"Gender Mainstreaming": A Silent Revolution Dismantling Civilization

"Gender mainstreaming," an ideology that proposes to erase the foundational unit of western society, the natural family, is being infiltrated into laws and institutions around the world under the rubric of "equality" legislation and guidelines, says author Gabrielle Kuby. Kuby, the author of a 2003 book, endorsed by the former Cardinal Ratzinger, warning Christian parents of the danger of the Harry Potter book series, has written on the threat of the work of ideologues on the far left who are working to create a "new man" who can arbitrarily decide whether he is a man, a woman or some other "gender" unrelated to the natural distinctions of biology. "According to them," she writes, "there are not two sexes, but six or more, depending on sexual preference." "Behind the facade" of equality, "lurks the general attack on the moral standards to which we owe the Western culture. Without it, neither the family nor Christianity can survive."

In her article, "Gender Mainstreaming - The Secret Revolution," to be published in German in this month's edition of Vatican magazine, Kuby warns that the new ideology is being carefully inculcated into international law and particularly into the materials made available to educators to create school curricula. Kuby writes, "This view of freedom and sexuality, according to the will of the UN, EU and most European governments is to be imprinted onto the minds of children from the nursery onwards."

In the case of one national government, Germany's, the "gender mainstreaming" ideology is part of the guiding principles of every ministry of the government. The homepage of the German government's Ministry of Science says, "The Federal Government has established an equal opportunities policy based on the political strategy of gender mainstreaming as a universal guiding principle."

Kuby's contention is supported by John Smeaton, head of the UK's Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, who wrote this weekend that people in Europe who adhere to traditional Judeo-Christian values and ideas are under threat by anti-family ideologues working to enforce their anti-family policies and silence dissent. "Pro-life and pro-family campaigners," he wrote, "must expect to see the publication of documents, funded by the European Union, which promote abortion, euthanasia and other anti-life and anti-family practices - with a special emphasis on zero tolerance for dissent."

Kuby's thesis also corresponds with that of Babette Francis, a long-time campaigner for life and family at the international level who in 2004 told LifeSiteNews.com that the fight over the definition of "gender" has become the cornerstone of UN and other internationalist ideology. This ideology also links closely to the efforts of the international agencies to impose legal abortion on countries in developing nations. Francis said that the gender ideology was first raised at a seminal conference on women, Beijing +5, in 1995, when delegates argued that gender was a socially malleable concept and that human beings could not be restricted to the mere biological categories of male and female. The argument was that there is a "continuous spectrum and that there were all kinds of genders."

Kuby also relates that the gender ideology first found fertile ground when it was brought forward by a powerful group of feminist and lesbian NGOs at the Beijing conference. Since then gender mainstreaming has been pushed into international law with the Treaty of Amsterdam (1999) and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights of Nice (2000). As a negation of the traditional values of the family, Kuby writes, "abortion follows automatically as part of the global agenda" of the gender ideologies.

Kuby concludes with an admonition that Christians fight the incursions of the new ideologies. "At this stage of history, the main attack of evil is in the field of sexuality. Christians need to meet the enemy there, otherwise they will have lost. If the young generation is pushed into moral degeneracy, the human condition of family and faith will be further destroyed and abortion will never be overcome."

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Karl Lagerfeld defends fur industry saying 'beasts' would kill us if we didn't kill them

Karl Lagerfeld is no guru of mine but I think he is largely right on this one. He is certainly an authority to many

The fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld has defended the fur industry saying it is justified because the "beasts" fur comes from would "kill us if they could." The Chanel supremo said it was "childish" to even discuss the issue of wearing fur in a world where eating meat was normal.

German-born Lagerfeld, 75, a contemporary of the late Yves Saint Laurent, said that he did not himself wear fur. But he defended the practice, saying there was "an industry who lives from that". Hunters in the north "make a living having learnt nothing else than hunting", he said, "killing those beasts who would kill us if they could."

Animals should be killed "nicely" if at all possible, said Lagerfeld, who admitted to being queasy about eating meat. "I can hardly eat meat because it has to look like something what it was not when it was alive," he said. He concluded: "In a meat-eating world, wearing leather for shoes and clothes and even handbags, the discussion of fur is childish." ....

A spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) described Lagerfeld as a "dinosaur" who had got his facts wrong. She said: "Karl Lagerfeld is a fashion dinosaur who is as out of step as his furs are out of style. "The vast majority of fur these days comes not from hunters as he suggests, but from Chinese fur farms, where no law protects the millions of animals who are routinely beaten and skinned alive. "Lagerfeld's childish refusal to acknowledge the needless suffering behind every piece of fur and listen to public opinion means that he is being overtaken in the style stakes by an increasing number of designers who believe that cruelty has no place in fashion."

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Britain shows that Leftist sex education does not work

Old fashioned approaches worked better

Affluent middle-class areas are experiencing the sharpest rises in teenagers giving birth, figures reveal. The number of teenaged mothers is rising in two out of three constituencies - and has almost tripled in some of the leafiest suburbs. Teenage maternity is also rising in two-thirds of the areas already worst affected, despite being targeted by Government policies to tackle the problem.

The damning statistics will further-undermine Labour's claims that is getting to grips with the issue through greater sex education and contraceptive use. Experts said young women are over-reliant on the morning-after pill or are having babies to copy so-called 'celebrity' pregnancies. They also claimed there is a growing distaste for abortion among well-off families.

Last month official figures showed a 2.7 per cent increase in the rate of under-18 pregnancies in England and Wales last year. Britain already has the highest teenage pregnancy levels in Europe. The latest figures uncovered by the Tories provide the first seat-byseat snapshot of the number of teenage girls giving birth. They show women aged under 20 gave birth to 42,300 babies in England and Wales in 2006.

The Nottingham suburb of Rushcliffe - whose MP is former Health Secretary Ken Clarke - saw the biggest increase in teenage births. In 2006, 44 teenagers gave birth compared with only 16 in 2002 - a rise of 175 per cent. Next on the list was the well-to-do West Yorkshire town of Pudsey, where the number of maternities to mothers aged under 20 rose from 26 to 60, or 130 per cent. And the leafy Surrey constituency of Epsom and Ewell saw a 113 per cent rise - from 15 to 32.

Other well-heeled areas which saw huge increases included Finchley and Golders Green in North London (81 per cent), Haltemprice and Howden in East Yorkshire (76 per cent), East Devon (75 per cent) and the affluent Cheshire seat of Altrincham and Sale West (73 per cent). The National Childbirth Trust wants schools to focus less on sex education and more on the realities of being a parent.

The Conservatives uncovered the figures from Parliamentary answers. Tory spokesman on children Tim Loughton said: 'Despite all the Government's smoke and mirrors on teenage pregnancy the fact is that in most parts of the country the situation is getting worse. 'Most of the areas that are already experiencing the biggest problems are seeing the number of teenage pregnancies rise.'

Former Tory frontbencher Ann Widdecombe said: 'Girls are increasingly sexually active and nobody is willing to tell them that they should not be. We are all afraid of being judgmental.' Norman Wells, director of the pressure group Family and Youth Concern, said: 'The Government's emphasis on more sex education combined with the confidential provision of contraception and the morning-after pill is counterproductive. 'It is giving the green light to girls to embark on sexual relationships when they might otherwise have refrained from sexual activity.' Nadine Dorries, a pro-life Tory MP, said there was 'no doubt' that the figures reflected an increasing distaste for abortion among the middle classes.

A large number of the constituencies with the highest increases would traditionally be considered wellheeled areas. A significant proportion have Tory MPs - usually voted in by affluent voters in suburbia or the shires.

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Religious liberty

by Jeff Jacoby

SAME-SEX MARRIAGE made plenty of news in 2008, from court decisions legalizing it to the adoption of amendments banning it to the ongoing battle over Proposition 8 in the one state -- California -- where both occurred. But one front in the marriage wars rarely gets the coverage it deserves: the drive by gay activists to punish religious believers whose faith forbids homosexual relationships. Consider three (of many) recent cases:

In April, photographers Jon and Elaine Huguenin were fined $6,637 by the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission for declining to shoot a lesbian commitment ceremony. The Huguenins didn't want to take a job that would have required them to disregard their Christian values. But the civil rights commission ruled that in turning down the work, they had illegally discriminated on the basis of sexual orientation.

Marcia Walden, a licensed counselor in Georgia, was fired for referring a lesbian client to a counselor better suited to help her. "Jane Doe" had approached Walden for help with her same-sex relationship -- a request with which Walden recognized her own religious beliefs were in conflict. Rather than provide insincere counseling, Walden referred Jane to a colleague. That colleague commended her for doing "the right thing" by making the referral, but Jane later filed a complaint, and Walden ended up losing her job.

Just last month, the dating site eHarmony agreed to begin providing gay and lesbian matchmaking services in order to settle a lawsuit accusing it of discrimination. eHarmony was founded by evangelical psychologist Neil Clark Warren in 2000 and had never provided a same-sex option. ("I don't know what the dynamics are there," Warren once explained.) But rather than choose a dating service that catered to gays, a New Jersey man decided to sue eHarmony for not doing so. It was "hurtful," he said, that the site required members to register as either "man seeking a woman" or "woman seeking a man." New Jersey's attorney general jumped into the case -- and eHarmony caved under pressure.

For many gay marriage supporters, it is not enough that same-sex relationships be normalized: Any private reluctance to accept that normalization must also be penalized. Freedom of religion is the first of our liberties, the guarantee that opens the First Amendment. But religious liberty is under assault by gay activists, and the First Amendment is getting battered. It ought to be a bigger story.

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of other countries. The only real difference, however, is how much power they have. In America, their power is limited by democracy. To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges. They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did: None. So look to the colleges to see what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way. It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, DISSECTING LEFTISM, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here. For readers in China or for times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site here.

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