Meme Of The Day
US State Dept Warns Gays In Anti-LGBT Tanzania To Scrub Social Media
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| The national flag of Tanzania |
Earlier this week, the governor of Tanzania’s most populous city, Dar es Salaam, called for an anti-gay ‘witch hunt’ in an effort to arrest and prosecute homosexuals in the East African country.
“Give me their names – My ad hoc team will begin to get their hands on them next Monday,” demanded Commissioner Paul Makonda.
According to The Guardian, in one day he received over 5,700 messages with more than 100 names.
In Tanzania, a conviction for having homosexual relations is punishable by up to 30 years in prison.
The country has seen a crack down an anti-LGBT sentiment since President John Magufuli came into power in 2015.
Now, the United States embassy is warning Americans who may travel to Tanzania to be cautious.
A notice posted on the State Department’s website warns U.S. citizens to “employ sound security practices” which would include monitoring both local and international news.
As there are reports that Makonda is employing a 17-member committee to find gay individuals on social media, the U.S. State Department also says Americans should review their “internet footprint and social media profiles.”
“Remove or protect images and language that may run afoul of Tanzanian laws regarding homosexual practices and explicit sexual activity,” the embassy warns.
The embassy also informs Americans that, if arrested, Tanzanian officials are obligated to alert the American Embassy but “this is not consistently done.”
Nielsen Begins Tracking Same-Sex Couples’ TV Habits
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| The cast of ‘Murphy Brown’ |
For the first time ever, TV data tracking service Nielsen has begun to report the television viewing habits of LGBTQ Americans.
Working in conjunction with GLAAD, Nielsen is now measuring the viewing habits of households with same-sex couples, whether they are spouses or unmarried partners.
The first results show that what we watch varies a bit from the general television viewing audience.
For instance, the top four shows for all viewers for the week ending September 30, 2018, were:
1. Manifest (NBC)
2. The Big Bang Theory CBS)
3. NCIS (CBS)
4. This Is Us (NBC)
But, for same-sex households, the top four shows were:
1. Murphy Brown (CBS)
2. Manifest NBC)
3. American Horror Story (FX)
4. This Is Us (NBC)
S0, there’s some crossover in the Top 4s with Manifest and This Is Us, but things diverge from there.
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| The cast of ‘Manifest’ |
When it comes to the Top 20 shows preferred by same-sex households, eight shows don’t appear at all in the general viewers’ Top 20: Murphy Brown, American Horror Story, Modern Family, Mom, 9-1-1, Rachel Maddow Show, Grey’s Anatomy, Empire and Law & Order: SVU.
It’s easy to see why many of those are of interest to the LGBTQ community. Modern Family, American Horror Story, Empire and 9-1-1 all have gay leading characters. And Rachel Maddow is openly lesbian.
Conversely, some of the most popular shows on television like Blue Bloods, Bulland NCISdon’t show up in our Top 20.
According to USA Today, the new data collection is only including households with same-sex couples, not individuals, out of sensitivity to “privacy concerns.” Nielsen hopes to incorporate individuals eventually.
Sarah Kate Ellis, GLAAD’s president and CEO, said in a statement, “We are at the highest levels ever reported for LGBTQ inclusion on television, and it’s important that we know American audiences are connecting with these characters and shows.”
“We appreciate Nielsen’s commitment to ensuring that LGBTQ people wherever they live and consume television are being counted, and that those numbers are being reported,” she added. “GLAAD is proud to work alongside them as they continue to expand and enhance their capabilities.”
Here are the Top 20 television shows watched by households with same-sex couples for the week ending September 30, 2018 (via USA Today):
1. Murphy Brown (CBS)
2. Manifest (NBC)
3. American Horror Story (FX)
4. This Is Us (NBC)
5. The Big Bang Theory (CBS)
6. The Good Doctor (ABC)
7. Modern Family (ABC)
8. The Big Bang Theory (special) (CBS)
9. The Voice (NBC)
10. Young Sheldon (CBS)
11. Mom (CBS)
12. 9-1-1 (Fox)
13. 60 Minutes (CBS)
14. The Voice (Tues) (NBC)
15. Young Sheldon (special) (CBS)
16. Rachel Maddow Show (MSNBC)
17. Grey’s Anatomy (ABC)
18. New Amsterdam (NBC)
19. Empire (Fox)
20. Law & Order: SVU (NBC)
What do you think, readers? Are your favorite shows in this Top 20?
(h/t USA Today)
Podcast: Tanzania Calls For Rounding Up Gays, Scientists Denounce ‘Redefining’ Trans People Out Of Existence, Ex-Gay Therapist Caught On Gay Dating Apps
In this week’s podcast:
• Gay Tanzanians are living in fear after the commissioner of the country’s largest city called for a witch hunt to round up gay people
• Over 1,600 scientists have joined in protest over the Trump administration’s plans to redefine transgender people out of existence
• A notorious ex-gay therapist is caught trolling for sex on gay dating apps
• And a ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ star came out on social media minutes after his TV character experienced his first same-sex kiss
All that and more on this episode of The Randy Report.
Far-Right Citizens Militia Self-Deploy To Mexican Border
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| The ‘dangerous’ caravan of migrants |
Far-right extremists are packing up their guns, coolers, tents and more to form their own ‘caravan’ to the Mexican border where they say they’ll ‘prove themselves’ after hearing Donald Trump’s ‘call to arms’ regarding the group of traveling migrants in Central America moving through Mexico.
The news has local landowners worried, and U.S. military planners see potential dangers in the armed groups.
What could possibly go wrong?
From MSNBC:
“We’ll observe and report, and offer aid in any way we can,” said Shannon McGauley, a bail bondsman in the Dallas suburbs who is president of the Texas Minutemen. McGauley said he was preparing to head for the Rio Grande in coming days.
“We’ve proved ourselves before, and we’ll prove ourselves again,” he said.
McGauley and others have been roused by the president’s call to restore order and defend the country against what Trump has called “an invasion,” as thousands of Central American migrants advance slowly through southern Mexico toward the U.S. border. Trump has insisted that “unknown Middle Easterners,” “very tough fighters,” and large numbers of violent criminals are traveling among the women, children and families heading north on foot.
The Texas Minutemen, according to McGauley, have 100 volunteers en route to the Rio Grande who want to help stop the migrants, with more likely on the way.
“I can’t put a number on it,” McGauley said. “My phone’s been ringing nonstop for the last seven days. You got other militias, and husbands and wives, people coming from Oregon, Indiana. We’ve even got two from Canada.”
Asked whether his group planned to deploy with weapons, McGauley laughed. “This is Texas, man,” he said.
These citizen militia must not feel the 5,000 U.S. troops Trump sent along with the entire Border Patrol is enough to handle the estimated one or two thousand migrants who might arrive at the border in a month or two.
The recently ordered U.S. troops will join over 2,000 National Guardsmen who are already at the border, meaning upwards of 7,000 American forces will be mobilized to stop the Central American migrants that are weeks away from arriving in the US.
According to the Associate Press, the ‘caravan’ of migrants, made up of primarily women and children walking on foot, is about 1,000 miles from the U.S. border.
Trump Takes Credit For Job Numbers, But He’s Actually In Line With Obama Trends
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| (Images via Forbes) |
Donald Trump is very fond of taking credit for the current economic conditions in the United States.
Low unemployment (3.7%), more jobs being created…
But did he really ‘create’ this? Was there some miraculous reversal of trends that he engineered?
Umm, no.
For instance, start with Trump’s campaign promise that 25 million jobs would be created over 10 years if he were elected.
That sounds like a huge achievement, right?
From Forbes:
President Trump started with a distinct advantage with a workforce of 145.7 million, 9% larger than when President Obama took office. If the workforce were to only grow by 2%, that would add just over 2.9 million jobs a year or 243,000 per month. Over the course of 10 years, there would be over 29 million jobs added.
Additionally, over President Obama’s last six and five years in office after the economy had recovered from the Great Recession, the average employment gains were 2.42 and 2.48 million jobs per year. Pretty much on track to add 25 million over 10 years. So it appears that Trump can reach his 25 million job growth goal even if the economy continued to grow at the pace under Obama .
To provide a monthly comparison, the average employment gain in Obama’s last six years in office (after getting out of the recession’s impact) was 201 thousand. And the average for his last five years was 207 thousand, essentially the same as the 208 thousand for the first nine months this year.
The second graph that shows the U.S. unemployment rate continues on essentially the same path even with a slightly higher GDP growth rate (based on trailing four quarters growth).
A child can see that the trends for both job creation and unemployment are continuing in pretty much a straight line.
Trump hasn’t achieved some incredible ‘turn-around.’
He’s managed to not screw up what President Obama put in motion.
“Failing” CNN Projected To Turn $1.2 Billion Profit In 2018
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| Donald Trump |
To hear Donald Trump tell it, the “failing” CNN is on its last legs.
And then, there are the facts.
Via Vanity Fair:
The average number of people watching on a given day has been above 700,000 each year since 2016, compared to around 400,000 in the pre-Trump news cycle. That’s also considerably larger than any other time over the past 25 years, an astonishing feat given the ubiquity of news and the decline of cable.
The ratings, of course, skew higher in the evening hours, when the most people are watching all at once.
The average prime-time audience is around a million, compared to fewer than 600,000 when Zucker arrived, in 2013.
According to someone with direct knowledge of the numbers, CNN is projected to turn a $1.2 billion profit on $2.5 billion in revenue this year, making 2018 its most profitable year ever.
Anti-Ted Cruz Ad Uses Donald Trump Sound Bites
We all knew this was coming. I’m just surprised it took this long.
A new anti-Ted Cruz ad from Progressive Change Committee (not affiliated with Beto O’Rourke campaign) uses images of Sen. Ted Cruz and sound bites from Donald Trump to describe the Texas Republican:
“I must tell you something about Ted Cruz. I have never, never met someone who lies more than Ted Cruz.
One of the great liars of all time. That’s why we call him ‘Lyin’ Ted.’
Lyin’ Ted! He holds the Bible high, and then he lies.
Ted Cruz, he’s taken so much money from so many different people, and he’s totally controlled.
He’s a nasty guy, nobody likes him, nobody in Congress likes him.
Cruz is not a truthful person.
Cruz is the most dishonest guy I think I’ve ever met in politics.”
2019 Ben Cohen Calendar
Sigh.
Long-time readers of The Randy Report know what a fan I am of rugby legend and anti-bullying advocate, Ben Cohen.
For several years, a highlight for me was to share the news of the new Ben Cohen calendar.
Ben is back with a new calendar! But this time it’s a limited run of only 1,000 calendars.
You can check it out at www.bencohencalendar.com.
Hypocrisy: Conversion Therapist By Day, ‘Hotnhairy72’ On Manhunt At Night
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| (Image via Truth Wins Out) |
A notorious “ex-gay” therapist who takes money from unsuspecting patients promising to ‘cure’ them of being gay while secretly trolling for sex with men on dating apps has been outed.
From Truth Wins Out:
Norman Goldwasser, by day, is an Orthodox Jewish therapist at Horizon Psychological Services who compares homosexuality to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and misleads clients by claiming that their sexual orientation can be changed with his special brand of quack therapy, which is rejected by every respected medical and mental health association.
By night, an undercover investigation by Truth Wins Out has found, he solicits sexual partners on Manhunt, a gay dating App, using the profile “Hotnhairy72.”
During our operation, Goldwasser, going by the pseudonym “Dave”, offered to meet for sex with our operative, “Brandon,” at a Fort Lauderdale motel room. Goldwasser also had a profile on Bear Nation by the same name.
Clearly, the hypocrisy is stunning.
Studies have shown that so-called “ex-gay therapy” can lead to depression, anxiety, drug use, homelessness, and suicide.
Also known as “reparative” or “conversion therapy,” the practice has been debunked and denounced by nearly every major medical organization including the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Currently 15 states – Connecticut, California, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon, Illinois, Vermont, New York, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Washington, Maryland, Hawaii, New Hampshire and Delaware – plus the District of Columbia – all have laws or regulations protecting youth from the harmful practice.
Additionally, local municipalities including cities and counties in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Washington, Florida, New York, Arizona, and Wisconsin have also passed similar legislation.
In reporting the story for Truth Wins Out, Executive Director Wayne Besen writes that Goldwasser’s “double life of unconscionable lies highlights the rank hypocrisy and predatory nature of the fraudulent ‘ex-gay’ industry.”
Besen, the author of Anything Bust Straight: Unmasking the Scandals and Lies Behind the Ex-Gay Myth, says his organization doesn’t condone outing others unless “there is overwhelming hypocrisy, exchange of commerce, and the threat of harm to LGBT youth.”
Clearly, the Goldwasser situation ticks all three boxes.
Goldwasser has long ties to the “conversion therapy” community going back to Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality (JONAH), an “ex-gay therapy” organization which was ordered dissolved by a New Jersey Superior Court in 2015 for violating consumer fraud laws.
Besen told JoeMyGod that he had been communicating with Goldwasser in advance of the Truth Wins Out article, and Goldwasser apparently begged Besen to consider his children and grandchildren in regard to exposing him.
Besen shared a text message from Goldwasser which read, in part, “If you want to prove a point, then please do so without destroying my ability to support my family.”
“I reminded Goldwasser that he was asking for sympathy he never afforded his victims, some teenagers, as he coldly collected their money and ruined their lives,” Besen told JoeMyGod.
“I also told him that only caring about his own predicament without apologizing for the harm he caused other people was narcissistic — something he could, unlike homosexuality — fix by visiting a real therapist.”
This scandal comes to light as the new film Boy Erased opens in theaters this week.
The movie, starring Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman, and Russell Crowe, focuses on the true-life experience of Gerrard Connelly whose parents sent him to “ex-gay camp” when they discovered his sexuality when he was a teen.