About 200 “so called christians” who oppose recent diversity initiatives implemented by the city of Fort Worth, TX after the last years June 28 raid on the Rainbow Lounge by officers with the Fort Worth Police Department and agents of the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission. packed Cowtown’s City Council chambers on Tuesday, July 13 led by Republican and closeted Tea Party, bigoted wingnut Richard Clough who is an UBER– failed candidate for Tarrant County judge who is an associate minister with Kenneth Copeland Ministries. (Which by the way has been involved in a tax fraud scandal.)
The Ft, Worth council’s diversity initiatives included improving diversity training for all city employees, domestic partner benefits for gay and lesbian city employees, coverage of gender reassignment surgery for transgender employees in transition, promoting the city as a destination for LGBT tourism, and lobbying for passage of state and federal laws banning anti-LGBT discrimination in employment.The task force also recommended that the council amend the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance to specifically prohibit discrimination based on gender identity and the The city council voted, 6-3, on Nov. 11 last year to add specific gender identity protections to the nondiscrimination ordinance.
Thomas Anable, president of Fairness Fort Worth said he learned on Monday of e-mails that had been circulated over the weekend among conservative and evangelical Christian churches, calling on evangelical Christians to pack the council chambers at Tuesday’s meeting. “They said last November when the task force’s report was presented to the council, and when the council voted on the transgender ordinance, they said then that they had been left out and that they would be back,” Anable said. “Every meeting that the task force had was open to the public, and nobody showed up. I think, with the CCPD budget on the agenda this week, they saw an opportunity to try and make a sneak attack.” (The budget included funds to pay for diversity training for police officers and for officer recruitment efforts within the LGBT community)
Richard Clough stood at the podium flanked by supporters wearing paper badges printed with the word “Truth,” and began by accusing Mayor Mike Moncrief and the council of “intentionally hiding the implementation of a homosexual agenda.” The accusation prompted an angry rebuttal for the mayor, who threatened to have Clough removed from the council chambers if he continued with “personal attacks.” The two men argued briefly, with Clough continuing to speak over the mayor’s admonishments and with Moncrief at one point turning off the microphone at the podium where Clough stood. When Moncrief allowed Clough to continue, the minister accused the mayor of refusing to meet with him, although some council members had met with him. Clough said that “every voice was not heard” on the Diversity Task Force’s recommendations, adding that the council was going against the wishes of the majority of the city’s citizens who had, he said, voted against same-sex marriage in 2004 by a 77 percent majority.
He criticized the city for spending money to send lobbyists to Washington, D.C., to promote passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, and for promoting the city as a destination for LGBT tourism.
“Who are you promoting it to? Queer liberation [possibly a reference to the now-defunct direct action group Queer LiberAction]? To NAMBLA — the North American Man-Boy Love Association? Or are you just promoting it to the gay chambers?” Clough said.
Clough also criticized the addition of gender identity to the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance, suggesting that council members “ask the ladies do they want a man who suffers from gender identity disorder coming in on them in the bathroom. … If they gays want to promote something, let them spend their own money to promote it.”
There’s nothing quite like a Bat shit crazy, Texas Republican Tea Bagger, Bible Thumping, Homophobic, Bigoted asshole to perpetualate stereotypes now is there?
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