Boykin Singles Out Trans People at Liberty Counsel Conference
Last weekend, the anti-LGBT hate groupĚýLiberty CounselĚýheld its annual conference, The Awakening, to provide a platform for anti-LGBT and anti-Muslim voices.But the event was much more than that ââ at times, it seemed a call to battle.ĚýâThe war wages. We cannot stand idly by,â the Counsel said in promotional materials.ĚýAnd true to form, the panel of speakers formed an angry chorus.Ěý
The vitriol was perhaps bestĚýembodied by retired Lt. Gen. Jerry Boykin, who employed violent rhetoric in lamenting the advances in LGBT equality, particularly in regards to trans people. Boykin is executive vice president at the anti-LGBT hate group Family Research Council. He is perhaps best known for his anti-Islam statements over the years.
At The Awakening, however, Boykin lambasted non-discrimination ordinances that include sexual orientation and gender identity protections, especially those designed to protect trans people from humiliation and discrimination by allowing them to use bathrooms that match their gender identity. He evenĚýthreatened physical violence against anyone using a bathroom that didnât align with their assigned sex at birth:
âWhere is the Christian world today? Where are the Christians of America today? They should be flocking to people like Kim Davis. They should be flocking to the city council to say, âNo you're not going to let a man go in my daughters bathroom, just because he feels like a man today.â Boykin said. âWhere are the Christians that are standing up to these kind of evil.â
Boykin continued, âAnd Iâve already said and somebody will be recording this and this will be on YouTube before itâs all over with, but Iâll tell you what ââ the first man that walks in my daughterâs bathroom, he ainât gonna have to worry about a surgery. Thatâs not right. That is not right. Itâs not right. Itâs ungodly, but itâs also just unnatural.â
Attacks on trans people continued through the afternoon with panels such as âGender Confusion: Setting the Record Straight,ââ a trend of particular concern given that trans people are already a target of discrimination and violence, especially trans women of color, who are one of the most victimized populations in the country. Ěý
Several speakers also focused on so-called âex-gay,â or reparative therapy, a discredited practice that claims to turn gay people heterosexual.
Greg Quinlan, former president of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX) and ministry leader at Living Free Ministries of New Jersey, insisted repeatedly that it is possible to change sexual orientation despite widespread consensus among medical and psychological authorities that it is not possible.
âHomosexuality is a developmental, gender identity disorder,â Quinlan harped, later adding, "I tell parents and friends who have loved ones in the lifestyle, to pray for relational failure ââĚýthat every relationship they have that is in that lifestyle will fail. And it does eventually because itâs a bankrupt relationship and itâs based on false premises.â Ironically, Quinlan, who claims to be a âformer homosexual,â was married to a woman who also claimed to be âex-gay.â .
Matt Barber, the editor of the virulently anti-LGBT and host of the Liberty Counselâs Faith and Freedom Radio, characterized trans people as suffering from a mental health illness and insisted that trans people suffer from a âdelusion.â
"We are asked, we are told, demanded under penalty of law ⌠to embrace and play along in a delusion ââ that a man can somehow become a woman and that a woman can somehow become a man,â Barber said.
But Barber suggested a more nefarious explanation for homosexuality and the LGBTQ rights movement: Satan.
The homosexual activist and transgender activist movement have done a masterful job of browbeating people into silence, of silencing dissent by accusing people who want, who have, who speak truth and love on these issues by calling them transphobic, homophobic. Youâre a bigot, youâre a hater, and there are even within the church, people who are buying into this worldly deception, and thatâs what it is. The enemy loves to, the enemy of the world, the father of lies, is all about deception. And he is going to attack the very nature of humanity, our sexuality, our genders, how God, in the beginning, God created them male and female.âĚý
LGBT people werenât the only group demonized at the conference.
Pamphlets accusing President Obama of being engaged in âA Romance with Islamism,â produced by David Horowitz, were also on display and distributed free of charge. Liberty Council pamphlets warned of âSharia Law and Its Threat to Americaâ on a pamphlet emblazoned with the Islamic crescent and star in fire and boasting Islamophobic titles such as ââHoly Warâ the Norm for Islamâ and âLicense to Kill in the Name of Allah.âĚý