I got this in my inbox the other day. It's similar to the one posted earlier, but it's different too. It has an interview with Santorum:
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National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Slams Santorum's "Gutter Language" Comparing Homosexuality to Pedophilia, Bestiality
MEDIA CONTACT:
NGLTF Communications Department
media@ngltf.org323-857-8751
Pager: 800-757-6476
The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF) today called on Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) to apologize for comments he made in an Associated Press interview comparing homosexuality to pedophilia and bestiality. NGLTF also called on President Bush and other Republican leaders to repudiate Santorum's remarks, the full transcript of which was released last night by A.P. and is included at the bottom of this release.
Finally, NGLTF called for both Republicans and Democrats to stand up against Santorum's remarks by:
1. speaking out in favor of and calling upon the White House to support the upcoming U.N. resolution which opposes sexual orientation-based human rights violations and links anti-gay bias to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; and,
2. speaking out against anti-gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) legislation currently before several state legislatures.
In an April 7th interview, Santorum, the third highest ranking Republican in the U.S. Senate, compared same-sex marriages to "man on child, man on dog" relationships. He also described homosexuality as "antithetical to a healthy, stable traditional family," ignoring recent 2000 Census data showing that one in three lesbian and bisexual female couples are raising children, as are 22 percent of gay/bisexual male couples.
"Comments comparing committed same-sex relationships to bestiality and pedophilia are unbecoming of a United States Senator," said Lorri L. Jean, Executive Director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "This is the gutter language of the extreme right wing in this country. And Senator Santorum is wrong to portray gay families as 'antithetical' to the institution of the family. Research shows that half to three quarters of lesbians and gay men are in committed, caring, long-term relationships. The 2000 Census showed that 34 percent of lesbian couples and 22 percent of gay male couples are raising children under the age of 18. It is despicable that a United States Senator would devalue our families by presenting them as a threat to the American family, and by comparing them to man-dog, man-child 'relationships,'" Jean said. "We are the American family."
Jean also challenged Santorum's characterization of the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal as "a basic homosexual relationship." "When a man abuses a young girl, the problem is not heterosexuality," Jean said. "Few would characterize such abuse as a heterosexual act similar to consensual sex between an adult man and woman. Similarly, when a man sexually abuses a boy or underage teen, the problem is not homosexuality. The problem is child abuse. Period."
NGLTF understands that the U.S. may abstain from the U.N. resolution vote, unlike many other allied and democratic countries. The vote, originally scheduled for today, is now scheduled to take place on Friday. "Both Congress and the media should be asking the White House why the United States would abstain on this human rights issue, especially in light of Santorum's inhumane comments," Jean said. "It is time for this 'compassionate conservative' administration to stand up for the rights of all human beings. Failure to take concrete action beyond rhetoric in this and all human rights cases will leave this administration standing in concert with the sentiments underlying Santorum's remarks." More information on the U.N. resolution can be found in the NGLTF U.N. Action Alert.
Jean also called on President Bush and other political leaders to repudiate Santorum's comments, and to take action against the stigmatization of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) families, particularly gay parents with children, by speaking out against anti-gay adoption and foster care bills currently before the Texas and Oklahoma legislatures. In Oklahoma, HB1308 would ban "a homosexual, bisexual or lesbian" from adopting in the state. In Texas, HB 194 would prevent homosexuals and bisexuals from serving as foster parents, and stigmatize GLB parents and foster children by mandating that all prospective foster parents be asked if they are homosexual or bisexual. Another Texas bill would ban unmarried individuals from serving as foster parents. North Dakota's legislature just passed an anti-gay adoption bill, which awaits the Republican governor's signature. "These mean-spirited bills would codify the hatred expressed by Senator Santorum," Jean said. "This is hardly 'compassionate conservatism.' It is incumbent that the Republican and Democratic leadership, including President Bush, take concrete action to oppose these bills and speak out against laws like that in place in Florida, which bans gay men and lesbians from adopting."
With half a million children in the U.S. foster care system, many of whom bounce from foster home to foster home until they turn 18, it is not in the interest of child welfare to restrict the pool of potential parents on the basis of prejudice against their sexual orientation. Florida, Mississippi, Arkansas and Utah currently ban lesbians, gay men, or same-sex couples from serving as foster or adoptive parents. The Child Welfare League of America, the nation's premier child advocacy organization, says that adoption "[a]pplicants should be assessed on the basis of their abilities to successfully parent a child needing family membership and not on their . . . sexual orientation." The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and the North American Council on Adoptable Children also support evaluating gay and lesbian applicants for adoption on the same basis as heterosexual applicants.
Nearly 40 states have passed anti-same-sex marriage bills, and Texas is considering its second such bill. Ohio's legislature is considering a bill that would ban all forms of same-sex couple recognition, including non-economic benefits for domestic partners such as hospital visitation and inheritance rights.
For more information on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender family policy issues, see Family Policy: Issues Affecting Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Families, a comprehensive study released by NGLTF in January 2003 and available at the NGLTF publications library.
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Following is an unedited section of the Associated Press interview, taped April 7, with Sen. Rick Santorum, R-PA. Words that couldn't be heard clearly on the tape are marked (unintelligible).
AP: If you're saying that liberalism is taking power away from the families, how is conservatism giving more power to the families?
SANTORUM: Putting more money in their pocketbook is one. The more money you take away from families is the less power that family has. And that's a basic power. The average American family in the 1950s paid (unintelligible) percent in federal taxes. An average American family now pays about 25 percent.
The argument is, yes, we need to help other people. But one of the things we tried to do with welfare, and we're trying to do with other programs is, we're setting levels of expectation and responsibility, which the left never wanted to do. They don't want to judge. They say, Oh, you can't judge people. They should be able to do what they want to do. Well, not if you're taking my money and giving it to them. But it's this whole idea of moral equivalency. (unintelligible) My feeling is, well, if it's my money, I have a right to judge.
AP: Speaking of liberalism, there was a story in The Washington Post about six months ago, they'd pulled something off the Web, some article that you wrote blaming, according to The Washington Post, blaming in part the Catholic Church scandal on liberalism. Can you explain that?
SANTORUM: You have the problem within the church. Again, it goes back to this moral relativism, which is very accepting of a variety of different lifestyles. And if you make the case that if you can do whatever you want to do, as long as it's in the privacy of your own home, this "right to privacy," then why be surprised that people are doing things that are deviant within their own home? If you say, there is no deviant as long as it's private, as long as it's consensual, then don't be surprised what you get. You're going to get a lot of things that you're sending signals that as long as you do it privately and consensually, we don't really care what you do. And that leads to a culture that is not one that is nurturing and necessarily healthy. I would make the argument in areas where you have that as an accepted lifestyle, don't be surprised that you get more of it.
AP: The right to privacy lifestyle?
SANTORUM: The right to privacy lifestyle.
AP: What's the alternative?
SANTORUM: In this case, what we're talking about, basically, is priests who were having sexual relations with post-pubescent men. We're not talking about priests with 3-year-olds, or 5-year-olds. We're talking about a basic homosexual relationship. Which, again, according to the world view sense is a a perfectly fine relationship as long as it's consensual between people. If you view the world that way, and you say that's fine, you would assume that you would see more of it.
AP: Well, what would you do?
SANTORUM: What would I do with what?
AP: I mean, how would you remedy? What's the alternative?
SANTORUM: First off, I don't believe --
AP: I mean, should we outlaw homosexuality?
SANTORUM: I have no problem with homosexuality. I have a problem with homosexual acts. As I would with acts of other, what I would consider to be, acts outside of traditional heterosexual relationships. And that includes a variety of different acts, not just homosexual. I have nothing, absolutely nothing against anyone who's homosexual. If that's their orientation, then I accept that. And I have no problem with someone who has other orientations. The question is, do you act upon those orientations? So it's not the person, it's the person's actions. And you have to separate the person from their actions.
AP: OK, without being too gory or graphic, so if somebody is homosexual,you would argue that they should not have sex?
SANTORUM: We have laws in states, like the one at the Supreme Court right now, that has sodomy laws and they were there for a purpose. Because, again, I would argue, they undermine the basic tenets of our society and the family. And if the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn't exist in my opinion in the United States Constitution, this right that was created, it was created in Griswold -- Griswold was the contraceptive case -- and abortion. And now we're just extending it out. And the further you extend it out, the more you -- this freedom actually intervenes and affects the family. You say, well, it's my individual freedom. Yes, but it destroys the basic unit of our society because it condones behavior that's antithetical to strong, healthy families. Whether it's polygamy, whether it's adultery, where it's sodomy, all of those things, are antithetical to a healthy, stable, traditional family.
Every society in the history of man has upheld the institution of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman. Why? Because society is based on one thing: that society is based on the future of the society. And that's what? Children. Monogamous relationships. In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality. That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing. And when you destroy that you have a dramatic impact on the quality --
AP: I'm sorry, I didn't think I was going to talk about "man on dog" with a United States senator, it's sort of freaking me out.
SANTORUM: And that's sort of where we are in today's world, unfortunately. The idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire. And we're seeing it in our society.
AP: Sorry, I just never expected to talk about that when I came over here to interview you. Would a President Santorum eliminate a right to privacy -- you don't agree with it?
SANTORUM: I've been very clear about that. The right to privacy is a right that was created in a law that set forth a (ban on) rights to limit individual passions. And I don't agree with that. So I would make the argument that with President, or Senator or Congressman or whoever Santorum, I would put it back to where it is, the democratic process. If New York doesn't want sodomy laws, if the people of New York want abortion, fine. I mean, I wouldn't agree with it, but that's their right. But I don't agree with the Supreme Court coming in.
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All I have to say is that I seriously hope that we all remember all things Bush is doing and not doing come election day next year.
(For the non-Canadians: the National Post is as ultraconservative as you can get in the Canadian newspaper industry.) Their page 
at: 5/2/03 11:19:19 am
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