Base8 FAQ
“If there ever needs to be sunshine on a particular issue, it’s a ballot measure.”
U.S. District Judge Morrison England
January 29, 2009
Q. Why “Base8″?
A. Because the basis of this database began with donor records to California’s 2008 rights-gutting ballot initiative, Proposition 8.
That, and “Base8″ is the de facto (and somewhat arbitrary) number system used by modern computers (eight bits = one byte.) Being a geek, I like that.
Q. What is Base8, exactly?
Base8 is an ever-growing, ever-evolving, human-edited, searchable database of donors to political campaigns and related causes, both for and against equal rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people.
Q. Why are you doing this?
A. Because a lot of people — mainly those of us who have been harmed, badly, and in real and measurable ways — want to know who is funding our oppression, and who is helping further the recognition of our equality.
We were (and continue to be) profoundly affected by Proposition 8, and by the continuing tide of anti-gay legislation and bigotry across the United States. We’re tired of funding our own oppression by giving our money to people who turn around and donate it to anti-gay ballot measures, anti-gay causes, anti-gay organizations, anti-gay political parties, and anti-gay politicians. We know there are many millions of people just like us, and that is why we created Base8.
Ultimately, Base8 forces bigots to be honest with their clientele. They will no longer be able to smile at their gay customers and clients, take their gay money, and then use it to fund laws that keep LGBT people second-class citizens. They’ll have to drop the pretense that they “love” gay people while they actively work to deny us equal rights.
They can’t have it both ways. They can’t pretend LGBT people don’t deserve equal rights while expecting us to still be their customers, clients and “friends.” If they want our support, they cannot treat us as their inferiors.
Q. Why don’t you name all the pro-equality donors the way you do the anti-gay donors? That seems only fair.
A. Because, frankly, we don’t trust Base8’s anti-gay visitors to use that information responsibly. There’s so much hysteria from the anti-gay side over imagined harassment, intimidation, vandalism, and violence (much of which, we believe, is nothing more than empty fearmongering), we can only conclude they are projecting their fantasies of what they’d like to do to us if they thought they could get away with it. We’re not going to pave the way for another gay-hating crackpot like Jim David Adkisson to start picking us off one by one.
You don’t see gay people running around shooting bigots — but you so see an awful lot of bigots running around killing gay people.
That is the main reason we do not identify specific pro-equality donors and other progressives in the same way we do the bigots. Exceptions include out-and-proud businesspeople, and those who have taken a public stand (e.g., in a TV interview, in a signed letter to the editor, etc.) in support of equality.
Another reason we don’t out equality supporters by name is that it is still legal in most states to fire a person from his or her job simply for being LGBT. We don’t want to be responsible for some kid getting sacked from his much-needed minimum-wage job just because his bigoted boss disapproved of his $25 donation to a pro-equality cause.
Q. But you do identify minimum-wage workers who donated mere pennies to anti-gay causes, by name. Is that fair?
A. Probably not. But then, we’re not trying to get anybody fired, from any job. Besides, unlike the loophole that allows bigots to fire gay people in most states, it would be pretty hard to fire somebody (or get somebody fired) for his or her political views without incurring a wrongful termination lawsuit — which is as it should be.
We just want to know that if we go to Restaurant XYZ, we can avoid being served by the one person in the place who contributed to stripping us of our equal rights. (Not only do we not want to give someone like that our money, but if somebody is that homophobic, we don’t want to worry about them spitting — or worse — in our food. Seriously.)
Mind you, we don’t boycott entire companies just because one low-level employee donated to hate. When we decide whether or not to do business with a company, we take into consideration the position(s) of the donor(s), how many donors there are (on each side of the war), and, of course, whether or not the company itself has a good (or bad) track record of diversity and inclusion.
For example, you’ll find a large number of law firms with great diversity policies (which we recognize and detail here), but which, sadly, employ a few anti-gay lawyers. Naturally, we would definitely do business with a LGBT-supportive law firm, but we’d never want to use an anti-gay lawyer. (Again, not only would we not want to give him or her our money, but we would never have complete trust or confidence such a person would handle our affairs with our best interest at heart.)
We also wouldn’t boycott a hospital with one anti-gay doctor — we just wouldn’t want that doctor sticking his hands in our bodies.
One thing that will prompt us to write off an entire company is an anti-gay donation (or other anti-gay activism) on the part of a business owner, company executive, director, major stockholder, or other person of great influence or benefit. Two of the first examples that come to mind: Doug Manchester’s hotel operations, and Cinemark (Century, CinéArts, and Tinseltown Theater movie theatre chains).
Q. But that hurts all the good, low-paid employees who had nothing to do with these donations.
A. Sorry about the collateral damage. We think good people like that should find jobs elsewhere.
Q. Why do you include donations of mere pennies at all? Why not just include donations of more than, say, $1,000, or even $100?
A. Because it makes no difference to us whether someone donated a million dollars, or ten cents. Some people can afford a million dollars, and some people would love to donate a million dollars, but can only afford five.
Conversely, many very rich people are just plain cheap — and some people who really can’t afford to donate much go to the ridiculous ends of wiping out their entire savings — like Pam and Rick Patterson of Folsom, California, a Mormon couple raising five young sons (who would probably like to go to college someday) in “a comfortable but modest three-bedroom home”: it was so important to the Pattersons to donate to the cause of hatred and bigotry, they withdrew $50,000 from their life savings and donated it to Yes On 8.
As far as we’re concerned, a donation is nothing more than a statement of support for a cause. The amount does not matter; the donor is on record as denying us our birthright as American citizens.
Q. Don’t Web sites like yours result in a lot of anti-gay donors being fired from their jobs?
A. Not that we’re aware of. As I wrote in May, 2009, using the two most often cited examples of people being “fired” for supporting Prop 8, Scott Eckern of Sacramento’s California Musical Theatre, and Richard Raddon of the Los Angeles Film Festival:
Eckern did not “lose” his job, nor was he “forced” to resign, as the vast majority of … Mormons insist on saying; he resigned voluntarily, “after prayerful consideration”:“I am leaving California Musical Theatre after prayerful consideration to protect the organization and to help the healing in the local theatre-going and creative community.”
And as for Raddon, his initial resignation was rejected before he successfully resigned a second time:
First, Richard Raddon wasn’t forced to do anything. We, however, chose not to give our money to an organization that pays someone who uses his money against us. What a simple concept that is, and how sad so few simple minds actually comprehend it.(Shame on you, Bill Condon, for saying Raddon “lost his job.” That’s bullshit, and you know it. He was free to stay; in fact, the first time he tried to resign, you wouldn’t let him.)
If anyone has ever been fired from a job for supporting anti-gay causes, we have yet to hear about it.
On the other hand, we do understand the risks faced by employees who support progressive causes, especially LGBT employees: They can be fired, legally. And we’re not about to help any anti-gay bigot find an excuse to sack a good guy.
Q. Why do some records show home addresses of donors? I thought you weren’t going to expose home addresses.
A. We reproduce donor records as shown by the state agency (usually the Secretary of State) that makes them available for public perusal. California generally does not show home addresses; states like Arizona and Maine do.
While we can easily find the home addresses of most donors, we don’t normally display them in Base8, unless 1) the address is already part of the public donor record, and/or 2) a home address is given as the official address of a business.
In other words, we want to avoid doing business with people at their places of business; we have no interest in where they live.
On the other hand, if you want to know which of your neighbors think you don’t deserve equal rights (would you really want to invite them to your next BBQ, or ask them to house-sit for you?), a little Googling makes it easy to figure out. But that’s up to you; we’re only interested in keeping our money out of the hands of our oppressors, and giving it instead to businesses and organizations that recognize and support our equality.
Q. What are those strange numbers I see in some records?
You’re probably looking at a Proposition 8 record, which includes the actual transaction number (pulled from the California Secretary of State’s records) of a single donation. Every Prop 8 record has (or should have) a line that looks something like this:
10/14/08 - $100.00 - 1369259-INC104904 - Filed: 01/30/09
The first date (in the above example, “10/14/08″) is the transaction date — the date the donation was made.
The dollar amount (in the above example, “$100.00″) is the actual dollar amount of the donation.
The “Filed” date (in the above example, “Filed: 01/30/09″) is the date the receiving PAC filed the record with the office of the California Secretary of State. Not all records will include a “Filed” date; we started adding “Filed” after the anti-gay brigades filed suit to keep tens of thousands of donations hidden from public view (you can read all about that here). The “Filed” date (the vast majority of which are 01/30/09) shows you which records the Yes On 8 camp didn’t file until the very last minute — and often reveals some very (deliberately?) sloppy bookkeeping; e.g., a donation from a specific donor in August, 2008, may have been reported in August, 2008, while another, earlier donation (say, from June, 2008) from the very same donor may not have been reported until January, 2009. Very curious, indeed.
The long number (in the above example, “1369259-INC104904″) is the transaction number as recorded by the Secretary of State’s office. It is a unique identifier (think of it like a Social Security number); we include it in each and every record so that any entry can be cross-checked against the original SoS record, if needed.
Q. I checked one of your records against the original Secretary of State record, and the name of the employer doesn’t match. What gives?
We do a lot of corrections, especially on employer names, which are often badly (deliberately?) mangled in the original SoS record, or abbreviated to the point that it would be difficult for us on the back end to combine multiple donor records into a single, easy-to-read record here. For example, you and I might immediately recognize the abbreviation “LADWP” or “LBUSD,” but not everyone will know they mean, respectively, “Los Angeles Department of Water and Power” and “Long Beach Unified School District” — so we spell out the full name.
In the end, the basic information — who donated, how much, and to what — never changes. If you think we’ve made an error in a given record, let us know in a comment for that record.
Q. Why aren’t the Web sites for companies whose employees donated to Proposition 8 clickable?
Simple: Because we don’t want to increase the Google PageRank (or the ranking in any other “live” traffic-tracking system, such as Alexa.com) of sites belonging to anti-gay bigots.
You’ll notice that URLs for businesses with a record of supporting progressive causes are clickable — we’re happy to send traffic their way, and to make it as easy as possible for you to get there.
Q. What does “(q.v.)” mean?
It means quod vide, Latin for “see which.” In other words, we’re citing another record we recommend you look up for further information. For example: “XYZ Co. president Joe Blow also owns Blah Blah Ginger, Inc. (q.v.)” tells you that there’s another record for Blah Blah Ginger, Inc. (and that record may have more information you’ll be interested in).
Q. I searched for a record you cited, and couldn’t find it. Why not?
A. Because not all records have been imported into Base8 yet. We’re trying to present as clean a database as possible, which is why we release just one category at a time (and why it’s taking so long to get the whole database online). If we cite a record that’s missing at present, rest assured it will show up soon.
Q. What do the red and blue headings mean?
RED indicates an anti-gay donor or activist. The specific text tells you which anti-gay cause the business/person contributed to, most commonly:
California Proposition 8 (2008)
PROTECTMARRIAGE.COM (ANTI-GAY)
NATL ORG/MARRIAGE (ANTI-GAY)
CAPITOL RESOURCE (ANTI-GAY)
Maine Question 1 (2009)
STANDFORMARRIAGEMAINE.COM (ANTI-GAY)
Hawaii Anti-Gay Constitutional Amendment (1998)
SAVE TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE ‘98 HAWAII (ANTI-GAY)
You’ll also find “red” entries for contributors to the anti-gay measures Proposition 102 (Arizona, 2008) and Amendment 2 (Florida, 2008), as soon as we get them imported.
BLUE indicates a business or individual we ourselves would be glad to support; the business (or one or more of its employees) is known to support/have supported progressive causes (LGBT or otherwise), which may, or may not, mean a donation to pro-LGBT legislation. We provide “blue” records as positive alternatives to the many “red” records.
Q. I found inaccurate information in a record. Will you fix it?
A. We have made every attempt to be as accurate as possible with the records in Base8. We have used public records, corporate Websites and other such records to this end. However, we acknowledge the possibility that errors may occur. If you believe a factual error exists in a record, use the Comments link located beneath that record, and explain the nature of the error. We will look into the matter and issue any/all corrections that are required. Please note, however, that this does not apply if the information is correct and you are simply disgruntled as to its presence in our database.
Q. You’re making us targets! You want to intimidate us!
A. That’s not our intent. In fact, we explicitly warn visitors to Base8 that we neither advocate nor condone any malicious behavior on their part with any information they find here. Do not use any of the information from Base8 to stalk, harass, intimidate or otherwise harm any person(s) or property. If you do so, you do it without our support or consent. Furthermore, we fully support any legal actions taken by those physically or materially harmed by any individual using information found here.
That said: We wish merely to provide LGBT individuals and their supporters the opportunity to stop funding their own oppression. For years we have been giving our hard-earned cash to people who then turn around and use it to fund anti-gay legislation like Proposition 8. We don’t have to do that any longer. We have other options.
And since our votes don’t seem to matter, our choice is to vote with our wallets.
Q. Boycotts are illegal/immoral/McCarthyism!
A. Boycotts are a perfectly legal consumer action which involve individuals or groups voluntarily abstaining from buying products or using the services of a particular business, often for political reasons. Probably the most famous boycott is the Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955-56). No one is legally obligated to patronize any particular business.
Q. You’re destroying my/our livelihood!
A. Like anyone else, we have the right to determine where we spend our money. If we discover that certain individuals to whom we give our money are using that money against us — funneling it into anti-gay legislation, for example — we have every right to choose not to give them our money. Just as you have the right to fund whatever ballot initiatives you wish, we have the right to stop funding our own oppression and destruction.
In our opinion, if your actions cause people to stop patronizing your business, you’re destroying your own livelihood.
Q. You’re targeting us for defending marriage / participating in democracy / standing up for what we believe in / etc.!
A. You can “defend marriage” / participate in democracy / stand up for what you believe in / etc., all you want. You have every right to do so and nobody is stopping you. However, some people are choosing to stop funding your efforts with their money, and we are merely providing them information which will assist them in doing so… or not, as they prefer. We’re not demanding anyone boycott anything. It’s still (last time we checked) a free country.
Q. How dare you put my information online? This is an invasion of my privacy!
A. We didn’t. Every last piece of information you see in Base8 was already online, and publicly accessible. We merely gathered it all from various sources and put it into Base8.
If you have a problem with that, we suggest you take it up with the many sources the information came from — public donor records from the state, school alumni records, your church newsletters, etc., etc., etc.
Besides, if you don’t have anything to hide, what are you worried about?
And if you’re ashamed of donating to bigotry, or feel remorse, maybe you should have thought about that before you made your donation. (But congratulations on feeling shame or remorse — that’s a sign there’s hope for you!)
Q. How would you like it if someone made a database with all of the “No on 8″ people in it?
A. Go ahead. The donor information for Proposition 8 is available at cal-access.ss.ca.gov/…, and the donor information for every other anti-gay ballot measure of note here can be found in Our Sources . If you want to spend some 18 hours a day, seven days a week for the next year extracting the records, formatting them into something readable, and researching every last one, nobody is stopping you. Knock yourself out.
Q. I’m going to expose you!
A. Here, we’ll give you a head start: cal-access.ss.ca.gov/…. Some of us are proud of our donations and don’t feel the need to go to court and beg for a voter-approved initiative to be overturned so we can hide what we did.
Q. I’m going to come to your house and (insert threat here).
A. That’s not recommended. We live in a very quiet, safe community. We kid you not when we say that it makes the local paper if somebody’s flower pot gets kicked over. Our police force patrols routinely and is very responsive to any and all calls for assistance — usually within five minutes or less (it’s a small town) — and we will bring charges against you (and, if we can, file a civil lawsuit against you).
Furthermore, it’s up to you if you want to risk being caught on tape, and finding yourself on YouTube.
Q. How would you like it if I boycotted your business just because you’re gay?
A. Feel free: Lavender Liberal Store
Go ahead and tell all your homophobic friends to boycott our gear all they want — they never would have bought any of our unapologetic, left-wing, pro-LGBT merchandise in the first place.
We’d actually prefer you boycott our business rather than eradicate our rights, because the former does us no harm, whereas the latter does.
Q. I’m going to use your database to boycott all the “gay” businesses, and support all the anti-gay businesses!
A. So? Most of you do that anyway. If you’re so homophobic that you wouldn’t support a business with a rainbow decal in the window, or you search out businesses that brand their advertising with an ixthys (the “fish” symbol), you’re going to do that anyway. (Mormons, especially, are known for keeping their business among themselves.) What do we care?
Besides, if you use Base8 for any reason, you give us more traffic. And we like that, a lot.
Q. Why are you singling out Mormons and Catholics?
A. If it looks like there are more Mormons here than other religionists, there’s a reason for that, and it’s not that we’re “singling them out.” The fact is that Mormons contributed the majority of the funds to Yes On 8, which was documented long before we created Base8.
Mormon donors are typically easy to identify as they often went to Brigham Young University, have blogs where they clearly indicate their affiliation with the LDS church, are noted LDS members on one or more social networking sites (LinkedIn, MySpace, Facebook, and the like), chatter up a storm on “mission” reunion sites, etc., etc. In reality, Mormons single themselves out, with monotonous, predictable regularity.
As for Catholics, you’ll find most anti-gay Catholics in the records for the state of Maine. Why do you think that is? (Hint: Ask the Diocese of Portland.)
Q. Why can’t you respect our privacy?
A. We’re the ones who should be asking you that question: Why can’t you respect our privacy, and butt out of our lives?
In any case, per California law (and the law of all other states whose anti-gay donors are listed here), in a voter-approved initiative, donations to ballot initiatives are not a private matter.
As U.S. District Judge Morrison England said: “If there ever needs to be sunshine on a particular issue, it’s a ballot measure.”
The People — and, like it or not, we are “The People” just as much as you are (even if we don’t get to vote on your marriage… yet) — deserve to know who is funneling money into these measures.
Q. Why are there so many typographical errors? Are you people illiterate?
No, but we suspect many of the anti-gay volunteers who took donations over the phone (or, perhaps, the donors themselves) are quite illiterate. The Yes On 8 records, especially, are littered with typos (most of which we suspect are the result of laziness or simply the inability to spell big, scary words like “school” and “district” correctly, and a great many of which we suspect are deliberate attempts to mask the names of specific companies or individuals). Correcting these typos is a slow process, as we research each record, so when you see something ridiculous (like “Church of Ladder Saints“), you’ll know that that’s how the record was filed with the Secretary of State’s office (and will be corrected eventually — and often highlighted just for laughs).
Incidentally, we’ve found that pro-equality donor records are surprisingly free of misspellings and erroneous information. Make of that what you will.
Q. You called me a “bigot”! I’m suing you for libel!
“a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices ; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance … One who is strongly partial to one’s own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ. … a person who is intolerant, esp. regarding religion, politics, or race … A hypocrite; esp., a superstitious hypocrite. A person who regards his own faith and views in matters of religion as unquestionably right, and any belief or opinion opposed to or differing from them as unreasonable or wicked. In an extended sense, a person who is intolerant of opinions which conflict with his own, as in politics or morals; one obstinately and blindly devoted to his own church, party, belief, or opinion. …”
If you fit any of the above definitions, you are a bigot.
“1) n. to publish in print (including pictures), writing or broadcast through radio, television or film, an untruth about another which will do harm to that person or his/her reputation, by tending to bring the target into ridicule, hatred, scorn or contempt of others. Libel is the written or broadcast form of defamation, distinguished from slander, which is oral defamation.
“It is a tort (civil wrong) making the person or entity (like a newspaper, magazine or political organization) open to a lawsuit for damages by the person who can prove the statement about him/her was a lie. Publication need only be to one person, but it must be a statement which claims to be fact and is not clearly identified as an opinion. While it is sometimes said that the person making the libelous statement must have been intentional and malicious, actually it need only be obvious that the statement would do harm and is untrue.
“Proof of malice, however, does allow a party defamed to sue for general damages for damage to reputation, while an inadvertent libel limits the damages to actual harm (such as loss of business) called special damages. Libel per se involves statements so vicious that malice is assumed and does not require a proof of intent to get an award of general damages. Libel against the reputation of a person who has died will allow surviving members of the family to bring an action for damages. Most states provide for a party defamed by a periodical to demand a published retraction. If the correction is made, then there is no right to file a lawsuit.
“Governmental bodies are supposedly immune to actions for libel on the basis that there could be no intent by a non-personal entity, and further, public records are exempt from claims of libel. However, there is at least one known case in which there was a financial settlement as well as a published correction when a state government newsletter incorrectly stated that a dentist had been disciplined for illegal conduct.
“The rules covering libel against a ‘public figure’ (particularly a political or governmental person) are special, based on U.S. Supreme Court decisions. The key is that to uphold the right to express opinions or fair comment on public figures, the libel must be malicious to constitute grounds for a lawsuit for damages.
“Minor errors in reporting are not libel, such as saying Mrs. Jones was 55 when she was only 48, or getting an address or title incorrect.” …
See also: Online Defamation Law, Electronic Frontier Foundation
That said: If you have ever once called a gay person sick, diseased, mentally ill, a pedophile, a sinner, hellbound, a threat, a terrorist, worse than a terrorist, deviant, perverted, or any of the countless other terms of condemnation regularly hurled at us, we’re the ones who should be suing you.
