Gay Today: World

Scottish Cardinal Compares Gays to Nazis

Gay China Comes Out

Group Pickets Salvadoran Consulate

By Rex Wockner
International News Report

Scottish Cardinal Compares Gays to Nazis

Scottish Roman Catholic Cardinal Thomas Winning said January 22 that gays are as dangerous as Nazis, British newspapers reported.

"All over Europe, an active and militant homosexual lobby is pushing for greater power and the threat to the Christian family is very real," Winning said. "Cast your minds back to the dark days of World War II. The parallels with today are striking. In place of the bombs of 50 years ago, you find yourselves bombarded with images, values and ideas which are utterly alien."

Gay leaders were outraged at the remarks.

Cardinal Thomas Winning says the homosexual lobby is as dangerous as the Nazis. He should know. Winning represents a body that stood by and watched the Nazis kill millions during the 1930s and '40s.

"Cardinal Winning's claims of an international conspiracy are reminiscent of the kinds of claims being made against the Jews 100 years ago -- the very kind of claims that led to the Holocaust," said Tim Hopkins of the Equality Network.

A day later, Winning accused journalists of maliciously misinterpreting his comments.

"The suggestion that I compared homosexual activists to Nazis is utterly false," he said. "The word 'Nazi' does not appear at any point in my address and I believe it would be inappropriate, offensive and fatuous to compare the current debate to what happened in Germany in the war years."

Gay China Comes Out

Gay life is opening up in China, the Washington Post reported January 24.

Beijing has a burgeoning gay bar scene and gays and lesbians are getting hitched in "semi-open" 'wedding' ceremonies, the paper said.

Sodomy was decriminalized in 1997 and there is no law against homosexual prostitution.

The nation has several gay magazines, the Post said, and gays and lesbians have also taken quickly to the nation's Internet explosion.

Related Stories from the GayToday Archive:
Vatican Condemns Homosexuality as Intrinsically Evil

Hong Kong to Celebrate First Pride Day

Deaths & Threats Haunt El Salvadorian Activists

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Group Pickets Salvadoran Consulate

elsalvadorgun.jpg - 7.39 K Members and supporters of the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission picketed the Consulate of El Salvador in San Francisco January 26 in support of the San Salvador gay group Entre Amigos.

El Salvador's National Civil Police (PNC) has declined to assign officers to protect Entre Amigos leader William Hernandez, his family, and other members of the group, all of whom have received death threats.

Police Chief Mauricio Sandoval has acknowledged that the individuals qualify for police assistance under the nation's Protection for Important People program, but he said he would not actually assign any cops to the case because the officers do not share Hernandez' "sexual tastes" and thus would be uncomfortable.

Sandoval suggested instead that Entre Amigos hire private security officers which the PNC could train, or that the gay group give the PNC a list of names of gay and lesbian cops who could be considered for the assignment.

In a statement, the picketers said: "IGLHRC is issuing a demand to the government of El Salvador that it immediately extend police protection to all gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people in El Salvador and specifically to Entre Amigos, a GLBT organization targeted with death threats and murder. The police have deliberately withheld protection despite meetings with Entre Amigos and the very real, clear, and present danger."