Petition Of The Day

Click over to Change.org for the answer.

Headline Of The Day

Disappointing.

Petition Of The Day

Change.org sends a press release:

Shannon Ritchie, a new mom and North Carolina native who volunteered in the effort to fight Amendment 1, the state’s recent ban on gay marriage, launched her petition on Change.org on Wednesday night after seeing President Obama publicly endorse gay marriage. “My husband and I were heartbroken when we found out that North Carolina’s hurtful and discriminatory Amendment 1 had passed on Tuesday evening,” said Ritchie, a registered Democrat. “But when I saw the president speak out in support of marriage equality, it gave me hope that we can still make a positive change right here in my home state of North Carolina. With the Democratic National Convention coming here in September, now is our chance to make history.” Each signature on the petition generates an email that is sent to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, the 2012 Democratic National Convention Chair. Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Democratic National Committee Chair, is also listed as a target on the petition.

Sign the petition here.

Petition Of The Day

It'll never happen, but the idea does deliver a smile.

Focus On The Family: LGBT Activists Are Pressuring Corporations To Be Pro-Gay

To which we say, DUH. This latest whine arises from the Change.org petition campaign asking the CEO of Starbucks to cancel an appearance before an anti-gay church. And he did cancel. The megachurch in question complains that they totally aren't anti-gay and that they welcome the "broken of the fallen world." Meaning YOU.

Petition: Let Bert & Ernie Get Married

A petition drive launched on Change.org asks the producers of Sesame Street to allow long-rumored boyfriends Bert and Ernie to marry.

Chicago resident Lair Scott started an online petition at Change.org to pressure the Sesame Street Workshop to "Let Bert & Ernie get married on Sesame Street." The petition reads, "We are not asking Sesame Street to do anything crude or disrespectful…. It can be done in a tasteful way. Let us teach tolerance of those that are different." As of this writing, the petition had collected more than 1,600 signatures. But are Bert and Ernie even gay, never mind ready for the ultimate commitment? Scott clearly thinks so. In an interview with ABC News.com, Scott said, "A lot of people have wondered about Bert and Ernie.... Living in the same bedroom and the same home would make anyone question their sexuality." His aim, he added, is to get 20,000 petitioners to encourage the Sesame Workshop to either marry Bert and Ernie or introduce a gay or lesbian character.

Sesame Street has denied that Bert and Ernie are gay ever since the rumors started over 20 years ago. The usual response: "They are puppets. They don't exist below the waist."

Apple Ends Christianist Affiliation

Apple has pulled their iTunes store from a Christianist site that funds anti-gay hate groups like the Family Research Council. This move comes after pressure from petition site Change.org convinced other major companies such as the BBC to end their affiliations as well.

Apple has removed their iTunes store from the “Christan Values Network” (CVN.org) after more than 22,000 people signed a petition on Change.org started by Ben Crowther, a student and Apple customer concerned about CVN’s funding of anti-gay, anti-women organizations like Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council. The Apple campaign, which picked up significant momentum after 13,000 AllOut.org members signed another petition on Thursday, follows Microsoft’s decision to leave CVN two weeks ago, prompted by another customer-driven campaign on Change.org. Several other companies have removed their online stores since then, including REI, Macy's, Delta Airlines, BBC America, and Wells Fargo.

Chicken Filets For Gays

Saying they "won't be bullied" by radical homosexual activists, anti-gay groups are passing around a website that claims to be collecting donations to send Chick-Fil-A sandwiches to the operators of Change.org, the progressive site that launched a petition to boycott the chain.

Okay, wait a minute. Halt the Inquisition. We call fowl! You mean Chick-fil-A, a company founded by a Christian—a company that has explicit Christian values—isn’t free to donate chicken sandwiches to organizations celebrating traditional marriage without getting hen-pecked by gay activists? C’mon. This is America. Pro-family companies and individuals should be able to express their religious views openly. Right? Yes, right! But our gay activist friends have stinky wet feathers and a fowl mood over anyone who disagrees with them, so we think it’s only right to respond to their petitions and boycotts with . . . chicken!

Let’s show them some love by burying them in Chick-fil-A chicken sandwiches. When you donate, we’ll use your donation to buy and send a Chick-fil-A chicken sandwich to Change.Org’s headquarters—your way of supporting Chick-fil-A, and telling gay activists to stop having a cow, and for goodness’ sakes stop attacking someone else’s religion. (And we WON’T include your name on anything, since gay activists have a habit of personally attacking individuals who fund their opposition. Nice tolerant bunch, huh?)

As always, the hypocritical Christianists fail to note the many, many boycotts they've launched against companies with employee LGBT groups, with gay marketing campaigns, and those that have made donations to gay causes. Gay boycott = radical homosexual intimidation. Christian boycott = taking their money elsewhere. If any chicken sandwiches actually make it to the folks at Change.org, we encourage them to promptly donate that food to gay kids made homeless by Christian Love™.

MINNESOTA: Target Donates $150K To Anti-Gay Political Fund

Over at SFist, Matt Baume makes a stunning discovery.

Bradlee Dean, the frontman of a Christian rock band in Minnesota called You Can Run But You Cannot Hide, recently said that Muslim countries that execute LGBTs are "more moral than even the American Christians," plus some mouth-foaming about gays engaging in abominations and child molestation. Ugh. So what's the Target connection? Well, Bradlee's ministry received money and support from Tom Emmer, an anti-gay Minnesota Republican running for Governor. And Tom Emmer's campaign got a boost from Minnesota Forward, a PAC running TV ads on his behalf. And Minnesota Forward got $150,000 -- which amounts to about a third of all of their donations -- from Target. So, to follow the money: Target gave $150,000 to Minnesota Forward, which bought TV ads for Tom Emmer, who says "I believe marriage is the union between one man and one woman," and who hangs out with a guy who thinks killing gays is moral.

Baume allows that Target may be unaware of Emmer's connection to murder advocate Bradlee Dean. Over at Change.org, Michael Jones reacts:

Send Target a message now, urging them to explain this donation, and to adamantly condemn the type of fear-based politics that folks like Tom Emmer and You Can Run But You Cannot Hide profit off of. Simply put, Target should know better, and they should do a better job of following their political contributions to make sure they're not funding anti-gay politics.

RELATED: Last month I mentioned the connection between Rep. Michele Bachmann and Bradlee Dean and his band. Bachmann has praised the band, which has ties to her reelection campaign and has shared the bill with her at at least one Minnesota GOP fundraiser. Bachmann to Bradlee Dean: "It a tough job that you do, but someone has to do it. I thank God that he has given you the strength and the resolve to fight for our timeless values." Those "timeless values" include openly advocating for the murder of LGBT Americans.

TAKE ACTION: Sign Change.org's petition to Target.

(Graphic via SFist)

Queering The 2010 Census

Via Change.org:

Since 1990, gay and lesbian couples have been provided an unintentional outlet to categorize their relationship, by self-identifying as married or unmarried partners. Even though the results aren’t officially reported, the raw numbers reveal that 145,000 same-sex couples identified as married or “unmarried partners” in 1990 (before any legal recognition in the U.S. even existed) and close to 600,000 same-sex couples self-reported in 2000. The Obama administration has reversed a Bush-era policy, so in the 2010 Census, a report will be released that outlines official information about same-sex couples. Here are some quick instructions on how to make sure your family is reported correctly.

What Box Do You Check?
If you are in a relationship and you live together, you have two choices. First, one of you will be designated as “Person 1.” If there is no clear favorite for who should be the head of household, perhaps you could flip a coin, wrestle for it or hold a lip-synching competition. Whoever doesn’t win will be designated as “Person 2.” This person is asked how they are related to Person 1. There are 16 choices, but the two that concern you are “husband or wife” and “unmarried partner.”

This is the important part: You do not answer based on the actual legal status of your relationship, you answer based on how you personally categorize your relationship. If you are legally married, you will probably mark down “husband or wife,” though if you are in a civil union or domestic partnership, yet you still feel married, than you should also mark “husband or wife.” If there is no legal recognition of your relationship where you live, but you still consider yourself married, it’s also important that you mark “husband or wife.”

For more information on how to fill out the 2010 Census and how to order a free Queer The Census sticker for your packet, please click here.