Va. County Supervisor Exposed as Founder of Hate Group

March 27, 2012; Source:WJLA

The NPQ Newswire recently highlighted the rise of hate groups that target the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. Now, the founder of a nonprofit in Loudoun County, Va. that was recently designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center is facing calls to step down. The Public Advocate of the United States was founded by Eugene Delgaudio, who also happens to be the Loudoun County supervisor. Loudoun Democrats are calling for Delgaudio to step down because, as Evan Macbeth, chairman of the Loudoun Democratic Committee, told local ABC affiliate WJLA, his organization has long been known to propagate hate.

“This is not a change of their status,” Macbeth said. “It’s an acknowledgement of what Eugene Delgaudio has been doing for a decade.” For some context, Delgaudio once characterized an anti-discrimination bill as an effort to “ram through [an] entire perverted vision of a homosexual America.” He declined to be interviewed by WJLA, but issued a statement saying that the Southern Poverty Law Center is “incompetent and unethical” and that the respected organization should “turn themselves in to the Alabama bar.”

Macbeth insists that the majority of Loudoun County does not share Delgaudio’s fringe attitudes. Rick MacDonald, a local, thinks Delgaudio “needs to find a hobby.” “There’s enough hate going on,” MacDonald adds. Amen to that, brother.

Originally posted on Nonprofit Quarterly Nonprofit Newswire, March 30, 2012.

Anti-LGBT Hate Groups on the Rise, Says Southern Poverty Law Center

March 13, 2012; Source: Philadelphia Magazine

Polls show that more Americans are accepting of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals and that many have become more open to same-gender relationships. There are those however, who not only wish to stop the tide of change, but to propagate hate against the LGBT community. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which monitors hate groups and other extremists throughout the United States, recently added ten new organizations to their list of anti-LGBT hate groups.

The SPLC’s latest report says that advances made by the LGBT community “seemed to set off a furious rage on the religious right, with renewed efforts to ban or repeal marriage equality and what seemed to be an intensification of anti-gay propaganda in certain quarters.” Those advances include marriage licenses now granted to gay couples in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont, New Hampshire, New York, and the District of Columbia. Marriage equality was also passed and signed into law in Maryland and Washington last month but has not taken effect. And last year, Gallup reported that 64 percent of respondents said lesbian or gay relations between consenting adults should be legal and 56 percent find such relations morally acceptable.

“Overall, the number of anti-gay hate groups in the United States rose markedly, going from 17 in 2010 to 27 last year,” the SPLC report reads. As an example, SPLC points to American Family Association official Bryan Fischer, who said that “gays are Nazis” and claimed that HIV does not cause AIDS but gay men do. Philadelphia Magazine lists the new LGBT hate groups—not to give them free publicity, but “because many of them sport names that could be very misleading to anyone who really does care about basic human rights.”

Among those with seemingly innocuous names are the Jewish Political Action Committee (New York), Mission: America (Ohio), Parents Action League (Minnesota), Public Advocate of the United States (Virginia), Save California (California), and United Families International (Arizona). A few of these groups also have mainstream congregational names, such as Tom Brown Ministries (Texas), True Light Pentecost Church (South Carolina), and Windsor Hills Baptist Church (Oklahoma).

Originally posted on Nonprofit Quarterly Nonprofit Newswire, March 19, 2012.

Are Presidential Hopefuls Palling Around with Hate Groups?

October 9, 2011; Source: LGBTQ Nation | Republican presidential hopefuls were at this past weekend’s Values Voters Summit addressing socially conservative constituents whose support they are all vying for. Despite being called a cult member by a prominent Baptist and Rick Perry supporter, Mitt Romney addressed the crowd and called for civility. By the end of the weekend, Ron Paul won the religious voters’ straw poll followed by Herman Cain.

Last Friday, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) released a report on the Family Research Council (FRC) and the American Family Association (AFA) just in time for the summit. Entitled “The Anti-Gay Lobby: The Family Research Council, the American Family Association and the Demonization of LGBT People,” the document exposes the anti-gay agenda of FRC and AFA; debunks myths propagated by anti-gay activists which expressly “demonizes” the LGBT community; and presents alarming statistics on violent hate crimes against LGBT people spurred by the defamation and mischaracterization of the minority group.

SPLC began listing FRC and AFA, which it considers “among the most powerful groups on the American religious right,” as hate groups last year, based on the organizations’ activities targeting the LGBT community.  SPLC points out that the conservative groups are “the chief purveyors of lies about the LGBT people” which have resulted in discrimination and violence against LGBT individuals.

“LGBT people are now, by far, the group most victimized by violent hate crimes in America,” said Mark Potok, director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project, which compiles statistics and information on hate groups operating in the United States.

There is no denying that FRC and AFA are two of the most influential conservative advocacy groups in the United States – they are the ones behind the Values Voters Summit, a required stop for hopefuls in the GOP presidential primary race.

“Public figures should not lend their names to groups that vilify or spread lies about them (LGBT people),” argued Potok. He said that politicians “who know that the claims made by FRC and AFA are false, but who take no action, make these outrageous lies seem legitimate,” referring to GOP presidential candidates, Republican leaders, and other notables who graced the gathering.

Come general elections time, will the Republican presidential candidate be called out for associating with hate groups or will he or she get a pass since FRC and AFA are only vilifying gays?

Originally posted on Nonprofit Quarterly Nonprofit Newswire, October 10, 2011.