Um diddle diddle (Shelly Goldstein)

Fuck off, Binetti

Good news for all those people, like me, who know that the best way of getting rid of Berlusconi is to concentrate votes on the Partito Democratico (PD), but just can't stomach it while Paola Binetti, fundamentalist catholic and - alas - member of the Italian senate, is a PD member. Well, she's gone. That's right, gone. After announcing her opposition to the candidate chosen by the PD for the regional elections in Lazio, Emma Bonino, she's taken her obscurantism and intolerance where it belongs, to the UdC, a party I can't bring myself to describe after a decent lunch. She ought to be a lot more comfortable there. Among her new chums is Rocco "Buttplug" Buttiglione, an orang-utan lookalike and self-styled catholic philosopher, who was forced to resign from his role as EU commissioner some years ago after making a homophobic speech, and then whined about freedom of expression and ungodliness until he was fobbed off with another sinecure. He was working for Berlusconi at the time, without any noticeable spiritual unease, whore-mongers presumably being less disturbing to the soul than the idea of civil partnerships.

Binetti has made a number of previous appearances on this blog. You can find one of them here, along with a picture of her favourite item of jewellery. And while I was looking for a picture to grace this post (and found the one to the right, where the senator is caught discussing that specific item), I came across Binetti's blog. As you can see, it was rather short-lived, withering away after only four posts. I wonder if the little poll she ran (see right, beneath the profile link) discouraged her. She asked her readers if they wanted the law permitting abortion in Italy to be 'modified' (theodem newspeak for 'revoked'). Of the 26 people who bothered to vote, 84% said no. That's the trouble with the internet; it's just too bloody democratic.

It should be part of the deal

I was going to do a simple post today, celebrating my blog's third birthday. But I've just received an email that I thought I'd share with you instead. It comes from someone who doesn't sign his (her?) name but shops at Waitrose and mails from the address ckr@waitrose.com. The subject is "It should be part of the deal that I as an individual is (sic) told the book I am reading is written by a homosexual."

Had I known you were homosexual I would not have chosen to read your book. But once bitten............. etc! Your plea (read this) for others to see reason and accept homosexuality falls on deaf ears with myself and the majority of people. The recent years of outpouring of vile homosexual promotion from every corner, has done them no favours whatsoever. Instead we now know "homophobic" attacks have never been greater. I am not in anyway supporting this, just reporting facts.

But why should we (the general public) be forced to agree with such depravity. When gays become unwell, as they will, it is of their own making. They bring about their own demise. Penetrating the anus, the bodies sewage system is an extraordinary low life act. Why would anyone ever want to engage in any activity that involves their own and others faeces?! It is the most direct way to pass life eroding disease from one individual to another.

The only cure for A.I.D.S is to stop the debauchery that causes it.

I'm not sure which of my books ckr has read, but I hope the experience wasn't too distressing (or, indeed, faecal). In the meantime, it might be worth considering some sort of colour code indicating the sexual preferences of all authors to protect such delicate readers. And why stop at authors? Why not doctors? Busdrivers? It should be part of the deal....

Touching with intent

This is an extract from the anti-homosexuality bill proposed by the Government of Uganda:

You can read the entire disgraceful document here.

Shock horror: Homophobic obscurantist has top job

I discovered an interesting fact about Italy's National Research Council (CNR) today, thanks to a letter in Repubblica. The CNR is a state-financed public organization that, according to its website, exists "to carry out, promote, spread, transfer and improve research activities in the main sectors of knowledge growth and of its applications for the scientific, technological, economic and social development of the Country." (I love that capital 'C'.) This is a laudable aim but it's a little hard to square with an event entitled Evoluzionismo: il tramonto di una ipotesi (Evolutionism: the twilight of an hypothesis), organized (although not apparently financed, for which much thanks) by the CNR, and intended to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Darwin's birth. This is rather like celebrating the anniversary of Mother Teresa's birth by holding a lap dancing competition but there you go, there's nowt so queer as folk, especially scientific folk. Especially scientific folk in Italy's top scientific body.

The conference was organized by the deputy president of the CNR, a certain Roberto de Mattei. You'd expect someone in such a prestigious position to have a pretty impressive scientific curriculum, and you'd be right. Let's have a look. De Mattei is professor of that rigorous discipline, the history of Christianity and the church, in a place called Università Europea di Roma. No, I hadn't heard of it either, but that's hardly surprising. It's run by the Legion of Christ (currently under investigation by the Vatican) and only started handing out degrees three years ago, after being granted permission to do so by the then-Berlusconi government. The Legion of Christ is justly famous for its level-headed approach to molesting children scientific endeavour, as is another richly spiritual organization, the Lepanto Foundation, of which the same De Mattei is the president. Judging from its site, which claims that the stated mission of the foundation is to "defend the principles and institutions of Western Christian civilisation", the Lepanto Foundation is a sort of vanity press for the works of its main man. These include: "Turkey in Europe: benefit or catastrophe?" (I'll leave it to you to work out the answer to that one) and "Holy War, Just War". Just the sort of thing that qualifies a man to become second in command of a national research council and to make him supremely competent to talk about evolution. Sorry, evolutionism.

And if you're still not quite convinced of the man's credentials, here's the clincher. After the 2000 Gay Pride in Rome, which culminated in Piazza San Giovanni, de Mattei and some chums went along to the square to perform, in laboratory conditions naturally, a rite of expiation. So that's all right then.

(One last thing. The acts of the conference, edited by de Mattei, have since been published 'with a modest financial contribution' from the Publications and Scientific Information Office of the CNR.)

Wil the real Maggie Gallagher fuck off?

My Facebook friends will already have seen this video, but why keep all the good stuff for them? It's funny, and sad, and harrowing and you don't need to have seen the sanctimonious bitch's original video to appreciate it - indeed, it's better if you don't. The real Maggie Gallagher already has more attention than she deserves. It was made by a writer/actor called Jeff Whitty. His excellent website can be found here.

Mud, to be worn with pride

Last Friday, Dino Boffo, the editor of the Catholic newspaper, Avvenire, decided to resign after having been attacked and accused of hypocrisy by one of Berlusconi's house rags (Il Giornale, owned by his brother). The Vatican accused Il Giornale of an aggression it considered disgusting, vile, indefensible, etc. As did the opposition, the opposition press, and pretty much everyone not on the Grand Buffoon's payroll. Great fun, and it's hard not to be happy to see the blood flowing from Berlusconi's foot while the gun's still smoking in his hand. But hypocrisy is hardly a hanging issue in Italy. The dreadful stigma that's destroyed Boffo's career, family life, mental health, public probity, and so on, and merrily reduced him to the state of Dreyfus on his way to Devil's Island, the mud that's stuck to his face and hands and keyboard, the sin that is so beyond the pale that it can definitively shit on the man and his professional future, is not that he's a hypocrite. Good god, he worked for the Vatican! Of course, he's a hypocrite.The problem is that he's been accused of being gay. Because in liberal, 21st century Italy, being gay is THAT bad. Get used to it, boys and girls. And get used to the fact that practically no one, in all the outrage this spat produced, and with all the anathema discharged left, right and centre, had the - what shall I say? - political sensitivity to remark on this. It's no surprise that some deranged heroin addict who calls himself Svastichella (hiding behind a sheet of paper, above) should be stabbing gay men in the country's capital because he finds them upsetting, or offensive, or potentially damaging to the morals of a twelve-year-old who wasn't there.

Imagine

Drinking through nose

If you think human rights are an optional, you should sign up to New York University Law School and the courses of its new Professor of Human Rights, Dr. Li-ann Thio, scheduled for this autumn. Want to know why? Click here.

(Immediate update. So few people enrolled for her course that it's been dropped. Which apparently makes her a victim...)

Happy with restraint

OK, you've crossed Iran and Jamaica (and Zimbabwe and Iraq and Nigeria and...) off your list of possible holiday venues. You'd better cross off Fort Worth, Texas, too... You don't see why? Read this.

Here we go again

Last year, for the most absurd reasons (a choral recital in a nearby building, if I remember rightly), under evident pressure from the Vatican and the post-fascist mayor of Rome, Gianni Alemanno, Rome Gay Pride was denied the use of Piazza San Giovanni. The mean-spirited sods are trying it on again this year, eleven days before the march is due to take place, in an attempt to effectively cancel the event. I've been asked to pass this message on to you by the SUPPORT ROMA PRIDE 2009, and that's what I'm doing. If you don't want Rome to look like Moscow or Tehran, you know what to do. And if you're on Facebook, you can join up here. 

Dear friends,

As some of you already know the 13th of June is the date of Roma Pride 2009, but at the moment, only ten days before the event, we still have no authorized route for the final parade and march. Yesterday the police autorities again denied authorization, for the third time, with reasons that are no more than absurd excuses.

As well as the usual Pride issues, such as visibility, rights, non discrimination and equality for LGBT people and communities, we face a conservative attack on basic democratic and civil rights, as guaranteed by the Italian Constitution and the international conventions. Again Piazza San Giovanni has been denied because of the veto of the Vatican and clerical authorities. However, last year's route from Piazza della Repubblica to Piazza Navona has also been denied this year, making it almost impossible the march to take place, and damaging the democratic and civil rights of all Italian citizens, not just GLBT people.

We really need moral support from all of you, and from abroad.You can support Roma Pride 2009 by writing your personal or associative support to romapride@gmail.com (you can send a copy also to me at a.maccarrone@mariomieli.org), by spreading and forwarding this message to other people, above all other groups or associations, GLBT groups, Pride organisers, activists for civil and human rights, politicians, journalists that may be interested in this topic, and by creating mobilization or any other kind of useful iniative at any level.
If you are a journalist or have web sites, blogs, newsletters or acces to any other media, please help us byspreading this information.

Thank you for your support and help,

Andrea Maccarrone

Some are more equal

Remember the ministries in 1984? The Ministry of Peace, responsible for war; the Ministry of Love, responsible for torture? Most governments are more subtle about this sort of thing, but Italy, a country that enjoys subtlety in so many guises, from moral hypocrisy to Andreottian dissimulation, has taken a cruder leaf out of Orwell's book. The Ministry for Equal Opportunities is now explicitly discriminating against gays. During the last government, minister Barbara Pollastrini instituted a web site listing the various groups that suffered discrimination for reasons of religion, health, nationality, sexual orientation and so on. The new minister, ex-calendar girl Mara Carfagna (seen here on government business), has removed all reference to homophobia from the site, presumably on the grounds that, under the wise and caring governance of such gay-friendly politicians as Berlusconi, Bossi, Calderoli etc. the phenomenon no longer exists in Italy. Like racism and sexism and all those other nasty -isms, it's been smoothed away and replaced by a feeling of general wellbeing and love towards one neighbour, ideally a 17-year-old blonde with acquiescent parents. What other reason could there be? To prove my point, she's also got rid of a commission set up by Pollastrini, for LGBT rights. Clearly there's no more need for it. What a wonderful world we live in. And I've just heard some Northern League apparatchik on television say that the fact that the centre for illegal immigrants on Lampedusa is now empty is a clear indication that government policy on immigration is working. This is like claiming that an empty hospital is working by ignoring the dead and dying refused admittance. 

Maybe the art of subtlety isn't entirely dead.

No Red Stripe no cry

Even though you are who you are

An extraordinary tale from Mark Doty's blog.

Aiming at foot, hitting foot

I've heard people say that the Westboro Baptist Church, by revealing the true face of fundamentalist homophobia, is the best thing to happen to the fight for gay equality in years. I suppose this is true in the same way that summary executions of teenage gays in Iran or the anathema of Mugabe and the president of the Gambia, whose name I have no intention of committing to memory, are 'useful' reminders of the lengths to which instutionalised homophobia can go. By this token, Ratzinger's decision to welcome back to the catholic fold a gang of befrocked negationists, otherwise known as the schismatic followers of French archbishop Lefebvre, can also be seen as a good thing as it strips away yet one more layer of whatever moral authority the man, and the organisation he represents, is supposed to possess, though it must be rather hard on those catholics who belong to the church because they believe in the message of Christ. The next thing you know he'll be recognising the authenticity of the Protocols of Zion. Why shouldn't he? Holocaust-denier archbishop Robert Williamson already does. 

Gaia

Ratzinger's festive message was unusually spirited this year. It's good to know that old age and too many tennis lessons with the lovely Georg haven't robbed the old trooper of his sense of humour. In a costume that Widow Twanky would have murdered for - and one can only imagine the sumptuousness of the under-garments - Eggs tried out a new routine to the joy of the usual fanbase of lick-spittles and Italian politicians worshipping catholics. Well, not exactly new, more a reworking of old material, but hey! a girl can't go on dancing all the time. The new wheeze is that the world's ecology is damaged less by deforestation than it is by pussy-bumping and its male equivalent. (I'd use Madame Arcati's more colourful terms for this but my mother's only feet away from me as I write.) According to the mad old slapper, gay sex is the equivalent of wiping out whole tracts of the Amazon. What he hasn't provided us with, alas, is a conversion table. For example, just how much damage does one act of consensual anal sex do in carbon footprint terms? Come on, Ratzy, we need to know. I mean, if it can be proven that a quick blow job is no more destructive than, say, uprooting a small fruit-bearing bush, at least we know where we stand. We can make a reasoned decision. Maybe we can offset the carbon cost of a weekend on Ibiza, or Lesbos, by planting a hedge of privet and growing some rhubarb. You must have people who know these things, Ratzy. You seem to be surrounded by experts on just about everything, from medicine for the terminally ill, indeed totally vegetative, to the price of bloody fish.

Iran, Jamaica, Vatican, Sudan....

Surprise news from the Holy See. Someone called (Father) Federico Lombardi claims that the Vatican's refusal to endorse a proposal for the UN that homosexuality be decriminalised, signed by all EU states, presumably including Poland (!), does not mean that it approves of the death penalty for homosexuals. Phew. Its position on waterboarding hasn't yet been announced. 

While we're waiting, read Wendell Ricketts' comment on the whole sordid business here.

Mammon, Mormon

The Mormons are crying foul as they get picked on for bankrolling the Yes to Prop 8 campaign. It really isn't fair. After all, they only raised something like half of the more than 30 million dollars used to deny Californians their basic rights last week. It wasn't all their fault. Just leave them alone. Spoilsports. Bullies.

If you want to know where the rest of money came from, click here. My thanks to Jockohomo.

Marriage, shmarriage

The joy of Obama's victory has been slightly soured by the votes in California and elsewhere against gay marriages, confirmation - if that were needed - of Obama's extraordinary ability to draw on a wide variety of constituencies, including many that are hostile to gay issues. It's evident that part of Obama's appeal derives from the way in which he and his team have used his family in an iconic way, normative as Palin's horde could never be. If she was a hockey mom, Barack Obama was also a basketball pop.

But the prop 8 vote has set me thinking about where to go next, not only in the USA but in other places, such as Italy, where there is continued resistance to the recognition of gay unions. Both here and in the States, ickiness at the idea of gay sex among heterosexual men and some women is being manoeuvred into something more substantial and discriminatory by religious bodies, from the Phelps family to the Vatican to the Mormons, who see marriage as what they term a sacred bond. For the sake of argument, let's suppose they really believe this and aren't merely frothing at the mouth about perverts and fags and the second coming and all the rest of the odd mindset of evangelofascism, a word that's almost as ugly as the phenomenon it describes. Let's suppose they genuinely do want to protect what they see as a sacrament from 'the gays'. 

Well, I come from a generation when nobody I knew, gay or straight, wanted to get married. Marriage was seen as a cage rather than a bond, along with mortgages - and look what happened to them. Times changed, people came to realise that marriage provides legal and financial security, and a host of other benefits that have nothing to do with sacrality. The state recognises this by allowing people's marriages to be recognised by both secular and religious structures. And that's the problem. Those people who've chosen town halls or registry offices to get married in have signed a civil contract. God hasn't blessed their union. And that's their choice. And that choice should be made available to those people regarded as anathema by churches. Because, in most cases, it's mutual. The churches can keep their approval for those who want it. 

What I'd like to see is all those straight couples who married without God's blessing coming out to defend the opportunity of others to benefit from the bundle of basic civil rights provided by state-recognised marriage, or civil union, or registered partnership, or whatever we want to call it. Right now, the churches are claiming to protect an institution on behalf of people who don't care a dried fig about church recognition. Isn't it time these people opened their mouths? 

Ditching the bitch

This time PD senator Paola "Mrs Doubtfire" Binetti (see two posts down) really does seem to have gone too far. Following her comment that homosexuals couldn't control their paedophilic instincts and were therefore disqualified from becoming priests, members of her centre-left party have called for her to be expelled. (Better late than never. If they'd done it two years ago we might, just might, have civil union legislation in place in Italy.) She's going to be hauled up before an internal commission tomorrow and asked to explain herself. 

Binetti's used to waffling on uninterrupted, under the assumption that religious bigotry has a sort of authority denied other forms of bullying, and can't quite see what she's done wrong. She's apologised, after all, even though she has used the apology to repeat the slur. She even seems to think there's some sort of scientific validity in what she says, although it wouldn't matter if there weren't because, well, she just know she's right. She must be. She's only repeating what the pope says, after all. And he's always right. Why? Because he says he is. That's what infallibility's all about.