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‘I Kill Them!’: HBO’s VICE Goes To Uganda To See What American Anti-Gay Christians Have Created

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American Christian extremists have found a willing host in Uganda, where they have so dramatically affected the culture that average citizens now consider raping and killing gay people a duty.

The latest episode of HBO’s VICE, “A Prayer for Uganda,” exposes what American Christian extremists, like Scott Lively, have done to the country of Uganda. A poor, landlocked nation of about 37 million people, Uganda has become synonymous with its “Kill The Gays” bill, that was debated for year, generating international condemnation and fear. It became law and then was tossed out by the Ugandan Supreme Court, but only on a technicality.

VICE interviews Member of Parliament David Bahati (image, top left), who authored the bill. “Homosexuality is evil,” he says. Bahati is a member of the secretive Washington, D.C. based organization known as The Family, which has helped to coordinate the war against LGBT people in Uganda.

Author and professor Jeff Sharlet, also featured in the VICE episode, exposed their work and their members – several of whom are U.S. Congressmen and Senators who take up residence at a luxury C Street boarding house – in his books, The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power, and C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy. Among them? U.S. Senator James Inhofe, who, VICE reports, has traveled to Uganda at least 135 times.

In the VICE episode, Bahati refuses to name any one of his American partners, but Inhofe is clearly one. Also among Bahati’s supporters and partners are Scott Lively, Pastor Rick Warren, Sharon Slater, and the World Congress of Families. And Bahati makes clear he and his country support the culture these American Christian extremists have brought to Uganda –  one that teaches, falsely, that gay people are all pedophiles, homosexuality is a choice, it is evil, and children must be protected from it at all costs.

The costs?

VICE correspondent Isobel Yeung – that’s her face in the top right image – interviewed poor, working class men. She wrote later, “I don’t ever recall feeling as heartbroken as the week we spent shooting this.”

The men tell her that the first thing she needs to know about their culture is “we hate is homosexuality.” That is the first thing of which they are proud. Not arts, science, their families, their heritage – not even their perverted interpretation of Christianity. 

“We hate that one [homosexuality] completely,” one of the men tell her. “If we find a woman with a woman, we will pull out one and we will do it to her.” He’s of course talking about rape. “We cannot allow a woman to have sex with a fellow woman.”

Yeung asks, “Have you ever raped a lesbian?”

“Yeah,” the man replies. “Serious raping.”

Then Yeung asks, “So what would you do if you saw a gay man?”

“Kill! Kill! You kill that one! Kill! I just kill them. Woman and woman we rape, but man and man we kill.”

What the clip above does not show, but the VICE episode does, is that American Christians have brought this culture to Uganda. While the nation has never been gay friendly, the country’s war on homosexuality is a direct response to the teachings of American Christians.

Scott Lively, head of Abiding Truth Ministries, which appears on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of anti-gay hate groups, is currently on trial in America in a lawsuit for crimes against humanity. VICE offers a short profile of Lively, taken from this documentary by Political Research Associates:

Also featured in the VICE episode is Dr. Kapya Kaoma, who filmed Scott Lively’s anti-gay teachings. Lively’s work is believed to be what sparked Uganda’s “Kill The Gays” bill.

The 15 minutes VICE spends revealing the extreme homophobic hate American Christian fundamentalist extremists have injected into Uganda is just the tip of the iceberg.

The VICE episode premiered last night, but is available on HBO On Demand and HBO GO. It’s also airing again tonight. Check your listings or HBO.

Please find a way to watch it.

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CORRUPTION

Bill Barr Ouster Demanded by Over 1100 Ex-Justice Dept Officials in Scathing Letter

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February 16, 2020

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According to a report from the New York Times, over 1,100 former federal prosecutors and Justice Department officials have signed on to a letter calling for Attorney General Bill Barr to step down.

The report states the letter insists, “Each of us strongly condemns President Trump’s and Attorney General Barr’s interference in the fair administration of justice,” adding those actions “require Mr. Barr to resign.”

The Times notes that signers of the letter come from across the political spectrum, adding, “Protect Democracy, a nonprofit legal group, gathered the signatures from Justice Department alumni and said it would collect more.”

Pointing out that the impetus for the letter is related to Barr’s interference in the Roger Stone case that led to prosecutors who handled it resigning en masse, the Times also reports that the signees, “Also urged current government employees to report any signs of unethical behavior at the Justice Department to the agency’s inspector general and to Congress.”

You can read more here.

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OMG

Internet Disgusted After Trump Retweets Gross Video of Texas Mayor in Bathroom: ‘I Think You Have Hit a New Low’

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February 15, 2020

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For some reason Donald Trump decided on Saturday to retweet a video of a Texas mayor who was unaware he was still wearing a hot mic when he went to the bathroom, which stunned even Trump’s regular critics on Twitter.

Trump pushed out the tweet with the video that stated, “THIS IS HILARIOUS. Mayor of Georgetown in the US excused himself to go & use the washroom in the middle of a meeting & forgot to switch off his mic on his tie & this is what happened.”

Not everyone agreed, with one commenter pointing out the putative Leader of the Free World “… has too much time on his hands.”

You can see a sampling below:

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AYFKM?

Trump Deploying Border Patrol’s Highly-Armed Elite Tactical Agents to Round Up Undocumented Immigrants in Sanctuary Cities

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February 14, 2020

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Continuing his attacks on his enemies one week after being acquitted on articles of impeachmenmt President Donald Trump on Friday ordered a group of the Border Patrol’s elite tactical agents to deploy in major sanctuary cities to round up and arrest undocumented immigrants, The New York Times reports.

Agents from the U.S. Border Patrol’s Tactical Unit, BORTAC, are being sent to sent to San Francisco, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Houston, Boston, New Orleans, Detroit and Newark, N.J.

BORTAC “acts essentially as the SWAT team of the Border Patrol.”

These are top border patrol agents, who use stun grenades and other weapons usually reserved for warfare “in the most rugged and swelteringly hot areas of the border.”

BORTAC agents receive “enhanced Special Forces-type training, including sniper certification,” and “the officers typically conduct high-risk operations targeting individuals who are known to be violent, many of them with extensive criminal records.”

“Their presence could spark new fear in immigrant communities that have been on high alert under the stepped-up deportation and detention policies adopted after Mr. Trump took office,” the Times notes.

Former CBP commissioner Gil Kerlikowske calls the decision a  “significant mistake.”

“If you were a police chief and you were going to make an apprehension for a relatively minor offense, you don’t send the SWAT team. And BORTAC is the SWAT team,” Kerlikowske, a former chief of police in Seattle, told the Times. “They’re trained for much more hazardous missions than this.”

 

Image by Kristoffer Grogan/U.S. Customs and Border Protection via Flickr 

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