Gay Rights

Thom Vernon -

I am an American citizen married to a Canadian citizen for five years, and partnered for 32 years. We have one son age 6.

The US is ill-served by "gentrified accomodationist 'activists'" who enable the neolibs by accepting incremental rights - never to get the real right from which all others emanate.....Marriage. In turn, they get access and lip-service from both sides of the hill.

I am giving Obama one year to prove that federal marriage rights equaling heterosexuals, and repeal of DOMA and DADT.

Otherwise,  I will emigrate and join my dual nation son and spouse and finally will live in the only true democracy in North America.

This issue needs to get some high exposure.  Let's get some ideas rolling here.

1.  A list of safety tips.  Law enforcement and safety experts ideas are very welcomed.

2.  A national LGBT alert system, such as an Amber Alert. 

A system similar to phone trees but using the net.  One main organization who has the highest national recognition and membership-I vote the HRC. In turn, any and all LGBT organizations and every local LGBT law enforcement liason would be on this mailing list. 

When an attack occurs, such as recently happened in California with Richmond's Jane Doe, HRC (as example) sends the email to all groups, who in turn immediately email their members. 

Everyone nationally responds first to help the victim and/or their family.  By doing this, it puts law enforcement and the legal system on notice we are watching. 

It allows the local and nearby community to join forces for rallies/vigils, to ensure proper press coverage and to provide updates back or ask for help for a specific need of the family or if the media/law enforcement/legal process lacks/fails.

3.  Is there an all inclusive list of organizations that specialize in LGBT hate crimes by city/state?  

4.  And MOST IMPORTANTLY, we HAVE to have federal protection--- N O W!   

"No more Mr/Miss/Ms/Mrs Lazy-noT-interested-because-it-doesn't-affect-me-LGBT"  No excuses!

Those are just a few off the cuff thoughts.  Any one else?  

Rella Roo -

Federal protection has always been on the neolib/neocon compromise agenda for the 111th Congress. For months now, it became clear that this piece of the LGBT agenda was acceptable to most Americans. In our kleptocratic theocracy, justice is filtered by both greed and pragmatism.

The analogy that I repeat is that American LGBT groups are like the enabling black groups during Jim Crow. " We'll behave, massa, we'll just stay at your feet, quiet like, and accept the crumbs you throw at us in your generosity." Now to those who find that last sentence offensive, think about being gay and lesbian AND AA too.

The HRC under Cheryl Jacques of MA focused like a laser on marriage. It was clean and honest. You knew who your friends were, and not who would invite you to DC parties, and take your phone calls. The neolibs criticized the Jacques administration, and found DLC or DINO or Log Cabin Republicans to push for the dessert before the main course.

With the HRC, it is RDP or civil union or marriage....but the big incremental emphasis is hate crimes legislation and ENDA. The DADT has DOD opposition and will be gummed to death, as will DOMA....since we will again hear that DOMA's repeal would make the neocons push for the FMA. In the meantime, state by state constitutions prohibit same-sex marriage.

I am becoming SO FATIGUED to see the so-called "DC cocktail party set gay activists" triangulate about the ONLY issue from which all others emanate. Blogs are complicit as they mirror the message of incrementalism and accomodation.

Raymond,

I have enjoyed reading your comments from day one, and again agree 200% with you about marriage.  It is the root solution and I believe we should be knocking down doors to get it with everything we have.  Notice I didn't say knocking 'on'.

The only reason I mentioned the hate crimes issues, more from a standpoint that our community has not learned to care for our own, that we need to learn from the opponents in Prop 8 on organizational skills and our vocal skills. 

Recently someone told me that many LGBT would rather show up for brunch and attend a function in which they had no requirements really other than to show (meaning all the work was done for them) and, sadly, I am beginning to believe it. 

An example:  on the Home page here, there are more people signed up for Energy and Animal Rights than there are for Gay Rights.  W.T.F?  My favorite Cali Prop 8 protest sign still is:  Chickens 1, Gays 0. 

So how do we combine the brunches with activity-- and get the signatures needed to raise some brows and get something accomplished other than just sipping mimosas? And, how do we get all these splintered factions of organizations together to have ONE voice rather than 500,000 different whispers?

Since travel is difficult for many due to the economy, how do we create a 'million human march' from coast to coast, on the highways across the nation--that way no one has to leave their respective cities, but we join hands from sea to shining sea at the same time.  Maybe a sit in for a day?   (Dayum, I am a dreamer).  At least it would show we are unified in our wants and organized enough to create something that could not be overlooked.

The satellite coverage would be awesome, it could be designed to delay traffic everywhere.. maybe we could have someone experienced with making crop circles- design the routes to spell out the words MARRIAGE or EQUALITY or something like that?  That way it would run through cities and everyone would be able to participate.

Holy cow... lmao... I am really liking this idea the more I think about it.  It would resolve the problem of everyone getting to DC for a collective march (not to say there couldn't be a contingency present in DC) and be much more visible than a few minutes on the evening news.  It would disrupt everything AND bring us together! 

..... if this ever happens, remember where you heard it first.  HA

Ok you geography majors, satellite operators, choreographers, Olympic torch-runner route makers, and everyone... let's get to work! 

Planning begins today!  What date should we do this? 

(I've had too much coffee). 

I agree with you. Here is an example. WOMEN"S RIGHTS. The old lesbian v straight fight is still there after all these decades.

Then came Rick Warren and he uses the Limbaugh term " femi-nazi" by referring to women who support the right to choice as persons engaged in Holocaust activities. Feminism as in woman.
Holocaust as in Nazi.

So, I tried to get the WOMEN'S RIGHTS  to engage on this issue. Only lesbians and friends responded, but more cautiously. Did I click on the wrong CAUSE? I do not have the logistical ability to organize such an event you have in mind, Rella, but W O W !!!!!  Months, I would assume on the outside....

Today, the sacred boycotts of Selma and those sacred MLK marches, were dismissed by the majority of blacks in that day. The prevailing wisdom is that it would not last nor succeed.
More, it would enbolden their enemies to remove more of their second-class rights. Courage created change.

I think that I know how Rip Van Winkle felt after dozing for twenty years or so. I always loved that story in my youth because you could have left my home town a generation before my birth and locate most of the important landmarks and buildings.

Today, everything is built for obsolescence. I doubt that anything will ever again be placed on any national or state historical registry.

The segue is here. Who did we just elect?

Every day, the MSM gives us new glimpses of the "real Barack Obama" and frankly, I do not like the NEOLIB IN BED WITH NEOCONS image of him now.

On economics, Nobel Prize economist Krugman wonders what happened to raise taxes on rich and lower taxes on poor and working class? The Neocon Coddling by the NEOLIB IN CHIEF begins to worry Krugman. Obama will now cut the taxes on the rich as well. The bottom line:

OBAMA IS KISSING THE ANUS OF THE DEFEATED NEOCONS.

On political loyalty, the NeoLib in Chief is defining " NO DRAMA OBAMA"   into spacious SRO under the bus for liberals. Rick Warren is a passive aggressive message to us....keep quiet and behave, and I will throw you a few crumbs with hooks that you'll hate....

OBAMA IS KISSING THE ANUS OF THE DEFEATED NEOCONS.

The IL legislature failed to create articles of impeachment or inhibit the governor from exercising his gubernatorial prerogative in appointment. Legally, the Burris appointment is valid, and if the Senate exercises its prerogatives, it will backfire on them.

So, Casper Milquetoast DINO Reid has decided to let Senator Mitch McConnell decide about Burris and the hook will be to deny Senator-elect Franken to be seated until the Neocons play some 2000 game in MN....

OBAMA IS KISSING THE ANUS OF THE NEOCONS

I trust that this reincarnation of Abraham Lincoln should produce these admonitions.

Hannibal Hamlin was vice president in the first Lincoln term. He was, like Lincoln, the second person nominated by the GOP. They won the presidency after only one loss in 1856.

Lincoln looked like he would be defeated in 1864. General McClellan was the Democratic nominee. The triangulating Cabinet was filled with men ready to pick at the cadaver.

Lincoln decided to run on a National Union ticket in  1864. He chose a loyalist, a TN Democrat, named Andrew Johnson to run with him. Hence, Johnson is described erroneously as a Republican as is Lincoln for his second term. Historians accept the (R) since the National Union reality is usually considered an historical asterisk.

Andrew Johnson succeeded to the presidency, and the Radical Republicans had him for breakfast, lunch and dinner and impeached him......and as JFK noted in PROFILES IN COURAGE, he failed to be convicted by one vote.

OBAMA'S STRATEGY HAS HISTORICAL PRECEDENCE.....AND PRIDE ALWAYS COMETH BEFORE THE FALL.......

"Human nature itself is evermore an advocate for liberty. There is also in human nature a resentment of injury, and indignation against wrong. A love of truth and a veneration of virtue. These amiable passions, are the "latent spark"... If the people are capable of understanding, seeing and feeling the differences between true and false, right and wrong, virtue and vice, to what better principle can the friends of mankind apply than to the sense of this difference?"--John Adams, the Novanglus, 1775

"Old minds are like old horses; you must exercise them if you wish to keep them in working order. " - John Adams (1735-1826)

I feel very torn about the Matt Shepard act. The reason being is I know much more about the whole affair than will ever reach the news.
Matt Shepard knew his killers well, they were his connection for Methamphetamine. The night he was killed he was spending money he owed the people he owed money to for drugs. They were themselves very "tweaked" as well as drunk. They confronted Mathew about the money owed and things got WAY out of hand ending up with Mathew beaten and left for dead. His death was a drug crime first and a hate crime very second. The ones responsible for his death had been his drug suppliers for well over 2yrs, they knew he was gay and it was not an issue untill he became indebted to them then it was just more fuel for their drunken ,meth induced rage over the drug debt.
I know these things first hand as it was my sister dating the main perpetrator of the attack( who by the way IS a piece of shit). So I am torn as I know of so many more innocent gays and lesbians who have been targeted for only that that this law should be aknowleging. I am sorry but Mathew Sheppard was a drug addict in debt to his dealer and that ,not his sexuality,  was the primary motivation for his demise. As the father of a gay teen I feel it is very important that the rights of gays are as effective as for straits. I just feel, knowing much more of the back story that Mathew Shepard's tragedy should be addressed from a drug standpoint and not a sexual orientation standpoint.
With love to all,
JF

I feel very torn about the Matt Shepard act. The reason being is I know much more about the whole affair than will ever reach the news.
Matt Shepard knew his killers well, they were his connection for Methamphetamine. The night he was killed he was spending money he owed the people he owed money to for drugs. They were themselves very "tweaked" as well as drunk. They confronted Mathew about the money owed and things got WAY out of hand ending up with Mathew beaten and left for dead. His death was a drug crime first and a hate crime very second. The ones responsible for his death had been his drug suppliers for well over 2yrs, they knew he was gay and it was not an issue untill he became indebted to them then it was just more fuel for their drunken ,meth induced rage over the drug debt.
I know these things first hand as it was my sister dating the main perpetrator of the attack( who by the way IS a piece of shit). So I am torn as I know of so many more innocent gays and lesbians who have been targeted for only that that this law should be aknowleging. I am sorry but Mathew Sheppard was a drug addict in debt to his dealer and that ,not his sexuality,  was the primary motivation for his demise. As the father of a gay teen I feel it is very important that the rights of gays are as effective as for straits. I just feel, knowing much more of the back story that Mathew Shepard's tragedy should be addressed from a drug standpoint and not a sexual orientation standpoint.
With love to all,
JF

James Freitas-

The only thing new about what you said was your personal connection to Matthew Shepard. There have been several special television infotertainment programs dealing with this slant.

It is easily very clear that the proponents of this particular scenario feel that the perpetrators were not initially involved in a hate crime. I believe that their defense attorneys tried to use this scenario to lessen their culpability.

This shall rest with the conspiracy theorists. I have lived with the JFK conspiracy theories since my senior year in high school when he died.

What is NOT in doubt, however, James, is the FACT that every day, lesbian and gay youth are bashed and murdered. Mrs. Judy Shepard speaks for those victims too. Her foundation has done much to enlighten those who include homophobia in whatever other motivation they may have to commit murder.

Therefore, James, the issue goes far beyond stories or alleged versions of the story. The Matthew Shepard Act, for high information consumers, is the story of hate crimes legislation and justice for ALL those who are injured or murdered with the component of homophobia in the mix.

Love back to you, too.

Police seek 2 who beat woman in Uptown hate crimeLast update: January 25, 2009 - 7:40 AMPrint this storyE-mail this storySave to del.icio.usShare on newsvineShare on DiggGet more maps + statsHomicide mapRamsey County jail bookingsSchool test scoresBridge ratingsPublic employee salariesCampaign contributionsTop 200 campaign donorsMinnesota company rankingsCEO pay packagesReal estate transactionsHomicide map: A comprehensive map of Minnesota homicides and links to crime stats, booking records and sex offender registrations.More from Local + MetroBurnsville fire: She was asphyxiated; he committed suicide'Miracle On Ice' hero Johnson to coach Olympic womenMan charged in archbishop's home burglaryIowa slaughterhouse mgr. faces 900 new child labor chargesFormer boxer LeDoux diagnosed with Lou Gehrig'sMinneapolis police are seeking two suspects who allegedly beat a woman in her Uptown neighborhood after verbally attacking her for being a lesbian.According to police, Kristen Boyne, 32, was walking to the Rainbow Foods grocery store at 11 p.m. Thursday when she was accosted by two men at Lake Street and Dupont Avenue. Sgt. William Palmer said the men beat her until she lost consciousness.Boyne, who told police she is a lesbian, suffered head injuries and was taken by ambulance to Hennepin County Medical Center, where she was treated and later released.Palmer said the case appears to be the first such bias crime in the Uptown area in recent memory, and police have no suspects or witnesses. Anyone with information regarding the assault is asked to contact Sgt. Bruce Kohn at 612-673-2941.

Well, I'm not sure what to say about all of this >,<   As a Homosexual 18 year old male, I am very scared about the college thing. I heard about Matthew Shepard which not only infuriated me, it frightened me. I mean, why do people have to attack us physically because of something we cannot change. I am doing a research paper trying to find information on why heterosexuals have to commit hate crimes against members of the LGBT community.

Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of awesome heterosexual people, I am just scared that something like that can happen. We do not want to live in fear. This is the reason why some people come to America, to become more free. What really pushes my buttons is that people have the nerve to hate so much that they have to hurt a fellow American. As a president, Obama should have already taken care of the gay-marriage law. I mean sure, he may have created some sort of rule about prejudice over LGBT, but it's like he almost skipped over the issue.

This is a serious issue, since from 2005 the anti-LGBT hate crime percentage went up by 24%. I think it is so pitiful that people have to be so insecure about themselves to physically harm people that are different than they are. Personally I don't care what people say to me, what I do care about is what people do to me. What people need to realize is that Gay's are not weak, and once someone touches me, I will defend myself.

But anyways, if someone could send information about anything pertaining to LGBT hate crimes and why people commit them, that would be amazing of you.

Much Love,

Jason

P.S. I am aware not all my thoughts are valid, I was rambling sometimes, but I do believe strongly that the LGBT's cannot continue to be harmed.