News Round-Up: February 8, 2019

(image via Instagram)

Some news items you might have missed:

• InstaHunk 'Steve In LA' wants you to remember to consider adopting from a dog rescue next time you want to expand your furry family. OMG, I want all four! 

• The Arizona state government has raised over a million dollars for a notorious anti-LGBTI group, Alliance Defending Freedom, by selling specialty license plates.

• Things got way out of hand last night at popular West Hollywood gay bar, Micky's, when a patron being escorted out of the establishment turned and stabbed the security guard twice in the back.

• Tennessee state Sen. Joey Hensley, virulently anti-gay and professes "deeply held religious convictions," has introduced legislation in his state that would allow adoption agencies to discriminate against same-sex couples. Hensley, who has divorced four times (sanctity of marriage my ass), was named in a divorce proceeding in 2017 for sleeping with another man's wife. #DeeplyHeldReligiousBeliefs

• One of the highest ranking officers in the California National Guard has announced the state won't discharge transgender soldiers from its ranks even as the Trump administration continues to move its ban on trans military service members.

• The president of Brazil has announced plans to remove all references to homosexuality, feminism, and violence against women from public school textbooks. President Jair Bolsonaro's campaign for the presidency proudly included anti-LGBTQ policies.

• Laverne Cox was giving you LIFE as she closed the 11 Honore fashion show finale during New York Fashion Week.

The event is a first for 11 Honore as it only featured plus size clothes from designers.

Wearing a gown by Zac Posen, the Orange is the New Black star twirled on the runway, serving up glamour, and clearly having the time of her life. Get it, diva!

View this post on Instagram

What an incredible honor to close @11honore's first fashion show with these incredible women who represent the size diversity of the women of America. Thank you for existing @11honore and for giving me this incredible honor. ...thank you @zacposen for the gown of LIFE!!! #TransIsBeautiful #SizeInclusivity #SizeDiversity ... Reposted from @harpersbazaarus - Now this is how you close a fashion show! @11honore set the bar high for the kickoff of #NYFW. @lavernecox - #regrann

A post shared by laverne cox (@lavernecox) on Feb 6, 2019 at 4:48pm PST

Anti-LGBT Arizona Artists "Prepared To Go To Jail" If They Lose State Supreme Court Appeal

Joanna Duka and Breanna Koski 

Having already lost twice in court, the owners of a wedding invitation design firm in Phoenix, Arizona, have appealed to the state Supreme Court to determine if a public accommodation ordinance that protects LGBTQ people from discrimination violates their First Amendment rights of free religion and free speech.

The co-owners of Brush & Nib Studio, Breanna Koski and Joanna Duka, said in an interview with conservative radio host Todd Starnes they are prepared to go to jail if the state’s high court rules against them.

“I mean that's that's a possibility that we're hoping we won't have to face,” Duka told Starnes. “We're hopeful that the Arizona Supreme Court will affirm some rights of artists that will never violate our beliefs and our conscience.”

They are being represented at the state Supreme Court by the virulently anti-LGBTQ law firm, Alliance Defending Freedom.

It's important to note that no gay couple has asked Brush & Nib Studio for wedding services, nor has anyone has filed a complaint against the artists with the city.

The duo decided to file their initial lawsuit, in May 2016, as a pre-emptive strike of sorts against Phoenix’s non-discrimination ordinance.

The Phoenix City Council added sexual orientation and gender identity to its existing ordinance in 2013.

After losing in the Maricopa County Superior Court, the artists went to the state Court of Appeals. And lost there, too.

Now, the Arizona Supreme Court has agreed to hear their appeal.

The city of Phoenix issued the following statement regarding the issue:

“Phoenix’s non-discrimination ordinance is about access to goods and services on equal terms. The ordinance does not tell businesses what to write, what to think, or what to believe. The city’s legal team made this point to the Arizona Supreme Court. Four judges have already agreed that businesses in Phoenix must be open to everyone.

"Those legal rulings protect all and confirm that everyone should be treated fairly and equally regardless of sexual orientation, race, gender, religion, or disability. The city of Phoenix will continue to observe these shared community values, allowing the non-discrimination ordinance to protect and respect the rights of all residents.”

(screen capture)

Some LGBTQ activists, like Joe Jervis of JoeMyGod, have wondered aloud if the company might have been created by Alliance Defending Freedom to surreptitiously present a challenge to the Phoenix ordinance.

When their initial lawsuit was filed in 2016, the company didn't appear to have a physical address. And the artists' social media accounts were only months old, making it credible that the company might have been created just to file the lawsuit.

The video below, titled "Getting to Know the Artists of Brush & Nib," was uploaded to YouTube just days before the lawsuit was filed, and the comments section is closed.

Additionally, the video is listed as "Unlisted."

Now, why have a "getting to know" video be "unlisted" on YouTube?

#ThingsThatMakeYouGoHmm…

In the video, the artists make a point to say their teaming up was a "God thing," "beautiful things just come from God," and how "special" they view their work on wedding invitations.

JoeMyGod also notes that the firm has an online store on Etsy despite the fact the website has a very clear anti-discrimination policy that protects LGBT people.

Media Matters Shines A Light On "Christian" Legal Group Alliance Defending Freedom

Media Matters' Carlos Maza reports on anti-LGBT Alliance Defending Freedom

Media Matters' Carlos Maza shines a spotlight on the virulently anti-LGBT legal group, Alliance Defending Freedom.

Sounds really patriotic and all that jazz, right?

Not so much. These folks are NOT fighting for LGBT freedoms.

The right-wing organization routinely opposes transgender rights, LGBT rights and women's reproductive rights. In fact, they have advocated for prison sentences for gays around the world.

ADF is a right-wing legal powerhouse that’s been linked to nearly every recent attack on LGBT equality and women’s reproductive health care. The group has testified against Planned Parenthood and was a major player in the Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby case. Legislation like North Carolina’s bathroom law and Indiana’s “religious freedom” law are the products of ADF’s behind-the-scenes legal work. The group shops extreme model legislation to state lawmakers across the country, testifies in favor of those laws, and then defends them in local and national media.

But news networks that host ADF often identify them as a “Christian” or “conservative” legal organization, failing to mention the group’s history of smearing the LGBT community and working to criminalize homosexuality. ADF has helped defend laws in Belize and Jamaica that would put people in prison for engaging in gay sex. The group opposes anti-bullying efforts, which it believes will indoctrinate “impressionable” children into homosexuality. Alan Sears, the group’s current president, co-wrote a book which claims that homosexuality and pedophilia are “intrinsically linked.” At a recent conference, one ADF attorney claimed that the brutal murder of Matthew Shepard had been falsely depicted as an anti-gay hate crime in order to advance the “homosexual legal agenda.”