Where did the Maxim Institute get its loopy references to lesbian and gay parenting, paedophilia and polygamy at its recent Milford Baptist Church anti-CUB seminar? All can now be revealed, and it involves a Cameronism. I leafed through the Winter 2004 Evidence, the Maxim Institute's 'policy journal' and spied a reference to Maxim boss Bruce Logan's attendance at the so-called "World Congress of Families" in Mexico, back in March 2004. I wonder if the Derek Corporation subsidised this little trip for him? Happily, the so-called World Congress has its own website, and that website contains articles from contributors, although not our Brucie, sadly enough, or otherwise. Predictably, there was one antigay rant at the World Congress, and judging from its speakers list, the organisation appears to be dominated by the US Christian Right, its Canadian and Australian satellites, and a handful of Muslim and Orthodox Jewish social conservatives, also from the United States, or Pakistan. One Peter Sprigg was the perpetrator of a scabrous paper entitled "Homosexuality: The Threat to the Family and the Attack on Marriage." Sprigg is an activist for the Family Research Council, a Washington-based 'research institute' spun off from the equally antigay Focus on the Family US, and the content is predictably hysterical. We evil homer-sexuals interfered with the American Psychiatric Association and its third Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (1973). We lie about the gay gene. We want antidiscrimination and hate crimes legislation, inclusion in school curricula and relationship and parenting equality. Sorry, got most of those already, Pete, and nobody I've heard of has been eternally damned as a result! As for this alleged "attack on marriage," Spriggs is an advocate of 'weds under the beds,' and sees sinister implications in the Netherlands (2001), Belgium (2002), Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia (2003) and Massachuesett's judicial support for same-sex marriages. Sprigg argues that his stance isn't discriminatory, it is based on (conservative Catholic bowdlerisation of) "natural law theory", as well as objection to the use of new birth technologies, and worries that lesbian and gay relationship equality will open the way for paedophilia, incestuous heterosexual marriage and polygamy, courtesy of right-wing US tabloid journalist Stanley Kurtz (Weekly Standard). Anyway, why are they hanging around the United Nations and other global institutions? Aren't they aware that these are part of the (deep breath) Giant Lesbian Deconstructionist Social Welfare Beneficiary Ethnic Minority Cannabis Smoking Morris Dancing Left-Wing Conspiracy to Corrupt Western Civilisation? Well, no, not really. Given that the United Nations has adopted sane and sensible policies about lesbian and gay rights and reproductive health, Canadian, US and Australian antigay/antiabortion/antifeminist activists decided to dip their snouts in the trough and interfere with their deliberation processes. In all three countries, mainstream taxpayers subsidise the export of this hardcore US Christian Right agenda to the rest of us. Happily, Logan wasn't in that category, and as noted, there wasn't a New Zealand speaker at the WCF. Canadian antifeminist Gwen Landolt belongs to REAL Women, which received a state subsidy for its 'representative' nongovernmental organisation status. She noted that the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission is trying to amend the UN Declaration on Human Rights (1948) to include lesbian and gay spousal and parenting rights, although REAL Women also opposes adolescent reproductive rights, even if the young woman is a survivor of parental sexual abuse, it seems. Furthermore, although American antifeminist Janice Crouse also lambasts us, lesbian and gay rights activism is really the fault of feminist advocacy of our issues, as well as subsidised childcare for working mums, abortion rights and general anti-masculine bias. Worse still, we're gaining ground (except in the aforementioned benighted nations, it seems). And why does she use violent rhetoric like 'culture wars,' given the history of murderous US antiabortion terrorism over the last decade? And where are her footnotes? Source: World Congress of Families III (March 2004): http://www.worldcongress.org See especially: Janet Crouse (Concerned Women for America): "Feminism and the Family:" Gwen Landolt (REAL Women of Canada): "Keeping Families on the UN's Agenda:" Peter Spriggs (US Family Research Council): "Homosexuality: The Threat to the Family and the Attack on Marriage:" http://www.worldcongress.org/WCF3/wcf3_spkrs.htm Rebuttal: Didi Herman and Doris Buss: Globalising Family Values: The Christian Right's International Agenda: Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press: 2003. [Essential reading on US Christian Right international networking and interference with global reproductive and sexual health and lesbian/gay rights organising. Herman is a Canadian lesbian legal scholar.] [Editor's note: Aristotle's Books in Auckland now have copies of Gay Marriage by Jonathan Rausch and Same-Sex Unions by John Boswell. The Boswell book shows how same-sex relationships were "sanctified" in religious ceremonies in Europe for hundreds of years, contrary to the claims of the historically devoid fantasies of the Religious Right.] Craig Young - 30th June 2004