New York City Trip - Day Four; Back to Virginia

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Yesterday afternoon we walked around the West Village and checked out shops - I purchase some cowboy boots at a great vintage clothing shop on 14th Street - and the Monster Bar before heading to our friend's new place in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn.  Before venturing to a wonderful called Maison Premiere, we had drinks on the roof top deck of her apartment building and enjoyed the view of Manhattan in the distance (see photo above).  Overall, the feel of the area of Brooklyn we were in felt much like the Village given the abundance of shops and restaurants.

Today, we spent more time walking around Manhattan and went by the United Nations and had lunch near Grand Central Station before returning to my brother's apartment and heading to the airport.  Overall, we did our part to boost the New York economy!!  Below is a great shot of the Chrysler Building that I took while walking down Lexington Avenue.

We arrived safely back in Hampton Roads this evening and now I will have to recover from the funk that always over takes me after we have traveled to somewhere progressive and gay friendly.  Yes, we have a nice life here in many ways, but being a fourth class citizens makes one weary at times.  Especially, when you experience progressive and dynamic places where gays are truly equal.  If circumstances were different, I leave Virginia forever in a heartbeat and shake the dust off my shoes.

Justice Anthony Kennedy: A Surprising Friend to Gay Rights

Kennedy picture at center

The New York Times has a piece on Justice Anthony Kennedy who has become a pariah in Christofascist circles and a hero in gay rights circles.  That Kennedy would find himself viewed this way is a bit of a surprise if one remembers that he was nominated to the U. S. Supreme Court by Ronald Reagan who conveniently closed his eyes to the AIDS epidemic in its beginning years.  In deed, when appointed, few advocates for gay rights would have expected that Kennedy would go on to author three landmark decisions that have helped propel gay equality, the most recent being the majority opinion in United States v. Windsor - which identified the true motivation behind anti-gay laws, anti-gay animus - and which may yet unleash a whirlwind nationwide against anti-gay laws.  Here are article highlights:

The San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus sang “Give ’Em Hope” for a revered and in some ways surprising guest who shared a California stage with them last month: Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. 

In remarks from the stage, San Francisco’s mayor, Edwin M. Lee, thanked the justice “for upholding the Constitution and justice for all” in his majority opinion in June in United States v. Windsor, a major gay rights victory. 

“Freedom is always a work in progress,” Justice Kennedy said in his own remarks, making clear that there was more work to be done. 

Justice Kennedy has emerged as the most important judicial champion of gay rights in the nation’s history, having written three landmark opinions on the subject, including this summer’s Windsor decision, which overturned a ban on federal benefits for married same-sex couples. Those rulings collectively represent a new chapter in the nation’s civil rights law, and they have cemented his legacy as a hero to the gay rights movement. 

The praise now being showered on Justice Kennedy by gay rights advocates — and the deep disappointment of conservatives — would have been hard to imagine when President Ronald Reagan nominated him to the Supreme Court in 1987. Gay rights groups were more than a little wary then.  

The justice’s trajectory since then has been a product of overlapping factors, associates and observers say. His Supreme Court jurisprudence is characterized by an expansive commitment to individual liberty. He believes that American courts should consider international norms, and foreign courts have expanded gay rights. His politics, reflecting his background as a Sacramento lawyer and lobbyist, tend toward fiscal conservatism and moderate social views. And he has long had gay friends. 

Romer v. Evans, in 1996, struck down a Colorado constitutional amendment that had banned laws protecting gay men and lesbians. Lawrence v. Texas, in 2003, struck down laws making gay sex a crime. And in June, Justice Kennedy wrote the Windsor decision. 

In 1987, gay rights advocates could see little of this coming.

In 1986, a month after the Supreme Court upheld a Georgia law that made gay sex a crime in Bowers v. Hardwick, Judge Kennedy, not yet a justice, gave a speech at Stanford expressing reservations about the ruling. He contrasted it to a 1981 decision from the European Court of Human Rights striking down a similar law in Northern Ireland. 

Seventeen years later, Justice Kennedy cited the European court’s decision in his majority opinion in Lawrence v. Texas, which overruled Bowers.  “Its continuance as precedent demeans the lives of homosexual persons,” Justice Kennedy wrote.

These days, Professor Dorf said, there is more praise than criticism, and Justice Kennedy has joined a select group.  “What Earl Warren was to civil rights and what Ruth Bader Ginsburg was to women’s rights,” he said, “Kennedy is to gay rights.”

The Myth of the Gay Threat

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I saw this image on Facebook and it sums up why the Christofascists want to keep gays invisible.  Yes, it's Colbert acting as him usual self, but it speaks a great truth: if people find out that we LGBT individuals  are basically just like them, that we have similar hopes and dreams and, God forbid, that we have normal functioning families  the Christianist  anti-gay jihad falls apart.  It also underscores why living out and proud and refusing to hide you are is the greatest weapon in the fight for full civil equality.  It's easy to hate and oppose something/someone unknown.  It's far harder when the targets of hate are one's friends, neighbors and family members.

Catholic Church Bitch Slaped for 'Selfish and Hedonistic Wasteland' Statement

Yesterday, in advance of Pope Benedict XVI's state visit to the UK, Edmund Adamus, an adviser to the Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, said that Britain: had become "the geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death," had been "the most permissively anti-life and progressively anti-family and marriage, in essence one of the most anti-Catholic landscapes, culturally speaking, and represented a selfish, hedonistic wasteland objectifies women for sexual gratification". This from a spokesman for a religious institution that has knowingly covered up the worldwide rape of children and youth - not to mention other reprehensible actions. Now, an op-ed in the Independent has fired back and lays out the case as to why Britain is far more moral than the hypocrites and scolds within the Catholic Church hierarchy and Catholic apologists such as William Donohue and the Knights of Columbus. Here are some highlights:
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I woke up as usual yesterday in the "geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death" – and very pleasant it was. . . . congratulating myself on being a citizen of a country that doesn't stone women to death, hang gay men from cranes or murder people who change their religion. I mean, how great is that? I love living in the "selfish, hedonistic wasteland" that is London – both quotes come from one Edmund Adamus, who is apparently a senior British Catholic and an adviser to the Archbishop of Westminster – and I just wish more nations would follow our example.
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Frankly, I'm tired of hearing religious bigots running down this country. For all its faults – crap public transport, Nick Clegg popping up everywhere and a national obsession with Simon Cowell – Britain is still one of the most civilised places in the world to live. It's not Iran, where prisoners are subjected to rape and mock executions; it isn't Saudi Arabia either, despite Mr Adamus's downright peculiar belief that we're more anti-Catholic than the Chinese or the Saudis. (Might I suggest he tries walking along a street in Riyadh carrying a crucifix and a Bible?) The Catholic Church has picked up this habit of dissing secular culture from hardline Muslims, who dislike pretty much the same things: gay relationships, equal rights for women and the freedom to mock religion.
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This latest row has brought into the open what many people suspected in the run-up to a controversial papal visit to Britain; some Vatican officials, it seems, are alarmed by the threat of demonstrations and increasingly regard the UK as a hostile country.
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The confusion that's been exposed by this latest attack on life-loving secular culture is actually a very old one, namely the pernicious myth that morality resides in sexual behaviour. Sexuality has always been an obsession for Christian churches and the Vatican's teachings on the subject are so severe that millions of Catholics – including Cherie Blair, wife of the former Prime Minister, who wrote in her autobiography about her contraceptive methods – simply ignore them.
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[T]here are more important issues on which the moral standing of a nation should be judged. Here's one of them: when an earthquake devastated Haiti earlier this year, British donations to disaster relief eventually reached £101m. Now that floods have devastated Pakistan, leaving millions of people homeless, the British public has contributed another £42m to the Disasters Emergency Committee. Does that really sound like the response of a nation which is supposedly the "geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death"?

Why Being Out to Family and Friends Matters

Often, the most powerful act of activism that most of us can engage in is to come out to family, friends and employers. It is far harder to support discrimination when the targets involve people that you know and in many cases love. The figures above show the change that has occurred since 1992 in terms of the percentage of Americans who know someone gay. I believe that there is a direct correlation between the number of people who know someone gay and the growing acceptance of LGBT individuals and support for gay equality - particularly among the younger generations. Want to create change? Then come out and be honest about who you are. Is it something easy? Definitely not as long time readers of this blog have witnessed as I have made my jpurney. The rewards, however, are worth it.

Come Out, Come Out Wherever You Are!

New Years Day we went to a holiday open house hosted by one of the boyfriend's long time friends. It was a fun party and what was perhaps most striking to me was the fact that few, if any, of the men in attendance fit the public stereotype of what gay men look like. The talent of some of the individuals was also amazing - our host has an addition to his house in which he has built his own pipe organ. As he and others played the organ, another guest alternated between playing a harp and a flute as we were all serenaded with classical music and carols. It was pretty amazing. This thought brings me to a post that James Hipps has up at Gay Agenda with which I very much agree. Although I have been taken to task by long time activists for advocating that others come out of the closet since I was long closeted myself, I believe that what James talks about does matter and make a difference. Here are some highlights:

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Often I have stressed the importance of being out. Whether you’re a celebrity, professional athlete or Joe plumber, if you’re part of the LGBT community, coming out and being out is of huge importance.
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I remember the process well and know first hand it takes a lot of strength and courage. When we come out in the workplace, we risk losing our income. When we come out to family, we risk losing them too. We risk being beaten or murdered. We set ourselves up for verbal and/or physical abuse. But, as one who has been fired for being gay, I know the ultimate outcome is well worth the trade-off.
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But it’s not simply about being here and being queer, it really has more to do with other’s perceptions. When we do come out, we demonstrate the ‘normalcy’ of being LGBT. We allow people to see us as human, and we break the stereotypes which are reinforced by media and are so often detrimental to our equality.
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But, just in case you don’t believe me let’s take a look at the facts. According to a post on the NY Times:
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There are currently at least 445 openly gay and lesbian people holding elected office in the United States, up from 257 eight years ago, according to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, a political group that supports gay candidates.
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and…
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The National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago has been polling people since 1973 about whether homosexual behavior is morally wrong. In 1973, 73 percent of the people polled described it as always wrong and only 11 percent as “not wrong.” By 2006, those saying homosexuality was “always wrong” had dropped to 56 percent, and 32 percent said it was not wrong.
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Why the change in attitudes towards homosexuality…well as also stated in the post:
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One reason for the shift in attitudes, some political scientists contend, is a rising number of gays acknowledging their sexual preference openly in various walks of life, from workers on factory floors to Hollywood stars.
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This is why being out is so important. Tell your neighbors, tell you co-workers, tell the person that rings up your groceries every week at the store. The more people know of us, the less they will fear us, and the more they will accept us.
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Will there be those who want to hit you over the head with the Bible…of course. That’s a battle you can choose to take or not. Will some people dislike you, yes! But those are not people you really want or need in your life anyway. But as long as you are matter of fact about it, you will be representing a movement toward equality.
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I leave you with this for the ’straight’ people who don’t know you. Whether you know it or not, someone you love is gay. Whether you know them or not, someone gay is fighting for right from which we will all benefit!

2009 Legends Gala Tonight

I will not be posting this evening or first thing tomorrow morning as is my normal habit since the boyfriend and I will be attending the 2009 Equality Virginia Legends Gala at the Waterside Marriott tonight. As a member of the host committee, we will be at the hotel helping to do the set up this afternoon. We will be taking advantage of discount rooms at the hotel has offered to event attendees and will be spending the night at the hotel rather than driving back late after the event. It should be a great time and the event should raise a significant amount of money to help the efforts of Equality Virginia to bring full equality to all Virginians. The honoree this year is my wonderful friend, Cynthia Cutler, an amazing straight ally of the local GLBT community.

California AG's Brief Finds Proposition 8 in Violation of U.S. Constitution

In what is a stunning opposite to the Obama Justice Department's brief filed in support of DOMA, California Attorney General Jerry Brown has filed a brief that states that that Proposition 8 violates the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Would that Obama would argue the law rather than Christianist talking points and stop apparently trying to kiss Rick Warren's very wide ample ass. Like many, I continue to be seething over the nasty and gratuitously insulting brief filed by the Justice Department and written by a Mormon hold over from the Bush administration. WTF was Obama thinking. Here are highlights from Box Turtle Bulletin on Jerry Brown's very different brief:

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What a contrast between the California Attorney General and the U.S. Department of Justice. On the same day in which the Obama administration filed a brief before the U.S. Supreme Court defending the so-called “Defense of Marriage Act,“ California Attorney General Jerry Brown filed a very different brief in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, the Prop 8 challenge brought by Ted Olson and David Boies.

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In the brief filed on behalf of the State of California (PDF: 128KB/11 pages), Brown notes that:

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The Attorney General of California is sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States in addition to the Constitution of the State of California. Cal. Const., art. XX, § 3. The United States Constitution is the “supreme law of the land.” Taking from same-sex couples the right to civil marriage that they had previously possessed under California’s Constitution cannot be squared with guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment. Accordingly, the Attorney General answers the Complaint consistent with his duty to uphold the United States Constitution, as Attorney General Thomas C. Lynch did when he argued that Proposition 14, passed by the California voters in 1964, was incompatible with the Federal Constitution..

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The response by the Attorney General addresses each of the numbered paragraphs in the original complaint. The response begins with a stipulation that California’s Domestic Partnerships are not equal to civil marriage and therefore violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution”

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In response to paragraph 1 of the Complaint, the Attorney General admits that in November 2008 California adopted Proposition 8; that Proposition 8 amended Article I of the California Constitution by adding section 7.5 which provides that “[o]nly marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California;” and that the effect of Proposition 8 is to deny gay men and lesbians and their same-sex partners access to civil marriage in California and to deny them recognition of their civil marriages performed elsewhere. The Attorney General admits that lesbians and gay men and their same-sex partners may form domestic partnerships in California pursuant to California Family Code sections 297 through 299.6, and that such domestic partnerships are not equal to civil marriage, and that this unequal treatment denies lesbians and gay men rights guarantees by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

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…In response to paragraph 7 of the Complaint, the Attorney General admits that Proposition 8 denies same-sex couples the right to civil marriage in California, and that it therefore violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

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Brown also invokes Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 U.S. Supreme Court ruling which struck down laws banning marriage between people of different races:

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In response to paragraph 35 of the Complaint, the Attorney General admits that the United States Supreme Court found in Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1. 12 (1967), that the “freedom to marry has long been recognized as one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.”

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The brief then addresses the Due Process claims: In response to paragraph 38 of the Complaint, the Attorney General admits that, to the extent that Proposition 8 took from Plaintiffs their previously held fundamental right to marry, the measure violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution on its face.

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Obama may have been a constitutional law professor, but he seems more concerned with imposing Christian Right religious based beliefs on LGBT Americans than he is in upholding equality under the United States Constitution. His promises are apparently not any more trustworthy than the Chimperator's.

Dick Cheney Supports Gay Marriage

While I view Dick Cheney as somewhere between the spawn of Satan and the Anti-Christ and seriously want him put on trial for war crimes, Emperor Palpatine Cheney in a recent interview basically voiced support for same sex marriage. Cheney's statements are not enough to cause me to re-evaluate my opinion of the man, but they do indeed make me wonder how it is that Cheney is more progressive on gay equality in this realm than Barack Obama who claimed to champion gay equality during his presidential campaign. Here are highlights from the Huffington Post in respect to Cheney's comments:

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Dick Cheney rarely takes a position that places him at a more progressive tilt than President Obama. But on Monday, the former vice president did just that, saying that he supports gay marriage as long as it is deemed legal by state and not federal government.

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Speaking at the National Press Club for the Gerald R. Ford Foundation journalism awards, Cheney was asked about recent rulings and legislative action in Iowa and elsewhere that allowed for gay couples to legally wed.

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"I think that freedom means freedom for everyone," replied the former V.P. "As many of you know, one of my daughters is gay and it is something we have lived with for a long time in our family. I think people ought to be free to enter into any kind of union they wish. Any kind of arrangement they wish. The question of whether or not there ought to be a federal statute to protect this, I don't support. I do believe that the historically the way marriage has been regulated is at the state level. It has always been a state issue and I think that is the way it ought to be handled, on a state-by-state basis. ... But I don't have any problem with that. People ought to get a shot at that."

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As I have said before, it is past time for Obama to begin to deliver on his campaign promises.

GOP Continues to Traffic in Anti-Gay Hate Speech

The Colorado Senate has passed a bill extending health insurance coverage to the partners of gay and lesbian state workers. As the Denver Post reports, the Senate approved Senate Bill 88 in a 22-12 vote on Tuesday, sending it to the House for consideration. All too typically, the Republican members of the Colorado legislature are (1) chanting the mantra that the majority gets to decide what civil rights, if any, minorities will be allowed and/or (2) engaging in religious based hate speech against gays. Some of the worse hate speech came from Sen. Scott Renfroe, R-Greeley, who equated homosexuality with rape and murder. Obviously, Mr. Renfroe cares nothing about the possible violence against gays that talk such as his can cause. Here are some highlights from the Colorado Springs Gazette that illustrate the irresponsible, theocratic behavior of the Colorado GOP:

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Debating a gay-rights bill on the floor of the state Senate on Monday, a Republican lawmaker took the rhetoric to new heights by equating homosexuality as a sin with murder. "I'm not saying this (homosexuality) is the only sin that's out there," said Sen. Scott Renfroe, R-Greeley. "We have murder. We have all sorts of sin. We have adultery. And we don't make laws making those legal, and we would never think to make murder legal."

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Other Republicans said the bill, which would allow partners of gay state employees to be covered by health care benefits, is an attempt by Democrats to chip away at a constitutional amendment voters passed in 2006 defining marriage as between a man and a woman. "These are just micro-steps to a lawsuit in the Colorado Supreme Court to overturn what the voters voted for," charged Sen. Dave Schultheis, R-Colorado Springs.

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Renfroe called homosexuality an "abomination" and an "offense to God" and argued that God created men and women so they would procreate. He compared the nuclear family structure to the Holy Trinity and, quoting the book of Genesis, said women had been created to be "helpers" for men.

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Sen. John Morse, D-Colorado Springs, wasn't at a loss for words in responding to Republican opponents. "Just because there's hate in their (Republicans') hearts doesn't mean we're going to do hateful things," Morse said. Veiga denied her bill is about gay marriage. "This is not about marriage. This is about health care," Veiga said. "If today is not the right time, then you've got to tell me when, because equality is equality is equality regardless of when we do it."

Utah - All Gay-Rights Bills Killed

Well, if there was any doubt that the Mormon Church is anti-gay - as opposed to only trying to "protect marriage" as it alleged in explaining the Church's support of Proposition 8 - the debacle in the Utah Legislature should remove any lingering doubts. Every pro-gay bill, even fairly noncontroversial ones, was killed. Equally outrageous is the fact that Utah state senator Chris Buttars (R) stated that the gay-rights movement "probably the greatest threat to America," likened gay activists to Muslim radicals and dubbed same-sex relationships "abominations." In my view, it is jackasses like Mr. Buttars who are abominations and who are a mirror image of the Taliban. I guess Buttars is hoping he can spur some more murders of LGBT citizens. Here are highlights from the Salt Lake Tribune:

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On Wednesday, the Legislature dealt its final blow to this year's Common Ground Initiative, possibly the most expansive push for legal protections for gay and transgender Utahns in state history. The effort had the backing of popular Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., positive signals from the LDS Church, and, on most issues, the support of public opinion, according to a Salt Lake Tribune poll.

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Even so, a House committee Wednesday rejected Rep. Jennifer Seelig's HB160, which would have offered two, unmarried cohabiting adults -- including same-sex couples -- safeguards of inheritance rights and medical-decision making for one another.

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Despite Wednesday's defeat, the Common Ground Initiative is far from dead, said Mike Thompson, executive director of Equality Utah, the advocacy group leading the charge. Democratic lawmakers have promised to bring back their bills, with some variations, next year.
And activists scored some mini-victories. All the bills, save for one pulled by its sponsor, at least reached committee hearings. "The majority of Utahns support these basic protections," Thompson said. "We are not giving up on these issues. The Common Ground Initiative is not a 2009 legislative agenda."

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Equality Utah crafted the Common Ground Initiative in response to statements made by the LDS Church after passage of California's Proposition 8. Even though it supported the ballot measure, which banned same-sex marriage in the Golden State, the church said it "does not object to rights for same-sex couples regarding hospitalization and medical care, fair housing and employment rights, or probate rights, so long as these do not infringe on the integrity of the traditional family or the constitutional rights of churches." Despite those comments, the LDS Church did not endorse Equality Utah's initiative.