Exodus: Live Out Loud

Montana Universities Must Offer Health Insurance to Gay Employees' Partners

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/31/national/31gay.html

By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: December 31, 2004

Montana's public universities must provide their gay employees with insurance coverage for their domestic partners, the state's Supreme Court ruled yesterday.

The majority in the 4-to-3 decision said the decision had nothing to do with the rights of gay couples to marry. But a dissenting judge criticized his colleagues as "radically altering common law marriage in Montana."

Gay rights advocates said the decision was an important victory on the narrower point.

Selective separation

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=42187

Publisheded: December 31, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

It would be shocking if those who worship at the altar of church-state separation, while denying this nation's Christian heritage, would at least acknowledge that they are selective as to which values they object to the state promoting.

Until these avowed secularists start complaining about non-Christian, values-laden instruction in public schools, they'll come up short in the credibility department. When public schools endorse New Age ideas or the radical homosexual agenda, for example, the separationists are nowhere to be found.

Lesbians raising sons; got a problem with that?

http://www.bpnews.net/printcolumn.asp?ID=1672

FIRST-PERSON: By R. Albert Mohler Jr. Dec 30, 2004

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP)--"Brian, a bright and personable third-grader, brought home from school a form that frustrated him: his family tree, complete with empty spaces for mother, father, and four spaces for grandparents. Brian's parents are a lesbian couple; his father is an unknown sperm donor. Brian's mothers worked to persuade their son that nothing was wrong with this family -- instead, something was wrong with the school form." That story was told by Peggy F. Drexler, a research psychologist and advisory board member of the San Francisco Day School. It was published in the The San Francisco Chronicle last summer, and served notice that America is adopting "new family values."

Ark. court overrules ban on gay foster parents

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6767205/

State promises to appeal ruling won by ACLU

The Associated Press

Updated: 1:32 p.m. ET Dec. 30, 2004

A judge struck down a state ban on placing foster children in any household with a gay member, ruling that the state agency enforcing the rule had overstepped its authority by trying to regulate “public morality.”

The state promised Thursday to appeal the ruling, which came Wednesday from Judge Timothy Fox in a case brought by the Arkansas chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.

At issue was a 1999 regulation of the Child Welfare Agency Review Board that said gays cannot become foster parents, and foster children cannot be placed in any home with a gay member under its roof.

Dobson on the Gay Marriage Battle

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/001/21.60.html

Interviewed by Kathleen K. Rutledge | posted 12/30/2004

James Dobson and his political lobbying group, Focus on the Family Action, were instrumental in keeping the homosexual marriage issue before voters. Below Dobson discusses what the November 2 vote meant, and what's ahead.

What role did the marriage amendments (and the homosexual marriage issue) play in getting voters—particularly Christians—to the polls?
There's no question that the effort to protect marriage certainly helped to energize and engage many Christians in the election process. I have been critical in the past of the church's reluctance to "dirty itself" in these so-called political battles, which are in reality profoundly moral in nature, but I believe this signals the dawn of a new day.

ASU to reply to Christian group's suit

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/tempe/articles/1230tasuchristian31Z10.html

William Hermann
The Arizona Republic
Dec. 30, 2004 12:00 AM

Arizona State University on Monday will answer in federal court a suit filed by a Christian group that says the school can't refuse to recognize a student group that doesn't allow gay or non-Christian members.

The Christian Legal Society is suing ASU because several law school students weren't allowed to form a society chapter that would exclude gay and non-Christian students.

TV networks show 'cowardice, pure and simple'

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/pilot/columnists/la-dpt-bellcurve30dec30,1,1397324.story

JOSEPH N. BELL
December 30, 2004

In my view, one of the best and most provocative regular features offered up by the Pilot is the commentary by a cross-section of local religious leaders on some of the pithier moral issues of the day. Their opinions are mostly straight to the point — and not always predictable.

Even though two of their number opted out, I was especially pleased that the other three tackled the recent refusal of several major TV networks to run a commercial on behalf of the United Church of Christ. In case you missed the dispute, the commercial rejected by ABC, NBC and CBS shows a pair of bouncers in front of an unidentified church picking and choosing the people they allow to enter, followed by the tagline: "Jesus didn't turn people away. Neither do we." The reference is primarily aimed at churches that reject gay people unwilling to accept celibacy as a condition for membership, a restriction that doesn't exist at the United Church of Christ.

Tributes to Reggie White Show Incomplete Picture

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/29/sports/football/29sandomir.html

[NOTE: It is likely that few, if any, of us personally knew Reggie White. It is therefore difficult to say with any certainty what his motives were in his speech to the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1998. However, I personally see no reason to doubt that they were for any other reason than his agreement with scripture.

While some people may believe that he could have said it more tactfully, I sincerely doubt that had he delivered the same basic message in a more "pleasant" tone, that those in opposition to his message would have been any less virulant in their current response.]

By RICHARD SANDOMIR
Published: December 29, 2004

Reggie White's death on Sunday prompted a case of one-sided history on the CBS and Fox pregame shows, which remembered him as a great football player but an even greater man, and a man loved by everyone.

White might have deserved much of the praise, but it was the type of unabashed admiration that prompts concern that the stars and producers of the programs forgot or, worse, ignored how White denounced homosexuality and traded in ethnic stereotypes in a speech to the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1998.

Ark. Judge Voids Ban on Gay Foster Parents

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Gay-Foster-Parents.html

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: December 29, 2004

Filed at 8:17 p.m. ET

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) -- An Arkansas judge Wednesday declared unconstitutional a state ban on placing foster children in any household with a gay member.

Ruling in a case brought by the Arkansas chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Timothy Fox said the state Child Welfare Agency Review board had overstepped its authority by trying to regulate ``public morality.''

New Library in SF takes "research" to an all time LOW!

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/12/29/DDG92AHN9T1.DTL

Whatever your taste in pornography, new library has room for more

John Koopman

Wednesday, December 29, 2004

Carol Queen wants your old porn.

Not right now, not if you're using it. But later, when you want to purge it, replace it or, you know, when you're gone you could leave it to her in your will.

Queen will add it to the growing collection of erotica in the library of the Center for Sex and Culture. The center already has 7,000 erotic books, 2, 000 adult videotapes, 2,000 to 3,000 magazines and 1,000 pieces of erotic art. There is also a collection of old and antique sexual devices.

This is not about titillation; it's about research.