Fast4Equality

by dday

Here in California we’re fighting the fundie right as they try to pass Prop. 8 and eliminate the right to marry for same-sex couples. The Yes campaign has been completely taken over by an alliance of religious extremists, in particular the Mormons, where 35% of the funds for the Yes on 8 campaign have originated. They’ve certainly been successful financially, outraising the no side to this point.

But the strategy to pass the proposition is mixed. Part of it concerns intimidating and threatening whoever doesn’t support them…

I am a Mormon High Priest. My bishop is a long-time family friend, and he has come to see me a couple of times recently, but each time he has come by assignment of his church supervisor. On the first visit, my bishop offered me a chance to resign my membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. When I declined, he told me a church disciplinary council would be held. On the second visit, just a couple of days ago, he brought me a letter informing me that I am charged with conduct unbecoming a member of the Mormon Church, and being “in apostasy.”

…and here’s another one…

Turns out the aptly-named “Church of the Divide” in faraway Placerville had sent a group of hate-mongering protesters to the church where (Sacramento mayoral candidate Kevin Johnson) and his family worships, complete with signs blaring “SODOMY” (and worse), to protest Kevin’s decision to oppose Prop 8.

‘Course, personally threatening millions of Californians is going to get time-consuming, so there’s also the “shock and awe” strategy. The first idea was to plant a million yard signs in the largest mass visibility action in American history. Weeks after this was supposed to occur, the signs still aren’t here.

It seems that the signs, some of them outsourced overseas, didn’t all arrive in time for the September event. And many still haven’t reached supporters of the measure that would amend the state Constitution to ban gay marriage.

“It takes longer to get a million than we thought,” said Sonja Eddings Brown, deputy communications director for the Protect Marriage coalition […]

Brown tried to spin the production glitch as a positive thing for the campaign — a sign, so to speak, of the overwhelming demand for lawn signs by voters who wanted to participate in “the most unprecedented and largest grass-roots effort ever attempted in California.”

That’s some tasty spin!

The next big event seeks to pass a ballot initiative through fasting and praying (I don’t buy the 100,000 figure below, by the way, it sounds like more bluster):

Hundreds of pastors have called on their congregations to fast and pray for passage of a ballot measure in November that would put an end to gay marriage in California.

The collective act of piety, starting Wednesday and culminating three days before the election in a revival for as many as 100,000 people at the San Diego Chargers’ stadium, comes as church leaders across California put people, money and powerful words behind Proposition 8.

Some pastors around the state and nation are encouraging their flocks to forgo solid food for up to 40 days in the biblical tradition.

Well, not quite. In a remarkable catch by skippy, this 40-day fasting period would be somewhat unusual.

the gathering, called the call, will conclude a 40-day fasting period for california that begins sept. 24. christians are being asked to fast in some way, either the entire 40 days or perhaps by using team relays to cover the entire 40 days. running parallel to the 40-day fast is a 100-day prayer effort, which was scheduled to start july 28.

Um… team relays?

Let me get this straight. If I last from lunch to dinner without a morsel, then tag off to my partner in prayer, I can go ahead and eat dinner then? Is that really a fast, or is it, I don’t know… just not snacking?

Just the notion of fasting to pass a ballot initiative is kee-razy to the extreme. Well, if they can do it, so can we.

Calitics, one of my other blogosphere haunts, has decided to set up a Counter-Fast For Equality. Participants can fast for 1 minute, 10 minutes, half an hour, whatever you can spare. At the Counter-Fast For Equality website, you can sign up for the amount of time you’ll be fasting (hey Jews, don’t pick Yom Kippur, you’re fasting anyway). And much like a charity race, you can get sponsored for your time and trouble for fasting at the rate of a dollar a minute. At the Fast4Equality ActBlue page, you can donate as little as $1 (or one minute’s worth of fasting) to the No on 8 campaign. We also have a Twitter feed set up. If you send a tweet with the #fast4equality hashtag, it’ll appear on our site.

Just to get you in the swing of things, we put together this video detailing the ins and outs of a short-term fast. Actually, our volunteer faster had a little trouble with it:

Hey, if the religious right can pull off a largely symbolic show of support based on meaningless displays of piety, why not us? So stop by and help us out.

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