Could Austin Ruse's Violent Rhetoric Endanger C-FAM's Status with the UN?
Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-FAM), an anti-LGBT hate group that lobbies at the United Nations, has had a bad week.
First, Ruse garnered outrage last Wednesday when he that the âhard left, human-hating people that run modern universitiesâŚshould all be taken out and shot.â He was speaking about a female student at Duke University who works as an actress in the pornography industry. Ruse blamed Dukeâs womenâs studies department, claiming that the student âlearned thisâ there.
In the wake of his remarks, Ruse and engaged in Twitter flame wars with detractors and lambasted the blog Right Wing Watch (RWW), which had posted audio and a transcript from the show. Ruse railed against RWW, saying that âThe pajama boys over at Right Wing Watch have their panties all in a twist about what I said.â He also called liberals âdumb,â âstupidâ and âidioticâ and claimed that his remarks about shooting leftists shouldnât be taken seriously.
On Thursday, Ruse deactivated his Twitter account, grousing that it was overrun by a âleftist swarmâ and on Friday, (AFR), which is run by the extreme anti-LGBT group American Family Association (AFA), which allows all manner of bigotry on its airwaves, particularly from . Apparently, calling for the shooting of university officials was a little too extreme even for them.
In a Facebook statement, AFR announced that âThe fill-in host on AFR who made those comments is no longer on the air with us and will not be filling in on AFR in the futureâ and that the views were âun-Christian.â AFR also scrubbed Ruseâs shows from their archives (the Facebook announcement appears to have been removed, as well). Ruse , sort of, on Friday, telling Talking Points Memo that he regretted using the expression âtaken out and shotâ and that it wasnât meant to be taken literally.
Yesterday, the fallout continued. One of the four board members of C-FAM (Ruse is one) . On Monday, the group Faithful America asking the board member, , a prominent Catholic priest of St. Joseph Cathedral in Manchester, New Hampshire, to resign. Yesterday, Frontiero informed Faithful America via email that he had.
Frontiero on the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace at the Vatican and from 1999-2002, and he as diplomatic attachĂŠ of the . He represented the Vatican on issues such as womenâs rights and sustainable and social development. During that time, he was also director of special projects at the and officially represented the Holy See at human rights, democracy and criminal justice meetings of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the UN. He was appointed to rector of St. Josephâs in 2011.
This isnât the first time Ruse has made statements about potential violence. Catholics for Choice released (PDF; may not load in some browsers) documenting Ruseâs and C-FAMâs efforts at the United Nations to undermine efforts to stop discrimination against women.
In 2000, the report notes, Ruse addressed the conspiracist, anti-communist and anti-Obama whose current president is Eleanor Schlafly, a sister-in law of Eagle Forum president Phyllis Schlafly. When Ruse addressed the Foundation, he reportedly told a story about talking to a Catholic priest about killing Hillary Clinton. âHillary [Clinton] is the âconquering queenâ at the United Nations,â Ruse said. âI was standing on the floor of the UN a couple of months ago, when she was thinking about running, and I was talking to a priest from the Holy See delegation and â I shouldnât tell you this but he offered me guaranteed absolution if I just took her out â and not on a date.â
Ruse and C-FAM have been lobbying against sexual and reproductive rights, abortion, and LGBT people at the UN and for years. In 2012, Ruse and C-FAM even helped because, the groups claimed, it was âpro-abortion.â The wording of the document stated that people with disabilities should have access to healthcare, including âin the area of sexual and reproductive health and population-based public health programmes.â
C-FAM is an offshoot of the hardline anti-abortion group (HLI, founded in 1981), whose ties to violent anti-abortionists and extreme tactics made it too controversial for the UN. Its founder, Paul Marx, a DC-based Catholic priest, also had a of claiming that the pro-choice movement was full of Jews, who in his words, were perpetrating another Holocaust. HLI was denied consultative status in 1993, so it set up C-FAM in 1997 as its UN lobbying arm, and the organization to include vague terminology like âtraditional valuesâ and ârespect for sovereigntyâ (useful for countries that employ repressive policies and wish to avoid scrutiny for human rights violations).
This year C-FAM was for at the UNâs Economic and Social Council (), which is concerned with the worldâs social, economic, and environmental issues. ECOSOC will review the organizations in July and in most cases, will approve consultative status. Non-governmental organizations that are granted this status then have access to ECOSOC and its subsidiary bodies and the various human rights mechanisms of the UN and various special events organized by the President of the General Assembly.
If C-FAM is approved, expect even more international outreach and anti-LGBT propagandizing from Ruse. Over the years, he has railed against abortion and for laws criminalizing homosexuality. Last year, he voiced support for Russiaâs anti-gay propaganda law (which criminalizes free speech with regard to homosexuality). Ruse called the law a noble quest for âhuman rightsâ and a joint statement (along with other anti-LGBT groups) in support of it.
On C-FAM blogâs, Turtle Bay and Beyond, blogger Stefano Gennarini nothing more than a âtax on homosexual PDAâ (public displays of affection) and argued that discouraging homosexuality among children âsimply codifies that Russia truly is interested in protecting its children.â Following the passage of that law, violence against Russian LGBT people has .
Itâs clear that Ruseâs definition of âhuman rightsâ does not include LGBT people. He has making sexual orientation and gender identity new categories for non-discrimination in international law and homosexuality âharmful to public health and morals.â When talking about the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), he why gay people put up with transgender people and allow them to âleadâ on ENDA. âMost Americans,â Ruse said, âare rightly put off by such displays of psychological disturbances.â
Weâll find out in July whether the UNâs ECOSOC will be âput offâ by Ruseâs calls for violence and inflammatory rhetoric.
