Joy Ashford enabling an enemy of the LGBT, the DMN reporting of the "He Gets Us" campaign with active misdirection.
With the latest articles on the "He Gets Us" campaign, Joy Ashford moves from ommisions of homophobia to active misrepresentations. The Dallas LGBT need to get some fight in them.
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Joy Ashford misrepresentation of the “He Gets Us” campaign in the Dallas Morning News. Lerma Agency
Joy Ashford had the following Feb. 12, 2024 article, “Dallas ad firm is behind “He Gets Us” Jesus Superbowl commercials,” in the Dallas Morning News (DMN).
In the article Ashford does tell about how the people behind the “He Gets Us,” campaign were major homophobic Evangelical organizations.
Then Ashford writes:
The “He Gets Us” campaign is now under a new charitable organization, Come Near, meaning the Servant Foundation is no longer overseeing it. The nonprofit says it is “committed to sharing the life and love of Jesus in thought-provoking new ways.”
On its website, the campaign notes that “probably the most common questions” received are about its stance on the LGBTQ community. “So let us be clear in our opinion. Jesus loves gay people and Jesus loves trans people. … No matter who you are, YOU are invited to explore the story of Jesus and consider what it means for your life.” [Boldface added.]
At the “He Gets Us” page they have a section, “Frequently Asked Questions,” and one of the questions is “What is your stance on the LGBTQ+ Community,” and they say the following.
These are probably the most common questions we receive. And we understand why. Many of those who represent Jesus have made people in the LGBTQ+ community feel judged and excluded. And others in the Jesus community have simply ignored their stories and lived experiences.
So let us be clear in our opinion. Jesus loves gay people and Jesus loves trans people. The LGBTQ+ community, like all people, is invited to explore the story of Jesus and consider his example of unconditional love, grace, and forgiveness of others. No matter who you are, YOU are invited to explore the story of Jesus and consider what it means for your life.
Almost all the homophobic churches now days have this as their standard position on the LGBTQ+. More concisely it is known as the “Love the sinner, hate the sin,” position.
Jesus loves sinners. Jesus forgives. The homophobic churches would love LGBTQ+ to get to know Jesus as they understand Jesus and stop being LGBTQ+.
So the statement by “He Gets Us” doesn’t mean that they aren’t homophobic. The new approach of “Love the Sinner, hate the sin,” of homophobic Christians is so widely known and understood that you would have to be a complete idiot, or shamelessly disingenuous to think it was any affirming statement. I don’t exclude the possibility that Joy Ashford is both.
However, Joy Ashford frames the new group and statement by “He Gets Us,” as opposed to the previous situation where “He Gets Us,” is the campaign of known homophobic groups which leads you to think that the “He Gets Us,” is no longer being supported by a homophobic group.
The sinister reality of what “He Gets Us” really is.
This article in the Rolling Stones, “This Evangelical Billionaire Family Wants to Convert You on Super Bowl Sunday,” Feb. 7, 2024 explains very clearly that the “He Gets Us,” campaign is backed by homophobes. Note that the Rolling Stones article was five days before the Dallas Morning News article. Even a minimal effort would have led Joy Ashford to discover this article. I found it in a minute or two.
The Rolling Stones explains:
The He Gets Us campaign is being driven by the billionaire family behind Hobby Lobby, the arts and crafts chain infamous for its crusades to deny its employees birth control coverage and use of bathrooms associated with their gender identity. Hobby Lobby co-founder David Green has previously disclosed helping fund the He Gets Us ads, but his eldest son, Mart — Hobby Lobby’s “Ministry Investment Officer” — is one of three board members at the new nonprofit managing the ad campaign, documents show.
The article states that Mart Green is one of the three board members running Come Near, the other two board members are Bob Hoskins and Marwan Rifka who are the Founder and Vice-President respectively of OneHope, a group pushing for Evangelical world domination through missionary work with youth in many nations. They are homophobic and a menace.
OneHope
I have a full report on OneHope at this post. They have ECFA certification.
Compassion International and Ken Calwell
Come Near’s CEO is Ken Calwell, formerly marketing officer at Compassion International, another homophobic Christian group. They have ECFA certification.
This is his Linked In.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ken-calwell/
I have a report on Compassion International at this post.
Come Near
They have a website and a LinkedIn page.
The webpage doesn’t list any officers or board members or address or much of anything.
The LinkedIn page is not very informative either.
https://www.linkedin.com/company/come-near/about/
I downloaded the corporate files from the State of North Carolina and confirmed that the three officers are Bob Hoskins, Marwan Rifka, and Mart Green. (Section 5. Directors, Article VI. Board of Directors in their filing.)
The original name was “Come Closer Foundation” which I think they realized is sort of creepy.
In Article III. Purposes, they state that the purpose is, “promoting spiritual growth and lifestyle based on biblical values,” among other things.
Lerma Agency
The head of the agency is Pedro Lerma.
This is their website.
They are proud of profiting off homophobia.
https://lermaagency.co m/the-work/he-gets-us/
What Joy Ashford of the Dallas Morning News didn’t tell you is that he is a director for Catholic Charities of Dallas, a part of another homophobic institution.
https://www.ccdallas.org/about-ccd/meet-the-board/
https://www.ccdallas.org/bio/pedro-lerma/
Brandhaven, the real agency behind the ad?
BrandHaven, formerly Haven, is part of a team of organizations under a newly formed nonprofit that has secured two ad spots for the national “He Gets Us” campaign during Super Bowl LVIII this Sunday. BrandHaven is providing integrated marketing and will have team members in Las Vegas this weekend for on-the-ground support.
This is their webpage.
They are proud of aiding and abetting a homophobic group.
https://brandhavenagency.com/portfolio/he-gets-us/
So what is “He Gets Us”? It is a stealth homophobic organization.
As someone stated, it is a bait and switch. It is a group which has adopted a stealth approach to their purpose.
The homophobic Christians are realizing that the “love the sinner, hate the sin,” is recognized by most people, (excepting Joy Ashford I suppose) and so the real agenda is buried deeper.
Joy Ashford and the Dallas Morning News are a menace to the LGBT in Dallas
Prior to this article there have been a whole series of articles that mislead by omission. However, with this latest article Ashford is actively misleading.
If you look at the listing post of stealth articles at the Dallas Morning News you will see that the majority are by Joy Ashford.
Also, the Dallas Morning News editors certainly must know what is happening both with these articles about “He Gets Us” as well as the other stealth articles.
You might point out that they did a report on Stedfast Baptist church, but that probably isn’t so much that they are concerned with the LGBT, but that Stedfast was disrupting the whole “love the sinner, hate the sin,” strategy. To repair the disruption to the image evangelicals want Christianity to have they published an appalling letter to the editor by Paula Dardaganian.
We need to realize that we have two anti-LGBT papers in the city of Dallas, one obvious in its hostility, the Dallas Express, but the other one more pernicious, and sly, is the Dallas Morning News.
The Dallas Morning News is going with this idea that the “He Gets Us” campaign isn’t homophobic or anti-LGBT. The following article is titled, “Dallas bar Lee Harvey’s taking heat for appearing in “He Gets Us’ Super Bowl ad,” Feb. 14, 2024, by Clair Bailor.
The article states:
The campaign has been called out for being backed by funders who have supported anti-LGBTQ causes.
The article represents that as being a mistaken idea stating.
Regarding its stance on the LGBTQ community, the campaign notes on its website that “Jesus loves gay people and Jesus loves trans people. The LGBTQ+ community, like all people, is invited to explore the story of Jesus and consider his example of unconditional love, grace, and forgiveness of others.”
The owner denies that he knew what the photos taken by the “He Gets Us” would be used for. The DMN talks about the bar supposedly having drag shows at some time and LGBTQ+ happy hours. So what? They enabled a major national menace to the LGBT and think token trivialities make up for it. It also shows how the DMN is trying to continue to support those who aided and abetted homophobia.
Again, we need to realize what the agenda of the Dallas Morning News is.
Why do they think they can get away with this?
They can because they realize that the whole so-called leadership of the LGBT in Dallas are cringing supplicants worried not to be seen as troublemakers and worried about what the straight evangelicals will think.
That is why there was a bathhouse raid in 2010 in Dallas, they knew that the LGBT wouldn’t do much more than whine. There were no protests over the 2010 Bath house raids, and the whole matter was dropped after charges were dropped and forgotten. The Dallas Voice avoided putting the news and developments regarding the raid on the cover of its newspaper or in the table of contents.
The City of Dallas thinks they can refuse to release the records of the 2010 Bathhouse raid because they know that the so-called LGBT leadership are cringing supplicants.
This is why the Dallas Police Dept. thinks they can give meaningless replies.
This spinless LGBT so-called leadership is why we don’t have a human rights commission.
Though this post is about an article published in D Magazine in 1996, it still describes much of the LGBT leadership in 2024. We will don’t have a parade in June on the streets. Instead it is behind walls in Fair Park miles away from the community.
Conclusion
Homophobic Christianity realizes they are losing badly the culture war with previous tactics and now they are going stealth. They have developed a strategy, a bait and switch, to revive their fortunes. Unlike homophobic Christianity in the past, they have become a lot more sophisticated and strategic in their thinking, and they are on the prowl to bring down the LGBT.