Bulgarian extremists attack gay parade with rocks The Associated Press
Extremists throwing rocks, bottles and gasoline bombs have attacked the Bulgarian capital’s first gay pride parade.
Police say they prevented the extremists from harming the 150 or so people in the procession through Sofia. No serious injuries have been reported.
Police say they detained about 60 people for harassing the parade participants.
Bulgarian extremists attack gay parade with rocks The Associated Press
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Lesbians Rally In S.F.
On the eve of the annual Gay Pride Parade, thousands of women converge on Dolores Park for a celebration and march.
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Gay soldier outed in Bush Pentagon
An openly gay and much-decorated soldier has been released from the Army after telling his story to the media.
According to the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, Sgt. Darren Manzella lost his job — which included stints in Baghdad providing medical care to soldiers, Iraqi guardsmen and civilians — because of the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
His troubles may have begun during a CBS “60 Minutes” interview aired in December, when he told Lesley Stahl that he served openly during much of his service.
The “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy was put in place by President Clinton and has been left in place by President Bush.
Gay rights advocates argue that whoever imposed it, Congress should lift it.
Gay soldier outed in Bush Pentagon
Los Angeles Times, CA
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MICHELLE OBAMA STRONGER ON GAY RIGHTS THAN ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORTED
BY STEVE RALLS
Words matter, and Michelle Obama is a woman of powerful words.
Last night, in a passionate address to the Democratic National Committee’s Gay and Lesbian Leadership Council, Mrs. Obama delivered a rousing call-to-equality and put her husband on record as a fighter for the full equality of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans. “Barack believes,” she said, “that we must fight for the world as it should be, a world where we work together to reverse discriminatory laws.”
Invoking “those who marched and bled and died, from Selma to Stonewall,” Michelle implored Democrats to continue those early crusaders’ march “in the pursuit of a more perfect union.”
And it was unions, no doubt, that were on the minds of the LGBT audience that Michelle was reaching out to. With marriages under way in California, and a national debate about marriage equality for all couples taking place in living rooms and legislatures from coast to coast, many in the gay community are looking and listening to see if Obama will stand up strongly for our families or allow the country to be divided and conquered over the issue once again.
The question, for many gay voters, boils down to whether the Obamas can change the tone of the conversation, within the country and the party, about what it means to be equal and free?
According to Michelle, yes, they can.
MICHELLE OBAMA STRONGER ON GAY RIGHTS THAN ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORTED
SanFranciscoSentinel.com, CA
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Delhi’s feeling gay & Deepa’s happy
Deepa Mehta, who has just completed another celluloid treatise on the subjugation of women, can’t hide the pride in her voice when she’s told that Delhi’s first-ever gay parade today will begin from Regal cinema in the Capital, where the screening of her lesbian film, Fire, was forcibly stopped years ago.
“I remember I was in Dubai in 1996, watching AR Rahman’s concert. I had just thought Fire would come and go in India without creating a ripple, like all films on unconventional themes. I should’ve known better. I got a call in the middle of the concert, asking me to come down to Delhi immediately. They had just halted the screening of Fire. I was aghast. It was my first brush with the moral police. Later, of course, I got used to being bullied by extra-constitutional censors in India.”
And to think Fire had been passed without a cut when it was submitted to the censor board. “Not a single shot was cut! Not even Shabana and Nandita’s lovemaking. That lulled me into a false sense of security. I thought India had progressed, but a section of moralists won’t accept it.”
Delhi’s feeling gay & Deepa’s happy
Times of India, India
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Gay Soldier Murdered in Afghanistan? Military Rules It was Suicide
NEW YORK The military has finally, after nine months, announced the results of its probe into the death by gunshot of a gay soldier in Afghanistan, who was engaged to marry her partner in Massachusetts, last fall. The case has drawn wide coverage by Boston area newspapers.
The military’s handling of the case has been disturbing from the outset, with claims of murder voiced by friends and family due to the fact that the victim was known to be gay and had written home that she had seen some troubling things that might cause her not to survive.
Officials first reported that Ciara Durkin, 30, of Quincy, Mass., who served in the National Guard, had died “in action,” then revealed that she was killed in a “noncombat” incident that was being investigated.
Her family was told that she had been killed by a single gunshot near a church. They soon charged — and the media widely covered the allegations — that the military had been dragging its feet in giving them more details. They rejected any chance of suicide and suspected friendly fire or murder.
They said she had told them to push for an investigation if anything ever happened to her. She was in a finance unit and may have found some improprieties, according to a story in the Patriot-Ledger, which also disclosed that her family had notified the military about her concerns about her safety.
An e-mail she had sent friends in June 2007, claimed a fellow soldier had pulled a 9mm gun on her.
The Boston Globe reported that the family wondered if, as a lesbian, she may have been targeted. Sen. John Kerry and Sen. Ted Kennedy pushed for answers.
“She did say to us that she had concerns about things she was seeing when she was over there,” her sister, Fiona Canavan, told WGBH-TV in Boston. “She told us if anything happened to her, that we were to investigate it.” Gay Soldier Murdered in Afghanistan? Military Rules It was Suicide
Editor & Publisher
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The Supreme Court’s Gay Rights Legacy
Five years ago this week, the United State Supreme Court delivered its most sweeping gay rights decision ever, striking down laws in Texas and other states that had criminalized sex between gays. The court erected a shield of privacy around sexual behavior for all consenting adults, and in doing so paved the way for other milestones in the gay rights legal movement, including judicial victories for gay marriage in Nov. 2003 in Massachusetts and this year in California.
The decision in the Lawrence v. Texas case overturned convictions against two Houston men, who police had arrested after busting into their home and finding them engaged in sex. And for the first time in their lives, thousands of gay men and women who lived in states where sodomy had been illegal were free to be gay without being criminals. Gay rights groups held spontaneous celebrations in dozens of U.S. cities
But matched against their joy was a storm of protests, beginning from right inside the nation’s top courthouse itself. Justice Antonin Scalia read aloud from the bench his withering dissent that morning five years ago. Joined by then-Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justice Clarence Thomas, Scalia called the decision to strike down laws against sodomy “a massive disruption of the current social order,” and predicted that it would lead to the collapse of laws against gay marriage, fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality, and obscenity. “This effectively decrees the end of all morals legislation.”
But in the five years since Lawrence came down, this much is clear: Scalia was not all wrong. Indeed, his central point — that the decision would give sustenance to a range of challenges to gay- and sex-related laws — has proven prescient.
The legal changes wrought by Lawrence have been considerable. Both the Massachusetts and California marriage cases, for instance, cite Lawrence. So have cases in Alabama involving sex toys, in Florida involving gay adoptions, and just last month, a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision cited Lawrence in holding for the first time that the military’s exclusion of openly gay members must be based on more than simple moral disapproval of homosexuals. That case has been sent back to lower courts for further proceedings, but is already seen as a major challenge to the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy of the U.S. Armed Forces.
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Gay Kenyan Anglicans Send Strong Message to Lambeth Conference
By Rev. John Makokha
Other Sheep Coordinator/United Methodist Minister.
NAIROBI, June 28, 2008 (Other Sheep) – Kenyan Anglican clergy, gays and allies have sent a strong message of affirmation and inclusiveness to the bishops at the forthcoming Lambeth conference, due to be held next month.
The message was unanimously agreed at the ceremony organised by Integrity USA, a pro-gay Anglican based group, in partnership with the Other Sheep organisation in Kenya at a meeting last week.
Rev. Cynthia Black and Katie Sherrod from Integrity USA carried out the personal interview of the participants using video recording. The objective of this program was to take the voices and faces of gays, lesbians and allies to the Lambeth conference for the Anglican bishops to see and hear from the horse’s own mouth.
Rev. Michael Kimindu, an Anglican priest and Other Sheep East Africa Coordinator, said that it is hard for young people to discover that they are gay in Kenya.
They come to fear God and hate themselves, he pointed out, adding that society and religious condemnation causes young gay people to live in isolation, depression and subsequently commit suicide in schools, colleges and homes.
“Religious teachings are against homosexuality, and for us allies we are looked at as people promoting a gay movement in Africa,” said Rev. Kimindu.
“You cannot discourage or promote what you cannot change. It is not a choice – it is inborn.”
His message to the bishops was that they should be bishops and not judges.
“[The bishops] should appreciate the diversity of God’s gifts in relation to the clergy and laity in the church without being dictators. [They] should commission well educated people to conduct a research on homosexuality. The findings can help remove grey hairs in their approach.”
Rev. Kimindu said that the church in Kenya has lesbians, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex persons who have questions and are seeking answers.
“They are living in the closet due to fear of stigma and condemnation propagated by religious homophobia.”
He said the bishops should stop thinking that homosexuality is un-African.
“The truth of the matter is homosexuality is part of human history and since civilization started in Africa, therefore homosexuality started from Africa. We should not blame the West for introducing homosexuality.”
The meeting last week heard from a number of Christian gay men and women.
Peter Wanyama and Fabian, who are Anglicans and partners, said that they hoped the church will one day bless their union. They have been partners for two years and they love each other so much.
Wanyama said that there are so many gay and lesbian people in all cadres of leadership in the society and the church in Kenya.
“The church receives our offerings, tithes and utilizes our gifts and yet discriminates against us,” he said.
His message to the bishops is that they should represent Christ holistically. They should stop looking at gays and lesbians as enemies.
“We need to be inclusive and accepted in our church where my late father was a priest.”
Maxi who is a lesbian said she knew her sexual orientation when she was eight years old and in a boarding school. This caused her to live in isolation until she met other lesbians in high school, college and community.
She used to be Catholic but drifted because of anti-gay sermons. She is the secretary of PFLAG (Parents, Friends of lesbians and gay), a ministry of Other Sheep in Kenya. The aim is to seek allies in the society, church and the government, to understand gay and lesbian people in a positive way.
Solo who is gay said he does not go to any church because of the spiritual violence spearheaded by anti-gay sermons.
He said he is ready to go to church if there is affirmation and acceptance of gay persons.
“They should stop seeing us as the worst sinners when they are wallowing in the miasm of tribalism and corruption.”
Ben who is gay and Pentecostal said he knew he was gay when he was 7 years old. His twin brother is also gay. He met so many gay friends in high school. He said he is tired of staying in the closet.
“For a long time I was suicidal without seeking a solution from the church. It has been a real struggle.”
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Presbyterian leaders OK gay clergy
Leaders of the Presbyterian Church (USA) overturned a long-standing ban on the ordination of gays and lesbians Friday, providing yet the latest example of a religious denomination struggling with how, and whether, to incorporate homosexuality into church life.
At the same time, the church’s national governing body, meeting in San Jose, refused to alter its definition of marriage, calling it a “covenant between a woman and a man.” The actions by the General Assembly came the week after same-sex marriage became legal in California. They also follow the decision of a gathering of Methodists from Southern California and Hawaii, who went against their national church by voting to support same-sex couples who marry and the pastors who welcome them.
The Presbyterian Church is among many mainline Protestant denominations struggling to reconcile conflicting beliefs about biblical authority and the role of gays.
Some parishes have left the Episcopal Church, prompting predictions that the issue may tear the denomination apart. In the Presbyterian Church (USA) — the nation’s largest Presbyterian group, with 2.3 million members — Friday’s actions were likely to deepen theological fissures.
The General Assembly voted in favor of the ordination measure 54% to 46%, but its decision must still be approved by a majority of the nation’s 173 regional presbyteries over the next year. Several prominent church leaders predicted it would fail.Presbyterian leaders OK gay clergy
Los Angeles Times, CA -
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Ban on gay marriage on AZ state ballot
In the final hours of one of the longest state legislative sessions on record, state senators approved a measure sending a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage to the fall ballot.
The long-anticipated vote came just before adjournment and followed hours of angry, raucous debate in which the legislative rule book was used as a weapon to both stall the vote (Democrats) and cut short debate (Republicans). Senators on both sides of the aisle and of the issue lamented a meltdown in the higher chamber, as most of the day’s work was scrapped so that the marriage amendment could be voted upon while key senators were present.
Senate President Tim Bee, a Tucson Republican, cast the decisive, 16th vote in favor of the referendum that defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman – the only measure that lawmakers sent to the ballot after weighing several over the months. But Bee first chastised groups lobbying on the issue for threats and coercive tactics that served to divide the chamber and overshadow much of the session.
After the vote, conservative activists rejoiced that voters would get a chance to vote on the issue this fall. A similar measure, which also banned governments from offering benefits to employees’ domestic partners, gay or straight, failed at the polls in 2006.
Ban on gay marriage on state ballot
Arizona Republic, AZ
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