Morphicon hotel needs your support

Most of the content of this letter I'm just passing along from a
mailing list it appeared on. This is of importance to Ohiofur, to
Morphicon, and to furries in general, I think. If these people object
to a bondage convention, then I can't imagine that they'd view a furry
convention any more positively. Please do call or write the hotel
(instructions are in the letter), and express your support for freedom
for all Americans. Thanks!

Do feel free to pass this along as well.

------------------

Local Kink Convention attacked by religious right:

For those of you who haven't heard by now, the religious right has
started a smear campaign against a local convention called winter
wickedness. They are trying to get the hotel to agree to never host
anything like this again.

I don't care where you live or if you are kinky, gay, straight, furry,
vampire, bi, christian, pagan, whatever. What this group of people is
doing is wrong - they are trying to dictate via intimidation tactics
what legal actions people are allowed to do.

Please everyone who reads this journal, take a moment to call and
e-mail the hotel and tell them thank you for continuing to support
basic freedom of expression. Get your loved ones to do it as well. The
radicals use these intimidation tactics because they have a history of
working and the only way to stop that is to show that those of use who
support the rights of consenting adults to do as they please are just
as large in number as those who oppose such freedom. The holiday Inn
is more than likely treating this as a test case to see if they should
allow these types of events in their hotels in the future. Please,
please, PLEASE help us keep our right to gather in public.

The hotel's number is 614-436-0700. Their corporate office (better to
call but make sure to reference this event, happening this weekend) is
800-621-0555, then press option 1, then option 5 to get to a live
person. The e-mail form if you prefer to write instead of call is
http://www.ihgplc.com/index.asp?pageid=39. This is one time when
taking 2 minutes to call and e-mail really will matter - they are
documenting everything.

Here's the bulletin from the National Coalition on sexual freedom,
copy and pasted from
http://www.ncsfreedom.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=320&Itemid=48.
It gives you some ideas on what to say.



Support the Holiday Inn - Worthington, OH!

February 4, 2009

Please make a phone call now to support the Holiday Inn Worthington,
the host hotel for Adventures In
Sexuality's (AIS) Winter Wickedness Event taking place February 6-8th.
The religious extremist group, Americans for Truth About
Homosexuality, along with a local religious radio station in the
Columbus, Ohio, area are running a smear campaign against this
pansexual BDSM event.

Peter LaBarbara of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality calls the
event "a freakish sadomasochistic perversion-fest" and urges people to
call the hotel's corporate headquarters to pressure them into
canceling "for the sake of decency and public health."

Bob Burney, a religious extremist Talk Radio DJ, devoted an entire
segment of his show slamming Winter Wickedness and attempting to link
the event with non-consensual and criminal activities. He urged his
listeners to call and mount a campaign against the hotel. (Tuesday,
Part 3 starting at 10 min 42sec: ) Click here to listen.
It will only take a minute for you to help! It doesn't matter where
you live or if you're not going to
attend this event. Please call the Intercontinental Hotels Group
Corporate Customer service line at 800-
621-0555, then press option 1, then option 5, and thank them for not
discriminating against groups, and
for being willing to face minor adversity for the sake of our freedom.

You can also call the Holiday Inn Columbus-Worthington today at
614-436-0700 – they'll be very glad to
hear a friendly voice to counter the hatred of the religious extremists.

Suggested points to make:

1. Thank you for upholding the Fair Accommodations Act and choosing
not to discriminate against legal
events.2. Please don't let a small number of religious extremists
manipulate you by drumming up fear with their misinformation
campaigns.

3. There are over 200 weekend-long BDSM events that take place every
year in America – we bring in a lot of revenue in these hard times. We
like to stay at hotel chains where we have been welcomed when we're
traveling on personal or business travel.

4. Organizers of BDSM events such as Winter Wickedness at The Holiday
Inn comply with state and local
laws prohibiting public sexual intercourse and other forms of sexual
intimacy. Demonstrations, lectures
and discussion groups as well as dinners and evening parties compose
the variety of offerings to guests,
nothing different from any of the other hundreds of conventions hosted
by your franchisees on a weekly basis.

5. Thank you for standing strong against hate and ignorance.

Please pass this on to your friends to call now!


Please re-post this in your journals and encourage your friends to as
well. The radicals will be calling all weekend. I'll be at the event
(tipping the staff generously for every little thing and leaving my
room spotless) but you have no idea how much it would mean to me if my
friends list passed this on to their friends lists who passed it on
and ended up helping to keep groups of furries, pagans, gays,
kinksters, sci-fi freaks, and all the rest of it able to attend this
convention. The radicals have this posted all over the web and they
are using a broad stroke in defining what is sick. If we get shut down
or if after this event the holiday inn has way more negatives than
positives and they decide not to host any of these events nationwide
it only encourages this intimidation against any group not considered
pure enough.

Those of you who know me know I don't pass on chain letters or ask for
this sort of stuff, well, ever. Please help!