THE RIGHT FOR GAYS AND LESBIANS TO MARRY IN NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY CONTINUES
Gay rights activists are renewing their fight to legalize same-sex marriage in New York, hoping a mix of moneyed supporters and celebrity star power will tilt the scales in their favor.
A group called Fight Back New York, created with money from software entrepreneur and openly gay philanthropist Tim Gill, is pledging to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get pro-gay marriage candidates elected to the state Senate in November’s elections.
Advocates aim to bring the issue of same-sex marriage to the Senate floor as early as next year. The legislature voted three months ago to reject a similar bill.
“There is definitely a theme of punishment in our work,” said spokesman Alex Navarro-McKay. The group would target some of the eight Democrats who helped defeat the bill, he said. All 30 Republicans and eight Democrats voted no, defeating the bill 38 to 24. – Source – Reuters
New Jersey gays rights advocates, with the help of New York-based Lambda Legal, are going back to the New Jersey Supreme Court in order to fight for the right to marry in the Garden State.
Lambda Legal and Garden State Equality have scheduled a news conference for Thursday morning in Trenton to announce their action.
It comes barely two months after a stinging defeat in the New Jersey State Senate, when several legislators apparently backtracked on earlier promises and failed to pass a Marriage Equality law.
The advocates are prepared for a tough battle. “It’s hard to tell [how long this will take],” said Lambda Legal spokeswoman Lisa Hardaway in New York.
But the organization will be building on a 2006 decision by New Jersey’s highest court that ordered legislators to pass either a Marriage Equality law or an equivalent Civil Union law that gave gays identical rights. Legislators chose civil union.
Ever since, gay marriage advocates have argued civil union doesn’t work, that it’s not recognized by hospitals, doctors and employers. And in fact, several senators who voted against gay marriage in January admitted that it might not work, but they weren’t willing to go with a law that used the word ‘marriage.’
So now it turns to New Jersey’s Supremes. – Source – NBC4 New York
THREE MEN INDICTED ON CHARGE OF HATE CRIME IN ATTACK OF GAY MAN
Three north suburban men were indicted Wednesday for allegedly harassing and attacking a gay man on a CTA train in January.
Kevin McAndrew and Benjamin Eder, both 23, and Sean Little, 21, all of Evanston, originally faced misdemeanor battery charges stemming from the Jan. 10 incident.
On Wednesday, the three men were each indicted on one count of hate crime and two counts of aggravated battery, according to Cook County State’s Attorney’s office spokesman Andy Conklin. The men will appear for arraignment on March 26.
Little, Eder and McAndrew were riding the CTA Red Line train when Little allegedly began verbally harassing and shoving a gay youth, according to a release from the attorney for Daniel Hauff, a Rogers Park man who tried to intervene.
At that point, Little allegedly began directing anti-gay slurs at Hauff and pushed him. Eder and McAndrew, who had been watching, joined in the assault, calling Hauff a “stupid faggot” and all three began punching Hauff’s face, bloodying him in front of train passengers, according to the release.
Chicago police say the three men “made disparaging comments” to the 33-year-old Hauff, taunted him and punched him on the train at the Argyle station in Uptown.
Another man tried to help and numerous other passengers pushed the train’s emergency button, the release said. A witness confirmed Little had been harassing and shoving a young man for being homosexual.
If convicted, the men face a maximum of five years in prison each.
CATHOLIC ADOPTION AGENCY IN THE UK CAN TURN DOWN GAY ADOPTION
Roman Catholic bishops have welcomed a high court ruling that will allow a Catholic adoption agency to reject gay couples as parents.
Catholic Care, which serves Leeds, Middlesbrough and Hallam in South Yorkshire, won its appeal for an exemption from sexual orientation regulations that say it must consider applications from gay couples. The agency warned it would abandon its work of finding homes for children, as many others have done, rather than comply with the law.
The bishop of Leeds, the Rt Rev Arthur Roche, insisted there was no homophobic element to the case and claimed that children would have been “seriously disadvantaged” had Catholic Care not won the appeal.
“Our case has not been brought on an anti-gay agenda of any sort. We respect, and would not want to diminish, the dignity of any person,” he said.
The judgment was condemned by the British Humanist Association and the gay rights charity Stonewall. Jonathan Finney, its head of external affairs, said: “It’s unthinkable that anyone engaged in delivering any kind of public or publicly funded service should be given licence to pick and choose service users on the basis of individual prejudice.”
Caritas Social Action Network, the umbrella group for Catholic care agencies, said an important principle had been upheld. – Source – Guardian.co/uk
TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE BEING ERODED BY SAME-SEX MARRIAGE
English law no longer has a clear concept of marriage, a leading family lawyer has said.
Baroness Deech, the chairman of the Bar Standards Board, also believes that human rights law could soon be used to legalise full homosexual marriage.
She said the traditional Christian image of a lifelong union of man and woman is no longer accurate because of the changing nature of relationships and the introduction of legal rights for same-sex couples.
Lady Deech said she believes that human rights law may soon rule that it is discriminatory to ban homosexuals from marrying in the same way that heterosexual couples do.
But she added that some differences between civil partnerships and marriages should be preserved, and criticised recent Labour laws that allow same-sex couples to be named on birth certificates with no mention of a father.
PAYROLL ERRORS CAN COST SAME-SEX COUPLES THOUSANDS IN TAX MONEY
Filing your own tax returns is confusing enough. But the process can be even more bewildering for gay and lesbian couples in civil unions and marriages. This is doubly true when their own employers aren’t clear on how differences between state and federal tax codes affect their withholdings.
For the last decade, the payroll system for the Vermont State Colleges wasn’t accounting for the fact that some of its 2000 employees are gay or lesbian and provide their partners with health care benefits. Twenty-nine former and current Vermont State Colleges staffers were notified in a February 16 letter from the chancellor’s office that the automated payroll system wasn’t set up properly to process contributions to their partners’ medical and dental policies as a pre-tax withholding.
Those letters were followed shortly thereafter by checks to reimburse them for the state taxes the couples improperly paid during the years their partners received VSC health and dental insurance benefits.
Under Vermont’s civil-union law, which took effect on July 1, 2000, any employment benefit afforded to same-sex partners in a civil union must be treated the same way as those given to heterosexual couples. Vermont’s gay-marriage law, enacted last year, included the same requirement. And, under Vermont’s tax code, health benefits provided to spouses and dependents are treated as nontaxable income.
“We made a mistake,” says VSC chancellor Tim Donovan. “We wish that it hadn’t happened, but we’re glad someone found it.” – Source – 7 Days/Vermont’s Independent Voice
HEARING SET IN LESBIAN TEENS SUIT OVER MS HIGH SCHOOL PROM
School officials in a rural Mississippi county told a lesbian student to get “guys” to take her and her girlfriend to a high school prom and warned the girls against slow dancing with each other because that could “push people’s buttons,” according to documents filed Tuesday in federal court.
In the court documents, McMillen said Rick Mitchell, the assistant principal at the school, told her she could not attend the prom with her girlfriend but they could go with “guys.” Superintendent Teresa McNeece told the teen that the girls should attend the prom separately, had to wear dresses and couldn’t slow dance with each other because that could “push people’s buttons,” according to court documents.
The school district last week said it wouldn’t host the prom “due to the distractions to the educational process caused by recent events.” District officials said they hoped private citizens would sponsor a dance. The decision came on the same day the ACLU asked the district to act on McMillen’s prom requests.
McMillen said she approached school officials weeks ago about wanting to take her girlfriend to the prom.
“I want my prom experience to be the same as all of the other students, a night to remember with the person I’m dating,” McMillen said.
The district, located in northern Mississippi near the Alabama state line, prohibits same-sex dates at the prom. The ACLU has said that violates the rights of gay and lesbian students.
The school district had not responded to the ACLU filing by Tuesday afternoon. – Source – AP
DISCUSSION BUT NO UPCOMING VOTE ON GAY ADOPTION IN FLORIDA
After years of trying unsuccessfully to get lawmakers to discuss gay adoptions and pass a bill allowing them, Sen. Nan Rich won a victory of sorts on the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon.
Senate President Jeff Atwater allowed Sen. Charlie Justice to offer an amendment to another bill dealing with adoptions — one (SB 530) that would clarify already existing state law barring adoption agencies from discriminating against families that own guns.
Justice’s amendment would bar adoption agencies from refusing to allow gay couples to adopt. But he only offered it long enough for several Democrats, including Rich, to speak in favor of it before he withdrew it without seeking a vote.
Justice, D-St. Petersburg, said he was told that the Republicans, who have a majority in the chamber, would use a procedural maneuver to not have a vote, so he withdrew it because the goal was “for the first time in decades to have this issue discussed on the floor of the Florida Senate.”
More than 3,000 Florida kids are waiting to be adopted and about 25,000 children are now in foster homes. Gay Floridians are welcome to be foster parents but a state law passed more than three decades ago prohibits them from permanently adopting the children. – Source – The Palm Beach Post
HIV INCREASE IN GAY MEN CAN BE ATTRIBUTED TO ANTI-GAY POLICIES BUT WHY IN US
New HIV infections are increasing among homosexuals, drug users and prostitutes who don’t seek help because of laws that criminalize these practices, the head of the U.N. AIDS agency said Monday.
Michel Sidibe, the head of UNAIDS, said “it is unacceptable” that 85 countries still have laws criminalizing same sex relations among adults, including seven that impose the death penalty for homosexual practices.
He called a proposed Ugandan law that would impose the death penalty for some gays “very unfortunate” and expressed hope it will never be approved.
Sidibe told a group of journalists at a luncheon hosted by the United Nations Foundation that in countries from China to Kenya and Malawi, about 33 percent of new HIV infections are in men having sex with men, a significant increase.
By contrast, he said that in the Caribbean where most countries don’t have repressive laws, only between 3 and 6 percent of HIV infections are in male homosexuals.
Even in the United States, where laws are not restrictive and the gay community was the first to tackle AIDS, Sidibe said it is “shocking” that more than 50 percent of new HIV infections last year occurred among homosexuals. And he said in the 19-25 age bracket the infection rate was even higher.
“It seems like we have come full circle” in the United States, he said. “After almost no cases a few years ago we are seeing again this new peak among people who are not having access to all the information, the protection that is needed.” – Source – AP
SAME-SEX MARRIAGE BAN STALLS IN PENNSLYVANIA
A bill to ban same-sex marriage in Pennsylvania stalled Tuesday in the Senate.
The state Senate Judiciary Committee voted 8-6 to table the measure defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
State law already defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
But proponents of a constitutional amendment said a judge could overturn the law even though the courts are not believed to be considering a challenge to that law. – Source – WGAL-TV
FIRST SAME-SEX MARRIAGE IN MCC CHURCH IN WASHINGTON DC
History happened at the Metropolitan Community Church of Washington, D.C., on Sunday. Willard Knicely married Robert Whitman in front of more than 100 family members and friends.
When the District legalized same-sex marriage March 3, people lined up for licenses and a few days later ceremonies were performed at a government building. So, same-sex marriages themselves may no longer be breaking news, but where this one happened is noteworthy.
The Rev. Dwayne Johnson, who helped preside over the ceremony, said Metropolitan Community Church has actually been performing same-sex ceremonies since 1971.
“We have believed all along that God has recognized our relationships, but the meaning of this day is what God has recognized all along,” Johnson said. ”And what we’ve recognized all along is now recognized by the District of Columbia.” -Source – NBC Washington DC
MAN WHO WAS SEXUALLY HARRASSED AND FIRED WINS LAWSUIT
A restaurant worker sacked after being discriminated against because of his sexual orientation has been awarded has been awarded nearly $15,000.
The Employment Relations Authority found that the man, whose name was not disclosed, was unfairly dismissed in July 2009 after three just three weeks as front manager at Auckland’s Mission Bay restaurant El Centro.
He was awarded $7000 damages and $7600 for lost wages and holiday pay.
The man said his employer, Graeme Edwards, was difficult to work with and began to make “inappropriate” comments based on his sexual orientation.
Mr Edwards alluded to sexually transmitted disease in front of customers and other employees.
Mr Edwards would often refer to him as a “f***ing faggot” and telling others present “not to bend over” around him.
The applicant described Mr Edwards’ treatment as “humiliating, sexually discriminatory and abusive,” making him feel “insignificant, worthless and isolated”.
He said he was fired on July 25 with Mr Edwards saying he couldn’t manage his way out of a brothel and not to bother coming back. – Source – NZHerald
LESBIAN COUPLE SPEAKS ABOUT CHILD BARRED FROM SCHOOL
The couple’s two children are not being allowed to continue at the Sacred Heart of Jesus Catholic School because of the parents’ sexual orientation.
They remain unidentified, but released a statement Monday night through Boulder Pride, an organization representing the gay and lesbian community.
They say the school’s decision comes as a shock to them. The couple says they were initially very hurt and angry. According to the couple, their two children have been attending Sacred Heart of Jesus Catholic School for three years.
“There are divorced parents, children of parents born out of wedlock, non-Catholics and non-practicing Catholics. Their eligibility has not been questioned. There seems to be a subjective rating system of which sins are more unacceptable.”
“Perhaps our biggest objection to the school’s decision is that we think that it is wrong to punish a child for who the child’s parents are,” the couple stated. “We do not think this reflects what Jesus would have done.”
The reason they enrolled their children in the school they say was because they themselves were raised in the Catholic faith and went to Catholic schools.
The couple says both of their children have been baptized, and attend church regularly at Sacred Heart.
They now feel their goal of raising their children in the Catholic faith is being undermined by the church.
“We do not believe that homosexuality and organized religion need to be mutually exclusive,” the couple stated.
DALLAS COUNTRY JAIL GUARD FIRED OVER ANTI-GAY REMARKS
A veteran Dallas County jail guard has been fired for making offensive comments about his religious beliefs to co-workers, including his contention that gays should be “put to death,” sheriff’s reports show.
Stephen Johnson, 59, had been disciplined for making offensive comments in the past, records show. He was fired Jan. 20 for conduct unbecoming an officer and for lying to internal affairs during the investigation.
Johnson has worked as a jail guard at the Sheriff’s Department for almost 17 years. He was most recently assigned to the intake area, where arriving inmates are processed.
In October, he interrupted a private conversation among jail staff and “interjected his own opinions,” telling them all gays should be annihilated, sheriff’s reports show. He also said that whites were the superior race and that he supported slavery, reports show.
Johnson said the Bible supported his opinions, reports show. – Source – Dallas Morning News
The Iowa Family Policy Center, a group that opposes equal marriage rights for same-sex couples, released a statement today comparing smoking-related health costs to gay unions.
“The Iowa Legislature outlawed smoking in an effort to improve health and reduce the medical costs that are often passed on to the state,” said Chuck Hurley, president of the group. “The secondhand impacts of certain homosexual acts are arguably more destructive, and potentially more costly to society than smoking.”
He continued: “Homosexual activity is certainly more dangerous for the individuals who engage in it than is smoking.”
Hurley pointed to a report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control that showed gay men have higher rates of HIV and syphilis.
“Because of their (legislators) unwillingness to correct the error of last April’s Iowa Supreme Court opinion, the Iowa Legislature is responsible for sanctioning activities that will lead to dramatically higher rates of HIV and syphilis in Iowa,” Hurley said
The latest information about HIV is more evidence that additional resources are needed for prevention and tests, said Jordan Selha, executive director of the AIDS Project of Central Iowa. Most new transmissions are by people who are unaware of their HIV status, he said. – Source – Des Moines Register
GLAAD AWARDS HONOR ABC-TV’s “BROTHERS & SISTERS” AND OTHERS
Gay media group GLAAD honored the TV series “Brothers & Sisters” and singled-out actress Cynthia Nixon for her work at a Saturday night gala highlighting gay marriage rights.
“We are bringing marriage back to its fundamentals and revitalizing it from its roots up,” “Sex and the City” actress Nixon said in accepting an honorary award at the 21st annual Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Media Awards.
ABC drama series “Brothers & Sisters” won the outstanding drama series award for their storyline of a gay married couple looking to start a family.
Actress Sigourney Weaver accepted the award for outstanding TV miniseries for Lifetime’s “Prayers for Bobby.” In the program, based on a true story, Weaver played a 1970s religious housewife who struggles to accept her son is gay.
“The Oprah Winfrey Show” won the best talk show episode category for the episode “Ellen DeGeneres and Her Wife, Portia de Rossi.”
Spanish-British film “Little Ashes” won for outstanding film in limited release, while among other winners for their coverage of gay and lesbian issues included MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show,” NBC, The New York Times, CNN and ESPN.com.
Joy Behar, a co-host of ABC’s “The View,” received the excellence in media award for bringing up gay rights on the popular daytime talk show. – Source – Reuters
A lesbian student who wanted to take her girlfriend to her senior prom is asking a federal judge to force her Mississippi school district to reinstate the dance it canceled rather than let the couple attend.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi on Thursday filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Oxford on behalf of 18-year-old Constance McMillen, who said she faced some unhappy classmates after the Itawamba County School District said it wouldn’t host the April 2 prom.
“Somebody said, ‘Thanks for ruining my senior year.’” McMillen said of her reluctant return Thursday to Itawamba Agricultural High School in Fulton.
The lawsuit seeks a court order for the school to hold the prom. It also asks that McMillen be allowed to escort her girlfriend, who also is a student at the school, and wear the tuxedo.
The district’s decision Wednesday came after the ACLU demanded that officials change a policy banning same-sex prom dates because it said it violated students’ rights. The ACLU said the district violated McMillen’s free expression rights by not letting her wear a tux.
McMillen said she never expected the district to respond the way it did.
“A lot of people said that was going to happen, but I said, they had already spent too much money on the prom” to cancel it, she said. – Source – AP
WEDDING BELLS HAVE BEGUN RINGING IN MEXICO CITY
Two glowing brides in matching white gowns and four other same-sex couples made history in Mexico City on Thursday as they wed under Latin America’s first law that explicitly approves gay marriage.
Mayor Marcelo Ebrard was a guest of honor at the weddings of Judith Vazquez and Lol Kin Castaneda and the other couples who tied the knot in a city building, despite harsh criticism from the Roman Catholic Church and a campaign against the measure by President Felipe Calderon’s conservative National Action Party.
Vazquez, a 45-year-old small-business owner, and Castaneda, a 33-year-old psychologist, signed and put their thumb print on the official documents. Then they sealed their union with a kiss amid cheers from family and friends gathered in the colonial-era building’s courtyard, decorated with calla lilies, banners with the colors of Mexico’s flag and a sign that read “Tolerance, Liberty, Equality, Solidarity.”
“This is the mark of freedom,” said Vazquez, raising her thumb. – Source – AP
WILL THE FIGHT TO KEEP SAME-SEX MARRIAGE BEGIN IN NH ?
Granite State voters on Tuesday signaled a desire to vote on same-sex marriage, according to results of town meetings from across the state.
Ballot articles calling for a statewide referendum passed in at least 42 towns, according to results compiled by the New Hampshire Union Leader.
The results so far indicate a clear majority of Granite Staters want to vote on a constitutional amendment defining marriage, said state Rep. David Bates. The Windham Republican has spearheaded a grass-roots campaign to place the non-binding measure on town ballots.
A law allowing same-sex marriage went into effect in January.
“At this point, it’s clear the people want to vote,” Bates said. “It doesn’t mean (a constitutional amendment) is going to pass, but we shouldn’t make a decision for the people based on our speculation of whether it’s going to pass or not.”
Statewide, 133 towns will have weighed in on the marriage question by the end of the week, according to Bates.
According to his tally yesterday, at least 38 towns had passed the measure on Tuesday. – Source – New Hampshire Union Leader
YET ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF THE INJUSTICE OF DADT
Surgeons went to work on five Marines mangled by a roadside bomb.
Multiple blasts near Ramadi, west of Baghdad, had torn off the legs of one soldier. Another Marine required amputation of both legs.
Though the time for prayers would come, Army National Guard chaplain Aris Fokas saw the immediate need in the operating room was for an extra set of hands.
He offered his as doctors and nurses labored late into the night in December 2005.
Fokas got busy retrieving medical supplies, hanging intravenous drips and hand pumping blood through a warmer.
When the need for those tasks waned, Fokas slipped back into the role of chaplain. He spoke and prayed with the wounded and with their buddies, who paced and waited for news.
It was one trying night among many Fokas experienced during an 18-month deployment in Iraq.
Fokas, a United Church of Christ minister, joined the Pennsylvania Army National Guard in 2003. He was 39 years old and felt called to serve his country by pastoring to soldiers on the front lines.
Fokas warmed to the challenges, and many colleagues came to admire his professionalism and humanity.
But now that he’s home, Fokas, 46, is facing a challenge that threatens his future with the military.
An officer has accused Fokas of telling him he is gay.
Although Fokas denies any such disclosure, a commander at Fort Indiantown Gap has ordered an inquiry.
“It is the policy of the United States Army … that homosexuality is incompatible with military service,” Lt. Col. David W. Wood informed Fokas in a memorandum. “Therefore … an investigation is in process to determine if separation action is warranted.”
Fokas, for now, remains in the Guard, but his chaplain duties are suspended pending the investigation’s findings.
Under the 1993 law known as “don’t ask, don’t tell,” more than 13,000 service members have been dismissed for being gay or lesbian. – Source and full article at Army Times
Eight years after opening with great fanfare, San Francisco’s city-subsidized, $12.3 million Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center is on the verge of foreclosure – and is asking the cash-strapped city for a $1 million line of credit to help bail it out.
And from the looks of things, the center will probably get it.
The thinking: The city has already spent about $5.7 million on the building at Market and Octavia streets and needs to “make sure it doesn’t go under,” said Supervisor David Campos who along with fellow gay Supervisor Bevan Dufty is seeking approval of a $1 million “mortgage relief” fund.
According to a new report by the Board of Supervisors budget analyst, the center could need even more public funds to cover the nearly $3 million that it still owes on its mortgage.
“Clearly, it’s unprecedented,” Campos said of the bailout proposal. “But I do believe there is something unique about the role the LGBT Center plays – not only in the life of the community, but the entire city.”
If approved by the Board of Supervisors and the mayor, the bailout would be the first time the city has used its general fund to guarantee mortgage payments on behalf of a nonprofit, according to the budget analyst’s report.
MS SCHOOL CANCELS PROM RATHER THAN LET GIRL BRING SAME-SEX DATE
A northern Mississippi school district decided Wednesday not to host a high school prom after a lesbian student demanded she be able to attend with her girlfriend and wear a tuxedo.
The Itawamba County school district’s policy requires that senior prom dates be of the opposite sex. The American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi had given the district until Wednesday to change that policy and allow 18-year-old Constance McMillen to escort her girlfriend, who is also a student, to the dance on April 2.
Instead, the school board met and issued a statement announcing it wouldn’t host the event at Itawamba County Agricultural High School in Fulton, “due to the distractions to the educational process caused by recent events.”
The statement didn’t mention McMillen or the ACLU. When asked by The Associated Press if McMillen’s demand led to the cancellation, school board attorney Michele Floyd said she could only reference the statement.
“It is our hope that private citizens will organize an event for the juniors and seniors,” district officials said in the statement. “However, at this time, we feel that it is in the best interest of the Itawamba County School District, after taking into consideration the education, safety and well being of our students.”
The ACLU said a school policy banning same-sex prom dates violated McMillen’s constitutional rights. – Source – AP
MIGHT DENMARK BE NEXT TO ALLOW SAME-SEX MARRIAGE ?
Nearly two thirds of Danes support a call to allow gay and lesbian couples to be married by the Church, a poll showed Wednesday.
Denmark was the world’s first country to allow a civil union for homosexuals, in 1989, but its parliament is now split over a move by the centre-left opposition to amend the law to allow religious weddings too.
The minister for religion Birthe Roenn Hornbech has urged lawmakers to think the question through in-depth before reaching any decision.
But according to a poll published by the Christian daily Kristelig Dagbladet on Wednesday, 63 percent of the Danish population would be happy to see gay couples married at the altar.
A quarter of respondents said they would oppose the move, while 12 percent gave no opinion, according to the Capacent Research poll of 1,304 people carried out of March 5.
Separately, the Berlingske Tidende daily found that six out of 10 bishops with the Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church would agree to see gay couples make their vows in Church. – Source – AFP
HUBBY HUBBY ON THE MENU AT THIS GAY WEDDING
Ben & Jerry’s co-founder Jerry Greenfield will attend the wedding of a gay couple getting married in one of the ice cream maker’s stores in Georgetown.
Keith Spangler-Vellios and Andreas Vellios plan to marry Thursday at the scoop shop. Tuesday was the first day gay couples could marry in Washington. The couple previously married in San Francisco in 2004, but same-sex marriages in California were invalidated. The couple has been together for 11 years and have twin 2 1/2-year-olds.
Ben & Jerry’s symbolically changed the name its ice cream flavor “Chubby Hubby” to “Hubby Hubby” in 2009 after its home state of Vermont began recognizing same-sex marriages. – Source – Boston Globe
For gay US businessman Brad Fister, experiencing the joy of fatherhood meant flying half way around the world to India where he first held his baby daughter, born to a woman who had signed away any right to her child.
Commercial surrogacy is a booming industry in India, and in recent years the ranks of childless foreign couples have been swelled by gay partners looking for a low-cost, legally-friendly path to parenthood.
In the United States, laws governing adoption and surrogacy vary from state to state, while in India the service is legal, loosely regulated and — so far at least — non-discriminatory on grounds of sexual orientation.
For Fister and his partner Michael Griebe, a crucial attraction is that surrogate mothers in India are generally willing to renounce any legal claim to the child.
“We decided to have a baby a year and a half ago but the problem in the United States is mothers often do not relinquish the rights to the child,” Fister told AFP before leaving the southern city of Hyderabad with his baby daughter last month. – Source – AFP
ANTI-GAY WESTBORO CHURCH COMES UNDER SUPPREME COURT SCRUTINY
The US Supreme Court has agreed to consider whether vitriolic anti-gay protestors who picket the funerals of US soldiers are protected by free speech laws.
The emotionally-charged case was brought by the family of US Marine Matthew Snyder, who was killed in combat in Iraq in 2006.
His family organized a private Christian funeral for him in Maryland that attracted members of the radical Westboro Church led by Baptist preacher Fred Phelps.
Phelps and his congregation regularly demonstrate at military funerals, carrying inflammatory signs to draw attention to their anti-gay message.
The religious group protest at the funerals of soldiers, regardless of the sexuality of the deceased military personnel, and use the events to bring publicity to their campaign.
After the funeral was over, Phelps continued to deride and criticize Snyder on his website, prompting the dead Marine’s family to sue the preacher before a Maryland court.
Snyder’s father Albert claimed Phelps had intruded on a private event and intentionally inflicted emotional distress on the bereaved family and won an initial award of five million dollars.
But the award was overturned on appeal, where a court ruled that Westburo protestors were simply exercising their First Amendment right to free speech. – Source – AFP
BEING GAY AND LESBIAN IN THE CIA APPEARS NOT TO BE A PROBLEM
General David Petraeus, the head of the U.S. Central Command, told CNN that he has worked with Central Intelligence Agency officers “who were known to be gay and one who’s known to be lesbian.”
“After the 10 seconds of awareness wore off, the focus was on the professional attributes,” he said on the CNN program “Fareed Zakaria GPS” in a segment posted on the program’s Web site.
The U.S. military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell policy” is something that “can be worked through, frankly,” Petraeus said on the CNN program, which is scheduled for broadcast today. Petraeus said he’ll disclose his views on the policy to lawmakers. – Source – Bloomberg
MICHIGAN SCHOOL DISTRICT ORDERED TO PAY $800K TO HARASSED STUDENT
A federal court jury awarded $800,000 this past week to a Hudson Area Schools student who was harassed and sexually assaulted. An attorney for the school district said an appeal is likely.
The award is compensation for the loss of a normal high school educational experience and the mental anguish the boy suffered, said attorney Terry Heiss of Ada. The lawsuit claimed harassment started in the sixth grade when the boy was called names such as “gay” and “faggot” and ended with a locker-room sexual assault when he was a high school freshman.
The question posed to the jury, Heiss said, “was whether or not the district had actual notice of all the sexual harassment and whether or not they were clearly indifferent.”
After two weeks of testimony in a courtroom in Port Huron, the jury took four hours to reach a verdict in the young man’s favor, said Heiss.
He feels it was a fair verdict. He feels vindicated. He was painted as the one causing the problem and he wasn’t,” Heiss said.
“The jury’s decision “astounds me,” said school attorney Timothy Mullins of Troy. - Source – The Daily Telegram
TWO MEN CHARGED WITH HATE CRIME IN WASHINGTON STATE
King County prosecutors have charged Abdinasir Ahmed, 21, and Adnan Osman, 22, with felony malicious harassment–the state’s hate crime statute–for an alleged anti-gay assault outside the Filipino Community Center in Columbia City last January.
According to court documents, the victim was returning to the Somali New Year celebration being held at the Center when Ahmed and Osman blocked the path to the front door. A report filed by police alleges that Ahmed, who the victim recognized, attacked first. Then Osman jumped in. As they struck the victim about the head, both began yelling gay epithets, says the report.
The fight was broken up by the security guard working the party. Osman–whose middle name just happens to be Basher–was immediately detained, while Ahmed managed to escape before police arrived, yelling, “I wanna beat your ass you gay ass motherfucker” as he fled.
Both were eventually arrested by police, and arraigned on $50,000 bail. But a search of the King County Jail register shows that neither is currently in custody. Meanwhile, the victim has quit attending his Mosque, telling investigators that in Somali culture, gay men are stoned to death and that Ahmed has threatened to kill him. – Source – Seattle Weekly
COLORADANS COME OUT TO SUPPORT EQUAL MARRIAGE RIGHTS
Fort Collins residents in support of gay marriage said at a rally Saturday that not allowing people to marry on the basis of their sexual preference was discrimination.
About 150 people gathered in Old Town Square for the 11th annual Freedom to Marry Day. Nearly half a dozen people spoke at the event, some recounting the stories of falling in love with their partner and others talking about the struggles they’ve encountered as a gay or transgendered person.
The day is celebrated nationwide to raise awareness about equality issues in gay marriage. Gay couples aren’t guaranteed the 1,138 rights that married couples have, such as child custody and making medical decisions on behalf of spouses because each state recognizes gay marriage and civil unions differently, said Blane Harding, director of advising at Colorado State University.
“Discrimination is discrimination, no matter who it applies to,” he said. “To discriminate against one group is to discriminate against all groups.” – Source – The Coloradoan
PARTY HARDY AT THE WINTER PARTY BEACH PARTY IN MIAMI BEACH
Lizzz Kritzer and her girlfriend, Danielle Lise Desrochers, are not typical snowbirds.
Sure, they migrate from the South Hamptons to Miami Beach once a year to warm up. But for the past two years they have came with a mission: to party in support of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community at the annual Winter Party Beach Party in Miami Beach.
“The gays are our people,” said Kritzer, 52, who is staying with Desrochers at their South Beach nest — and whose name really does have three Z’s. “We love them!”
The party, on the beach at 12th Street and Ocean Drive, is a part of the Winter Party Festival, a week-long series of events benefiting the LGBT community.
Since 1994 the annual festival and its sister event, the Miami Recognition Dinner, have raised $2.3 million for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, said the festival’s development coordinator, David Cook.
Cook said the task force would distribute the net proceeds of the beach party’s $80 to $95 admission fee to HIV-prevention organizations, suicide hot lines and other charitable causes. Thousands of people passed through the gates Sunday.
“It’s a party with a purpose,” Cook said of the Mardi Gras-themed party on the sand.
Matthew Sicher compared going to the beach party to being in a fish bowl, though he welcomed the attention of onlookers peeking inside through the party’s fence at the crowded sea of shirtless men.
“We have a stronger sense of community. These events help to show the outside world that there are gays here,” said Sicher, 40, of Kendall, who has come to the beach party for the past six years. “At the very least we can help to create awareness.” – Source – Miami-Herald
