Petition Of The Day

Pennsylvania state Rep. Brian Sims writes:

The time has come for our Pennsylvania Human Relations Act to include a basic level of protection for members of the LGBT community in Pennsylvania. That's why I’ve not only co-sponsored House Bill 300 this legislative session, but am also working hard with Prime Sponsors Rep. Dan Frankel and Rep. Chris Ross to build support for its passage. Currently, we protect our citizens from discrimination based on race, religion, gender, age, ability, yet there is no protection for hate-crimes victims that are based on sexual orientation. Reps. Frankel, Ross, and I need your help to pressure my fellow legislators in the Pennsylvania House and Senate to support this ground-breaking and historic legislation to protect the LGBT people of Pennsylvania.

Hit the link to read in full and sign.

RELATED: Five years ago the anti-gay hate group Repent America successfully forced the repeal of Pennsylvania's 2002 hate crimes law.

Hate Group That Got Pennsylvania's Hate Crimes Law Overturned Protests At Washington DC Pride

In 2004 eleven members of Repent America were arrested for disorderly conduct at Philadelphia's Outfest after refusing police orders to disperse and stop blocking the street. The arrests became a major cause of national anti-gay hate groups who claimed that Repent America members were arrested merely for "reading the bible in public." Their subsequent lawsuit resulted in the 2008 overturn of the sexual orientation and gender identity amendments to Pennsylvania's hate crimes law.

Yesterday they showed up at DC Pride.

DC's annual Capital Pride Parade turns heated as Christian evangelists, with microphones and amplifiers, decry homosexuality as sin and argue that it is contributing to the moral and cultural decline of America. An evangelist repeatedly warns parade-goers that they will go to hell unless they repent for supporting gay causes and put their faith in Jesus. Parade-goers, vastly outnumbering the evangelists, respond that the activists are being hateful and arrogant and giving Christians everywhere a bad name.

RELATED: Here's video of the 2004 incident.

Skateboarder Stops Koran Burning

You might recall the Texas group Repent America as the nutjobs that called for a boycott of Houston after they elected a lesbian mayor. Yesterday their plan to burn a Koran was thwarted by a quick-thinking skateboarder.

American Talibangelists Destoying Lives Of Swingers In Texas

Dan Savage notes that the bizarre Christian group Repent Amarillo is staking out a Texas swingers club and calling the employers, employees, and families of its patrons in order to wreck their jobs and home lives. You might recall Repent America, their parent group, for their call for a boycott of Houston due to their newly elected lesbian mayor.

In June, when the building reopened, Repent Amarillo became an almost-constant presence, shouting through bullhorns, blasting Christian music, haranguing club members, following swingers in vehicles and sticking video cameras into people’s faces. The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission has been called out twice. Police records show that nearby businesses have called frequently with noise complaints. Repent even showed up on occasion when the Route 66 building was rented out for non-swinger events. “They have been here every time we open our doors, regardless of what kind of functions we have, whether I’m down here doing maintenance, cleaning, whatever,” Mac says. “They don’t have a life. Well, I guess we are their lives. We’re their blood. At three or four in the morning, we’ll open the door, and there they are. They come waddling out of their vehicles with their cameras.”

Some of the club's members have lost their jobs, others have been ostracized by friends and family. Read the full story. On their website Repent Amarillo has a war chart of sexually-related business they are targeting: gay bars, porn shops, strip clubs, etc. The site includes military imagery and gunshot sound effects when scrolling over certain items. They note that they intend to target upcoming gay pride events in Texas. Repent America: sharia law with a Christian face.

Christianists Gets Pennsylvania's Hate Crimes Law Overturned

Acting on a petition filed by the Christianist group Repent America, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has upheld a lower court's ruling that struck down that state's 2002 hate crimes law, saying it was inappropriately attached to an unrelated bill.

Pennsylvania Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision striking down amendments that added sexual orientation, gender identity, ancestry, gender, and mental and physical disability to the state hate crime law. The law, known as the Ethnic Intimidation and Institutional Vandalism Act, was amended in 2002 to include protections for these groups by a two-thirds majority of the state legislature. Then-governor Mark Schweiker signed it into law.

The lower court ruled last November that the law was invalid because it had been tacked onto another, nonrelated bill. The ruling did not criticize the content of the law, only the way in which it had been passed. “We are extremely disappointed that some of the most vulnerable people in Pennsylvania are now unprotected by our state’s hate crimes law,” Equality Advocates Pennsylvania said in a statement.

Stephen Glassman, chairman of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, said that the court ruling will make it more difficult to fight hate crimes. “It is vitally important for our agency to be able to respond to every act of hate and bias in the Commonwealth no matter who the victim may be,” said Galssman. “We must protect the rights of people to be free from these hate crimes just as surely as we protect them on the basis of their religion, race, ethnicity or national origin.”

Last year Gov. Ed Rendell asked the legislature to enact legislation reinstating the bill, but there has been no action thus far.