Connect with us

NC Gay And Straight Parents Fight Against Family-Killing Amendment One

Published

on

North Carolina gay, lesbian, transgender, and straight parents are fighting back against the Republican, Christian conservative attack on unmarried families, known as Amendment One, with these two new videos. Amendment One — on which early voters are already voting, though May 8 is the official voting day — would not only write anti-gay discrimination directly into North Carolina’s constitution, but because it is so broadly written, it would make marriage the only form of legal recognition for all families and all couples, regardless of gender.

No longer would domestic partnerships be recognized. As these videos explain, children of unmarried gay or straight, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender unmarried parents will lose their health insurance immediately, and victims of domestic abuse would lose their protection orders.

Karen Ocamb, writing at LGBT POV reports:

In just over two weeks, on May 8, the LGBT community has an opportunity to defeat the antigay Religious Right forces behind the horrid antigay ballot measure Amendment One in North Carolina. Prop 8 mastermind Frank Schubert is now working in that red state (and in Maine where he is doing the same thing) organizing a faith-based effort to pass the antigay initiative. Next Sunday, April 29, Schubert and the antigay VoteForMarriage campaign are launching ”Marriage Sunday” that will promote the premise that churches and antigay Christians have a right to discriminate when it comes to civil marriages. In this video, with clear elements of the National Organization of Marriage’s divisive strategy to pit African Americans against gays, Dr. Mark Creech, Executive Director of the Christian Action League, says:

“Politics simply means the affairs of the people. Jesus, our lord, was in the very middle of the affairs of the people. And he taught that his people ought to be in the very middle of the affairs of the people so the church has a role to play in bringing righteousness to bear upon the political process. And that’s why it’s so very important that the church be involved in this campaign to protect marriage as one man and one woman.”

But the antigay Christian leaders are silent on the very real harm the initiative would have by recognizing ONLY heterosexual marriage as legal in the state – something the Chad Griffin/Mark Armour-produced TV ads with real people for the bi-partisan Protect All North Carolina Families campaign underscore by contrast. Wonder what Jesus would say about the churches intentionally harming children in His name. I mean – even David Blankenhorn, Protect Marriage’s expert witness in the federal Prop 8 trial, opposes Amendment One.

In “‘It’s just an act of meanness’,” Washington Blade writer Chris Johnson examines Amendment One closely, and offers interviews with Shana Carignan and Megan Parker Carignan, one of the couples affected. The Carignans, while not legally married, have a four-year-old special needs child and care for an elderly woman. They could lose almost everything — including custody, healthcare, benefits, even the terms of their will could be negated — if Amendment One passes.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=OlKsycrW1rw%3Fversion%3D3%26hl%3Den_US

https://youtube.com/watch?v=coAussnLrjY%3Fversion%3D3%26hl%3Den_US

You can help protect all North Carolina families by making a donation to the Coalition to Protect North Carolina Families, and by sharing these videos. This man, Ocamb notes, is “the straight ally who put up $100,000 in a match fund grant on why he’s involved in the campaign against Amendment One.”

https://youtube.com/watch?v=5bGV3-j1DiA%3Fversion%3D3%26hl%3Den_US

Continue Reading
Click to comment
 
 

Enjoy this piece?

… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.

NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.

Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.

News

Tennessee Governor Slammed After ‘Praying’ for Nashville School Community Without Mentioning Mass Shooting

Published

on

Governor Bill Lee quickly drew tremendous outrage in the wake of a school mass shooting where six people including three young children were shot to death. Social media users criticized the Tennessee Republican, who had signed a permit-less gun carry law, for declaring he was “praying for the school, congregation & Nashville community,” without posting any mention of the mass shooting.

Tweeting he was “closely monitoring the tragic situation at Covenant,” Gov. Lee said, “As we continue to respond, please join us in praying for the school, congregation & Nashville community.”

There was no mention of any loss of life, and, as Moms Demand Action founder Shannon Watts passionately noted, the “situation” was a mass shooting.

“If thoughts and prayers alone worked to stop gun violence, there wouldn’t have been a shooting at a Christian elementary school. It’s your actions – including weakening the state’s gun laws – that’s killing kids in Tennessee,” Watts also tweeted. “SHAME ON YOU.”

Gov. Lee signed a permit-less carry bill into law in 2021, at a Beretta gun manufacturing plant.

According to the CDC, as of 2020 – one year before the permit-less carry bill was signed into law – Tennessee ranked tenth in the nation in per-capita firearm mortality.

READ MORE: ‘Our Children Deserve Better’: First Lady Jill Biden Speaks Out After Six Die in Nashville School Mass Shooting

Meanwhile, others took notice of the gun culture Gov. Lee has fostered in “The Volunteer State.”

MSNBC analyst and Bulwark writer Tim Miller commented, “Tennessee governor Bill Lee issued a statement recently about how the drag ban in Tennessee ‘protects children.’ If only he would have instead focused on laws that might have prevented the mass murder of children in his state today.”

Historian Kevin Kruse pointed to an article from last year, after the Uvalde, Texas school shooting, titled: “Rep. Clemmons Seeks Renewed Gun Laws, Gov. Lee Requests Prayer.”

“You chose prayer over gun reforms last year after the Uvalde massacre,” Kruse wrote. “And now here we are.”

The progressive website Tennessee Holler pointed out that Gov. Lee, along with GOP lawmakers, “just appointed Jordan Mollenhour to the [state] board of education— whose company was sued for selling ammo to an underage mass killer (SANTA FE) and sold ammo to at least one more (AURORA) He has ZERO education experience.”

Let’s Give a Damn founder Nick Laparra tweeted, “We are 86 days into 2023. So far, 9859 people have died by gun violence and there have been 128 mass shootings. Meanwhile, @GovBillLee spends his days being outraged over drag queens and CRT and book bans. This is Bill Lee’s and the GOP’s fault.”

See the tweets and video above or at this link.

READ MORE: New WSJ Poll Is Devastating for DeSantis and His ‘Anti-Woke’ Policies

 

 

 

Continue Reading

News

Mystery Grand Jury Witness in Trump Hush Money Probe Is Former ‘Enquirer’ Publisher and Trump Ally

Published

on

Avid followers of the Manhattan District Attorney’s moves noted the grand jury had been called into service for Monday, and soon news leaked that yet another witness would be testifying in the probe into Donald Trump’s alleged hush money payment to Stormy Daniels.

Monday afternoon, NBC News’ Garrett Haake reported live on MSNBC that the mystery witness was David Pecker, the former tabloid publisher of the “National Enquirer,” who reportedly had been looking for stories in 2016 to protect Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. Haake notes Monday was Pecker’s second appearance before the grand jury in the hush money case.

The New York Times also reported David Pecker as the grand jury witness, calling Pecker “a key player in the hush-money matter. He and the tabloid’s top editor helped broker the deal between the porn star, Stormy Daniels, and Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s fixer at the time.”

READ MORE: ‘Our Children Deserve Better’: First Lady Jill Biden Speaks Out After Six Die in Nashville School Mass Shooting

“While the focus of Mr. Pecker’s testimony is unclear, he could provide valuable information for prosecutors. A longtime ally of Mr. Trump, he agreed to keep an eye out for potentially damaging stories about Mr. Trump during the 2016 campaign,” The Times reports. “For a brief time in October 2016, Ms. Daniels appeared to have just that kind of story. Her agent and lawyer discussed the possibility of selling exclusive rights to her story of a sexual encounter with Mr. Trump to The National Enquirer, which would then promise to never publish it, a practice known as ‘catch and kill.'”

Former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Harry Litman weighed in, noting, “nothing about that decision [to have Pecker testify] suggests any change of heart on Bragg’s part to indict Trump.”

Former Dept. of Defense Special Counsel Ryan Goodman, an NYU professor of law, notes that Pecker’s “testimony can show the [hush money] scheme was designed to affect outcome of election.”

“He reportedly communicated directly with Trump on payment,” Goodman adds.

Continue Reading

News

‘Our Children Deserve Better’: First Lady Jill Biden Speaks Out After Six Die in Nashville School Mass Shooting

Published

on

First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, speaking Monday afternoon at a National League of Cities conference, told attendees, “Our children deserve better,” as she broke the news of the Nashville school mass shooting at Covenant Presbyterian School where three children and three adults were shot dead.

“You know,” Dr. Biden, herself an educator and clearly pained by the news, began her remarks by saying, “I hate to say what I’m gonna say next because you know you’re so enthusiastic and with so much energy and hope and I feel it.”

“But while you’ve been in this room, I don’t know whether you’ve been on your phones but we just learned about another shooting in Tennessee, a school shooting and I am truly without words and our children deserve better, and we stand – all of us – we stand with Nashville in prayer.”

READ MORE: New WSJ Poll Is Devastating for DeSantis and His ‘Anti-Woke’ Policies

The First Lady, a former public high school English teacher and currently a professor of English at a community college, was speaking at the organization’s Congressional City Conference.

Watch Dr. Biden below or at this link.

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2020 AlterNet Media.