Free Republic

Faithful Catholics in the Australian diocese of Wollongong are expressing frustration after the bishop canceled a presentation defending marriage, instead joining LGBT activists in their pro-homosexual propaganda on church property. On June 14 the Australian Family Association (AFA) was scheduled to deliver a presentation at the hall of St. Therese Catholic School in Wollongong, about 50 miles south of Sydney. The AFA describes as its mission "to cultivate within society an appreciation that the integrity and well-being of the family is essential to the stability, morale, security and prosperity of the Australian nation." A flyer for the event was emailed...

A growing number of Americans are having gay sex, or at least admitting to it. And that's OK with more and more of us. "People over time are reporting more same-sex sexual experiences than ever before," said Brooke Wells, a social psychologist at Widener University's Center for Human Sexuality Studies. ....an annual survey conducted between 1973 and 2014, was fueled largely by people who had sex with both men and women. There has been little change in the number of people reporting exclusively homosexual behavior. from 3.6 to 8.7 percent for women and from 4.5 to 8.2 percent for men....

President Barack Obama issued a proclamation on Tuesday declaring June as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month, and in the proclamation noted that “gay and bisexual men and transgender women of color are at particularly high risk of HIV,” the virus that causes AIDS. […] Obama credits the LGBT community and its supporters for “sweeping progress by changing hearts and minds and by demanding equal treatment — under our laws, from our courts, and in our politics,” the proclamation states. “This month, we recognize all they have done to bring us to this point, and we recommit to bending...

When Australia's most successful Olympian, Ian Thorpe, came out as gay in an interview with Sir Michael Parkinson in July 2014, he was inundated with messages of support. At the time, some posed the question: does this even count as news? Is homosexuality today not a simple biographical detail rather than a sensational scandal? And yet, it is significant that on the same night that Thorpe came out, Australian Rules Football commentator Brian Taylor used a homophobic slur on air, referring to Geelong player Harry Taylor as a "big poofter." The two events accentuated perfectly why it remains the case,...

The latest salvos in the struggle over whether a law passed during March in North Carolina forces transgender people to use public restrooms that don't correspond with their “gender identity” came on Monday, when Dan Savage tweeted that those who disagree with House Bill 2 should leave jars filled with their urine at Republican Governor Pat McCrory's office. The strategy promoted by the gay activist and columnist drew the immediate attention of Noah Michelson, an editorial director on the liberal Huffington Post website, who called Savage's idea a “brilliantly gross” method of protesting the state's “Anti-LGBT Law.” “If Dan Savage...

Manipulated Conservatives: Transgendered Bathrooms are Trivial As I watch people get involved with dramas over this issue, I think: What is it that we are not supposed to pay attention to? What is it that the elites, the media and the government don't want us to notice? Is it the loss of our history and culture with the change with monies, another knife in the gut by the Obama administration? Is it the subtlest of this election? Is it the lousy depression like statistics in some areas of the country? Is it the invasion of western Civ and our country...

A proposal to name a street after pioneering gay leader Harvey Milk is the latest display of Salt Lake City standing out as a blue dot in a deep-red state where the prevailing Mormon faith still has a fraught relationship with the LGBT community. Utah's capital city recently elected its first openly gay mayor and its second sitting gay councilman, creating an increasingly friendly atmosphere for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community in the home of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The conservative religion's tone on gay issues has softened in recent years, but it still...

Target Corp. made it clear that transgender people in its stores are welcome to use the bathroom that aligns with their gender identity. The statement Tuesday by the Minneapolis-based retailer comes amid debates in many state legislatures over restricting public restroom use to the sex listed on a person’s birth certificate. While many of those conversations have centered around restrooms in public schools and government buildings, Target appears to be one of the first big-box retailers to take a proactive stance in declaring its position on the matter when it comes to its own restrooms. While they may not be...

Pope Francis, who has long revealed his liberal positions through interviews, came out on Friday in an official statement calling on Catholics to be more accepting of homosexuals as well as divorced Catholics. While he didn't change official church doctrines in his paper, which is an "apostolic exhortation" instructing Catholics on how to live, the pope paved the way for a serious shift in the Catholic church away from central tenets of the faith. "A pastor cannot feel that it is enough simply to apply moral laws...as if they were stones to throw at people's lives," he wrote in the...

In a major shift of Catholic tenets of faith, pope releases paper instructing Catholics on how to live, tells them to accept homosexuals Pope Francis, who has long revealed his liberal positions through interviews, came out on Friday in an official statement calling on Catholics to be more accepting of homosexuals as well as divorced Catholics. While he didn't change official church doctrines in his paper, which is an "apostolic exhortation" instructing Catholics on how to live, the pope paved the way for a serious shift in the Catholic church away from central tenets of the faith. "A pastor cannot...

PayPal sits on remittances for up to a month, money they use as Float on the back of small merchants and businesses. PayPal is a nuisance. Don't use PayPal. Sorry to WCPE listeners who aren't leftists, your station is great, North Carolina is a great state despite UNC Raleigh-Durham. Take back your country.

The Obama administration is considering whether North Carolina’s new law on gay and transgender rights makes the state ineligible for billions of dollars in federal aid for schools, highways and housing, officials said Friday. Cutting off any federal money — or even simply threatening to do so — would put major new pressure on North Carolina to repeal the law, which eliminated local protections for gay and transgender people and restricted which bathrooms transgender people can use. A loss of federal money could send the state into a budget crisis and jeopardize services that are central to daily life. Although...

Best-selling author Fay Weldon has caused controversy after suggesting that men are being driven to sex change because 'women have it better than men'. The 84-year-old, who lives in Dorset, also said anorexia was for 'girls who don`t want to grow up' and 'have periods', claiming that for many 'sex is disgusting'. It comes after fellow writer Ian McEwan sparked a row on Thursday after warning of a 'troubling' wave of political correctness when discussing the rights of transgender people.

The CEO of PepsiCo, Inc., a company with roots in North Carolina, has written Gov. Pat McCrory, asking him to repeal the new law preventing specific anti-discrimination rules for LGBT people for public accommodations and restroom use. In a letter hand delivered to McCrory on Friday, PepsiCo head Indra Nooyi called the law inconsistent with how her company treats its employees. …

Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump may want to avoid West Hollywood when he campaigns in California ahead of the state's potentially decisive June 7 primary. Lindsey Horvath, the mayor of West Hollywood, Calif., which is located in the heart of Los Angeles County and home to a sizable population of gay men, penned a letter to Trump this week explaining that he is unwelcome in her city. "With the primary making its way to California, as West Hollywood's Mayor, I want to make very clear that your campaign of violence and intimidation is not welcome in our City," she wrote...

If you needed proof that America has lost it corporate mind, here are 5 compelling examples. 1. In New York City, Cooper Union College has decided to remove all “gender markings” from its bathrooms. As reported by The Guardian, “Last fall, the oldest building on the Cooper Union campus underwent a sudden renovation. A group of students, agitating for their transgender classmates, stripped the words ‘men’ and ‘women’ off the doors of the Foundation Building’s restrooms.” But rather than discipline the unruly students, “the Cooper Union administration this month moved to remove the gender designations from all the bathrooms on...

mayor of San Francisco has banned all publicly-funded city employees from traveling to North Carolina. The NFL is threatening to block Atlanta, Georgia from hosting a future Super Bowl. The NBA is threatening to relocate next year’s All Star game from Charlotte, North Carolina to another city. Corporate giants like American Airlines and Hollywood giants like Disney are threatening action against Georgia and North Carolina. Why? It is because North Carolina has passed a bill requiring people to use the public bathroom or locker room that corresponds to their birth certificate gender and because Georgia has enacted legislation (yet to...

Gov. Nathan Deal said he will veto the “religious liberty” bill that triggered a wave of criticism from gay rights groups and business leaders and presented him with one of the most consequential challenges he’s faced since his election to Georgia’s top office. The measure “doesn’t reflect the character of our state or the character of its people,” the governor said Monday in prepared remarks. He said state legislators should leave freedom of religion and freedom of speech to the U.S. Constitution.

Corporations expressed disappointment Thursday and the NCAA vowed to monitor what North Carolina does next now that the state has banned any local government measures protecting people from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. American Airlines, which operates its second-largest hub in Charlotte; IBM and Biogen, which have facilities in the state’s Research Triangle; and payments processor PayPal, which had announced plans to hire 400 people in Charlotte only last week, were among major employers condemning the new law. The legislature called a special session Wednesday to void a Charlotte ordinance that would have enabled transgender...

A “large number” of doctors in certain EU member states still view homosexuality as a disease, a report has revealed. Euroefe reports. “The research also shows that there are still quite a number of healthcare professionals in several EU member states who believe LGBT people suffer from pathological diseases,” said Michael O’Flaherty, the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA). A recent FRA report found that Bulgaria, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia are the EU countries where this misconception is most widely held. This negative view of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people held by groups of professionals...