North Carolina: On Gay Marriage And Civil Rights, They Have Issues.
North Carolina has a terrible record on the civil rights front, especially when it comes to treatment of their LGBT community and marriage equality.
What the hell is your problem, North Carolina? Seriously. What did we ever do to you? Nothing, that’s what. We were just minding our own business, trying to forget about how your high school graduation rates are 37th in the nation, or maybe trying to figure out how to find jobs considering that you have the 42nd highest unemployment rate out of all 50 states. We haven’t been running around spreading gay cooties in pre-schools, or trying to find new methods to bring about the destruction of your marriages, or whatever it is you straight people think we do. Here’s a fun fact you may find surprising: Gay people, for the most part, find your marriages painfully boring.
Yet, we have to be subject to this sort of crap:
Gay Marriage: North Carolina Senate Votes To Put Ban Before Voters
Another marriage amendment. This time, a ban on same-sex civil marriage that will get written directly into the state constitution.
This is why you can’t leave issues like marriage equality up to the states. Some of them will get it right, like New York and Iowa, but most of them will do everything they can to remain as ignorant and intolerant as possible, for as long as they can manage to hold out. Gay North Carolinians are out there quietly living their lives, not bothering anybody, just trying to scrape out a life for themselves that contains a little peace and dignity. They didn’t ask to be political footballs. They just want to be left alone. Instead, they find themselves the continual victims of bigotry, not just from their fellow citizens, but from their government.
Before we go much further, let me say that I’m sure many North Carolinians are decent, honest, free thinking individuals who have no interest in crusading against marriage equality or gay rights generally. But really guys, you can’t blame me. You picked these sociopaths to run your government, and to represent you in Congress, and if you dislike the negative attention they bring your state, feel free to do something about it.
However, as the rest of you have chosen to pick a fight, I present to you:
Things You May Not Know About North Carolina
- Same-Sex unions are already banned by North Carolina law. Conservative lawmakers just want to make it harder to change things when public opinion finally does catch up with reality. This proves that the bigoted proponents of this amendment know that they are on the losing side of history. As the passage of time will only diminish their political influence over this issue, they have to act now while they can still get away with it. I like to call this asshole insurance.
- Wanna marry your first cousin? Then North Carolina is the place for you. I suppose the Bible doesn’t have much to say about this, so it’s okay. The Bible doesn’t get into cognitive dissonance much either, for obvious reasons.
- Oh, and bestiality is legal. No word on where North Carolina law comes down on sex with animals that are of your same gender. I assume that’s when this behavior becomes frowned upon.
- If you are gay in North Carolina, things are already pretty dicey. North Carolina has no discrimination protections of any kind. Gays can be refused services, fired, or denied housing, and there is absolutely nothing they can do about it. This is a state’s way of saying “Hey gay people, it’s totally okay to hate you. You are not as human as everybody else.†LGBT people are second-class citizens in North Carolina, and the law is never on their side. I wonder if they have to pay the same tax rate? That hardly seems fair.
- State judicial precedent exists that could mean losing custody of your children because you are gay. Right. Let’s examine this last item for a moment.
I want to draw your attention to the case of Pulliam v. Smith. This little gem from North Carolina judicial history involves the troubled marriage of Carol Pulliam and Frederick Smith. They were together for 8 years, and in that time had two children. They divorced, and an arrangement was worked out where Fred got physical custody of the children, and Carol got them for a couple of months in the summer. This goes on without incident for three years or so, right up until the day Mr. Smith’s boyfriend, Tim Tipton, moves in with him and the kids.
Apart from going some distance toward explaining the collapse of the marriage, this change in living arrangements prompts Ms. Pulliam to sue for sole custody on the grounds that Mr. Smith is not only a homosexual, but one who has the unmitigated audacity to actually live as a homosexual. That is, and I’m not kidding here, the only basis for her claim.
And the North Carolina Supreme Court agreed with her.
What offenses were depraved enough to require the removal of the children? I turn to the judgement itself for answers. All of this comes right from the court documents.
- That Tim Tipton and the Defendant often kiss on the check [sic] and sometimes on the lips in front of the two minor children. That Tim Tipton and the Defendant would often hold hands in front of the two minor children.
- Mr. Tipton keeps in the bedroom he shares with the Defendant pictures of “drag queens”. These are pictures of men dressed like women. These pictures are not under a lock, and it is possible for the children to gain access to the pictures.
- That Tim Tipton and the Defendant [had sex] while the minor children were present in the home. That the minor children share the same bedroom and the said bedroom of the minor children is directly across the hall from the bedroom occupied by the Defendant and Tipton.
- That the Defendant and Mr. Tipton on at least one (1) occasion had a party for homosexuals at the home… That the occasion was an anniversary party marking the first year since the Defendant and Tim Tipton meet [sic] at a homosexual bar in Asheville, North Carolina.
What. A. Monster. How dare that gay man be gay. And like gay things. And have gay friends.
Let me reiterate: He got his kids taken away and returned to a woman who only three years earlier the court had decided should only see these children for two months of the year, solely because he had a boyfriend. That, and pictures of drag queens, which is a big deal here for some reason. I am not even doing this story justice. You really need to read through the judgement issued by the North Carolina Supreme Court. Really. Go read it right now. It is among the most insulting legal documents I have ever seen, and is not only morally appalling, but really gives you a good idea of bullcrap the LGBT citizens of North Carolina have to put up with. An actual journalist should dig into this little nugget, as it hasn’t gotten nearly enough attention.
This is the kind of bigotry that every citizen of North Carolina should find not only disgusting, but fundamentally unacceptable.
The good news for you citizens of North Carolina is that you have a chance to start fixing this. When the primary elections come around you can vote against this amendment and tell the world no, we don’t want to be the kind of state that would take a man’s children away from him simply because he gay. You have an oppertunity to right some of these wrongs. You do seem to be a little confused about the issue. While 61% of you feel gay marriage should be illegal, 55% of you would vote against the amendment. That’s something, but you can do way, way better. I have faith in you, though based on your record, I’m not sure why.
(Image: North Carolina’s Wake Up Church which pushed the North Carolina legislature to put a marriage equality ban on the ballot. You can buy the graphic as a yard sign for $7.00)
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Benjamin Phillips is a Humor Writer, Web Developer, Civics Nerd, and all around crank that spends entirely too much time shouting with deep exasperation at the television, especially whenever cable news is on. He lives in St. Louis, MO and spends most of his time staring at various LCD screens, occasionally taking walks in the park whenever his boyfriend becomes sufficiently convinced that Benjamin is becoming a reclusive hermit person. He is available for children’s parties, provided that those children are entertained by hearing a complete windbag talk for two hours about the importance of science education, or worse yet, poorly researched anecdotes PROVING that James Buchanan was totally gay. If civilization were to collapse due to zombie hoards or nuclear holocaust, Benjamin would be among the first to die as he has no useful skills of any kind. The post-apocalyptic hellscape has no real need for homosexual computer programmers who can name all the presidents in order, as well as the actors who have played all eleven incarnations of Doctor Who.
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
