Another Call for Kevin Jennings Ouster as "Safe Schools Czar"

"Degrading Sex, Government Style"

By Helen M. Alvare, J.D., 

Senior Fellow in Law, 

Culture of Life Foundation

… President Obama is under fire for moving too slowly to champion homosexual rights, in the view of leading voices on the left. The appointment of a “czar” like Kevin Jennings is one way in which President Obama can ensure the influence of homosexual-rights-activists in important places – like our nation’s public schools – without the president’s having to pass a law, or even hold a Congressional hearing, both of which might generate public attention and opposition.  That Jennings’ influence in the Department of Education might promote the early or inappropriate sexualization of children is apparently not as important as what Jennings’ appointment might do in the way of smoothing relations between President Obama and the Human Rights Campaign.

In the case of the 2000 and 2001 sex education workshops sponsored in part by the Massachusetts state education establishment, the state partnered with GLSEN and with Planned Parenthood (known usually as the nations’ largest abortion provider), which provided the actual fisting “kits” available to participants.  Both of these groups are clearly outside the “mainstream” of adults’ thinking and behavior about human sexuality and respect for human life and dignity.  When states offer taxpayer dollars to private “partners” for carrying out state programs, the identity of these partners matters a lot.

Groups like Planned Parenthood, GLSEN, or another frequent government partner – SIECUS (Sexuality Information and Education Council of the U.S) -- have little in common with the average American’s beliefs about sexual morality.  For such groups, the body is a tool, an object to be managed to maximize physical pleasure while minimizing disease and pregnancy.  The materials they publish for adolescents can only be described as depressing and dehumanizing.  Watchdog groups and citizens are vitally necessary in order to expose these groups, and the government programs and bureaucrats who would partner with them. 

One of the outcomes of the current tempest over Kevin Jennings should be his ouster.  But surely another should be a demand that the government get out and stay out of the business of instructing our children about human sexuality in ways that degrade them specifically as children, and also as human beings. [Emphasis added.]

See also:

“LAWYER DECRIES CHOICE OF US SAFE SCHOOLS ‘CZAR’; Denounces Agenda of Sexualizing Children” (Zenit, 1-12-10)

A consultor to the Vatican's laity council is protesting U.S. President Barack Obama's chosen "safe schools czar," Kevin Jennings, due to his history of promoting homosexuality, especially to young people. … She expressed concern regarding recent revelations about the career history of Jennings …

New Year's Resolutions for Concerned Parents

Linda Harvey at Mission America has a good piece for all of us concerned parents. Here are some of her resolutions:

The Top 10 Ways to Make Kids Truly Safe in 2010

By Linda Harvey

[Excerpts:]

7. Children should not be endangered personally by sexually transmitted diseases allowed to rage unchecked through our under-30 population because of political correctness. They should no longer be told the outright lies that life-threatening and/or debilitating infections can be managed through either latex or life-long, expensive drug therapy. Let’s not leave them with rampant infertility due to “everyone’s” reproductive damage. We need to establish a public health system that deals with reality.


4. We must pledge to overhaul the schools we are paying for. Let’s start sending our children to Christian schools, conservative charter schools, or begin home schooling them, while we simultaneously evict our local NEA-backed public school boards and replace them with smart soccer moms and dads who have true family values. Let’s get the radicals out of our taxpayer- funded classrooms, and refuse to vote for one more levy guaranteeing the same old anti-Christian, socialist, Darwinist, hyper-sexualized, and phony “green” school curricula.

3. As responsible stewards, we must continue to demand that U.S. Department of Education ‘safe schools’ czar Kevin Jennings be fired for his lack of experience plus his known radical, sexually corrupt ideology. Let’s also eject Obama’s Chicago crony, DOE Secretary Arne Duncan, and all public officials whose track records attest to “poor education as usual” policies. Where’s the commitment to genuine child safety? Let’s make plans to fire Barack Obama at least by 2012, too, while we are at it, before he does any more damage to the next generation.

2. Get all pro-homosexual and pro-promiscuity programs, literature, teachers, and counselors out of every school now. Remove “gay” clubs, Planned Parenthood at health fairs, and GLSEN- PFLAG- SIECUS activists. Cease all condom demonstrations, abortion referrals, on-site birth control dispensing, sexual orientation affirmation, and messing with children’s hearts, minds and bodies. Demand that schools uphold the traditional value of heterosexual identities, teach abstinence- until- marriage, and celebrate male/ female gender differences.

Kevin Jennings & Acolyte Attacked Religious Right at GLSEN Fistgate Conference in 2000

In Kevin Jennings’s keynote address at the GLSEN-Boston Fistgate conference (March 25, 2000), he related a Bible story of the “widow’s mite,” but gave it a perverted meaning. He twisted it from an exhortation to give all you can to God, to give all you can to the homosexual community.

Also at that conference, a GLSEN national board member, Leif Mitchell from Planned Parenthood of Connecticut, led a workshop “exposing” the “Religious Wrong.” At that time, Mitchell “train[ed] teachers and children about sex education in the classroom and how to integrate homosexuality into the curriculum of public schools.” As a national board member, Mitchell was surely in touch with GLSEN’s national director Kevin Jennings on content and strategy.

The teacher who attended the conference and reported on this workshop to Massachusetts News (May 2000) has just emailed us more background on the “Religious Wrong” workshop. She is convinced that its leader, Leif Mitchell, “got his training” directly from Kevin Jennings:

I know he got his training from Kevin Jennings because the strategies numbered for how to work against the Religious Right is something right out of KJ's handbook. Also, relating to ex-gay John Paulk having been verbally attacked by Leif Mitchell, his explanation of the difference between “sexual orientation” and “sexual identity” is something I heard Kevin Jennings say on an instruction tape/video. … At any rate, Mitchell was espousing the KJ philosophy/teaching/propaganda word for word. (Fallout: Mitchell was removed from that position soon after he talked to the Massachusetts News reporter, not knowing who the press was he was chatting with, and letting it "all hang out.") Mitchell said he learned to speak "Christianese" and went to all the conservative Evangelical conferences for a decade before 2000. (- Teacher attendee at Fistgate; email to MassResistance, 12-18-09.)

We would add that Mitchell’s advice to “keep bringing it back to the issue of student safety” when confronted by difficult challenges is exactly the strategy Jennings developed in his 1993 report for the Massachusetts “Governor’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth” (which we will soon post), which he later outlined in his 1995 speech to the Human Rights Campaign on how to “frame the issue” for victory.

In the GLSEN workshop, Mitchell …

… explained the need to combat such questions by using safety and suicide prevention issues as their mantra. Several times during the discussions Mitchell told the participants when they get in trouble during such discussion with the public or the press to: “Just keep bringing it back to safety in the schools. That’s the message." (Massachusetts News, May 2000)

That is GLSEN’s #1 strategy given to fight the Religious Right. Here are all five, as outlined by Mitchell:

1)            Focus on violence prevention. “Always go back to the issues of safety to explain why Gay/Straight Alliances need to be formed. ‘Violence helps us!’ he said.”

2)            Focus on legal perspectives. "Focusing on legal perspectives also helps to bring the focus back to safe schools," he said.

3)            Put a Face on Homophobia (e.g., Matthew Sheppard)

4)            Use statistics effectively

5)            Build coalitions proactively with like-minded groups (e.g., Coalition for Democracy, NAACP, The Anti-Defamation League, Planned Parenthood)

For the full Massachusetts News report on Mitchell’s workshop attacking the Religious Right, see “ ‘Religious Wrong’ Exposed at Fistgate” (Tom Duggan, Massachusetts News, May 2001). Excerpts:

[Jennings] attacked religion and even used the Gospel to do so. He used the story of the widow’s mite to motivate children in the audience to give all they can give to the gay and lesbian community.

"This is ridiculous," exclaimed one teacher in utter disbelief. "I know that Bible passage and it is a direct reference to giving all you can to God. How ironic that GLSEN is preaching hatred towards religious people, attacking religion as ‘wrong’ and at the same time they are quoting Jesus and twisting the scripture. … Not a single person in the audience that I could see had any negative reaction to his "sermon". He simply "tickled their ears."

A handout attacked religion and people of faith. It promoted a book by a lesbian activist who claimed to expose "The Right and THEIR Agenda; The Right’s overall goals, the targets of their organizing efforts, the strategies they employ, and who benefits from their agenda." …

Kevin Jennings' GLSEN Handed Out "Fisting Kits" to Young Teens in 2001

Great to see Gateway Pundit and Breitbart posting the truth about Kevin Jennings' GLSEN indoctrination materials.

Michelle Malkin drew attention to GLSEN way back in 1997. Linda Harvey of MissionAmerica exposed GLSEN's readings in 2002. And Brian Camenker of Parents' Rights Coalition (now MassResistance) exposed the Fistgate incident in 2000, and the Little Black Book in 2005. But the time apparently wasn't ripe. Now that GLSEN founder and leader Jennings is Obama's "Safe Schools czar," people are finally starting to pay attention to what he's been pushing in schools across America for 20 years.

GLSEN -- under Jennings' guidance -- didn't just recommend reading materials or lead discussions on fisting. Just one year after GLSEN-Boston's infamous Fistgate conference, they handed out "fisting kits"to young teens at their 2001 conference, held again at Tufts University:

[photo: Massachusetts News, March 2001]

Planned Parenthood, long-time GLSEN ally, brought enough kits for everyone and laid them out on their table for all to take.  Massachusetts News reported, "Out of approximately 650 attendees, about 400 of those were students."

Planned Parenthood Distributes Kits for Fisting

Massachusetts News, March 26, 2001

Planned Parenthood of Massachusetts distributed kits for fisting and oral sex. They contained a single plastic glove, a package of K-Y lubricant and instructions on how to make a “dental dam” out of the material.

The instructions explained how to cut up the glove with scissors until all that remains is a rubber rectangle with the “thumb” portion protruding from the middle. “Use the thumb space for your tongue,” say the directions. 

The label on the ziplocked package says, “protects against STD’s,” and bears the Planned Parenthood logo and phone number. 

GLSEN (Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network) got into trouble last year for hosting a workshop that gave young teens explicit how-to instructions on homosexual sex practices such as “fisting.” The ensuing scandal was subsequently dubbed “Fistgate.” 

Regarding “dental dams,” Dr. John Diggs, a specialist in internal medicine who lectures about STDs, said that the kits create a false sense of security. “I’ve written a brochure about this whole thing,” he said. “The way I describe it is, I ask ‘How many people want to take a bite of a sandwich without taking the wrapper off?’ ‘How many people want to suck on balloons?’ Nobody does.” 

Diggs said when you encourage kids to use such a barrier by saying it is “safe,” then when it comes time for them to use it, they find they don’t like it and throw it aside. Because they are already in an aroused condition they continue on and increase the chances of spreading STD’s orally like syphilis, gonorrhea, chlamydia, HIV, human hepaloma virus and hepatitis B.

A lone protester showed up that day. A disgruntled Tufts alumna, her sign read:

Shame on TUFTS. 

Marginalizing Christians. 

Promoting dangerous lifestyles.

Kennedy Funeral Mass a "Scandal" Says Catholic Action League of Mass.

We have no comment upon the death of Senator Ted Kennedy. (If you can't say anything good ...) But we are eager to share this press release from the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts:

SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2009

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT: C. J. DOYLE (781) 251-9739

SCANDAL AT MISSION CHURCH IN BOSTON

The Catholic Action League of Massachusetts today decried the scandal which occurred this morning at Boston's most historic Catholic shrine --- the Minor Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, known as Mission Church --- where a Mass of Christian Burial was used to “celebrate the life” of one of America's most notorious opponents of Catholic morality, the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy. Senator Kennedy fought for more than three decades to keep the killing of pre-born children legal and unrestricted in the United States.

Surgical abortion has claimed more than fifty-one million human lives since 1973. The Catholic religion defines abortion as an “abominable crime”.

President Barack Obama delivered the eulogy, in which he alluded to Kennedy's support for gay rights. One of the Prayers of the Faithful was a petition to end divisions “between gays and straights”.

Ecclesial participants included Rev. Raymond Collins, Rector of the Basilica; Rev. Mark Hession, Kennedy’s parish priest from Our Lady of Victories Church in Centerville on Cape Cod; Rev. J. Donald Monan, Chancellor of Boston College; and Sean Cardinal O'Malley, Archbishop of Boston, who thanked President Obama for his words and his presence. Both the homilist, Fr. Hession, and Cardinal O'Malley suggested that the late senator had found eternal salvation.

The Catholic Action League called the event “a tragic example of the Church’s willingness to surrender to the culture, and serve Caesar rather than Christ”.

Catholic Action League Executive Director C. J. Doyle stated: “Senator Kennedy supported legal abortion, partial-birth abortion, the public funding of Medicaid abortions, embryonic stem cell research, birth control, federal family planning programs, and so-called emergency contraception. He defended Roe v. Wade, endorsed the proposed Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA), and opposed both the Human Life Amendment and the Hyde Amendment. Kennedy maintained a 100% rating from both NARAL and Planned Parenthood. In 1993, he received the Kenneth Edelin Award from Planned Parenthood, and in 2000 received the Champions of Choice Award from NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts at the hands of the same Dr. Kenneth Edelin, the infamous abortionist.”

During his 1994 reelection campaign, Kennedy said ‘I wear as a badge of honor my opposition to the anti-choicers’. His successful obstruction of the nomination of Judge Robert Bork to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987 effectively prevented the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Beyond his specific positions on human life issues, Senator Kennedy, along with the late Congressman Robert Drinan, provided the cover and the example for two generations of Catholic politicians to defect from Church teaching on the sanctity of innocent human life.”

“No rational person can reasonably be expected to take seriously Catholic opposition to abortion when a champion of the Culture of Death, who repeatedly betrayed the Faith of his baptism, is lauded and extolled by priests and prelates in a Marian basilica. This morning's spectacle is evidence of the corruption which pervades the Catholic Church in the United States. The right to life will never be recognized by secular society if it is not first vindicated and consistently upheld within the institutions of the Church itself.”

Disease and Abortion

[Comments from Colonel Randy:]

A recent Reuters article informs us that HIV is not that ubiquitous, global killer-threat as hyped by the media. See "Under 1 percent of U.S. adults have HIV: report." Some numbers/stats paint an interesting picture:
*About 1/2 of 1% of the US population has HIV/AIDS.
*About 0.55% or slightly more than 1/2% of the world population dies from HIV annually (33 million deaths worldwide).

Consider the following:
*MRSA is now being spread epidemically in the promiscuous heterosexual and "gay" communities. There are people at CDC that are really worried about MRSA becoming a killer epidemic if it breaks out of the controlled medical environment and into the general public.
*H5N1, Bird Flu is uncontrolled in the Third World and is expected to mutate into a human form soon... some epidemiologists say that it already has. This flu strain could become a plague.
*Mad Cow disease not yet controlled and the meat supply is still at risk from various forms of cattle feed supplements still on the market parts of the world.
*There are many other hideous diseases like Ebola waiting to be unleashed.

All of the above are awful but now consider the following:
* Approximately 8 million die from hunger every year and 800 million suffer from hunger every year.
* 46 million babies are sacrificed to abortion each year [0.76% a much larger percent than from HIV], that's 46 million victims who never took their first breath, never committed a sin, made a mistake or even offended anyone.

Hunger is preventable. It is publicized but we do not act. Why should we be moved to act? After all, abortion is legal and encouraged throughout the "developed" world.

Abortion is not only preventable it is criminal. You can only read this because your mother "chose" to give you life and not to have you aborted.

How much is spent advertising and providing Planned Parenthood abortion services and procedures, versus how much is spent, for example, on HIV/AIDS research?

It is said that in the news, "If it bleeds, it leads." If this is true, why are the details of HIV/AIDS published, but the tragic effects of abortion on humanity not published? Why is it still acceptable to kill innocent babies? Contradictions we will all have to answer for on that last day...
From Reuters:

Under 1 percent of U.S. adults have HIV: report
Reuters 1-29-08
About one-half of one percent of young adults living in homes in the United States are infected with the AIDS virus, around 600,000 people, the National Center for Health Statistics reported on Tuesday.The agency's snapshot of HIV infection in the United States shows the rate continues to be stable and confirms other surveys that show black men are far more likely than other Americans to be infected....
Men were more likely to be infected (0.7 percent) than women (0.2 percent). People infected with the herpes simplex type 2 virus, known as genital herpes, were 15 times more likely to also be infected with HIV, according to the report ... Black men aged 40 to 49 had the highest rate of infection, at close to 4 percent, the survey found....

Culture of Death Victory Near with Abortion Clinic Buffer Zone Expansion

Angry women at the State House: State Senators Susan Fargo and

Harriette Chandler [photo: Boston Globe]

The State Senate passed a bill yesterday that would expand the "buffer zone" around abortion clinics. That's the current law that denies free speech, and shields women troubled with problem pregnancies from the truth about the humanity of their developing baby.

A pro-life activist friend of mine once told me that she believes that one of the motivators of liberal anger and hatred, especially on the abortion issue, is unresolved guilt that the person carries over their own involvement in an abortion. That would apply to both the mother and father of the murdered baby. And when you think that 1/4 or so of all women in America have had an abortion, that would roughly coincide with the proportion of the population that is hysterically pro-abortion, and hysterically liberal. As long as abortion is said to be legal, their consciences are put to rest ... sort of.

Then throw in all the GLBT activists who are strong abortion proponents, for instance, openly homosexual State Rep. Carl Sciortino, who is a co-sponsor of the buffer zone expansion in the House. It's easy to understand their support for abortion, since their whole sexual existence is a denial of God's plan for human sexuality.

Amazing how this crowd can portray this as a "public safety initiative." The baby is not a part of the public that's being protected. And even that begs the question: Have you ever heard of a "patient" at an abortion clinic being assaulted by sidewalk counselors?

We have, however, heard of women (and their babies, of course) dying on the abortionist's table. (For more on that, see Operation Rescue Boston.)

Mass. Senate OK's expanded limits on abortion protesters (Boston Globe, 10-24-07)
A bill that would establish a 35-foot no-protest zone around clinics where abortions are performed won the support of the state Senate yesterday and now proceeds to the House, where at least 75 lawmakers have endorsed it.
The legislation would almost double the current 18-foot buffer zone and bar protesters from entering it. Currently, protesters may come within 6 feet of someone within the zone to provide counsel or share information, as long as the individual consents.
Supporters say the measure is a public safety initiative that would protect women from intimidation they may face from protesters and would make it easier to prosecute violators....

Slick Willard Romney's "Conservative" Resume

By John Haskins

Here's Mitt Romney's "social conservative" resume that Jay Sekulow (ACLJ), David French (Evangelicals for Mitt), Hugh Hewitt (TownHall.com, Salem Radio), Jim Bopp (Romney pro-life advisor), et al. are boasting about. He accomplished more than our new communist governor --Deval "Baby Doc" Patrick (Janet Reno's accomplice in the Ruby Ridge massacre aftermath) --could have fantasized about accomplishing.

Romney's "Conservative" Resume

* Compulsory government-run central heath care system, with ... massive boost in funding for abortions, and ... a new and unconstitutional role for Planned Parenthood as a permanent and unelected voice in our government.

* Looking the other way as an extra-constitutional fourth branch of government called the "Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth" was set up with no accountability to the people.

* Refusal to enforce the parents' rights law when hardened criminal David Parker (really just a regular parent protecting his rights as a father) was taken in handcuffs to a jail cell. Parker's crime: daring to say to the sodomy brainwashers: "Not to my little boy, you don't!" (Come to think of it, not once did Slick Willard enforce the parents' rights law.)

* Increased state funding for pro-homosexuality lessons starting in kindergarten.

* Turning a deaf ear to protests of massive irregularities at the Department of Social Services, which takes children from their parents on the basis of unsubstantiated charges, routinely ignores constitutional rights and due process, places children with homosexuals, and has recklessly put a child in a situation where he or she was killed.

* Ignored fathers' rights activists who are defending men being treated by the courts and the bureacracy like Blacks were treated under Jim Crow laws.

* Illegally "legalized" the sodomy-based family.

So, our new communist governor starts off with most of his objectives already accomplished by Slick Willard (the "pro-family, constitutionalist" Republican). So Gov. Patrick can now turn the political, social, and constitutional ratchets even further to the left than the Founding Fathers ever could have imagined in their wildest nightmares.

Mixed Messages from "Pro-Family" Group Harmful

We’ve pointed out before the “spirit of compromise” exhibited by the Mass. Family Institute in its half-baked promotion of abstinence education. MFI promises not to "circumvent existing comprehensive sex education programs” and reminds everyone that the abstinence program would only be voluntary. Hey, it's just fine with MFI that girls are told where to go for birth control pills and abortions, and elementary school kids are taught about different types of "families." They have no problem with mixed messages, sowing confusion in the minds of young people. This is a disgrace. Baby steps don't work when you're up against the Planned Parenthood monster.

From MFI's latest action alert:

The federal government wants to again grant $800,000 to Massachusetts for the purpose of offering school-based abstinence education to middle-school students. This program would be voluntary, not mandatory, for any middle-school. It would be used to complement, not circumvent, existing comprehensive sex education programs.

Right now, there are forces who oppose any message to youth that encourages them to wait until they are older to have sex. They don't want Ways & Means Chairman DeLeo to include the federal abstinence education grant in the State Budget.

Make sure your legislator and Chairman DeLeo know you do want that federal abstinence education money to encourage 10-13 year olds to avoid risky behaviors and delay sex!

Child Abuse in Germany -- and Massachusetts

Everyone's talking about the young German boy undergoing "sex-change" procedures. Today, it's in Germany; tomorrow, it will be in Massachusetts. In fact, it's already underway.

This blog and the MassResistance organization have been exposing "trans" propaganda already inundating our public schools for several years now. Organizations including Planned Parenthood, PFLAG, GLSEN and the transgender activists are gearing up, pushing young people, their parents, and school personnel into this brave new world. Kathleen Henry, director of the Mass. Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth, has stated they will make a big effort to "protect" bisexual and transgender youth.

Proof of where this movement is going: PFLAG (Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender People) joined with assorted GLBTIQ activists just this past October in their regional conference in Worcester, called "Transcending Boundaries" (for "bisexual/pansexual, trans/genderqueer, and intersex people and our allies"). Sponsors included MassEquality's education fund, Planned Parenthood, New England Leather Alliance (whips & chains; they gave a workshop, "SM 101"), GlaxoSmithKline (sex-change drugs?). One workshop was called "PFLAG and Transgender – Sharing a Future."

Bad enough there are doctors willing to perform such mutilations on their young (or adult) patients -- fiendish medical experiments reminiscent of the Nazis. What's more surprising is this young German boy's abuse at the hands of his own parents, who've bought into the hideous concepts of "transgenderism" and "gender identity"! Here in Massachusetts, PFLAG and Planned Parenthood jumped on that bandwagon quite a while ago. These groups have, after all, transcended all boundaries. Killing babies? No problem. Homosexual marriage? A civil right. So how can they say no to sadomasochism, polyamory, or sex changes for children?

Right now, PFLAG and Planned Parenthood are busy holding seminars across Massachusetts (like those below), encouraging parents to accept and help their "trans" children, and schools to support "trans" students. And how scary is this: PFLAG has the largest representation of any group on the new Mass. Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth. Here are five workshops given at PFLAG's Transcending Boundaries conference last October:

Raising A Transgender Child/Compassionate Parenting
Using a combination of personal stories and exploring raising children through the lens of gender development, this workshop will provide a safe space in which to explore the myriad of emotions, beliefs, and ideas parents and other caregivers go through as children express their gender identification(s). A combination of presentation and discussion, the presenters will use their own experiences plus invite participants to share their journeys in the ongoing efforts to accept and nurture our children....

Supporting Gender Variant Youth in Today’s Schools
Is this child a boy or a girl or does it matter? Youth in today’s schools are increasingly fluid in their expression of gender, sometimes confusing adults and challenging those around them to think again about boy vs. girl. The workshop is designed to uncover the overlapping aspects of sexuality and clarify terminology related to gender expression and identity. Participants will also be provided with resources for transgender youth, transgender civil rights issues, recent school assessments, and available curriculum supplements for classroom use....

Coming out as a child or adolescent as transgendered or transsexual and the parents’ process of acceptance
This will be a panel presentation including parents and their transgendered children and teenagers. ... an experienced gender specialist will moderate this panel. The discussion will explore issues of coming out as a young transgendered individual to parents and their parents’ emotional process that led to eventual full acceptance. Crossgender expression at home, at school and in the community will be discussed. Non-medical and medical treatment of children and adolescents who are transgendered/transsexual will be discussed as well as other topics.

Lifelines for Trans Youth: Helping Transgender and Transsexual Youth Make Successful Transitions to Adulthood
This presentation examines the institutional resources and policies needed for transgender/transsexual youth to make successful transitions to adulthood. The formal talk segment combines clinical literature review with personal stories from trans youth and input from adult providers. This presentation offers cohesive strategies and guidelines to increase the cultural competency of educators, parents, physicians, therapists, administrators, policy makers, and other providers who may encounter trans youth. The interactive component of this workshop includes facilitated exercises to enable adult providers from diverse professions to serve as "lifelines" for transgender/transsexual youth....

Taking a Stand: Creating Safe Schools for All Students
This introductory workshop, designed for all school personnel, uses video clips and hands-on activities to examine the obvious and subtle ways that bias plays out in schools, and offers resources for creating schools that are safe for all students, regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Compromisers Wherever We Turn

Kris Mineau, spokesman for VoteOnMarriage (VOM) and president of Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI), has announced his desire to "dialogue" with the homofascist leaders -- the same people who advocated violence to the constitution and blocking a vote "by any means necessary" on VOM's own citizens' petition! Mineau thinks he has an "excellent relationship" with the leadership of the extremist GLBT groups. From the MFI press release:

[Jan. 9, 2007] Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) today announced an initiative that seeks to build mutual respect and dialogue between those who support and those who oppose same sex marriage in Massachusetts. Advocates for same sex marriage routinely have called supporters of the marriage amendment hateful and bigoted, while amendment supporters say they are simply following the constitutional process to have their voice heard on what they view as an important social issue.

"The tone and rhetoric around this public policy issue has escalated to a frenzied level, too often with shouting that does nothing promote [sic] understanding. Denouncing individuals as bigots does not bring people with honest differences together. We would like to work with our opponents to raise the quality of the dialogue," said Kris Mineau. [meaning: Please don't call us names! It hurts our feelings!]

"I have come to know my political opponent Marc Solomon, executive director of MassEquality as a gentleman who has strong personal convictions," Mineau added. "I believe that if asked he would come to the table in good faith to advance meaningful dialogue that his supporters also would embrace-today begins the process of asking." [emphasis added]

Are we seeing political naivete here, or just plain simple-mindedness? Mineau is clearly in denial about the behavior and tactics of Marc Solomon and Arline Isaacson, the GLBT extremist group leaders, who cheered on their troopers in the most disruptive behaviors imaginable short of violence, protesting VOM's rally at the State House (Nov. 19).

The president of the MassEquality Board of Directors (Solomon's boss) said MassEquality "will redouble its efforts to protect marriage equality and defeat this discriminatory amendment in the legislature.... We are not going away. We are going to get bigger and stronger and do whatever is necessary to make sure that our families, our rights and our communities are safe.”

Mineau began his dialogue by giving an interview to the GLBT newspaper, Bay Windows ("Calling for a cease fire", 1-17-07), which immediately turned on him, snidely dismissing his proposal. From Bay Windows:

Following the Jan. 2 vote by the legislature to advance the constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage into the new legislative session, activists on both sides of the marriage debate put out public calls for dialogue to encourage an end to offensive rhetoric and a de-escalation of the war of words. Yet in an interview with Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) and spokesperson for VoteOnMarriage.org, he made it clear that opponents of same-sex marriage would make no effort to rein in some of the most egregious offenders, members of the clergy speaking out in favor of the amendment....

Mineau said VoteOnMarriage.org believes the most hateful language in the marriage debate has come not from the lead advocates on either side but from rank-and-file supporters at events from either side.

“I cannot attribute anything to MassEquality or the Religious Coalition [for the Freedom to Marry], and again the leadership of those organizations, I think we have an excellent relationship,” said Mineau.... When asked for examples when he felt same-sex marriage supporters crossed the line he pointed to the counter-protestors at the series of rallies VoteOnMarriage.org held across the state last month urging lawmakers to vote on their amendment....

Mineau said he envisions the dialogue consisting of a series of public forums where the leaders of the different organizations on both sides come together to talk about how to have a more civil debate. He said VoteOnMarriage.org is still planning out its proposal for the dialogue and has not yet formally reached out to same-sex marriage activists.

“We’re right at the gestation point of this initiative. We want to do this, and that’s the point that we’re at. We have some ideas where hopefully we can have some constructive forums to discuss, not necessarily to debate, to discuss, not necessarily the pros and cons of same-sex marriage but the pros and cons of how the debate should be conducted on both sides,” said Mineau.

For their part, the Religious Coalition for the Freedom to Marry (RCFM) has put out its own call for dialogue, aimed not at VoteOnMarriage.org but at the most powerful member of the clergy working to advance the amendment, Catholic Archbishop Sean O’Malley.

Meanwhile the assault on parents' rights and children in the public schools has begun in the legislature. Planned Parenthood and the homosexual lobby held a press conference before a packed hearing room in the State House on Jan. 8, and announced their three-pronged attack on in Massachusetts coming in this legislative session:

• mandatory K-12 health education, including pro-abortion, pro-promiscuity, pro-homosexual indoctrination (MassResistance helped mobilize the opposition to this last session, along with MCFL);
• ending federal funding to abstinence-only sex education; and
• overturning "outmoded anti-abortion statutes" in Massachusetts.

Mass. Citizens for Life (MCFL) was apparently unreachable for comment, according to the State House News Service. Its new president, Mr. Joe Reilly, was however reachable by the Boston Globe and Kathryn Lopez of National Review Online regarding his support for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign (around that same time). Has MCFL has been Romneyized, focusing on "bigger things" -- like their new friend Romney's Presidential campaign -- instead of what's going on in their own back yard? We find no mention of this on MCFL's web site.

STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE, STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, JAN. 8, 2007
Legislation mandating K-12 health education, cutting off federal funding for abstinence-only education and repealing outmoded anti-abortion statutes drew dozens of legislators to a strategy session and bill-signing hosted by the Massachusetts Coalition for Choice on Monday morning. A packed hearing room listened as coalition members, who hail from Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice and other public health groups, rallied legislators to support their agenda and discussed a game plan for dealing with opposition. The young 2007-2008 legislative session is just getting underway.

The health education bill, sponsored by Sen. Edward Augustus (D-Worcester) and Rep. Alice Wolf (D-Cambridge), would add health education to the “core curriculum” at primary and secondary schools. The bill reintroduces legislation that died in committee at the end of the last session, but “the prospects for this bill are very good,” according to Angus McQuilken, vice president for public affairs for Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts. McQuilken, who heads the Massachusetts Coalition for Choice, cited the founding of the Coalition Advocating Responsible Education for Youth, a broad-based coalition lobbying for the education law, as a sign that momentum has turned in favor of the bill....

[And the supposedly conservative pro-family abstinence educators seem to be caving:]
Healthy Futures, a faith-based health education advocate, believes that the state should shed a common misconception that federal funding for abstinence education would limit the sexual education students receive. Rebecca Ray, the group’s director, said that while federal funding must be used for abstinence education, the state can still supplement that education with its own curriculum. Responding to the notion that schools that couldn’t afford their own health curriculum would only teach abstinence, Ray said that “presumably” the new mandatory health education law “would come with some funding.” Ray said her group could get behind both of the laws pertaining to health education as long as neither one was limited what children were taught – including the idea that “abstinence is a realistic option.” ...

Massachusetts Citizens for Life could not be reached for comment.

Attendees at the bill-signing event said they were excited to have a pro-choice governor, Deval Patrick, in the Corner Office, placing every branch of state government firmly in the pro-choice column. Melissa Kogut, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts, said that Patrick, in conjunction with a heavily pro-choice Legislature, would offer “new opportunities to promote access to reproductive health services” and to advance more comprehensive health education.
[emphasis added]