Tag: Bryan Fischer

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American Family Association: The First Amendment only applies to Christians

Hate group leader Bryan Fischer

Hate group leader Bryan Fischer is in a “do as I say, not as I do” kind of mood today.

He has single-handedly decided that the First Amendment’s protection to religious liberties only applies to Christians.

From his blog post today on the American Family Association website:

“I have contended for years that the First Amendment, as given by the Founders, provides religious liberty protections for Christianity only. Most attorney types, befuddled by years of untethered Supreme Court activism, think it covers any and all religions you can name.

“The results of this expansive but badly misguided understanding of the First Amendment have not been too costly to this point. But with Islam growing in America like a noxious weed, some of the more troublesome aspects of this distorted view of religious liberty are becoming evident, when it comes to things like school curricula, halal food, and Christian evangelism at Muslim street fairs.”

Halal food must be very troubling to Bryan Fischer.

Fischer goes on to say that the Founding Father’s never, ever, ever, never meant to say that “religion” meant all religions when writing the First Amendment.

Except, they did.

Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli, which was ratified unanimously and without debate by the US Senate in 1797 and signed by President Adama, reads as follows:

“As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion, – as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen,- and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.”

Bolding is mine. Clearly unequivocal in it’s clarity. “The United States of America is not IN ANY SENSE founded on the Christian Religion.”

Bryan Fischer, take a history class.  And stop misleading folks for your own purposes.

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Another time Bryan Fischer was caught lying

Speaking on July 18th about the downed Malaysian Airlines flight, President Obama mentioned the many HIV/AIDS researchers and advocates headed for the 20th International AIDS Conference in Australia who were on the plane.

At the time, Obama said “the United States of America is going to continue to stand for the basic principle that people have the right to live as they choose.”

Hate group leader Bryan Fischer decided he didn’t like that. Fischer said that Obama’s statement was meant to “politicize” their deaths in order to legitimize gay relationships.

Fischer added, “We know how to stop AIDS: persuade men not to have sex with men.”

Well, we all know that’s not true. But let’s let the folks at PolitiFact break it all down for us, shall we?

About 70 percent of all people infected with HIV live in sub-Saharan Africa, about 24 million people. This region is also home to the most children living with HIV whose infections originated during pregnancy, childbirth of consuming breast milk, according to AIDS.gov.

Globally, the dominant form of transmission is heterosexual sex, said Sophie Barton Knott, UNAIDS spokeswoman. Nearly half of people with HIV are female, and most were infected through heterosexual sex. Most of the 50.9 percent of men with HIV got it through heterosexual sex, too, she said.

The highest rates of AIDS among 15- to 24-year-olds is among women in many parts of the world, said Seth Faison, spokesman for The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. And in Eastern Europe, the highest transmission rates of AIDS are among people who inject drugs.

“Men who have sex with men are a high-risk group, but not the only one,” he said.

The bottom line?

Preventing men from having sex with men will not end AIDS.

Faison said the criminalization of same-sex activity actually can increase transmission rates. Being gay is a crime in at least 76 countries, and in those places, gay men are less likely to receive treatment, testing and prevention.

The CDC also says stigma and homophobia are likely one factor behind the rise in HIV infections among young gay men in the United States.

“In effect, efforts to ‘persuade men not to have sex with men’ is counterproductive,” Faison said. “It will not stop AIDS.”

PolitiFact gives the statement it’s worst rating of “Pants On Fire.”

(h/t JMG)

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Bryan Fischer: Only 2% of Americans are gay, and they are belligerent and intolerant!

Today’s rant from anti-gay hate group leader Bryan Fischer, comes in response to the latest National Health Interview Survey, which is the government’s premier tool for annually assessing Americans’ health and behaviors.

The NHIS found that 1.6 percent of adults self-identify as gay or lesbian, and 0.7 percent consider themselves bisexual.  1.1 percent declined to answer, so you know what that means.  Results from other surveys put the numbers closer to 3.5-4%.

Apparently, according to Fischer, this means gays and lesbians should accept being “less than” and the treatment that bigots feel go with such standing.  Equal rights?  No way, Mr. Gay…..

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Bryan Fischer is mad at the Proud Whopper

Bryan Fischer is mad about Burger King's new "Proud Whopper"

Right Wing Watch reports on the extreme rhetoric and activities of key right-wing figures and organizations by showing their views in their own words.

In this video, Bryan Fischer says Burger King’s “Proud Whopper” is a disastrous idea because nobody wants to eat a hamburger that makes them think about two guys having sex.

I posted about the “Proud Whopper” last week when the story made news. The new marketing campaign only took place at one location in San Francisco, and the hook was that customers and employees couldn’t tell the difference between the “regular” Whopper and the “Proud Whopper” – until the sandwich was unwrapped where Burger King had printed “We Are All the Same Inside.”

Clearly, the message was lost on Fischer…

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Bryan Fischer: “There is no equality between homosexuality and heterosexuality”

From our friend at American Family Association, Bryan Fischer, talking on the idea of equality between heterosexuals and homosexuals:

“They are not equal.

“They are not equal in morality. They are not equal in worth. They are not equal in procreative power. They are not equal in their consistency with God’s design.

“There is no equality between homosexuality and heterosexuality.”

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Bryan Fischer practicing more right wing hypocrisy

I love when the “inconsistencies” and hypocrisy of right wing idiots become inescapably obvious to everyone.  “The rules I set for you don’t apply to me” kind of thing.

Like this little incident today with anti-gay Bryan Fischer from the ironically named American Family Association, via Right Wing Watch:

Last month, after Christian radio stations and music fans began to boycott the band Jars of Clay over the lead singer’s support for marriage equality, Bryan Fischer proclaimed that this sort of reaction was the logical result of that singer’s own decision to make a “foolish declaration.”

If someone chooses to speak out on this sort of issue, Fischer declared, “that’s fine, but then don’t complain when there are consequences for making a foolish declaration like that.”

Of course, that was two whole weeks ago, back when Fischer found such “consequences” to be totally acceptable because he happened to disagree with the stated position of the person who was experiencing those consequences.

That stand has now been totally abandoned in the face of the Benham brothers having lost their HGTV program over their anti-gay, anti-choice activism, with Fischer declaring on his radio program today that they are the victims of the “gay gestapo” which will soon force Christians to wear yellow crosses upon their sleeves “like the Jews in Nazi Germany.”

Just to recap, when someone that Fischer disagrees with suffers a backlash because of their publicly stated position, that is because “there are consequences for making a foolish declaration” … but when someone that Fischer agrees with suffers consequences for making public declarations, that is Nazi-like persecution.

(via Right Wing Watch)

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Anti-gay Bryan Fischer: “Gay activists are like leeches”

Virulently anti-gay Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association:

“The point here is that with the homosexual lobby, you cannot ever give them enough. Don’t even try. There’s no point in making concessions. There’s no point in capitulating. There’s no point in yielding to their demands. There’s no point in offering them some kind of appeasement in the hopes that they will leave you alone, that they will leave you in peace. It won’t work.”

(via Right Wing Watch)

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Bryan Fischer wishes the US had Russian-style anti-gay laws

Bryan Fischer continues to complain that the United States does not have Russian-style anti-gay “propaganda” laws. In fact, Fischer lauds Russian President Putin as “the lion of Christianity” for leading his nation’s crackdown on gays.

On yesterday’s radio broadcast, Fischer again voiced his support for implementing such laws in America, declaring that it is “inexcusable” that these sorts of laws are not being put into place here.

“That’s a policy we ought to have in the United States,” he said of the Russian laws. “It’s inexcusable that we allow vulnerable, innocent young children to be indoctrinated, brainwashed, propagandized into thinking that homosexual conduct is perfectly normal and absolutely benign behavior when it absolutely is not”:

I want to point out that the kind of activities Fischer is talking about – “indoctrinating,” “brainwashing,” “propagandizing” – in Russia, includes merely carrying a rainbow flag, or holding your partner’s hand.

The anti-gay laws in Russia have emboldened anti-gay vigilantes to literally hunt down gays and lesbians, all for the crime of holding someone’s hand.

Those are the kinds of activities and laws Bryan Fischer supports.

(via Right Wing Watch)

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American Family Association spokesman: The poor should be “kissing the ground” that the rich walk on

Right Wing Watch points out this little moment from Bryan Fischer’s radio show this week:

“So rather than the poor, the low-income, and the middle class being resentful of [the rich], they should be kissing the ground on which they walk. Who’s paying for the EBT cards? Who’s paying for food stamps? Who’s paying for the women and infant children program? Who’s paying for subsidized housing? Who’s paying for Medicaid? It is the top 1% So they ought to be given ticker tape parades once a week in all of our major cities to thank them for funding welfare for everybody.”

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Bryan Fischer: SCOTUS says it’s a crime to be a Christian

Bryan Fischer tries to put his tiresome spin on the decision by the US Supreme Court to let stand a ruling that found a New Mexico photographer violated the state’s public accommodation laws by refusing services to a gay couple for their commitment ceremony.

Of course, SCOTUS did not rule that it’s against the law to be Christian. They ruled it’s against the law to be a bigot when there are public accommodation laws in place.