Box Turtle Bulletin

The Daily Agenda for Monday, November 14

TODAY’S AGENDA (THEIRS):
Opening of the U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference: Baltimore, MD. As the American Catholic bishops gather for their annual fall meeting, one of the issues almost certainly to be discussed is the Church’s growing antagonistic campaigns against marriage equality. According to USA Today:

The bishops’ strategy is centered around their new Committee for Religious Liberty. It was unveiled just days after the bishops’ president, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, warned President Obama that his decision not to defend a federal ban on gay marriage could “precipitate a national conflict between church and state of enormous proportions.”

A group of leading American bishops took that same dire message to Pope Benedict XVI and Vatican officials this week to rally support for their efforts, which they see as key to averting an era of religious persecution.

As you can see, the tone of the conference is the claim that granting LGBT people equality under the law somehow amounts to “religious persecution,” a theme that various Catholic bishops have been taking up with increasing stridency. But this stridency can perhaps be best seen as a sign of their growing frustration and sense of irrelevance among the Catholic laity. Divorce and birth control have long ceased to be controversial among Catholics in the pews (with the exception of a very tiny fringe minority), with 78% rejecting the church’s stance on birth control and 69% disagreeing on the church’s position on divorce and remarriage. In other words, those debates are over as far as Catholics are concerned, and the bishops lost. And with about half of all Catholics supporting marriage equality, the bishops look to be set to lose yet another round.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
Albrecht Becker: 1906. Albrecht Becker was an actor and production designer who lived with his parter of ten yeas in Würzburg in Bavaria. In 1935, he came under the notice of the Gestapo when they were investigating another Würzburg resident, Dr. Leopold Obermayer, a Swiss national who was both Jewish and gay. During the course of the Gestapo’s investigation, they found several photos of young men, including Albert Becker, in his possession. Obermeyer was sent to Manthausen concentration camp, where he ultimately perished. Becker was also tried under Germany’s notorious Paragraph 175 and sentenced to a three year term in Nürnburg Prison. In 1940, he joined the German army and sent directly to the Eastern front where soldiers weren’t expected to survive. But survive he did, and was able to return to Germany and work in the film industry after the war. He became an internationally recognized photographer, production designer and actor for German television. His story is one of six personal histories recounted in the 2000 documentary, Paragraph 175, about the Nazi persecution of gay men. He died in 2002 in Hamburg at the age of 95.

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

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

The Daily Agenda for Sunday, November 13

To tell you the truth, the only thing I have marked on my calendar for today is the fact that this is Fred Phelps’s birthday. Born in 1929, he has spent his entire life tormenting more souls than the Prince of Darkness himself. The mark of a life well spent is the degree to which one has made the world a better place for those around him. Phelps’s mark is such that his name will forever be synonymous with the worst brand of hatred known to man or beast. Virtually every anti-gay bigot in the world claims at least one measure of self-defense: “I’m nothing like Fred Phelps.” Except, in truth, many of them are just as bad as he, and some are worse. Evil may be banal, but each instance of evil is unique in its own way. Phelps is just one of far too many.

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

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

The Daily Agenda for Saturday, November 12

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Gone: The Disappearance of Aeryn Gillern: Discovery Investigation. In 2007, Kathy Gilleran received a call from Austria reporting that her gay son, Aeryn, was missing. A retired policewoman, Kathy immediately flew overseas to aid in the search, but was shocked to learn that local police had no interest in helping. The story that Austrian detectives told Kathy was that Aeryn had been at an exclusive men’s sauna on October 29, 2007, when he suffered a sudden emotional breakdown, fled the sauna naked and then jumped to his death into the Danube Canal. They claimed that Aeryn committed “spontaneous” suicide, but to Kathy, the explanation made no sense, especially because no body was recovered. Honing her instincts as a mother and her skills as a cop, she ultimately discovers her own strength to keep fighting to learn her son’s fate — even to this day, more than four years after he went missing. Gone: The Disappearance of Aeryn Gillern debuts tonight at 9:00 p.m. EST on Investigation Discovery.

"A martini, honey, and don't waste any space with those olives!"

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Megan Mullally: 1958. “What’s this? What’s going on here? What’s happening?” Oh sure, some might have thought the sitcom Will & Grace were about the two characters, Will and Grace. But if that were true, the entire sitcom would have been largely forgettable. Another gay man and his fag hag. Yawn. So if you ask me (and I’m acutely aware that you didn’t), Megan Mullally’s portrayal of booze-guzzling, pill-popping, boob-flashing, gold-digging Karen Walker (alias, “Anastasia Beaverhausen”) is what really made the series an essential part of NBC’s Must See TV. To say that Karen was narcissistic was, well, as Karen would say, “That’s like saying Prada’s are just shoes or vodka is just a morning beverage.” Mullally started out in Chicago theater before moving to Los Angeles in 1985. She made minor guest appearances in a long, long list of sitcoms, including Seinfeld, Frasier, Wings, and Mad About You. After her eight year run on Will & Grace, she had her own short-lived talk show and has stayed busy with several guest appearances. She also returned to the stage, starring in Mel Brook’s Broadway musical adaptation of Young Frankenstein, and in a production of Adam Bart’s The Receptionist in Los Angeles.

The most feared Man on Capital Hill

Mike Rogers: 1963. “The Most Feared Man On Capital Hill” is known for his ability to snoop out closeted anti-gay politicians and expose them long before the mainstream media catches on. Rogers’s targets have included Virginia Congressman Edward Schrock, Montana Idaho Senator Larry Craig, and former RNC chair Ken Mehlman. Some have criticized him for it, but he says what others call “outing” he calls “reporting.” In 2009, Rogers appeared on a local Washington, D.C. news program with host Doug McKelway, who criticized Rogers and said that he would like to “take you (Rogers) outside and punch you across the face.” Rogers demanded an apology, but never got one. Ask him what his favorite movie was, and he will tell you it is Outrage, the 2009 documentary by Kirby Dick which discusses the hypocrisy of closeted politicians who work against the gay community.

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

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

Happy All-Veterans Day

There is a specialness that happens when an worthy event becomes even more so, when an asterisk marring an otherwise admirable effort is removed.

So today is a very special Veterans Day. It is the day we honor all Veterans who fought for the interests of our nation without discounting any because of their race or gender or orientation. Perhaps gender identity will also some day be dropped from consideration, and we will be even prouder. But on this, the first Veterans Day after the termination of more than 200 years of restriction and exclusion, I am a bit prouder and a bit more appreciative of those who don a uniform and stand between me and those who wish me harm.

(Recruitment poster was by JC Leyendecker, a Saturday Evening Post illustrator who gave us such iconic images as the New Year’s Baby and Santa Claus (as currently dressed). He also had other patrons, including several branches of the US Military. Leyendecker is known for his idolization of the male form – often in ways that would be considered too suggestive today. His most famous advertising campaign was his creation of The Arrow Collar Man, based on his long-term companion, Charles Beach.)

Lesbian Advocate Barbara Grier Dies at 78

Barbara Grier, longtime lesbian author, editor, advocate and founder of what was once the world’s largest publisher of gay and lesbian literature, died of cancer Thursday at a hospital in Tallahassee, Florida. She was 78.

Barbara was born on November 4, 1933 in Cincinnati. She said she came out as a lesbian at twelve years old, and spent the rest of her life finding out as much about lesbians as she could. She told her mother she was homosexual, but as she later recalled, her mother replied, “No, because you’re a woman, you’re a lesbian. And since 12 years old is too young to make such a decision, let’s wait six months before we tell the newspapers.” Her book collection began when her mother gave her a copy of Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness when she turned sixteen. Barbara’s love for lesbian literature, which she called Lesbiana, would serve as the guiding force for her life’s work, not the mention the basis for her massive personal book collection.

Barbara began her career at The Ladder, the in-house newsletter for the Daughters of Bilitis, in 1957. She mostly wrote book reviews for works of fiction in which lesbians were characters, and like most gay and lesbian authors at that time, she used multiple pen names, including Gene Damon, Lennox Strong, and Vern Niven. When she took over as editor of The Ladder in 1968, she sought to broaden its appeal by dropping the word “lesbian” from the front cover and expanding coverage to include more feminist themes. At this time, the Daughters of Bilitis themselves were in conflict about the organizations direction; the founders wanted a more conservative, assimilationist approach, which conflicted with the younger, more separatist feminists. Grier was solildly in the latter camp, and when the Daughters of Bilitis folded, Grier retained the subscription lists without the knowledge of DOB’s founders, causing an uproar. The Ladder ultimately folded in 1972.

In 1973, Barbara and her partner, Donna McBride, founded Naiad Press, which mostly published Lesbian fiction. Naiad published anything from pulp fiction to poetry, mysteries and romance novels. Barbara’s goal was for lesbians in the midwest to have books to read that reflected who they were. Naiad Press launched the careers of a number of successful lesbian authors, and Naiad also drew from Barbara’s own vast collection of out-of-print works by Renée Vivien and Gertrude Stein. But Naiad became best known for publishing Rosemary Curb and Nancy Manahan’s groundbreaking nonfiction Lesbian Nuns: Breaking Silence. The book, which was banned in Boston and heavily criticized by the Catholic Church, was a collaboration with 51 former and then-current nuns in religious communities.

Barbara and Donna sold the company to Bella Books in 2003 and retired. They also donated their collection of literature to the San Francisco Public Library. It consisted of an entire tractor trailer full of 14,000 books.

Barbara and Donna married in California on September 5, 2008, during the brief period in which same-sex marriages were available. Barbara’s body was cremated, and there will be no funeral services.

The Daily Agenda for Friday, 11/11/11

TODAY’S AGENDA (OURS):
Veterans Day: Nationwide. This will be the first Veterans Day commemoration since the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” which means that this will be the first Veterans Day commemoration in which gay and lesbian servicemembers will be able to participate fully. I know of two cities  in which LGBT veterans will be celebrated as part of the mainstream events:

• San Diego, CA: San Diego LGBT Pride extends its welcome to all LGBT veterans, active duty servicemembers, and their families and supporters to walk with us in the San Diego Veterans Day Parade. The contingent will meet at 10am on the west side of the north Parking lot of the Country Administration Building, 1600 Pacific Hwy, San Diego CA 92101. The Parade will kick off at 11am.
• San Francisco, CA: Today’s 92nd annual Veterans Day Parade will be led by San Francisco Freedom Day Marching Band. “It’s just the right thing to do,” said Wallace Levin, the parade coordinator. “Future generations of Americans will look back on this issue and wonder what all the fuss was about.” The parade begins at 11:00 a.m. at the corner of Market and Montgomery streets, and will go down Market Street to McAllister Street and then continue up McAllister to the reviewing stand across from City Hall.

I’m sure there are others. If you know of any, please let us know in the comments.

Lou Engle at TheCall in Nashville, 2007

TODAY’S AGENDA (THEIRS):
Lou Engle’s TheCall Rally: Detroit, MI. Engle is apparently transfixed by certain numbers when they repeat themselves on the calendar. When July 7, 2007 rolled around, Engle held a TheCall rally in Nashville which he believed would mark the end of a forty year period of rebellion since the “Summer of Love” in 1967. Apparently believe that God conforms himself to the man-made western Gregorian calendar, Engle has managed to read some sort of significance into the date 11/11/11, although what that would be is anybody’s guess. Targeting the substantial Arab-American community of Dearborn, Engle’s goal for TheCall Detroit is the conversion of “millions of Muslims” to Christianity and what he calls the transformation of “urban communities.” And gays. Don’t forget the gays, although it looks like he really has his sights set on Muslims this time. He took care of the gays in 2010 at a rally in Kampala, Uganda, where he lent tactical support for the proposed “Kill the Gays” Bill.

Today’s rally begins tonight at 6:00 p.m. and continues for twenty-four hours until tomorrow night at 6:00 p.m. And Engle has issued some pretty crazy warnings if he doesn’t get a massive turnout in Detroit: ” If we actually have The Call and you don’t sustain prayer ongoing you open a vacuum for demons seven times worse to come in. If black and white can’t move together in prayer and sustain it, forget it let’s not even go there, you get demons seven times worse.” So yeah, there’s that to chew on.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Woman Who Posed As Man 60 Years, Dead: 1907. That was the headline in The Trinidad (Colorado) Advertiser above this news item:

Katherine Vosbaugh, who for sixty years posed as a man, wearing male garb, living the rough life of the pioneers in the Southwest and who even “married” another woman, died yesterday morning at the San Raphael Hospital in this city, where she had been a county charge since he secret of her life was discovered by Dr. T.J. Forham, of this city two years ago.

Born nearly four-score years ago in France of a good family, this remarkable woman donned male garb when but a slip of a girl, came to America and worked as a back clerk, bookkeeper, restauranteur, cook, and sheep herder for over half a century without her sex being known.

In July, two years ago, “Frenchy,” a cook and sheep herder on the Sam Brown ranch, near this city, was taken with pneumonia and brought to the hospital where her secret was revealed. Even then, this strange woman refused to wear skirts. Clad in regulation man’s attire, she has since worked about the hospital and was known by the nickname of “Grandpa.”

Katherine Vosbaugh was left an orphan at the age of twenty years. Her father, a well educated man of considerable means, gave her an excellent business education. At hi death she was an expert accountant and spoke her native tongue, English, German, and Hungarian. Her only motive in assuming the disguise at first seems to have been to enable her more easily to secure employment.

She worked in several cities all over the country before settling at Joplin, Mo., where she worked for fifteen years as a bank clerk, and it was in this city where she married. The name of her “wife” was never learned, but the ceremony seems to have taken place for the purpose of saving the woman’s good name. A few months after the marriage a child was born to the wife, which died after a few months.

Shortly after the death of the child the two women came to this city and opened a restaurant on Commercial street. Here she was known as “Frenchy” and the establishment was one of the most popular restaurants in the Southwest.

Wheat became of “Frenchy’s” wife is not known. She drifted away and her “husband” refused until the time of her death to reveal the woman’s name.

After leaving here the woman secured a position as cook on a big sheep ranch near Trinche ranch. The eccentricities of youth became more pronounced as she grew older and more and more she came to look like a man. For years she lived with men on the ranch, cooking for them, assisting them in the ranch work, and sleeping in the same rooms, but her secret was never suspected.

Two years and four months ago she was stricken with pneumonia, and it was then that her secret was discovered. Since then she failed rapidly in body and mind and her death was due to a general breakdown.

From Jonathan Ned Katz’s Gay/Lesbian Almanac (New York: Harper & Row, 1983), pages 323-324.

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

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

DOMA Repeal Bill Passes Out Of Senate Committee

The Senate Judiciary Committee passed the Respect for Marriage Act (RMA) this morning on a 10-8 vote after two hours of debate. The RMA would not only repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), it would also require the federal government to recognize the marriage of any couple “valid in the state where the marriage was entered into.” This provision would also apply even if the couple lived in a state where the marriage wasn’t recognized.

The Washington Blade reported yesterday that three amendments had been proposed to the bill. But in today’s hearing, ranking minority committee member Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) said, “We know where the votes are,” and declined to offer the amendments.

A similar bill to repeal DOMA has been introduced in the House, but the GOP-controlled chamber is not expected to take up the bill.

Update: Here’s a video of Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) fact-checking Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) on the supposedly unchanging definition of marriage:

Ugandan Gay Advocate’s Alleged Murderer Sentenced To 30 Years

Sidney Nsubuga Enoch (L), convicted and sentenced to 30 years imprisonment for the murder of gay rights advocate David Kato. (Daily Monitor / Johnson Mayamba)

Daily Monitor, Uganda’s largest independent newspaper, reports that Sydney Nsubuga Enoch, who had plead guilty to murdering LGBT advocate David Kato, was sentenced to thirty years in prison. The African blog Behind the Mask also reports.

Justice Joseph Mulangira sentenced Nsubuga, on his own plea of guilty, for the murder of the gay rights activist on January 26, 2011 at his home in Mukono district.

Nsubuga pleaded guilty to both the police and before a magistrate, before he was committed to the High Court to stand trial.

Under Uganda’s judicial systems capital offences such as murder, rape and defilement are only heard by the high court, although suspects are brought before magistrates and charges are read to them as investigations go on.

David Kato

Nsubuga had been arrested in February, just a week after Kato’s death. At the time, many LGBT activists in Uganda expressed doubts about the police investigation leading to the arrest. But in this article at Behind the Mask, Kato’s layer, Francis Onyango, expressed satisfaction with the unusually speedy trial and conviction of Nsubuga, which seems to have caught everyone off guard. “Even the witnesses, lawyers and families of the man never knew he was convicted and sentenced. But this is normal in a criminal trial,” he said.

Meanwhile, the account in Daily Monitor mirrors the story which had been spread by editors of the notorious Rolling Stone tabloid (no relation to the U.S. publication by the same name), which sought to place the blame on the murder of Kato himself. In this latest account from Daily Monitor, “The police issued a statement to the effect that Kato’s killing was no way related to his campaign for gay rights.” LGBT activists in Uganda disputed that assertion.

The suddenness of today’s proceedings before anyone was even notified of the trial and sentencing only added to those doubts. Frank Mugisha, who is in Washington, D.C. to receive the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award today, posted on his Facebook page, “It is disheartening that this trial happened secretly and hurriedly with out any one knowing about it and leaves many questions unanswered.”

Front cover of the Oct 2, 2010 edition of Rolling Stone, featuring a photo of David Kato (left) and Bishop Christopher Senyonjo (right). (Click to enlarge.)

Davik Kato Kisule, the Advocacy and Litigation Officer for Sexual Minorities Uganda, was found in his home on January 26, 2011, after having been beaten in the head with a hammer or blunt object. Residents told police that they saw a man entering David’s house, and then they saw him leaving dressed in the David’s shoes and a jacket that covered part of his face. Later, they became suspicious and went to check on David but found the door locked. After they forced their way in, they found him and rushed him to Mulago Hospital, but he died on the way.

The attack occurred a few months after David’s face appeared on the front page of the Ugandan tabloid Rolling Stone (no relation to the U.S. publication by the same name) under a headline that demanded “Hang Them!” Kato and others sued the paper, seeking damages and a permanent injunction against the paper’s “outing” campaign. Kato and the other plaintiffs prevailed, and Rolling Stone ceased publication shortly after.

The Daily Agenda for Thursday, November 10

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Senate Judiciary Committee to Hold Markup for DOMA Repeal: Washington, D.C. The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold an Executive Business Meeting this morning to go over, among other things, Senate Bill 598, known as the Respect for Marriage Act, which would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act.  This bill was scheduled to be marked up last week, but Republicans on the panel forced a delay for a week. The Washington Blade has obtained copies of three proposed  amendments:

Of the three amendments, only one is germane: a measure that would strike Section 2 of the Respect for Marriage Act. That portion of the bill enables federal benefits to flow to married gay couples even if they live in states that don’t recognize marriage equality. Under the bill as it currently stands, a couple could marry in a state such as New York, where same-sex marriage is legal and still receive federal benefits if they move to a state such as Michigan, which doesn’t recognize same-sex marriage. The other two have no relevance to the Respect for Marriage Act, but still can be offered under Senate rules, which allow non-germane amendments to legislation.

The committee, chaired by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) will meet at 10:00 a.m. in Hart Senate Office Building, room 216, and will be webcast here. The House version of the Respect for Marriage Act has 128 co-sponsors, but because the House is under Republican control, it is extremely unlikely it will take action on the bill.

Frank Mugisha to Receive the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award: Washington, D.C. Ugandan LGBT advocate Frank Mugisha will be presented the prestigious human rights award in a ceremony at the Kennedy Caucus Room of the Russell Senate Office Building. The award will be presented by Kennedy’s widow, Ethel Kennedy, and Senator John Kerry, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

United States Conference on AIDS: Chicago, IL. Billed as the largest AIDS-related gathering in the U.S., the conference organized by the National Minority AIDS Council will kick off today, bringing together over 3,000 workers, including case managers, physicians, public health workers, advocates, people living with HIV/AIDS, and policy makers, to build national support networks, exchange the latest information and learn cutting-edge tools to address the challenges of HIV/AIDS. The three day conference begins today at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel and Towers.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
Phyllis Lyon: 1924. The Oklahoma native earned a degree in journalism from the University of California at Berkeley in 1946 and worked as a reporter for a California paper before moving to Seattle to work at a magazine in 1950. That’s where she met the love of her life, Del Martin. They became a couple in 1953 when they moved to San Francisco together. “We really only had problems our first year together,” she later told The Washington Post. “Del would leave her shoes in the middle of the room, and I’d throw them out the window.” Del responded “You’d have an argument with me and try to storm out the door. I had to teach you to fight back.” Their life together was all about fighting back. In 1955 Phyllis and Del, along with six other women, formed the Daughters of Bilitis, the first national lesbian organization in the U.S. Phyllis was the first editor of the DOB’s groundbreaking newsletter, The Ladder from 1956 to 1960, when Del took over. Pseudonyms were common then, and Phillis edited The Ladder as “Ann Ferguson” for the first few months, but she dropped it to encourage their readers not to hide. By October 1957, they had 400 subscribers across the country. In 1964, they helped found the Council on Religion and the Homosexual, bringing together national religious leaders and gay and lesbian activists for a national discussion of gay rights. Phyllis was also the first open lesbian to serve on the board of the National Organization for Women in 1973. Phyllis and Del were also active in San Francisco’s Alice B. Toklas Democratic Club.

On February 12, 2004, Phyllis and Del married for the first time when San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom ordered that marriage licenses be granted to same-sex couples. That marriage lasted until August 12, but not because the couple split up. That was when the California Supreme Court voided several thousand marriage licenses given to same-sex couples. Del and Phyllis were deeply dissapointed. “Del is 83 years old and I am 79,” she said. “After being together for more than 50 years, it is a terrible blow to have the rights and protections of marriage taken away from us. At our age, we do not have the luxury of time.”

But they had the luxury of just enough time. They were married again on June 16, 2008 after the California Supreme Court ruled that prohibiting same-sex marriage was against the state constitution. Del and Phyllis were given the honor of being the first same-sex couple to be married, and they wore the same outfits in which they were first married in 2004. Del passed away two months later, on August 27, 2008.

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

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

French Protest American Ex-Gay Program in Tolouse

Organizers of Rainbow Toulouse had hoped that maybe a hundred people at the most might to show up in front of a small Evangelical church to protest a planned ex-gay seminar. Instead, they were pleasantly surprised to see between 200 and 300 protesters turning out. Michel Megnin, secretary of Rainbow Toulouse, called the showing “the most important LGBT gathering in Toulouse aside from Gay Pride.” Protesters denounced the ministry, saying “we are not sick.” Another sardonically noted the price of an ex-gay seminar that was scheduled for last weekend and said,  “At €330 (US$400), I am too poor to become straight.”

The scheduled seminar, scheduled for last weekend, is affiliated with Andrew Comiskey’s Living Waters program in the U.S.  Comiskey, a former president of Exodus International, has been aggressively expanding his Desert Stream Ministries and its Living Waters program in Canada and Europe. Former ex-gay leader Vonnie Pits issued an apology for her role in a Living Waters-based program she set up in New South Wales, Australia. Last year, Comiskey posted an admission on his blog that a staffer at DSM had sexually abused at least one teenager under their care. But instead of publicly apologizing for the appalling transgression or expressing anguish over the teen’s abuse, he talked about his own anguish over having been interrogated by police and liability insurers, and he thanked his god that “God spared us” from the humiliation of their story appearing in the newspapers. In 2005, DSM moved to Kansas City where Comiskey announcedhe was partnering with Dominionist theologian Mike Bickle (organizer of Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s crusade in Houston) and the International House of Prayer. DSM  reportedly uses “extreme methods that involve forms of exorcism (deliverance/healing prayer) and rely on teachings that believe that people become gay through demonic influences and the sins of ancestors.”  

You can see a video testimony of an ex-gay survivor of Living Waters here.

Armenian “Bad Romance”

Responding to today’s Daily Agenda, a friend of mine sent me this video. He says it begins with a traditional Armenian dirge accompanied by a duduk, a traditional wind instrument, for about the first minute and forty-five seconds. And then suddenly….

I have a feeling there are a million of these out there.

Gay, Pro-Gay Candidates Win Big

Yesterday was a very good day for gay and -pro-gay candidates throughout the country. Here is a wrap-up. Please let me know what else is out there in the comments.

NOM Loses Big: Same-sex marriage remains secure in Iowa as Liz Mathis won big, 56-44%, over her NOM-backed opponent, Cindy Golding, in a special election for the Iowa state Senate. The National Organization for Marriage threw about $40,000 toward their failed attempt to elect Golding by making same-sex marriage an issue in the race. But soon after it was clear Golding lost, NOM’s cultural director Thomas Peters tweeted: “That’s what happens when a state GOP nominates a weak candidate.” Wow. Talk about your fair weather friends.

Virginia’s First: Adam Ebbin became the first openly gay state senator in Virginia after defeating his Republican challenger by a margin of 64-35%. His district, which is solidly Democratic, includes parts of Alexandria, Arlington, and Fairfax counties.

First Openly Gay, African-American Republican Mayor: At least that’s what we think happened when Bruce Harris was elected mayor of Chatham Borough, New Jersey.

Charlotte’s First: LaWana Mayfield became the first openly gay city council member as part of a Democratic landslide in North Carolina’s largest city. North Carolina, which will see a marriage amendment on the ballot next year, saw a number of other LGBT victories:

• Chapel Hill Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt won re-election with 78% of the vote.
• Lee Storrow, a gay 22-year-old UNC grad won his race for a seat on the Chapel Hill city council.
• Carrboro incumbent Alderwoman Lydia Lavelle was re-elected to another term for city council.

Cincinnati’s First: Chis Seelbach became the first openly gay city council member. He worked in 2004 to help defeat Article XII in the city charter which banned anti-discrimination ordinances for gay people.

Indianapolis’s First: Zach Adamson became the first openly gay city council member. S

Missoula’s First: Caitlin Copple became the first openly gay city council member. She defeated one of only two city council members who voted against the city’s anti-discrimination ordinance in 2010, which made Missoula the first city in Montana to provide discrimination protections in housing and employment regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.

Youngest Mayor: Alex Morse, 22, beat incumbent mayor Mary Pluta in Holyoke, Massachusetts, to become the nation’s youngest mayor.

Houston Re-elects: Mayor Annise Parker was re-elected with more than 50% of the vote, a margin which allows her to avoid a run-off. Mike Laster also became the first openly gay member of Houston’s city council.

Traverse City Supports Anti-Discrimination Ordinance: Voters in Traverse City, Michigan voted by a 2-to-1 margin to keep an anti-discrimination ordinance.  The vote came more than a year after Traverse City adopted the ordinance to prevent discrimination against gays in employment, housing and other areas. Opponents of the measure collected signatures to place a referendum for repeal on the ballot.

And on a final note, there were a number of gains in school board elections around the country which I didn’t cover, but I would like to point one out anyway: Daniel Hernandez, Jr., Rep. Gabrielle Gifford’s openly gay intern, was elected to as seat on the board of the Sunnyside Unified School District in Tuscon’s south side. Hernandez was one of the recognized heros during the January shooting at a Northwest side Safeway which killed  six and critically injured Rep. Giffords. And on a more personal note, I couldn’t be happier about the stunning news that Arizona Senate President Russell Pearce, architect of infamous anti-immigrant S.B. 1070 which was later found unconstitutional, was ousted by voters in favor of a political newcomer in Mesa.

The Daily Agenda for Wednesday, November 9

TODAY’S AGENDA:
My apologies for not posting anything yesterday except for yesterday’s agenda. I’ve been extremely busy. I’ve got a lot of things in the pipeline for BTB, but they are time consuming. Which means they’ll be done and published when they’re done.

And as for today’s agenda, this is one of those days where I don’t have any notifications of anything happening, nor do I have any historical items or birthdays to write about. But I do have this from Domenick Scudera, describing what a typical day in his totally gay lifestyle looks like:

7:00 a.m. I wake up, and just as I have done every morning since puberty, I choose to be gay today. This will come as a great relief to my gay, homosexual, male lover who lies beside me. Because being gay is a choice, our relationship is a gamble day to day. Even though we have both chosen to remain gay and to be together every day for the past 16 years, we never take anything for granted. One of us just might throw in the towel one day and give up the lifestyle.

7:30 a.m. I take a gay shower and let the gay water rinse off my gay body.

8:00 a.m. I have a gay breakfast of cereal with milk, and a good, strong, gay cup of coffee. I am fortified for another day of ruining the fabric of American society.

That doesn’t hold your interest? Well how about this video that Rob Tisinai found: a bunch of old Chinese people singing Lady Ga Ga’s “Bad Romance”?

You think you have anything better? Tell us about it in the comments.

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

The Daily Agenda for Tuesday, November 8

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Secretary of State Clinton to Deliver Remarks on Global HIV/AIDS Epidemic: Bethesda, MD. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will deliver remarks this morning at the National Institutes of Health on the fight against the global HIV/AIDS epidemic in light of recent scientific advances. Her talk is titled, “A vision for the next steps in the fight against HIV/AIDS,” and will be live-streamed on the State Department web site beginning at 11:00 a.m. EST.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Police Woman “Flowers of Evil” Episode Airs: 1974. When NBC’s hour-long action drama Police Woman starring Angie Dickinson began airing in 1974, was so popular that even its reruns in the spring and summer of 1975 ranked number one in the Nielsen ratings, making it the first successful police drama to feature a woman in the starring role. Dickinson’s unabashed sex appeal, undoubtedly, played a far greater role in its success than the plot lines themselves. One particularly odious episode, “Flowers of Evil,” had Dickinson’s character, Sgt. Pepper Anderson, investigating a trio of lesbians who run a retirement home where they murdered and robbed their elderly residents. Positive portrayals — indeed, any portrayal — of gays and lesbians were extraordinarily rare, which made this episode particularly egregious.

To add insult to injury, the Police Woman episode aired one month to the day after a similarly negative plot line appeared on ABC’s Marcus Welby, M.D., in which a child molester was portrayed as gay. Police Woman’s “Flowers of Evil” was originally scheduled to air on October 25, but after the National Gay Rights Task Force organized national protests which led some advertisers to pull their commercials, NBC pulled the episode for re-editing. But with the filming wrapped up, the edits were mostly cosmetic. After the episode aired on November 8, TV Guide called it “the single most homophobic show to date.” A week later, a group known as Lesbian Feminist Liberation occupied NBC’s Standards and Practices office overnight, unfurled a banner from an office window reading “Lesbians Protest NBC.” Advocates continued to negotiate with NBC for several more months, and NBC finally agreed in 1975 to not rebroadcast the episode during re-runs and to withhold it from syndication. The “Flowers of Evil” episode re-appeared again, but only after thirty years had passed, in the Season 1 DVD box set where in today’s context it can be safely viewed as a historic and cultural artifact.

Harvey Milk taking the oath of office.

Harvey Milk Elected to San Francisco Board of Supervisors: 1977. Newspapers across American carried this two-paragraph news item a few days after election day:

Homosexual Elected to Supervisors’ Board

San Francisco (AP) — Harvey Milk Tuesday became the first avowed homosexual to be elected to the city’s board of supervisors, some 25 years afte he was discharged by the navy when it learned he was gay. Mr. Milk, 47, a camera store owner, said Wednesday, “I’m a symbol of hope for gays and all minorities. My election, against all the odds, shows that the system can work and that there is hope.”

Mr Milk defeated a field of 17 candidates which included several other gays and former San Francisco 49ers football player Bob St. Clair.

This was Milk’s third run for Supervisor. He lost in 1973 and 1975 when all six Supervisor seats were elected in city-wide at-large elections where the top six vote getters joined the board. He also ran for the State Assembly in 1976, but lost in a close race. In 1977, San Francisco switched to single-member districts, and Milk won a seat on the Board of Supervisors on his third try.

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

And feel free to consider this your open thread for the day. What’s happening in your world?

UK lifts blood ban

As in the United States and much of the world, in the 1980’s the United Kingdom implemented a ban on blood donations by gay men. The UK Department of Health has now revised the ban to reflect the changes in blood analysis and knowledge about HIV that have occurred since that time. (herald)

.. following a review by the Advisory Committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs (Sabto), men who have not had homosexual sex within a year will be able to donate if they meet certain other criteria. The move will be implemented in England, Scotland and Wales.

Men who have had anal or oral sex with another man in the past 12 months, with or without a condom, will still not be eligible to donate blood, the DoH said. They said this was to reduce the risk of infections being missed by testing and then being passed on to a patient.

Health officials agree that this policy change will not measurably increase risk of HIV contaminated blood.

However, over the objections of the Red Cross and other health officials, the United States continues to base its blood donation policies on fear and prejudice rather than science.