Commit to vote: http://OFA.BO/k7d82u

Billie Jean King shares her life experiences and why she supports President Obama.

As Billie Jean shares:
“Every generation stands on the shoulders of the generations before—just like I do. And I’m very thankful to all those people that suffered so that I could have a better life. When I was going through all my suffering I use to always imagine what I’d like the world to look like and we are certainly much closer to it than ever—and I know that President Obama is very responsible for this happening because he stood up for us.”

Obama Pride: Ricky Martin

Ricky Martin shares why he’s standing with President Obama and what you can do to make sure he’s re-elected for a second term.

As Ricky shares:
“As a parent, I’m especially thankful that the President is working to end bullying because no one should be afraid to walk down the street holding hands with the person they love.”

Share this: http://OFA.BO/5ZicB5
Tweet this: http://OFA.BO/8qqBP4

“Tim Kurek has written a book that could be described as ‘spiritual espionage.’ As a young fundamentalist, he goes undercover—accepting all the attendant moral and personal ambiguities—and gathers ‘intelligence’ that few heterosexual people have ever had access to. He tells his story with skill and grace, revealing secrets that need to be heard from where he began (Liberty University) to wherever you are. A one-of-a-kind book with unforgettable moral impact.”
—Brian D. McLaren, Author, Speaker: A New Kind of Christianity; Why Did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road?

Why a Bible belt conservative spent a year pretending to be gay
Timothy Kurek, a graduate of the evangelical Liberty University, decided to ‘walk in the shoes’ of a gay man and emerged with his faith strengthened

Timothy Kurek grew up hating homosexuality. As a conservative Christian deep in America’s Bible belt, he had been taught that being gay was an abomination before God. He went to his right-wing church, saw himself as a soldier for Christ and attended Liberty University, the “evangelical West Point”.

 

But when a Christian friend in a karaoke bar told him how her family had kicked her out when she revealed she was a lesbian, Kurek began to question profoundly his beliefs and religious teaching. Amazingly, the 26-year-old decided to “walk in the shoes” of a gay man in America by pretending to be homosexual.

 

For an entire year Kurek lived “under cover” as a homosexual in his home town of Nashville. He told his family he was gay, as well as his friends and his church. Only two pals and an aunt – used to keep an eye on how his mother coped with the news – knew his secret. One friend, a gay man called Shawn – whom Kurek describes as a “big black burly teddy bear” – pretended to be his boyfriend. Kurek got a job in a gay cafe, hung out in a gay bar and joined a gay softball league, all the while maintaining his inner identity as a straight Christian. MORE AT GUARDIAN UK

For more information, see http://www.facebook.com/timothykurek

President Obama has fought for Native American communities to increase opportunities for tribes and individual tribal members. The President has respected and worked hard to strengthen our government-to-government relationships. This administration also recognizes our history together and acknowledges the unique heritage of Native peoples that includes you in the dreams that we all share. Are you in? http://OFA.BO/DLnzBr

Why We Want to Make this Documentary: BRIDEGROOM, will tell the emotional journey of Shane Bitney Crone and Tom Bridegroom, two young men in a loving and committed relationship – a relationship that was cut tragically short by a misstep off the side of a roof. The story of what happened after this accidental death– of how people without the legal protections of marriage can find themselves completely shut out and ostracized– is poignant, enraging and opens a window onto the issue of marriage equality like no speech or lecture ever will.

On May 7, 2012, the anniversary of Tom’s death, Shane made a video tribute to his greatest love entitled “It Could Happen To You.” This film, posted on YouTube, has gotten over 2.7 million hits and inspired over 50 thousand e-mails and comments on YouTube and Facebook. The impact of Shane’s original film and the raw nerve it touched for so many, tells us this is an important story that needs to be told… and told now.


How BRIDEGROOM Can be in Theaters by Fall: Our ambitious production schedule can be met if we immediately raise our bare minimum, fundraising goal of $300,000. To all of you Kickstarter novices out there: if we fall short of our goal during the designated donation period, we will lose all money raised, along with the opportunity to make this film, as well as play a meaningful role in the burgeoning debate over marriage equality.

If we are in the fortunate position of having surpassed our minimum goal, we will use this money to enhance the production value of the film and pay for costly marketing, distribution and music.

A message from Director/ Producer Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: In March of 1986, my mother was diagnosed with AIDS, after receiving a contaminated blood transfusion. This occurred just as the pilot for “Designing Women” was getting underway. As I wrote much of the first season, sitting beside my mom, I was witness to the incredible prejudice and prevailing ignorance inflicted not just on her, but all the homosexual men who shared her hospital floor. Because of this, I was honored to write the Emmy nominated DW episode, “Killing all the Right People,” which was television’s first scripted show to tackle the hateful prejudice surrounding gays and AIDS.

Little did I know that I would someday be provided with another opportunity to address this same kind of bigotry. It all began when I attended a gay wedding ceremony in Palm Springs, California. That night, a couple of unforgettable, young men named Shane and Tom joined my table. I learned they were “Designing Women” fans, madly in love and literally brimming with all their big plans for an exciting life together. Sadly, that possibility ended when Tom was killed in an accident last year. When I heard the news, I was haunted by the sheer weight of Shane’s loss. Even though I barely knew them, their good-hearted demeanors and earnest love had made an indelible impression on me.

Then, a few weeks ago, I saw Shane’s YouTube posting, along with his bone crushing grief and the story of what happened to him after Tom’s death—and all because they were never allowed to marry. Like so many others who saw this video, I was deeply touched. And angered. I called Shane told him I wanted to make a documentary that would tell his and Tom’s love story from beginning to end. I have now seen all of Shane and Tom’s videos and home movies. Like a lot of young people, they routinely documented their lives—but this recorded history is so prolific, it almost seems as though they had a premonition or unconscious fear of not getting to live out something important.

Tom and Shane were each other’s first and only loves. They are devoted, hardworking, unassuming and funny. Each is from a small town and each, in his own way, is imbued with the best kind of small town values. They are, in fact, the sort of young people who hold within themselves the promise of America. And that is why I want to bring to life, on film, this real life Romeo and Romeo—so that all who condemn them, might come face to face with exactly what it is they are opposing.

Certainly the fact that Tom’s last name is Bridegroom is a lucky and serendipitous gift to a filmmaker. But it is so unusual, even a skeptic would find it hard not to also feel that Tom, in his own way, is now standing in for something larger than himself. I can think of no more powerful opportunity to change hearts and minds on this very important issue of human rights, than to tell the story of Shane and Tom, which at its core, is the struggle of all people who yearn to be who they are and love who they love.

Watch the YouTube Video That Started it All:
It Could Happen To You

[BRIDEGROOM KICKSTARTER PAGE]

What happened to the Green Movement? What happened to Iranians protesting in the streets? This excellent documentary examines the situation in Iran. Be rest assured we will soon rise up again….this time, we need the international community by our side! No more appeasements to these terrorist Mullahs who not only pose the gravest threat to the human rights and freedoms of freedom loving Iranians, but to the international community and all freedom loving people with their nuclear weapons. Such apoclaptic weapons should never be in the hands of such madmen!! Iran is the only country in the region which offers the hope for true secularism and democracy!!! We are a good people who value western ideals of freedom, secularism, and human rights.

In Uganda, a new bill threatens to make homosexuality punishable by death. David Kato – Uganda’s first openly gay man – and his fellow activists work against the clock to defeat the legislation while combatting vicious persecution in their daily lives. But no one is prepared for the brutal murder that shakes their movement to its core and sends shock waves around the world.

SYNOPSIS:
In an unmarked office at the end of a dirt track, veteran activist David Kato labors to repeal Uganda’s homophobic laws and liberate his fellow lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender men and women, or “kuchus.” But David’s formidable task just became much more difficult. A new “Anti-Homosexuality Bill” proposes death for HIV-positive gay men, and prison for anyone who fails to turn in a known homosexual. Inspired by American evangelicals who have christened Uganda ground zero in their war on the “homosexual agenda,” the bill awaits debate in Uganda’s Parliament. Meanwhile, local newspapers have begun outing kuchus with vicious fervor under headlines such as: “HOMO TERROR! We Name and Shame Top Gays in the City.”

David, Uganda’s first openly gay man, is one of the few who dare to publicly protest state-sanctioned homophobia. Working with an idiosyncratic clan of fellow activists, David fights Uganda’s government and tabloids in the courts, on television, and at the United Nations. Because, he insists, “if we keep on hiding, they will say we’re not here.”
But one year into filming CALL ME KUCHU and just three weeks after a landmark legal victory, on January 26, 2011, the unthinkable happens: David is brutally murdered in his home. His death sends shock waves around the world, and leaves Kampala’s kuchus traumatized and seeking answers for a way forward.

With unprecedented access, CALL ME KUCHU depicts the last year in the life of a courageous, quick-witted and steadfast man whose wisdom and achievements were not fully recognized until after his death. While heartbreaking, the documentary traces a narrative that takes the viewer beyond the chronicle of victimization depicted in international news media: it tells the nuanced story of David and Kampala’s kuchus as they work to change their fate, and that of other kuchus across Africa.

A story told in his words, David Kato’s final testimony lives on in this film, while his work is continued by the fellow activists he left behind.

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT
During our first days in Kampala, Member of Parliament David Bahati told us: “There is no longer a debate in Uganda as to whether homosexuality is right or not – it is not.” We were tempted to believe him. State-sanctioned homophobia was gaining momentum across the African continent, with a recent volley of attempts to pass homophobic laws and arrest LGBT people in countries from Senegal to Burundi.

But during that first week in Uganda we also met David Kato. Initially, he played something of a fixer, our main liaison with the LGBT, or “kuchu” community. We soon realized, however, that the man known as the “grandfather of the kuchus” was one of the most outspoken and inspired activists in East Africa. The more time we spent documenting his work, the more evident it became that, contrary to the M.P.’s claim, David and his fellow activists were, in fact, generating a public debate in Uganda that was shaking the foundations of the country’s discriminatory status quo and drawing international attention. Uganda, it seemed, had become a frontier in the global battle for LGBT rights.

Over the course of two years, we documented the daily lives and courageous work of David and his fellow kuchus. We were there when David appeared on television to call for an end to LGBT persecution, we were there when David won his case against gay-bashing tabloid Rolling Stone, and we were there during David’s rare moments of respite, when he’d kick back, open a beer and tend to his small farm.

So David’s brutal murder in January 2011 came as a terrible shock to us both. Nonetheless, we felt compelled to continue filming in order to document the impact of his death on the tight-knit community, as well as the courageous efforts of Kampala’s kuchus to continue his astounding work.

In telling this crucial story, we explore the parodox of democracy in a country where a judiciary recognizes the civil rights of individual kuchus, yet the popular vote and daily violence threaten to eradicate those rights altogether. We also examine the nature and consequences of profound religious faith, as expressed both by American and Ugandan evangelical leaders, as well as the LGBT community and its allies.

But perhaps most consequential to us both is that this portrait depicts the David Kato we knew, and David Kato as he saw himself – before he was a mythologized activist, or just as he was becoming one.

FILM SUBJECTS:
DAVID
In public, David is passionate, relentless, fiercely intelligent. In private, at home on his small farm, a charismatic yet vulnerable individual emerges: a man with a sharp sense of humor and a deep-seated fear of sleeping alone at night. In those rare moments away from the daily toil of his activism, David daydreams about one day building a gay village on his land, where Kampala’s kuchus can live and work in solidarity.

NAOME

A warm-hearted and motherly activist who has experienced more than her fair share of persecution, Naome is David’s closest friend and an equally gutsy advocate in Uganda’s fledgling LGBT rights movement.

BISHOP SENYONJO
Bishop Senyonjo has been expelled from the Anglican Church of Uganda for his theological defense of Uganda’s LGBT community. Nonetheless, armed with a PhD in human sexuality and a thorough understanding of Biblical scripture, this purple-robed sage doggedly continues his work to establish a kuchu counseling center and safe house.

STOSH
After enduring a “corrective” rape at a young age, Stosh spent years living lonely, confused, suicidal. But the female-to-male transman found solace in Kampala’s tight-knit LGBT community.

LONGJONES
An LGBT counselor, Longjones has always shied away from the limelight of his sexual orientation. But in the wake of David’s death, Longjones feels compelled to sustain the veteran activist’s crusade for human rights, and steps forward to become one of the public faces of kuchu activism in Uganda.

[CALL ME KUCHU WEBSITE]

Londoners participate in a day of mourning for the West Papuans who have lost their lives for defending what they… fb.me/1jcleFBkK

— Benny Wenda (@BennyWenda) June 18, 2012

RT @ahrcindonesia #INDONESIA: #Military members shot civilians and burned their properties in #Wamena, #WestPapua humanrights.asia/news/urgent-ap…

— Jen Robinson (@suigenerisjen) June 18, 2012

a law that forbids speaking about freedom is a crime against humanity – and speaking out your opinion is no crime. #FilepKarma #WestPapua

— ポール (@PurePapua) June 13, 2012