The Albany gay marriage back room
Gay City News reports that a high-stakes meeting that included the governor, senior Democratic lawmakers and top gay advocates offered “the best sign yet that marriage equality may become a reality by New Year’s Day.”
Says Gay City News:
Shortly after 8 p.m., Paterson, four senior Senate Democrats — Jeffrey Klein of …
Thailand institutes new GRS rules
A one-year waiting period, etc., are now required in Thailand to obtain GRS.
Tags: Grs, New Year, Thailand, Waiting PeriodCalifornia gay marriage fight goes to Chinatown
The path to gay marriage in California may start in Chinatown.
After a double defeat at the voting booth and in court, gay advocates are reassessing their plans to push for legal same-sex marriage in the most populous U.S. state.
The new drive, focused on getting the issue on the ballot again as soon as November 2010, is more personal and reaches farther beyond the liberal confines of San Francisco’s Castro or Los Angeles’ gay heartland West Hollywood.
Lost in the 2009 election wreckage for gays was the marriage campaign’s relative success in Asian communities, which have swung toward support of same-sex marriage at a faster rate than the rest of California and have become a model for other groups.
Asian Americans have been building grass-roots support in Chinatown, Little Tokyo, Filipinotown for four years. Gays, lesbians and straight allies have talked about the often-taboo topic of homosexuality, set up booths at festivals, harangued non-English language media to change coverage and lobbied elected officials for support.
“What we felt we had to do is talk to people who aren’t on our side. So that’s why we do these crazy things like walk through the streets of Chinatown as part of the New Year’s Parade. That’s why we go out to festivals from Little India to Little Tokyo and talk to complete strangers,” said Marshall Wong, co-chair of Asia Pacific Islander group API Equality.
See
California gay marriage fight goes to Chinatown
* Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/06/california-ga…
Eve Pearlman: Curriculum battle lines drawn over values vs. bigotry in Alameda
A HOT TOPIC AROUND TOWN the last several months has been Alameda Unified School District’s proposed anti-bullying curriculum, which has been discussed with increasing fervor, and has turned into a referendum on gay rights. I admit I’d only been paying half attention to the debate (though my husband has been actively advocating for the curriculum’s adoption), until Tuesday night when I watched hours of testimony at the school board meeting, my heart dropping as a long line of speakers voiced their opposition to a few short lessons acknowledging the existence of gay and lesbian families. “It’s about sex!” the opponents claimed. But teaching about same-gender families is no more about sex than the words “marriage” and “husband” and “wife” and “wedding” are about sex. Yes, marriage is based in part on a sexual commitment, but we speak about husbands and wives all the time in a way in which sexuality is not the focus. To children, the word lesbian is no more about sex than the word marriage is. “But I want to teach my child about these things,” parents said. “I want to teach my beliefs to my child.” I have strong empathy for parents who want to impart their values to their children. But I do not have empathy when that “value” is that someone else is a lesser person. Imagine if the “value” in question were that women should not own property or that people could be owned by other people or that people with certain skin color should not be allowed to vote. These are not “values,” these are discriminatory prejudices.
At Tuesday’s meeting, the technique of the well-organized and coordinated curriculum opponents was to attack the series of lessons — designed to complement an already-established anti-bullying curriculum — on a number of technical grounds. “It’s not legal,” they said. “It doesn’t go far enough” or “It privileges one group over another.” But these attacks were contrived and disingenuous. Most curriculum opponents operated from what only few more frankly admitted: They don’t think gay families are the moral equivalent of their own straight families. They don’t think gay families are “OK” and they don’t want their kids being taught that they are. As many in this debate have done, all you have to do is switch the opponents’ arguments to another social group to see how undemocratic their viewpoints are. Would the district allow a student to opt out of a Black history lesson? A celebration of Chinese New Year? To leave the room any time divorce is discussed? Of course not. Religion has been used to support all sorts of atrocities past and present (as well as all sorts of good things). Because an argument is religion-based doesn’t mean that it is more right, more valid or more just. In this country, in this democracy, in this friendly city of 70,000, it is our shared value that all people are created equal — and to those parents who want to teach otherwise, well, this is not a “value.” It is bigotry. And it has no place in our community’s schools. It has surprised me that in this day and age, in the Bay Area, that some are so hostile to difference and so obsessed with other people’s sex lives. The aim of the Alameda school district curriculum is simple: to teach about reality in order to help children skillfully and respectfully navigate their diverse community. All families (the majority of families, in fact) don’t look like the Cleavers. Families have all sorts of configurations, incorporating grandparents and cousins, step-siblings and stepfathers, same gender couples and opposite gender couples. That is reality. Children should be taught what’s real.
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/05/eve-pearlman-…
We are family, too: Vietnamese gays and lesbians join San Jose’s …
Dressed in a form-fitted black tuxedo, holding a bridal bouquet of white roses specked with yellow and red orchids, Annie Nguyen beamed, surrounded by men in colorful traditional Vietnamese wedding attire.
For the 50-year-old factory supervisor and mother of five, the short march in downtown San Jose’s 12th annual Vietnamese Spring Festival and Parade marked a personal milestone.
Two years ago, after decades of being in the closet, the San Jose woman came out to her husband and children. On Sunday, standing behind a sign in Vietnamese and English that said, “Love and support ALL of your children,” Nguyen made a public declaration and appeal:
“You could lead two lives: one out, one hidden. But you’ll not be part of your family. Parents should accept their children.”
Nguyen was one of 40 Vietnamese gays and lesbians from the Bay Area and other parts of California who marched during the traditional annual celebration of Tet, the lunar new year. It was only the second time in the parade’s history that gays and lesbians marched openly — and the first time that families joined them. For Vietnamese gay and lesbian groups, the event signaled a new kind of visibility and openness in a culture that traditionally views homosexuality as shameful — and something to hide.
See We are family, too: Vietnamese gays and lesbians join San Jose’s …
San Jose Mercury News, USA
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/we-are-family…
We are family, too: Vietnamese gays and lesbians join San Jose’s …
Dressed in a form-fitted black tuxedo, holding a bridal bouquet of white roses specked with yellow and red orchids, Annie Nguyen beamed, surrounded by men in colorful traditional Vietnamese wedding attire.
For the 50-year-old factory supervisor and mother of five, the short march in downtown San Jose’s 12th annual Vietnamese Spring Festival and Parade marked a personal milestone.
Two years ago, after decades of being in the closet, the San Jose woman came out to her husband and children. On Sunday, standing behind a sign in Vietnamese and English that said, “Love and support ALL of your children,” Nguyen made a public declaration and appeal:
“You could lead two lives: one out, one hidden. But you’ll not be part of your family. Parents should accept their children.”
Nguyen was one of 40 Vietnamese gays and lesbians from the Bay Area and other parts of California who marched during the traditional annual celebration of Tet, the lunar new year. It was only the second time in the parade’s history that gays and lesbians marched openly — and the first time that families joined them. For Vietnamese gay and lesbian groups, the event signaled a new kind of visibility and openness in a culture that traditionally views homosexuality as shameful — and something to hide.
See We are family, too: Vietnamese gays and lesbians join San Jose’s …
San Jose Mercury News, USA
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/we-are-family…
Mardi Gras returns to Galveston; Winter Party heats up Miami
Last February, Galveston Island rolled out the red carpet for a Mardi Gras celebration that showed the Gulf Coast to be home to one of Texas’ most gay-friendly small towns. Barely seven months later, the city resembled Atlantis, with most of it completely submerged.
But Galveston, as it did more than a century ago, is roaring back. This week, Harbor House — a bayside boutique of 42 rooms — officially reopened for business. Its older seawall-side sister, the Hotel Galvez, opened late last year, and another property, the Tremont Hotel (which on New Year’s Eve 2007 was sold out for a same-sex wedding) is set to be back in business by May.
And the city is already gearing up for Mardi Gras, with a 12-day celebration starting Feb. 13 and ending on Fat Tuesday, Feb. 24. The main event will be on Saturday, Feb. 21, with the Knights of Momus Grand Night Parade and the 24th annual Tremont House Ball (this time held at the Hotel Galvez). See Mardi Gras returns to Galveston; Winter Party heats up Miami
Dallas Voice, TX
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/mardi-gras-re…
200 Supporters of Gay & Lesbian Community March in2009 Los Angeles Chinatown New Year’s Parade
Contingent Organized by API Equality-LA Draws Record Participation
Los Angeles – On Saturday, January 31, 2009, a record 200 people joined the API Equality-LA contingent in the Golden Dragon Parade in Los Angeles’ Chinatown, one of the city’s most popular community event. Saturday marked only the fourth time in the parade’s 110-year history that a contingent representing and supporting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) members of the Asian and Pacific Islander (API) community has participated in the parade.
“We expected a strong turnout after all of the energy in our community since the November 2008 election, but we were absolutely astounded to welcome 200 participants – nearly three times as many as last year!” said Ericson Herbas, API Equality-LA steering committee member and one of the organizers of the contingent. “Particularly meaningful for all of us, we were also joined this year by same-sex couples who had been able to legally marry before November 2008.”
Wearing bright red t-shirts, the large contingent marched proudly through the streets of Chinatown, carrying banners displaying the six colors of the rainbow. The rainbow is commonly used to represent the pride of the LGBT community and was chosen by the API Equality-LA contingent to also represent the diversity of the coalition’s membership and supporters.
“Our participation in the lunar new year parade each year sends a powerful message of pride, diversity and inclusion,” said Marshall Wong, API Equality-LA co-chair. “Saturday was a wonderful way to enter the Year of the Ox. It is said that the Ox is a sign of prosperity through fortitude and hard work. Fortitude and hard work describe exactly what we need to win back the freedom to marry for the LGBT community. Today we took a short stroll around Chinatown but we’re committed to the long march to full equality.”
The contingent was led by a drum troupe playing traditional Korean drums, comprised of volunteers from the Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance (KIWA). And bringing up the rear of the API Equality-LA contingent was Danza Méxica Cuauhtemoc, a cultural troupe performing traditional Aztec dances, accompanied by Aztec drums and dressed in traditional Aztec clothes and tall feather headdresses.
“API Equality-LA was thrilled to be able to include both Korean and Aztec drums as well as Aztec dancers,” said Eileen Ma, another API Equality-LA steering committee member and organizer of the contingent. “For us, the drummers and dancers reinforced our message of pride in our diversity as a community.”
The diversity of the marchers was also evident in the organizations that officially joined the API Equality-LA contingent, many of whom proudly displayed their own organizational banners as part of the contingent. In addition to API Equality-LA, other organizations who participated in the contingent included: Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC); Asian Pacific Health Care Venture (APHCV); Asian Pacific Islander Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (API PFLAG); ); California Faith for Equality; Chinese Progressive Association (CPA) of San Gabriel Valley; Equal Roots Coalition; Gays United Network (Gays U.N.); Japanese American Citizens League (JACL); Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance (KIWA); Little Tokyo Service Center (LTSC); Love Honor Cherish; OCA-Greater Los Angeles; South Asian Network (SAN); and Asian Pacific Islander Pride Council, which includes Asian American Queer Women Activists (AAQWA), Asian Pacific AIDS Intervention Team (APAIT), Chinese Rainbow Association, Gay Asian Pacific Support Network (GAPSN), and Satrang.
(photo credit Ericson Herbas) * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/02/200-supporter…
Anti-gay remarks raise ire
It wasn’t exactly a New Year’s resolution, but KOA’s “Gunny” Bob Newman already has broken from his own suggestion to other conservatives about how to behave in making public statements. In doing so, Newman perpetuated a bigoted stereotype and smeared an entire class of U.S. veterans.
Shortly after the November election, Newman said that with an eye to the 2010 and 2012 campaigns, conservatives “cannot afford to do stupid things” such as “telling demonstrable lies about anything or anyone. We cannot, let’s say, exaggerate.”
See Anti-gay remarks raise ire
Denver Daily News, CO
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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/01/anti-gay-rema…
SF fails to cut HIV in gay men by 50 percent
San Francisco health officials set for themselves a fairly high mark five years ago in their fight against HIV: reduce new infections among gay and bi men by 50 percent by 2008.
Based on the latest estimates for new HIV infection rates in San Francisco, the city failed to reach its goal. It did achieve a roughly 10 percent reduction in HIV rates and has downgraded classifying its HIV epidemic to now being endemic, meaning rates are remaining flat from year to year.
Back in 2004, when the reduction target was included in the San Francisco HIV Prevention Plan, the health department estimated there were 1,082 new infections of HIV each year, with gay and bi men accounting for 835 of those cases.
Today, the city has reduced those estimates, with approximately 975 new HIV infections expected each year, with gay and bi men accounting for 772 of those cases. The bulk of those individuals continue to be among white men.
See SF fails to cut HIV in gay men by 50 percent
Bay Area Reporter, CA
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