Opponents of equality are currently collecting signatures in an attempt to challenge Washington state’s new marriage equality law at the ballot through Referendum 74. But Washington conservatives have pushed back on same-sex couples’ recognition before, through 2009′s failed Referendum 71, a challenge to the state’s “everything but marriage” domestic partnerships. Despite attempts to keep the signatories of that campaign hidden, they are now publicly available at whosigned.org, and one activist is attempting to reach out to all of them.

So far, Paul Thomasson has emailed almost 2,000 of the R71 signers, identifying himself as a gay veteran and encouraging them not to sign R74. So far, he has received 60 email responses, all of which he has published on his webpage. Many, if not most, of those who reply take time to explain why they oppose same-sex marriage and reaffirm their Christian beliefs, like this prototypical example:

The reason I did, and will again, is simple. The family is the foundation of our country. Relationships have been created and defined by God. When you start to redefine and do things outside of that, it is destructive. I am not a hater of homosexuals. I have good friends that struggle with it. I will not endorse the practice though. It is a counterfeit love that comes from pain/woundings. It is no different than the sins I struggle with. I don’t seperate you from me. We both fall short. And we both have a Savior who paid the price for our sins. I love you and hope GOD’s will for your life. Thanks for the email

A few respondents have actually had a change of heart or at least agreed to reconsider their position, like this couple:

Dear Paul,

Thank you for sharing your life story. Don’t worry, we will not support R 74. Good luck to you and your life partner.

Mike & [wife's unusual name redacted]

But many of the respondents are concerned that their information is publicly available. They believe that even though they signed a legal document to impact the legislative process, their identities should remain completely anonymous, like the author of this reply:

Dear Paul: I appreciate your activism. I routinely sign petitions because I believe that people should have a more direct say in the laws that govern them. However, I also strongly believe that voting and petition signing should be by secret ballot. I therefore consider the listing of petitioner’s names, irregardless of the court’s ruling on the matter, an anti-democratic invasion of my privacy and a subversion of people’s freedom. It is the sort of thing I would expect from a dictatorial form of government. I think you should consider this aspect of using the list that was made public over the petitioner’s objections before you use it. Thank You for taking time to hear my views on this. Sincerely, Cal [last name redacted]

Paul Thomasson’s email is anything but threatening, but replies like Cal’s are proving to be quite common in his project. It’s an odd perspective that these individuals expect to have the power to impact the law without having to be held accountable for playing that role. At the foundation of democracy is ensuring that lawmakers are accountable to voters, but many of these signatories seem to believe they have rights that circumvent that principle. Of course, these are also individuals seeking to roll back rights the legislature has advanced — an undemocratic notion— so perhaps it sensibly follows they also feel they should bear no responsibility for the consequences.

Nevertheless, Thomasson’s effort could make a significant difference in how many Washington voters think about Referendum 74 this year, which is crucial given how they are currently split. Plus, their replies provide a compelling glimpse into the opposition’s beliefs.

Image from the website of anti-gay hate group Sons of Thundr

Yesterday, ThinkProgress LGBT noted that a new report by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) identifies 27 active anti-gay hate groups, up from 17 in 2010. Sadly, the 11 groups new to this list from last year richly deserved the dubious honor.

They are:

• United Families International (Gilbert, AZ): This group backed the sodomy laws ruled unconstitutional in the Lawrence v. Texas case and has argued “No one is ‘born that way.’ Policies that would normalize homosexuality by equating homosexual behavior with innate characteristics such as race or ethnicity should be opposed.”
• Save California (Sacramento, CA): The group is leading the charge to repeal California’s FAIR Education Act, hoping to stop teachers from “kidnapping the brains of kids” by teaching about the contributions of LGBT Americans. Save California’s head, Randy Thomasson, blamed a bullied and murdered gay teen for his own death.
• Sons of Thundr (Faith Baptist Church) (Luthersville, GA): The church’s website feautures a “sodomites can be saved” section which claims “ALL HOMOS ARE: SICK, BRAIN DAMAGED, PERVERTS!”
• You Can Run, But You Cannot Hide (Annandale, MN). Bradlee Dean, the group’s president and CEO, has said, “The gay ‘movement’ is part of a sexual revolution that has stripped sexuality of all moral significance for an entire generation. We cannot accept the physical prosecution of homosexuals and we cannot accept the proposal that homosexuality is either private or moral,” but notes he is opposed to actually executing LGBT citizens.
• Parents Action League (Champlin, MN): A small group of parents in the bullying-riddled Anoka-Hennepin School District want to require schools to teach that AIDS is a gay disease and to promote harmful and ineffective ex-gay therapy.
• Jewish Political Action Committee (Brooklyn, NY): This group claims that marriage equality in New York State has created a “surge” of child molestation and distributes signs that say “G-d sent AIDS to punish male gays.”
• Mission: America (Columbus, OH): Lead by Linda Harvey, who has been dubbed “the most homophobic woman in America,” this group has discouraged the hiring of gay and lesbian employees and claimed that “there is no proof” that gay, lesbian or bisexual or transgendered people even exist.
• Windsor Hills Baptist Church (Oklahoma City, OK): The church’s pastor, Tom Vineyard, argued against an employment non-discrimination proposal by making the bizarre claim that half of all murders in large cities are by gay people.
• True Light Pentecost Church (Spartanburg, SC): On the church’s blog, it warns that “The sub-human culture created by the anti-christ and magnified by the Sodomite/Lesbian movement,” has “brought end-time prophecy to a final state,” and encourages followers to “fight the great sodomite/lesbian army.”
• Tom Brown Ministries (El Paso, TX): Pastor and exorcist Tom Brown led the charge in El Paso to rescind an employment non-discrimination law he felt was “condoning immorality.” He also preaches that “homosexuality is actually an emotional, psychological disorder brought on early in childhood.”
• Public Advocate of the United States (Falls Church, VA): Run by Loudoun County, Virginia Supervisor Eugene Delguaido (R), this group is infamous for its over-the-top anti-gay fundraising letters, including comments like, “As homosexuals die off due to AIDS, the remaining AIDS carriers prey on children to replenish the ‘Homosexual Community.’”

The SPLC observed that the advances of the LGBT equality movement “seemed to set off a furious rage on the religious right, with renewed efforts to ban or repeal marriage equality and what seemed to be an intensification of anti-gay propaganda in certain quarters.” These hate groups clearly are among those quarters.

Dunkerton High School in Iowa thought it was providing students with a positive message about provocative lyrics in music, but the You Can Run But You Cannot Hide Ministry used its invitation yesterday to promote anti-gay and anti-choice messages with the students. Superintendent Jim Stanton then called a second assembly to apologize to the students, admitting he was wrong to bring the group to the district. He owned his mistake in an interview with KWWL:

STANTON: Where did that come from? That’s not what we were anticipating, and when we called the other schools where they had been… why wasn’t that mentioned? [...] To not take that responsibility, what is that teaching our children? We made a decision. It was a poor decision. And you know what? We’re going to suffer the consequences of that decision. We’re going to continue to do what we can to make it right.

Had the district researched the ministry, it would have quickly found the vile anti-gay rhetoric of its founder, Bradlee Dean. Dean has supported the criminalization, incarceration, and execution of gays through his radio show, which makes it no surprise that the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated his ministry a “hate group.” He also has close ties to Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and has defended the efforts of the Parents Action League — also now a designated “hate group” — to maintain an anti-LGBT atmosphere in Minnesota’s Anoka-Hennepin School District.

Watch KWWL’s report of the assembly gone awry, featuring reactions from students and parents.

Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) told Rachel Maddow last night that while he does expect marriage equality to be challenged at the ballot, he believes voters will side with “human dignity”:

O’MALLEY: There has been a conversation that has been taking place among our elected representatives over the last year, and the fruit of that conversation was that together, we concluded, that in fact we could pass a law that protects religious freedom and the rights of individuals equally, and to do that at the same time. In the end, we concluded that human dignity —the dignity of every person, the dignity of every child’s home — was the principle where we could come together. And I think that’s what people are going to do now as they talk around their own kitchen tables, in their family living rooms, and at work. So if there’s a referendum, I believe that the people of our state will once again side on the side of human dignity.

O’Malley also said that regardless of the outcome, Maryland will continue “the march of human understanding” toward marriage equality. Watch it:

A new poll released yesterday found that 52 percent of Maryland voters would “definitely” or “probably” vote to uphold the marriage equality law.

Focus on the Family (and vicariously the National Organization for Marriage) has revealed just how inane their arguments against same-sex adoption are. In a post at CitizenLink this week, FOTF’s director of family formation studies, Glenn T. Stanton, tries to make the case that children of same-sex couples are “not problem-free” because girls are more likely to consider a same-sex encounter:

According to a study published late last year in the Archive of Sexual Behavior, girls raised by lesbian mothers are seven times more likely to consider a same-sex encounter, and twice as likely to identify as lesbian or bisexual than those raised by heterosexual parents. They are also seven times more likely to use “the “morning after” pill.

“We already know that girls who grow up without fathers are more likely to be sexually adventurous, and it has a lot to do with being fatherless,” Stanton explained. “Two lesbians can be the most loving moms in the world, but they can’t give a girl the kind of positive attention and other-gendered affirmation she needs from a dad.”

Not only is he regurgitating the debunked “fatherless” meme, he’s relying on a self-reinforcing argument. Stanton opposes same-sex couples having families because it might lead to more same-sex couples having families, and somehow that’s a “problem.” He seems to think it’s downright shocking that a child might grow up exposed to a loving and committed same-sex couple and actually feel comfortable considering such a possibility for herself, even though she’s no more likely to be gay than a child of opposite-sex parents. In fact, Stanton is contributing to the stigma that is actually the only thing that sets apart the life experiences of children raised by same-sex couples.

FOTF seems to rely on a shared assumption that anything gay is bad, but with a growing majority supporting marriage equality nationwide, this notion is quickly evaporating. Not only are these anti-gay conservatives admitting pure animus against LGBT people, they’re conceding that they don’t have any better arguments than archaic gender norms and petulant objection. Of course, they never did.