Events across US being held to counter release of the film adaptation of book by same-sex marriage opponent Orson Scott Card

Gay rights groups and their supporters are holding events across the US on Friday to counter the release of Ender’s Game – the film adaption of the sci-fi book by vocal same-sex marriage opponent Orson Scott Card.

“We thought that if we gave our community, our allies and our friends something else that’s awesome to do, that would simultaneously benefit their community to offset any damage that might accrue from Ender’s Game becoming a blockbuster and making a new fortune for Orson Scott Card,” said Jono Jarrett of Geeks Out, the gay fan group coordinating the Skip Enders Game campaign.

Jarrett is part of Geeks Out’s founding New York chapter and collaborated with the group’s Dallas and Chicago chapters and supporters to arrange events in Orlando, Toronto and other cities in North America. In New York and Dallas, they’ll be showing the film The Fifth Element at local bars; Chicago’s geeks will be treated to Scott Pilgrim vs The World at a nightclub; and in Orlando, they’ve planned a night of karaoke.

“It’s in keeping with the character of Geeks Out initiatives to have a gathering, to have a party, to make sure that we’re having fun celebrating that we’re geeks and dorks and nerds and weirdos – to marshal those resources so that we’re saying don’t spend in this negative way and maybe you can put them to our community,” Jarrett said.

Card has called gay marriage “the end of democracy in America” and became a board member of the National Organization for Marriage – a group that works against the legalization of same-sex marriage.

Card said in July that the gay marriage issue is “moot” because of the US Supreme Court’s June ruling that it is unconstitutional for the federal government to not recognize same-sex marriage.

“Now it will be interesting to see whether the victorious proponents of gay marriage will show tolerance toward those who disagreed with them when the issue was still in dispute,” Card told Entertainment Weekly.

Jarrett said the Skip Ender’s Game events are about diverting resources from the film and empowering “all the queer geeks who don’t feel like there is room at the table.”

“Even more than Skip Ender’s Game is about what Orson Scott Card has said or done, it’s about what we do – it’s about us as community understanding that we belong to each other and that we have a place in the pop culture conversation, in the pop culture marketplace,” Jarrett said. “That’s the most important outcome out of all of this, for a community to recognize itself and to understand that it has a point of view.”

Any monetary component to a city's Skip Ender’s Game event, such as a cover charge or suggested donation, will be put toward a local LGBT group in the event’s respective city. Jarrett said the only place this might not be the case is in San Francisco, because the organizing group in that city reached out to Geeks Out, instead of the reverse as it was for the other city’s events.

The events coincided with an online campaign to encourage people to Skip Ender’s Game. After seeing the campaign, groups in Australia and Europe reached out to Geeks Out about holding events.

Lionsgate, the film financier, said it was a supporter of the LGBT community and that the film and book do not reflect anti-LGBT views. “The simple fact is that neither the underlying book nor the film itself reflect these views in any way, shape or form,” the company said in a statement. “On the contrary, the film not only transports viewers to an entertaining and action-filled world, but it does so with positive and inspiring characters who ultimately deliver an ennobling and life-affirming message.”