It was bad enough that San Francisco 49ers player Chris Culliver said earlier this week that he wouldn’t tolerate a gay teammate and then offered a non-apology apology for saying so. Now, two other 49ers have claimed that they didn’t appear in an “It Gets Better” video they clearly were in. Linebacker Ahmad Brooks and defensive tackle Isaac Sopoaga denied to USA Today that they made the video, then when showed the video, claimed they didn’t realize it was to fight the bullying of LGBT youth (even though teammate Donte Whitner specifically identifies “LGBT teens”):

BROOKS: I didn’t make any video. This is America and if someone wants to be gay, they can be gay. It’s their right. But I didn’t make any video… I don’t remember that. I think if I made a video, I’d remember it. [After being shown the video...] Oh, that. It was an anti-bullying video, not a gay (rights) video.

Indeed, the San Francisco 49ers are the only NFL team to have produced a video for the “It Gets Better” project, but Dan Savage has said they’ve removed the video from the project’s website because of these players’ comments. OutSports recut the video without Brooks and Sopoaga, such that it now only features defensive tackle Ricky Jean Francois and safety Donte Whitner. Watch it:

Indiana’s Apostolic Truth Tabernacle Church has made national news since a video surfaced this week of Pastor Jeff Sangl and his congregation encouraging a four-year-old singing a song called, “Ain’t no homos gonna make it to heaven.” The church is in apparent damage control, but sending a variety of mixed messages. The following statement appeared on the church’s website:

The Pastor and members of Apostolic Truth Tabernacle do not condone, teach, or practice hate of any person for any reason. We believe and hope that every person can find true Bible salvation and the mercy and grace of God in their lives. We are a strong advocate of the family unit according to the teachings and precepts found in the Holy Bible. We believe the Holy Bible is the Divinely-inspired Word of God and we will continue to uphold and preach that which is found in scripture.

Of course, this statement doesn’t exactly distance itself from the message of the song, which church members have defended. One congregant stood behind the video, saying, “The people who are upset just don’t read the word of God. If we don’t teach the children the truth early they will never learn… Of course we applauded a child who is singing a song about God.”

Meanwhile, Pastor Sangl has received death threats, leading him to abruptly leave for vacation with his wife without telling anyone where they were going. Church members are taking turns keeping vigil over their church to provide extra security as a result of harassing phone calls.

Dan Savage noted yesterday that Apostolic Truth Tabernacle is in Greensburg, IN, which is where Billy Lucas lived. Billy committed suicide in 2010 after being bullied for being gay, and his death was one in a spate of similar suicides that led Savage to create the It Gets Better project. If four-year-olds in Greensburg are still being taught to celebrate the idea that all gay people deserve to go to hell, it’s not getting better there yet.

Last year’s string of heartbreaking suicides by young members of the LGBT community who had been bullied by their classmates led hundreds of celebrities, sports teams, politicians and ordinary citizens to record “It Gets Better” videos. Even President Obama recorded one.

One politician who has not: Mitt Romney, who has been relatively silent on the issue. This morning, a story in The Washington Post reveals that the presidential candidate engaged in bullying behavior during his days at a prestigious preparatory school in Michigan:

John Lauber, a soft-spoken new student one year behind Romney, was perpetually teased for his nonconformity and presumed homosexuality. Now he was walking around the all-boys school with bleached-blond hair that draped over one eye, and Romney wasn’t having it.
[…]
A few days later, Friedemann entered Stevens Hall off the school’s collegiate quad to find Romney marching out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber’s hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.

Jason Horowitz spoke with five students who attended Cranbrook School at the same time as Romney, and all of them independently recalled the same story. Mitt Romney was asked about the Post’s story during a live radio broadcast with Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, apologizing before explaining that he didn’t remember many of the details of what took place: “Back in high school, I did some dumb things and if anybody was hurt by that or offended, obviously I apologize for that…I don’t remember that incident,” Romney said, laughing. “I certainly don’t believe that I thought the fellow was homosexual. That was the furthest thing from our minds back in the 1960s, so that was not the case.”

It seems odd that Romney would not recall such a bizarre event, especially since so many other students who were asked about it painted clear pictures of what transpired, but perhaps such “hijinks and pranks” were so frequent he has simply lost track of them all.

A separate incident, in which Romney ridiculed a closeted gay classmate by sarcastically praising him with “atta girl!” comments, helps paint a troubling picture for the Republican Party’s presumptive presidential nominee. To date, Romney has not stepped forward to support any bills that seek to protect LGBT students from the kind of bullying that Romney himself participated in while in high school.

But the presumptive Republican nominee has made it clear where he stands on LGBT rights today, 50 years after the incident. Just this week he again affirmed his position that gay couples should not receive equal recognition under the law as straight couples do.

This all stands in stark contrast with President Obama, who less than 24 hours ago became the first sitting occupant of the Oval Office to endorse same sex marriage.