Uganda could soon be jailing homosexuals for life after the president said he intended to sign an anti-gay bill.
It comes after Yoweri Museveni received a report from ‘medical experts’ saying ‘homosexuality is not genetic but a social behaviour’, a government spokesman wrote on Twitter.
Homosexuality, which Museveni has called abnormal, is a crime in Uganda. The bill, approved by parliament in December, would legalise life imprisonment for some acts.
Yoweri Museveni, the Ugandan president, is poised to sign a law which would make some homosexual acts punishable by up to life in prison
It comes after Yoweri Museveni received a report from ‘medical experts’ saying ‘homosexuality is not genetic but a social behaviour’, a government spokesman wrote on Twitter.
Homosexuality, which Museveni has called abnormal, is a crime in Uganda. The bill, approved by parliament in December, would legalise life imprisonment for some acts.
Yoweri Museveni, the Ugandan president, is poised to sign a law which would make some homosexual acts punishable by up to life in prison
Museveni announced his decision to governing party lawmakers, said government spokesman Ofwono Opondo.
In Twitter posts on Friday, Opondo said the legislators, who are holding a retreat chaired by Museveni, 'welcomed the development as a measure to protect Ugandans from social deviants.'
Evelyn Anite, a spokeswoman for the governing party, said the report, which had been requested by the president, was prepared by more than a dozen scientists from Uganda's Health Ministry.
Opondo and Anite both said the president did not indicate when he will sign the legislation into law.
Homosexuality already is illegal in Uganda under a colonial-era law that criminalizes sex acts 'against the order of nature.'
In Twitter posts on Friday, Opondo said the legislators, who are holding a retreat chaired by Museveni, 'welcomed the development as a measure to protect Ugandans from social deviants.'
Evelyn Anite, a spokeswoman for the governing party, said the report, which had been requested by the president, was prepared by more than a dozen scientists from Uganda's Health Ministry.
Opondo and Anite both said the president did not indicate when he will sign the legislation into law.
Homosexuality already is illegal in Uganda under a colonial-era law that criminalizes sex acts 'against the order of nature.'
An earlier version of the bill, first introduced in 2009, proposed the death penalty for some homosexual acts, although that sentence was removed after international pressure.
The bill is popular in Uganda, one of many sub-Saharan African countries where homosexuals face severe discrimination. A new law in Nigeria last month increased penalties against gays.
Museveni, who has criticized gays as 'abnormal' people who should be 'rehabilitated,' had previously called the bill too harsh.
Government spokesman Ofwono Opondo tweeted the announcement saying he welcomed the measure to protect the country from 'social deviants'
The bill is popular in Uganda, one of many sub-Saharan African countries where homosexuals face severe discrimination. A new law in Nigeria last month increased penalties against gays.
Museveni, who has criticized gays as 'abnormal' people who should be 'rehabilitated,' had previously called the bill too harsh.
Government spokesman Ofwono Opondo tweeted the announcement saying he welcomed the measure to protect the country from 'social deviants'
Ugandan lawmakers passed it on Dec. 20. Since then Museveni has been under pressure within his own party to sign the legislation, which has wide support among Christian clerics and lawmakers who say it is needed to deter Western homosexuals from 'recruiting' Ugandan children.
The bill before Museveni would allow life imprisonment for acts of 'aggravated homosexuality,' defined as sex acts where one of the partners is infected with HIV, sex with minors or the disabled, and repeated sexual offenses among consenting adults.
The bill also would make conducting a same-sex marriage ceremony punishable by seven years in prison.
On Friday, the watchdog group Human Rights First expressed 'deep concern' over news that the bill will be signed into law, saying it 'will have severely adverse consequences for the human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people as well as other Ugandans.'
Robyn Lieberman of Human Rights First said: 'There should be no doubt that Museveni's latest words on the subject have been influenced by the reaction to similar legislation in Nigeria, Russia and elsewhere.'
Human Rights Campaign President Chad Griffin said: 'Unless this bill is stopped from becoming law, lives will be destroyed and countless people will be punished for an immutable characteristic.'
He addded: 'Anti-LGBT Americans advocated for laws further criminalizing LGBT people in Uganda, and it looks like they are now getting their wish.
'Whether it's Brian Brown advocating for anti-LGBT laws in Russia or Scott Lively calling for the further criminalization of LGBT people in Uganda, anti-LGBT Americans must stop exporting their hate abroad.'
Brown is president of the National Organization for Marriage, a Washington-based group that opposes same-sex marriage.
A Russian law, signed by President Vladimir Putin in June, bans gay 'propaganda' from reaching minors.
The law has drawn strong international criticism and calls for a boycott of the Sochi Games from gay activists and others.
The bill before Museveni would allow life imprisonment for acts of 'aggravated homosexuality,' defined as sex acts where one of the partners is infected with HIV, sex with minors or the disabled, and repeated sexual offenses among consenting adults.
The bill also would make conducting a same-sex marriage ceremony punishable by seven years in prison.
On Friday, the watchdog group Human Rights First expressed 'deep concern' over news that the bill will be signed into law, saying it 'will have severely adverse consequences for the human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people as well as other Ugandans.'
Robyn Lieberman of Human Rights First said: 'There should be no doubt that Museveni's latest words on the subject have been influenced by the reaction to similar legislation in Nigeria, Russia and elsewhere.'
Human Rights Campaign President Chad Griffin said: 'Unless this bill is stopped from becoming law, lives will be destroyed and countless people will be punished for an immutable characteristic.'
He addded: 'Anti-LGBT Americans advocated for laws further criminalizing LGBT people in Uganda, and it looks like they are now getting their wish.
'Whether it's Brian Brown advocating for anti-LGBT laws in Russia or Scott Lively calling for the further criminalization of LGBT people in Uganda, anti-LGBT Americans must stop exporting their hate abroad.'
Brown is president of the National Organization for Marriage, a Washington-based group that opposes same-sex marriage.
A Russian law, signed by President Vladimir Putin in June, bans gay 'propaganda' from reaching minors.
The law has drawn strong international criticism and calls for a boycott of the Sochi Games from gay activists and others.
[h=1]Uganda President Signs Antigay Bill into Law[/h]
Well Zit, you can always move to Uganda 
I like it better how we treat gay people here than most of the rest of the world. Besides, these "first gay this" and "first gay that" stories are going to fade, as soon as everyone accepts that gays are normal and deserve the same opportunities to enjoy life and love as the rest of us.
I like it better how we treat gay people here than most of the rest of the world. Besides, these "first gay this" and "first gay that" stories are going to fade, as soon as everyone accepts that gays are normal and deserve the same opportunities to enjoy life and love as the rest of us.
Well Zit, you can always move to Uganda
I like it better how we treat gay people here than most of the rest of the world. Besides, these "first gay this" and "first gay that" stories are going to fade, as soon as everyone accepts that gays are normal and deserve the same opportunities to enjoy life and love as the rest of us.
Gays constitute about 2% of the population, I'm not sure I'd define that as "normal" They also have much higher rates of mental health and physical health problems that heterosexuals.
Gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM))[SUP]a[/SUP] represent approximately 2% of the United States population, yet are the population most severely affected by HIV. In 2010, young MSM (aged 13-24 years) accounted for 72% of new HIV infections among all persons aged 13 to 24, and 30% of new infections among all MSM. At the end of 2010, an estimated 489,121 (56%) persons living with an HIV diagnosis in the United States were MSM or MSM-IDU.
http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/risk/gender/msm/facts/index.html
Zit NO ONE is going to click your link. You made up your mind a long time ago, and then searched for 'evidence' that supports your decision. I know some wannabe touts who do the same thing, make a pick and then run numbers in a database until it spits out an ATS angle they can sell. And then lose! You are on the wrong side of history my friend. I still like ya, but you've been intolerant on this issue for years. Gays aren't changing, regardless of what you say or do, any faster than someone can 'teach' someone you consider 'normal' to be gay. They're never going away either. Not gonna happen. I know your Holy Book is against them (kind of hypocritical seeing what horrors are committed by men with authority in the church and then covered up by their superiors).
And of course more gays have mental health problems than average. They have to endure being made to feel inferior and outcasted. And either they find the strength to overcome intolerance or they cower from living. Or die. Totally understandable. I'll bet straight kids who are bullied end up with similar issues, and number the same percentage wise.
And of course more gays have mental health problems than average. They have to endure being made to feel inferior and outcasted. And either they find the strength to overcome intolerance or they cower from living. Or die. Totally understandable. I'll bet straight kids who are bullied end up with similar issues, and number the same percentage wise.
Imo Putin has struck the right balance on this issue.
"We do not have a ban on non-traditional sexual relationships," said Putin in comments reported by Russian agencies. "We have a ban on the propaganda of homosexuality and paedophilia. I want to underline this. Propaganda among children. These are absolutely different things – a ban on something or a ban on the propaganda of that thing."
"We are not forbidding anything and nobody is being grabbed off the street, and there is no punishment for such kinds of relations," said Putin. "You can feel relaxed and calm [in Russia], but leave children alone please," said Putin.
Your right Scott, you're way is much better:
http://americansfortruth.com/issues/gay-culture/homosexual-pride-parades-festivals/
WARNING: HIGHLY OFFENSIVE GRAPHICS
http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/21/us/arizona-anti-gay-bill/
[h=1]Arizona lawmakers pass controversial anti-gay bill[/h] By Ray Sanchez and Miguel Marquez, CNN
updated 7:57 PM EST, Fri February 21, 2014
[h=1]Protestors rally against Arizona bill[/h]
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
(CNN) -- Arizona's Legislature has passed a controversial bill that would allow business owners, as long as they assert their religious beliefs, to deny service to gay and lesbian customers.
The bill, which the state House of Representatives passed by a 33-27 vote Thursday, now goes to Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican and onetime small business owner who vetoed similar legislation last year but has expressed the right of business owners to deny service.
"I think anybody that owns a business can choose who they work with or who they don't work with," Brewer told CNN in Washington on Friday. "But I don't know that it needs to be statutory. In my life and in my businesses, if I don't want to do business or if I don't want to deal with a particular company or person or whatever, I'm not interested. That's America. That's freedom."
Arizona Rep: Law would not shield waiter
Arizona passes bill seen as 'anti-gay'
As expected, the measure has drawn criticism from Democrats and business groups who said it would sanction discrimination and open the state to the risk of damaging litigation.
On Friday, the LGBT group Wingspan staged a protest march to the governor's office that drew about 200 people. Some carried signs with messages "God created us all equal" and "Shame on Arizona."
Tucson-based Rocco's Little Chicago Pizzeria posted a photo on its Facebook page of a sign with a message for state lawmakers: "We reserve the right to refuse service to Arizona legislators."
"It's a ridiculous bill," pizzeria manager Evan Stevens told CNN on Friday. "Arizona has much bigger problems than allowing businesses to discriminate against people."
In a statement, Anna Tovar, the state senate Democratic minority leader, said: "With the express consent of Republicans in this Legislature, many Arizonans will find themselves members of a separate and unequal class under this law because of their sexual orientation. This bill may also open the door to discriminate based on race, familial status, religion, sex, national origin, age or disability."
The Greater Phoenix Economic Council, in a letter to Brewer on Friday, urged the governor to veto Senate Bill 1062, saying the "legislation will likely have profound, negative effects on our business community for years to come."
"The legislation places businesses currently in Arizona, as well as those looking to locate here, in potentially damaging risk of litigation, and costly, needless legal disputes," council President Barry Broome wrote, adding that four unidentified companies have vowed to locate elsewhere if the legislation is signed.
He added, "With major events approaching in the coming year, including Super Bowl XLIX, Arizona will be the center of the world's stage. This legislation has the potential of subjecting the Super Bowl, and major events surrounding it, to the threats of boycotts."
On CNN's "The Lead with Jake Tapper," Arizona state Rep. John Kavanagh, a Republican, said the bill would not allow hotel clerks or waiters, for instance, to turn away customers, unless there was a "substantial burden on their sincerely held religious beliefs."
The bill is being pushed by the Center for Arizona Policy, a conservative group opposed to abortion and same-sex marriage. The group has justified the measure on grounds that the proposal protects people against increasingly activist federal courts.
"As we witness hostility towards people of faith grow like never before, we must take this opportunity to speak up for religious liberty," the group said on its website, asking people to contact Brewer and urge her to sign the bill. "The great news is that SB 1062 protects your right to live and work according to your faith."
Cathi Herrod, the center's president, told CNN on Friday, "The Arizona bill has a very simple premise, that Americans should be free to live and work according to their religious faith. It's simply about protecting religious liberty and nothing else."
Herrod said the bill's opponents are "showing unbelievable hostility toward religious beliefs."
"America still stands for the principle that religious beliefs matter (for) something in this country, that we have the right to freely exercise our religious beliefs," she said.
But Robert Boston, a spokesman for the Washington-based Americans United for Separation of Church and State, told CNN the legislation would "fling the door wide open to discrimination, not just against gay people, but basically to any class of individuals that a religious fundamentalist decides he or she doesn't want to deal with."
He added, "A woman who is pregnant out of wedlock, for example, 'Well, out the door, you don't get served in my business.' "
The Arizona legislation was passed as conservative states work to counter laws legalizing same-sex marriage. Arizona voters approved a ban on same-sex marriage as a state constitutional amendment in 2008.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona called the bill "unnecessary and discriminatory."
"What today's bill does is allow private individuals and businesses to use religion to discriminate, sending a message that Arizona is intolerant and unwelcoming," the group said in a statement.
Some Republican legislators have defended the bill as a First Amendment issue. Democrats dismissed it as an attack on gays and lesbians.
"It's a very bad day for Arizona," Rep. Chad Campbell, a Phoenix Democrat who voted against the legislation, told CNN Friday.
He added, "Let there be no doubt about what this bill does. It's going to allow people to discriminate against the gay community in Arizona. It goes after unprotected classes of people and we all know that the biggest unprotected class of people in the state is the LBGT community. If we were having this conversation in regard to African-Americans or women, there would be outrage across the country right now."
[h=1]Arizona lawmakers pass controversial anti-gay bill[/h] By Ray Sanchez and Miguel Marquez, CNN
updated 7:57 PM EST, Fri February 21, 2014
[h=1]Protestors rally against Arizona bill[/h]
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- NEW: Not sure this needs to be a law, governor tells CNN
- Bill allows business owners to deny service to gays, lesbians
- Critics say the measure sanctions discrimination
- Proponents of the bill say it protects people against activist federal courts
(CNN) -- Arizona's Legislature has passed a controversial bill that would allow business owners, as long as they assert their religious beliefs, to deny service to gay and lesbian customers.
The bill, which the state House of Representatives passed by a 33-27 vote Thursday, now goes to Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican and onetime small business owner who vetoed similar legislation last year but has expressed the right of business owners to deny service.
"I think anybody that owns a business can choose who they work with or who they don't work with," Brewer told CNN in Washington on Friday. "But I don't know that it needs to be statutory. In my life and in my businesses, if I don't want to do business or if I don't want to deal with a particular company or person or whatever, I'm not interested. That's America. That's freedom."
As expected, the measure has drawn criticism from Democrats and business groups who said it would sanction discrimination and open the state to the risk of damaging litigation.
On Friday, the LGBT group Wingspan staged a protest march to the governor's office that drew about 200 people. Some carried signs with messages "God created us all equal" and "Shame on Arizona."
Tucson-based Rocco's Little Chicago Pizzeria posted a photo on its Facebook page of a sign with a message for state lawmakers: "We reserve the right to refuse service to Arizona legislators."
"It's a ridiculous bill," pizzeria manager Evan Stevens told CNN on Friday. "Arizona has much bigger problems than allowing businesses to discriminate against people."
In a statement, Anna Tovar, the state senate Democratic minority leader, said: "With the express consent of Republicans in this Legislature, many Arizonans will find themselves members of a separate and unequal class under this law because of their sexual orientation. This bill may also open the door to discriminate based on race, familial status, religion, sex, national origin, age or disability."
The Greater Phoenix Economic Council, in a letter to Brewer on Friday, urged the governor to veto Senate Bill 1062, saying the "legislation will likely have profound, negative effects on our business community for years to come."
"The legislation places businesses currently in Arizona, as well as those looking to locate here, in potentially damaging risk of litigation, and costly, needless legal disputes," council President Barry Broome wrote, adding that four unidentified companies have vowed to locate elsewhere if the legislation is signed.
He added, "With major events approaching in the coming year, including Super Bowl XLIX, Arizona will be the center of the world's stage. This legislation has the potential of subjecting the Super Bowl, and major events surrounding it, to the threats of boycotts."
On CNN's "The Lead with Jake Tapper," Arizona state Rep. John Kavanagh, a Republican, said the bill would not allow hotel clerks or waiters, for instance, to turn away customers, unless there was a "substantial burden on their sincerely held religious beliefs."
The bill is being pushed by the Center for Arizona Policy, a conservative group opposed to abortion and same-sex marriage. The group has justified the measure on grounds that the proposal protects people against increasingly activist federal courts.
"As we witness hostility towards people of faith grow like never before, we must take this opportunity to speak up for religious liberty," the group said on its website, asking people to contact Brewer and urge her to sign the bill. "The great news is that SB 1062 protects your right to live and work according to your faith."
Cathi Herrod, the center's president, told CNN on Friday, "The Arizona bill has a very simple premise, that Americans should be free to live and work according to their religious faith. It's simply about protecting religious liberty and nothing else."
Herrod said the bill's opponents are "showing unbelievable hostility toward religious beliefs."
"America still stands for the principle that religious beliefs matter (for) something in this country, that we have the right to freely exercise our religious beliefs," she said.
But Robert Boston, a spokesman for the Washington-based Americans United for Separation of Church and State, told CNN the legislation would "fling the door wide open to discrimination, not just against gay people, but basically to any class of individuals that a religious fundamentalist decides he or she doesn't want to deal with."
He added, "A woman who is pregnant out of wedlock, for example, 'Well, out the door, you don't get served in my business.' "
The Arizona legislation was passed as conservative states work to counter laws legalizing same-sex marriage. Arizona voters approved a ban on same-sex marriage as a state constitutional amendment in 2008.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona called the bill "unnecessary and discriminatory."
"What today's bill does is allow private individuals and businesses to use religion to discriminate, sending a message that Arizona is intolerant and unwelcoming," the group said in a statement.
Some Republican legislators have defended the bill as a First Amendment issue. Democrats dismissed it as an attack on gays and lesbians.
"It's a very bad day for Arizona," Rep. Chad Campbell, a Phoenix Democrat who voted against the legislation, told CNN Friday.
He added, "Let there be no doubt about what this bill does. It's going to allow people to discriminate against the gay community in Arizona. It goes after unprotected classes of people and we all know that the biggest unprotected class of people in the state is the LBGT community. If we were having this conversation in regard to African-Americans or women, there would be outrage across the country right now."
Your right Scott, you're way is much better:
http://americansfortruth.com/issues/gay-culture/homosexual-pride-parades-festivals/
WARNING: HIGHLY OFFENSIVE GRAPHICS
Diversion ....... And if you think I'm clicking that you don't know me very well. Hope you enjoyed whatever it was.
hno:One *might* think the far rightys in here who say that want smaller and less intrusive government would realize it speaks volumes that oppressive dictatorships make the lives of gay people intolerable while democratic societies like America protect them from discrimination.
People who believe gays should be villified "because they are sick" are truly the sick ones.
People who believe gays should be villified "because they are sick" are truly the sick ones.
