Illinois Family Institute attacks gay funding request

[kbm8795]

In another of a series of unwarranted attacks, the Illinois Family Institute has launched a campaign to ask the Illinois State Tourism Board not to honor a request from the Gay Games for promotion funding. The games, expected to attract up to 100,000 people to Chicago next summer and pump some $80 million into the Chicago economy, has submitted an application for some funds to use toward promotion of the event as a tourism attraction.

Naturally, the crazy wingnuts at the Illinois Family Institute, who represent a few hundred Illinois voters that believe gays should be sent to reparative therapy camps, are claiming that taxpayer monies not be used to "celebrate" homosexuality. Of course, the monies used for tourism promotion generally come from taxes in the lodging industry, which means gays make contributions every time they stay at a hotel. And since this event is likely to bring in lots of tax money in hotel stays, we have a legitimate reason for asking for these funds.

Again, I'm sick and tired of having to play defense with this bogus excuse for a lunatic organization. If anyone out there knows anyone they do business with, right down to where they buy their inkpens and paper, I sure wish someone would start posting the information. They want to attack something? They can deal with some attacks right back. And it wouldn't hurt for us to remind the Tourism Board that this group is associated with the AFA, an organization named by the SPLC as a hate organization. Perhaps we could start by referring them to PFOXS - the spoof group that handles therapy for those with unwanted heterosexual desires.

You can see the story at: http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/08/080505gayGames.htm

Moreover, the email address for the Illinois Tourism Bureau is:

[e-mail] and [e-mail]

Chicago telephone number is: 312-814-4733

Please put in your message subject area something like: Please support tourism funding for Gay Games. We want the tourism board to be able to differentiate between us and the hatemongers.

Illinois has a law that prevents discrimination in public accommodations. Since the "public" funds used for tourism are primarily drawn from lodging taxes, the IFI really doesn't have anything to complain about. However, the next time they'd like to have a conference in a hotel complex, it might be time to complain to the hotels which house THEIR conferences. Yes, the law allows them to meet because they claim to be a religious group, but we don't have to make it any more pleasant for them than they make it for us.

[Ian David]

1. Normally opposed to ANY proffitable organization looking for a hand-out

But in this case, if it pisses of the fundies, I'm all for it.

And I, too have contemplated about complaining about xian conferences the way they complain about everyone elses.

Concerned Wenches for America have ruined more than one of my weekends. Payback's a bitch.

[kbm8795]

2. Exactly. . .

For one thing, why do we have to accept that they are "christian" merely because they use the words? We should be entitled to our own opinions and to air them as well, including the belief that this is a cult requiring gay Americans to be human sacrifices in order for them to maintain a ministry.