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 lobbyJune 8th, 2013
TODAY’S AGENDA:
Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Albany, NY; Anchorage, AK; Athens, Greece; Birmingham, AL; Blackpool, UK; Boston, MA; Brooklyn, NY; Des Moines, IA; Detroit, MI; Edmonton, AB; El Paso, TX; Indianapolis, IN; Innsbruck, Austria; Karlsruge, Germany; Key West, FL; Long Island (Huntington), NY; Los Angeles, CA; Ljubljana, Slovenia; Milwaukee, WI; Oxford, UK; Philadelphia, PA; Shanghai China; Söderhamn, Sweden; Split, Croatia; Spokane, WA; Turin, Italy; Washington, DC; Zurich, Switzerland.
Other Celebrations This Weekend: Razzle Dazzle Dallas, Dallas, TX; Connecticut Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, Hartford, CT; Sierra Stampede, Rio Linda, CA; AIDS Lifecycle, San Francisco to Los Angeles, CA (Sponsor BTB’s Rob Tisinai here!); Tel Aviv LGBT International Film Festival, Tel Aviv, Israel.
Gov. Reubin Askew
TODAY IN HISTORY:
Florida Bans Gay Marriage and Adoption: 1977. Florida’s gay community took a triple whammy today. On the very day after Miami voters overwhelmingly sided with Anita Bryant to rescind that county’s anti-discrimination ordinance, Governor Reuben Askew (D) signed into law two anti-gay measures. The first one banned same-sex marriage and the second one banned gay adults from adopting. State Sen. Curtis Peterson, (D-Eaton Park) sponsored the measures, and said that the new laws tell homosexuals, “We are tired of you and wish you would go back in the closet.” He continued, “The problem in Florida is that homosexuals are surfacing to such an extent that they are infringing on average, normal people who have a few rights, too.” The bills sailed through the legislature with little opposition and became effective immediately upon Askew’s signing.
In 2008, Florida voters made same-sex marriage even more illegaler when they passed Amendment 2. In 2010, a Florida appeals court upheld a lower court ruling that found the adoption ban unconstitutional.
First Gay Days at Disney World: 1991. It started as a very modest idea: a time for about 3,000 gays and lesbians in central Florida to enjoy a day at Orlando’s top attraction — and to become more visible. “Twenty years ago, there were hardly any visible portrayals of our community other than the pride parades,” Chris Alexander-Manley, president of Gay Days Inc., told Time in 2010. He was also one of the volunteers who helped organize the first event in 1991. He said, that the media tended to show “the drag queens and the extremes, the leather people, but that’s only a small part of the overall community.” To increase their visibility, gay attendees wore read shirts in the park. And it was that very visibility which caught the attention of anti-gay activists. The Southern Baptist Convention launched a boycott of all things Disney, despite the fact that Disney never sanctioned the event. Disney always instructed their employees to treat the first Saturday of June just like any other Saturday, which put the SBC in an odd position of, I guess, demanding that Disney ban red shirts or something.
Gay Days at Disney World has grown from that modest 3,000 assemblage to an estimated 150,000 participants in recent years. And with that growth the nature of the event has changed somewhat. There are still family events taking place catering to LGBT families, but they occur alongside pool parties, dance raves and other circuit party-style activities of a more specifically adult orientation. But within the confines of the park itself, it’s all about Mickey Mouse and Magic Mountain and getting the kids in line for the spinning teacups. And despite ongoing grumbling from social conservatives — Disney typically issues refunds to families offended by the sight of red shirts — Gay Days continues to appeal to the kids in all of us.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Peter Jepson-Young: 1957. The Vancouver, BC doctor was known to millions across Canada simply as Dr. Peter, host of a regular segment on the CBC’s news broadcast called The Dr. Peter Diaries. That platform made Dr. Peter the country’s best-known educator for AIDS and HIV awareness. Dr. Peter’s approach was uniquely personal: he documented, on his own program, his experiences both as a doctor and as a person with AIDS. He began the segment in 1990, after he was unable to continue his medical practice because of his deteriorating health. His 111 episodes, which continued until a few weeks before he died in November 1992. He brought a sense of humor to his weekly video diaries, and his frank discussion of the disease helped to break down stereotypes and stigma surrounding the disease. Shortly before he died, Dr. Peter established the Dr. Peter AIDS Foundation to provide care for people with HIV/AIDS.
In 1993, the CBC and HBO jointly produced a 45-minute documentary, The Broadcast Tapes of Dr. Peter, which consisted of excerpts from his video diary. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. Today, all 111 episodes are available on the CBC’s website.
Mary Bonauto: 1961. If you’re in a state where you’re allowed to marry, or if you’re in a state where you can get civilunionized, or even if you’re in a state where they just thinking about letting you get married or civilly united, then you have Mary Bonauto to thank. The civil rights attorney, lauded as “our Thurgood Marshal,” has been working with the Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) since 1990, playing key roles in methodically building the legal foundation through a series of court cases which eventually opened the doors, at least part way, to marriage equality for same-sex couples. As Roberta Kaplan told The New York Times in March 2013, “No gay person in this country would be married without Mary Bonauto.”
Bonauto began her work at GLAD by litigating several employment discrimination, custody and free speech cases throughout New England. Seven years later, she was co-counselor for three Vermont couples seeking a marriage license. The goal was full marriage, but at that time it was still difficult to make a legal case. Instead, Baker v. Vermont compelled the Vermont legislature to enact the nation’s first civil union law in 2000. The following year, Bonauto took another crack at marriage as lead counsel for Goodridge v. Department of Public Health. That led to the landmark 2003 decision by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court which led the Bay State to become the first in the nation in marriage equality. She was also co-counsel in the Connecticut court case which prompted that state legislature to enact a civil union law.
Bonauto now has her sights set on the Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act as lead counsel for Gill v. Office of Personnel Management, one of five federal cases challenging DOMA’s constitutionality. In the Gill case, the Federal District Court held that DOMA violates the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection clause, and the First Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision. The case is now pending at the U.S. Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments for a different DOMA challenge in March and is expected to issue its ruling sometime this month.
Bonauto is currently GLAD’s Civil Rights Project Director. She lives in Portland, Maine with her wife and their twin daughters.
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Jim Hlavac
June 9th, 2013
In 1977 I had been out of high school for a year and visiting my grandparents and other relatives in Florida — and look, the Democrats were 100% against me — while my family was 100% Republican and rather loving to me. Maybe this is why I never could quite go with the theory that the Democrats were “for” me — seems they were not. Meanwhile, Republicans I knew were for me. So, I developed political positions based not on which party was gay anything — but on every other issue. Of course, even back then I recommended: don’t tie gayness to any political party — we are not a political issue — but something far deeper. Something to keep in mind today.
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