Shanghai Journal Gay Festival in China Pushes Official Boundaries New York Times
SHANGHAI — It was shortly after the “hot body” contest and just before a painted procession of Chinese opera singers took the stage that the police threatened to shut down China’s first gay pride festival. The authorities had already forced the cancellation of a play, a film screening and a social mixer, so when an irritated plainclothes officer arrived at the Saturday afternoon gala and flashed his badge, organizers feared the worst.
After some fraught negotiations, Hannah Miller, an American teacher who helped put together the weeklong festival, agreed to limit the crowds, keep the noise down and, most important, “not let anything happen that might embarrass the government,” she explained after returning from the impromptu sidewalk meeting. “That was a close call,” she said.
Crisis averted, the party continued.
And so it went for Shanghai Pride week, a delicately orchestrated series of private events that revealed how far China’s gay community had come, and how much further it had to go. In the 12 years since homosexuality was decriminalized in China, there has been an unmistakable blossoming of gay life, even if largely underground. Most big cities have gay bars, and social networking sites ease the isolation of those living in China’s rural hinterland. Antigay violence is virtually unheard of.
But official tolerance has its limits. Gay publications and plays are banned, gay Web sites are occasionally blocked and those who try to advocate for greater legal protections for lesbians and gay men sometimes face harassment from the police. For years, movie buffs in Beijing have tried, and failed, to get permission for a gay film festival.
This month, public security officials forced Wan Yanhai, a prominent advocate on gay issues, including AIDS, to leave Beijing for a week because they feared he might cause trouble during the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown.
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New York Times
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Exhibit celebrates 40 years of gay activism
orty years ago this month, riots against a police raid at the Stonewall Inn marked the beginning of the gay liberation movement. An exhibit opening today at the New York Public Library charts what happened in the heady year that followed.
Before Stonewall, gay rights activists pursued a lonely agenda, working for homosexuals to be accepted as part of normal society and not as the sociopaths judged by psychiatric associations.
“But 1969 suddenly saw a mass movement getting behind these activists,” said curator Jason Baumann, amid the artifacts of the blossoming battle, from colorful newsweekly publications to photos of the first Gay Pride march up Sixth Avenue in 1970.
Gay bars were often owned by the mob and run as private clubs. The mob offered protection but sold out patrons whenever advantageous. On June 28, 1969, a routine raid on the Stonewall Inn — owned by “Fat Tony” Lauria — took a significant turn when patrons decided to fight back.
“The police were freaked out by drag queens throwing rocks,” Baumann said.
The rights groups that followed — with names like the Gay Liberation Front, the Radicalesbians and Street Transvestites Action Revolutionaries — no longer cared about fitting in, said Baumann.
“They wanted to transform society.”
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Cathedral city ‘not gay-friendly’
The cathedral city of Canterbury is being investigated over claims it is not welcoming to gay people.
Andrew Brettell of Canterbury Pride has complained the Kent city is a “cultural wilderness” and one of few in England without any gay bars.
He said the city fails to welcome its “closeted” lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.
The Local Government Ombudsman is investigating the claims, which have been denied by the council.
Mr Brettell criticised Canterbury City Council for “ticking the boxes” but failing to do anything to attract gay people to the area.
“What we need is for the council to send signals that it’s OK to be gay and that they are welcoming gays to the city,” he said.
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Galveston gay bar attack draws rare use of law
Galveston prosecutors took the exceedingly rare step this week of filing hate crime enhancements when they charged three men with felony assault for an attack at one of the city’s gay bars.
This marks only the second time the Galveston County District Attorney’s Office has pursued such enhancements, based on the staff’s recollections, said prosecutor Jennifer Ott.
As a result, brothers Lawrence Henry Lewis III, 20, and Lawrneil Henry Lewis, 18, and their cousin, Alejandro Sam Gray, 17 could face an elevated punishment of five to 99 years or life in prison if a jury convicts them of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and agrees they committed a hate crime.
The trio is accused of hurling large rocks or pieces of concrete at patrons inside Robert’s Lafitte in the 2500 block of Avenue Q around 8 p.m. Sunday, injuring two men, including one who tried to chase them.
Marc Bosaw, 57, needed 12 staples to close a laceration to the back of his head, while James Troy Nickelson, 39, was struck in the jaw.
One of the three suspects later told police their intent was to target homosexuals, said Galveston Police Department Lt. D.J. Alvarez. The trio also hurled homophobic insults, authorities said.
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‘Milk’ shows high stakes of gay rights movement
Democracy at the street level makes for great theater. Shipyard workers in Gdansk, the newly enfranchised in Selma or the newly liberated in Baghdad – “people power” is electrifying to behold.
“Milk,” the long, long-awaited bio-film of gay politician and “community organizer” Harvey Milk, is filled with such political thrills. It’s about a man who pioneered the cause, was elected to office as an openly gay man and who was martyred, just as he always predicted.
This history, brought vividly to life by filmmaker Gus Van Sant and a great cast headed by Sean Penn, debuts as a “community organizer” has won the presidency and the country wrestles again with gay rights.
“Milk” doesn’t waste a moment in telling Harvey’s story. From the opening credits, a montage of vintage TV and newsreel footage of police raids on gay bars in the ’60s, it gives us context, personalities, the stakes in the struggle and one who saw the big picture. See ‘Milk’ shows high stakes of gay rights movement
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Gay bars hopping despite terror threat
Ricin threat not deterring patronage; ‘If you don’t drink, a terrorist wins.’ More at SLOG.
Bar patrons drink on through threats
Business as usual expected at Seattle gay bars, even as second threat letter is released.
Did ricin threat come from within gay community?
(Seattle, Washington) Security has been beefed up at gay bars in Seattle following this week’s threats that patrons would be targeted in a ricin attack.
The FBI and Homeland Security are participating in the investigation into who made the anonymous threats at 11 gay bars, but are referring all questions to …
Seattle gay bars threatened with ricin attacks
(Seattle, Washington) Seattle police say they are taking seriously threats of ricin attacks on 11 gay bars in the city.
The threats were made in letters received by the bars on Tuesday and have been turned over to police. Seattle weekly newspaper The Stranger received a 12th letter saying it should …
Milk yanks gay movies from closet to mainstream
Milk is a message movie, but more importantly, it’s an openly proud and entirely self-possessed message movie that wears its progressive rhetoric on its rainbow sleeve.
The distinction is crucial, because when you get right down to the nitty-gritty nub of what director Gus Van Sant has been able to achieve with Milk, it goes beyond teaching a particularly loathsome chapter of American history.
Van Sant, the openly gay film director, has created a universally accessible movie about the birth of the gay movement that is not framed by shame.
Back when this movie was set, in the mid-1970s, shame was an inherent part of the entire gay experience and Van Sant quickly sketches the emotional mood in the opening credit sequence.
Small, plain white titles appear over archival footage of police raids on gay bars. Slowing down the black and white footage to a surreal, dreamy pace, Van Sant sends us through the glass darkly as we watch all sorts of men being loaded into paddy wagons with their hands hiding their faces.
It’s mind-altering imagery because it’s obvious these men are not criminals, yet truncheon-swinging police are corralling them into custody. Their only crime is hanging out with other men and being who they are, but homosexuality was seen as a legitimate reason to deprive a human being of his or her civil rights.
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