A brief bit of activism, and then back to your regularly scheduled blog…

Hey all,

Not a ton of time at the moment.  I posted this to my other blog, and thought I’d share here too.
A group cleverly mis-named the National Organization for Marriage, had spent $1.5 million dollars on an ad campaign spreading a lot of lies and misinformation about the issue of Gay marriage hiring actors to portray concerned citizens…

Information available from the HRC and from CBS news…

If you would like to support the cause of Gay Marriage, and of GLBT Civil rights in general, please feel free to check out these sites…

Freedom to Marry

Marriage Equality USA

Yes On Gay Marriage

Peace, and thank you for your time,

Pax

Why aren’t more Pagans speaking out for GLBT rights?

Now I realize that I can hardly have viewed the entirety of the Pagan blogosphere or news stories related to Paganism… yet it seems to me that except for a few blog posts there hasn’t been a lot of discussion in the Pagan world of GLBT rights and the whole Gay Marriage issue.

There have been a few personal posts, excellent ones, but where are the statements from some of our national organizations and Churches and Groves and Hearths and Friths?  As far as I can tell CoG is one of the only National Pagan organizations to speak out in favor of Gay Marriage.

Hrafnkell at A Heathen’s Day blog recently posted an excellent and detailed refutation of an anti-GLBT rights article.  It is one of the few detailed examples I have seen from Pagan Bloggers writing to refute the absurdist arguments put forth by the Fundamentalist Right.

Is it fear of speaking up or we’ll be next?  Cause we are already next on the hit-list of the Fundamentalist Right, have no doubts about that!

Perhaps we of the Pagan community are working in other ways, as members of other communities and through political rather than religious community.  I’d like to believe that…

Peace,

Pax

!UPDATE!

~12/15/2008~

In the spirit of synchronicity, I post this post and then Jason over at The Wild Hunt, posts an excellent article on how the current debate on GLBT Rights and Gay Marriage completely ignores points of view outside of the Christian so-called mainstream.

I was also rather neglectful in not mentioning Tracie the Red’s own recent blog posting of video of the John Stewart/Mike Huckabee discussion about Gay Marriage.

Sorry about that Tracie!

Peace and more later kids!

Pax

Reacting (more constructively) to the Election and Anti-GLBT votes…

I am a Patriot, an Idealist, and a Witch.  I find myself overflowing with hope in the promise of America.  Optimism that through the efforts of committed hardworking people the world can be changed.   Barrack Obama’s election proves that.  There were volunteers in all 50 states canvassing and calling and working day in and day out to reach out to their fellow Americans in support of their cause.  It worked.  Yes, as a matter of fact, they could!

Even as I experience the wrestling match of emotions between elation at the results of the election, and grievous disappointment at the results of the anti-GLBT ballot innitiatives, I know that I can either sit sullenly and complain or I can do something about it.

As a Witch my Goddess has been giving me my marching orders for years now…

“Keep pure your highest ideal; strive ever towards it;
let nothing stop you or turn you aside.”
~From The Charge of the Goddess by Doreen Valliente

I just didn’t have the compass until now.  While I am not a rich man, I am , on occassion, an eloquent and sometimes even persuasive one.  I am impelled to use my words and my Will in the cause of justice and equality.

I have seen how the grass roots efforts of the Democratic Party and Obama’s vollunteers has changed the world; we in the GLBT community can do nothing less.  I should do nothing less.

To that end I have started a new blog…

Gay Marriage (or something like it)

I am still working out some of my thoughts and feelings… and trying to figure out where to start my research… I think I shall have to track down the writings of Dr. King.  I also need to reach out to like minded souls.

Thus I have created a companion Yahoogroup to go along with the blog.  Here is the group description…

This group is founded upon the belief that Marriage, and all other GLBT Rights are Civil Rights issues.

This is a place for discussion, planning, sharing, and mobilization. Let us form a grass roots movement towards the end that we will see Gay Marriage (or something like it) in all 50 States in our lifetimes.

While national organizations like the HRC and GLAAD have helped GLBT people make great strides over the last 30 years or so, the elections of 2008 have shown us that we need to do more. The victory of President Elect Obama is instructive. He took his message to every corner of our great Nation and mobilized thousands of people in support of his cause. We the GLBT people can do now less in our efforts to reach out to our fellow Americans, calmly quietly and consistently speaking our truth so that, in the end, it is We The People who stand up for GLBT Civil Rights!

If this sounds like something you’d like to be involved in bookmark the other blog and join the Yahoogroup.

Peace, and Equality,

Pax