+ protesters

BYU students and others dressed as angels.

BYU students and others dressed as angels. (YouTube/Latter Gay Stories)

A group of “angel” defenders protected LGBTQ+ Brigham Young University students from protesters who targeted a Pride event.

Utah’s Brigham Young University (BYU) students were confronted by protesters on Saturday (3 September) during a scheduled “Back to School Pride Night” that included an all-ages drag show.

The hundreds of anti-LGBTQ+ protesters reportedly screamed homophobic slurs and some had even brought handguns, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

 

But things took a turn after a group of counter-protesters appeared in white cloaks and wings made of sheets.

They formed a protective barrier around the group of rainbow-wearing students.

BYU student and “angel” Sabrina Wong told the Tribune: “I’m doing this because I want our LGBTQ community to feel like they can be themselves and know we have their backs.”

The religious university, which is sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, more commonly known as the Mormon church, disallows LGBTQ+ students from meeting on campus in organised groups.

 

It forbids same-sex dating on campus (despite removing the official policy in 2020), potentially violating several civil rights clauses according to Associated Press.

The group of protesters included former and current BYU students ,who described gender dysphoria as a “social contagion“. Others screamed various slurs at the group, including saying they were “going against God”.

“This shouldn’t be at a public park,” co-founder of the informal BYU conservative group Thomas Stevenson said.

The “Back to School Pride Night” was organised by the RaYnbow Collective, a local group focused on creating safe spaces for LGBTQ+ BYU students and staff.

It was a spin-off of the usual annual Pride event for new students of BYU, this time also featuring a family-friendly drag show that included BYU students as performers.

 

RaYnbow Collective’s founder Maddison Tenney was told by police to expect large anti-LGBTQ+ crowds ahead of the event.

“Religion has been weaponised against the queer community for a long time,” she said. “But that needs to end. I believe there’s nothing more divine than who I am as a queer child of God.”

Tenney initially thought of the angel costumes after seeing them being used by friends of gay University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard in 1999.

Shepard died six days after being beaten, tortured, and left hanging from a fence by two homophobic men, who were eventually sentenced to two consecutive life terms without parole.

The tactic was used to block signs by members of the Westboro Baptist Church that read “God hates f*gs” from public view using the wings as a cover. It has become a common tactic by pro-LGBTQ+ religious groups, including at the funerals for the victims of the Orlando LGBTQ+ nightclub shooting in 2016.

Gay paramedic files lawsuit over harassment and “culture of discrimination” at Denver Health

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2022/09/gay-paramedic-files-lawsuit-harassment-culture-discrimination-denver-health/

Notice the main antagonist against the gay man was a white supremacist.   The same people who support the republicans and the many of the elected republicans also are.   Hugs

 
Ambulance
Photo: Shutterstock
 

According to a gay, former paramedic for Denver Health, the city’s largest health services provider has been corrupted by a “culture of discrimination, retaliation, sexism, [and] racism, and it “needs to stop.”

The paramedic, Jordan Christensen, filed a lawsuit alleging he faced serial harassment and discrimination from his superiors in Denver Health’s Paramedic Division due to his sexual orientation.

The suit follows a string of others filed by employees since 2017, including a whistleblower complaint and one alleging retaliation for calling out racial discrimination.

Christensen, who worked at Denver Health since 2012, was fired in January. His complaint details a litany of abuse.

Christensen was the object of harassment by one superior in particular. Lt. Christopher Pattinson, since fired for stealing fentanyl, would disparage the paramedic’s appearance with comments like, “Do they make those pants in a man’s size?”

Another mocked Christensen by saying, “Oh that’s right, you wouldn’t have kids.” According to Christensen, the same superior flashed a white power sign in a photo taken during an awards ceremony for a Black paramedic.

Christensen said the abuse started in earnest after he came out on social media.

“I always felt nervous for my job, and I always felt like I was doing something wrong,” he told Denver7 News. “I felt humiliated in front of my coworkers many times. It was embarrassing to be singled out.”

According to the suit, Denver Health brought in outside investigators to address growing complaints among staff in 2019. One investigator “encouraged Mr. Christensen to complain to the Defendant’s HR department and retain counsel due to the ongoing harassment.” Christensen claims his reports were ignored and the harassment only got worse. He also alleges he was singled out for disciplinary action while co-workers escaped scrutiny for the same actions.

Spencer Kontnik, Christensen’s attorney, said the hospital turned a “blind eye” to the paramedic’s complaints in violation of its own anti-discrimination policies.

“It was so egregious to the extent that Mr. Christensen started waiting in his car and hiding in his car before he went into work so he didn’t have to deal with that type of harassment,” the attorney said.

According to the suit, the abuse only ended with Christensen’s termination, when the paramedic was accused of mistreating a patient.

“I was treating a patient with superiors, including Lt. Chris Pattinson,” Christensen recounted. “I was brought up to discuss that call by myself without them, and I was terminated. We were all three actively treating the exact same patient who ultimately walked out of the hospital, gave us a hug and actually thanked us for the treatment that we provided her.”

“We want Denver Health to be held accountable for what it did,” said Christensen’s attorney. “He lost his career. He lost his profession.”

Violence erupts between anti-LGBTQ extremists and anti-fascist counter protestors at Pride event

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2022/09/violence-erupts-anti-lgbtq-extremists-anti-fascist-counter-protestors-pride-event/

And the republican’s in office and the republican candidates for office keep stoking the anger of their rabid gang enforcer brownshirt thugs, knowing those thugs will attack the legal events of the LGBTQ+.  This result is the point, this violence against the LGBTQ+ is what they want.   When they did not want women to use their legal rights to abortion they tried to use violence and threats made in anger stoked by the republicans in office.   Now they got their way in the Supreme Court on taking away that civil right, so they are coming after the LGBTQ+ to take away their civil rights.   Notice the police released the thugs who attacked the event with the goal of shutting it down.   I posted a few weeks ago where the police attacked the counter protestors who were LGBTQ+ at a white pride event when the Proud Boys started to attack the LGBTQ+ counter protestors.    The police have members that are part of these militia gang thug groups.    It is likely they wont protect the LGBTQ+ community no matter what.     Hugs

 
Violence erupts between anti-LGBTQ extremists and anti-fascist counter protestors at Pride event
Chris Reyes Photo: Screenshot/News to Share
 

Protests outside an LGBTQ Pride event in Riverside, California erupted into violence on Sunday, leading to the arrest of at least one local far-right extremist.

The Inland Empire Pride Festival, held inside the Riverside Municipal Auditorium, was organized by local group Riverside LGBTQ+ Pride and was reportedly the first local Pride event since 2009. Inside the venue, the event featured live music, entertainment, dancing, panel discussions, information on the history of the LGBTQ community, and a youth program, according to The Press-Enterprise.

Outside, however, anti-LGBTQ protesters, led by local extremist Chris Reyes, clashed with local anti-fascist counter protesters. Video posted on YouTube by News2Share shows protesters, including Reyes, brawling on the street in front of the auditorium. The anti-LGBTQ protesters can be seen holding signs and banners with messages like, “No disgusting pedos/groomers” and “Pedophilia is not a sexual orientation.”

One particularly bellicose protester even seems to identify himself as gay while hurling profanity and slurs at festival attendees.

Reyes, who was reportedly an organizer of July’s far-right “Freedom Fest” in Phoenix, Arizona, and attended the “Stop the Steal” rally leading to the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, was arrested following the fight. According to News2Share’s Ford Fischer, Reyes was later released.

Opposition on social media prior to Riverside’s Inland Empire Pride Festival led local police to increase security around the event.

The Riverside festival was just the latest Pride event to attract far-right protesters in recent months. Family friendly events like drag story hours at local libraries have been a particular target for groups like the Proud Boys.

In June, dozens of members of the white supremacist group Patriot Front were arrested on their way to disrupt an Idaho Pride event. According to a study by The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), incidents of political violence targeting the LGBTQ community this year have already exceeded the total number of attacks reported in 2021.

 

Iran to execute two prominent LGBTQ activists for “promoting homosexuality”

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2022/09/iran-execute-two-prominent-lgbtq-activists-promoting-homosexuality/

This is what the theocratic right wing religious republicans want for the US.   They have already passed laws that say this for schools, but instead of death is loss of job and large sums of money.   However I have posted enough hate preachers that want gay people stoned to death and the laws of the country to match the moral precepts of their holy book written with the understandings of humans 2,500 years ago.    Hugs

 
Iran to execute two prominent LGBTQ activists for “promoting homosexuality”
Zahra Sediqi HamedaniPhoto: Screenshot
 

Iran’s Revolutionary Court of Urmia has sentenced two prominent LGBTQ activists to death.

According to the Hengaw Human Rights Organization, which reports on human rights violations in the Kurdistan region, 31-year-old Zahra Sediqi Hamedani and 24-year-old Elham Chubdar, were accused by the Urmia Public Prosecutor’s Office in January of “Corruption on Earth” through “promoting homosexuality,” “promoting Christianity,” and “communicating with the media opposing the Islamic Republic.”

Hamdani, who goes by “Sareh” and is a member of the LGBTQ community, was arrested in October 2021 by intelligence forces from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp while attempting to flee to Turkey. “I am journeying toward freedom now,” she said in a video recorded before she tried to leave Iran. “If I don’t make it, I will have given my life for this cause.”

Hamdani was held in solitary confinement for two months at the intelligence detention center of the IRGC in Urmia before being transferred to the women’s ward of the Urmia Central Prison.

Both women have been informed of their sentences. According to Gay Times, Iran’s judiciary claims Hamdani and Chubdar were charged with “human trafficking offenses.”

Following Hamdani’s arrest and imprisonment, Amnesty Iran tweeted that “The criminalization of LGBTI people perpetuates violence & discrimination against them.”

The organization also renewed its call on Iran to decriminalize same-sex sexual conduct, release all those detained on the basis of their identity or for defending LGBTQ rights, and adopt legislation to respect and protect the human rights of LGBTQ people.

 

Marjorie Taylor Greene spreads false story of students using litter boxes during anti-trans crusade

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2022/09/marjorie-taylor-greene-spreads-false-story-students-using-litter-boxes-anti-trans-crusade/

This is a flat out lie that has been repeatedly debunked.   In fact back in the beginning of this year a republican candidate for office used that as a campaign point and had to admit after the campaign event that it was all a lie.    It was started by an anti-trans activist, surprise surprise.  Marge Greene knows that it is a lie, but she wants to stoke anti-trans anger and is making a point about how dangerous the left is for kids.   She knows what she is doing, that what she is doing could get a rabid right wing maga thug to go hurt / assault a trans person.  Not to mention she also is stoking hate for a government civil servant, Dr. Fauci whom the right doesn’t like because he speaks the truth.   Hugs 

 
Marjorie Taylor Greene spreads false story of students using litter boxes during anti-trans crusade

Marjorie Taylor Greene scratched up a litter box of lies on Saturday in cameo appearances at Donald Trump’s latest “Save America” rally in Pennsylvania.

The MAGA meet-up, which took place in Wilkes-Barre in the northeast part of the state near Scranton, filled the 10,000 seat arena with superfans of the former president and his picks for senate and governor in the Keystone State, Mehmet Oz and Doug Mastriano.

In a pre-show interview outside the Mohegan Sun Arena, Greene perpetuated at least two long-debunked myths.

In an interview with the Right Side Broadcasting Network, Greene ran with the correspondent’s story of a school in Texas, where officials purportedly added a litter box option in a restroom to accommodate children identifying as furries. While the interviewer laughed and said “I thought it was from the Onion,” he nevertheless described the thinly-veiled attempt at anti-trans rhetoric as “Absolutely true.” Greene was all-in.

“If some student wants to pretend like a cat and use a litter box after school, that’s their prerogative, but the school and school resources and the other students and teachers should not have to be put through that because it’s a lie.”

“We have to reject them,” said Greene of the children pretending to be cats. “It’s not about people’s feelings. It’s about the truth and rejecting the lies and we have to stand up.”

The litter box story was introduced in January in Michigan, not Texas, by GOP co-chair Meshawn Maddock, who was in the news at the time for her role in the fake electors scandal in the state. A school superintendent swatted down the false rumor, but by that time right-wing “Libs of TikTok” scowl Chaya Raichik had launched the lie into infamy.

Outside, Greene whipped up the crowd with more anti-trans rhetoric directed at the Biden administration’s assistant secretary for health and the nation’s highest ranking trans official.

“How do you guys feel about Dr. Rachel Levine?” Greene shouted to rally-goers.

“That’s a man, not a woman,” one attendee said. “We know the difference,” another added.

Greene continued: “He supports children having sex change surgeries. This is what Fetterman supports,” Greene said of the Democratic candidate for Pennsylvania governor. “I don’t think that’s mainstream, do you? It’s child abuse.”

Levine does not support gender-affirming surgeries for minors.

Inside, Greene also perpetuated the lie that Biden stole the 2020 election.

“President Trump won the 2020 election,” she shouted to gleeful screams of approval. “That’s right. We know President Trump won.”

Greene added variously: Wind turbines “will plunge us into darkness,” “Biden has “ripped open the border,” and, “You better bet we are going to fire Nancy Pelosi. I’ve never liked her anyways.”

Still obsessed with fading pandemic lockdowns and mandates, Greene also had a warning for Dr. Anthony Fauci, should Republicans retake the House: “He thinks he’s gonna retire. Let me tell you something. I think that man belongs in jail.”

The crowd roared in approval.

Country star raises over $100,000 for trans youth after denouncing influencer’s transphobia

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2022/09/country-star-raises-100000-trans-youth-denouncing-influencers-transphobia/

marren-morris-country-music-lunatic-country-music-person-t-shirt-aldean-transphobia-transgender
Marren MorrisPhoto: YouTube screenshot

Country music star Maren Morris has raised over $100,000 for transgender support organizations after white supremacist Tucker Carlson mocked her on his Fox News show last Thursday.

Carlson called Morris a “lunatic,” and a “fake country music singer” after mentioning Morris’ public statements against transphobic comments made by Brittany Kerr Aldean. Aldean is a beauty lifestyle influencer married to Grammy-nominated country music artist Jason Aldean.

Morris immediately mocked Carlson’s insult by publishing a fake image of herself with a chyron from Carlson’s show declaring her as a “lunatic country music person.”

 
 

Morris then published a tweet announcing the sale of a t-shirt with the words, “Marren Morris: Lunatic Country Music Person” on it. The shirt also had the phone number of the Trans Lifeline, a peer support phone service run by trans people for trans and questioning peers.

“All proceeds will be split between @TransLifeline & the @GLAAD Transgender Media Program,” Morris wrote in the tweet.

By Labor Day, Morris announced on Twitter, “Over $100K raised. Have a great Labor Day weekend, lunatics.”

During his rant against Morris, Carlson said that in 2022, “You’re required to believe that minors should be castrated by their parents.”

Brittany Kerr Aldean told Carlson, “For some reason, people are thinking that we can let a child choose their gender so young. It’s very baffling to me. Especially when that process is irreparable. I mean, you wind up castrating children removing their sex organs, making them sterile for life. I mean, these are huge consequences.”

In reality, genital surgeries for trans minors are rare, but cisgender parents regularly conduct such surgeries on intersex children without the child’s informed consent. Other forms of gender-affirming healthcare for trans youth — such as puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy — are reversible and do not cause permanent sterility.

Carlson has repeatedly used his show, Fox News’ most popular program, to push an anti-Semitic and white supremacist “replacement theory,” the idea that immigrants and people of color seek to replace white Americans to fundamentally change the nation’s racial makeup and political culture. The theory has been cited by white supremacists as a justification for political and physical violence against Jews and non-white people.

The feud between Morris and Brittany Kerr Aldean began on August 24 when Aldean wrote on an Instagram video caption, “I’d really like to thank my parents for not changing my gender when I went through my tomboy phase. I love this girly life.” Her comment ignorantly parroted several right-wing claims about trans youth and highlighted her and her husband’s recent outspoken conservative activism.

On Twitter, Morris responded to the video by writing, “You know, I’m glad she didn’t become a boy either because we really don’t need another as***le dude in the world. Sucks when Karens try to hide their homophobia/transphobia behind their ‘protectiveness of the children.’”

Morris also published tweets referring to Aldean as “a scumbag human” and “Insurrection Barbie.”

Aldean has since marketed clothing with the phrase “Don’t Tread On Our Kids.” Profits from the clothing will go to Operation Light Shine, a Nashville-based organization that combats human trafficking and child exploitation.

Aldean’s donation furthers the right-wing claim that LGBTQ activists and allies of trans-youth want to “groom” children for sexual exploitation.

 
 

Liz Truss’ likely cabinet: The good, the bad and the terrifying for LGBTQ+ rights

Collage of Kemi, Nadine, Liz, Steve and Suella

Liz Truss’ likely cabinet. (Getty)

After Liz Truss’ victory in the Tory leadership race, we look at her likely new cabinet and their stances on LGBTQ+ rights.

Truss was confirmed as Britain’s next prime minister on Monday (5 September), and will take office after visiting the Queen in Balmoral on Tuesday (6 September).

Immediately, she will set about installing a team of allies around her, who collectively will shape Britain’s path on everything from education and finances to equality and human rights.

 

It’s been widely predicted that Liz Truss’ cabinet will include current business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng as chancellor and former leadership rival Suella Braverman as home secretary.

The current ministers in those roles – Nadhim Zahawi and Priti Patel, could offered lesser offices – whether they would accept demotions remains unclear.

There won’t be a job for Rishi Sunak, it’s thought. However Kemi Badenoch, who also vied for the leadership and was an equalities minister under Truss, is tipped for a big promotion, with work and pensions secretary Thérèse Coffey also being eyed for a key role.

Ahead of the official announcement, we take a look at the likely candidates for Liz Truss’ cabinet and scrutinise their LGBTQ+ records.

Suella Braverman

 
Suella Braverman wants schools to be able to misgender trans kids
Suella Braverman wants schools to be able to misgender trans kids. (Leon Neal/Getty Images)

Attorney general Suella Braverman made a short-lived bid for the Tory leadership, with a campaign rooted firmly in “war on woke” rhetoric.

She announced her bid with an anti-trans dogwhistle, claiming: “We need to get rid of all of this woke rubbish and get back to a country where describing a man and a woman in terms of biology does not mean that you’re going to lose your job.”

While anti-trans talking points became a defining part of the Tory leadership race, Braverman didn’t simply pick up this rhetoric to win votes. Even before Johnson’s downfall, she was making headlines for suggesting Westminster could block Scotland’s vital and long-promised reform of the Gender Recognition Act, which would make it easier for trans people to get a Gender Recognition Certificate. 

Since she was knocked out of the race, her profile heightened, she has continued this line of politics. In a speech in August, she attacked LGBTQ-inclusive education, saying schools should not be teaching kids “keywords” about the LGBTQ+ community or affirming trans identities. 

 

She also told The Times that teachers have no legal requirement to support trans and non-binary pupils by letting them use the toilets or wear school uniform that aligns with their gender. 

Kemi Badenoch

Equalities minster Kemi Badenoch
Equalities minister Kemi Badenoch. (Facebook/ Kemi Badenoch MP)

Truss confirmed in August that Kemi Badenoch was in line for a top cabinet role.

Badenoch served as junior equalities minister from 2020 until 6 July when she joined the mass exodus of officials from Johnson’s government. She was condemned for “utterly failing” LGBTQ+ people while in the role.

Kemi Badenoch faced repeated calls for her resignation over the Equalities Office’s delay on vital legislation banning conversion therapy.

In the background, she secretly met with anti-trans lobby group LGB Alliance and allegedly was instrumental in setting up a meeting between government officials and an organisation that advocates for conversion therapy. 

Badenoch reportedly skipped a key meeting on Gender Recognition Act reforms, described trans women as “men using women’s bathrooms” in leaked audio and defended anti-trans professor Kathleen Stock.

During her leadership bid, Badenoch positioned herself as “anti-woke”, winning an endorsement from far-right group Britain First.

Nadine Dorries

Culture secretary Nadine Dorries leaves 10 Downing Street
Culture secretary Nadine Dorries has increasingly taken aim at trans rights. (Leon Neal/Getty Images)

There is speculation that Nadine Dorries could remain in her role as secretary for digital, culture, media and sport, primarily so that she can continue her work around reforming the BBC license fee and privatising Channel 4.

This is bad news for the LGBTQ+ community – in particular, trans athletes.

Dorries has been vocal in her support of banning trans athletes from women’s sports, telling British sports bosses that trans women competing alongside cis players is “inherently unfair”. 

In June, Dorries told representatives from football, cricket, rugby, tennis, athletics and other sports: “I have made my position absolutely clear: I expect sporting bodies to follow the policy that competitive women’s sport must be reserved for people born of the female sex.”

In 2013, Dorries voted against same-sex marriage and even compared it to incest, asking parliament: “If the gay marriage bill takes sex out of marriage could a sister marry a sister to avoid inheritance tax?”

She labelled the bill “political suicide” and argued that same-sex marriage could never be valid because queer couples couldn’t consummate the union with “ordinary and complete sex”.

In 2021, Dorries called the vote her “biggest regret”. “I will regret it all of my life but truly hope that all same-sex marriages live happily ever after,” she said.

Thérèse Coffey

Work and Pensions Secretary Therese Coffey
Work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey

Thérèse Coffey has become known for her staunch opposition to same-sex marriage.

She voted against marriage equality in England and Wales 2013 and against in Northern Ireland in 2019.

Explaining her views in 2020, she said: “I took the view at the time, and I still hold to that, I have a strong faith background about what is a legal partnership and what is marriage.”

Kwasi Kwarteng

Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng
Business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng arrives at CCHQ ahead of the prime minister announcement. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images)

Kwasi Kwarteng, who is expected to take the role of chancellor in the newly formed cabinet, twice voted against same-sex marriage in 2013, and has been absent from all other votes on the subject since.

In 2022 he was criticised for rejecting the idea of inherent sexism in Westminister, a day after Tory MP Neil Parish resigned for watching porn in the Commons.

Kwarteng told Sky News: “I don’t think there’s a culture of misogyny”. He later conceded that while there were some “bad apples”, “that doesn’t mean that the entire culture is extremely misogynistic or full of male entitlement”.

James Cleverly

James Cleverly smiling
James Cleverly, education secretary, arrives for a Cabinet meeting at 10 Downing Street. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images)

James Cleverly, currently education secretary, could become the new foreign secretary after he backed Truss’ campaign.

Cleverly has never voted on LGBTQ+ rights in parliament but has made statements supporting same-sex marriage, LGBTQ-inclusive education and LGBTQ+ servicepeople.

“There were ‘no’ gay soldiers when I joined the army, yet some of my closest military friends were gay,” he said in 2019.

“Since homosexuality was legalised in the forces we discover that military discipline didn’t collapse and (surprise, surprise) we are still a world class fighting force.”

In a 2005 blog titled “I like marriage”, which he reposed in 2013, he described his views on equality.

“Gay ‘marriage’ takes nothing away from heterosexual marriage and while there will be some civil partnerships which are done for the wrong reasons the same can be said of straight marriage. Best of luck I say,” he wrote.

Matt Walsh Demands Apology After Being Blamed For Inspiring Bomb Threat to Children’s Hospital

Trump judge says wedding photographer can legally discriminate against LGBTQ couples

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2022/09/trump-judge-says-wedding-photographer-can-legally-discriminate-lgbtq-couples/

Another person who chose a job serving the public who demands the right to discriminate against a segment of the public due to religious privilege.   If you think this sounds OK, replace the LGBTQ+ with Jews or Blacks.    If she were suing to have the right to not serve black couples or Jewish couples would that sound reasonable?     Think of this, what these religious people want is to roll back all civil rights laws against discrimination for them.   They want special privileges.   Remember when they said gays wanted special privileges just because we wanted to be treated equally?   Well now they insist they be above anti-discrimination laws, because god demands the right to hate, the right to treat others as less than the good people.   They feel that their hate is good, their hate is righteous.  But the day they get the right to not give a marriage license to gay couples how long until they demand the right to not give one to a mixed-race couple?   An adoption agency got the right to discriminate against gay people and still receive taxpayer money by the supreme court, they then promptly denied service to a Jewish couple.   They were the only adoption agency in that region that could certify homes, basically denying adoption to both couples.   That is the goal of these Christian groups, to elevate Christianity to above any laws regulating them to not discriminate or to treat people equally.   The goal is to elevate Christianity to above every law or requirement making them above the laws.   I wonder if my sincerely held belief lets me violate the speed limits?     Hugs

 
Christy Nelson, LGBTQ, wedding photographer, Louisville Kentucky, fairness ordinance, LGBTQ non-discrimination, case, lawsuit, Alliance Defending Freedom
Photo: Shutterstock
 

Federal district court Judge Benjamin Beaton has ruled in favor of a Louisville, Kentucky wedding photographer who said her religious beliefs should allow her to refuse service to same-sex couples, even though her refusal would violate the city’s non-discrimination ordinance. The Trump administration had supported the photographer in the case, and the judge was appointed by Donald Trump.

The city has said it will likely appeal the judge’s ruling.

The case in question involves Chelsey Nelson, a photographer who said that shooting a same-sex marriage would violate her sincerely held religious beliefs and her First Amendment rights.

Nelson preemptively sued the city over its non-discrimination “fairness ordinance” in 2019. The ordinance requires all businesses to treat customers equally, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. Before filing her lawsuit, no same-sex couple had even asked her to work at their wedding.

Nelson herself said that her belief that “God created marriage to be an exclusive covenant between one man and one woman [affects] every aspect of her life… her business, her art, and her creativity.” She added that she’d “decline any request” to work for “a same-sex wedding, polygamous wedding, or an open marriage wedding because creating artwork promoting these events would violate Chelsey’s religious and artistic beliefs.”

Beaton granted Nelson’s request to issue an injunction against the ordinance. His injunction order said that the city couldn’t use its ordinance to compel her to photograph same-sex weddings or “otherwise express messages inconsistent with Nelson’s beliefs,” U.S. News reports.

The judge was appointed by Trump. He is a member of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group that has helped pack U.S. courts with anti-LGBTQ judges who will serve for decades to come.

“We’re pleased the court agreed that the city violated Chelsey’s First Amendment rights,” said Bryan Neihart, an attorney with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the SPLC-designated hate group that served as Nelson’s legal counsel and the legal counsel in numerous cases seeking to erode LGBTQ civil rights.

“The court’s decision sends a clear and necessary message to every Kentuckian — and American — that each of us is free to speak and work according to our deeply held beliefs,” Neihart said.

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer (D) disagreed with Beaton’s ruling and said that city attorneys would likely appeal.

“We are a city of compassion and we appreciate the many ways our LGBTQ+ family contributes to our diverse community,” Fischer said. “Louisville Metro Government will continue to enforce to the fullest extent possible its ordinance prohibiting anti-discriminatory practices and will fight against discrimination in any form.”

In 2020, Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a  “statement of interest” supporting Nelson’s stance. The DOJ’s filing was unsurprising seeing that, in July 2018, the DOJ announced the formation of the Religious Liberty Task Force to allow religious discrimination in national civil rights cases. The Task Force was the brainchild of anti-LGBTQ hate groups.

In June 2018, the DOJ also filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court siding with the anti-gay baker in the case of Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. In its brief, the DOJ said wedding services are basically forms of “art” and that the government has no compelling interest to stop societal homophobia.

The problem with defining publicly offered business services as “artistic acts of self-expression” and “free speech” is that numerous other businesses and employees could say that their own professions — such as medicine, training, or child care — are all “arts” that shouldn’t be extended to individuals whose lives contradict their own religious beliefs.

Seeing as six of the current nine members of the U.S. Supreme Court are current or former members of the Federalist Society, they have the majority power to uphold the Society’s belief in religious-based discrimination. The Justice may do so if a case like this ever reaches the nation’s highest court.