According to GLAAD, a coalition of human rights groups is calling on public officials not to
attend the upcoming Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C., because
its host, the Family Research Council, has spread harmful misinformation about
the LGBT community, and because one of its co-sponsors, the American
Family Association, has linked homosexuality to the Holocaust.
“Given the FRC’s and AFA’s public statements, we urge you not to lend
the prestige of your office to the summit,” the coalition wrote in
letters to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, Sens.
Jim DeMint and Rand Paul, and other public officials who have been
invited to speak at the summit.
“The FRC is far outside the mainstream,” the letter states. “It has
engaged in repeated, groundless demonization portraying LGBT people as
sick, vile, incestuous, violent, perverted, and a danger to the nation.
One of its officials has gone so far as to say that homosexuality should
be criminalized.”
“The FRC’s extremism is vividly illustrated,” the letter adds, “by the
fact that it has invited the American Family Association (AFA) to
co-sponsor the Summit at which you have been invited to speak. Here is
what Bryan Fischer, the AFA’s Director of Issue Analysis, wrote in 2010:
‘Homosexuality gave us Adolph Hitler, and homosexuals in the military
gave us the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war machine and 6 million dead
Jews.’”
The coalition letter also points out that the FRC has repeatedly
claimed that gay men molest children at far higher rates than
heterosexual men do, despite the fact that all credible scientific
authorities reject the claim.
The three-day summit begins Friday. The letter can be read at: http://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/VVS2012_Letter.pdf
The human rights groups that signed the letters are: the Southern
Poverty Law Center (SPLC); People for the American Way Foundation
(PFAWF); the Human Rights Campaign Foundation (HRCF); the Gay &
Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD); the National Black Justice
Coalition (NBJC); the National Council of La Raza (NCLR); and Faithful
America.
The public officials to whom the letter was sent are: U.S. Rep.
Michele Bachmann, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, House Majority Leader Eric
Cantor, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint,
U.S. Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, U.S. Rep. Tim Huelskamp, U.S. Rep. Jim
Jordan, U.S. Rep. Steve King, U.S. Rep. Jim Lankford, Virginia Gov. Bob
McDonnell, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, U.S. Rep. Paul
Ryan, and U.S. Rep. Allen West.
“Our message is a simple one,” said Richard Cohen, president of the
Southern Poverty Law Center. “Public officials should not lend the
prestige of their office to groups that spread demeaning and false
propaganda about other people.”