Box Turtle Bulletin
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobby“Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife…”
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobbySeptember 24th, 2011
THE AGENDA (OURS):
Southern Comfort Conference/WPATH Symposium: Atlanta, GA. The World Professional Association for Transgender Health holds its biennial symposium beginning today and continuing through Wednesday, September 28. The symposium is being held in conjunction with Southern Comfort Conference, which takes place every year in Atlanta and is the largest and most famous transgender conference in the country. Southern Comfort began on Wednesday and continues through the weekend. The WPATH Symposium is open to professionals, students of transgender study and supporters, and covers every aspect of transgender health, from surgical procedure techniques to bullying and childhood abuse. On Sunday, Southern Comfort and the WPATH Symposium will hold a joint session with the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, which is also having its annual convention in Atlanta. That session, “Transgender Beyond Disorder: Identity, Community, and Health,” will take place at the Emory University Conference Center beginning at 9:00 a.m.
Campus Pride College Fair and Prep Day: Chicago, IL. Campus Pride’s College Fair is an opportunity for LGBT students and their families to discuss educational opportunities with participating LGBT-affirming colleges and universities. The fair features expert advice about LGBT-friendly colleges, scholarship resources and even effective tips for campus visits. The Midwest Region College Fair takes place today at Chicago’s Center on Halstead, 3956 N. Halsted, and goes from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. More information can be found here. Future College Fairs will take place in Boston (Oct 7), Los Angeles (Oct 15) and New York (Nov 4).
AIDS Walks This Weekend: Albany, NY; Brampton, ON; Flint, MI; Calgary, AB; Corner Brook, NL; Dryden, ON; Grand Prairie, AB; Halifax, NS; Louisville, KY; Moncton, NB; Mt. Pleasant, MI; Oklahoma City, OK; Oshawa, ON; Ottawa, ON; Peterborough, ON; Red Deer, AB; Regina, SK; San Diego, CA; Seattle, WA; St. John, NB; Thunder Bay, ON; Traverse City, MI; Windsor, ON and Winnipeg, MB.
Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Holyoke, MA; Kaohsiung, Taiwan; Nelson Mandela Bay, South Africa; Peterborough, ON; Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill, NC; Richmond, VA; St. Cloud, MN; Soweto, South Africa; Sunderland, UK.
Also This Weekend: Folsom Street Fair, San Francisco, CA.
THE AGENDA (THEIRS):
Evergreen International Conference: Salt Lake City, UT. Evergreen International, the Mormon ex-gay organization, is holding its annual conference today. The plenary session features LDS elder Jay Jensen, of the First Quorum of the Seventy. The conference takes place from 8:30 to 4:30 at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. David Pruden, Evergreen President, is also Vice President of Operations at the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), which is listed as a “trusted partner” of the Evergreen Conference.
A candlelight vigil at the Backstreet Cafe following the shooting.
TODAY IN HISTORY:
Mass Shooting in Gay Bar Kills One, Injures Six: 2000. Ronald Edward Gay spent his entire life hearing jokes about his surname. A former Vietnam vet, he become an alcohol and drug abuser, and had just been divorced for the sixth time. His children changed their last names, he claimed, to escape the jokes. So when he finally had had enough, he decided to turn it around and take it out not on his tormenters, but on those who he believed had ruined his name. On September 24, 2000, the fifty-three-year-old drifter walked into the Backstreet Cafe in Roanoke, Virginia, pulled a 9mm handgun from his black trench coat and opened fire. One of the bar’s patrons, Anna Sparks, described the terror. “The guy was standing there with a trench coat on, and the gun was going pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, and people were falling over everywhere, trying to get behind booths. He just stood there for a couple of seconds, then lowered the gun and walked out like nothing had happened.” When the shooting spree ended, Danny Lee Overstreet, 43, was dead in a pool of blood and six others were injured, one critically.
Danny Lee Overstreet (left), Ronald Edward Gay (right)
Gay had been at a different bar earlier that night asking where the city’s nearest gay bar was, telling patrons he wanted to shoot some gay people. One person gave him directions and then called the police, who arrived at the Backstreet Cafe shortly after the shooting. They found Gay about two blocks away. “He said he was shooting people to get rid of, in his term, ‘faggots,'” Lieutenant William Althoff of the Roanoke police was quoted as saying. He told authorities that he became obsessed with fulfilling four “missions”: to stop corruption, to stop communism, the bring all Vietnam vets “out of the mountains”, and to stop the spread of AIDS by forcing all gay people to move to San Francisco. Gay pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and six malicious wounding charges and on July 23, 2001 was given to four life sentences.
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Paul
September 24th, 2011
It sure would be nice if Campus Pride would consider going to other cities…
I mean, it’s not like LGBT youth only live in California, Illinois, and New York. Come on guys.
Pintuck
September 26th, 2011
It sure would be nice if Jim Burroway didn’t feel obligated to include Folsom Street Fair as part of “Our agenda”.
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