Antigay group buys Super Bowl ad
Advocate. com reports the antigay group Focus on the Family will air a TV ad during the Super Bowl on Feb. 7.
The 30-second spot, which features University of Florida quarterback and 2007 Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow and his mother, is supposed to be “life- and family-affirming,” a group spokesperson said.
Tebow is known for wearing Bible verse citations in his game-day eye black.
Focus on the Family is one of the most outspoken groups in opposition to equal rights for gays and lesbians, as well as a strong proponent of therapy suggesting homosexuality can be “cured.”
Calif. court to hear custody suit
The San Francisco Chronicle reports a Santa Cruz court will hear a custody dispute between former lesbian partners in which the biological mother has become romantically involved with the sperm-donor father of her 10-month-old twins.
Kim T. Smith of Santa Cruz has sued for joint custody of the twins, saying she and former partner Maggie Quale agreed to raise the boys together.
Quale and the biological father now live together and argue they should be able to parent the children.
Quale and Smith never registered as domestic partners, but the two women are listed as the boys’ parents on their birth certificates.
A hearing in the case is scheduled for Jan. 29.
Editor resigns over antigay cartoon
The Chicago Tribune reports the editor of the independent student newspaper for the University of Notre Dame and St. Mary’s College has resigned and that the paper has discontinued a cartoon strip that made a joke about violence against gays.
The Observer newspaper published a letter of resignation and apology Jan. 18 from Kara King, an assistant managing editor. King said miscommunication with another editor led to the strip running without her first reviewing the material.
The cartoon depicted a conversation that says a baseball bat is the “easiest way to turn a fruit into a vegetable.”
The authors of “The Mobile Party” comic strip apologized in a letter published Jan. 15.
— Larry Nichols