Proposed Fayetteville Ordinance Threatens Religious Liberty

7 CommentsHomosexuality, Transgender, ,

The Fayetteville City Council is currently considering “Proposed Chapter 119: The Civil Rights Administration.”

Proponents are billing this proposal as an anti-discrimination ordinance protecting the rights of homosexuals and transgender people (i.e. people who disagree with their biological gender) in Fayetteville. However, the ordinance carries a number of unintended consequences:

1. The ordinance affects churches. Under this ordinance, churches who have religious objections to homosexuality or disagreeing with one’s biological gender could face criminal prosecution if they refuse to hire a gay or transgender job applicant to fill a “secular” staff position (e.g. bookkeeper, receptionist, etc.).

Many churches do not distinguish between “secular” and “non-secular” staff positions. This ordinance would force them to do so.

Churches could also be forced to open their fellowship hall or similar portions of their property for same-sex “wedding” receptions and similar functions they find objectionable.

2. The ordinance inadvertently allows men to use women’s restrooms, locker rooms, and changing areas. (more…)

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Calling Your Child a Boy or Girl is Child Abuse?

Homosexuality, Transgender,

A blogger at Slate has written an article saying that calling your newborn baby a boy or girl could do irreparable harm to your child.

The article reads,

“With infant gender assignment, in a single moment your baby’s life is instantly and brutally reduced from such infinite potentials down to one concrete set of expectations and stereotypes, and any behavioral deviation from that will be severely punished—both intentionally through bigotry, and unintentionally through ignorance.”

Eric Metaxas at the Chuck Colson Center for Christian worldview analyzed the bizarre comments, saying,

“Yes, she’s saying—she’s actually, seriously saying—that a doctor who tells you the sex of your baby could be doing the baby irreparable harm, by not taking into consideration that in later years, that child might not want to belong to that sex. . . .

“Why am I taking this kookiness seriously, even enough to mention it? Because I think we need to recognize what got this culture to the point of such absurdity—and where we might go from here.

“For years now we’ve been hearing ever louder arguments that we need to free children and everyone else from the tyranny of gender, with all the practical implications that argument has—laws that say that boys can use girls’ bathrooms if they identify as girls, for instance.”

You can listen to Metaxas’ full analysis of the article and its implications below.

[audio:http://bit.ly/XEJsAN|titles=Eric Metaxas – Gender Assignment as Russian Roulette?]

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Media Hype and Same-Sex Parenting Studies

Homosexuality

Recently, a study was released from Australia claiming children with same-sex parents fair better than children with heterosexual parents.

The study, however, suffers from a number of fatal flaws which John Stonestreet pointed out in a radio commentary earlier this month.

Stonestreet writes,

“The first problem is the study’s sketchy methodology which significantly biased its results. … The authors themselves admitted that they used a small non-representative sample. It is what’s known as a “convenience sample,” derived by recruiting self-motivated families in gay-themed publications. They even allowed the parents to know they were participating in a major study on the well-being of same-sex families which biases the results, and they relied on these motivated parents’ self-reports about their own children’s well-being.

“These methodological flaws are no small matter. As Stanton notes, the authors of this study (as well as in all the other studies to date) fail to appreciate that the same-sex parents being studied are fully aware that they’re participating in a study that could influence social stigma and public policy.

“This obviously creates a conflict of interest, because some of the participants will have a strong reason to be more positive in their self-reporting.”

This is a flaw very similar to one we pointed out about a recent “survey” of homosexuals in Arkansas commissioned by the Human Rights Campaign.

Listen to Stonestreet’s full radio commentary below.

[audio:http://bit.ly/1k93b5E|titles=Media Hype and Same-Sex Parenting Studies]

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