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They Want Us Exterminated: Murder, Torture, Sexual Orientation and Gender in Iraq
After 10 years of being involved in human rights activism, there aren’t many crimes that shock me. But I came across this report from Human Rights Watch that was published last year and found yet another form of torture/murder that I had no idea existed.
From the report:
The Mahdi Army killed Khaldoun in Baghdad al-Jadida. I heard that Khaldoun was tortured, beaten and disfigured, and finally hung on the street. One of the tortures they used on him was a very strong glue to close his anus, after which he was given a laxative causing diarrhea that killed him.
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the campaign is its publicity and impunity. The death squads treat murder as a message, aimed at other presumed “deviants” and at the population at large. The brutality of the killings, the proliferation of mutilated corpses discarded in the trash, not only conveys the power of the killers and the dispensability of the victims, but makes the dead a savage example. Bodies-castrated, broken, tortured-become billboards, on which punishment is less imposed than inscribed. As one man told us, “It is a slaughterhouse on the streets.”
The excruciating killing of victims by injecting glue in their anuses reached the press on April 19, in an al-Arabiya article that quoted the Iraqi women’s rights activist Yanar Mohammad condemning “an unprecedented form of torture against homosexuals.” Other doctors in Baghdad confirmed the practice to Human Rights Watch. One, at Chawader Hospital in Sadr City, told us that he had seen four men’s dead bodies brought to the hospital:
I knew one of them. One of the bodies was found in the garbage in the Kasra wa Atash area and the others were found in several other streets. …. Two of the bodies I saw were glued. I heard that happened in one of the car workshops in Sadr City but I don’t think there have been any investigations.
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Jenna Bissell, an 11-year-old fifth grader at Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, says she tripped outside on the school playground, cut open her face in a fall that left her bloody and with two loosened teeth, and was denied even a visit to the school nurse by her teacher — because, she says, she has two gay moms.
At first, even we thought this was a stretch: A grade school teacher would be that vindictive to a tween girl because she happens to have lesbian mothers? And then came this: Shannon Peterson, one of Bissell’s mothers, said she called the school after Bissell came home injured on Feb. 26. She said she talked to Bissell’s teacher, asking why she hadn’t been notified and why the girl went without treatment. Peterson said she asked, “Is this because she has two moms?” and that the teacher replied with a raised voice that yes, this was the reason and that Peterson should take her children to another school.
District spokeswoman Kim Vesely said any teacher who discriminated against a student would be disciplined. Bissell’s former teacher is still teaching and Vesely would not say whether she has been disciplined, citing personnel privacy. Vesely also said “there are differing versions of what occurred,” but declined to give the district’s version. Peterson said there was a pattern of tension between Bissell and her teacher, including over an assignment in which students were asked to write a book about themselves. On one page, they were asked to write about something they did over the summer, and Bissell said she wrote about her parents’ wedding in Iowa, where gay marriage is legal. “She threw out the whole page about where my moms got married and how beautiful it was,” Bissell said, referring to the teacher. “She said, ‘This is gross, this is horrible, you need to write about something else.’”
As it stands, the Bissels say they are planning a civil rights lawsuit against the school district Rio Rancho Public Schools. At the very least, they should be suing for neglect; no teacher who witnesses a student’s bloody injury, and fails to immediately arrange medical attention, has a place in the classroom.
Link: Girl: I Was Punished For Having 2 Moms: Parents Plan Suit Against Rio Rancho Schools
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Catholic archbishop says kids are spontaneously gay
A Brazilian archbishop said adolescents are “spontaneously homosexual” and in need of guidance, while society at large is pedophile, reports The Associated Press.
“Society today is pedophile, that is the problem. So, people easily fall into it. And the fact it is denounced is a good sign,” Grings told Brazilian newspaper O Globo.
The archbishop also said it was important to help children avoid homosexuality.
“We know that the adolescent is spontaneously homosexual. Boys play with boys, girls play with girls,” he said. “If there is no proper guidance, this sticks. The question is — how are we going to educate our children to use a sexuality that is human and suitable?”
Grings also said the acceptance of homosexuality in society could pave the way for the acceptance of pedophilia.
What a creepy old fucker.
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Gays and lesbians in Zimbabwe facing ‘corrective rape’
An annual report by the US State Department on human rights in Zimbabwe has said that gays and lesbians in the country face harassment and rape by people trying to ‘cure’ them.
It said that lesbians were sometimes raped, even by their family members, to try and turn them straight, while gay men were forced into heterosexual sex.
Associated Press reports that Amanda Porter, political officer at the US Embassy in Harare, said yesterday: “Some families reportedly subjected men and women to corrective rape and forced marriages to encourage heterosexual conduct.”
Sodomy is illegal in Zimbabwe and punishable with up to a year in prison or a heavy fine.
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Albany protest (via The Rachel Maddow Show)
“Don’t we all deserve the right to marry Rachel Maddow?”
Yes, yes, we do. If only she’d accept my proposals. Or cancel that restraining order… sigh.
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Pictures from an anti-gay, anti-people with disabilities prom | La Figa
(via robot-heart-politics)
With comments actually worth reading! What a find!
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Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced Thursday that the Pentagon will start to ease its enforcement of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy prohibiting homosexuals from serving openly in the military.
Among other things, Gates said the Pentagon is raising the threshold for what constitutes an appropriate level of information necessary to launch a “credible inquiry” into allegations of homosexual behavior.
—Gates eases ban on gays in the military
Again: This isn’t enough. Obama should sign an Executive Order ending enforcement of DADT, then Congress should pass the Military Readiness Enhancement Act and get rid of the DADT policy for good. — Ryking
(via ryking)
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(via nhaler)
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LGBT community banned from NYC St. Patrick’s Day Parade
The traditional St Patrick’s Day Parade excludes members of the LGBT community on the grounds that it is a religious event.
The organizers of the NYC St. Patrick’s Day parade, seeking to legalize their discrimination against Irish lesbian, gay, bisexual & transgender marchers, have redefined the parade as a private, religious procession.
Today, gay group Irish Queers lined the sides of the parade to protest against the exclusion. They also criticised local police departments for joining the march, estimating that tens of thousands of police officers and firefighters were involved.
JF Mulligan of Irish Queers said in a statement: “Anti-gay discrimination is now illegal in both Ireland and New York City. The NYPD, FDNY and Mayor Bloomberg need catch up. As city representatives, they cannot legally march until parade organisers renounce their discriminatory message.”
Dublin LGBT groups have also criticised the event. A statement said the exclusion was “deeply un-Irish and something that we cannot allow to happen in the name of an event that is about celebrating Ireland’s rich cultural heritage, of which the LGBT community are a corner stone here in Ireland”.
(Full story: Pink Paper UK)
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Christian group says gay marriage more dangerous than smoking
Homosexual activity is “more dangerous for individuals who engage in it than is smoking,” and because of this, state lawmakers need to pass a constitutional amendment overturning last year’s Iowa Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage, according to Iowa Family Policy Center President Chuck Hurley.
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gay lgbt black african american US civil rights Bayard Rustin 1950s 1960s
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Microsoft Bing blocks Arab LGBT searches
Microsoft’s Bing search engine has been accused of censoring non-pornographic gay and lesbian searches in Arabic countries.
Technology website The Register reports that testing of the search engine in January found it filtered out English and Arabic words related to homosexuality.
Bing users searching for “gay,” “lesbian,” or “homosexuality” are met with the warning, “Your country or region requires a strict Bing SafeSearch setting, which filters out results that might return adult content.”
Bing users in these countries cannot disable the SafeSearch option.
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Fascism (as defined by Mark Shea - Catholic and Loving it):
A crowd holding signs protesting the treatment of a student with lesbian parents exchanged smiles and waves with parishioners walking into a Boulder church for Sunday Mass.
Before Mass started, church members citing their Catholic hospitality crossed the street to offer donuts and fresh coffee to the group of about 30 protesters.
Despite the friendly gestures, protest signs underscored why demonstrators were there.
“Teach acceptance. Celebrate all of God’s children,” read one banner.
More: Group outside Boulder church protests barring of child from Catholic school - Denver Post
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Quite a move by an organization that has allowed sexual abuse by its clerics to go unchecked for decades. How many thousands of innocent children have been irreparably damaged by priests who used them to satisfy their repressed sexual urges? And all of this while the Church hierarchy kept it secret in fear of exposing the dark, ugly truth. Sure, look down on homosexuals and gay parents while you quietly give your blessings to pedophiles masquerading as priests.
— Mario Piperni on a Catholic preschool’s decision to ban a student from returning because his parents are homosexual. (via holyhate) -
What we have here is a failure to discriminate?
Virginia’s Attorney General ordered Virginia’s Universities to remove policies which ban discrimination for sexual orientation. Let me repeat that. Universities in Virginia put policies into place which prohibited the schools from discriminating against gays and lesbians. And the Attorney General of Virginia is ordering these universities to eliminate such policies.
