6 LGBTs to join the DNC
From the Victory Fund:
Six more openly LGBT Democrats are on track to join the 447-member Democratic National Committee as at-large members, including two Victory Fund-endorsed elected officials and two other individuals affliated with the Victory Fund and Leadership Institute.
The DNC is the steering organization of the U.S. Democratic Party. Its …
Tags: Democratic National Committee, Democratic Party, Democrats, Dnc, Leadership Institute, Organization, Victory FundDean drops out of LGBT Democratic Pary Fundraiser
(Washington) According to Ben Smith at Politico, former DNC Chairman Howard Dean has pulled out of tomorrow’s LGBT Democratic Party Fundraiser in Washington, D.C. A Dean spokeswoman, Karen Finney, said that he pulled out due to a scheduling conflict because of a “family commitment.” Dean was listed as one of …
Tags: Conflict, Dean, Democratic Party, Democratic Pary, Dnc Chairman, Family Commitment, Fundraiser, Howard Dean, Karen Finney, Scheduling, Spokeswoman, Washington D CAngry Gay Democrats Pull Support For DNC
The Obama administration’s decision to file a controversial brief on behalf of the Defense Of Marriage Act appears to have been the last straw for many gay and lesbians who were once enthusiastic supporters of the administration as well as the Democratic party.
Politico reports that the National Stonewall Democrats is the latest group to pull out of a June 25 Democratic National Committee fundraiser because of the Obama administration’s defense of DOMA and lack of action on gay issues.
The group said is “incredibly disappointed” in the party for a variety of reasons, including a perceived lack of support.
“The DNC has traditionally provided materials for the many Pride parades and festivals around the country to help educate the LGBT community about why the Democratic Party is the Party for full LGBT equality,” National Stonewall wrote in an e-mail, according to Politico. “This year, we were informed that we would not be receiving any materials or support for producing materials for the various nationwide Pride activities. These decisions were very disappointing.” See Angry Gay Democrats Pull Support For DNC
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Gay Dems complain DNC cut off funding, drop support for Biden event
Theboard of directors of the National Stonewall Democrats are dropping their support for a June 25 DNC fundraiser with Vice President Joe Biden over, they wrote in an email obtained by POLITICO, a combination of policy slights and the claim that they’ve been cut off from traditional party funding.
In the email to Tom Petrillo, who runs the party’s substantial gay fundraising operation, the board members write:
[W]e are incredibly disappointed that the DNC has made a decision to withhold any financial support to National Stonewall Democrats this year but is in turn asking us to help raise money for the DNC in a difficult financial environment. The DNC has historically supported National Stonewall through sponsorship of the annual Capitol Champions event. This year, we did not receive any support. The DNC has traditionally provided materials for the many Pride parades and festivals around the country to help educate the LGBT community about why the Democratic Party is the Party for full LGBT equality. This year we were informed that we would not be receiving any materials or support for producing materials for the various nationwide Pride activities. These decisions were very disappointing.
We’d be remiss to also not mention that the recent legal brief of the Obama Administration defending DOMA is incredibly hurtful. The members of the Board and our membership put our hopes, our dollars and our time into ensuring the election of Barack Obama because we believed that he supported us. To now have his Administration refer to our relationships in the same terms used by our long time enemies such as Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and James Dobson hurts on so many levels. To have our committed and loving relationships referred to as the moral equivalent of incest and pedophilia is not something that any of us ever expected from this Administration considering how hard we worked to be seen and respected. For that reason alone, advocating for attendance at a fundraiser to support the Administration and the DNC, while they have not condemned this hurtful language, is not something our membership will receive positively.
The group says it’s not “boycotting” the June 25 fundraiser with Joe Biden; it just won’t encourage its members to attend.
Gay money is, historically, of outsized importance to the Democratic Party. Howard Dean, in particular, launched his presidential campaign in part on enthusiasm from gay donors about his support for civil unions, and maintained those relationships as chairman. For update see Gay Dems complain DNC cut off funding, drop support for Biden event
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Black Pastors and Gay Rights: DC Becomes a Battleground
The nation’s capital is suddenly center court in America’s loud argument over gay marriage. Nothing new about that, except that this time the battle is being hashed out in the streets, churches and living rooms in working class wards of the city. While there is something poignant about both sides literally singing the same hymn (”We Shall Overcome”) at its rallies, there is also something refreshing about the debate taking place in the unofficial part of Washington, D.C: For once, it’s not partisan.That is not to say it’s not a touchy issue. Gay marriage pits race and faith together in the same combustible conversation, and does so in a community in which both are sacrosanct subjects. The black Christian church predates Emancipation by more than two centuries, and served as a bulwark against the pernicious effects of slavery, Jim Crow, alcohol and drugs, AIDS, poverty, crime, police brutality and bad schools.
In the face of all that, African-American pastors and their churches have offered up faith and love of family as twin defenses. Thus they have been an institution with a message that at its core is fundamentally conservative. And at the same time, it was from the pulpits of these very same black churches that emanated the commanding voices that demanded fundamental change to the old order. Make no mistake, the moral authority and raw political power of the civil rights movement was rooted in these self-same churches. And in that sense they were a liberating, as well as a stabilizing, force.
These contradictory forces of liberalism and conservatism have coexisted, not always easily, for centuries within the church. But gay marriage has opened a chasm in the black community, in which, to paraphrase (and modernize) Lincoln who, while speaking about the North and South during the Civil War, observed that each side reads the same bible, prays to the same God, invokes His wisdom against the other – and belongs to the same political party.
In the local politics of Washington, the true power brokers are predominately black, monolithically Democratic and tuned into the religious sensibilities of their constituents. Thus, the discussion taking place here over gay marriage is really a series of conversations; some within the black community and some within the Christian churches, and almost all of it within the Democratic Party. This is not altogether a bad thing. For starters, there’s no Republican bogeyman, and for another, the race card is played to establish one’s bona fides, not to stoke prejudice. Finally, the church-bashing rhetoric one finds in other places where this debate is taking place is muted here: Attacking the church would simply be a good way to lose the argument. And judging by the language being invoked by both sides, the stakes of this argument are high: Leaders of competing camps clearly believe that what unfolds here in unofficial Washington will be a harbinger for where this nation is heading on gay rights.
“The march towards equality is coming to this country, and you can either be a part of it or stand in the way,” David Catania, one of two openly gay D.C. Council members, declared on May 5, as the council approved his pro-gay marriage measure.
“This is the Armageddon of the marriage debate,” was the rejoinder offered by Bishop Harry Jackson, pastor of Hope Christian Church in Beltsville, Md., and author of a petition seeking to have the question put on the ballot for every voter in Washington. “It’s a declaration of war.” See Black Pastors and Gay Rights: DC Becomes a Battleground
Politics Daily
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Lowenstein: Hate Crimes bill to move in Senate this week
[caption id=”attachment_8040″ align=”alignleft” width=”200″ caption=”Judy Shepard, advocating for hate crimes legislation”][/caption]
An anonymous Democratic Party source told the Washington Blade that hate crimes legislation will likely go to a vote before Wednesday in the Senate. The legislation, which the House of Representatives passed earlier this year, will be attached to a …
Tags: Democratic Party, Hate Crimes Bill, Hate Crimes Legislation, House Of Representatives, Judy Shepard, Lowenstein, Party Source, Senate, Vote, Washington BladeWis. Democrats elect gay advocate as nation’s youngest chair
(Green Bay, Wisc.) Wisconsin’s Democratic Party says it now has the nation’s youngest state chairman in either party.
Wisconsin Democrats elected Mike Tate as their new chairman Saturday at their convention in Green Bay. He just turned 30 in March.
Tate has been involved in state Democratic politics for more than a …
Tags: Advocate, Democratic Party, Democratic Politics, Democrats, elect, gay, Green Bay, Mike Tate, State Chairman, Wis, WiscDC Panel Hears Arguments On Gay Marriage Referendum Washington Post -
The battle over same-sex marriage in the District moved to the city election board yesterday as supporters and opponents packed into a hearing room to debate whether the city should put the issue on the ballot.
The D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics, which currently has two members and one vacancy, will determine whether voters should have a chance in a referendum to block a bill legalizing same-sex marriages performed elsewhere.
The board heard four hours of testimony yesterday and is expected to make a decision Friday or early next week.
Both sides presented legal and political arguments about whether the same-sex marriage issue should be in the hands of voters or the politicians who represent them.
“All we are asking for is a public debate,” said the Rev. Dale Wafer, a supporter of the referendum and a minister with the Harvest, a religious community in Northeast Washington. “We are not afraid of a debate. All we want is a public debate.”
Philip E. Pannell, a longtime gay rights advocate and Democratic Party activist, accused referendum supporters of “advocating for a popular vote that will give vent to public homophobia.”
See DC Panel Hears Arguments On Gay Marriage Referendum Washington Post -
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Lt. Dan Choi, Gay Arabic Translator Discharged From Army, Gives Speech
Nearly a hundred protesters assembled Wednesday outside the Beverly Hilton hotel in Beverly Hills, CA where President Obama hosted a Democratic Party fundraiser.
Protest organizers called for Obama to repeal the government’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that exempts openly gay men and women from serving in the military.
Lt. Dan Choi, a West Point graduate and an Arabic translator, was discharged from the Army when he declared he was gay on national television. His conviction that the military’s policy is “a deadly poison” inspired him to lead the protest on Wednesday.
“There is a message that I want to give to Obama,” said Choi. “Stop forcing our soldiers to hide. Let them be free to serve.”
Undeterred by Tuesday’s decision by the California Supreme Court to uphold the ban on gay marriage passed by voters in November, Choi said to the crowd, “We can’t wait for somebody else to give us rights…. if we want rights, we have to fight for it. We have to earn it.” Choi ended his speech the same way it began, chanting, “Love is worth it.”
Pro-peace and anti-torture protesters took part in the demonstration as well. See Lt. Dan Choi, Gay Arabic Translator Discharged From Army, Gives Speech
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Global video mashup for International Day Against Homophobia & Transphobia 2009 hits the Internet
359 people from 48 countries take part in massive global web video project to mark the IDAHO 2009
A global project to create a public awareness video for the International Day Against Homophobia & Transphobia (IDAHO) on May 17 has attracted the participation of 359 people from 48 countries across six continents around the world. The groundbreaking project is a joint undertaking of the Paris-based IDAHO Committee and the social network Gays.com, attracting 50,000 people to its website within a month.
Said Louis-Georges Tin, founder of the IDAHO committee, “We are overwhelmed and, at the same time, humbled by this torrent of enthusiastic support that has poured in from all four corners of the world since we kickstarted the video project in April. People have made the effort to go to such places as the Statue of Liberty, the Great Wall of China, the Sydney Opera House, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Merlion, the Petronas Twin Towers and the Eiffel Tower to shoot their video, contributing to the spectacular visual feast you see in the mashup.”
In April, members of the global LGBT community were invited to step out in front of the camera and in their own language introduce themselves, state where they are from and how proud they are to be gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. The result is a video that sends the powerful message that LGBT individuals are present in every country, every society and every corner of the world. Participants submitted videos in all of the world’s key languages, including Afrikaans, Arabic, Cantonese, English, French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Tamil and even American Sign Language.
In addition to the groundswell of support from local communities from around the globe, renowned celebrities, activists, politicians and web personalities have also participated in the project. These include (in alphabetical order):
Ali Hili: Gay Iraqi activist now living in exile in London and founder of the Iraqi-LGBT group
ANT: Host of VH1 reality series Celebrity Fit Club and U.S. of ANT on MTV’s LOGO channel
Lizzy the Lezzy: Animated lesbian standup comedy character with a cult following on Youtube
Michael Buckley: Celebrity host of the entertainment show What the Buck, the 5th most subscribed comedy channel of all time on Youtube
Michael Kauch: German member of parliament and coordinator of the gay and lesbian policy for the Free Democratic Party
Stephen Williams: British Liberal Democrat member of parliament for Bristol West
Said Kenneth Tan, spokesperson for Gays.com, “Much has been said about Stonewall 2.0 and netroots activism since the Proposition 8 vote against gay marriage in California. This project was made possible only by the Internet, and we believe there are a limitless number of opportunities for the LGBT community to harness the power of the Internet to educate, raise awareness, promote equality, and to debunk myths. We have been honoured to partner with the IDAHO Committee in the execution of such an amazing project.”
Prior to the launch of the video, Gays.com announced that it experienced a massive distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack which began at approximately 3.50am Hong Kong time on May 15, 2009, causing the entire website to be inaccessible.
A distributed denial of service attack occurs when a multitude of systems attempt to flood the bandwidth or resources of a targeted system with illegitimate website requests. The flood of traffic by these requests cause the Internet bandwidth of the attacked site to be consumed to such an extent that the website is inaccessible to other legitimate users.
Said Kenneth Tan, Gays.com spokesperson, “The timing of this DDoS attack on Gays.com is by no means a coincidence. We have been working for weeks on this high profile video campaign together with the Committee for the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia. The final product of this campaign, a public awareness video, was going to be launched on the campaign site at http://gays.com/idaho on Sunday. This is a well-timed, well-orchestrated assault by a large botnet with tens of thousands of PCs sending requests to our site. Engineers with our Internet Service Provider remarked they have never seen an attack of this intensity before. We deplore these unscrupulous actions by an organised group to harrass, intimidate and silence us for what we are doing.”
Added Tan, “Our technical staff are now working round the clock to restore services to legitimate users. In the meanwhile, we are going through our access logs, gathering information through various mechanisms and connecting the dots to identify the origin of the attacks. We will be working with law enforcement officials to bring the cyberterrorists to justice.”
The video “IDAHO 2009: One Voice, One Message, Heard Around the World” is now accessible at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2Rp8ep_ezE
The Committee for the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHO) is a network of activists, present in over 50 countries, who seek to promote the idea of an international day against homophobia and transphobia. This day has been recognized officially by a number of governments around the world and provides an opportunity for the LGBT movement across the world to unite in a powerful demonstration of collective visibility.
Gays.com was designed for members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community as the world’s first LGBT social networking website that designed for real people with real names an real world connections. The site aims to build an authentic social environment that helps people maintain their relationships with people they actually know. Launched in May 2008, Gays.com is headquartered in Hong Kong with a development team spread between Shanghai, China and Bielefeld, Germany.
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