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Neph
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Getting started |
Registered: January 1970
Messages: 23
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The parade was to have been last Friday but has been postponed to this coming Friday because a religious gay man was among those killed in the terrorist attack on a bus last Wednesday. (His life partner is devastated.) Jerusalem recently elected its first ever Ultra-religious mayor: he gave permission for the parade even though he won't take part. Reading the article one wonders who are the real "fringe groups". Here is newspaper coverage in English. http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/304782.html
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smith
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On fire! |
Registered: January 1970
Messages: 1095
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I went to read what Kach is......A bunch of outlawed extremists who are allowed to rip down and burn rainbow flags.
How can people walking in a pride parade "delegitimize the Jewish family unit" or send negative messages to the youth? The only message I hear from this is that people turn their eyes away from violence and truth. Believe me, kids see and understand alot more than grownups think sometimes. Hopefully, they are seeing intolerance and bigotry in its purest form.
I'm so sorry for the man who died, his partner and his family. I just hope the parade can be held without any more violence. I agree, the "fringe group" is not the gay people who just want to be heard but the extremists who try to silence the voices of just another group of God's people.
I'll be watching the news to see what happens and hoping that it will be a beautiful rainbowfilled day. You know though...if the mayor really represented ALL his people, he would make an appearance......
{{{hugs}}}
smith
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It's not like we're asking that much. We're not asking for everyone be gay, we're only asking for everyone let US be gay. But it would seem that is too much to ask. Atleast from some people. It's weird how most gays don't have a problem with str8 people (like we could afford to) but so many str8 have a problem with gays. As long as we don't force it on them, what is it to them who we love?
I hope the parade will be held anyway, and without any more violence. Also, my condolences to the people that mourn the man who died.
Setras
PS. Neph, do me a favour and keep us posted on how the parade goes. I'll see if it gets on the news here in Finland, but I don't really expect it to. Unless there is enough trouble.
That which is dreamed can never be lost, can never be undreamed.
-Master Li in Neil Gaiman's Sandman
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This is the same hateful rhetoric that we here in the United States get from such “reverends” as Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and Lou Sheldon (this is the first I’ve heard of this “Kach” group, and I am not surprised at all to learn that it was founded by none other than “Rabbi” Meir Kahane, as he and they were certainly kindred spirits).
As you may know, there is in the United States a law called (euphemistically) “The Defense of Marriage Act” which officially refuses to recognize civil unions between homosexuals (the Vermont law notwithstanding), believing that such unions destroy the very sanctity of the institution of marriage. I just don’t get it, though. If somebody feels his marriage is threatened by another marriage (even though the partners in that other marriage are in no way involved in his marriage), then his marriage must not be very secure to begin with (and if he blames the collapse of his marriage on that other marriage, then that is definitely a major-league cop-out).
Young people do indeed often see and understand more than grown-ups give them credit for; but, at the same time, that’s precisely what the Falwells and Kahanes fear the most: that the next generation will see through their hate-filled claptrap and (God forbid!) start to think for themselves (and in so doing undermine what they believe is their God-mandated efforts). When they succeed in passing on that hatred, it is child abuse of the worst kind.
I, too, feel for the partner and family of the man who was killed (as I feel we all do), and hope this parade and rally can be an expression of peace in the midst of a land fraught with violence from so many fronts.
We do not remember days...we remember moments.
Cesare Pavese
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Neph
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Getting started |
Registered: January 1970
Messages: 23
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At the risk of boring you all here is a newspaper account of recent developments. (You may recall that Haggai El-Ad was paralyzed for many months by the GBS syndrome, from which he has completely recovered.)
Three days before Jerusalem's second annual Gay Pride Parade, activists from the outlawed Kach movement have pulled down dozens of rainbow-striped parade flags affixed by the city in the downtown area ahead of the event. The parade, which is to take place on Friday, has been a source of contention among part of Jerusalem's largely traditional community, with some religious residents calling the event nothing short of an abomination that should never have received a permit.
"The gay and lesbian community is a marginal, fringe group and they must not be given a public stage," said Shas Knesset Member Nissim Ze'ev, who called for the parade's cancellation. "This is a disgusting parade which has no place in a Jewish state," said far-right activist and self-declared former Kach spokesman Itamar Ben-Gvir, who took credit for the removal of at least 30 flags. Ben-Gvir voiced his disappointment that Jerusalem's first haredi mayor, Uri Lupolianski, did not see fit to cancel the event. "This religious mayor is promoting an abomination, and not Judaism," he said.
For his part, Lupolianski, who has pledged to maintain the delicate religious-secular status quo in the city, defended the right of individuals to live as they please.
Reacting to the flag removal, Hagai El-Ad, the executive-director of Jerusalem's Gay and Lesbian Center, which is organizing the event, said he had filed a complaint with police against the Kahane supporters for breaking the law. "The rule of law will overcome this racist movement," El-Ad said, adding that the gay pride flags were "the most prominent symbol for tolerance and openness."
Last year, the group took the city to court after former mayor Ehud Olmert, citing budgetary limitations, refused to provide any city funding for the event, which was attended by some 4,000 people. The court later made the city pay NIS 40,000 - nearly 25% of the cost of the parade - in keeping with past support of other city events. El-Ad said that after last year's ruling he expects the city to "wise up" and provide some funding for the event, or face another court case.
Gay Pride Day was also marked in the Knesset Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women, the Knesset panel that has adopted the cause of homosexuals. At the start of the meeting, a moment of silence was held to remember Alan Be'er, a US immigrant who was killed in last week's suicide bombing attack on a No. 14 Jerusalem bus. Committee chair Gila Gamliel (Likud) read a letter that Be'er had recited to the committee at last year's event. Be'er said he was "proud of his many identities," including being a Jerusalemite, a homosexual, an Orthodox Jew, and a Zionist. He also told the committee that people can be "both free and holy."
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