If you contend that Kate Hunt is being prosecuted because of her sexual orientation

[shawn703]

Or that her girlfriend's parents must be religious zealots, what evidence do you have to support your beliefs?

If you don't have any real evidence and just "have a feeling" it must be true, why is this any different than what birthers do?

[MrSlayer]

1. God Bless America…

http://m.

[Buzz Clik]

3. Oh. That Kate Smith. +1

(I don't like the Flyers)

[Buzz Clik]

2. What? Holy crapoli! False equivalence of the first order.

I have no desire to enter the argument at all because I don't have any emotional involvement in this whatsoever. However, you are drawing a parallel that cannot exist: Orly Taits (sp?) deciding that Obama has no birth certificate is a lunatic disputing physical evidence; questioning the motives of the parents is simply stating an opinion.

[shawn703]

7. Well

What more evidence is possible other than the statements of the parents with the complaints and the prosecutors to explain their own motives? There's also a gender and orientation-neutral law on the books that is being applied in this case. The people making the accusations of homophobia and religious zealotry have been pretty adamant in their assertions without any evidence to the contrary, other than statements from non-credible parties who have already been caught making other statements proven false.

Edit to add that I'll concede I don't think anyone has risen to the level of Orly Taitz nuttery, more to the level of the type of person that would claim Obama wasn't born here because they read it on the Internet so it must be true.

[uppityperson]

4. Kate Smith died in 1986. Who is prosecuting her?

[shawn703]

5. My mistake

Corrected the title

[alp227]

6. Kaitlyn Hunt, whose step dad is a Smith. N/t

[HooptieWagon]

8. The "Free Kate" crowd has been caught in so many lies, I don't believe a thing they say. nt

[Initech]

9. I'm having a hard time sorting through the facts.

Something stinks about this story and I can't put my finger on it. So if she did convince that girl to leave her parents home, that paints the story in a whole different light. I'm waiting for the facts not the conspiracy theories.

[Ms. Toad]

15. No one directly involved

has said that Kaitlyn Hunt convinced the 14 year old to leave her parents home. That event is described, twice, in the affidavit as running away - with no suggestion that Hunt had anything to do with her decision to leave home.

(That spin comes from DU, even though neither the affidavit nor the media report quoting the younger girl's parents gave it that spin.)

[dsc]

10. well among other things

I have to wonder just how many males of her age have been prosecuted for this in say the past few years and how many gay females. Since gays make up around 6% of the population, then the prosecutions should be around 15 males involved in this behavior for every one female engaged in this behavior. (underage sex with a female). I am going to be blunt, I don't think the ration is anywhere near that.

[madville]

19. The ratio is probably much higher

This charge originating from a lesbian relationship certainly makes it unique, the reason why it's a story in the first place. Males in hetero relationships getting charged with this barely make the local news if at all, usually not a story.

[dsc]

20. that is just plain not true

several cases of that have made the news and it nearly always does due to how rare it is for an 18 year old to be so charged.

[Iggo]

11. ...

...

[davidpdx]

12. There are apparently witnesses to a discussion that took place at the school

when the mother was there. We do know the mother approached the school and the school board several times. The substance of those conversations has not be made pubic, for obvious reasons. If they were made public those who believe everyone who supports Kate is lying would then go on to say they are smearing the other parents. Assuming that there will be a trial, these statements will come out eventually.

I think the comparison to birthers is ridiculous. Birthers are conspiracy nuts with their own purpose being to try to get the president thrown out of office. There are people who genuinely care about what happens to Kate and that she is not railroaded by the prosecution who sees fit to use her as an example.

I'm sorry to say, you have lost my respect.

[shawn703]

13. Did I ever have it?

But let's put that aside for a moment.

There are apparently witnesses to a discussion that took place at school - is the context of this alleged discussion discussed anywhere not connected to the freekate site? After actual facts started coming out in this case and we saw their narrative starting to have holes poked in it, they have lost credibility as a reliable source of information.

We do know the mother approached the school and school board - we also know that one of the alleged incidents took place in the school restroom. That's on the arrest affidavit.

If the substance of the conversations is made public and they support the assertion that the girlfriend's parents are religious zealots and homophobes - and the person making those conversations public is not tied to the freekate crowd or at least has a demonstrably neutral corroborating witness, I would be the first person to change his tune on whether or not the girlfriend's parents are deserving of those labels. I will admit though that it wouldn't change whether or not I believe a crime was committed.

And the comparison to birthers isn't that ridiculous. You have one group of people that spreads baseless smears to try to delegitimize someone they don't agree with because they read on the Internet that these smears are actually "facts", and the other group of people are the birthers.

[davidpdx]

14. I'm not saying what the substance of the conversations were, but there were witnesses

What I'm saying is, if this goes to trial we will find out what the witnesses heard. I am curious about the conversation as it applies to the context of the motive the parents had for pressing charges. It is possible there is no truth to it, in which case there will be no effect.

This is not from the Freekate site, but the Facebook page. I read through a lot of the comments and don't see baseless lies being spread. I have to wonder if you are reading anything remotely close to what I am. If they were baseless lies, I would not support them, I guarantee you that. I'm an educated guy who is not naive.

The only once I see making baseless attacks are you and other people in this thread that have time and time again said Kate's supporters are smearing the other parents and equivocating them to "birthers". Now that is an attack.

[shawn703]

16. So what about the lies already proven false?

The freekate page I'm referring to is the one on Facebook. I am not sure if there is another, but a lot of those initial details that were "misreported" include the ages of the girls when they started dating, the claim that they were both minors and the parents waited until Kate turned 18 to press charges, the claim that the parents never spoke to Kate prior to pressing charges, and I can't remember what else at the moment. But when I see that they lied about all of that, I have to question their credibility on their other claims - such as the parents are religious zealots who couldn't handle their daughter being gay.

Don't you question that yourself? I'm assuming you followed this since last week and saw how details "evolved" once law enforcement and the other family spoke to the press and after the arrest affidavit was released. Aren't there enough holes in their narrative already for you to have some doubts about anything else they might claim?

My only claim is that the people labeling the parents as religious zealots and homophobes are doing so without any credible evidence to back it up. Once they provide credible evidence, I will stop making that claim. I'm sorry you take offense to the comparison to how the birthers do things, but in my eyes there isn't much difference. I'm talking methods here, not politics or nuttery.

[davidpdx]

17. I am being very careful what I say about the other parents and I think all supporters should

basically because it hurts Kate and the chances of getting the charges dropped or reduced. The mother HAS stated that on the Facebook page. They have also stated that anyone that engages in negative conversations about the other girl's parents will be kicked out of the group. I have seen this with my own two eyes. As I have stated elsewhere I believe Kate does have a right to defense regardless of what preconceived notions people have. There are people on DU that want to see her branded as a felon and put in prison. I think that is totally ludicrous. Broad-brushing an entire group as nutty (unless it is the Republicans or Tea Party) can be dangerous.

Whether there was confusion about the other girls age or not, it is clear she was 14 when Kate was 18.

I started following the story somewhat over the last few weeks, and then more so since late last week.

I do question the motives of the younger girl's parents, but I will wait until more information comes out in court. Only then will we know the details of what happened. I am interested to know these details for clarification purposes.

I try to be as respectful as possible when I disagree, though it doesn't work. Sometimes we lose it and say things. It happens to me all the time (more so when I'm face to face with someone).

[shawn703]

18. That's all I ask

I don't have a problem with your methods of supporting Kate or your questioning of the parents motives, since you're careful not to label anyone as being homophobic or a fundie. There are posters here who persist on doing this though, and curiously they have been absent from this thread. My criticism was directed at them, not the supporters who aren't employing these tactics.