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June 9, 2009
AFA-Michigan 2009
Annual Banquet
LEONARD, Michigan — Over 200 supporters and guests attended the American Family Association’s 2009 annual banquet in Oakland County May 21st, which featured a video greeting by former Gov. Mike Huckabee, keynote speaker and Fireproof star Erin Bethea, special recognition of citizens who have stood firmly for traditional values, and an annual report by AFA-Michigan President Gary Glenn. See our highlights below…
Gov. Mike Huckabee praises AFA-Michigan stand for truth
 Former presidential candidate, pastor, and Gov. Mike Huckabee offered a video greeting to the American Family Association of Michigan’s 2009 annual banquet, praising the organization for its leadership in defense of prenatal children’s unalienable Right to Life and the God-ordained institution of marriage and the family.
“In a time when so many organizations, even Christian ones, are running from truth, and running from controversy,” Huckabee said, “Gary and American Family Association of Michigan have been absolutely, totally committed to maintaining a steady, solid course for truth.”
Click to watch video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNI00Skt2rk
Fireproof star Erin Bethea: “Marriage is worth fighting for”
 Erin Bethea, the pastor’s daughter who starred in the 2008 hit movie Fireproof as the wife of the fireman played by Kirk Cameron, shared an inspiring and uplifting testimony of how God is using the vision He gave one church in Georgia to reach millions of viewers worldwide through Christian films. It was no accident, she said, that when the institution of God-ordained marriage is under attack, the church was led to focus its latest film on the importance of preserving Christ-centered marriages.
Glenn honored for decade of leadership for Michigan families
 AFA-Michigan’s 2009 banquet marked the tenth year of Gary Glenn’s service as president of the state’s highest-profile advocate for traditional Judeo-Christian family values, during which the organization has been recognized as a leader not only in Michigan but nationally on such issues as pornography, protecting prenatal life and religious liberty, and opposing the homosexual agenda, including Gary’s co-authorship of the Marriage Protection Amendment overwhel-mingly approved by Michigan voters in 2004.
AFA-Michigan’s activities under Gary’s direction have been reported by the BBC, New York Times, CNN, Paula Zahn Now, MSNBC, USA Today, Fox News, Associated Press, Washington Post, Washington Times, Boston Globe, Chronicle of Higher Education, Tech Law Journal, Arizona Star, Focus on the Family’s Citizen magazine, and countless TV, radio, and newspaper stories in Michigan.
American Political Science Association in San Francisco — later published by Harvard University — two Calvin College political science professors stated: “In recent years, AFA of Michigan has played an increasingly visible role in state politics as it has turned much of its attention to opposing gay rights initiatives across the state. In addition, AFA of Michigan is engaged in opposing pornography… Much of the publicity received by AFA of Michigan is attributable to the energetic leadership of its current president, Gary Glenn, particularly with respect to the controversial area of gay rights.
…Glenn has shown no fear in dealing with what his group labels the ‘homosexual agenda’ and has vigorously opposed proposals to permit gays to head Boy Scout troops as well as sexual non-discrimination ordinances proposed by various cities across Michigan.”
AFA-Michigan honors three citizen activists in Hamtramck…
 Each year, the American Family Association of Michigan honors citizens who have sacrificed their time, money, and energy in defense of traditional family values. At this year’s banquet, we recognized the three leaders of last November’s successful campaign to overturn a discriminatory “gay rights” ordinance adopted by the Hamtramck city council, which would have created special “protected class” status based on homosexual behavior and cross-dressing.
 Campaign co-chairs Rev. Andrew Wesley and Akm Rahman and campaign manager Jay McNally first conducted a successful petition drive to force the ordinance onto the November ballot, then waged an aggressive public education campaign in four languages exposing the threat the discrimina-tory measure posed to religious liberty and the privacy rights of women and children in public restrooms and other facilities.
 In a city that voted a whopping 85 percent for Democratic presidential candidate Barak Obama, voters nonetheless rejected the so-called “gay rights” ordinance by a ten-point margin, 55 to 45 percent. The city’s local newspaper, the Hamtramck Citizen, in December named the ordinance’s defeat the city’s top news story of 2008. AFA-Michigan thanks and salutes Rev. Wesley, Akm, and Jay for their faithful, tireless, and effective leadership.
…and a faithful Christian expelled by Eastern Michigan University.
We were also privileged to welcome and honor Daryl and Julea Ward from Ypsilanti. Julea is an African-American public school teacher who, until March, was also a 3.9 GPA student in the graduate counseling program at Eastern Michigan University before being expelled for refusing academic administrators’ demand that she abandon her Christian convictions.
Four credits short of completing her Masters degree, Julea was referred a patient who wanted counseling to help improve his relationship with his homosexual “partner.” Because she could not in good conscience affirm the patient’s homosexual relationship, Julea followed her supervisor’s instructions and asked that the patient be referred to another counselor, which he was. However, she was thereafter rebuked by her supervisor and instructed to submit to a remedial reeducation course to change her religious views, which she refused.
Administrators then conducted a formal inquisition during which they mocked and belittled her faith and pressured Julea to recant her convictions. She politely but firmly refused, calmly telling the academic elites that she would not “sell out God.” In response, the panel voted to expel her from the counseling program, and after an EMU dean rejected Julea’s appeal, she was expelled. The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal foundation, has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against EMU, which university officials will spend our tax dollars to contest.
Click here to read the transcript of Julea Ward’s inquisition by EMU officials and her unshakeable witness: http://blog.mlive.com/annarbornews_impact/2009/04/EMUhearing_transcript.pdf
AFA-Michigan thanks and honors Julea for the bold resolution of her faith, and we pray the Lord will grant her success in her lawsuit, reinstatement at EMU, and many opportunities in the future to positively influence the patients who seek her counsel once she has completed her degree.
Michigan’s Julea Ward joins Miss California Carrie Prejean as young Christian women who set an example for us all of principled conviction in the face of cultural hostility and persecu-tion. Julea, we salute you!
Rep. Tom McMillin: eyewitness to AFA-Michigan’s effectiveness
 Rep. Tom McMillin, R-Rochester Hills, former mayor of Auburn Hills, former Oakland County Commissioner, and a long-time supporter and ally of the American Family Association of Michigan, closed the evening by sharing eyewitness testimony from Lansing of AFA-Michigan’s effectiveness at persuading — and when necessary, pressuring — the state Legislature to preserve traditional family values in law, more often than not by blocking legislation hostile to those values.
Rep. McMillin and AFA-Michigan’s Gary Glenn in May were the only two individuals who appeared before the state House Judiciary Committee to testify against discriminatory so-called “hate crime” legislation that threatens free speech rights in Michigan.
Tom then led the opposition to the bill on the floor of the House of Representatives, where all Democrats but two voted for it, while all of his fellow Republicans but two voted against it. AFA-Michigan thanks and salutes Tom for his long history of steadfast leadership for traditional family values in the public policy arena.
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May 12, 2009
Homosexual activists seek criminal prosecution of pastors,
others who publicly oppose homosexual political agenda
Family group urges defeat of “hate crime” bill
Judges endorsed by homosexual activist groups may agree
with strategy to treat religious speech as “abetting” violence
LANSING, Mich. — With the state House of Representatives set to vote on the issue as early as Wednesday, a statewide family values group and its national affiliate Monday urged tens of thousands of Michigan residents to contact lawmakers in opposition to a bill that would create special “protected class” status for individuals who engage in homosexual behavior or cross-dressing and special enhanced prison sentences for crimes committed against them.House Bill 4836, introduced by Rep. Robert Jones, D-Kalamazoo, is scheduled for a public hearing and vote Wednesday at 10:30 a.m., with a vote by the full House possible any time thereafter.
The American Family Association in an e-mail alert Monday said the legislation violates “the principle of equal justice under law…and would mean that a criminal who attacks a senior citizen, pregnant mom, or small child would be punished less severely — with a shorter prison sentence — than someone who attacks a grown man, if that grown man is involved in homosexual behavior or cross-dressing. The notion that some victims are worthy of greater protection than others, especially if it’s based on their choice of sexual behavior, is simply outrageous.”
Gary Glenn, Midland, president of the American Family Association of Michigan, also said HB 4836 poses a serious threat to religious free speech rights, citing the use of such “hate crime” laws in Europe, Canada, and the U.S. to prosecute Christians merely for speaking out against homosexual activists’ political agenda.
“In Michigan, homosexual activists openly admit they want to see pastors and others who speak out against the homosexual agenda criminally prosecuted as ‘accessories’ any time a violent crime is committed against an individual who’s involved in homosexual behavior or cross-dressing,” the AFA e-mail alert said.
Glenn cited a Saginaw News report of its interview with prominent homosexual activist Jeffrey Montgomery, former executive director of the Triangle Foundation, a Detroit-based homosexual lobby:
“Jeffrey Montgomery is calling out the political extremists and religious fundamentalists whose rhetoric, he says, has fueled a steady rise in hate crimes against gays and lesbians. ‘We’ve seen an increase in vitriolic, vociferous, vehement, demonizing rhetoric against gays and lesbians,’ said Montgomery… ‘The vocal anti-gay activists should be held accountable as accessories to these crimes because, many times, it is their rhetoric that led the perpetrators to believe that their crimes are OK.’ …If a criminal borrows a gun and then uses it to kill someone, the law considers the gun owner an accessory to the crime. So, too, are the people who own the words that incite violence, Montgomery said.” (”Triangle exec decries violence” by Lania Coleman, p. 4A, The Saginaw News, April 27, 2005)
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He also cited a report by State News, the Michigan State University student newspaper, which quoted another prominent homosexual activist — former Triangle Foundation director of policy Sean Kosofsky — as saying: “We personally believe that the AFA may support the murder of gay, lesbian, and bisexual people.” http://www.statenews.com/article.phtml?pk=6737
Glenn also cited a news release issued by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force in 2007 which accused him and Cardinal Maida of Detroit — merely by having publicly disagreed with homosexual activists’ political agenda on marriage and other issues — of being responsible for inciting the alleged beating death of a homosexual senior citizen in Detroit. http://thetaskforce.org/press/releases/prMF_022307
“It is appalling hypocrisy for (Glenn and Maida) to pretend that their venomous words and organizing have no connection to the plague of hate violence against gay people, including the murder of Mr. Anthos,” the NGLTF statement said.
Glenn said homosexual activists and their political allies — including Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who condemned the purported “hate crime” on the U.S. Senate floor — were later embarrassed when Detroit police announced they had found no evidence of any assault and the Wayne County Medical Examiner ruled Anthos suffered a blow to the head after falling due to arthritic paralysis of his neck. (See Associated Press, March 28, 2007: http://www.randythomas.org/blog/2007/03/hate-crime-or-arthritis.html)
The statements by Montgomery, Kosofsky, and NGLTF “make clear that homosexual activists hope to sell society and the courts on their repressive view that anyone who dares publicly disagree with their political agenda should face the threat of being criminally prosecuted, and they’re not beyond fabricating false ‘hate crime’ claims to do it,” Glenn said.
According to the AFA e-mail alert, a provision of already existing state law could be used by homosexual activists and their allies in the judiciary to justify such prosecutions.
Michigan Code Section 767.39 states: “Every person concerned in the commission of an offense, whether he directly commits the act constituting the offense or procures, counsels, aids, or abets in its commission may hereafter be prosecuted, indicted, tried and on conviction shall be punished as if he had directly committed such offense.”
The word “abet” means “to encourage.” http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/abet
“If HB 4836 becomes law,” Glenn said, “we have no doubt that there are openly homosexual or sympathetic judges in Michigan who agree with the Triangle Foundation’s propaganda strategy of accusing anyone who speaks out against their political agenda of being guilty of ‘encouraging’ criminal activity any time a crime is actually committed or falsely alleged to have been committed against an individual involved in homosexual behavior or cross-dressing.”
Glenn cited as examples of judges likely to share the Triangle Foundation’s legal strategy:
* Openly homosexual 36th District Judge Rudy Serra, Wayne County, a former member of the Triangle Foundation’s board of trustees, and 57th District Judge William Baillargeon, Allegan County, a former member of the Triangle Foundation board of advisors.
- Serra: http://www.vendio.com/mesg/read.html?num=28&thread=223286
- Baillargeon: http://web.archive.org/web/20021029115642/www.tri.org/advisors.html
* Triangle Pride PAC, the Triangle Foundations’ affiliated political action committee, also endorsed the following sitting judges in the 2008 election: 15th District Judge Chris Easthope, Washtenaw County; 46th District Judge William Richards, Oakland County; 91st District Judge Elizabeth Church, Chippewa County; Ingham County Circuit Judge Rosemarie Aquilina, Oakland County Circuit Judge Mary Ellen Brennan, Wayne County Circuit Judges Connie Kelley and Lynne Pierce, and Oakland County Prosecutor Jessica Cooper. http://www.pride-pac.org/guide/showall.php
* Michigan Supreme Court Justice Diane Hathaway “supports (homosexual and cross-dressing) rights and issues and was strongly endorsed by” Between the Lines, a homosexual activist newsmagazine in Detroit. Circuit Court Judges Christopher Yates and Donald Shelton were also endorsed by Between the Lines in 2008, as were District Court Judges Bill Richards and Elizabeth Church. http://www.pridesource.com/article.shtml?article=32861
* Ingham County Circuit Judge Joyce Dragunchuk — whose 2005 ruling in support of homosexual activists’ lawsuit against the state Marriage Protection Amendment was overturned by the Michigan Court of Appeals — was endorsed by both Triangle Pride PAC and another homosexual activist group, the Lansing Association for Human Rights.
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April 16, 2009
“Faith organizations and individuals who view homosexuality as sinful and refuse to provide services to gay people are losing a growing number of legal battles that they say are costing them their religious freedom. The lawsuits have resulted from states and communities that have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation. …Some legal analysts suggest that religious groups that do not support gay rights might lose their tax exemptions because of their politically unpopular views. Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University who supports same-sex marriage, said the Bob Jones (tax exemption) ruling ‘puts us on a slippery slope that inevitably takes us to the point where we punish religious groups because of their religious views.’”
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WASHINGTON POST
Washington, D.C.
April 10, 2009
Faith groups increasingly lose gay rights fights
by Jacqueline L. Salmon, Washington Post Staff Writer
Faith organizations and individuals who view homosexuality as sinful and refuse to provide services to gay people are losing a growing number of legal battles that they say are costing them their religious freedom.
The lawsuits have resulted from states and communities that have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation. Those laws have created a clash between the right to be free from discrimination and the right to freedom of religion, religious groups said, with faith losing. They point to what they say are ominous recent examples:
– A Christian photographer was forced by the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission to pay $6,637 in attorney’s costs after she refused to photograph a gay couple’s commitment ceremony.
– A psychologist in Georgia was fired after she declined for religious reasons to counsel a lesbian about her relationship.
– Christian fertility doctors in California who refused to artificially inseminate a lesbian patient were barred by the state Supreme Court from invoking their religious beliefs in refusing treatment.
– A Christian student group was not recognized at a University of California law school because it denies membership to anyone practicing sex outside of traditional marriage.
“It really is all about religious liberty for us,” said Scott Hoffman, chief administrative officer of a New Jersey Methodist group, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, which lost a property tax exemption after it declined to allow its beachside pavilion to be used for a same-sex union ceremony.
“The protection to not be forced to do something that is against deeply held religious principles.”
But gay groups and liberal legal scholars say they are prevailing because an individual’s religious views about homosexuality cannot be used to violate gays’ right to equal treatment under the law.
“We are not required to pay the price for other people’s religious views about us,” said Jennifer Pizer, director of the Marriage Project for Lambda Legal, a gay rights legal advocacy group.
Twelve states now offer some form of same-sex marriage or same-sex partner recognition. Twenty states — including Maryland — and more than 180 cities and counties, including the District, ban discrimination against gays, according to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights group. Virginia bans it against state employees.
These laws generally offer some type of exemption to religious entities when hiring employees. But some groups are working to expand that exemption to include commercial businesses to protect owners and their employees when exercising their religious views.
Gay rights groups said they do not object to making faith groups’ religious jobs exempt from the discrimination laws but that offering services to the public is different.
“In their role as a participant in the marketplace, they are being required to do that in a non-discriminatory way,” said Brian Moulton, Human Rights Campaign senior counsel.
Battles are increasingly including private businesses. Last August, the California Supreme Court ruled in favor of Guadalupe Benitez, who is a lesbian, when she sued the North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group after doctors said their religious beliefs prevented them from artificially inseminating her.
“We were devastated,” said Benitez, 37, who has been with partner Joanne Clark for almost two decades. Sexual orientation “should never have been an issue,” she said. “The issue was that I had a medical condition.”
The court ruled that North Coast Women’s Care did not have a free-speech right or a religious exemption from the state antidiscrimination law.
Sometimes, organizations that don’t wish to serve gays give in rather than go to court.
The online dating site eHarmony agreed to provide gay and lesbian matchmaking services to settle a complaint by a gay New Jersey man accusing it of discrimination. The new site, CompatiblePartners.net, started Tuesday.
The site eHarmony, founded by evangelical psychologist Neil Clark Warren, does not provide a same-sex option. Warren said his research into successful relationships did not include same-sex couples.
Company attorneys said that it settled because of the unpredictable nature of litigation and that New Jersey’s attorney general did not find that eHarmony had violated the state’s anti-discrimination law.
“People seem to say that if you enter the world of commerce, you lose all your First Amendment rights” to free exercise of religion, said Jordan Lorence, senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal organization that has represented several businesses. “They . . . have become nothing more than vending machines, and the government can dictate the conditions under which they dispense their goods and services.”
Even when groups opposing homosexuality have prevailed in court, they have gone on to face other setbacks. The Boy Scouts of America won a lawsuit in 2000 because it did not allow openly gay Scouts or Scout leaders. Since then, some private charities have refused to support the Scouts, and some local governments have yanked free use of facilities and other benefits. In Philadelphia, the city is demanding that the Scouts pay $200,000 in annual rent for a building that they had been using rent-free. The dispute is in court.
Some scholars also point to Bob Jones University, which lost its tax exemption over a ban on interracial dating and marriage among students, even though it claimed that those beliefs were religiously grounded. Some legal analysts suggest that religious groups that do not support gay rights might lose their tax exemptions because of their politically unpopular views.
Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University who supports same-sex marriage, said the Bob Jones ruling “puts us on a slippery slope that inevitably takes us to the point where we punish religious groups because of their religious views.”
Both sides predict more litigation as gay rights bump up against strong religious beliefs.
Marc Stern, general counsel for American Jewish Congress, said: “When you have a change that is as dramatic as has happened in the last 10 to 15 years with regards to attitudes toward homosexuality, it’s inevitable it’s going to reverberate in dozens of places in the law that you’re never going to be able to foresee.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/09/AR2009040904063.html
April 16, 2009
Dear AFA-Michigan supporter,
Under pressure from multiple sources on and off campus, Central Michigan University’s student newspaper Friday morning published — on page two of its on-campus print version — a three-sentence retraction of the false report included in its story regarding my visit to the campus this past Tuesday night.
In response to my phone discussion today with student editor-in-chief Jacob May, pointing out that their ethical obligation to correct their false report extended beyond the confines of the CMU campus, he later in the day added the retraction to the CM Life website at the top of the Wednesday story which falsely reported that “many groups” had accused me of being “anti-Semitic.” (In fact, no group has ever made such an accusation.)
Here’s the retraction:
“Editor’s note: Because of an editing error in Wednesday’s edition of Central Michigan Life, this article originally included uncorroborated remarks alleging that American Family Association (of Michigan) President Gary Glenn was ‘anti-Semitic.’ This is incorrect. Central Michigan Life regrets publishing this error.” http://media.www.cm-life.com/media/storage/paper906/news/2009/04/08/News/Hundreds.Protest.Conservative.Speaker-3701563.shtml
What CM Life terms an “editing error” was in fact the now former managing editor’s insertion of the false allegation into the story after the reporter had turned it in for publication; thus, the reporter — under whose name the false information was published without his prior knowledge — joined us in demanding it be removed.
Jacob advised me that the managing editor guilty of this “error” has been fired, as first reported yesterday by the Campus Conservatives group which invited me to speak…see their news release below.
However, still having not fully learned their lesson, CM Life editors as of this moment have let remain on their website the “corrected” version of Wednesday’s story, which merely diverts what they now admit was a false attack on me personally to an equally unsubstantiated attack on the national AFA organization — again, without citing any accuser by name or identifying any factual sources or substance for the slur.
Thus, what originally read — “Glenn also denied any allegations of being anti-Semitic, which many groups have accused him of.” — now reads instead — “…which some people have accused the national AFA of being.”
Folks, this student newspaper is funded and operated by your tax dollars.
If you’d like to join us in demanding that CM Life remove all “anti-Semitic” slurs from their story — a subject which, by the way, had nothing whatsoever to do with the topic on which I spoke Tuesday night — please join us in contacting the CMU president’s office as follows:
Phone: (989) 774-3131
E-mail: president@cmich.edu
Thanks as always for your support!
Gary Glenn, President
American Family Association of Michigan
989-835-7978
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For more information, contact:
Dennis Lennox, CMU Campus Conservatives
MOUNT PLEASANT, Mich. — The managing editor of Central Michigan University’s student newspaper was fired for falsifying accusations that libeled Michigan’s leading traditional values spokesman.
Garrett Ellison had changed a piece after the reporter turned it in for publishing in Wednesday’s edition of Central Michigan Life. His changes claimed American Family Association of Michigan President Gary Glenn was an anti-Semite.
The thrice-weekly newspaper is retracting the story and issuing a full apology in Friday’s edition.
Glenn was at CMU to speak during a Campus Conservatives meeting. He is the author of the 2004 constitutional amendment that enshrined traditional marriage in the Michigan Constitution.
“This is a victory for conservatives, who have been oppressed for years at CMU,” said Campus Conservatives spokesman Dennis Lennox. “One has to wonder how many other utter falsehoods have been published.”
Lennox has also called for the firing of another editor, Caitlin Foyt, who attacked Glenn on Twitter calling him “homophobic” and “anti-semitic (sic).” Foyt, who is bisexual, according to her Facebook profile, has been previously banned from writing about Campus Conservatives because of her biases.
“As a taxpayer-funded newspaper, Central Michigan Life has an obligation to be objective and impartial,” said Lennox. “Students need to know they can trust the school newspaper.”
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Letter to CMU newspaper by Rabbi Glenn Harris,
Congregation Shema Yisrael, Bloomfield Hills
To the Editor (Central Michigan Life),
There is a thing called libel. It consists of putting falsehood to print. It potentially carries criminal charges.
Joe Borlik authored an article (”Hundreds protest conservative speaker: Group closes meeting in response to demonstrations” April 8, 2009), in which he commented about American Family Association (of Michigan) President Gary Glenn, and I quote:
“Glenn also denied any allegations of being anti-Semitic, which many groups have accused him of (italics mine). He said the mission statement of his organization has always been to promote Judeo-Christian values.”
Unless Mr. Borlik’s is intentionally sabotaging any future career in journalism, I call on him to either provide the organizations, names and dates of the alleged allegations of anti-Semitism against Mr. Glenn (and they must be verifiably dated prior to 4/8/09), or else retract his statement in writing, with appropriate apologies to your constituency and to Mr. Glenn.
I am all for free speech, but I have a particular disdain for false accusation, particularly when it is memorialized in print. I have known Mr. Glenn for the better part of a decade, and this man has not a shred of anti-Semitism in him.
Sincerely,
Rabbi Glenn Harris
Congregation Shema Yisrael
Bloomfield Hills, MI
(248) 593-5150
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E-mail message from Joe Borlik, the student reporter under whose
byline the false CM-Life report was published (highlights added):
Gary Glenn,
I apologize if you were unhappy with the article and I will forward this to the managing editor. But I would like you to know that when I wrote the article in the newsroom I never wrote that “many groups have accused you of being anti-semetic.” If I had wrote that I would have said which groups accused you of such allogations. It is not like I wrote it and it instantly went into print. It was edited by three editors after it was written and one of them must have added that in. Once again I apologize.
Joe Borlik
Central Michigan Life
(616) 405-3578
April 11, 2009
Note: we’ve demanded a retraction of the flatly false allegation included in this story that “many groups have accused (Gary Glenn) of” being anti-Semitic. No group has ever made such an accusation. If you’d like to join us in that demand, or otherwise express support for AFA-Michigan’s stand for traditional Judeo-Christian values, please e-mail the CMU student newspaper at:
studentlife@cm-life.com
“Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association in Michigan, was greeted by about 200 protesters when he arrived to speak with the (Central Michigan University) Campus Conservatives Tuesday night. …The AFA is strongly opposed to laws allowing gay marriage. Glenn is the (co-)author of Proposal 2, which in 2004 called for marriage to be defined in Michigan as between a man and a woman.
…Glenn spoke on the importance of traditional marriage and said the majority of Americans, including two thirds of blacks and more than 50 percent of Democrats agree that marriage should be between a man and a women. …According to Glenn, an Oxford University study suggests that college-aged gay men will die eight to 20 years earlier than straight men, and that gay people are more likely to experience domestic violence, a life-threatening disease and premature death.”
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CENTRAL MICHIGAN LIFE
Central Michigan University
Mount Pleasant, Michigan
April 8, 2009
Hundreds protest conservative speaker
Group closes meeting in response to demonstrations
by Joe Borlik
Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association in Michigan, was greeted by about 200 protesters when he arrived to speak with the Campus Conservatives Tuesday night.
The crowd, which waited behind the metal gate across the street from the Bovee University Center harmoniously chanted “Gay, straight, black, white, marriage is a civil right,” and “Hey, hey, ho, ho, homophobia’s got to go.”
Signs were printed with statements like “hate is not a family value,” and “you don’t have the balls to be queer.”
The AFA is strongly opposed to laws allowing gay marriage. Glenn is the author of Proposal 2, which in 2004 called for marriage to be defined in Michigan as between a man and a woman.
“I wanted to send a message to Gary Glenn and the organization he represents that we won’t represent hate on campus,” said Tennessee senior Ben Dotson. “He has the right to freedom of speech, but we have the right to take a stand against the bigotry he stands for.”
Many of the protesters heard about the event from a Facebook event that was created by Dotson on Monday. Several officers with the Central Michigan University Police were on hand, presumably for crowd control.
In response to the protest, Campus Conservatives decided to close the meeting to the general public.
“Tonight is just for us because we don’t want people coming in and attacking him,” said Hart sophomore and Campus Conservatives president Bryant Greiner.
Many protesters waited outside the University Center Isabella Room where Glenn spoke to make their presence heard.
Glenn was prepared for the crowd who awaiting his arrival after seeing the protest scheduled on Facebook.
“It’s the first time I’ve ever had my own Facebook (page),” he said. “They preach tolerance and diversity, yet if they had it their way, I wouldn’t be here.”
Glenn spoke on the importance of traditional marriage and said the majority of Americans, including two thirds of blacks and more than 50 percent of Democrats agree that marriage should be between a man and a women.
He also said that people who preach love and diversity can sometimes be the most hateful and intolerant people.
Glenn also denied any allegations of being anti-Semitic, which many groups have accused him of. He said the mission statement of his organization has always been to promote Judeo-Christian values.
According to Glenn, an Oxford University study suggests that college-aged gay men will die eight to 20 years earlier than straight men, and that gay people are more likely to experience domestic violence, a life-threatening disease and premature death.
At 6:30 p.m., a half hour before the protest was scheduled to begin, Campus Conservatives sent out a press release to media entitled “Radical bullies try silencing Campus Conservatives meeting.”
The statement read that “radical activists from the fringe of the political spectrum are threatening to disrupt tonight’s meeting.”
Journalism professor Timothy Boudreau, adviser to the Campus Conservatives, said he wished Glenn’s speech would have been open to the public.
“I find it ironic and profoundly disappointing that on a night when they preached the value of free expression, they closed the door on opposing points of view,” he said.
April 11, 2009
“The Iowa Supreme Court on Friday morning struck down a state law restricting marriage to one man and one woman… As gay rights groups across the country hail the ruling, opponents are not as happy. Gary Glenn, the president of the American Family Association of Michigan, opposed the ruling.
‘Activist judges in Iowa proved once again today how right the American Family Association of Michigan was to call for a preemptive Marriage Protection Amendment constitutionally securing the definition of one-man, one-woman marriage in our state, and how right the people of Michigan were to overwhelmingly approve it,’ he said. ‘Homosexual activists will of course now parade counterfeit ‘marriages’ through the streets of Des Moines for a while, as they did in California, but eventually the people of Iowa will have a chance to vote on the issue, and the result will be the same there as in Michigan and 29 other states.’”
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MICHIGAN MESSENGER
Lansing, Michigan
April 3, 2009
Michigan gay rights advocates praise
Iowa’s same-sex marriage court ruling
by Todd A. Heywood
The Iowa Supreme Court on Friday morning struck down a state law restricting marriage to one man and one woman, and many Michigan residents are hailing the ruling that makes the Hawkeye State the first in the Midwest to OK same-sex marriage. However, the case will have little direct impact on Michigan.
“This is a great opinion,” said Jay Kaplan, staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan’s Gay Lesbian Project. “This was a unanimous decision from Iowa’s Supreme Court and the first time we have a favorable opinion in the Midwest.”
“While the ruling itself is significant, the reasoning behind the unanimous decision is insightful, fair, and thorough,” said Julie Nemecek, co-director of Michigan Equality, a Lansing-based LBGT rights organization.
“It’s a different scenario there,” Kaplan said. “Iowa doesn’t have a constitutional amendment like we do. Its civil rights laws cover LGBT people, and the make-up of its Supreme Court is different than what we have here. We’d have to repeal our constitutional amendment, replace several justices on the Michigan Supreme Court before we’d be able to see a decision like this here.”
Michigan voters passed a constitutional amendment in 2004 that banned gay marriage and other same-sex unions.
Still, Kaplan said, other states can look to Iowa’s ruling. “I think it sets a good template for states that are similarly situated to Iowa (in terms of laws, courts, etc.), and we may see more developments in marriage equality in the Midwest (possibly a successful challenge in Illinois in the future) — so that the successes are not just limited to the coasts.”
As gay rights groups across the country hail the ruling, opponents are not as happy.
Gary Glenn, the president of the American Family Association of Michigan, opposed the ruling. “Activist judges in Iowa proved once again today how right the American Family Association of Michigan was to call for a preemptive Marriage Protection Amendment constitutionally securing the definition of one-man, one-woman marriage in our state, and how right the people of Michigan were to overwhelmingly approve it,” he said. “Homosexual activists will of course now parade counterfeit ‘marriages’ through the streets of Des Moines for a while, as they did in California, but eventually the people of Iowa will have a chance to vote on the issue, and the result will be the same there as in Michigan and 29 other states.”
According to Lynda Waddington over at Michigan Messenger’s sibling site, The Iowa Independent, state law there does not have any residency requirements for marriage. This means same-sex couples could begin going to the Hawkeye State to get married, as was seen last year when California legalized same-sex marriage.
The Iowa Supreme Court judges are appointed by the governor, approved by the state Senate, then serve one year. At the end of the year they face a judicial retention election.
http://michiganmessenger.com/16081/michigan-gay-rights-advocates-react-to-iowa-same-sex-marriage-court-ruling
April 10, 2009
“The coalition of (homosexual activist) groups supporting the (so-called ‘anti-bullying’) bill and the lobbying efforts have ‘postponed’ indefinitely the event. …Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association of Michigan, sent out a gleeful email late Friday afternoon declaring victory, ‘AFA-Michigan has so effectively exposed and discredited the Triangle Foundation’s past Trojan Horse “bullying” legislation that homosexual activists still trying to ride that dead horse have been reduced to attacking Triangle for being smart enough to jump off in midstream.’”
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MICHIGAN MESSENGER
Lansing, Michigan
March 23, 2009
Anti-bullying forces delay statewide lobby day
by Todd A. Heywood
On Wednesday, hundreds of parents, educators and youth were expected to flood the halls of the state Capitol to urge law makers to pass Matt’s Safe School Law– a series of bills designed to address bullying in Michigan schools.
However my colleague, Jessica Carrerras, at Between the Lines, has learned the coalition of groups supporting the bill and the lobbying efforts have “postponed” indefinitely the event. The Safe Schools Coalition is made up of various groups, including social workers and LGBT groups.
As we have recently reported, the LGBT goups have been barking at each other over a piece of compromise legislation which would remove enumeration– a list of protected classes.
Sources at Triangle Foundation, an LGBT group pushing for the compromise legislation, told Carrerras this postponement had nothing to do with the ongoing schism in the community.
Triangle Foundation Executive Director Alicia Skillman maintains that the decision to postpone is not tied in any way to the arguments that have taken place. “It’s been an ongoing discussion in the safe schools coalition,” she said.
But Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association of Michigan, sent out a gleeful email late Friday afternoon declaring victory.
AFA-Michigan has so effectively exposed and discredited the Triangle Foundation’s past Trojan Horse “bullying” legislation that homosexual activists still trying to ride that dead horse have been reduced to attacking Triangle for being smart enough to jump off in midstream.
Glenn and his group have opposed the legislation for years, arguing it would create special rights for the gay community. You can read our earlier coverage on this issue here, here and here.
http://michiganmessenger.com:80/15129/anti-bullying-forces-delay-statewide-lobby-day
February 21, 2009
WOOD-TV of Grand Rapids, Michigan, originally agreed to air the hour-long paid program ‘Speechless: Silencing Christians,’ a documentary seeking to expose the agenda of homosexual activists and their impact on families and freedom of religion. The station later canceled the agreement shortly after the Human Rights Campaign, a pro-homosexual organization, issued a national alert against the film urging people to call for its cancellation. The American Family Association of Michigan, however, has now learned that Trevor Thomas, the deputy communications director for the HRC in Washington, D.C., once worked in WOOD-TV’s newsroom.”
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WORLD NET DAILY
Cave Junction, Oregon
February 20, 2009
Censorship query uncovers pro-’gay’ activist
Spokesman worked at station that silenced Christian program
by Drew Zahn
A Michigan television station agreed to broadcast a Christian documentary critical of the “gay rights” movement, but later backed out – and now a family values organization is questioning whether the station’s about-face was influenced by a former newsroom executive who is a homosexual activist.
As WND reported, WOOD-TV of Grand Rapids, Mich., originally agreed to air the hour-long paid program “Speechless: Silencing Christians,” a documentary seeking to expose the agenda of homosexual activists and their impact on families and freedom of religion. The station later canceled the agreement shortly after the Human Rights Campaign, a pro-homosexual organization, issued a national alert against the film urging people to call for its cancellation.
The American Family Association of Michigan, however, has now learned that Trevor Thomas, the deputy communications director for the HRC in Washington, D.C., once worked in WOOD-TV’s newsroom.
Gary Glenn, president of AFA-Michigan, said in a statement to WOOD-TV General Manager Diane Kniowski that he originally suspected the cancellation was merely a matter of political correctness, but now wonders how deeply the connection runs between Thomas and the station.
“Now,” Glenn wrote to Kniowski, “we learn that a public spokesman for the so-called Human Rights Campaign – the national homosexual activist group that claimed credit for pressuring your station to censor and breach its agreement to air AFA’s paid documentary – is a former long-time WOOD-TV newsroom executive who while holding that position was allowed by the station to actively and publicly campaign against the Marriage Protection Amendment approved by Michigan voters in 2004.”
“That new information,” Glenn continued, “leads us to question whether the real story is that WOOD-TV management was unduly influenced by or even acted in collusion with a former high-level staffer who you allowed to openly campaign for homosexual activists’ political agenda while with the station and who now promotes that agenda full-time nationwide.”
According to the HRC website, Thomas worked as an assignment editor and news producer at WOOD-TV from at least September 2001 through November 2004. During his tenure at the station, Thomas also wrote an essay for The Grand Rapids Press, speaking out against Michigan’s 2004 marriage amendment. Following its publication, he served on a number of college panels on “gay,” lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues. Thomas’ work also includes a three-year tenure on the board of directors for the Network of Western Michigan: a non-profit that aides the GLBT community.
Two television station professionals, according to a Michigan Messenger report, denied any hint of collusion between Thomas and the station, and scoffed at the AFA description of Thomas’ news room producer position as either an “executive” or a “high-level staffer.”
The Messenger reached Thomas by phone, but he declined to comment on the allegations of collusion.
A WOOD-TV statement released following cancellation of “Speechless” suggested the station was attempting to back out of the controversy over the program.
“Our station is being bombarded with calls and messages, and we find ourselves in the middle of someone else’s fight,” Kniowski said in the statement. “We are removing ourselves from this matter.”
Glenn, however, says the timing of WOOD-TV’s cancellation announcement – coming only an hour after the HRC’s action alert was issued – suggests there may have been an intentional coordination.
He said WOOD-TV’s claim that it cancelled the broadcast to avoid controversy “is simply nonsensical in light of the station’s actual actions, which were tailor-made to generate as much controversy and publicity as possible.”
“The question,” Glenn continued, “is whether WOOD-TV was influenced by its former editor and producer to handle it this way on purpose to make sure its censorship of the AFA video got as much publicity as possible and their former newsroom executive’s new employer got the credit.”
“Speechless,” hosted by talk show host Janet Parshall, emphasizes the media’s role in promotion of homosexuals’ “radical agenda,” and includes examples of how television shows and movies such as Friends,” “Will & Grace,” “The L-Word,” “The War at Home,” “ER” and “Entourage” attempt to persuade viewers that aversions to homosexuality stem from bigotry and ignorance.
“Speechless” explores the homosexual lobby’s impact on school curriculums. Videos promoted as anti-bullying actually endorsed “gay” lifestyles, and students were forced to view them during school hours. It claims homosexual lobbyists also push for “gay” literature in schools.
According to the program, the homosexual activist agenda demands same-sex “marriage,” teaches children that homosexuality is normal, promotes homosexual service in the armed forces, pushes for hate crime laws that threaten freedom of speech, calls for laws forcing Christian business to hire homosexuals and insists upon reserving minority status and preferential treatment for them.
“If you think that agenda is bad for America, you must do something,” a female voiceover states.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=89523
February 21, 2009
“The ruling Friday prompted American Family Association of Michigan President Gary Glenn to call for a ballot measure that would ban gay adoptions in the state. ‘What’s best for any child is to have both a mother and a father who are married,’ Glenn said. He said Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi and Utah have bans against gay adoptions.”
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ASSOCIATED PRESS
Lansing, Michigan
February 20, 2009
Michigan court recognizes
Illinois adoption by gay couple
by David Eggert, Associated Press Writer
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan courts can oversee a custody dispute between lesbian parents who adopted in Illinois even though Michigan doesn’t formally recognize gay relationships, the state Court of Appeals said Friday.
The court ruled 2-1 that the U.S. Constitution requires state courts to recognize Diane Giancaspro and Lisa Congleton as adoptive parents. It reversed a trial judge who said Michigan’s 2004 voter-approved gay marriage ban kept her from enforcing the women’s parental rights.
“The only relevant consideration in this matter is each individual party’s established relationship as an adoptive parent with the children, not their relationship with each other,” Judges Alton Davis and Stephen Borrello wrote.
Judge Kurtis Wilder dissented because he said Giancaspro didn’t show documents authenticating the Illinois adoption.
“My concern is the well-being of my children. I want them to live in a place where their rights are protected,” Giancaspro said in a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan and the New York-based gay rights group Lambda Legal.
An attempt to reach Congleton was unsuccessful because her phone number was disconnected. The couple’s three children were living with Giancaspro, the ACLU said.
The couple adopted from China while living in Illinois, and the children began living with them in 2003. But the couple’s relationship ended in 2007 after they moved to southwestern Michigan.
Giancaspro sued for custody under Michigan law, but Congleton said the case should be dismissed because neither parent has rights since the state constitution doesn’t allow the recognition of domestic partnerships. The couple never married.
Berrien County Circuit Judge Mabel Johnson Mayfield ruled for Congleton in September 2007, recognizing the validity of the adoption. But the judge said Michigan’s amendment banning gay marriage kept her from enforcing either woman’s parental rights.
The appeals court disagreed with the trial judge and sent the case back to her for a child custody hearing.
The ruling Friday prompted American Family Association of Michigan President Gary Glenn to call for a ballot measure that would ban gay adoptions in the state.
“What’s best for any child is to have both a mother and a father who are married,” Glenn said. He said Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi and Utah have bans against gay adoptions. The ACLU said it was thrilled with the appeals court’s decision.
“Today gay parents and their children can rest easier knowing that they again have access to Michigan courts,” said Kary Moss, the Michigan executive director of ACLU.
Gay couples in Michigan were allowed to jointly adopt children in Washtenaw County but the practice stopped in 2002 after the county’s chief judge said such adoptions violated state law.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/G/GAY_ADOPTIONSITE=MTBIL&SECTION=NATIONAL&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-02-20-21-14-31
February 21, 2009
Former WOOD-TV news editor/producer who campaigned against state
Marriage Protection Amendment is now spokesman for Washington, D.C.
group that claimed credit for pressuring station to drop paid documentary
Flint, Traverse City stations aired AFA program without controversy
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The state affiliate of the American Family Association Thursday urged a Grand Rapids television station to reverse its breach of an agreement to air the group’s one-hour documentary on the threat posed to religious freedom by homosexual activists’ political agenda. The American Family Association of Michigan, in an e-mail to NBC affiliate WOOD-TV Channel 8, questioned whether the station’s decision was unduly influenced by its relationship with former WOOD-TV assignment editor and producer Trevor Thomas, now a public spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, a national homosexual activist group that last week claimed credit for pressuring the station to cancel the broadcast.
AFA-Michigan President Gary Glenn said in a statement delivered Thursday to WOOD-TV General Manager Diane Kniowski that “the irony of station management’s on-again, off-again gymnastics was so transparent that it would be amusing if the issues addressed by the documentary were not so serious.”
“The documentary details the threat homosexual activists’ political agenda poses to religious freedom and such activists’ efforts to demonize, silence, and eventually criminalize any expression of public opposition to that agenda,” Glenn wrote Kniowski. “Its title is ‘Speechless: Silencing the Christians,’ and your capitulation or perhaps even collusion with homosexual activists’ demands that you censor and cancel the broadcast proves the point. To reassure the public that WOOD-TV is not in collusion with homosexual activists, including a former high-level WOOD-TV staffer, we urge you to reconsider your decision.”
Glenn wrote Kniowski that he “initially thought station management’s clumsy path to censorship resulted from a combination of politically correct handwringing, lack of professional objectivity, or perhaps even incompetence.”
“Now, however, we learn that a public spokesman for the so-called Human Rights Campaign — the national homosexual activist group that claimed credit for pressuring your station to censor and breach its agreement to air AFA’s paid documentary — is a former long-time WOOD-TV newsroom executive who while holding that position was allowed by the station to actively and publicly campaign against the Marriage Protection Amendment approved by Michigan voters in 2004,” Glenn wrote.
“That new information leads us to question whether the real story is that WOOD-TV management was unduly influenced by or even acted in collusion with a former high-level staffer who you allowed to openly campaign for homosexual activists’ political agenda while with the station and who now promotes that agenda full-time nationwide,” Glenn wrote. “The broader question raised by that relationship and your censorship of AFA’s pro-family documentary is whether viewers can trust WOOD-TV to be a fair and impartial source of news regarding the homosexual agenda.”
Glenn cited the Human Rights Campaign’s website which reports that Thomas has served since October 2007 as the group’s deputy communications director.
“Thomas, a journalist by trade, worked as an assignment editor and news producer at West Michigan’s NBC affiliate – WOOD-TV” from at least September 2001 through November 2004, HRC’s website reports, and was allowed by station management while on staff to actively campaign against Michigan’s Marriage Protection Amendment, which in 2004 was overwhelmingly approved by voters including a two-thirds majority in conservative west Michigan, WOOD-TV’s viewing area.
http://www.hrc.org/about_us/9643.htm
HRC’s website states: “In July of 2004, Thomas served as a guest essayist for The Grand Rapids Press, speaking out against an anti-gay marriage amendment on the Michigan ballot. Following its publication, he served on a number of (Gay-Lesbian-Bisexual-Transgender) panels at Grand Valley State University, Western Michigan University, (and) Aquinas College.
“WOOD-TV initially agreed and accepted payment to air the AFA-produced documentary on Monday, Feb. 9th, at 7:00 p.m. Station management breached that agreement, however, claiming they were concerned about unspecified ill effects of airing it immediately preceding President Obama’s news conference the same evening. Management initially said they were merely delaying the broadcast until Wed., Feb. 11th at 7:00 p.m; however, prior to that time slot, the station announced it was again delaying the broadcast until 2:00 p.m. Saturday.
Wednesday of last week, the Washington, D.C.-based Human Rights Campaign, which claims to be the nation’s largest homosexual activist group, issued a nationwide e-mail alert urging its members to send e-mails to WOOD-TV demanding the station cancel the broadcast altogether. Within an hour of HRC’s alert, WOOD-TV announced they would do just that.
HRC immediately claimed credit for the decision, issuing a news release titled “Michigan Television Station Pulls Misleading AFA Program Following Announcement of National Action Alert By Human Rights Campaign,” in which HRC President Mark Solomnese boasted: “Within an hour of (HRC’s) action alert announcement, the Grand Rapids station which had planned to air the deceptive programming rescinded that offer. …I am so proud of our members who answered the lies and distortions of the AFA and stopped this campaign of hate and deception.”
http://www.hrcactioncenter.org/campaign/stopthespecial
The timing of HRC’s action alert and WOOD-TV’s announcement of the documentary’s cancellation — coming within an hour of each other — suggests that there may have been coordination between the two, Glenn said.
He said WOOD-TV’s claim that it cancelled the broadcast to avoid controversy “is simply nonsensical in light of the station’s actual actions, which were tailor-made to generate as much controversy and publicity as possible.”
He said WOOD-TV’s announced delay of the broadcast generated media attention and opposition from homosexual activist groups opposed to the broadcast. The station’s repeated delays and public statements over a matter of days invited additional pressure from both sides of the issue, he said, then its decision to cancel the broadcast ensured that local viewers who supported the broadcast would be upset.
AFA’s e-mail system confirmed, for example, that 2,199 e-mails were sent to the station urging it to air the documentary, all from AFA e-mail subscribers who live within 75 miles of Grand Rapids, WOOD-TV’s viewing area.
“Given that station management handled this in the way guaranteed to generate as much controversy and publicity as possible, it’s simply not believable that your decision to censor the broadcast was based on trying to extricate yourselves from a fight you yourself — by your own actions — created,” Glenn wrote Kniowski.
He pointed to the dramatically different experience of two other Michigan television stations — WSMH Fox 66 in Flint and NBC’s WPBN Channels 7&4 in Traverse City — which aired the program Sat., Feb. 7th at 7:00 p.m. as scheduled, without incident.
“The lesson for WOOD management would seem to be that if you want to avoid getting hammered by both sides of the debate on any issue, it’s simple,” Glenn said. “Be professional and impartial, keep an arm’s length relationship with all parties, and run paid programming when you contract to run it. That’s not a difficult concept to understand, and it’s what stations in Flint and Traverse City did without incident and without managing to make themselves the subject of a national news story.”
“The question,” he said, “is whether WOOD-TV was influenced by its former editor and producer to handle it this way on purpose to make sure its censorship of the AFA video got as much publicity as possible and their former newsroom executive’s new employer got the credit.”
Thomas remains involved in the homosexual movement in west Michigan, despite now living in Washington, D.C., HRC’s website reports:
“Thomas’ work also includes a three-year tenure on the board of directors for the Network of Western Michigan: a non-profit that aids the local gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community. While in college, he served two years as chair of education for Grand Valley State University’s Gay-Straight Alliance – a position he created. He’s also credited with starting a gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender speaker’s program aimed at educating students on sexual orientation and gender identity. Thomas currently serves as an alumni advisor for (GVSU’s) newly created GLBT campus center, expected to open in the fall of 2008.”
February 11, 2009
Please call or e-mail WOOD-TV today and urge station managers not to cave in to homosexual activists’ demands that they censor the AFA documentary “Speechless: Silencing the Christians.”
Phone: 616-456-8888
E-mail: news@woodtv.com
_______________________________________________________
“To inform America and here in Michigan about the danger homosexual activism and the so-called gay rights movement poses to religious freedom,” said Gary Glenn, president of AFA-Michigan.
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WXMI-TV Channel 17
Grand Rapids, Michigan
February 9, 2009
Anti-gay TV program stirs up controversy
GRAND RAPIDS – A documentary set to air this week in West Michigan has gay and lesbian groups fuming. Some are saying that it’s pushing an agenda of intolerance.
Speechless: Silencing the Christians was produced by the American Family Association. They say it’s meant to counter “Pro-gay Propaganda.
“It’s a paid program being showed in cities around the country including Traverse City and Flint and set to air this week on WOOD-TV. It’s part of the American Family Association’s anti-gay pro traditional family message.
“To inform America and here in Michigan about the danger homosexual activism and the so-called gay rights movement poses to religious freedom,” said Gary Glenn, president of AFA Michigan.
They want to reveal the “Truths” about what they call the “Radical homosexual agenda,” including that homosexuals are not born that way and should not have protected rights.
Colette Beighley is with the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Resource Center at Grand Valley State.
“That kind of broadcasting is irresponsible, not only irresponsible, it’s reprehensible,” said Beighley.She had not yet seen the video but read literature about it from the AFA and says it will only spread hatred.
“There’s a direct connect between anti gay propaganda and an increase in hate crimes against the gay community,” said Beighley.
The General Manager for WOOD-TV said they considered not airing the program but felt not airing the documentary would set a bad precedent. She felt it was appropriate to give air time to someone who legitimately paid for it, the same way they would to a political candidate.
The program was supposed to air Monday night but they postponed because of the President’s News Conference. It will still air at 7 pm on a date yet to be announced.
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On the Web: Silencing Christians
http://www.wxmi.com/pages/landing/?blockID=208994&feedID=296
___________________________________________________
GRAND RAPIDS PRESS
Grand Rapids, Michigan
February 10, 2009
WOOD-TV considers airing paid program
decrying ‘radical homosexual agenda.
by Ted Roelofs | The Grand Rapids Press
Colette Beighley, assistant director of Grand Valley State University’s Lesbian, Gay,
Bisexual and Transgender Resource Center, says a show decrying the “radical
homosexual agenda” hurts the image of West Michigan if WOOD-TV chooses to air it.
GRAND RAPIDS — A controversial one-hour paid program on the “radical homosexual agenda” scheduled for WOOD-TV is delayed for the second time as partisans on both sides debate its merit.
Opponents decry it as verging on hate speech, as they press WOOD-TV officials to cancel a special funded by the American Family Association.
But backers are just as passionate in their belief it should air, adding heat to an issue that has long divided West Michigan.
The program was originally slated to air Monday in the time slot before President Barack Obama’s 8 p.m. news conference.
WOOD-TV program director Craig Cole said Tuesday that station officials decided to move it to Wednesday, before it was moved again.
“We didn’t feel that it was the appropriate place, leading into the presidential event,” Cole said.Cole said he had received about a hundred emails on the subject, about evenly split on the issue.
In a letter promoting the program, the American Family Association asserts that most Americans get their “information about the homosexual movement from the secular news media and Hollywood, which not only support but promote the gay agenda. What people know is tainted by pro-homosexual propaganda.
“Colette Beighley, assistant director of Grand Valley State University’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Resource Center, called it “irresponsible programming. I am just so disappointed that WOOD-TV would participate in something like this.
“If an organization came into Grand Rapids and wanted to air biased programming slamming the Asian community, West Michigan would send a message that that puts Asians brothers and sisters at risk, Beighley said. “Grand Rapids wants to be a cool city and one of the cornerstones of a cool city is diversity.
“The special, says the American Family Association, will “reveal the truth about the radical homosexual agenda and its impact on the family, the nation and religious freedom.”
It promises to “alert viewers about what’s at stake for the family” if activists get their way.In a statement, WOOD-TV general manager Diane Kniowski said the scheduling of the show “slipped through our filters. We don’t pre-judge people’s ideas or opinions. However, we have restrictions on controversial programming and key time periods.
“Kniowski said the station is offering a time slot for Saturday from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. but had not received a decision from the sponsor. “If the show airs, we will have disclaimers at the beginning and end of the show stating that these are not the opinions or views of this station.”
http://www.mlive.com:80/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2009/02/woodtv_considers_airing_paid_p.html
January 12, 2009
“Gary Glenn of the American Family Association of Michigan says the (Kalamazoo ordinance) is just one more step in an orchestrated effort by homosexuals to normalize their lifestyle nationwide. …’This is the bread-and-butter of (homosexual activists’) national strategy,’ he said. (They) first seek so-called ‘non-discrimination’ ordinances from local governments, then demand taxpayer subsidies for insurance for homosexual partners, Glenn explained.
They then seek to incorporate protections for cross-dressing and other behaviors in state law and finally target the full legalization of homosexual marriage, he said. Glenn noted that homosexual activist and billionaire Tim Gill said in a speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver last year that (homosexual activists must make state and local ‘gay rights’ laws a national priority because) there never has been an advance in the homosexual agenda at the federal level.”
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WORLD NET DAILY
Cave Junction, Oregon
January 6, 2009
Voters fight back against ‘perceived gender’ bias ban
Spring election expected on proposal to protect homosexuality
by Bob Unruh
Pro-family organizations across the nation need to watch what is happening in Kalamazoo, Mich., where residents won the right to vote on a far-reaching “gender anti-discrimination” plan that effectively opens women’s public showers to men, according to one leader.
Gary Glenn of the American Family Association of Michigan says the case is just one more step in an orchestrated effort by homosexuals to normalize their lifestyle nationwide.
A Kalamazoo ordinance adopted by city officials in December would have banned discrimination based on “a person’s actual or perceived gender, including a person’s self-image, appearance, expression, or behavior, whether or not that … is different from that traditionally associated with the person’s sex at birth.”
But the ordinance became the target of a successful petition effort by concerned residents who had only 20 days to collect at least 1,273 valid signatures to force the city either to repeal the ordinance or put it up for a vote.
According to City Clerk Scott Borling, more than enough signatures were submitted, so the ordinance’s provisions were suspended immediately. A majority of the city council members said they would not support repeal, leaving a vote as the likely outcome, according to the Kalamazoo Gazette.
It’s the second recent case in which the issue of adding homosexuality and gender identity to the list of protected classes, such as minorities or the handicapped, has been addressed in Michigan.
Two months ago, voters in Hamtramck – who supported Barack Obama by a margin of about four-to-one – rejected the special protected designation for gender identity and perception cases 55-to-45 percent.
Glenn said the issue has come up over and over in local elections in Michigan for the last 10 years.
“This specific issue has been on the ballot in Michigan in this decade more often than the rest of the United States combined,” he said.
“This is the bread-and-butter of [homosexuals'] national strategy,” he said.
Supporters of the campaign first seek so-called “non-discrimination” ordinances from local governments, then demand taxpayer subsidies for insurance for homosexual partners, Glenn explained. They then seek to incorporate protections for cross-dressing and other behaviors in state law and finally target the full legalization of homosexual marriage, he said.
Glenn noted that homosexual activists and billionaire Tim Gill said in a speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver last year that there never has been an advance in the homosexual agenda at the federal level.
Glenn said national pro-family organizations need to pay attention to each vote, like the one pending in Kalamazoo, because of the discriminatory impact of “gender anti-discrimination” on their ministries.
Under one such law in Massachusetts, he said, Catholic Charities had to close down its adoption services rather than submit to a requirement that it place children with homosexuals in violation of the organization’s religious beliefs. He said for similar reasons the Salvation Army was banned from bidding on contracts to serve the poor in the Chicago area. There also have been repeated efforts to ban the Boy Scouts from gaining access like other groups to public facilities.
The pro-homosexual perspective was explained in a commentary published in the Kalamazoo newspaper. It said, “While people are certainly ‘entitled’ to understand that their Bible says God hates homosexuality, and some of them may want to cast the first stones, government should not support or allow discrimination based on such religious views. We contend that imperfect humans should leave to God any sanctions, if they are even appropriate.”
The commentary compared the unwillingness to endorse homosexual behavior to the worldview of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
“When people ‘know’ the ethical universe has been revealed uniquely to them by their God, moral certainty often results. Armed with their God-given version of ‘truth,’ dictating appropriate behavior for others can become commonplace. Are the Taliban not obvious examples of this subjective vision – punishing women who seek education, unbearded men and any who dare to dissent? How about the Puritans? Their intolerance of nonconforming behaviors yielded water torture, witch trials and other excesses,” the letter said.
The letter then cited the “church-based opposition” to the gender anti-discrimination plan, questioning, “Is this a Taliban-like illustration of how a sense of religious infallibility slides into moral dictatorship?”
Glenn said in the numerous arguments over such gender anti-discrimination plans in Michigan, supporters of the protections do not cite examples of egregious cases of discrimination. However, he said, “these ordinances are in and of themselves discriminatory.”
And he said while the Kalamazoo plan contains a number of “exceptions” that seem to allow religious organizations to restrict the use of restrooms, changing rooms or locker rooms on the basis of sex, he noted that in Michigan there already has been a proposal to allow individuals to obtain a paperwork “sex change” with a doctor’s diagnosis of gender issues.
While the most recent attempt to allow such “sex changes” was defeated at the rule-making stage, there will be further attempts, he warned.
“How does a business in Kalamazoo, presented with a person who obviously is a man but has a driver’s license with a female designation, deny services and not be in violation,” he said.
He cited a situation involving a “gender” protection plan from Montgomery County, Md., where opponents raised similar concerns about the possibility of men demanding access to women’s facilities, which in at least one case already has happened.
WND reported earlier on a documentary from Coral Ridge Ministries that contended such “anti-discrimination” laws are part of an effort to do no more or less than criminalize Christianity.
The “Hate Crime Laws” program focused on how Christians in America, Canada, Australia and Sweden already have been arrested and prosecuted for expressing opinions that are rooted in the Bible regarding homosexual conduct, Islam or other topics about which Scriptures express clear teachings.
“On the surface, hate crime laws might sound like a good idea,” said Jerry Newcombe, of Coral Ridge, who hosted the special. “After all, none of us advocates hatred or violence against another person. But if you look below the surface, suddenly you realize that these laws are really thought crime laws.”
Such laws have, in the case of Colorado, already have banned publication of statements that can be perceived as negative toward people who live alternative sexual lifestyles.
Opponents of the law have worried that it effectively bans publication of the Bible, because of its condemnation of homosexuality.
Canada already has aggressive “hate crimes” laws, and authorities have gone so far as to tell a Christian pastor he must recant his faith because of legislation that bans statements that can be “perceived” as condemning another person.
Some states already have similar statutes, too, and in New Mexico, a photography company run by two Christians was fined $6,600 by the state for declining to provide services to a lesbian couple setting up a lookalike “marriage” ceremony.
The documentary cites the New Mexico case and others.
“Canadian youth pastor Stephen Boissoin wrote a letter to the editor in 2002 criticizing homosexual activism and offering compassion and hope for people trapped by homosexuality. A human rights tribunal took notice and slapped him with a $5,000 fine, ordered him to apologize in writing, and snuffed out his free speech rights by placing a prior restraint on his public expression of any ‘disparaging’ opinions about homosexuality,” Coral Ridge leaders said.
“In Sweden, Pastor Ake Green spoke out against homosexual conduct in a 2003 sermon and was prosecuted for ‘hate speech,’” the documentary continued.
The late Coral Ridge founder D. James Kennedy repeatedly had warned such developments would endanger Americans’ civil rights.
“This will silence churches, which is their great desire – that churches … may not be able to say anything negative about homosexuality,” he said in an earlier presentation.
Opponents of such actions note the deceptiveness of some of the proposals. In Colorado, for example a bill “makes it a crime to publish or distribute anything that is deemed a ‘discrimination’ against the homosexual and transsexual lifestyle,” according to the Christian Family Alliance.
Mark Hotaling, the group’s executive director, said initially supporters and even some opponents of the bill explained that there was an exception for churches and church organizations. However, lawmakers then attached to the bill a state “safety clause” which is supposed to deal with laws that are fundamental to protecting the lives of residents.
The clause, he said, simply stripped away any potential allowances for churches and church groups.
“Anyone who claims that there’s an exception for churches really doesn’t know the ins and outs of the bill,” Hotaling told WND.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=85474
November 28, 2008
“Gary Glenn, who chairs Campaign for Michigan Families…said the group was reacting to (Gov. Jennifer) Granholm’s appointment of Baillargeon, which he called ‘a contempt for the values of the citizens of Allegan County in the first place. This county had voted 68 percent in favor of the Marriage Protection Amendment’ of 2004, which would limit marriage to unions of one man and one woman. To support the PAC’s claim, Glenn cited a $500 donation Baillargeon made to Coalition for a Fair Michigan, a group that opposed the amendment.”
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MICHIGAN LAWYERS WEEKLY
Farmington Hills, Michigan
November 24, 2008
“There was no backup plan” for incumbent judge
by Douglas J. Levy
(Excerpt)
With more than 43,000 votes cast in the western Michigan county’s election, (newly-elected Allegan County Circuit Court Judge Kevin) Cronin won by 255 votes, a margin of 0.6 percent.
…Although the race was technically non-partisan, Cronin had the support of the Campaign for Michigan Families, a conservative political action committee and subgroup of the Midland-based American Family Association of Michigan.
The Campaign for Michigan Families spent about $2,500 on ads and robo-calls that portrayed (incumbent Judge William) Baillargeon, according to one ad, as “personally involved in promoting the homosexual agenda” because of his ties to gay-rights groups Affirmation Community Center of Ferndale, for which he served as a youth-group facilitator, and the Detroit-based Triangle Foundation, where he once served on the board of advisors.
Cronin said his campaign wasn’t affiliated with the Campaign for Michigan Families, nor is he now, and he said he neither heard nor read any of the PAC’s ads.
Gary Glenn, who chairs Campaign for Michigan Families, said the group neither contacted Cronin nor worked with him in the ad campaign.
Rather, he said, the group was reacting to (Gov. Jennifer) Granholm’s appointment of Baillargeon, which he called “a contempt for the values of the citizens of Allegan County in the first place. This county had voted 68 percent in favor of the Marriage Protection Amendment” of 2004, which would limit marriage to unions of one man and one woman.
To support the PAC’s claim, Glenn cited a $500 donation Baillargeon made to Coalition for a Fair Michigan, a group that opposed the amendment.
Glenn did, however, say he was surprised that given the county’s voting history, there was such a narrow margin. But when asked whether that would have suggested the group’s ads were not as effective as anticipated, he answered, “That’s irrelevant. The results are what counts.”
…Considering the narrow vote margin, Baillargeon said he is likely to ask for a recount after the state completes its canvass of the election this week.
(Link to full story at www.MiLawyersWeekly.com available only by subscription)
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