Madrid Open 2012: Serena vs Azarenka in Final

Serena Williams will face World #1 Victoria Azarenka in the finals of the 2012 Mutua Madrid Open on Sunday. Serena quickly dispatched World #2 Maria Sharapova 6-1 6-3 on Friday while MadProfessah and Sentient Meat watched from the stands of the Caja Magica. On Saturday she reached the final by eliminating Czech Lucie Hradecka 7-6(5) 6-0. Serena is unbeaten on clay in 2012 in 12 matches, having previously won the Charleston by obliterating a field that included Samantha Stosur and Carolina Wozniacki last month. Her performance on the (controversial)  blue clay of Madrid this week means that her ranking will be at least #6 on Monday.

The World #1 beat World #3 Agnieska Radwanska for the sixth time this year, dominating again the Polish player who curiously has yet to lose in 2012 to anyone not named Victoria Azarenka 6-2 6-4.

Serena leads Azarenka 6-1 in their head-to-head meetings, although their last meeting was a very tightly contested affair in the 3rd round of the 2011 US Open. Serena also has the second most wins of any active player against World #1 players (12 wins to 11 losses), second to her sister Venus who has 13 wins (and 19 losses) against top rated players. No other player has more than 6 wins against the reigning #1 player in the world.

I saw both players playing on Friday, with Azarenka toughing out a 3-set match after an(other) epic collapse from Li Na while Serena put on a serving clinic, blasting 13 aces in under 90 minutes to extend her winning streak against Sharapova to 6 consecutive matches. Sharapova was completely flummoxed when she had to serve in the sun, losing her serve on that side of the court 4 consecutive times, and at one point (after starting off well to hold serve at 1-all) the Russian lost 8 games in a row.

It should be quite a good match between the WTA's hottest player (only 2 losses in 2012: to Marion Bartoli and Maria Sharapova) in 36 matches played so far. Serena has played far fewer games but also looks sharp. It will be interesting to see the two best players on the WTA tour (the rankings are irrelevant where Serena is concerned!) in a clay court final which I suspect will be a preview of at least one major final contested in 2012.

The final is at 13:30 local time (4:30am PDT / 7:30am EDT).

MY PREDICTION: Serena.

The New Yorker on Obama's LGBT Stance

hat/tip to Joe.My.God

Celebrity Friday (bonus): Sen. Reid On Marriage Equality

Harry Reid is the majority leader of the United States Senate and a Mormon. In light of President Obama's historic statement supporting marriage equality, Sen. Reid has joined the President on the side of equality:

“My personal belief is that marriage is between a man and a woman. But in a civil society, I believe that people should be able to marry whomever they want, and it’s no business of mine if two men or two women want to get married.  The idea that allowing two loving, committed people to marry would have any impact on my life, or on my family’s life, always struck me as absurd.

“In talking with my children and grandchildren, it has become clear to me they take marriage equality as a given. I have no doubt that their view will carry the future.

“I handled a fair amount of domestic relations work when I was a practicing lawyer, and it was all governed by state law.  I believe that is the proper place for this issue to be decided as well.”

Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/gaysouthflorida/2012/05/senate-majority-leader-harry-reid-people-should-be-able-to-marry-whoever-they-want.html#storylink=cpy

I love the inclusion and re-statement that the idea that one person's marriage has an impact on someone else's life is absurd. I would love to have more public conversations about exactly this point among the people that oppose marriage equality. It's my belief that their main rationale for their belief is either based on religion or heterosexual supremacy.

Madrid Masters 2012: Going to see Serena-Sharapova!

Woo hoo! Today is the quarterfinals of the Mutua Madrid Open and I've got tickets to the day session with Victoria Azarenka v. Li Na and Serena Williams v. Maria Sharapova! Full report later...

Celebrity Friday: Oxy Alum Jacqueline Nguyen Joins 9th Circuit

Wow, this is good news! On Monday May 7th, 2012 the United States Senate voted 91-3 to approve President Obama's nomination of Jacqueline (Hong-Noc Thi) Nguyen to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Nguyen becomes just the second Asian-American on the federal appellate circuit (one level below the U.S. Supreme Court), after Denny Chin, who is on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (in New York).

Previously, Nguyen had made history as the first Vietnamese-American federal judge when she was approved by the United States Senate on December 1, 2009 by a vote of 97-0. Nguyen graduated with a degree in English literature from Occidental College in 1987, followed by a degree from UCLA Law School in 1991. Barack Obama attended Occidental College as well from 1979-1981 before transferring to Columbia University.

The muted debate over the approval of the Nguyen nomination is in stark contrast to the protracted and vituperative debate over the nomination of U.C. Berkeley Law Professor Goodwin Liu to the same bench last year, which ultimately ended in Liu asking the President to withdraw his nomination to the 9th Circuit after a successful Republican-led filibuster and subsequent nomination and confirmation to the California Supreme Court.

It should be noted that there are no Americans of Asian or Pacific Islander descent on the U.S. Supreme Court, despite the fact they make up 5.6% of the population, according to the 2010 Census. All but one of the nine current members of the Court were a federal appellate judge prior to their elevation to the nation's highest court.

Madrid Masters 2012: Verdasco Shocks Nadal

Fernando Verdasco defeated the King of Clay Rafael Nadal at the Mutua Madrid Open 6-3 3-6 7-5 in the 3rd round, the earliest defeat for the 10-time major champion in a clay court tournament since 2002. It was Verdasco's first win against his Spanish compatriot in 14 tries, and Nadal's first loss in clay in 23 matches played since his loss in the final of the Rome Masters against World #1 Novak Djokovic last year.

Nadal was very unhappy with the experimental blue clay the Madrid tournament is being played on this year and vowed to not return if it is not changed.

With his nemesis' early round exit, World #3 Roger Federer has an opportunity to reach the #2 position again if he somehow manages to win the tournament. Federer beat Richard Gasquet to reach the quarterfinals, where he will face David Ferrer. Also in the quarterfinals are Verdasco, Aleksandr Dologopolv, Juan Martin del Potro, Tomas Berdych and either Djokovic or Stanislas Wawrinka and  Gilles Simon or Janko Tipsarevic.

NC Amendment One Passes by 61-39 Margin

As expected, North Carolina voters approved the horrendously discriminatory Amendment 1 at the ballot on Tuesday. The actual margin of the stinging defeat, 61% to 39%, was a bit of a shock, since polls prior to the election showed margins in the 55-39 range.

The only silver lining is that while North Carolina became the last state of the 13 members in the former Confederacy to approve a state constitutional amendment enshrining explicit discrimination against same-sex marriage, it did so with the lowest approval percentage. Unfortunately, the measure approved on Tuesday is also one of the most viciously discriminating, potentially prohibiting any benefit or right based on marriage to both unmarried opposite-sex or same-sex couples in Tarheel State.

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God.

Obama Endorses Marriage Equality!

Well, well! I fly 10,000 kilometers (6000 miles) to Madrid, Spain for the start of my vacation and the first thing I heard when I logged into the internet was "Barack Obama endorses marriage equality"! Woo hoo!

This is amazing news and not that unexpected, if one thinks about it. After all Democrats generally support marriage equality nationally in the 60-percent range with Independents having pretty similar opinions. I'm curious as to how the Obama haters (a.k.a. Hillary diehards) are taking the news. The Obama-Biden 2012 campaign is unashamedly promoting its new position, and apparently over 1 million dollars rushed into their campaign coffers in the immediate hours after the announcement.

Of course, on the other side, this is how Faux News "reported" the President's statement that he supports marriage equality.

This is basically self-parody! "War on marriage,"really? LOL!

MOVIE REVIEW: The Avengers

I got caught up in the hype last Friday and went and saw the new movie The Avengers on opening day. Although I went into the movie extremely skeptical that it would be any good, since in my estmation the last three movies involving individual members of the Avengers, i.e. Iron Man 2, Thor and Captain America were decidely mediocre so it seemed unlikely that a movie featuring all of these characters would be any better than a movie feautring one of them.

But, surprisingly, The Avengers is actually better than any of the individual movies that have preceded it in the sequence.

That is probably due to the influence of fan boy extroardinaire Joss Whedon who directed and co-wrote the film.

The Avengers is well over two hours but the time flies. One of the key features of the film is its balance between the characters. As in a high-stakes appearance by duelling divas, the time and focus is evenly distributed among the stars of the show. This also allows for interesting interactions and compelling couplings: Thor and Iron Man; Hulk and Thor; Captain America, Thor and Iron Man; just to name a few. The (new to me) characters of Black Widow (Scarlet Johannsen) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) are also given equal time, and turn out to be interesting as well. The villian is Loki, who was one of the best things about last summer's execrable Thor film.

Overall, this is an excellent summer popcorn movie, entertaining but will not leave a lasting impression.
And there's nothing wrong with that! It's not one of the best films of the year, but it's not trying to be that. It succeeds at what it is trying to do: entertain you for two hours of summer.

Title: The Avengers.
Director: Joss Whedon.
Running Time: 2 hours, 22 minutes.
MPAA Rating: Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action throughout, and a mild drug reference.
Release Date: May 4, 2012.
Viewing Date: May 4, 2012.

Plot: A-.
Acting: A-.
Visuals: A.
Impact: B-.

Overall Grade: A-/B+ (3.50/4.0).

GODLESS WEDNESDAY: Religiosity Around The World

A new report (Beliefs about God Across Time and Countries) from the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago analyzes surveys about religious beliefs of 30 countries around the world and finds some interesting results about religiosity and skepticism. The most immediate conclusion is that religious belief always appears to increase with age, and another is that the most religious countries tend to be Catholic countries, with the exception being the United States of America, which is highly religious but not largely Catholic.

Other results in the report are:

• Atheism is strongest in northwest European countries such as Scandinavia and those of the former Eastern Bloc (except for Poland). The former East Germany had the highest rate of people who said they never believed in God (59 percent); in comparison, 4 percent of Americans had that response.

• The country with the strongest belief is the Philippines, where 94 percent of those surveyed said they always had believed in God. In the United States, that response came from 81 percent of people surveyed.

• Although by most measures, belief in God is gradually declining worldwide, it is increasing in Russia, Slovenia and Israel. In Russia, comparing the difference between those who believe in God but hadn’t previously, and those who don’t believe in God but used to, researchers found a 16 percent change in favor of belief.

• Support for the concept that God is concerned with people in a personal way ranged from 8 percent in the former East Germany to 82 percent in the Philippines. In the United States, 68 percent of people surveyed held that view.

There are some interesting United States-specific results as well:

60.6 percent of Americans say they have no doubt about the existence of God, and 80.8 percent agree with the statement, "I believe in God now and I always have." 


The United States is the most religious of the highly developed nations, and most scholars attribute this to our tradition of separation between church and state.


54 percent of people younger than 28 said they were certain of God’s existence, compared with 66 percent of the people 68 and older.

As an atheist/agnostic (who is also a mathematician) these poll numbers are somewhat depressing. A majority of Americans are certain of God's existence, with absolutely no evidence to support such a claim! It's not the belief in God that annoys/frightens/bothers me, it's the certitude. It demonstrates a willingness to reason using evidence that indicates a disconnect with a reality-based worldview.

Hat/tip to The American Prospect

MadProfessah On Vacation in Spain and Italy

more...

From May 8, 2012 to May 23, 2012 MadProfessah and Sentient Meat will be on vacation in Europe (Madrid, Barcelona and Rome). It's not a coincidence that two important tennis tournaments (the Madrid Masters and Rome Masters) will be happening the weeks I am in each of those cities. I plan on attending both events!

I intend to have wireless access and  do some slightly lighter blogging than usual during the next two weeks.
Some posts, like the always-popular Eye Candy (Mondays) and Godless Wednesday (Wednesdays) and Celebrity Friday (Fridays) will be posted automatically while I'm on vacation.

Check back here often for updates and pictures...

POLL: Majority of U.S. Supports Marriage Equality

For the second year in a row, the Gallup polling institution has shown that support for marriage equality is a majority position in the United States. With a margin of error of ±3 points, the latest national Gallup poll conducted May 3-6, 2012 of 1,024 American adults shows that 50% think same-sex marriage should be legalized, while 48% think it should not be legal. In 2011, the numbers were 53% in support and 45% in opposition, which was outside the margin of error; the difference has decreased from +8 to +2.

The variations   in subgroups of support for marriage equality is striking:

An astonishing 74% of Republicans think marriage equality should not be legal, a much more strongly held position than the 65% of Democrats who feel that it should be legal. It is also important to note that Independents more closely resemble Democrats on this issue than Republicans.

David Badash at The New Civil Rights Movement notes that these numbers show that Republicans are actually growing more anti-gay (in 2011 28% of Republicans supported equal marriage rights compared to only 22% in the 2012 poll). Democrats have moved from 56% support in 2010 to 69% last year with a slight drop to 65% now.

It's easy to see how anti-gay positions on marriage equality is correlated with religious belief:

For people who have "no religious identity" (read agnostic or atheist) a whopping 88% support marriage equality and for people who "attend religious services seldom or never" 67% support legal same-sex marriage. People who "attend religious services weekly" think same-sex marriage should not be legal by a 67-31 margin.

I wish Gallup (and other polling organizations) would ask a question about whether (and how many) respondents understand we are talking about civil marriage licenses issued by the state and that would legalizing marriage equality would not force any religious institution to perform same-sex marriages.

Or asking the question "What are you protecting marriage from" (and see what their responses are). Almost certainly it would involve God and The Bible. The followup question would be "Why do you think that the state should follow your religion's view of what marriage is"?

Anyone got $50,000 to spare to run this poll?

VP Biden (Effectively) Endorses Marriage Equality

Vice President Joe Biden made news and The White House sweat yesterday when he went on NBC's Meet The Press and said:

BIDEN: Look, I am Vice President of the United States of America. The president sets the policy. I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and heterosexual men marrying women are entitled to the same exact rights. All the civil rights, all the civil liberties. And quite frankly I don’t see much of a distinction beyond that. [...] I think Will & Grace probably did more to educate the American public than almost anything anybody has done so far. People fear that is different and now they’re beginning to understand.

Sure sounds like an endorsement of marriage equality to me, no? The only way American LGBT citizens can have exactly the same rights if they are married is if their state allows same-sex marriage and DOMA is repealed. The question is, was Vice President Biden endorsing both of these policy changes (his boss has already committed to the second, but is famously "evolving" on the first).

LGBT groups reacted with delight to the news of the second-highest ranking official in the United States government endorsing marriage equality.

Final Poll On NC #Amendment1: 55% Yes, 39% No

Tomorrow voters in North Carolina will decide whether or not to amend their state's constitution to ban the legal recognition or validation of any other "domestic legal union" than a marriage between a man and woman in the state. The impact of the amendment is unclear (the words "domestic legal union" do not appear in any North Carolina statute) and it is written using deliberately confusing and obfuscatory language. Many experts believe it will ban any civil union, domestic partnership or same-sex marriage at the local, county or state level in North Carolina. Another impact will be to prevent any state or legal benefit or responsibility that accrues to an unmarried person, gay or straight, regardless of their de facto relationship status.

Many, many people and organizations have been fighting against the campaign to insert religious-based discrimination into the state's founding document; the proponents are not only virulently homophobic but arguable racist as well, in a state which is as much as 20% African American. (To their credit, the NC NAACP has been a strong champion in the fight against Amendment 1.)

The final video from Protect All NC Families summarizing the campaign and giving the final arguments against Amendment 1 is below:


Vote No on Amendment 1!

Eye Candy: Eddy Barrena (reprise)

Eddy Barrena has appeared as Eye Candy one before (on October 3, 2011) and makes his second appearance here in these amazing photographs taken by well-known photographer Thomas Synnamon. As you can see, Eddy has very distinctive tattoos on both shoulders which I think add to his appeal.

SUCCULENT SUNDAY: Rebutia neocumingii, syn Weingartia neocumingii

Bolivian cactus Rebutia neocumingii was known under genus name Weingartia from its description by Backeberg in 1950 until Weingartia was combined under Rebutia by Hunt in 1987. Its flowers can be yellow, orange or red depending on locality. It's normally solitary and unbranched, though the individual pictured is sprouting additional heads. Typically this species has much longer spines; this plant was obtained as form brevispina. It is about 7.5 cm across; at full growth, it can reach 10cm across and up to 20cm in height.

Rebutia neocumingii obrtained as Weingartia neocumingii brevispina.
Plant grown and photographed by Mr Sentient Meat.

Black U.S. Gymnast Josh Dixon Comes Out As Gay

Josh Dixon is a Stanford graduate and gymnast who is hoping to make the United States Olympics Men's gymnastics team, came out of the closet as an openly gay man recently. There has never been a publicly out gymnast in the Olympis, male or female, but Josh Dixon intends to change that.

According to the Jockblog at Outsports.com:

Dixon and his two sisters were all adopted at birth by Michael and Kathy Dixon. While the three children were born at different times, they share the same birth mother, whom none of the family has ever met. It was through his sisters that he first discovered gymnastics.

The Dixon household was diverse: Josh is half-black and half-Japanese, while his father Michael is white and his mother Kathy is Japanese.
Maybe it was the multicultural household he grew up in, but Dixon never felt his early crushes on boys were wrong. Still, he didn’t talk about those crushes because he was immersed in gymnastics from the time he hit puberty.

[...]

In fact, Dixon said he has not had a single negative response “in any way, shape or form.” If anything, the only homophobia he has encountered has been from within himself. He acknowledges he once felt internal pressure about being a gay man in what some label the “gay sport” of gymnastics. He didn’t want to fall into a stereotype. But he’s come to embrace it, and he says his sexual orientation now makes him stand out more at the elite level. While he stands out, he isn’t the only one. Dixon knows of at least three more still competing in college, and he says he is not the only elite-level American gymnast who is gay.

Good luck, Josh!

Analyzing The Pay Gap Between Men and Women

Kevin Drum analyzes the debate between Rachel Maddow and Bob Somerby over the accuracy of this sentence: “Women get paid 77 cents for every dollar that men get paid. For the same work, dudes get paid more.”


It is not really disputed that women earn less than men; the nexus of the debate is whether the source of this is discrimination.

Kevin says:

It's true that some of the gap goes away when you account for the fact that women tend to work in different jobs than men and take more time off to have children. But that's all part of the story. When all's said and done, women are punished financially in three different ways: because "women's jobs" have historically paid less than jobs dominated by men; because women are expected to take time off when they have children, which reduces their seniority; and because even when they're in the same job with the same amount of experience, they get paid less than men. All of these things are part of the pay gap. Whether you call all three of them "discrimination" is more a matter of taste than anything else.

I am not sure that one can just reduce this difference of opinion to a "matter of taste." The tendency of Republicans and conservatives to express disinterest and disbelief in a proven statistical disparate impact of the way society is  ordered on subaltern (marginalized) groups like women and people of color and LGBT folks is precisely a symptom of the problem. Do you think it's a coincidence that "women's jobs" (like teaching) has such low status and compensation in this country? There are real, serious and lasting impacts of gender-based discrimination.

President Bill Clinton Opposes NC Amendment 1

President Bill Clinton has taped a robo-call phone message going to potential North Carolina voters indicating his opposition to the anti-gay ballot measure:

"Hello, this is President Bill Clinton.  I’m calling to urge you to vote against Amendment One on Tuesday May 8.  If it passes, it won’t change North Carolina’s law on marriage.  What it will change is North Carolina’s ability to keep good businesses, attract new jobs, and attract and keep talented entrepreneurs.  If it passes, your ability to keep those businesses, get those jobs, and get those talented entrepreneurs will be weakened.  And losing even one job to Amendment One is too big of a risk.  Its passage will also take away health insurance from children and could even take away domestic violence protections from women.  So the real effect of the law is not to keep the traditional definition of marriage, you’ve already done that.  The real effect of the law will be to hurt families and drive away jobs.  North Carolina can do better.  Again, this is Bill Clinton asking you to please vote against Amendment One.  Thanks."

Primary election day in North Carolina is Tuesday May 8.

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God

Bullied Gay Black Teen Fights Back, May Get Expelled

Darnell "Dynasty" Young (left) with twin brother Darell (right), 17, attend
Arsenal Tech High School in Indianapolis, IN

Argh, this is a very upsetting story! A young, openly gay (and relatively "flamboyant") student is bullied by kids at his new high school constantly, administrators are told about it repeatedly, do nothing, bullying continues, mom gives kid a stun gun to protect himself, and when the bullied kid show it, he is the one expelled for bringing an illegal weapon to school, not the bullies!

The Indianapolis Star-News has more details of the situation:

Indiana law defines bullying as words or actions that are intended "to harass, ridicule, humiliate, intimidate or harm," so students do not have to be physically hurt to claim that they were bullied. 

Indianapolis Public Schools' bullying policy says administrators have to tell students that bullying "will not be tolerated." The policy also says administrators are responsible for investigating "complaints, allegations or rumors of bullying." 

Young and his mother said they told the school about the bullying more than 10 times, but Young said Tech did not formally investigate their complaints except for once when a student who taunted him during class was taken to the dean's office and punished. 

Grimes said she called the school about students following Young home from the bus stop, but school officials said they could not do anything since the students were not on school property. 

When she complained other times, they brought up his sexuality. Larry Yarrell, the Tech principal, said school staff were trying to help Young by suggesting that he "tone down" his accessories.

There's a lot more details in the full newspaper article, I encourage you to read the entire piece. In it, different experts disagree over whether Darnell should be expelled from school or not. It also appears as if the kids who did the bullying are not going to be punished because even though there were a number of witnesses, there is not enough information to identify any of the six kids who surrounded Darnell. It seems like in this day and age of cellphones and digital cameras there could have been some scenario arranged where the bullies were caught doing their illegal actions.

Celebrity Friday (extra): Keith Haring on google.com

Today's Google doodle recognizes openly gay artist Keith Haring who would be 54 today if he had not died of AIDS in 1990 at the age of 36.

CO: Civil Unions Bill Survives On 6-5 Vote

Rep. BJ Nikkel (R), the swing vote for Colorado's civil unions
 is swamped by reporters after voting yes. Photo: Daniel Gonzalez

What a difference a year makes! Last year, the Colorado House Judiciary Committee voted 6-5 to kill a civil unions bill, this year the vote was 6-5 in favor to pass it. Like last year, the Colorado State Senate has already passed the bill 23-12 on a bipartisan basis.

The swing vote was B.J. Nikel, a Republican female legislator who is not running for re-election and who voted against the bill last year.

The Denver Post reports:

Rep. B.J. Nikkel, R-Loveland, joined with Democrats in passing Senate Bill 2 on a 6-5 vote. She had infuriated some social conservatives by refusing to commit to vote against the measure, saying she wanted to first listen to the testimony.

"I think it was the right thing to do. We're all Coloradans, right?" Nikkel said after voting "yes." "It's not something I'm passionate about, but I think we ought to move forward and bring it to a vote in the House."

[...]

Senate Bill 2 now must go to two other committees, Finance and Appropriations, before going to the full House. Supporters say they are worried about tight deadlines with the session ending Wednesday.

The reason why the committee vote was so close is that Republicans hold a slim 33-32 majority of the Colorado House, so with all Democrats voting for the bill, it still need Republican votes in order to reach Democratic Governor John Hickenlooper's desk, who has promised to sign it.

As Joe.My.God noted, part of the intense interest in Colorado's measure is that 1) it is the state which is the home (in Colorado Springs, CO) of the virulently homophobic hate group "Focus on the Family" and 2) Almost exactly twenty years ago (in November 1992) Colorado passed Amendment 2, which purported to ban "special rights" for lesbians, gays and bisexuals by eliminating protections against anti-LGB discrimination at the local, county or state level. The U.S. Supreme Court later struck down "the hate amendment" 6-3 in the 1996 landmark case Romer v. Evans.

TowleRoad has more extensive coverage of yesterday's lengthy and emotional debate over Colorado's civil unions bill.

Celebrity Friday: Fringe Renewed for Final Season

The television show Fringe has been on the verge of cancellation from almost the very beginning. It was created by J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman and Robert Orci. Unfortunately, it never was able to capture the imagination of a wide audience like Abrams' Lost although it was spared the ignominy that his NBC show Undercovers underwent (cancellation in under 10 episodes). Kurtzman and Orci also worked together on Alias, which was one of my favorite shows and made Jennifer Garner a star.

The stars of  Fringe are Anna Torv, John Noble and Joshua Jackson. The show is really an update of Fox's The X-Files with a more complicated "mythology" back story and even wilder, more unbelievable phenomenon. It varies between frankly ridiculous plots but it's the acting and the relationships between the characters which has me hooked. It airs Friday nights at 9pm.

Now, happily, the news has been announced that Fringe has been renewed for a fifth and final season (of 13 episodes).

NC #Amendment1: Not Only Anti-Gay But Racist!

Previously I had blogged about the religious-based homophobia behind the backers of North Carolina's Amendment 1, which, if enacted, would ban any legal recognition of any relationship other than marriage between a man and a woman in the state.

Recently there comes word that Jodie Brunstetter,  the wife of Peter Brunstetter, one of the primary sponsors of the original Amendment in the State Legislature gave this astonishing reason for her and her husband's support of Amendment 1:

MICHAEL: 

“I had my back to her like this. She said, 'The reason my husband my husband wrote Amendment 1 was because the Caucasian race is diminishing and we need to uh, reproduce.” 

UNIDENTIFIED POLL WORKER: “(Mrs. Brunsetter said) … the Caucasian race is diminishing. ?The reason that's a problem is that it was white people that founded this country.” 

“She just wants a white majority so the good 'ol US of A can stay white.

And there you have it! Two great tastes that taste great together: religious-based homophobia and paranoid racism. Brought to you by the supporters and proponents of Amendment 1!

By the way, a poll released May 1st still has the ballot measure ahead by at least 14 points when election day is Tuesday May 8.


Public Policy Polling (which is based in Raleigh, NC) analyzes the latest trends:

-If the amendment ultimately passes it will have a lot to do with the fact that Republicans (76/21) are considerably more united in their support of it than Democrats (42/54) are in their opposition. Independents are split almost evenly, 48/46 in favor of the amendment.

-Support for the amendment is now more narrow among African Americans (53/43) than it is among white voters (56/41), suggesting that the efforts of the NAACP and other black leaders have had some impact in eroding support for it.

-Voters in the Triangle are opposed to the amendment by a 46/51 margin, while voters in eastern North Carolina support it 64/32. Voters in the Triad (55/42), metro Charlotte (54/40), and Mountains (55/39) track the statewide numbers pretty closely.

-There continues to be a massive generational gap with seniors (60/36) strongly in support of the amendment and young voters (33/59) strongly opposed.

The NC NAACP has released a statement condemning Mrs. Brundtsetter's remarks that Amendment 1 is  "to protect the Caucasian race":

The reality is that the extreme right wing forces behind this amendment are the same people waging a public policy campaign against African-Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, the poor and other minorities. Therefore, the alleged comments and the well-documented rationale represented in them are not surprising. They only serve to help connect the dots between a regressive, race-based strategy to pass Amendment One and the larger attack on the rights of minorities for the purpose of maintaining power in the hands of the few.

Should be a very interesting few days until May 8th!

MISSOURI: Gay Republican Legislator Comes Out

Well, well! I guess this is why they call Missouri the "Show Me State"! The debate over the "Don't Say Gay" bill took an amazing turn today when a Republican legislator named Zach Wyatt came out of the closet and announced that he is gay and opposes the don't say gay bill (House Bill 2051).

The Advocate reports:

"I am not the first or last Republican to come out," said Rep. Zach Wyatt in the announcement posted on YouTube. "I have just gotten tired of the bigotry being shown from both sides of the aisle on gay issues."

Wyatt disclosed that he had been a victim of school bullying, and he worries for the safety of school children who are now being bullied.

“Students need to feel safe when they go to school and be able to speak to teachers, counselors, and administrators when they are getting bullied," he said. "This bill will make that illegal."

In Missouri, HB 2051 would ensure "no instruction, material, or extracurricular activity sponsored by a public school that discusses sexual orientation other than in scientific instruction concerning human reproduction shall be provided in any public school." One of the bill's sponsors has claimed it doesn't single out homosexuality and instead bans discussion of "any sexual orientation."

By coming out today, Wyatt became the only openly gay Republican state legislator in the country. Does anyone think that he is the only gay Republican state legislator out of the over 6000 state legislators in the country?

How much more explicitly anti-gay bigotry from their party will Republicans allow before they start coming out and acknowledging the truth that sexual orientation is not a partisan issue?

GODLESS WEDNESDAY: Day of Reason May 3rd!

Tomorrow, May 3rd is the National Day of Reason, a response to the National Day of Prayer, which will be observed on Saturday May 5th. Why is such a thing necessary?

I'm glad you asked:

With the religious right’s influence in Congress, and with the threat to our Judiciary looming large, there has never been as important a moment in which to affirm our commitment to the Constitutional separation of religion and government, and to celebrate Reason as the guiding principle of our secular democracy.

During the past year we have witnessed the intrusion of religious ideology into all spheres of our government, with such assaults on the wall separating church and state as:

• Faith-based initiatives in federal agencies that give preferential treatment to religious organizations which proselytize and employ discriminatory hiring practices;
• Restrictions on important scientific research on the basis of religious objections;
• Attempts to introduce biblical creationism and its alter-ego “Intelligent Design” into our public school science curricula;
• The appointment of judges who willingly place their religious beliefs above our laws;
• Battles over the display of the Ten Commandments and other overtly religious icons in schools and on courthouses;
• Religiously motivated restrictions on access to reproductive services and information;

As in previous years, this year’s National Day of Reason is scheduled to coincide with the Congressionally-mandated and federally-supported National Day of Prayer on Thursday, May 5, 2011. We invite all who value the separation of religion and government to join us in commemorating the Day of Reason, and in building awareness for this important cause.

If there's a National Day of Prayer that Congress and the President support, shouldn't there also be a National Day of Reason?

NC's Amendment 1 Backers Fueled By Religious Dogma

The list of the top funders to the supporters of North Carolina's Amendment 1 has been revealed (By Good As You's Jeremy Hooper) and it is dominated by groups seething with unbridled homophobia and fuled by extreme religious dogma. Some of religious extremist and heterosexual supremacist groups that have poured tens of thousands of dollars in enacting their faith-based view of marriage on all citizens of North carolina regardless of religious belief are: Christian Action League ($300,000), National Organization for Marriage ($300,000), 2 Roman Catholic Dioceses ($50,000 each) et cetera, et cetera.





As Think Progress notes, this is not surprising because the entire argument of the proponents of the anti-gay Amendment 1 is based on the Bible (and one specific vision of faith and religion). Just look at their television ads, both of which mention "God" and depict the Bible.

It's a good thing we don't live in a theocracy, huh? What part of civil marriage do these people not understand?

New Report Analyzes Latino Views On LGBT Issues

There's an interesting report called LGBT Acceptance and Support: The Hispanic Perspective (pdf) funded by the Arcus Foundation and written by David Dutwin, Ph.D. of Social Science Research Solutions which has a lot of insight about attitude in the Latino community in America about homosexuality and LGBT people.

An excerpt from the overview summary:

We find, in fact, that Hispanics, if anything, are slightly more likely to support legal gay marriage and be open more generally toward gays and lesbians in society. As well, Hispanics are as likely to be gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender as any other group in the U.S. today. They are the most Catholic of ethnic groups, and yet Catholic Hispanics, we find, are more open than Protestant Hispanics with regard to LGBT attitudes and policy support.  

 Indeed, the great concern over Hispanic homophobia, according to our data, is highly exaggerated. That said, there are of course groups within the Hispanic community that are more intolerant than others. We find that if there is one concern with LGBT acceptance in the Hispanic community, it resides at the intersection of Hispanicity and religion. While the differences are not there for every measure of LGBT acceptance and policy support, for the majority of measures it is the case both that the most traditional, that is, unacculturated, Hispanics are among the least tolerant. Moreover, the most religious, at least as measured by born again status, Church attendance, and views on evolution and Biblical literalism, lead Hispanics in intolerance.

Hat/tip to Gloria Nieto

Summer 2012: Movies I'm Looking Forward To See

Summer 2012 is coming soon and the movie I am most looking forward to seeing is Prometheus directed by Ridley Scott (see full trailer here, opens June 1, 2012) returning to the universe of his classic Alien movie. My favorite director Christopher Nolan also has a new movie coming out (see full trailer here, opens on July 20, 2012), The Dark Knight Rises, the final film in his Batman trilogy (Batman Begins and The Dark Knight). Some people are looking forward to The  Avengers movie (see full trailer, opens this Friday on May 4, 2012) but since Iron Man 2, Thor and Captain America were all disappointing, why would a movie with all of them in it together be better than the movies which featured only one of them?

Charlize Theron appears to be having a good summer. She is in Prometheus, and also stars in Snow White and the Huntsman (full trailer here, opens June 1) along with Chris Hemsworth (who is also in Avengers as Thor) and Kristen Stewart from the execrable Twilight movies.

What movies are you looking forward to this summer?

If NC Amendment 1 Passes A Week From Today...

One week from today, on May 8th, we will know the results of whether North Carolina voters decided to insert discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and marital status into their state constitution by approving Amendment 1. If it passes, will we signs like the following?

This is an absolute fabulous set of images from every1against1.com reminiscent of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950s and 1960s placing the fight over the anti-gay ballot measure Amendment 1 in context.

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God