Shocker: Mass Resistance declared a hate group

Brian Camenker, Amy Contrada, and the rest of the anti-gay activists at Mass Resistance have finally received some long-overdue recognition. In the most recent issue of its Intelligence Report the Southern Poverty Law Center, an organization that tracks hate groups across the country, added Mass Resistance to its list of anti-gay hate groups. Camenker and co. join the illustrious ranks of Fred Phelps's Westboro Baptist Church and Lou Sheldon's Traditional Values Coalition.

Mass Resistance has worked hard over the past year to earn that distinction. In the run-up to the hearing on the transgender rights bill, House Bill 1722, Contrada drafted an exhaustive report cataloguing the impact the bill would have on the state, warning that it would force hotels to rent out their space to BDSM conferences. Last May, during a legislative hearing on health education-related bills, Mass Resistance activist Sally Naumann claimed that the Nazis were gay and that they only persecuted other gay people who were too flamboyant. And that same month Mass Resistance joined forces with Jim and Joe Rizoli of Framingham to take video footage of the Massachusetts Youth Pride festival on Boston Common and put clips they found particularly disturbing online. The Rizoli brothers are the subjects of another article in the Intelligence Report documenting their anti-immigrant activism against Framingham's Brazilian community.

It's hard to imagine how they'll top being inducted into the homophobe hall of fame. But we're betting Mass Resistance will find a way.