komov

===<a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/italy-is-this-weeks-hot-spot-for-right-wing-activists-converging-for-world-congress-of-families/" style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;">http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/italy-is-this-weeks-hot-spot-for-right-wing-activists-converging-for-world-congress-of-families/</a>
<div class="mce-content-body" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear;"><div class="layout-constrain--narrow" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; max-width: 47.2222em; padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em; line-height: 1.5;"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">The World Congress of Families, the international network of anti-LGBTQ and anti-choice activists who have <a href="https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/a3b4kk/is-authoritarian-europe-becoming-the-new-hope-of-the-religious-right-v26n1" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">allied themselves</a> with right-wing nationalist and authoritarian <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/world-congress-of-families-leaders-embrace-hungarys-anti-democratic-strongman/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">leaders</a> in Europe and Russia, will convene their 2019 global summit in Verona, Italy on March 29-31. U.S. Religious Right leaders <a href="https://thinkprogress.org/here-are-the-americans-speaking-at-a-hate-group-friendly-with-sanctioned-russian-oligarchs-bb7564932db2/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">scheduled to speak</a> include anti-LGBTQ activist <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/people/jim-garlow/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Jim Garlow</a>, right-wing law professor <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/meet-a-law-professor-conservatives-turn-to-on-marriage-immigration-and-the-scotus-blockade/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">John Eastman</a>, and home schooling advocate <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/people/mike-donnelly/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Mike Donnelly</a>.<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">The marriage of “traditional values” activism with the right-wing nationalist populism embraced by the Religious Right in both the U.S. and Europe is reflected in the appearance of another speaker. Steve Turley is an author and podcaster who argues that Trump’s “redemptive” presidency is one sign that “<a href="https://www.turleytalks.com/blog-summary/president-trump-and-the-global-religious-right" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">the political influence of the Religious Right is just beginning</a>.” In his book, “The Return of Christendom: Demography, Politics, and the Coming Christian Majority,” he <a href="https://www.scribd.com/book/402068631/The-Return-of-Christendom-Demography-Politics-and-the-Coming-Christian-Majority" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">wrote</a>, “I want to argue that we are actually seeing nothing less than a conservative Christian resurgence in our demographics and politics that promises not suicide but rather the salvation of the West.”<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">Now, that’s the kind of talk that gets you invited to WCF, though it is far more optimistic than the dire “demographic winter” predictions, prevalent on the right, that warn white Christians in Europe and elsewhere are being “replaced.”<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">Earlier this month, Turley published a podcast titled, “<a href="https://www.turleytalks.com/videos/studies-whites-projected-to-become-dominant-supermajority-in-u.s?utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=70578153&hsenc=p2ANqtz-9_Yb7h2ybPMXrPBZ6xLJeUBphyxsgb7QhE6oHPND_qsHp-See8CWFsE2kSResOCNc5BvCOctTSKP64OBqTeF0SuehEkg&hsmi=70578153" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">WHITES Projected to Become Dominant SUPERMAJORITY in U.S.</a>” While “the current multicultural insanity that’s unleashed a virulent and pernicious Cultural Marxism upon our nation” is causing damage, Turley said, that such multiculturalism is “slowly and surely dissipating” and it will be replaced by “the restoration of a distinctively American culture, custom and tradition that will continue to define our nation for generations to come.”<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">The WCF hosts regional gatherings as well as its global summit, at which conservative culture warriors re-energize their opposition to feminism and liberalism, brag about their political victories, and share information and strategies for defeating “<a href="https://slate.com/human-interest/2019/03/gender-ideology-trump-bolsonaro-lgbtq.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">gender ideology</a>” and defending “traditional” views on sexuality, family, and gender roles.<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">The World Congress of Families is currently run as a project of the <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/organizations/international-organization-for-the-family/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">International Organization for the Family</a>, the successor organization to the Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society, which started the WCF in the 1990s as an outgrowth of conversations between Russian and American social conservatives. Howard Center founder Allan Carlson will also be speaking in Verona.<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">The IOF and WCF are run by <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/people/brian-brown/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Brian Brown</a>, who made a name for himself as the head of the National Organization for Marriage and its failed effort to prevent marriage equality from becoming the law of the land in the United States. Brown spends enough time in Russia, where he once helped <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/report/globalizing-homophobia-how-the-american-right-supports-and-defends-russias-anti-gay-crackdown/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">lobby for legislation to ban gay couples from adopting</a>, to have a <a href="https://twitter.com/briansbrown/status/1039550784420175872" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">favorite restaurant in the Moscow airport</a>. After <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/anti-equality-activists-from-around-globe-help-brian-brown-launch-new-group/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">launching</a> the IOF in South Africa in late 2016, Brown made one of his frequent trips to Russia to <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/lesterfeder/a-leading-us-social-conservative-just-launched-a-mission-to#.pi6mNgo8j" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">seek funding</a> from Putin-aligned oligarchs and operatives.<p style="margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; line-height: 1.5;">Among the speakers are WCF representatives from Russia—<a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/people/alexey-komov/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Alexey Komov</a>, Brown’s connection to the political support and deep pockets of “God’s oligarch” <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/people/konstantin-malofeev/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Konstantin Malofeev</a>—and from Africa—<a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/people/theresa-okafor/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Theresa Okafor</a>, who has defended harsh anti-LGBTQ legislation in several countries. Joining them are a bevy of right-wing Italian politicians, academics, and activists. Other speakers include public officials from Hungary, Croatia, Malawi, Uganda, and, in a nod to right-wing nostalgia for the reign of Christian monarchs, a sprinkling of royalty, including “<a href="https://wcfverona.org/en/gloria-1/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; transition-duration: 0.2s; transition-property: background-color, border-color, box-shadow, color, opacity, text-shadow, transform, -webkit-transform; transition-timing-function: linear; background-color: transparent; outline-offset: 0.111111em;">Her Serene Highness, Gloria, Dowager Princess of Thurn and Taxis</a>” and Louis Alphonse de Bourbon, Duke of Anjou....</div></div>