I’m not talking wild and kinky stuff, like anything other than the missionary position. No, long before the religious right got up in arms about queers, they were trying to stop straight people from having non-procreative sex. And they were so successful that they had succeeded in banning the use of birth control in several states.

In Connecticut, there was a law that said: “Any person who uses any drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purpose of preventing conception shall be fined not less than fifty dollars or imprisoned not less than sixty days nor more than one year or be both fined and imprisoned.” Further, any doctor, pharmacist or other person who “assists, abets, counsels, causes, hires or commands another to commit” the offense could be prosecuted and punished in the same way.

In 1965, in a landmark case called Griswold v. Connecticut, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that there was inherent in the U.S. Constitution a core of rights around which glowed “penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance.”

Although a right of privacy is not explicit in the Constitution, a broader right of privacy exists in the penumbra of rights like freedom of association, quartering of soldiers, prohibition on search and seizure, etc. In the judgment of a 7-2 majority of the court, the right of privacy extended to making decisions about whether or not you could attempt to control whether having sex resulted in reproduction.

On June 7, 2008, the 43rd anniversary of the Griswold decision, the religious right is working to mobilize a nationwide protest called “The Pill Kills Babies.” And just in case you had any question about whether they are talking about the famous “Morning After” pill, the logo on their website — http://www.thepillkills.com — includes the familiar round pill case containing one month’s dosing of the regular old standard birth control pill.

According to their website, every prevented pregnancy is an abortion, meaning more than 11 million “chemical abortions” occur each year, with more than 324 million “chemical abortions” — nearly the entire US population! — since 1973.

So, in case you think the fight against gay marriage isn’t relevant to you, it’s only the tip of the iceberg in terms of what the forces of religious morality have in store for us all.

Please remember that when you talk to your friends and family about what those crazy queers are doing out in California.

A few months ago, our TiVo happened to capture an episode of Match Game as a “Suggestion” and we watched it and nearly wet ourselves laughing. I remember watching the show as a kid and found it funny then, but now it’s so much funnier.

We’ve set up a Season Pass for it, we always have about 25 episodes queued up and I watch them while cooking or just to pass the time. I would recommend that you try catching a few old shows yourself. It’s worth the effort!

The show is such an amazing artifact; an incredible snapshot of culture from the mid 1970s through the 1980s, from clothing to the who’s who of B-list and C-list stars, to the sometimes bizarre “matches” drawn from the cultural awareness of the day. And to see Charles Nelson Reilly, so obviously gay and yet so incredibly loved by his fellow panelists and the audience so many years ago, he was quite a force for change… and humor.

Goodbye, Charles!

Here’s some YouTube clips for your entertainment.

Identity Thief Uses iPod

Justice Department Adds Privacy Panel

Iowa House approves prescription database” peace activists, religious groups

Memphis Suburb Deploys GPS to City Vehicles

Update: David wanted me to comment on this outrageous story…
Christians Sue for Right to Ignore School’s Tolerance Policy

Whether you support the parents of Mrs. Schiavo, or her husband, I think that each side of the argument has very valid reasons for their position. But where they go wrong is when they try to apply those positions to anybody other than themselves and their own lives. Of all the ink spilled and airwaves filled with blathering, nobody but Mrs. Schiavo and her husband know what they discussed regarding her wishes for end-of-life care. This is why it’s so important to have that collection of documents known as a “Living Will.”

For what it’s worth, the Schiavo case is not far off the situation faced by gay couples all the time, insofar as the challenges facing a partner who, while s/he may know more about a person’s wishes in this regard, can be completely shut out of the medical decision-making process by bigoted family members. Horror stories many times more heartbreaking than the Schiavo case are legion in the gay community, especially after the ravages of AIDS. Partners who cared for their dying lovers being thrown out of the hospital room moments before their partner’s passing by narrow-minded, self-centered family members who have every right under law, but no right under any interpretation of decency or morality.

What sticks in my own mind about the Schiavo disaster is this: I just cannot imagine that if Mr. Schiavo had anything less than boundless love and devotion to his wife, he wouldn’t have packed it in years ago. If he was just tired of her and eager to see her dead, he could have filed for divorce fifteen years ago and gone on with his life, leaving the poor lady to the tender mercies of her nutty family… a family who, according to many observers, took a far less significant interest in her well-being before they realized how much money could be made on the pro-life speaking circuit. It also bears pointing out that Mr. Schiavo, instead of grandstanding before the cameras over the last several weeks, has been by his wife’s bedside almost constantly and hasn’t said hardly a peep to the media.

It takes a special kind of love for Mr. Schiavo to keep fighting this fight and facing down the religio-political opportunistic hoards. In fact, I promise you, gentle reader, that if I had to run the gauntlet of obnoxious protesters (e.g., cheering to greet the priest who administered the communion) to be with a dying relative at that hospice, I’d probably have rounded up some automatic weaponry and sent the whole lot of them to meet the maker they seem so reluctant for Mrs. Schiavo to meet.

At any rate, my feeling is that if you’re not a member of the Schiavo and Schindler families, you really should shut the hell up. That’s why I haven’t said anything before, and why I won’t say anything more.

Every week, I gather up news items and send them to David Lawrence in preparation for my segment. I thought I’d include a faux newswire item:

San Francisco — March 1 — Today marks the first anniversary of Ray and Justin Everett-Church’s wedding in San Francisco City Hall. The marriage, along with more than 4000 others, was voided by the notoriously “activist” Calif. State Supreme Court on August 13, 2004. When it was ended by court decree, Ray and Justin’s marriage had lasted 166 times longer than Britany Spears first marriage, and 55 times longer than the “Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire” marriage of Rick Rockwell and Darva Conger.

Despite the discrepency in longevity, the Everett-Church marriage is considered by many to be a “threat to traditional marriage,” presumably more of a threat than the Spears and Rockwell/Conger nuptuals. Reached at his home with his 4th wife, Defense of Marriage Act author and former Congressman Bob Barr had no comment on the Everett-Church anniversary. Former Speaker of the House of Representatives Newt Gingrich, who divorced his second wife to shack up with a former employee of his, also had no comment.

Unfortunately, with our crazy schedules we won’t get to actually go out and do anything to celebrate this anniversary until later in the week. But our focus is on the Big One Zero — 10 years together — in November.