The National Organization for Marriage is continuing its migration from a polished message about “traditional family” and “protecting children” to one that better resembles other “family” hate groups, revealing the clear anti-gay animus that motivates their opposition to marriage equality. This descent includes partnering with ex-gay advocates and promoting their harmful therapy, directly attacking same-sex families for having kids, and defending those who vomit at the thought of same-sex marriage. But NOM’s new chairman, Dr. John Eastman, summarizes the organization’s new approach best in a recent interview, in which he explained the importance of teaching children that homosexuality is evil:

NATIONAL CATHOLIC REGISTER: Those fighting for traditional marriage can feel beaten down by the culture at large. Do you feel that victory for traditional marriage is possible?

EASTMAN: Evil will be with us always, and it requires constant vigilance to defeat. I look at it as a litigator and an educator. There will always be threats to institutions grounded in human nature by those who think human nature doesn’t define limits. We need to be involved in the immediate defense of threats against marriage, but also take a long-range view by educating the next generation about the importance of the issues we’re confronting.

NOM has waged entire campaigns against same-sex marriage on the notion that children will somehow be harmed if they learn about homosexuality. In fact, just last week NOM president Brian Brown was calling on supporters to support the signature collection effort to repeal California’s FAIR Education Act — not because it has anything to do with marriage, but because it will “force schools to teach students (even kindergartners!) about homosexuality, bisexuality and transgenderism as part of a social science curriculum.” But Eastman’s response reveals that the organization has no problem with children learning about homosexuality in schools, so long as all the messages they teach them that homosexuality is “evil.”

This is a concerted effort to demonize LGBT people, and with an admitted focus on making sure young people absorb this stigmatizing rhetoric, NOM is directly contributing to the rampant anti-gay and anti-trans bullying that is overwhelming young people in schools. Not only does the group engage in such bullying, it encourages and condones others to do the same.

ThinkProgress filed this report from a town hall in Derry, New Hampshire.

During the last Republican presidential debate, a gay soldier named Stephen Hill asked the candidates about the recent repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Before former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) could respond, the GOP audience booed the servicemember. None of the candidates on stage rebuked the audience, allowing the booing to settle in unchallenged.

Though the moment was roundly criticized on the left and the right, one of Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s (R) newest endorsers told ThinkProgress this weekend that the he “thought it was great.”

ThinkProgress spoke with New Hampshire state Rep. Al Baldasaro (R) on Friday evening following a Perry town hall meeting in Derry. Discussing the audience’s boos, Baldasaro said the real issue was the fact that Hill divulged his sexual orientation in the first place. “I was so disgusted over that gay marine* coming out,” Baldasaro said, because now Hill’s fellow soldiers will “start getting away from him” and “start ignoring him.” Baldasaro even speculated that because Hill came out of the closet, other soldiers might not protect him when “the shit hits the fan” in battle.

Baldasaro concluded by praising the Republican audience’s reaction to Hill:

KEYES: What did you make of that moment in the debate when they had the gay marine asking a question and there were a few in the audience who were booing him?

BALDASARO: I was so disgusted over that gay marine coming out, because when he came out of the closet. Bob won’t say it because they’re scared to get in trouble, but their brothers and sisters – brothers especially- that are there, they’ll start getting away from him. They’ll start ignoring him. He doesn’t realize it, but when the shit hits the fan, you want your brothers covering your back, not looking at your back.

KEYES: Did you have an issue with the audience reaction?

BALDASARO: Oh no, I thought the audience, when they booed the marine, I thought it was great.

Listen here:

ThinkProgress readers will remember Baldasaro as the Perry endorser who testified last year during a hearing on same-sex marriage that New Hampshire “sold” adoptees to same-sex couples.

In the week and a half since the debate, a handful of candidates have condemned the audience’s boos and expressed their regrets that they didn’t speak up on stage, including Santorum, former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman (R), former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson (R), and former pizza executive Herman Cain. Perry has remained noticeably silent on the matter.

* During the conversation, Hill was inadvertently referred to as a marine rather than a soldier.

Last week, the Pentagon announced that military chaplains will be permitted to perform same-sex marriages on or off military bases so long as the marriages do not violate state or local laws. Conservatives like Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) have criticized this decision, suggesting it somehow circumvents the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits federal recognition of same-sex marriages. This week, equality opponents are arguing that allowing chaplains to practice a religious belief recognizing same-sex unions is “breaking the law.” The American Family Association reported these talking points from the Family Research Council‘s national security senior fellow, Lt. Col. Bob Maginnis:

He stresses that such officials are paid by the federal government, and he believes that even if the ceremonies are conducted by chaplains as private citizens, they will still be violating the law, “because a chaplain is on duty 7/24; they’re never off duty — just like every soldier, sailor, airman, and marine in the armed forces today. So that’s important to understand when you put this particular issue in context,” he says.

This is preposterous in the context of DOMA, as the law does not limit the religious ceremonies a military chaplain can perform. Furthermore, allowing same-sex couples to use military bases for their ceremonies in no way constitutes recognition of their marriages. Their argument suggests that chaplains and couples who marry on a base would somehow be breaking the law and could be charged. Enforcing the law in such a way would be tantamount to a “Prohibition” on same-sex marriages, with supportive chaplains having to set up the equivalent of “speakeasies” to marry couples in secret.

Conservatives have long opposed the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell on the grounds that it will curb the “religious liberties” of military chaplains who condemn homosexuality. If these conservative groups actually cared about military chaplains, they would stand up for the “religious liberty” of those who support same-sex marriage too.

Katie Carmichael and Deirdre DiBiaggio appeared on MSNBC this afternoon to discuss their case against Rose Marie Belforti, an elected town clerk in rural Ledyard, New York who has raised religious objections to issuing marriage certificates to same-sex couples. Belforti refused to wed the lesbian couple and arranged an appointment with a deputy. Under New York state law, “the marriage license is issued immediately, [but] the marriage ceremony may not take place within 24 hours from the exact time that the license was issued.”

“It was very sad and sort of shocking, ” Carmichael said of the experience, “we left and felt like we were second-class citizens.” “We just want to be able to go into that clerk’s office on any day that it’s open and just get a license, just like any other couple,” she added. Watch it:

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) has suggested that he supports the couple, saying that clerks should not be allowed to pick and choose which laws they enforce. “If you can’t enforce the law, then you shouldn’t be in that position,” Cumoo said.

North Carolina state Sen. James Forrester (R), one of the chief advocates for the state’s proposed constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, is accusing LGBT advocates of trying to “discredit” him after his disastrous interview with SiriusXM’s Michelangelo Signorile. Forrester was unable to back up his claims that people in the gay “lifestyle” live shorter lifespans and couldn’t explain how same-sex marriage undermines the institution. Following the interview, Pam’s House Blend contributor Scott Rose reported that Forrester is not a “Fellow of the American College of Preventive Medicine” — as he claims on his website. The senator’s connections to the Aerospace Medical Association and the Christian Medical and Dental Association have also come into question.

But in a phone conversation with qnotes’ Matt Comer, Forrester accused critics of trying to “discredit” him and claimed that “If I put anything on my résumé that is false, I’ll certainly change it”:

“What has happened is the gay community — the homosexuals don’t like the bill that I pushed through the General Assembly,” Forrester told qnotes via phone. “They don’t like the bill. They are trying to kill the messenger. They are working to discredit me but they can’t.” [...]

“I don’t need to make up credentials; I have enough of them already,” he said. “The gay community is just trying to dig up anything bad about me to discredit me and discredit the bill. I wish they’d quit sending such hate mail and the terrible phone calls I’m getting from them.”

Forrester also said he had already changed his résumé to list “former” affiliations with groups like the American College of Preventive Medicine, though mentions of the groups remain unedited on his résumé at his personal campaign site and at a web page on the Gaston County Republican Party’s website. In each instance, Forrester’s citations seem to indicate a current and active affiliation with various groups.

Comer traveled to Forrester’s medical office and discovered that his affiliations are as expired and outdated as his views of gay people. During his now infamous interview with Signorile, Forrester couldn’t point to a legitimate medical source to substantiate his belief that gay people live shorter lives and began referring Signorile to a book by Fred Turek, a Christian activist who argues that gay people are embracing harmful, “illegitimate,” and “changeable” behavior — on par with that of sociopaths, alcoholics, or even gay-bashers.

Rick Santorum condemned “the people who booed that gay soldier” one day after the now infamous GOP presidential debate last month, telling Fox News, “That soldier is serving our country. I thank him for his service to our country. I’m sure he’s doing an excellent job. I hope he’s safe and I hope he returns safely and does his mission well.”

But Santorum — who remained silent as the audience jeered the openly gay soldier during a question about the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell — doesn’t appear to understand the full magnitude of the boos or the offense it may have caused to gay and lesbian servicemembers. Here is how he described the incident to Robin Obcarian of the LA Times:

The issue flared again in the last debate, when Santorum told Stephen Hill, a gay soldier, that he would reinstitute the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Critics knocked him for failing to chastise the audience members who booed at Hill, and for failing to thank Hill for his service.

“In a perfect world,” Santorum said, he would have thanked the soldier. “I don’t stay awake at night thinking about this.” As for the booing, he said he didn’t hear it.

Santorum, in other words, doesn’t see the reaction as a particular problem, so his apology for failing to speak out against the jeers at the debate is less than sincere. After all, Santorum did not mention the incident during his first appearance on Fox & Friends the morning after the debate (he actually said that soldiers will feel “uncomfortable” and “odd” around openly gay servicemembers) and didn’t condemn the jeering until that afternoon, after a day of criticism from media and conservatives.