Box Turtle Bulletin

RI Committee advances civil unions

The Rhode Island House Judiciary Committee voted 9 to 3 to advance the civil unions bill to the floor of the full House. It is likely to be passed by a wide margin on Thursday.

Queer Rising continues its self-absorbed media-hungry approach to activism

Successful activism walks a fine line. If you get too cautious, you end up making excuses for the status quo, placing “alliances” ahead of goals, and end up as a politician rather than an advocate. To my way of thinking, some of our established organizations have gone way too far down that road.

On the other extreme, reckless actions that are not well thought out can have both immediate and long-term costs, some of which are catastrophic. Groups that come from an “I’m right so f*ck you” arrogance may place pissing people off as their highest goal without considering (or caring about) the consequences of their actions.

And when you have individuals or organizations that are in love with seeing their name in print, be it on a White House cocktail invitation or the screaming headlines of the New York Post, priorities are almost certain to become muddled. The goal becomes more about “visibility” than about what that visibility is supposed to accomplish.

It has become increasingly evident to me that Queer Rising, a small new activism collective, falls in the latter category. They are fond of public display, but seem to have little to no actual knowledge about what they are protesting and even less interest in finding out. Queer Rising’s sole objective appears to be getting their name in the newspaper.

I first became aware of Queer Rising back in March of last year when they lent their voice to the movement in opposition to DADT… and in opposition to HRC. While I have my concerns about HRC’s efficacy, I see little value in taking it to the streets.

Then in July when the National Organization for Marriage’s Tour of Empty City Plazas came to Providence, RI, a few Queer Rising members from New York decided to storm the stage and have a screaming match with Brian Brown. Who cares if the picture of angry screaming activists on someone else’s turf was was widely published by NOM? Who cares if we are now trying to appeal to the good will of Rhode Island legislators for relationship rights?

In March of this year, Queer Rising was back for some more media attention. This time they blocked traffic during New York’s morning commute to protest for the right to marry. Or do bad drag. Or something. But whatever “message” they were purportedly trying to relay, it was clearly secondary to their stated goals of “drag visibility”. Who cares if commuters now link marriage rights with fright wigs and stilettos?

This isn’t to say that they don’t have a flair. Bringing a cardboard cut-out of Senator Rev. Ruben Diaz dolled up in drag along with them on the AIDS Walk for photo-ops certainly drew attention (though I’m not sure how it squares with “drag visibility”.) And there is not only a place, but a necessity for those who are willing to confront the establishment, to challenge authority, and to behave outlandishly.

But Queer Rising seems, overall, to lack the wisdom and perspective to know when an action is going to achieve a goal and when it will only be a burden on the rest of the community. And again they have confirmed my estimation.

New Yorkers United for Marriage (a coalition of Empire State Pride Agenda, the Human Rights Campaign, Freedom to Marry, Log Cabin Republicans and Marriage Equality New York) has been working hard to achieve marriage equality in New York this year.

These are all serious organizations. And while some may at times put alliances ahead of achievements, I have great respect for a few of them. The visibility they seek has less to do with being either a chummy insider or an angry outsider and more to do with achieving tangible goals.

And tangible goals have been achieved. The Republican leadership in the Senate has promised to allow a vote to come up and not to punish Republicans who vote in favor of marriage (and the majority of funding has come from powerful high-level Republican donors). Democratic Governor Cuomo has made marriage equality a hallmark of his administration and is actively courting Senators. And while the Conservative Party has made a no vote on marriage to be a litmus test for their support, the Moderate Party leader has endorsed the change.

None of which seems to have been noted by Queer Rising.

Deciding to ignore those who have been working the hardest on this issue, Queer Rising came up with a unique political theory of their own. (WSJ)

But the group pushing for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender rights says Cuomo isn’t mustering support among lawmakers behind the scenes.

Allen Roskoff, speaking for Queer Rising Tuesday, says that if Cuomo doesn’t get the bill passed as promised, then he was only paying “lip service” to gay rights.

And they know that because… well, because they made it up. Who cares if the Wall Street Journal sees this as “a crack in the united effort to legalize gay marriage”? Who cares if New Yorkers United for Marriage now have to heal rifts created by this act? Who cares even if marriage becomes legal?

Queer Rising got their name in the paper.

Viva Visability!!

Rhode Island civil unions committee vote today

No one is supporting civil unions in Rhode Island. But they probably will get them anyway.

The gay community and its supporters remain convinced that there are enough votes in the legislature to pass full marriage equality this year. And some are of the opinion that the passing of civil unions would set back or delay the eventual recognition of married gay couples. So gay organizations have been lobbying against a civil unions bill.

On the other side are those, like the National Organization for Marriage, who pretend to be concerned about “protecting marriage” but in reality are opposed to any recognition of same-sex couples whatsoever (and, indeed, any rights at all for gay people). The are lobbying against the civil unions bill, claiming that it would be a stepping stone towards marriage.

And it likely would.

But the legislature in Rhode Island is on the razor’s edge. Many want to support same-sex couples, but are hesitant about full marriage – perhaps out of religious fear, perhaps out of political calculation, or perhaps out of ol’ fashioned “but, but that’s how it’s always been” prejudice. And civil unions are the ideal compromise, a vote to show that they support gay people but also not likely to result in any voter backlash. (The days of a civil unions vote costing a politician votes is gone in the Northeast).

And as House speaker Gordon Fox, a gay man, has determined that getting a majority in the House is not possible (or would cost more political capital than he is willing to spend) and is supporting civil unions, politicians have a rock-solid basis for taking this route. And they are further justified by the fact that full equality would be subjected to a fierce opposition from Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed, a Democrat that opposes marriage but supports civil unions.

And the first vote is today. The House Judiciary Committee will vote whether to send the civil unions bill to the full house and it is expected to do so.

It’s frustrating. Governor Lincoln Chafee is an outspoken advocate for marriage and polls show that a strong majority of Rhode Islanders support full equality. Democrats outnumber Republicans 65 to 10 in the House and 29 to 8 in the Senate. Waiting and compromise feels unnecessary and overly-cautious.

But that’s reality. Rather than marriage equality, Rhode Island will get civil unions this year.

And I’m (reluctantly) okay with that. As NOM notes, civil unions really are a stepping stone to marriage. And if DOMA fails in the courts (as it surely will), the federal recognition of same-sex marriages will compel civil union states to immediate revision so as to allow gay couples access to federal benefits.

The Daily Agenda for Tuesday, May 17

Rainbow Flashmob at St. Petersburg, Russia in 2010.

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Today is IDAHO: Worldwide. The International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia is today with events taking place all around the world. The theme for this year is “As I Am,” and the observance includes, among many, many events, the international photo project “Walk with Pride” developed by Charles ‘Chad’ Meacham and Sarah Baxter to be shown simultaneously in more than 20 locations around the world, including at the European Parliament. In several cities throughout Russia, there will be a Rainbow Flashmob release of balloons, and I would anticipate that the Russian web site Anti-Dogma will probably have updates over the next few days. Meanwhile, St. Petersburg authorities have authorized an anti-gay rally by a Russian nationalist group which will call for the “immediate punishment of deviants and the judges who let them go free.”

Cultural Congress Against Homophobia: Tijuana. An ambitious gathering begins today in Tijuana, Mexico for the start of a five-day conference on homophobia. Sponsored by the Tijuana LGBTI Cultural Community (COCUT), the congress includes artistic, literary, entertainment, educational, film, theater and HIV-related events at multiple venues downtown, on Revolution Avenue, in Plaza Santa Cecilia and Teniente Guerrero Park, and at the Palace of Culture on Second Street. The congress will kick off with a “mega caravan” that will depart Teniente Guerrero Park on May 17 at 4 p.m. and “cross the expanse of the urban area from east to west.” The park is between Third and Fourth streets and avenues F (5 de Mayo) and G (González Ortega). The procession will return to the park for an evening gathering and fiesta.

Rally Against Marriage: Raleigh, NC. The Family “Research” Council is seriously ticked off that they still haven’t been able to write marriage discrimination into North Carolina’s constitution, and they want to do something about it. FRC and Return America will rally at Halifax Mall behind the Legislative Building today beginning at 10:30. a.m.

HIV and Depression in Black Men: New York, NY. Antoine B. Craigwell, author of Depressed Black Gay Men and writer for Out In Jersey magazine will moderate a panel discussion, “Being Black and Gay: Struggles with HIV and Depression” at Riverside Church (91 Claremont Avenue, between 120th & 121st Streets, Room 10 T). Doors open 6:00 p.m. and refreshments will be served. The program begins at 6:30. Seating is limited, so please RSVP your attendance at riversidehiv@aol.com.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Gays Cured Worldwide: 1990. It’s amazing that it took so long, but the World Health Organization finally removed homosexuality from the tenth edition of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (also known as ICD-10). It took the WHO nearly seventeen years to catch up with the American Psychiatric Association, and when they did they followed the APA’s same cautious approach by including the diagnosis of “Ego-Dystonic Sexual Orientation,” for those who were troubled by their homosexuality. That diagnosis served as a loop-hole allowing therapists to continue to try to “cure” gay people of a mental disorder that no longer existed. The APA removed that diagnosis from its list of mental disorders in 1987. It is still in the WHO’s list of disorders.

IOC Allows Trans People To Compete In Assigned Gender: 2004. The International Olympic Committee ruled that post-operative transgender people will be able to compete in events in Athens according to their self-identified gender, provided the new gender is legally recognized and the athlete is two years into post-operative hormonal therapy. IOC Medical Commission Chairman Arne Ljungqvist announced the rule change in response to the increasing numbers of transgender athletes attempting to qualify for Olympic competition. “Although individuals who undergo sex reassignment usually have personal problems that make sports competition an unlikely activity for them, there are some for whom participation in sport is important,” he said. The IOC’s rule change came about after it become apparent that case-by-case evaluations were insufficient. Transgender advocates criticized the post-operative requirements, noting that many athletes cannot afford the surgeries where national or private health insurance doesn’t cover it.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Howard Ashman: 1950. Playwright and lyricists, Ashman first achieved acclaim for his collaboration with Alan Menken on Little Shop of Horrors. That collaboration put the songwriting duo on a course for greater hits to come. In 1986, Ashman wrote the screenplay for the film adaptation and wrote the lyrics for two new songs, “Some Fun Now” and “Mean Green Mother From Outer Space.” The latter of two received an Academy Award nomination. In 1989, he was co-producer, lyricist and occasional writer for Disney’s The Little Mermaid. It was his idea to give Sebastian the Crab a Jamaican accent, and the calypso song, “Under the Sea,” earned Ashman and Menkin the 1989 Oscar for Best Original Song. Asman died in 1991 of complications from AIDS shortly after completing work on the Disney films Beauty and the Beast and before he could complete Aladdin. Ashman was posthumously named a Disney Legend in 2001, and Beauty and the Beast is dedicated to him. Ashman was survived by his partner, architect William Lauch.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. PLEASE, don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

Report: “Kill the Gays” Bill Author On Museveni’s “Short List” for Cabinet

Rumors are rife in Uganda now that President Yoweri Museveni is assembling a new Cabinet following the swearing in of the 9th Parliament. Sunday Monitor has what they say is Museveni’s short list of possible cabinet ministers.

When I first saw Anti-Homosexuality Bill author David Bahati’s name tapped as Ethics Minister late on Saturday, I re-read the article, and from the first two paragraphs concluded that it as something of a dream team put together by the paper’s staff. I was very dismayed to see it, because I have been very impressed with Monitor’scoverage throughout the past two years. But since I took it to be a list put together by Montor’s staff, I ignored it. Unfortunately. Because when Warren Throckmorton posted about it this afternoon, it prompted me to go back and look again. And sure enough:

Tim Lwanga
The MP-elect for Kyamuswa County, Kalangala District, is also likely to bounce back on the list of the ministers.

Lwanga, a Born-again Christian, is a former Minister of Ethics and Integrity. He had been dropped from the list of ministers after losing in the 2006 parliamentary elections.

Lwanga was replaced by James Nsaba Buturo, who was also defeated in the recent elections.

New Vision doesn’t say what position Lwanga would be considred for. Bahati is not on New Vision’s list. And so the rumor mill grinds along…

[This post replaces an earlier post in which I erroneously stated that Warren Thockmorton and David Badash (at the New Civil Rights Movement) “misread” Monitor’s article when, in fact, it was I who misread it. I apologize to Warren, David, and to the readers who saw that post.]

Liberty Law School Teaches Students To Violate The Law

There have been quite a few observations that leading officials at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University Law School and the non-profit legal firm Liberty Counsel are deeply entangled in Isabella Miller-Jenkins kidnapping case. Today, we learn that the attorneys for the kidnapper are teaching their students at Liberty University to break the law when confronted with a nearly identical case.

To recap, a pastor, Timothy David Miller, was arrested on Friday in Alexandria, VA, for his role in providing plane tickets and shelter for Lisa Miller, who kidnapped 9-year-old Isabella Miller-Jenkins as part of a custody fight with her former civil union partner Janet Jenkins. Miller is believed to have fled to Nicaragua shortly before a Vermont court awarded primary custody to Jenkins over Miller’s refusal to cooperate with Jenkins’s visitation rights. It appears that Miller fled with considerable support from an employee and benefactor of Liberty University and Liberty Counsel, who provided for Miller’s legal defense, as well as encouragement from at least one ex-gay leader in the Lynchburg, Virginia area.

Today, Religion Dispatches associate editor Sarah Posner reports that Lisa Miller’s attorneys Mat Staver and Rena Lindevaldsen, who teach a required Foundations of Law course at Liberty University, are teaching their students that when confronted with a case like Lisa Miller’s, that the attorney has an obligation to resolve the conflict between “God’s Law” and “man’s law” by advising the client to solve the conflict through “civil disobedience”:

This student and two others, who all requested anonymity for fear of reprisal by Staver (who is also the law school’s dean), recounted the classroom discussion of civil disobedience, as well as efforts to draw comparisons between choosing “God’s law” over “man’s law” to the American revolution and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. According to one student, in the Foundations course both Staver and Lindevaldsen “espoused the opinion that in situations where God’s law is in direct contradiction to man’s law, we have an obligation to disobey it.”

…That semester’s mid-term exam, obtained by RD [see excerpts of the actual exam here], included a question based on Miller’s case asking students to describe what advice they would give her “as a friend who is a Christian lawyer.” After laying out a slanted history of the protracted legal battle, the exam asked, “Lisa needs your counsel on how to think through her legal situation and how to respond as a Christian to this difficult problem. Relying only on what we have learned thus far in class, how would you counsel Lisa?”

Students who wrote that Miller should comply with court orders received bad grades while those who wrote she should engage in civil disobedience received an A, the three students said. “People were appalled,” said one of the students, adding, “especially as lawyers to be, who are trained and licensed to practice the law—to disobey that law, that seemed completely counterintuitive to all of us.”

Some of the students who got an “A” on that exam write that the client should engage in civil disobedience and leave the country. The student added, “I knew that I needed to write that.” Some students worry that as more people learn what is being taught at Liberty University, that lawyers who are Liberty grads will be “laughed out of the courtroom.” A painting of Mat Staver hangs in “Revolutionary Hall,” which also commemorates Martin Luther King, Jr., Ronald Reagan, Ghandi, Mother Teresa and others.

If one wonders where Lisa Miller got the idea and support necessary to flee to Nicaragua, look no further than her own attorneys.

Welcome Out, Don Lemon

CNN Anchor Don Lemon has a new book out, Transparent, that talks about reporting and his career in journalism. But there is one tidbit that will get most of the attention: his coming out:

“People are going to say: ‘Oh, he was molested as a kid and now he is coming out.’ I get it,” he said.

…Even beyond whatever effect his revelation might have on his television career, Mr. Lemon said he recognized this step carried special risk for him as a black man.

“It’s quite different for an African-American male,” he said. “It’s about the worst thing you can be in black culture. You’re taught you have to be a man; you have to be masculine. In the black community they think you can pray the gay away.” He said he believed the negative reaction to male homosexuality had to do with the history of discrimination that still affects many black Americans, as well as the attitudes of some black women.

“You’re afraid that black women will say the same things they do about how black men should be dating black women.” He added, “I guess this makes me a double minority now.”

But citing Tyler Clementi’s suicide, Lemon recognized that the more people who come out, the better it will be for others who are struggling with their sexuality. “I think if I had seen more people like me who are out and proud, it wouldn’t have taken me 45 years to say it,” he said.

I know what a lot of people are going to say: Great, another celebrity with a book to sell.  True, but there is much more to it than that. Ricky Martin came out when he released his memoir, Me, but when people speak of him as a gay man today, it’s about his career and family, not some book he wrote that very few people read. The example of being out is a lifetime thing. The more people who come out under their own terms, however they decide to do it, is better for everyone.

Welcome out, Don Lemon.

Heterosexual Menace: Beware “The Rutting Champanzee”

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, head of the International Monetary Fund and a leading candidate for the French presidency, was arrested over the weekend on charges of attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment of a maid at the hotel where he was staying. Strauss-Kahn apparently has quite a reputation; the French call him “the great seducer“:

A 32-year-old hotel worker told police she went in to clean what she thought was an empty luxury suite. The woman claims Strauss-Kahn came out of the bathroom naked, locked her inside and sexually assaulted her.

Three hours later, police hauled him off an Air France jet at Kennedy Airport 10 minutes before takeoff.

Women are lining up for their shot against him. French writer Tristane Banon is also expected to lodge an official sexual assault complaint against him. She previously described the attack on television in 2007, when she called Strauss-Kahn, whose name was bleeped out, a “rutting chimpanzee.” Strauss-Kahn is scheduled to appear for his arraignment today. His wife is standing by him and protests his “innocence,” an apparently common practice among heterosexual wives.

You can learn more about how the heterosexuals are destroying the fabric of society here and in our report, The Heterosexual Agenda: Exposing the Myths.

The Daily Agenda for Monday, May 16

TODAY’S AGENDA:
It’s a very light day today and nothing much happened on this day in history, but the birthdays are fabulous.

Tamara de Lempicka (top) and "Auto-Portrait (Tamara in the Green Bugatti)," 1925 (bottom)

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Tamara de Lempicka: 1898. The polish Art Deco painter known as “la belle Polonaise,” she personified the glamor of the Great Gatsby society of the interwar years. In 1978, The New York Times called her the “Steel-eyed goddess of the automobile age.” Her famous self-portrait, Auto-Portrait (Tamara in the Green Bugatti) portrayed a woman who was utterly free, independent, and self-assured. Automobiles provided women with a freedom and mobility that they had never known before, and the portrait’s depiction of a 400 horsepower Bugatti added raw speed and power to the mix. During the roaring twenties, Tamara lived the bohemian life in Paris, hanging out with Pablo Picasso, Jean Cocteau, and André Gide. She was famously, infamously bisexual, and she was uncompromising in her very public affairs in a way that was scandalous at the time. She reveled in it. “I live on the fringe of society,” she announced, “and the rules of normal society have no currency for those on the fringe.”

In 1928, she earned a commission to paint a portrait of the mistress of Baron Raoul Kuffner. By the time she was finished, she replaced the mistress’s position, and eventually became Kuffner’s wife in 1933. In 1939, the couple took an “extended vacation” to America, and ended up staying through the Second World War, where she became a favorite in Hollywood. But by the time the War ended, her style was no longer popular. She switched from using a brush to a pallet knife, but critics savaged her work. She retired from active painting in 1962, determined never to show her work again.

In subsequent years, she not only complained that the paints and materials were now inferior to the “old days,” but that people in the 1970s lacked the qualities and “breeding” that inspired her art. After her husband died, she moved to Cuernevaca, Mexico in 1978 to rejoin the society of aging artists and aristocrats. By then, the art world was rediscovering the Art Deco era and her paintings were rediscovered and became highly sought after. She died in 1980, and her ashes were scattered over the volcano Popocatepetl.

Top: Liberace's signed photo to his mother. He was always Walter to her. Bottom: Liberace's transparent closet.

Liberace: 1919. Born Wladziu Valentino Liberace, he was known as Lee to his friends, Walter to his family, and Liberace to everyone else. His father, a french horn player, loved music but his mother saw it as an unfordable luxury. His father prevailed, taking his children to concerts and insisting on excellence in their music lessons. Liberace later recalled, “My dad’s love and respect for music created in him a deep determination to give as his legacy to the world, a family of musicians dedicated to the advancement of the art.”

On “Mr. Showmanship’s” terms, the advancement of the art took on an entirely new meaning. The word “synonymous” doesn’t do justice to the connection between Liberace’s name and flamboyance. He raised eyebrows by wearing a relatively simple white tuxedo at the Hollywood Bowl in 1952, and he continued to wear it so he could be easily seen in darkened concert halls. But it didn’t take long before that gave way to sequined jackets, then entire rhinestone-encrusted, fur-trimmed monstrosities that were “just one tuck short of drag,” as he put it. In the 1950’s he installed a pexiglass lid on his piano so as to not obstruct the view; by the 1960s his pianos were often encrusted with jewels and mirrors. And then there was the candelabrum. Always the rococo candelabrum. His entrances at the start of his Las Vegas shows were legendary. Sometimes he’d step out of  a sequined limousine that rolled onto stage, sometimes he flew in by invisible wires. After making a grand runway walk, he’d hold out his arms to show off his outfit and yet, “I hope you like it! You paid for it!” The audience roared back their approval.

He was as out as any closeted gay man could possible be, and as closeted as every fearful performer was determined to be. But the difference between Liberace and everyone else is that, his verbal denials aside — he even sued London’s Daily Mirror in 1956 when they questioned his sexuality in print and, incredibly, won! — he didn’t otherwise put a lot of effort into trying to fool his audience while on stage. Art critic Dave Hickey, in his essay “A Rhinestone as Big As The Ritz,” I think, put it best:

He never came out of the closet; he lived in it like the grand hypocrite that he was, and died in it, of a disease he refused to acknowledge. But neither, in fact, did Wilde come out of it, and he, along with Swineburn and their Belle Époque cronies, probably invented the closet as a mode of subversive public/private existence. Nor did Noel Coward come out of it. He tricked it up with the smoke and mirrors of leisure-class ennui and cloaked it in public-school double entendre. What Liberace did do, however, was Americanize the closet, democratize it, fit it out with transparent walls, and take it up on stage and demand our complicity in his “open secret.” …”A bit like cousin Ed, ain’t he,” my grandfather said. Getting it but not saying it.

In 1982, Scott Thorson, Liberace’s 24-year-old bodyguard, limo driver, and boyfriend of five years sued Liberace for $113 million in palimony after they broke up, but wound up settling for a pittance. Liberace’s closet remained sealed right up until he died in 1987. The official cause of death was cardiac arrest due to congestive heart failure brought on by subacute encephalopath. Before he died, Hank Greenspun, publisher of the Las Vegas Sun, wrote in a front-page story that Liberace had AIDS. Greenspun said he had known Liberace for 40 years and that he had the medical records, laboratory reports and other documentation to prove it. Liberace and his handlers stood by their denials, and Wikipedia still has an entire section devoted to his “alleged homosexuality” to this very day.

Tonéx: 1975. Born Anthony Charles Williams II, the preacher’s kid, gospel rapper, producer and preacher himself, Tonéx’s first release, Pronounced Toe-Nay, was sold mainly out of the trunk of his car. The eclectic mix of hip-hop, funk, jazz, mellow grooves, and soul-style gospel quickly caught on and garnered the attention of major gospel labels. While his music had cross-over appeal into secular markets, Tonéx remained committed to making gospel music. His 2004 double CD Out The Box debuted at number one on Billboard’s Gospel Album chart, and featured Kirk Franklin and Prince percussionist Sheila E.

But that same year, things started to unravel. His father died, forcing him to take on the responsibility of becoming senior pastor of their family’s church. He also divorced his wife of 5 years and was sued by his record label for one million dollars citing breach of contract. That led to Tonéx’s announcement that he would retire gospel music, “an industry that is only built to make money, not heal broken souls.” He continued to record, produce and appear in the San Diego cast of Dreamgirls. When he publicly came out as gay in 2010, his transformation was complete, and he officially retired his stage name, restyled TON3X, shortly after.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. PLEASE, don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

Welcome Out, Rick Welts

Who’s Rick Welts, you ask? He’s the President of the NBA’s Phoenix Suns. And in the sports pages of today’s New York Times — which I totally would never have read otherwise — there is a lengthy and touching profile of his decision to come out in an industry that is not at all known for its welcoming attitude towards LGBT acceptance.

…Mr. Welts explained that he wants to pierce the silence that envelops the subject of homosexuality in men’s team sports. He wants to be a mentor to gay people who harbor doubts about a sports career, whether on the court or in the front office. Most of all, he wants to feel whole, authentic.

“This is one of the last industries where the subject is off limits,” said Mr. Welts, who stands now as a true rarity, a man prominently employed in professional men’s team sports, willing to declare his homosexuality. “Nobody’s comfortable in engaging in a conversation.”

In 1984 Welts helped to raise the NBA’s profile by creating the NBA All-Star Weekend, and in 1997 he helped to establish the Women’s National Basketball Association. He became President of the Phoenix Suns in 2002.

The Daily Agenda for Sunday, May 15

T-B: New York State Sen. Ruben Diaz, National Organization for Marriage's Brian Brown

TODAY’S AGENDA:
NY Rally Against Marriage: Okay, that’s not how they bill it, but that’s what it is. New York State Sen. Ruben Diaz joins National Organization for Marriage’s Brian Brown for a “March for Dignity” (huh?) today at 149th & 3rd Avenue in The Bronx at noon. From there they will march to the Bronx Supreme Court on the Grand Concourse and 161st Street. It just so happens that for their rally they chose the same day as New York AIDS Walk. Diaz issued a press release justifying the date: “I’d also like to clarify some loathsome accusations about our May 15^th Rally coinciding with the New York AIDS Walk…  [I]t has to be made clear that everyone who participates in the March Against AIDS is not necessarily in support of gay marriage. There is a huge difference between the March Against AIDS and our Rally. One has nothing to do with the other.” Huge difference indeed.

AIDS Walks Today: Minneapolis, MN and New York, NY.

Pride Celebrations Today: Houston TX (Black Pride); Maspalomas, Canary Islands; New Hope, PA; and Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
“Writhing Bedfellows”: 1826. Few intimate letters between men survive from the early nineteenth century, which makes this one so remarkable. It was 185 years ago today when Jeffrey Withers, 22, wrote to his dear friend, James Hammond, 18, a letter which is both frank and playful — even “campy”:

Dear Jim:

I got your Letter this morning about 8 o’clock, from the hands of the Bearer . . . I was sick as the Devil, when the Gentleman entered the Room, and have been so during most of the day. About 1 o’clock I swallowed a huge mass of Epsom Salts — and it will not be hard to imagine that I have been at dirty work since. I feel partially relieved — enough to write a hasty dull letter.

I feel some inclination to learn whether you yet sleep in your Shirt-tail, and whether you yet have the extravagant delight of poking and punching a writhing Bedfellow with your long fleshen pole — the exquisite touches of which I have often had the honor of feeling? Let me say unto thee that unless thou changest former habits in this particular, thou wilt be represented by every future Chum as a nuisance. And, I pronounce it, with good reason too. Sir, you roughen the downy Slumbers of your Bedfellow — by such hostile — furious lunges as you are in the habit of making at him — when he is least prepared for defence against the crushing force of a Battering Ram. Without reformation my imagination depicts some awful results for which you will be held accountable — and therefore it is, that I earnestly recommend it. Indeed it is encouraging an assault and battery propensity, which needs correction — & uncorrected threatens devastation, horror & bloodshed, etc. …

[The letter goes on for two more pages on unrelated matters, then signs off–]

With great respect I am the old
Stud,
Jeff.

Withers would later become a judge in South Carolina and delegate to the conferences that established a provisional government for the Confederacy. Hammond would later become a Congressman, Senator and Governor of South Carolina, and a major apologist for slavery. Hammond responded in kind to Withers’s letter the following September. If you want to see Hammond’s response, you’ll have to do as Withers did: wait until September.

[From Martin Duberman, “‘Writhing Bedfellows’: 1826.” Journal of Homosexuality 6, no. 1 (1981): 85-101]

Homosexual Drives As Menstrual Cycles: 1950. This was a time when Congress was preoccupied with two color-coded scares: The Red Menace of imaginary communists hiding in every cupboard and The Pink Menace of homosexuals working in federal offices. Congressman Aurthur L. Miller (R-Nebr) was particularly incensed over the latter. He was also a doctor and a surgeon, which made this speech during a committee hearing particularly strange:

Some of these people are dangerous. They will go to any limit. These homosexuals have strong emotions. They are not to be trusted and when blackmail threatens they are a dangerous group. … It is found that the cycle of these individuals’ homosexual desires follow the cycle closely patterned to the menstrual period of women. There may be three or four days in each month that this homosexual’s instincts break down and drive the individual into abnormal fields of sexual practice.

Episcopal Church Allows Ordination of Gay Deacons: 1996. An Episcopal Church court threw out a heresy charge and ruled that an Bishop Walter C. Righter, did not violate the church’s core doctrine when he ordained openly gay Barry Stopfel as a deacon, the rank below that of a priest, in the Dioceses of Newark in 1990.

Jasper Johns's "Map," 1961 (Click to enlarge.)

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Jasper Johns: 1930. He probably best known for his 1955 painting Flag, which is, just as its name implies, simply a painting of an American Flag. His focus on the mundane as subjects have led some to consider him a pop artist with an abstract impressionist streak, but it’s probably more accurate to see him as a ne0-Dadaist. Flag exemplifies the movement by taking an object or popular imagery that is imbued with intense meaning and removing it from its context and thereby reducing it to a simple abstract design. Maps (1961) does the same thing. It’s an ordinary map of the United States portrayed in an abstract impressionist style which reduces the iconic image to a series of color splotches and shapes. Flags, maps, stenciled words and numbers — all of these mundane yet symbolic images were subjects for Johns’s paintings.

Jasper Johns receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Johns was born in South Carolina and studied for three semesters at the University of South Carolina before moving to New York to study briefly at the Parson’s School of Design in 1949. After a stint in the military during the Korean War, Johns returned to New York where he met Robert Rauschenberg and they became lovers for eight years. It was through his connection with Rauschenberg that Johns was discovered by the art world.  When prominent gallery owner visited Rauschenberg’s studio in 1958 and saw Johns’s work, he offered Johns a show on the spot. At that debut show, the Museum of Modern Art anointed Johns as a major figure in the art world by purchasing three of his paintings. By the 1980s, John’s paintings fetched higher prices than any other living artist in history. In 2011, Johns was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama, making him the first painter to receive the award since 1977.

Andy Towle: 1967. His last name is pronounced “toll,” not “towel,” making his blog, Towleroad, a homophone for the New Jersey Turnpike. I’m struggling to find a clever meaning in that, but I got nothing. Anyway, before becoming a full-time blogger, Towle was editor-in-chief for Genre magazine. Today, Towleroad (a site with homosexual tendencies) has become one of the highest trafficked LGTB blogs with its focus on popular culture and the arts with a heavy dose of politics thrown in.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. PLEASE, don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

Wealthy New York Republicans Back Marriage Equality Push

Clifford Asness

The New York Times this morning reports that wealthy Republican New Yorkers, some of them quite conservative otherwise, have donated more than $1 million to LGBT advocacy groups to fund their push for marriage equality. The donations already make up about two-thirds of the state’s same-sex marriage fundraising, far outstripping donations from Democratic and liberal sources.

New York mayor Michael Bloomberg has given $100,000 and will host a fundraiser among his well-connected friends. Donations have come in from top Republican donor and hedge fund manager Paul Singer, who is one of the most generous GOP donors in the country. He also has a gay son who married in Massachusetts. Singer has personally donated $425,000 and solicited an additional $500,000 in donations. Financiers Steven Cohen, Daniel Loeb and Clifford Asness have donated. Asness explains:

“I’m a pretty straight-down-the-line small-government guy,” said Mr. Asness, who described himself as a libertarian who favored less government intrusion in both markets and personal affairs. Mr. Asness, a frequent Republican donor, has praised Tea Party activists on his blog and last year attended a conference of right-leaning donors held by Charles and David Koch, among the leading conservative philanthropists in the nation.

“This is an issue of basic freedom,” Mr. Asness said.

The Daily Agenda for Saturday, May 14

TODAY’S AGENDA:
“Mayday for Marriage” RV Tour: The Family Research Foundation’s RV is touring the state with their message against marriage equality. Today, gampa’s grumpybus has a very special stop: a free, family-oriented barbecue fundraiser near Rochester. The event will be held in the baseball quadrant pavilion of the Grace & Truth Sports Park (373 North Greece Rd., Greece). If you’re in the area, you might consider bringing the kids and showing everyone what family really looks like.

GLAAD Media Awards: At the San Francisco Marriott Marquis. The details are here.

AIDS Walks This Weekend: Minneapolis, MN; New York, NY; and Stockton, CA.

Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Brussels, Belgium; Charleston, SC; Houston TX (Black Pride); Maspalomas, Canary Islands; New Hope, PA; and Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

A diagram from 1971 of a system to deliver electric shock aversion therapy to gay men. (Click to enlarge.)

TODAY IN HISTORY:
“Shock Doc” Protested at APA: 1970. Protests and demonstrations over injustices were already de rigueur when the American Psychiatric Association held its annual meeting in San Francisco in 1970. Gay advocates had long observed that the APA’s labeling of homosexuality a mental disorder served as a handy excuse to enforce widespread discrimination and legal sanctions against LGBT people in all areas of life. What’s more, psychiatry’s attempts to cure homosexuality often were physically torturous, with electric shock therapy not an uncommon method. And one of the stars of shock therapy, an Australian psychiatry by the name of Nathaniel McConaghy, was coming to San Francisco to read a paper before the august organization. Advocates were waiting. As McConaghy was coolly described the methods he used — his patients’ penises were wired to measurement devices and they were shown porn; once twinge of arousal and they were delivered powerful electric shocks — gay advocates were in the crowd shouting “vicious!” and “torture!” and “where did you take your residency, Auschwitz?”

When the moderator announced the next session, the gay advocates exploded and demanded to be heard. When the moderator refused, the meeting broke down into shouts and recriminations. One physician reportedly called for the police to shoot the protesters. Most left the room, but some stayed, and the conversations that ensued over the next three years ultimately led to the APA’s delisting of homosexuality as a mental disorder.

In 1981, McConaghy was still unapologetic about his treatment of gay people. In an article he published in the journal Behavior Research and Therapy, he was still presenting the results of his electric shock experiments on gay men. But before he did so, he defended his work as ethical and resented having had his presentation interrupted eleven years earlier. By the mid 1980’s he had abandoned aversion therapy, but he was still trying to cure an illness that no longer existed by other means. And yet somehow, his reputation remained intact. After he died in 2005, the Archives of Sexual Behavior published a memorial lauding him as a pioneer in behavioral therapy who “inspired many to pursue truth and beauty through his example.” The memorial was notable for three things. It briefly mentioned his attempts to cure gay men and painted his response to the “near riot” of 1970 as heroic (“He remained a fearless champion of the application of scientific methods to the study of human sexuality,” it said.) But the memorial neglected to mention his use of electric shock therapy. It was also unsigned.

First LGBT Civil Rights Bill in Congress: 1974. Bella Abzug, the Democratic Congresswoman in for Manhattan and part of the Bronx, was a civil rights attorney before she entered Congress. She was an outspoken supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment and opposed the Vietnam War. Her stands earned her a position on President Richard Nixon’s famed “Enemies List.” On this date in 1974, Rep. Abzug introduced the first federal gay rights bill, the Equality Act of 1974, with fellow New York City Rep. Ed Koch. The bill went nowhere then, and similar efforts to ban discrimination have come to naught in the 37 years since then.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Magnus Hirschfeld:1868. Known as “The Einstein of Sex,” German-born Magnus Hirschfeld was the most prominent advocate of gay emancipation in his day. In 1897, Hirschfeld co-founded the Wissenschaftlich-humanitäre Komitee (Scientific-Humanitarian Committee), whose first project was to repeal Paragraph 175, which criminalized homosexuality between men (women were unmentioned in Germany’s anti-gay code). He never succeeded in repealing the law, but the committee succeeded in gathering signatures of some 6,000 Germans calling for repeal. In 1919, he founded the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft (Institute for Sexual Science), and was widely recognized as a prolific writer and speaker on sexual minority issues. He also figured in film history, when he made a cameo appearance in the 1919 film Anders als die Andern (Different from the Others), the first film to portray a homosexual love story in a sympathetic light.

While Germany’s Wiemar Republic saw homosexuality becoming somewhat accepted in Berlin, extreme right-wing forces reacted with violence. In 1920, Hirschfeld was attacked and severely wounded in Munich after a conference, and in 1921 his skull was fractured in another attacked. From 1929, Nazis repeatedly disrupted his lectures. In 1930, Hirschfeld began a lecture tour of the United States, which was expanded to a world-wide tour. By the time he returned to Europe in 1932, conditions in Germany became so dangerous that he decided not to return. On May 6, 1933, the Nazis attacked and destroyed the Institute for Sexual Science, and on May 10, they burned its library and files, the largest of its kind in the world. Hirschfeld wandered Europe before settling in Nice, France in 1934. He died there in 1935, with his death coming also on this very same date in history.

Julian Eltinge: 1881. He was, perhaps, America’s first famous drag queen. One story has it that he first donned women’s clothing at the age of ten for an appearance in Boston. Another one suggests that his mother helped him to dress in drag at a very young age to perform in the saloons in Butte, Montana, and that his father nearly beat him to death when he found out. At any rate, he was performing onstage and touring Vaudeville after the turn of the century. Unlike most female impersonators at the time, he didn’t place farcical caricatures of women for laughs. He sought to create the full illusion of actually being a woman. He toured Vaudeville under the his last name “”Eltinge,” which gave no hint of his gender. After his act of singing and dancing, he stepped forward on stage, and in a dramatic gesture emulated later in the 1982 film Victor/Victoria, he reached up and removed his wig to the surprise of his often unsuspecting audience. He arrived on Broadway in 1907 at the Alhambra Theater, and through the next decade he was reputed to be the highest paid stage actor. He started appearing in films in 1914, and by 1920, had one of the most lavish mansions in Southern California, where he lived with his mother.

Eltinge countered rumors of his homosexuality offstage by presenting a unrelentingly masculine presence in public. He smoked cigars, was an amateur boxer, got into bar fights, and had long engagements with women. Funny though, he never married. “I am not gay,” he protested, “I just like pearls.” But by the 1930;s, his heyday was over. He gained weight and started drinking as his career took a nose-dive. He was reduced to performing in a Hollywood nightclub catering to a gay clientele, but local laws intended to contain the “homosexual menace” banned dressing in drag. Eltinge had to perform in a tuxedo alongside mannequins dressed in his outfits. He’d point to them while enacting his characters. He died in 1941, reportedly of a brain hemorrhage, although some suspect suicide. His will, dated October 13, 1938,  stated “I declare that I am a bachelor” and left everything to his mother.

You can see an early silent film from 1918 featuring Eltinge in drag here.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. PLEASE, don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

Maggie’s Minnesota poll mixup

Maggie Gallagher’s National Organization for Marriage put out poll results last week that showed that Minnesotans overwhelmingly support a constitution amendment to ban marriage equality in the state.

56 percent of Minnesotans said only heterosexual marriages should be recognized in Minnesota and 42 percent said they supported same-sex marriage. The poll, by the National Organization for Marriage, Minnesota Family Council and Lawrence Research, also says that 74 percent of Minnesotans want to vote on the marriage amendment.

The Minnesota Independent asked for more details about the poll, the questions asked, and the methodology used. Considering the accuracy of some of Maggie’s other polls, this seems reasonable. But it turns out that polling questions and methods are just like images of anti-gay witnesses and the identity of anti-gay donors: super-duper secret.

But now the Star Tribune has put out their Minnesota Poll which finds responses a bit differently than NOM. They also happily provide details about their questions and methodology.

Fifty-five percent of respondents said they oppose adding such an amendment while 39 percent favor a constitutional ban — views that appear to be a sharp reversal of poll results seven years ago.

Opposition to the ban generally cuts across all ages, though support rises gradually with age. Sixty percent of Minnesotans aged 18 to 34 oppose the idea. A slim majority, 51 percent, of Minnesotans older than 65 oppose the constitutional ban.

Now, I’m not calling Maggie a liar. Nor am I suggesting that she wouldn’t know the truth if it snuck up and bit her on her prodigious posterior. I’m not even implying that Maggie and her integrity parted long ago on such bad terms that if they find each other in the same room they scowl.

Not at all.

I merely think that Maggie accidentally reversed the “support” and the “oppose” results in her poll.

Maybe It Was The Line “Galileo Figaro”

Dateline Wasilla:

The Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman reports today that the principal of Wasilla High School told members of the school’s symphonic jazz choir that they would not be allowed to perform the 1975 Queen song “Bohemian Rhapsody” because Freddy Mercury, who wrote it, was gay.

In the face of student protests, and fearing ACLU involvement, the principal backed down–to a point.

The choir will be allowed to perform the song, but only in a censored version, without lyrics the principal deems objectionable.

In a lame face-saving move, principal Dwight Probasco decided to compromise by banning the lyrics about the singer having “just killed a man.” No word on whether “We Will Rock You” and “We Are The Champions” are allowed at hockey games. Joe McGinniss is having a field day on his blog, including a “separated at birth” photo of Probasco alongside Elton John that you absolutely have to see. His commenters are also getting in the spirit, including one Sandra Tompkins who re-wrote the lyrics of “Bohemian Rhapsody” just for Wasilla and its favorite daughter. It totally needs to go viral:

Click here to sing along to "Wasillian Rhapsody."