10.10.07
Posted in Gay Rights at 11:07 am by pikapp44
For years, rumblings have surfaced on the Internet, conjecture about her casual references to “sexual orientation” and “respect.” Now, Dear Abby is ready to say it flatly: She supports same-sex marriage.
“I believe if two people want to commit to each other, God bless ‘em,” the syndicated advice columnist told The Associated Press. “That is the highest form of commitment, for heaven’s sake.”
What Jeanne Phillips, aka Abigail Van Buren, finds offensive and misguided are homophobic jokes, phrases like “That’s so gay,” and parents who reject or try to reform their children when they come out of the closet.
Her views are the reason she’s being honored this week by Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, a national advocacy group that provides support for gay people and their families. The original Abby, Phillips’ 89-year-old mother, Pauline, helped put PFLAG on the map in 1984 when she first referred a distraught parent to the organization.
Jeanne Phillips, who formally took over the column when her mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease five years ago, has continued plugging the group, as well as its affiliate for parents with children who identify as transgender, and a suicide hot line aimed at gay teenagers.
“I’m trying to tell kids if they are gay, it’s OK to be gay. I’ve tried to tell families if they have a gay family member to accept them and love them as they always have,” she said Friday.
PFLAG director Jody Huckaby said Abby is the perfect choice for the first “Straight for Equality” award, part of the group’s new campaign to engage more heterosexuals as allies.
“She is such a mainstream voice,” Huckaby said. “If Dear Abby is talking about it, it gives other people permission to talk about it.”
Alert “Dear Abby” readers may have noticed that the youthful attitude Phillips promised to bring to the column includes a decidedly gay-friendly take on most matters.
In a March 2005 column that touched a nerve with some readers, for instance, Phillips came down unequivocally on the side of scientists who say sexual orientation is a matter of genetics, not personal choice. She advised a mother who had cautioned her 14-year-old daughter to keep her feelings for other girls secret to “come to terms with your own feelings about homosexuality.”
Last year, addressing a groom whose gay brother refused to serve as best man or even attend the wedding because he did not have the right to marry, she made it clear her sympathies lay with the boycotting brother.
“Accepting the status quo is not always the best thing to do,” she wrote. “Women were once considered chattel, and slavery was regarded as sanctioned in the Bible. However, western society grew to recognize that neither was just. Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands and Spain have recognized gay marriage, and one day, perhaps, our country will, too.”
Phillips, who lives in Los Angeles, said she isn’t worried that aligning herself with gay rights advocates will cause newspapers to censor or cancel the column, which appears in about 1,400 newspapers.
Her outspokenness on gay rights issues has never caused a strong backlash, said Kathie Kerr, a spokeswoman for Universal Press Syndicate, which distributes the column. It’s possible some editors choose not to run the segments dealing with homosexuality, but if so they have not complained to the syndicate, Kerr said.
Phillips realizes not everyone agrees with her on gay rights; she and her husband “argue about this continually,” she said. He thinks civil unions and domestic partnerships “would be less threatening to people who feel marriage is just a religious rite.” She thinks anything less than full marriage amounts to second-class citizenship.
“If gay Americans are not allowed to get married and have all the benefits that American citizens are entitled to by the Bill of Rights, they should get one hell of a tax break. That is my opinion,” said Phillips, who speaks with the no-nonsense tone of someone who is used to settling debates.
Right now, Abby, as Phillips prefers to be called, is working on a reply to a woman who wanted to know whether she should include childhood photographs of her transgender brother-in-law in a family album. The woman is worried what she will tell her children when they see pictures of their uncle as a little girl.
Phillips’ guidance to Worried Reader will be simple, she said: Include the photos, of course. Silence is the enemy. Answer any questions the kids have honestly — Uncle John was born with a body of the wrong sex, so even when he was called Jane he was really John inside.
Phillips said that while it might be tempting to devote an entire column to why she thinks jokes invoking homosexual slurs are in poor taste, she does not plan to spell out her views on gay marriage in print any more directly than she has already.
“If they are my readers, they know how I feel on the subject,” she said. “I don’t think I’m a flaming radical. I’m for civility in life. I’m for treating each other with respect, trying to do the best you can.”
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10.09.07
Posted in Gay Rights, Gay Seniors at 12:12 pm by pikapp44
Gay and lesbian seniors living in retirement communities and nursing homes often feel compelled to retreat back into the closet to avoid being discriminated against by staff or shunned by other residents, according to this article. To address the problem, L.G.B.T. Aging Projects in New York, Chicago and other major cities are beginning to conduct sensitivity training for long-term care providers, and some facilities geared toward LGBT seniors are opening their doors.
Elderly gay people living in nursing homes or assisted-living centers or receiving home care, increasingly report that they have been disrespected, shunned or mistreated in ways that range from hurtful to deadly, even leading some to commit suicide.
Some have seen their partners and friends insulted or isolated. Others live in fear of the day when they are dependent on strangers for the most personal care. That dread alone can be damaging, physically and emotionally, say geriatric doctors, psychiatrists and social workers.
The plight of the gay elderly has been taken up by a generation of gay men and lesbians, concerned about their own futures, who have begun a national drive to educate care providers about the social isolation, even outright discrimination, that lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender clients face.
Federal law provides no antidiscrimination protections to gay people. Twenty states explicitly outlaw such discrimination in housing and public accommodations. But no civil rights claims have been made by gay residents of nursing homes, according to the Lambda Legal Defense Fund, which litigates and monitors such cases. Potential plaintiffs, the organization says, are too frail or frightened to bring action.
Admissions forms for long-term care have boxes to check for marital status and next of kin. But none of the boxes match the circumstances of gay men or lesbians. Suggested follow-up questions like “Who is important in your life?
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10.05.07
Posted in Advocate Articles, Gay Rights at 7:05 pm by pikapp44
The Palm Beach County, Fla., legislature, on a vote of 6–1, approved a measure Tuesday that would specifically protect the rights of transgender people, according to a report on the Web site Out in Miami. The “yes” vote was split between three Democrats and three Republicans, while another Democrat voted against it.
The county board of commissioners must vote on the legislation twice more before the law can go into effect.
Board vice chair Jeff Koons proposed to alter Palm Beach’s Equal Employment Ordinance and the Fair Housing Ordinance to prohibit discrimination based on gender identity or expression, the newspaper reports.
The changes were spurred by the recent firing of Largo city manager Steve Stanton when it was revealed that he was going to undergo sex-reassignment surgery.
“Employers will still be able to enforce reasonable dress and grooming standards in the workplace after the law takes effect,” Rand Hoch, president of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council, said in the report. “However, the Equal Employment Ordinance will provide assurances that other aspects of a person’s gender identity and expression cannot be used as the basis for employment discrimination.”
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10.03.07
Posted in Advocate Articles, Gay Portal at 3:03 pm by pikapp44
A piece of outer space named for George Takei is in kind of a rough neighborhood for somebody who steers a starship: an asteroid belt. An asteroid between Mars and Jupiter has been renamed 7307 Takei in honor of the out actor, best known for his role as Hikaru Sulu in the original Star Trek series and movies.
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10.02.07
Posted in Gay Rights at 11:11 am by pikapp44
A gay police officer has filed a discrimination suit against the city and the New York Police Department, saying he was threatened with violence, called vulgar names, and treated unfairly by supervisors because of his sexuality.
The lawsuit was filed by Michael Harrington, 30, who claims his superior officers failed to take proper action when he told them about the malicious and discriminatory mistreatment he suffered.
Harrington says in court papers that his trouble with coworkers started in February 2003, when he told another officer at the 75th Precinct in Brooklyn that he was gay.
Harrington, of Brooklyn, said in the suit that within months he overheard an officer in the men’s room referring to him as a ”faggot.” Harrington spoke to the officer who said he would hurt Harrington if he confronted the officer again.
Court papers say Harrington also repeatedly sought a transfer from the 75th Precinct but his written applications ”kept getting lost.” He was told that after he finally transferred, that someone posted obscene drawings of him in a sex act, the lawsuit alleges.
While working at the 79th Precinct in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, Harrington brought his domestic partner to the station house Christmas party. Upon introducing his partner, another officer spit out his drink and began laughing.
Harrington says he complained to a supervisor about being mistreated and the supervisor said he was going to transfer him to the Sixth Precinct in Greenwich Village ‘’so plaintiff could be with his people,” the suit said.
At the Sixth Precinct, court papers say, a coworker told Harrington in December 2006 that ”all faggots should be shot.”
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10.01.07
Posted in Gay Portal at 5:45 pm by pikapp44
Leonard Bernstein, is one of the greatest American composers. He wrote the scores to classic shows like “West Side Story” and “Candide” This is a small list of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Icons.
Leonard Bernstein, Annie Leibovitz, Angela Davis, Alexander the Great, Billie Jean King, Lily Tomlin.
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