LGBT Activists Call for Removal of Anti-Gay Human Rights Commissioner

Virginia Beach is rapidly gaining national and international media attention due to the horrific anti-gay and anti-transgender remarks made by  a member of the City's Human Rights Commission. For a city that depends so heavily on tourism dollars, being perceived as intolerant and unwelcoming can be a kiss of death and Commissioner LaKendrick El toxic Facebook Posts are rapidly undue years of city efforts to enhance the city's image nationally and internationally. In an unusual display of unity, area LGBT organizations and activists have unanimously called for El's removal - something that seemingly is supported by a majority of the members of Virginia Beach City Council.  The Virginian Pilot is  reporting on the controversy that is generating animosity among elements of the city's population.  So far, there is no word on whether El will resign or be removed by City Council.  Here are article highlights (note El's comments about "special rights" - something that it is actually Christofascists and other right wing religious extremists are seeking for themselves): 

Leaders in Hampton Roads’ LGBT community called for the removal of a member of Virginia Beach’s Human Rights Commission on Thursday following comments he posted on Facebook saying homosexuality was an “abomination” and that transgender people suffer from a mental illness.

It’s unclear what sparked the series of Facebook posts by LaKendrick El on Monday. El did not respond to a message from The Virginian-Pilot seeking comment.

El’s posts are not publicly viewable, but screen shots provided to the Pilot by the advocacy group Hampton Roads Pride show that he shared a 2017 news story about a transgender woman in Wyoming who was convicted of sexually assaulting a 10-year-old girl in a bathroom in a private home [El may have quoted a false Fox News story about this occurence].

“This is why we need to stop giving men in dresses passes,” El wrote. “I have daughters and I won’t accept them sharing a restroom with a grown man suffering from this mental illness.”

In a separate post less than 15 minutes later, El suggested that gay and lesbian people are getting special treatment, although he did not specify in what way.

“Stop promoting sexuality to our children. Two men or women together is an abomination according to my faith,” he wrote. “Stop promoting your sexual behavior expecting special treatment based on who you’re having sex with.”

LGBT advocates expressed dismay that a member of a human rights commission would express such views. Stacie Walls-Beegle, executive director of the LGBT Life Center in Norfolk, said El’s comments are especially harmful to those struggling to understand their sexuality.

El’s comments also drew the ire of his fellow commission members, the city’s mayor and a majority of city council members.

“The Virginia Beach Human Rights Commission was founded to institute, conduct and engage in educational and informational programs for the promotion of mutual understanding and respect among citizens and the fulfillment of human rights," Mayor Bobby Dyer said at a news conference.

“We believe the public comments of Brother LaKendrick Coburn El are contrary to these basic goals that are the core of the Human Rights Commission, and it is no longer appropriate for him to serve in this capacity."

The commission’s chairwoman, Sylvia Nery-Strickland, said El’s comments do not reflect her group’s position.

“I am deeply saddened at the anguish and pain affecting LGBT community,” she said. “I understand how hurtful these comments are. … These comments stand in start contrast to the public position of the Human Rights Commission."

I would also note that time and time again when political figures and right wing religious figures are stridently anti-gay, it's usually only a matter of time before they are exposed for being sexual predators or engaging in the type of sex they are outwardly condemning. Think former congressman Ed Shrock, Tim Haggard, and an endless parade of Republican office holders this blog has noted over the years.

The Next Step for Gay Pride

Hampton Roads Pridefest take place today in downtown Norfolk at Town Point Park.  Very large crowds are anticipated and the event is now Norfolk's largest festival event after Harbor Fest.  Sponsors include not only the City of Norfolk which not too many years ago treated the LGBT community as if it was radioactive, and Newport News Shipbuilding, currently Virginia's largest employer and the company that builds America's nuclear aircraft carriers.  

The event was preceded by events around the area virtually every day this past week - more events are tomorrow in Virginia Beach - including the "Block Party" held the last number of years in Scope, Norfolk's sports and concert arena.  Having attended and closed down the party, it was packed, with the area floor completely filled with hundreds, if not thousands dancing while and even larger number socializing.  The Block Party alone is far larger than Pridefest was for many, many years and the crowd covered a wide gamut of ages and every ethnic group was there, white, Black, Asian, Hispanic, Pacific Islander. Trump supporters would have thoroughly hated seeing such a multi-racial crowd getting along and having fun together.  Things have come a long way since I came out going on 18 years ago.  

Yet much remains to be done - both here here in Virginia where, if the Democrats take control of the General Assembly in the November 2019 elections, LGBT Virginians will finally have non-discrimination protections - and in many parts of America where bigots and Christofascists hold sway, encouraged in their message of hate by the Trump/Pence regime, the Republican Party, and, of course, scamvangelists lining their pockets with money as they pervert the Gospel message.   To accomplish these needed changes, perhaps a new model is needed.  Self-proclaimed LGBT activist groups like the Human Rights Campaign ("HRC") and Equality Virginia ("EV") increasingly seem most focused on raising money to support ever higher salaries to their leadership and larger staffs.  Actually getting things done to benefit the wider array of the LGBT community has faded in importance despite lip service to the contrary. 

In a piece in New York Magazine, gay conservative Andrew Sullivan looks at where the LGBT community finds itself today both in terms of positive improvement and criticism of some gay activists and organizations like HRC and EV that have lost their way.  Some of what Sullivan says is on point, and some of it is out in the weeds due to his failure to let go of some aspects of conservatism and religion.   Here are excerpts:

There has never been a better time or place in the history of the world to be gay than in 2019 and in the West.

I think it’s worth repeating that — especially in front of the younger generation — because it gives us critical perspective on where we are now and where we are headed. If you glance at media aimed at gays, lesbians, and transgender people, you might imagine we are living in a state of siege. Gay students arriving in college in 2019 will be told instantly that they are oppressed in countless ways, and trans students will be told that they can be oppressed by gay people, as well. Check out the website for the biggest gay lobbying group, the Human Rights Campaign, and you will find that gays and lesbians and transgender people “have been under constant attack” since Trump became president.

And, yes, there has been some blowback, as one might expect after an astonishing decade of faster progress than in any civil-rights movement in history. The impulsively renewed ban on transgender service members makes no sense, was enacted by presidential whim (a tweet, no less), defended with arguments that collapse upon scrutiny, and opposed by much of the military brass. With luck, law, and lobbying, it will fall. There has also been executive action to defend the religious freedom of those fundamentalist Christians who make up a core of the Trump base. But it says a huge amount that Christianists are this panicked. They keep losing both secular and theological arguments — along with many members, especially among the young.

And look at what remains: marriage equality, even in Alabama; corporate America competing to brand itself as pro-gay (sometimes to an excruciating degree); full integration of gay service members; a lesbian mayor of Chicago and, in Corey Johnson, a future gay mayor of New York; a married gay man among the main contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination; a cornucopia of media-affirming gay and trans equality; openly gay and lesbian figures in almost every sphere of American life; a preventative pill for HIV and a pill to all but eradicate it from the living; and explicit legal protection from discrimination for half of the gay people in the country.
 I’m not saying there isn’t more to be done — laws against discrimination in employment and public accommodations in those states that don’t yet have those protections, for example . . . 
 It is, I know, sometimes hard to take “yes” for an answer. It is also prudent, given human history, to be vigilant in defending the gains. But this level of openness and equality was unimaginable only a decade ago. Compared with the 1950s, when “sodomy” was illegal in every state, when the government hounded gay men and women in public service out of their jobs and demonized them as inherently treasonous, when gay people were barred from entering the country, and when psychiatrists believed them to be mentally ill, this is close to utopia. Compared with the 1980s and early 1990s, when gay men found themselves circling the drain of their own extinction, and witnessed horrors and pain and stigma as never before, this is incredible.
 Because gay men and women are almost always brought up by straight parents, this history is hard to pass on. And so perspectives can be warped. Those whose livelihoods are built on defending victims have an interest in sustaining a victim paradigm for gay America, in which they are the saviors. And victim narratives are comfortable. They allow us to avoid responsibility for our own problems, while transferring it to others. . . . They actually provide status among today’s elites — and can help you advance your own career solely on the basis of your orientation if you want to go to college or get a job at a major corporation.

I think it’s time to shuck off this narrative, because it is a crude simplification of the gay experience, because it is profoundly out of date, and because it focuses us on other people we cannot always change while ignoring things closer to home that we can. What we need now, I think, is a narrative more productive and constructive, less about the harm the world can do to us, and more about the good we can give back to the world.

It will mean earning a living, raising kids in some cases, pursuing careers, sustaining marriages, and everything every straight person does without thinking twice about it. Being gay is not a political act; it is about deeper things than politics: love, above all, but sex and relationships as well. . . . We seek, in this sense, a kind of irrelevance for our sexual orientation — a world in which the hetero and homo categories define none of us, straight or gay, and the category of human includes us all.

But there’s more to the souls of gay folk than just this kind of normalcy, it seems to me. Unlike straights, we remain a specific minority, with life experiences that do shape us differently, and a way of life that will always, in some ways, be a subculture, as well as a counterculture. Equality and virtual normalcy need not be seen as ends, but as platforms for something larger, just as they are for other enfranchised minorities. Integration is not the same as assimilation.

This does indeed require pride in what we have that is distinct, a pride that is worth celebrating once a year. We have as gay people, it seems to me, a gift in our sometimes hidden sexual and emotional difference, a gift that teaches us at quite a young age not to judge a book by its dust-jacket, or to dismiss the different because they make us, at first, uncomfortable. The suffering that will always accompany gay and lesbian teens — the suffering that is a function of being so different at such a crucial age — can be deployed as adults, if we so choose, to see and alleviate the suffering of others.
 [G]ay people’s lopsided contribution to the arts, fashion, design, and aesthetics are ways in which we can reflect society back to itself with greater depth and beauty.
 These gay gifts can be shared. They always have been, of course, but under acute duress, and often silenced or unknown. What I’m emphasizing here is embracing these roles more explicitly as our charism, defining ourselves more clearly as human society’s indispensable regenerators, pillars, and buttresses. Gay male friendships can inform straight male ones — and surely for the better. Gay teachers can be a special boon to kids whose own family may not be engaged or supportive. We can be gay uncles and aunts, an often invaluable resource — financially and otherwise — for our siblings’ kids. 

Gay scholars and aesthetes can protect and preserve our common inheritance. Gay entrepreneurs can invigorate decaying neighborhoods and innovate new ways of living. Gay writers can become, as they often are, the strongest champions of free speech — because, for so long, it was the only right we had, the indispensable resource to let each other know that we existed.

As the long night of persecution gives way to the dawning of integration, let’s take a moment both to remember the legions of human souls who knew nothing but darkness, to acknowledge the vast numbers of gay people around the world for whom such freedom still doesn’t exist — but also to recognize this unique and pivotal chance for renewal and reinvention in the West. We should indeed have pride in our past, our selves, and our lives as survivors. But as we peer into the future, and to what we can still bring to the world, let us also know joy.

One of the most powerful forms of activism is simply living one's life openly and proudly. Yes, if one lives in rural areas of red states, that can be difficult and perhaps life threatening.  But the more of us that do this and demonstrate our normalcy to the straight world, the more positive change there will be.  Demonstrate daily that we are not the "other" to be feared but rather friends, neighbors and positive participants in our communities.  Yes, it can be scary, especially for those of older generations who grew up living in fear, but it is the way forward.  It is something the husband and I try to do every day be it at work, social gatherings, participating in a sailing regatta, . . . the list goes on and on.

Don't Miss Hampton Roads Pride Week: 6/17 - 6/23/2019

June is Pride Month and the transformation of the Pride celebration from the first one I attended hidden in the back of Lafayette Park with only a few hundred people to what we will see in 2019 is nothing short of amazing.  The following is a re-post of my May, 2019, VEER Magazine column that lays out all of the events.  As usual, my husband and I are among the sponsors and we and all of those working so hard a HR Pride hope people will come out and enjoy a week full of activities:

2019 HAMPTON ROADS PRIDE: “Live Your Best Pride”

Typically my columns on Hampton Road Pride’s PrideFest events have been published the same month in which the events have taken place.   The downside has been that many readers may not pick up their copy of VEER when it first hits the newsstands and, as a result, may miss out on the every growing Hampton Roads Pride celebration. Hence, the publishing this column in May rather than waiting until June. For new readers, Hampton Roads Pride’s mission is to unite the LGBT and allied communities in support of inclusion, dignity and equality of all people through nurturing and celebration of LGBT organizations, institutions and culture; by promoting strong community partnerships; and by increasing public affirmation of LGBT individuals through education, advocacy and outreach. 

While LGBT Americans have seen huge strides made over the last decade, including the right to marry same-sex spouses, much work still needs to be done. Here in Virginia, thanks to Republican obstructionists in the House of Delegates, LGBT Virginians continue to find themselves without any non-discrimination protections in the spheres of employment, housing and public accommodation. Worse yet, on the same day that I am finalizing this column, the Trump/Pence regime has announced the release of a new regulation that allows medical professionals and organizations that receive federal funds to refuse service to anyone if they claim serving that person would violate their “deeply-held religious beliefs.”  The number one target of the regulation is the LGBT community, although others will likely also find themselves rejected by healthcare providers claiming to be “godly Christians” who work at organizations that receive federal taxpayer funding.  Sadly, for now, Christian extremists are now exempt from the non-discrimination laws that govern the rest of us. 

Under this cloud of a license to discriminate afforded to the few, Pride month (the month of June each year) and Pride events can offer some who remain in the closet due to fears of job loss if their “secret” is discovered a brief opportunity to join their community under HR Pride’s promotional theme of “open to all.” For allies and potential allies, Pride events are an opportunity for learning and a chance to rebut negative stereotypes disseminated by enemies of equality inasmuch as Pride observances provide a reminder to all outside and within the LGBT community of our relationship with police, larger society, and the laws that historically aimed to dehumanize and/or criminalize us.

This year, with a theme of “Live Your Best Pride,” PrideFest has grown to involve events that truly encompass an entire week. In 2003 – my first Pride event – the event involved a few hundred people tucked away out of sight in a city park.  Now, PrideFest is second only to Harbor Fest in terms of Norfolk’s festival events in Town Point Park.   

Presenting sponsors for this year’s event will again include Decorum Furniture, Newport News Shipbuilding ("NNS"), WHRO-TV and the City of Norfolk.  As noted in a prior column, several years ago, the City of Norfolk came to realize that Hampton Roads Pride and the annual PrideFest event (i) brings significant tourism from across Virginia, Washington, D.C., and parts of North Carolina to the region which translates into revenues to the City and its hotels, merchants and restaurants, and (ii) helps to make Norfolk (and the region) look more progressive and more appealing to Millennials and progressive business.  In addition to the presenting sponsors, numerous banks, insurance companies, businesses and individuals (including my husband and myself) all pledged funds to support the 2019 Pride event.

This year’s music headliner will be the singer JoJo, an acclaimed pop singer who in 2004 at age 13 became the youngest person ever with a # 1 hit on the Billboard charts.  She has been a devoted advocate for LGBT rights and equality.  Jojo has in the past credited the LGBT community with “saving her life” and she has used her celebrity status to raise funds for suicide prevention organizations like The Trevor Project and Trans Lifeline and has included LGBT individuals in her music videos.   She has headlined Phoenix Pride and San Diego Pride, and should provide a great experience to PrideFest attendees.  The other headliner will be Crystal Waters, the Focus on 90s dance diva… Her hits include “Gypsy Woman (She’s Homeless)” and “100 Percent Pure Love.”  She has recently headlined Orlando Pride, Denver Pride, Louisville Pride, Queens Pride, and Hartford Pride.

As grand marshal, for 2019, PrideFest is welcoming Virginia Beach native Angela Hucles, a two-time Olympic Gold Medalist and two-time World Cup Bronze Medalist for the U.S. Women’s National Team.  Angela Hucles played college soccer at the University of Virginia (1996-1999) where she was a four-year all-ACC player. She currently holds the record at UVA for most overall goals, game-winning goals and total points. In her last year, she was listed as a finalist for the prestigious MAC Hermann Trophy. She is a regular speaker on topics of sports leadership, equality, inclusion & safe spaces, anti-bullying, and the power of sport and its impact on personal growth and development.  Born and raised in Virginia Beach, Hucles currently resides in Los Angeles, California with her wife, Meg and son, Huntley.  She is currently a sports analyst FOX Sports.

As noted above, PrideFest 2019 in Hampton Roads is much, much more than a single afternoon party in Town Point Park and has grown to a truly week-long event with venues scattered around Hampton Roads.  The following is a review of some of the varying events and venues which build in size and excitement as the week progresses.

·                     June 11 - Pride Night at Harbor Park with the Norfolk Tides. Enjoy a night OUT at Harbor Park as we celebrate the first Pride Night at Harbor Park!  You can support Hampton Roads Pride as they unite the LGBT community for a night at the ballpark. 
Ticket Promo Code: Pride

·                     Monday, June 17 - Ghent Pride - Party at the Palace Shops (6PM - 10PM).  The Ghent Business Association is proud to announce and support Hampton Roads Pride with the PARTY at The Palace Shops & Station at the start of Pride week.  Decorum Furniture and The Palace Shops & Station is partnering with the Ghent Business Association to bring you a party you won't forget. Music, Beer, Wine, Signature Cocktails, and tasty food from local Restaurants.  Cover charge: $10.00. To buy tickets go to the HR Pride Facebook page and click on this event.

·                     Tuesday, June 18 - LGBTQIA Interfaith Service. Details will follow on the HR Pride webpage and Facebook page.

·                     Wednesday, June 19 - Pride Party on the Peninsula (6PM - 8PM). Party with Pride at the fifth annual Pride Party on the Peninsula. The fun begins at Carousel Park in Downtown Hampton at 6:00PM. Attendees will enjoy complimentary food and beverage, as well as free rides on the historic Hampton Carousel. Later, hop aboard the Miss Hampton II for the annual Drag Down the River Boat Cruise.

·                     Thursday, June 20 - Pride at Chrysler Museum of Art (6PM - 9PM). Explore the Museum's galleries and special exhibitions and celebrate Pride, enjoy live music. Food will also be available at the “grab & go table” and beer, wine, and soda will be available at the cash bar. 

·                     Friday, June 21 – Eighth Annual Pride Block Party at Scope Arena (7PM - 12AM) “Strike a Pose” / tickets via Ticketmaster. Imagine a New York City or LD dance club transported to Norfolk.  Dancing, Drag, Live Art & Magical Performers!  DJ RAYS, Beer, Wine and Craft Cocktails, Tito's Handmade Vodka Miller Light/Yuengling, Barefoot Wine.  Ticket pricing: $13 ticket Before June 17, $16 ticket After June 17.

All Tickets Purchased via Ticketmaster.  All Proceeds Benefit Hampton Roads Pride & its Mission

Saturday, June 22 - PrideFest 2019 featuring JoJo and Crystal Waters.  See the nation's only Pride Boat Parade!  PrideFest is the largest annual LGBT festival in Virginia and the City of Norfolk's largest one-day festival!  PrideFest combines entertainment, vendors, and fun activities for all ages. PrideFest attracts thousands of visitors and brings together local residents, families, community leaders, civic organizations, and businesses to unite the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) and allied communities in support of inclusion, dignity and equality of all people. Admission: FREE   For more information, go to the Hampton Roads Pride website: http://www.hamptonroadspride.org/pridefest-2019/

·                     Sunday, 6/23 - First Annual Pride at the Beach at Neptune’s Park (2PM - 7PM).  A luxury, VIP, lounge experience with white linens and fabrics, couches, lounge beds, and exciting DJ. Music at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront!  Entertainment to be announced later in May 2019
Free and open to all 21+ to drink. White beachwear strongly encouraged! Admission: FREE and open to all.

·                     Pride Week at Ocean Breeze - special rate to be offered all of Pride Week with details to follow on the HR Pride website.

It should be a truly amazing week overall.  For those who have attended Pride events in the past, I hope you do so again this year.  For others, I hope you will make a point to try something new and different this year and participate in one or more of the Pride events.  If you do, I suspect you will have a great time and get to understand the diversity and friendliness of the LGBT community and how equality for all strengthens the Hampton Roads community both socially and economically.

2018 Hampton Roads Pride Launch - Setting New Records

Numerous state and local elected officials 

Governor Ralph Northam

The husband and I attended the launch party of the 2018 HR Pride project for presenting this year's Pride event which will occur on June 30, 2018 in Norfolk's Town Point Park.  The event was at the Harrison Opera House in Norfolk.  The event has grown larger and larger over the last five years as has the list of sponsors who help fund the festival.  Presenting sponsors will include Decorum Furniture, Newport News Shipbuilding ("NNS"), and WHRO-TV.  Stepping up at a truly amazing level was the City of Norfolk which now realizes that HR Pride and the annual Pride event is helping to make Norfolk in particular, by the region in general much more appealing to corporations and individuals seeking to relocate to a city/region where diversity and inclusion are welcomed.   Not that many years ago, previous mayors and city councils treated the LGBT community as if it were radioactive.  Today, the cities of Norfolk and Virginia Beach (on a much smaller scale than Norfolk), NNS, Virginia's larges corporate employer, numerous banks (one at the $10,000 level), USAA insurance, the CIA and many others all pledged funds to support the pride event which is now Norfolk's largest festival event other than Harborfest.

Politically, the event has also become the place to be seen, at least for Democrats and in attendance were Norfolk school board candidates, at least one congressional candidate.  The host of the event was Pam Northam, First Lady of Virginia.  With her was her husband, Governor Ralph Northam (who gave a much deserved shout out to my husband who does his hair), Congressman Bobby Scott, a number of members of the Virginia House of Delegates and state Senator Lynnwood Lewis, plus the Mayors of Norfolk and Virginia Beach (see the images above).

Perhaps most surprising was a resolution from the Virginia General Assembly - historically a body NOT friendly to the LGBT community - approved by both the Senate and the House of Delegates that recognized Hampton Roads Pride for the work it has done to increase diversity and inclusion, promote the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, and to recognize its 30th anniversary (see the image below).  Many older members of the LGBT community likely never believed that the day would come when such a resolution would ever be forthcoming.

All in all, it was an amazing event and convinced many of us of the old guard, if you will, that our efforts over the years have been worth the effort.   Sadly, in the age of Trump, we must redouble our efforts to make sure that progress continues. 

click image to enlarge

Recap of 2016 Hampton Roads Pride

Having served on the Hampton Roads Pride Board in the past and watched the event transform from a small event hidden away in an obscure location to now the second largest festival in Norfolk, I am very proud of the work that has been done to build community support and convince the City of Norfolk in particular to get fully behind the event.  The video above is a brief look at the 2016 event.  I hope readers will plan to attend the 2017 event next year. 

Pride Week 2015: Our Story, Our Time Growing Up . . . Gay in Hampton Roads

June is officially Pride month based on Barrack Obama's newly released proclamation.  Here locally, Hampton Roads Pride will sponsor PrideFest 2015 at Town Point Part on Saturday June, 27, 2015, commencing at 12:00 o'clock noon.  However, the local Pride celebration is growing with each passing year and more events are taking place in the lead up - Pride Week, if you will - to the main event on June 27th.  

This year The Hampton History Museum will be presenting an event entitled "Our Story, Our Time  Growing Up . . . Gay in Hampton Roads."  The event is free to the public and starts at 5:30 on June 24, 2015, at the Crown Plaza Marina, 700 Settlers Landing Road in downtown Hampton.  Part of what the event focuses upon is the reality that LGBT individuals have always been part of our local history even if in times past they felt the need to remain invisible. The Hampton History Museum event will include a panel the members of which will describe what it was like to grow up "different" in Hampton Roads.  Panelists include Dick Fore, the owner of Foremost Florists, Barry Menser, owner of Barry's for Hair, Corey Mason, an actor, theater director and college student, Anthony Cudrup of the Hampton Finance Department, Bobbi Mitchell, and Art Institute student and Gavin Grimm, a transgender high school student. 

 For Peninsula readers, the event might prove eye opening.  I hope that readers will try to attend. 

Disclaimer: the husband is one of the panelists.

SKY + PRIDE

View north towards Cape Henry

As noted, the husband and I attended the "SKY + PRIDE" event for Hampton Roads Pride last night at the Virginia Beach ocean front.  The image above gives an idea of the amazing view from the top of the 31st Street Hilton.  Besides Virginia Beach mayor Will Sessoms, also in attendance were Lt. Governor Ralph Northam, GOP House of Delegates member Scott Taylor and state Senator Lynwood Lewis.  Lots of money was raised (the husband and I previously made our pledge as HR Pride sponsors).  Here are but two of last nights sponsor who made pledges:

 

Yours truly chatting with the former Norfolk Democrat Party Chair (south view)

2015 Hampton Roads PrideFest Launch a Huge Success

The husband and I attended the PrideFest 2015 Launch Party this afternoon.  The event was a huge success and it is amazing to see how things have changed and evolved since I was on the Pride Board some years ago.  Not only were pledges secured for a good portion of the funds needed for the event in late June, 2015, but the number of participants was impressive.  Equally noticeable were the number of local and state politicians at the event at a lovely private home in Norfolk near Old Dominion University.  Among the elected officials in attendance were Lieutenant Governor Ralph Northam (with whom the husband and I are pictured above), Congressman Bobby Scott, Commissioner of the Revenue Evans Poston of Norfolk, State Senator Lynwood Lewis of northern Norfolk and the Eastern Shore, Mayor William Sessoms of Virginia Beach, and Delegate Scott Taylor of Virginia Beach.

Local readers interested in more information on how to be a sponsor or other ways to participate can go to the Hampton Roads Pride site here.   From my years of activism, getting involved does make a difference for the community as well as individuals.  Get involved!!

Legends Gala 2014 Legend: The Honorable Ralph and Mrs. Pam Northam

Tonight is the 9th annual Equality Virginia Legends Gala - the husband and I have been to all but one of the galas and I was on the Legends committee for 5 years (which had the added benefit of helping me make many wonderful friends).  The black tie event honors Hampton Roads area "legends" for their role in advance the cause of LGBT rights and equality.  This year's individual honorees are  Honorable Ralph Northam, Lt. Governor of Virginia and his wife,  Pam Northam.  The organizational honoree is Hampton Roads Pride which through its sponsorship of "Out in the Park" in the past and this year's amazing PrideFest has done much to increase the visibility of the LGBT community in a positive way.  Here are details from Equality Virginia's webpage:

Lt. Governor Ralph Northam and Mrs. Pam Northam have been longtime advocates for Virginia’s LGBT community.  For the Lt. Governor, as a pediatric neurologist first, and for Mrs. Northam, as an educator, their compassion for all people and families shines brightly both in their personal and professional lives.  As a state senator from 2008 to 2013, the Lt. Governor supported policies that promote LGBT equality; he scored a 100 percent in Equality Virginia’s 2012 and 2013 legislative scorecards.  When elected as Lt. Governor for the Commonwealth of Virginia in 2013, both he and Mrs. Northam  continued to advocate for marriage equality and workplace fairness.

Lt. Governor Ralph Northam and Mrs. Pam Northam believe that nobody should be discriminated against for their sexual orientation or gender identity, and have been vocal in their support of LGBT equality in Hampton Roads and beyond.  Their efforts for making Virginia a more welcoming and supportive place to live is inspiring and their warmth and humanity contagious.

Hampton Roads Pride has successfully put the Hampton Roads LGBT community and the issue of equality front and center in the civic consciousness. Its marquee event, PrideFest, has moved to Norfolk’s Town Point Park, expanding its reach to thousands of new people and gaining countless additional LGBT allies and advocates.  Hampton Roads Pride is also the only such organization in the United States to put on a Boat Parade, underlining the connections with the maritime history of Virginia’s port cities.