FSTDT

The Islamic State #fundie news.msn.com

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Islamic State, the al-Qaeda offshoot that seized large swathes of northern Iraq last month, has warned women in the city of Mosul to wear full-face veils or risk severe punishment.

The Sunni insurgents, who have declared a caliphate in parts of Iraq and Syria and have threatened to march on Baghdad, also listed guidelines on how veils and clothes should be worn, part of a campaign to violently impose their radical brand of Islam.

"The conditions imposed on her clothes and grooming was only to end the pretext of debauchery resulting from grooming and overdressing," said the Islamic State in a statement.

"This is not a restriction on her freedom but to prevent her from falling into humiliation and vulgarity or to be a theater for the eyes of those who are looking."

A cleric in Mosul told Reuters that Islamic State gunmen had shown up at his mosque and ordered him to read their warning on loudspeakers when worshipers gather.

"Anyone who is not committed to this duty and is motivated by glamour will be subject to accountability and severe punishment to protect society from harm and to maintain the necessities of religion and protect it from debauchery," said the Islamic State.

The insurgents, formerly called the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), have been systematically stamping out any religious or cultural influences they deem non-Islamic since their lightning sweep through the north.

U.S. military and Iraqi security officials estimate the Islamic State has at least 3,000 fighters in Iraq, rising towards 20,000 when new recruits since last month's advance are included.

The Islamic State provided guidelines on how women should dress in Mosul, one of Iraq's biggest cities. The hands and feet must be covered. Wear shapeless clothes that don't hug the body. No perfume.

The insurgents run vice patrols in Mosul which answer to a morality committee which has shut Mosul's college of fine arts and physical education, knocked down statues of famous poets and banned smoking and waterpipes.

Women have been told to never walk unaccompanied by a male guardian. The Islamic State even ordered shopkeepers to cover their store mannequins with full-face veils.

A man was recently whipped in public for sexually harassing a woman.

Islamic State militants view Iraq's majority Shi'ites as infidels who deserve to be killed and have told Christians to either convert to Islam, pay a religious levy or face death.

Republican Party of Texas #fundie news.msn.com

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — The Texas Republican Party now endorses so-called "reparative therapy" for gays, under a new platform given final approval at its annual convention Saturday.

The new anti-gay language never came up for debate before roughly 7,000 delegates ratified a Texas GOP platform that tea party groups succeeded in pushing further to the right, including winning a harder line on immigration.

One influential tea party group called Texas Eagle Forum had urged the party to support psychological treatments that seek to turn gay people straight. It comes after Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie last fall signed a law banning such therapies on minors, and California has a similar law.

The Fort Worth Convention Hall cheered when party leaders announced that Christie finished a distant 11th in a 2016 presidential straw poll.

"There's a very, very small group of people who want to keep the party in the past. We were here today to try to pull the party into the future," said Rudy Oeftering, vice president of the gay conservative group Metroplex Republicans. "The only way the party can go into the future is to start listening to young people, to start listening to people who have gay family members."

Oeftering and allies had lined up to speak against the therapy language that had been added earlier this week. But they never got a chance to address delegates, because a parliamentary motion to approve the full platform was called first.

Under the new plank, the Texas GOP recognizes "the legitimacy and efficacy of counseling, which offers reparative therapy and treatment for those patients seeking healing and wholeness from their homosexual lifestyle."

The American Psychological Association and other major health organizations have condemned such counseling, which generally try to change a person's sexual orientation or to lessen their interest in engaging in same-sex sexual activity. The groups say the practice should not be used on minors because of the danger of serious psychological harm.

"The platform reflects what the people in the Republican Party have asked for, and that should be no surprise: family values, protection of marriage between one man and one woman and everything that goes along with that," said Jonathan Saenz, president of the conservative group Texas Values and a convention delegate.

Gay conservatives did come away with a rare victory at the convention: Winning the removal of decades-old language in the state party platform that states, "homosexuality tears at the fabric of society."

Slawomir Kostrzewa #fundie news.msn.com

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — A Roman Catholic priest has touched off a controversy in Poland after news media quoted him describing toys like LEGO's Monster Fighters as tools of Satan that lead children to the "dark side."

The Super Express tabloid quoted the Rev. Slawomir Kostrzewa urging parents to dump the LEGO series as well as Mattel's Monster High. The remarks at a Sunday service in the town of Wolsztyn touched off discussion in predominantly Catholic Poland, which holds priests in high esteem.

Mainstream newspapers seized on the report, as did state radio. Parents took to Twitter to mock Kostrzewa.

At issue are the interlocking block toy's fantasy figures, such as a vampire baring his teeth. The range includes characters like The Swamp Creature and The Werewolf.

In remarks Friday to The Associated Press, Kostrzewa says the faces of the monsters and zombies are scary and undermine a child's right to live in harmony and security. Though he denied that he connected the matter to Satan, he underscored that corporations bent on profit do not have the best interests of children in mind.

"Toys are increasingly ugly and aggressive in form," he said. "Many of them promote negative emotions and the aesthetics of death. In my opinion they have a negative influence on a child's development."

He said some parents need guidance on the effect that toys have on their children.

LEGO spokesman Roar Trangbaek insisted the toys were fun and inspiring, while conflict games have been played for generations.

"You can play out various scenarios and various emotions with the different facial expressions the mini figures have: happy, angry, sad," Trangbaek told the AP. "The beauty of our product is that you can play out whatever you like."

It is not Kostrzewa's first crusade. He has in the past campaigned against Sanrio's Hello Kitty, arguing that it promoted the pornography industry and the sexualizing of young girls.

Jessica Dutro #fundie news.msn.com

"PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — An Oregon woman on trial for the murder of her 4-year-old son believed the boy was gay and that was a motive behind the deadly beatings, a prosecutor said.

Jessica Dutro's son Zachary died in August 2012, days after collapsing at the homeless shelter where his family was living southwest of Portland.

Washington County Judge Don Letourneau ruled Wednesday, after jurors were released for the day, that a Facebook message from Dutro to her boyfriend was admissible evidence, The Oregonian newspaper reported (http://is.gd/rfralf ).

In the message, Dutro told her boyfriend, Brian Canady, that Zachary was "facing the wall" because he had made her angry.

Her son was going to be gay, she wrote, using a slur. "He walks and talks like it. Ugh."

Canady would have to "work on" Zachary, she wrote.

The message established Dutro's motive for inflicting a pattern of abuse, prosecutor Megan Johnson said. Dutro assaulted three of her children, but Zachary received the harshest treatment, authorities said.

The judge ruled additional web searches done by Dutro were also admissible. On Aug. 16, 2012, the day her son's life support was terminated, Dutro searched terms such as anger management and parenting classes, prosecutors said. She also searched listings for free stuff and sex with strangers, they said.

Earlier this month, Canady pleaded guilty to manslaughter and assault for his role in the homicide.

The boy died of blunt-force trauma to his abdomen and a delay in medical treatment, prosecutors said.

Dutro, 25, is charged with murder, murder by abuse and second-degree assault."