Morocco gets first LGBT mag

Mithly hit newstands in Morocco this month, causing public outcry in the North African country.

Scholastic puts gay book back in fair

After public outcry, Scholastic agreed to include a book with a girl with two moms in its fair.

Scholastic puts gay book back in fair

After public outcry, Scholastic agreed to include a book with a girl with two moms in its fair.

Public Outcry Kills Anchorage Gay Protections

An Anchorage, Alaska gay protections bill is likely doomed as public sentiment turns sour, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

Hundreds of opponents appeared to testify against the bill at a Wednesday Anchorage Assembly hearing on the issue.

The bill would protect gay men and lesbians from discrimination in the areas of employment, housing and credit. An original draft included transgendered persons, but lawmakers cut out the provision amid loud protest.

Opponents’ demands have resulted in three drafts of the ordinance, including one that turns the protections on their head. That version would allow discrimination based on sexual orientation, while protecting other classes.

“The added language in the third version guts the intent and the integrity of the ordinance,” said Jackie Buckley, spokeswoman for EqualityWorks, the group that lobbied for the gay protections.

But time is ticking as a new, unsympathetic mayor is about to be installed on July 1, Republican Mayor-elect Dan Sullivan. Sullivan, however, gains veto power over all ordinances seven days prior, on Wednesday.

As people continued to pile in to testify against the bill – nearly 600 people have signed up and only 300 have been heard – Anchorage Assembly Chairwoman Debbie Ossiander said Friday she will continue to allow testimony. The extension is likely to make it impossible to approve the bill before Sullivan gains veto control. Acting Mayor Matt Claman, a Democrat, supports the measure.

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Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/06/public-outcry…

Gays under threat in Senegal

DAKAR, Senegal — A mob gathered near a mosque outside Dakar. They were there to hunt down and kill nine men accused of homosexual acts.

Earlier this week the nine Senegalese AIDS activists were freed from eight-year-prison terms for alleged homosexual acts, but they went into hiding because of death threats from Muslim religious leaders and the general population.

“The homosexuals will not escape lynching. They will be fish food,” Dakar newspaper L’Observeur quoted a local youth leader as saying.

“Gay men will never be free in Senegal. They expose us all to danger,” said Imam Mbaye Niang, a prominent religious leader and member of parliament. “The judges should understand that Senegalese people need to protect their children, their families from homosexuality.”

In Senegal — where 95 percent of the population is Muslim — homosexual acts are punishable by fines and up to five years in prison. In January, the nine men received the harshest sentence yet for such an offense in Senegal, getting the maximum of five years and an additional three for criminal conspiracy.

Though widely supported in Senegal, the conviction was condemned by international human rights groups and foreign governments, most notably France.

“They were judged and condemned very severely, surely on the basis of public outcry, therefore the justice was neither objective nor founded in law,” said lead defense attorney Barim Sassoum Sy, who called the initial ruling hasty and emotional.

A Dakar appeals court overturned that decision Monday, citing violations of legal protocol.

Acting on an anonymous tip, police had arrested the men — most of whom do HIV prevention work in the “men having sex with men” community — in December at the home of a prominent gay activist. But the police did not have a search warrant, nor did they catch the men in the act, which is required by the Senegalese law prohibiting “indecent acts against nature.” The judge hearing the appeal therefore declared their convictions null and void, Sy said.

Yet even as smiling attorneys and supporters celebrated in the packed courtroom Monday and exchanged congratulations, plans were already in place to get the freed men into hiding outside Dakar.

“The first judge sentenced them to eight years,” said Imam Niang. “He had the courage to say it. The judge that let them go was much less courageous. He yielded to international pressure.”

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