Aaron Russo's
Freedom To Fascism

Outing the Constitutional Criminals How the Federal Reserve Runs the US - Part 1 How the Federal Reserve Runs the US - Part 2 How the Federal Reserve Runs the US - Part 3 How the Federal Reserve Runs the US - Part 4 How the Federal Reserve Runs the US - Part 5 We're Going to Have to Break the Bank The Fed: Jekyll Island Monster Paper Money and Tyranny
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http://worldcantwait.net/flier/thecall.pdf
Distribute the Call to Drive out the Bush Regime, available as a pdf [click above], to everyone you know, and take it out to people you don't know (on the subway, at concerts, etc.). This call powerfully describes what this regime is doing and how it can be stopped, and needs to get out to the millions who are thirsty for it, and generate a national conversation.
YOUR GOVERNMENT, on the basis of outrageous lies, is waging a murderous and utterly illegitimate war in Iraq, with other countries in their sights.
YOUR GOVERNMENT is openly torturing people, and justifying it.
YOUR GOVERNMENT puts people in jail on the merest suspicion, refusing them lawyers, and either holding them indefinitely or deporting them in the dead of night.
YOUR GOVERNMENT is moving each day closer to a theocracy, where a narrow and hateful brand of Christian fundamentalism will rule.
YOUR GOVERNMENT suppresses the science that doesn't fit its religious, political and economic agenda, forcing present and future generations to pay a terrible price.
YOUR GOVERNMENT is moving to deny women here, and all over the world, the right to birth control and abortion.
YOUR GOVERNMENT enforces a culture of greed, bigotry, intolerance and ignorance.

9/11:
Lies...All Lies
7 World Trade Center was a 47-story steel-framed skyscraper that stood across Vesey Street north of the WTC complex. It was not hit by any plane and collapsed at approximately 5:20 p.m. EDT on the evening of Sept 11, 2001. According to experts, no building like WTC7, a modern, steel-reinforced high-rise, had ever collapsed because of an uncontrolled fire.
The official report of the 9/11 Commission does not address the collapse of WTC7. The FEMA report says that its proposed explanation of the collapse of WTC7 has only a small probability of being correct. NIST has several times postponed the issue date of its report on the collapse of WTC7. Some 9/11 researchers say these examples show that an explanation of the collapse of WTC7 is quite difficult, unless controlled demolition is introduced to explain it.
9/11 researchers have proposed the idea Building Seven collapsed as the result of a controlled demolition. Support for the demolition theory came from the visual observations of the collapse, the pulverization of concrete, the lateral ejection of debris from high up for large distances, and the reports of molten & partly evaporated steel found in the debris. Advocates for this theory point to the speed and the near symmetrical fall of the structure. The building came down in just under seven seconds.
Early tests conducted on steel beams from the World Trade Center show they generally met or were stronger than design requirements, ruling them out as a contributing cause of the collapse of the towers, federal investigators from NIST stated Building Seven was not struck by an aircraft nor were the fires inside caused or sustained by jet fuel. The official working hypothesis is that Building 7 collapsed as the result of structural damage from the collapsing Towers in addition to prolonged fires throughout sustained by fuel stored for emergency generators. Further discussion of the intensity and severity of the fires is mentioned below. Engineers refer to this type of destruction as a "progressive collapse."
A kink or crimp near the center of the building is identical in appearance to many that have occurred when implosion professionals have made buildings collapse inwards to minimize damage of the surrounding structures.
This observation appears to support the demolition idea which suggests that a carefully calculated fall took place.

9/11 Mysteries

Why 9/11 Was An Inside Job
1. No steel frame buildings had ever before in history collapsed either from fires or planes hitting them. They are designed to withstand those hazards. On 9/11 three of them fell, and fell perfectly straight down. Why do you think demolition experts spend weeks planting charges and timing the explosions with millisecond precision? To make sure the buildings implode and fall straight down, just as the three WTC towers did. That perfection does not happen by accident. Further, the timing of the falls are indicative of linear controlled demolitions, not accelerating natural gravitational collapse. An engineering failure of this magnitude would normally demand an exhaustive study as to the mechanism of failure to ensure it never happened again, but all the evidence was quickly whisked away and melted down thus ensuring the cause was never discovered.
2. The 1/3 sized wheels, turbofan and diffuser found at the Pentagon crash are not part of a 757, but of a much smaller military aircraft the A-3 drone. Two civilian defense contractor employees — told to remain silent — say other workers quietly retro-fitted missile
and remote control systems onto A-3 jets at Colorado public airport prior to September 11. Bush claims a Boeing 757 hit the Pentagon then vaporized, and that is why there was no wreckage, but that is utterly impossible. The titanium used in the 12 tons of engines does not even melt at temperatures reached by mixing jet fuel and pure oxygen much less vaporize. Think about it. Titanium was chosen for the engines because it would not even weaken when subjected to an optimum mixture of jet fuel and air for hours on end during ordinary flight. Further, there were not even broken windows where the engines purportedly hit the Pentagon. And to top it off, photos show no sign of a fuel fire like the ones hitting the two towers. So, according to Bush, not only did the most of the plane vanish, a mysterious shrinking ray made the wheels and turbofans shrink to 1/3 the normal diameter and change into a type used by A-3 military drones. Give us a break! How gullible do you think we are Mr. Bush? Bush is peddling an utterly preposterous lie. It amazing he got away with it so long. See the video Loose Change, part 1 and Loose Change, part 2 . So it was an A-3 drone that hit the Pentagon. This is so patently obvious from examining the wreckage that Bush must have know that all along, but decided to lie.
3. The hole in the side of the Pentagon is far too small for Boeing 757 flight 77 to pass through. The wingspan is 124 feet with a fuselage diameter of 13 feet. It is 44 feet from ground to the top of the tail. There was almost no debris, no bodies, no blood, no body parts, no baggage, no wreckage typical of a 757 plane crash, and of course no sheared off wings. Further there was no fire or smoke damage similar to the other two crashes. There should have been. The plane had a similar load of fuel. In contrast, after the shuttle disaster, it was possible to find pieces of the seven astronauts' bodies spread over hundreds of square miles. Some of the rubble appears to belong to a small Global Hawk drone (44 feet long by 15 feet high) including the tiny engine, including a tiny turbofan engine. The Pentagon blatantly lied in its story published by the Washington Post, saying the hole in the Pentagon was five stories high and 200 feet wide. Photos show it is no bigger than 18 feet in diameter. To fit in that tiny hole the wings had to have been sheared off. Where are the wings? Further the Pentagon crash did not show up seismically, because the object that hit was too light. Recall your high school physics. We know object that hit the Pentagon was traveling at 400 mph.
mass = energy / velocity2
The low energy of the hit means the object had to have considerably lower mass than a 757. The other two other hits, including another 757, registered seismically. Whatever hit the Pentagon was not nearly heavy enough to be a 757 as the Bush conspiracy theory claims. This is so patently obvious, Bush must have know that all along, but decided to lie.
4. See David Griffin's on-line lecture. This will painlessly give you a brief outline of some of the holes in Bush's story. Griffin has written two books on 9/11 .
5. Mike Ruppert's book, Crossing the Rubicon. This book explains exactly how Cheney pulled this off, and provides 700 pages of backup for this admittedly wild-sounding accusation.
6. There were no Arabs aboard flight 77 as claimed by Bush. Without Arabs, you have no highjackers. Without a highjack, why would the three American pilots all suicide unless Bush had threatened their families? The only other explanation is the planes were flown by wire. In other words, either way, 9/11 was an inside job. The key to Bush's conspiracy theory, the Arab highjacking, is a total fabrication. His whole lie comes unraveled just from the passenger and autopsy lists alone.
7. Stanley Hilton, Bob Dole's advisor and lead attorney in the 9/11 victims case says he has both documentary evidence and sworn testimony that Cheney and Bush ordered the 9/11 attack.
8. All of Bush's cabinet met with Mahmoud, the bankroller of 9/11, in the week prior to 9/11.
9. No planes scrambled to intercept the hijackers. This is standard procedure. Normally a plane would be in the air within four minutes. Just prior to 9/11 Cheney inserted himself in the highjack command loop. He is the one who ordered them to stand down.
10. There were all manner of war games in progress on 9/11 some simulating a 9/11 style attack. This deflected most of the air force out west. It further confused air traffic controllers who had to deal with insertions (fake planes for the war games on their radars). No body was really sure if the attacks were real or part of the game. No cave-dwelling terrorists could have arranged so convenient a distraction. The Pentagon publicly admitted this many times, including when Representative Cynthia McKinney grilled Donald Rumsfeld on C-Span 2005-03-24. transcript.
11. While every one else was in lockdown on 9/11, Bush got the FBI to arrange private jets to collect the bin Laden family and take them safely out of the USA without interrogation. At that point airspace had been reopened to commercial flights but not private flights.
12. Kevin R. Ryan, Site Manager, Environmental Health Laboratories, for Underwriter Labs, wrote that the fires in the World Trade buildings were not nearly hot enough to cause the UL-rated steel to fail.
13. CNN's reporter, Jamie McIntyre, on the scene announced that no plane hit the Pentagon.
14. Rudy Giuliani pre-announced the hit on the Pentagon. How did he know it would happen?
15. Rudy Giuliani announced a hit on the Sears tower. This part of the conspiracy was foiled, but apparently nobody told him. He announced it, as it was planned.
16. Rudy Giuliani gave a series of extremely polished speeches on 9/11. How did he find time to rehearse?
17. All three World Trade Towers fell faster over the first half of the collapse than physics allows by free fall. That meant they had to have an assist, e.g. an explosive push from pre-planted demolition charges, not just gravity pulling them down. The maximum collapse for free fall is computed by
distance = ½ g t²
where g is the acceleration due to gravity 32 feet per second per second, and t is time in seconds. In other words, free fall collapse should start out slowly and accelerate faster and faster for the big finale.
18. Why did the terrorists hit the west wing of the Pentagon? That required an extra complex flight maneuver. The west wing was being renovated. There were no military people there. Why wouldn't terrorists try to kill the top brass in the east wing?
19. David Ray Griffin's objection from The New Pearl Harbor: Disturbing Questions About the Bush Administration and 9/11.
President Bush has also been criticized for behaving somewhat bizarrely on 9/11.
As he and the Secret Service got word that a second plane had crashed into the World Trade Center and that three planes had been hijacked, there could have been no possible doubt in their mind that the United States was under terrorist attack . . . The most horrendous attack the United States had ever suffered. And they would have had to assume that one or more of them were heading toward President Bush himself. and so upon learning about this, the secret service surely would have whisked him away immediately. In fact, one secret service agent on the scene said, "We're out of here." but obviously he got overruled because president Bush stayed there. After Andrew Card reported the second crash on the World Trade Center, the president just nodded as if he understood and said, "we're going to go ahead with the reading lesson." and he sat there another 15 minutes listening to the children read a story about a pet goat. This was a photo op and when it was over he lingered around talking to the children and talking to the teacher.
Bill Sammon, of the Washington Times, wrote a very pro-Bush book, yet he comments how casual and relaxed the president was given the fact he'd just learned the country was under attack. He said Bush took his own sweet time and in fact called him "Our Dawdler in Chief." And then the president went on national TV, going forward with an interview that had been planned and announced in advance . . . then they took their regularly scheduled motorcade back to the airport. In other words, [Bush and the Secret Service] showed no fear whatsoever that they would be targeted for attack, which strongly suggests they knew how many aircraft were being hijacked and what their targets were.
Couldn't it have been that he was trying to project calm in the eye of the storm, that this was Bush projecting Churchillian resolve in the face of calamity?
People who want to believe such things can, of course, imagine such scenarios. But the president in a situation like that does not make the decisions; the Secret Service team makes the decisions. And the guys in the Secret Service are trained to be ready for a catastrophe like this where they make snap decisions and whisk the president to safety immediately. They would have had an escape route planned; they would have had contingencies planned — they always do. It is at least not very plausible to think they would have remained there and endangered the lives of all the children and teachers at that school in order to exude that Churchillian confidence.
Consider that the event was publicly scheduled and presumably known to any terrorists. A school is not a very secure location. Bush was recklessly endangering the lives of the children he was with unless of course he knew there was no danger because this was an inside job.
20. Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were busy discussing the Iraq war in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. Why were they so unconcerned about 9/11 unless it were an inside job?
“I expected to go back to a round of meetings [on 2001-09-12], examining what the next attacks could be, what our vulnerabilities were, what we could do about them in the short term. Instead, I walked into a series of discussions about Iraq. At first I was incredulous that we were talking about something other than getting al Qaeda. Then I realized with an almost sharp physical pain that Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were trying to take advantage of this national tragedy to promote their agenda about Iraq. Since the beginning of the administration, indeed well before, they had been pressing for a war with Iraq. My friends in the Pentagon had been telling me that the word was we would be invading Iraq sometimes in 2002.”
~ Richard A. Clarke, White House Counter Terrorism Chief, Against All Enemies
21. The alleged highjackers on their eve of a supposed religiously-motivated suicide attack went to a strip bar, drank alcohol and ate pork, all in public. They left copies of the Qu'ran behind presumably to help witnesses remember them. Devout Muslims are insanely fanatical about avoiding pork. They would sooner eat feces. In Saudi Arabia, drinking alcohol is considered so shameful it could get you killed. That is not plausible behavior for religious fanatics about to face judgment day. bin Laden is a Puritanical religious fanatic.
22. Seismic evidence shows the two main world trade towers were taken down by demolition.
23. A FOX reporter reported the plane that hit South Tower II of the World Trade Center had a blue logo. UA Flight 175 would have had a black and red United logo. The US air force uses a white star on a blue circle.
24. Bush at first tried to get noted war criminal Henry Kissinger to handle the 9/11 commission whitewash.
25. Put options (short selling) for American Airlines and United Airlines were massively above normal just prior to 9/11. Investors made a killing off foreknowledge of 9/11. Cheney claims he investigated these investors but claims no wrongdoing and he refused to say who profited from the carnage or to explain why he thought that. Some of the investors would have been people jumping on a bandwagon, not knowing what was afoot, just presuming insiders must know. But at the core were people who knew the day of the attack. How did they know?
26. Bush at first refused to testify at the 9/11 commission, and then agreed only reluctantly under the condition he and Cheney always appear together so could keep their stories straight.
27. As if they had prior knowledge, within four minutes after the Pentagon crash, FBI agents quickly confiscated:
* video tape from a gas station security camera aimed directly at the exact point of impact while recording the size of the plane and/or missile.
* security camera video film from a nearby Sheraton hotel.
* film from a Virginia Transportation Department freeway overpass camera.
They have never released these tapes, nor any of the on-grounds security camera tapes. What's the big secret?
28. Rumsfeld accidentally told the truth:
“Here we're talking about plastic knives, and using an American Airlines flight filled with our citizens, and the missile to damage this building, and similar (inaudible) that damaged the World Trade Center.”
~ Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of War, 2001-10-12 Parade Magazine interview.
29. Larry Silverstein, the leaseholder of tower 7, confesses on tape he had the building demolished to prevent the spread of fire. This building was not hit by any planes. Larry Silverstein look out long term leases on all the WTC numbered buildings three months before 9/11. He insured them to the max. He not the building's owners was the beneficiary. He was able to get double the usual payout by arguing the attacks were sufficiently separated in time to count as two separate attacks.
30. Marvin P. Bush, the president’s younger brother, was a principal in a company called Securacom that provided security for the World Trade Center, United Airlines, and Dulles International Airport. Bush's company had an ongoing contract to handle security at the World Trade Center up to the day the buildings fell down.
31. The following evidence is not available to the public. Either it does not exist, somebody destroyed it, or Bush is withholding it. In all three cases Bush is deceiving the public.
* Airport lobby video showing alleged hijackers on the targeted flights.
* Evidence tying bin Laden to the crime. All we have is Bush's say so. One day he claimed he had no idea the attack was coming, and the next he was 100% sure who did it.
* Recordings of air traffic controller communications with the flights. These were shredded and thrown into five different garbage cans.
* Remains of any of the targeted planes.
* Remains of the Twin Towers and Building 7.
* Blueprints of the Twin Towers and Building 7.
* Black boxes from any of the targeted planes.
* Photographs documenting the crime scenes before they were disturbed.
32. Mike Delbert Vreeland tried to warn the Canadian authorities of the coming 9/11 attacks. He was incarcerated, so his warnings were ignored. However, he was correct about the targets and the date of the attack.
33. Two days after 9/11, Michael Powell, (Colin Powell's son) chair of the FCC, moved to eliminate the few remaining restraints on media concentration. In 1983, 50 corporations controlled the majority of all news media in the United States. Today only six do: Time Warner, Disney, archconservative Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. (Fox’s parent company), Bertelsmann, Viacom and General Electric Co. It was as though Powell has this all ready to go, and waited for the right moment to spring it, behind a smokescreen. His behavior implies he knew 9/11 was coming. The technique is similar to one favored by Canadian politicians to pass unpopular legislation on Christmas eve when no one is looking.
34. Cheney and Ashcroft claim they drafted the 600-page Patriot Act in less than a week. It is a very complicated document· It even included unrelated pork for pharmaceutical companies like Merck, to get them of the hook for legal liability for contaminated vaccines, past, present and future. I can't believe they could have put this intricate, deceptively worded document together in only a week. They must have had it ready before hand waiting for the right moment to spring it, behind a smokescreen. Legislators passed it in a panic without even reading it first. It annulled the Bill of Rights. This behavior implies Cheney and Ashcroft knew 9/11 was coming. The technique is similar to one favored by Canadian politicians to pass unpopular legislation on Christmas eve when no one is looking.
35. Carmen bin Ladin (she spells her name differently), bin Laden's estranged sister in law, says in her book Inside the Kingdom: My Life in Saudi Arabia that the bin Laden family all believe Osama had nothing to do with 9/11.
36. Bush used 9/11 as a pretext to invade Afghanistan, even though Saudis ostensibly committed the deed. He then installed ex-Unocal men to run the country. They built a pipeline for Unocal and raised trillions by restarting the opium trade.
37. Bush used 9/11 as a pretext to invade Iraq even though he later admitted the two had no connection.
"We have no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the September 11th attacks."
~ George W. Bush, 2003-09-17
38. Bush used 9/11 as a pretext for the Patriot Act to nullify important constitutional rights such as habeas corpus, freedom from cruel and unusual punishment, freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.
39. In 1976 the US Army prepared a plan to take down the two World Trade Towers using commercial airliners, using plastic box cutters to get through security, as part of its "antiterrorism" activities. In 1976, Rumsfeld was Secretary of State, Bush 41 was CIA Director, Nelson Rockefeller was Vice President, Ford was president, Cheney was chief of staff, almost the same crew as was in charge for 9/11.
40. The elaborate Patriot Act was allegedly written in a few days after 9/11, but Cheney and Ashcroft somehow found time to insert some irrelevant pork to get Merck off the hook for contaminating vaccines with mercury, freeing it from liability for the autism it allegedly caused. They must have had the act ready prior to 9/11. They cleverly panicked the house and senate into passing it without even taking time to read it.
41. No high-rise buildings have collapsed before or since from fire elsewhere, yet three supposedly did on 2001-09-11 in New York City. Whomever chose those two buildings to hit either did a detailed engineering study to discover their vulnerability to collapse by fire, or took the buildings down with demolition. I have trouble imagining cave dwellers pulling either of those two feats off. Blind luck would be plausible if it were not for the fact Bush 41 had a detailed plan in place to take them out formulated in 1976 using airliners and box cutters. Bush had the rubble quickly shipped to China to be melted, even though it is illegal to destroy rubble from an engineering failure or a crime scene. You have to investigate precisely what caused the failures so that you can build safer buildings in future.
Our Addiction To Fear
Ah, yes, the six faces of the terrorist.

You Passed the US Citizenship Test
Congratulations - you got 10 out of 10 correct! Could You Pass the US Citizenship Test?
What Did You Learn In School Today Tom Paxton
What did you learn in school today, dear little boy of mine?
I learned that Washington never told a lie
I learned that soldiers seldom die
I learned that everybody's free
That's what the teacher said to me
And that's what I learned in school today
That's what I learned in school

What did you learn in school today, dear little boy of mine?
I learned that policemen are my friends
I learned that justice never ends
I learned that murderers die for their crimes
Even if we make a mistake sometimes
And that's what I learned in school today
That's what I learned in school

What did you learn in school today, dear little boy of mine?
I learned that war is not so bad
I learned about the great ones we have had
We fought in Germany and in France
And someday I might get my chance
And that's what I learned in school today
That's what I learned in school

What did you learn in school today, dear little boy of mine?
I learned that our government must be strong
It's always right and never wrong
Our leaders are the finest men
So we elect them again and again
And that's what I learned in school today
That's what I learned in school

A Must-See Film:

Why We Fight
a documentary by Eugene Jarecki

What people are saying:

“Why We Fight” should be required viewing for anyone who still believes that the U.S. presence in Iraq has anything to do with freedom. A masterpiece.

...it’s the best documentary about militarism and America’s political reach that I’ve seen, just edging out the 1972 Vietnam documentary Winter Soldier.

Jarecki’s “Why We Fight” is a cynical account of the state of a world that is becoming, more and more, under the control of governments and corporations...

...should be mandatory viewing for any voting citizen. Eisenhower was not the first President to warn us against the downfalls of unimpeded military buildup. Another military man, George Washington, warned against the same thing.

The film's strength is that it isn't hesitant to name names on either end of the political spectrum.

Whichever truth you hold to be self-evident, "Why We Fight" will encourage you to reassess your beliefs and reconsider the meaning of national security.

What will you do if you register and there is a draft?
Many people think they won't have to go to war because they are conscientious objectors (COs). A CO is someone who registers, convinces his draft board that he "opposes war in any form," and does unarmed military duty or poorly-paid civilian "alternative" work instead of fighting.
If you're planning to try for CO status, and you want to help prevent a draft or a war from happening, you might want to think twice about registering. A conservative think-tank reported that the SS wants to "accommodate with minimum divisiveness those who would seek CO status." The government gives COs special status within the system to keep them busy, quiet, and helpless to resist a war.
COs have to register first, and then take their chances with a draft board. Many genuine COs won't get CO status, or will "conscientiously object" to their alternative service jobs. You can't "un-register" if your CO claim is denied. But if you don't register now, you can always change your mind, register late, and try for CO status if you get an induction notice. Conscientious Objection is not an easy way to beat the draft.
You should talk to a draft counselor if you have questions about conscientious objection or resistance. Whatever you do, you won't be alone. All over the country, people are finding ways to oppose registration and the draft.

Before You Enlist!

FOOD NOT BOMBS
"Food Not Bombs is one of the fastest growing revolutionary movements and is gaining momentum throughout the world. There are hundreds of autonomous chapters sharing free vegetarian food with hungry people, protesting war and poverty. For over 25 years the movement has worked to end hunger and has supported actions to stop the globalization of the economy, restrictions to the movements of people, end exploitation and the destruction of the earth."
LINKS:
Food Not Bombs - Official site
Start A FNB - in 7 easy steps
Find the Food Not Bombs near you

EXTREME BIRTH DEFORMITIES
from the Gulf War. These photos are extremely disturbing. So disturbing in fact that I couldn't post one on my profile and look at it each day. To do that, would risk my being desensitized. One SHOULD be shocked. If you are not, you are not human.

Life Exists Beyond Our Borders

How to Build Global Community
Think of no one as "them"
Don't confuse your comfort with your safety
Talk to strangers
Imagine other cultures through their poetry and novels
Listen to music you don't understand
Dance to it
Act locally
Notice the workings of power & privilege in your culture
Question consumption
Know how your lettuce and coffee are grown: wake up and smell the exploitation
Look for fair trade and union labels
Help build economies from the bottom up
Acquire few needs
Learn a second (or third) language
Visit people, places, and cultures - not tourist attractions
Learn people’s history
Re-define progress
Know physical and political geography
Play games from other cultures
Watch films with subtitles
Know your heritage
Honor everyone’s holidays
Look at the moon and imagine someone else, somewhere else, looking at it too
Read the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Understand the global economy in terms of people, land and water
Know where your bank banks
Never believe you have a right to anyone else's resources
Refuse to wear corporate logos: defy corporate domination
Question military/corporate connections
Don't confuse money with wealth, or time with money
Have a pen/email pal
Honor indigenous cultures
Judge governance by how well it meets all people’s needs
Be skeptical about what you read
Eat adventurously
Enjoy vegetables, beans and grains in your diet
Choose curiosity over certainty
Know where your water comes from and where your wastes go
Pledge allegiance to the earth: question nationalism
Think South, Central and North – there are many Americans
Assume that many others share your dreams
Know that no one is silent though many are not heard
Work to change this

Human Rights

Myths & Facts About GLBT People
It’s important to remember that most of the negative stereotypes of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people are based on erroneous or inadequate information. Here are some myths and facts to help you flesh out what’s what:
It’s a “choice.” Sexual orientation and gender identity are not choices, any more than being left-handed or having brown eyes or being straight are choices. The choice is in deciding whether or not to live your life openly and honestly with yourself and others.
It’s a “lifestyle.” It’s sometimes said that GLBT people live a gay “lifestyle.” The problem with that word is that it can trivialize GLBT people and the struggles they face. Being GLBT is no more a lifestyle than being straight — it’s a life, just like anyone else’s.
Same-sex relationships don’t last. Same-sex couples can, and do, form lasting, lifelong, committed relationships — just like any other couple. And just like any other couple, sometimes same-sex relationships end. The primary difference is that same-sex couples have few opportunities to marry or enter into civil unions or domestic partnerships.
GLBT people can’t have families. According to the 2000 Census, more than 1 million children — probably many more — are being raised by same-sex couples nationwide. The American Psychological Association and other major medical and scientific researchers have stated that children of gay and lesbian parents are as mentally healthy as children raised by straight parents.
GLBT people aren’t happy. In 1994, the American Medical Association released a statement saying, “Most of the emotional disturbance experienced by gay men and lesbians around their sexual identity is not based on physiological causes but rather is due more to a sense of alienation in an unaccepting environment.” What that means is that the discrimination and stress that GLBT people face is the root cause of a great deal of pain for many GLBT people. That pain can be alleviated by knowing that there is a vibrant, growing community of GLBT and straight-supportive Americans who know and care about GLBT people and the issues they face.
GLBT people can “change” or be “cured.” No scientifically valid evidence exists that shows that people can change their sexual orientation, although some people do repress it. The most reputable medical and psychotherapeutic groups say you should not try to change your sexual orientation as the process can actually be damaging.