Box Turtle Bulletin

Will you still need me, will you still heed me, when you’re sixty-four?*

In recent months we’ve seen several polls showing a majority of Americans now support marriage equality (plus one from NOM, less favorable, that merely highlights their own polling desperation).

These polls always display amazing support from young voters. Our opponents dismiss that: People get more conservative as they get older. They’ll change their minds. They’ll come to our side.

Many people do get more conservative as they age. Does that mean we’ll lose them? I’ve got two replies:

1. No.
2. It doesn’t matter.

I dove into the ABC/Washington Post poll, which compares results from March 2011 and October 2005 and breaks down the data by age.  It’s pretty damn interesting. First, let’s deal with…

It doesn’t matter.

Support for marriage equality has increased in every age group from 2005 to 2011.

Now, this doesn’t tell us whether we’re losing people as they age.  When you compare, say 30-39-year-olds in 2005 and 2011, you’re not comparing the same demographic group.  The older half of 2005’s 30-39ers aged up into the 40-49 group by 2011, and were replaced by 2005’s older 20-29ers.

But it doesn’t matter. Even if we were losing some individuals as they age, we’re still making inroads into every age group.  According to ABC/WP’s data, we’ve gone deep enough to gain a majority across the population, with momentum on our side.

Still, I would like to know what’s happening in people’s heads as they get older.  Are we losing them?  I can’t be sure, but I think the answer is…

No.

I wish this data were broken into five-year cohorts  (30-34, 35-39, 40-44, etc.).  That would better match the five-and-a-half-year period between surveys:  2005’s 30-34-year-olds would become 2011’s 35-39ers, and we could see how they had changed.

But we’re stuck with these ten-year cohorts. That means about half of 2005’s 30-39ers have aged into 2011’s 40-49er group. Let’s make the best of it and compare those numbers.

This chart compares each 2005 cohort with its aged-up 2011 counterpart.

That’s pretty cool. Except for the oldest respondents, each group in 2011 was more supportive than its younger neighbor in 2005. (And that oldest group spans more years than any other, possibly making  it less susceptible to change.)  So in other words:

For the most part, older people are more supportive of marriage equality in 2011 than younger people were in 2005.

Of course, this on the sloppy side, the result of wrestling with whatever data’s available.  To do this right, we’d want a long-term longitudinal survey, asking a large sample of the same people year after year, preferably with the marriage equality question buried among a bunch of other issues covered by the survey.

That being said, I’d still like to point out this startling result:

Do you see that?

50-64-year-olds today aren’t just more supportive than 50-64-year-olds five years ago…

…or 40-49-year-olds five years ago…

…but are even more supportive than 30-39-year-olds five years ago!

That’s amazing. And it makes it hard to believe we’re losing people as they age. They may get more conservative (I don’t have data on that) but they’re not abandoning us. In fact, they’re joining us. That makes sense. Every year you live is another year you might meet more real, live gay people, decent folk to knock out the demonizing anti-gay stereotypes most of us grew up with.

Lord, I’d love more data. If anyone has other surveys conducted over time and broken down by age, please send them to me.

One last note.

Some people look at these surveys and say, We just have to wait for the bigots to die. Ugh. A gay commenter on another blog made an angry point along the lines of, I’ve been fighting for equality since the 60s. When you’re waiting for the older generation to die, you’re waiting for me to die. I fought too hard for too long — and you’re reaping too many benefits — for me to put up with that bullshit.

We don’t have to wait for anyone to die. And we don’t have to dismiss any generation as bigots. That’s what these numbers tell us. We can reach every age group. We can fight for everyone’s equality, no matter how old they are, no matter how old we are, and we can do it today.

*With deepest apologies to Lennon/McCartney.

The Daily Agenda for Thursday, July 14

TODAY’S AGENDA:

AIDS Walks This Weekend: San Francisco, CA.

Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Budapest, Hungary; Charlotte, NC (Black Pride); Colorado Springs, CO; Kitsap, WA; Peel, ON; Portland, OR (Latino Pride); Reading, PA; Rochester, MN; Rochester, NY; San Diego, CA; and Sheffield, UK.

And Also: Bear Week, Provincetown, MA.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Arthur Laurents: 1917. The three-time Tony Award winning playwright, director and screenwriter started out by writing scripts for radio shows and training films for the U.S. Army during World War II. One photograph of GIs in the South Pacific jungle inspired him to write Home of the Brave about anti-Semitism in the military. The play opened on Broadway in 1945 and ran for sixty nine performances. (When the play was adapted for the 1949 film, the topic switched from anti-Semitic to anti-black bigotry.) That first run wasn’t a long one, but its controversial subject would come back to haunt him later when he was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee and was placed on the infamous entertainment blacklist during the McCarthy red scare.

His tenure on the list was relatively brief, and by the mid-1050s, Laurents was in Broadway and Hollywood’s good graces again. Good thing, because he went on to write West Side Story and Gypsy, and the script for Alfred Hitchcock’s The Rope. He also wrote the scripts for the films The Way We Were and The Turning Point, and directed the 1983 stage production of  La Cage Aux Folles.  Laurents died just this past May in New York of pneumonia at the age of 93. His partner of more than fifty years, Tom Hatcher, had preceded him in 2006. In honor of Laurents’s career, the lights on Broadway were dimmed at 8:00 p.m. on May 6, 2011.

My Mom: 1940. Happy Birthday Mom!

Jane Lynch: 1960. Nobody does bitter sarcasm like Jane Lynch. Since 2009, she has played the role of Sue Sylvester on Glee, where her Emmy- and a Golden Globe-winning performance is the only rational reason why anyone would want to watch Glee (in my opinion at least). She has also appeared in The 40-Year-Old Virgin and has a recurring role in The L Word. In 2010, Lynch married clinical psychologist Dr. Laura Embry in Sunderland Massachusetts. They had met at a gala for the National Center for Lesbian Rights. You can see their video for Dan Savage’s It Gets Better project 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).

The curse of the anti-gay pledge

There is something truly delightful in watching the Family Leader’s anti-gay pledge – which was supposed to pressure Republican candidates into a commitment to fight the civil equality promised by the Fourteenth Amendment – go up in flames.

After it was discovered that Bob Vander Plaats had thrown in a statement that suggested that African-Americans were better off when white people owned them and after Michelle Bachmann was put in the unenviable position of having to explain to the media that, yes, she does think slavery is a bad thing, no one else wants to have anything to do with this pledge.

Mitt Romney rejected the pledge, calling it “undignified and inappropriate for a presidential campaign”, Newt Gingrich found too many unspecified problems (divorce, perhaps?), and even those who are slogging hardest to get the theocrat vote, Tim Pawlenty and Herman Cain, couldn’t distance themselves fast enough.

And as for Bachmann, this error combined with her husband’s wacky ex-gay counseling may prove just too much even for social conservatives who have a very high tolerance for crazy.

The social obligations of inclusion

“Fröken Salander, if I rescind your declaration of incompetence, that will mean that you have exactly the same rights as all other citizens. It also means that you have the same obligations. It is therefore your duty to manage your finances, pay taxes, obey the law, and assist the police in investigations of serious crimes. So I am summoning you to be questioned like any other citizen who has information that might be vital to an investigation.”

– The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, Stieg Larsson

The funny thing about rights is that they come with obligations. The right to vote, to choose the people who will make the laws that effect your lives, also has the obligation that you learn the issues, select a candidate and show up on a Tuesday in November to pull the lever. The right to plead your defense against governmental accusations to a panel of people just like you also comes with the excruciatingly irritating necessity to occasionally be one of the jurors on that panel.

Like Salander, the gay community has been in many ways been declared incompetent and childlike. Religious leaders have judged us broken, unaware of what is best for us, and in need to have others make decisions on our behalf. Convinced that our lives demonstrate that we are incapable of choosing what is best for us, they tell us what our choices should be: celibacy, therapy, repentance, or even just manning up and doing what their doctrines say is right.

And politicians have readily agreed, separating from us the rights, responsibilities and trappings of adulthood. Marriage is for responsible adults. Children are for responsible adults. We are not proper role models and should not be allowed employment that would give us respect in the eyes of children. Citizenship is for capable adults, and gay people have been deemed incapable of living up to the full rights of citizenship.

Even employers made hiring and advancement decisions based on what they believed that our family structure says about our maturity. A family man with a mortgage is presumed to be a more stable reliable employee than a single man who might party all night and blow off work. And a woman incapable of finding herself a good husband may not be well suited for a job which requires managing abilities. A presentable mate at the company social gatherings has always been a factor in advancement, and gay men and women – being “single” by definition – were at a disadvantage.

Knowing these presumptions to be false, for the past four decades we have fought for our rights as an equal citizen, one that need no overseer or patronizing decision maker, one that can choose what doctrines to believe and capable of social contributions equal to others.

And we have plead our case well and our evidence has been compelling.

Employers have come to see the gay man in the ten year relationship as being more similar to a married man than to a playboy. Many churches have found a lesbian parishioner to be no less spiritual mature than any worshiper and equally capable of pastoral care. Friends, family, coworkers and neighbors have discovered that fears about our inability to live a healthy, happy, balanced and responsible life were unfounded.

And finally, politicians have looked into their hearts and found that if you set aside bias (and reelection goals), gay men and women are entitled to the role of full and equal citizen promised to them by their constitutional inheritance.

So bit by bit, state by state, the doctrines, the policies, and the laws that have declared us incompetent are being changed.

But this is not Christmas morning and Santa Claus. And we are now having to face the realization that with the rights of citizenship come the responsibilities. And with full inclusion into society comes social obligation and expectation.

Those who malign us are not entirely baseless in their accusations. Our community has at times given itself license for childish excess and antisocial behavior. Being denied responsibility, we have at times behaved irresponsibly. Being ostracized, we have responded with messages and images designed to shock and offend. And being victims of social institutions, we have given ourselves permission to thwart social protocol and turn decorum on its head.

But as we gain responsibility and self-determination, as ostracization fades and social institutions expand to include us, such behavior no longer has an excuse. As we become full members of society, we now have to consider what impact our choices have on society.

And while much of the above addresses the collective mature response of a community, this change is also experienced on the individual level. As those who know us have come to believe us when we say that we are no different from our brothers and sisters, they have placed on us the same expectations and social obligations as our brothers and sisters.

And this has not been, nor will it continue to be, an easy transition. (Chicago Tribune)

As New York stood poised to become the latest state to legalize same-sex marriage, Michael Koresky felt the pressure deepen from friends and family eager to see him and his boyfriend of six years tie the knot.

But Koresky and his partner, who live in Brooklyn, aren’t sure wedding bells are in the cards. Amid exultant celebrations of marriage equality, they’ve found themselves in the awkward position of coming out of the we’re-not-sure-we-want-to-get-married closet.
…
They’re reluctant to spend thousands of dollars on a wedding just because it’s expected, and are hesitant to elope for fear loved ones would be disappointed they weren’t included.

The men already exchanged rings as a sign of their commitment to one another, so they question the purpose of a wedding.

“What would it mean?” Koresky said. “Who is it for?”

Koresky is not alone in resenting family pressures to conform. While valuing the right to marry, some also maintain a firm grip on their right not to marry and see social pressures as intrusive. What right has anyone else to tell them how their relationship should be structured? Who is the wedding really for? What business is it of theirs anyway?

And it is not just parental demands for a string quartet and open bar that we will encounter. Employers are taking steps to pressure employees to tie the knot. (NYTimes)

Now that same-sex marriage has been legalized in New York, at least a few large companies are requiring their employees to tie the knot if they want their partners to qualify for health insurance.

Corning, I.B.M. and Raytheon all provide domestic partner benefits to employees with same-sex partners in states where they cannot marry. But now that they can legally wed in New York, five other states and the District of Columbia, they will be required to do so if they want their partner to be covered for a routine checkup or a root canal.

But some of the same activists who have led the call for legal marriage equality have objected to marriage equality in the workplace. “That isn’t fair, marriage is still a complicated legal decision,” they insist. And, besides, what business is it of theirs anyway. Why should benefits be tied to a marriage license?

But society has a vested interest in relationship stability. Korelsky’s parents have a good reason to wish him encumbered with legal obligations to the person that he has introduced into their lives and whom they have grown to love. Raytheon has a good reason to wish that asset entanglement gives a sales manager added incentive to work out problems and keep the relationship stable. And your tax-paying neighbors have good reason to wish that you have legal as well as emotional obligations should one of you require care.

With our new inclusion into society as equal members, we will continue to face the social obligations and expectations that other members share. Aunt Thelma will wonder (in a voice louder than she realizes) why you haven’t settled down yet. Mom will discreetly slip Bride Magazine into your bag. Your boss will not-quite-jokingly inquire when you’re going make an honest woman out of her. And all of them will expect you to be as shocked as they are by some of the more free-spirited elements of our community.

Change is coming. But I don’t think that it is change we need to fear. And much of it is occurring organically anyway.

Couples with babies already are finding that Saturday night out on the town is often more hassle than it’s worth. Those with children are abandoning places that they feel are not child-friendly, opting instead for inclusive family settings. And the option to marry is already encouraging gay men and women to ask themselves whether the new cute thing is worth the investment of time and effort – and whether they too can withstand a candid evaluation.

Further, none of this suggests that we must readily acquiesce to every demand and be assimilated to the point of extinguishing our culture or uniqueness. As we enter society as equal but openly gay, we bring not just ourselves, but also our traditions, our perspectives, and our wisdom.

Like all times when societies have merged people with different histories and traditions, some of the presumptions of the current culture will fall away to be replaced by what we have to share. I doubt that it will be as drastic as the abandonment of sexual exclusivity that Dan Savage recommends, but perhaps relationship power structures or role negotiation and dispute resolution will be effected by our experiences. Perhaps the gender assumptions which now have a tenuous hold will lose grip completely. And perhaps there will be aspects and attributes of same-sex marriage that never are quite identical to those of opposite-sex marriages, and that too is fine. We will have to wait and see.

This is going to be an exciting time, but it will not be easy.

Some in our community will be angry at the traitorous sellouts to heterosexist hegemony that dare question their individuality. Some will judge the world to be “judgmental” for daring to criticize their excess. Others will sadly reminisce about the days in which social rejection created a cohesive vibrant community of proud self-reliant outsiders. And perhaps all of us will know that something has been lost.

Nor will the new model be functional for all. Some will find that the expectations and demands of social inclusion are based on the assumption of opportunities that time will never bring again. Some of us have grown too independent, too self-reliant, too old and set in our ways to ever have any realistic expectation of marriage and children. And having grown accustomed to being outside, and having built a life accordingly, assimilation will simply never be a reality. And some, having found ways to make alternative structures functionally provide for their needs, may find life even more difficult as sympathies fade for counter-culture or non-conformist lifestyles.

But while growing up is a difficult and painful process, it is time that we individually and collectively rise to the challenge and take our place as full adult citizens of our community, family, and nation. Having proven ourselves worthy to be treated as adults, we owe it to ourselves to hold ourselves to that standard.

California Board Accepts Credits From NARTH for Licensing Renewal

Licensed therapists need to demonstrate that they are staying current in their field through the accumulation of Continuing Education credits. A few earn these credits by taking additional coursework, but most earn them by attending lectures, seminars and workshops at conferences and conventions put on by a large number of organizations.

California-licensed mental health professionals can earn Continuing Education credits from the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), according to a CE provider list dated May 1 (PDF: 1MB/87 pages) from the California Board of Behavioral Sciences (Number 1240, see page 15). You will recall that George Rekers sat on NARTH’s Scientific Advisory Board as well as its Board of Directors. In June 1, we exposed Rekers’s fraudulent reporting of his most “successful” gay cure, that of five-year-old Kirk Murphy who committed suicide at the age of thirty-eight. Every major mental health and medical organization has condemned ex-gay therapy, yet NARTH’s accreditation for providing CU credits provides cover for therapists who try to cure that which is not an illness.

The Continuing Education Coordinator for the CBBS can be contacted at Patricia.Fay@dca.ca.gov. You can also contact Executive Officer Kim Madsen and Assistant Executive Officer Tracy Rhine at:

Board of Behavioral Sciences
1625 N Market Blvd., Suite S-200
Sacramento, CA 95834
Phone: (916) 574-7830
Fax: (916) 574-8625

[via Towleroad]

The Daily Agenda for Wednesday, July 13

TODAY’S AGENDA:
It’s hump day! Get ready for the weekend.

AIDS Walks This Weekend: San Francisco, CA.

Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Budapest, Hungary; Charlotte, NC (Black Pride); Colorado Springs, CO; Kitsap, WA; Peel, ON; Portland, OR (Latino Pride); Reading, PA; Rochester, MN; Rochester, NY; San Diego, CA; and Sheffield, UK.

And Also: Bear Week, Provincetown, MA.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Gay Pub Raided in London: 1810. From The Times of London: “The existence of a Club, or Society, for the purpose so detestable and repugnant to the common feelings of our nature, that by no word can it be described without committing an outrage upon decency, has for some time been suspected by the Magistrates of Bow-street; who cautiously concealing the odious secret, abstained from taking any steps on the information they had received, until an opportunity should offer of surprising the whole gang. About 11 o’clock last Sunday evening, three separate parties of the patrole, attended by constables, were detached from Bow-street on this service. … The enterprise was completely successful. — We regret most deeply, that the information given at the office was found to be so accurate, that the Officers felt themselves justified in seizing no fewer than 23 individuals, at a public-house, called the White Swan, in Vere-street, Clare-market.”

Two men were found guilty of sodomy and were hanged. Six more were found guilty of attempted sodomy and were made to stand at the pillory. The crowds who turned out for the pillory were particularly violent, throwing rotten fish, dead cats, “cannonballs” made of mud, and vegetables at the convicted men. The men were severely injured and barely survived their allotted time at the pillory.

“Brothers” Debuts: 1984. The first American television program featuring a gay lead character finally debuted on Showtime. The show, set in Philadelphia, centered around the three Waters brothers: Lou was a typical blue-collar construction foreman, Joe was a retired placekicker for the Philadelphia Eagles and owner of a sports bar, and Cliff, who in the first episode left his bride at the altar and came out to his family as a gay man.  ABC and NBC had already turned down the series out of fear of portraying homosexuality on prime time, but when Showtime decided to begin producing original television series, they saw Brothers as the perfect fit. After a successful first season, Showtime decided to pick up the series for a second season. Showtime also offer the series for syndication to over-the-air broadcast stations, and the fledgling Fox network decided to jump on that deal. Brother would go on for a full five seasons and 115 episodes.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Robert Gant: 1968. He was Ben Bruckner in the American version of “Queer as Folk.” His HIV-positive character gave the series an opportunity to explore anti-AIDS hysteria and stigma, both outside and inside the gay community. He has had numerous television guest roles, and he acted and produced in Save Me, the film staring Chad Allen about the ex-gay movement. Gant and Allen, along with Christopher Racster, are partners in the production company Mythgarden. He is active in LGBT elder issues, supporting SAGE (Senior Advocacy for GLBT Elders) and GLEH (Gay and Lesbian Elder Housing).

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).

I support polygamists’ lawsuit

Get ready to hear the anti-gays shriek, “I told you so!” A reality celebrity polygamist family from Utah is suing that state to have its polygamy law found unconstitutional. And I support them. (ABC)

The polygamist family portrayed on the TLC reality show “Sister Wives” said all along its main goal in going on national television was to gain public acceptance of its lifestyle.

Now family patriarch Kody Brown, his four wives and 16 children and stepchildren are moving from the court of public opinion to the court of law, arguing that criminalizing their lifestyle is unconstitutional.

This lawsuit may seem to support the contentions of Maggie Gallagher and the others who spend their energy obsessing over my life and campaigning to keep me inferior. And it may seek peculiar that I would support such and endeavor.

But here’s the thing. They are not suing to have their family structure given legal recognition; that I would oppose.

The legal bonds of matrimony uniquely empower one person to be the sole caretaker and decision-maker over another in times of trouble, the primary heir with unique right at death, and encompasses a whole host of entanglements that become complicated beyond possibility when more than two are included. While the State can step in to a family squabble and say we recognize the spouse, chaos would result from multiple spouse with equal claim or, worse yet, some hierarchy of squabbling spouses.

But their lawsuit is about something else, the effort by the state to control their sex life. Unlike other states which do not recognize multi-party marriage, Utah has banned multi-party cohabitation.

The state law reads: “A person is guilty of bigamy when, knowing he has a husband or wife or knowing the other person has a husband or wife, the person purports to marry another person or cohabits with another person.”

Kody Brown is legally married to one woman, Meri, but also calls the other three women his spouses.

And while I do not wish to open legal marriage to multiple parties, I am a big fan of leaving people live how they want, love whom they want, and in general be as stupid as they want to be (and, believe me, I think any non-bisexual woman that enters into a relationship in which she is one of four women with one man is stupid). So if you want to live with the knowledge that you have no right to recourse should your man and his other three women tire of you, knock yourself out.

And this is not just a theoretical complaint against the state. The police in Lehi, Utah, launched an investigation into the Brown family’s lifestyle for a possible charge of bigamy.

So yeah, I side with the crazy people on this one. If you think that your god wants you to share your man with three other women (one of whom has all the legal rights) then I’ll support your right to sleep where you want and with whom. But fair warning, polygamists, don’t be marrying 14 year-olds or abandoning your male children on a street corner or I’ll happily lead the charge to throw your nasty ass in jail.

Chilean President proposes couple recognition

During the last presidential campaign in Chile, candidates sought to outdo each other in their displays of support for gay Chileans. At the time, we wondered whether or how this would translate into legislation after the election.

As it turns out, conservative Chilean President Sebastian Pinera, who as a candidate ran prime-time ads with gay men holding hands and lesbians kissing each other, is prepared to take action on the issue. It appears to be comparable to a Domestic Partnership (but will probably be called “civil unions” in English-speaking press).

From La Tercera (as translated by Google)

According to a draft summary of the currency delivered in recent days representatives of the Alliance, which agreed the Third, this will allow unmarried couples, heterosexual and homosexual, to register with the Registrar if they meet some requirements, including a period of coexistence of more than one year.

Although the agreement between the cohabitants must subscribe before a notary, as a way to avoid a ceremony that may resemble that of a civil marriage, the contract must be validated within 15 days, with an inscription to the Civil Registry .

In line also with the idea of differentiating the new institution of marriage, it would be called “non-marital cohabitation agreements” (ACNM), and “will not alter or marital status of the contractor or establish kinship by affinity relatives of the other. “

If I read this correctly, you get couple recognition and legal rights, but no in-laws.

If this proposal passes, Latin America will have the following forms of couple recognition:

Argentina recognizes marriage and Mexico recognizes marriage provided that they occur in Mexico City. Brazil, Uruguay, and Ecuador recognize civil unions. Chile will recognize whatever form ultimately results from the legislation, and Colombia recognizes common-law marriage.

Bachmann: Being Gay Is “A Part Of Satan”

Minnesota Representative and GOP candidate Michelle Bachmann spoke in 2004 at a National Education Leadership Conference:

And I think something that was meant for evil was meant for good, and I think we can see that again today. Well there’s something that’s happening in our schools, and one of the reasons why I felt I was called to take up this issue, of bringing a constitutional amendment to the state of Minnesota before our people—I was the chief author in the MN state senate—is because of the profound impact this would have on every man, every woman, every child in the state of Minnesota. Because everyone thought this would only impact the 1.3 percent of our population that is a same-sex individual — and again, don’t misunderstand. I am not here bashing people who are homosexuals, who are lesbians, who are bisexual, who are transgendered. We need to have profound compassion for the people who are dealing with the very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life, and sexual identity disorders. This is a very real issue. It’s not funny, it’s sad. Any of you who have members of your family that are in the lifestyle—we have a member of our family that is. This is not funny. It’s a very sad life. It’s part of Satan, I think, to say this is gay. It’s anything but gay. And so we are not here tonight — in fact, I wish this whole room was filled with the gay community, because we’d reach our hand out in love.

The Love Won Out conference was here not too long ago in the Twin Cities, and it’s profoundly sad to recognize that almost all, if not all, individuals who have gone into the lifestyle have been abused at one time in their life, either by a male or by a female. There’s been profound hurt and profound things that have happened in almost all of their lives. And this gives us great compassion. So this is not to talk about gay bashing — do we understand that? That is not what this is about. But it’s to say that this new legal enforcement of a new status—homosexuality, lesbianism, bringing it into the mainstream, if you will, giving it a legitimacy if you will — that will impact not only the gay community, but every man, woman and child, particularly the schools.

Oh no, calling gay people, including one’s step-sister, a “part of Satan” isn’t bashing anyone at all. No siree…

In 2004, Michele Bachmann, who was then a Minnesota State Senator, gave a few opening remarks at the Love Won Out conference in the Twin Cities. According to this Christian Post press release, Bachmann said, “I know that Love Won Out will present the truth about homosexuality. I look forward to welcoming Minnesotans and residents of surrounding states to hear the message of healing that is possible.” The so-called “truth” would have included a line from Focus On the Family’s Melissa Fryrear, who claimed never to have met a lesbian or a gay man who had not been abused. As far as I have been able to determine, Fryrear uttered that line at every single LWO event she has ever spoken at. It was part of her standard stump speech. (She has since left Focus and is working at a church in Prescott, Arizona, and is no longer is part of the ex-gay roadshow.) When I heard her give that talk in Phoenix in 2007, I witnessed first hand the devastating impact it had on parents who were there:

The audience sat in stunned silence as Fryrear, her voice shaking, went on to talk about sexual abuse in greater detail. She later described her own sexual abuse as a child, and her talk had just followed a testimony by Mike Haley in which he described having sex with another older man beginning at the age of eleven. As far as this audience knew, there were no exceptions.

…It’s not fair to say that the parents and relatives were rife with suspicions, but I was surprised at the number of suspicions that did come up — and the circumstantial nature of the “evidence” which prompted many of them. I heard ex-boyfriends and babysitters suddenly come under suspicion where there had been none before. It seemed as if many of these relatives, taking Melissa Fryrear at her word, turned several possibilities over in their minds — dismissing some, but holding others for future consideration.

Sometimes, these suspicions got the better of them. Before that day, it had never even occurred to one mother that her son might have been molested. Now after Fryrear’s talk, she was momentarily certain of it. “There’s no other explanation!” she exclaimed. But as she thought about it, she remembered that she had no reason to suspect this, and that the only “evidence” she had was Fryrear’s statement. She was finally able to calm herself down after those around her reassured her that it probably didn’t happen.

Trailer Trash

From Towleroad comes this photo shot by a Reddit user at the DMV in Salem, Oregon.

“So That Means You Love Each Other”

A smart little boy is surprised at first, but gets it.

Michele Bachmann Says Ex-Gay Therapy Is “Jobs Creation”

Last Friday, we learned that Truth Wins Out’s John Becker had gone undercover as an patient in Marcus Bachmann’s clinic in Minnesota, where he was given at least five sessions of ex-gay therapy. Shortly after, The Nation revealed that a former patient, Andrew Ramirez, had come forward to reveal that he had undergone ex-gay therapy at Bachmann’s clinic in 2004. That would be two years before Bachmann denied offering ex-gay therapy. Marcus’s wife, GOP presidential candidate and Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachman spoke to a locak Iowa reporter and described her husband’s ex-gay therapy as “a business that deals with job creation,” adding, “I’m very proud of the business that we created.”

Last June, NBC reported that Bachmann had taken $137,000 in taxpayer-provided Medicaid funds, despite the Bachmann’s opposition to governmental programs. ABC News and NBC News has covered TWO’s undercover investigation of Bachmann’s clinic.  Fox has also covered the story in their own inimitable way:

Just so we’re clear on who the victims are.

The Daily Agenda for Tuesday, July 12

Van Cliburn's historic performance at the first Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow, 19589

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Van Cliburn: 1934. In 1958, the Soviet Union, flush with the technological success of Sputnik, inaugurated the first International Tchaikovsky Competition to showcase the Soviet’s cultural superiority. But twenty-four year old Van Cliburn’s astounding performance of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 resulted in a standing ovation lasting eight minutes. With an American clearly the crowd favorite to take what was supposed to have been a Soviet showcase, the judges reportedly sought Khrushchev permission. “”Is he the best? Then give him the prize!” so the story goes. Cliburn returned to the U.S. to a hero’s welcome, becoming the first and only classical musician to be treated to a New York ticker-tape parade. His 1958 Grammy-winning recording of Tchaikovsky’s first Piano Concerto became the first classical album to go platinum and was the best-selling classical album for more than a decade. It would eventually go on to go triple platinum and is still available for download in the internet age.

Van Cliburn's return to Moscow, 2011

In 1962, he became the artistic adviser for his own namesake competition, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, held every four years in Ft. Worth, Texas. His own competition now rivals the Tchaikovsky in international stature. He continued performing and recording through the 1960s and 1970s, but after the deaths of his father and manager, he took a hiatus from public life. He came out of retirement in 1987 to perform at the White House for President Ronald Reagan and Soviet president Mikhael Gorbachev. Last June, Van Cliburn returned to the XCI Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, where he served as an honorary juror and was treated like a rock star.

Cheyenne Jackson: 1975. He was named for show business, having been named by his father after a 1950s Western television series. He is a talented actor and singer, working on stage, film and television. His biggest role to date was as gay 9/11 hero Mark Bingham in the 2006 Oscar nominated United 93. He’s appeared in other films since then, along with a shift toward television with recurring roles on NBC’s 30 Rock and Fox’s Glee. In 2009, he released a CD with Michael Feinstein, The Power Of Two. He is an avid LGBT rights supporter and an ambassador for amfAR (The Foundation for AIDS Research).

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Nobody Pays Attention To Preambles Anyway

When the Iowa-based Family Leader began asking GOP presidential candidates to sign its anti-gay “Marriage Vow,” it originally contained this statement in the pledge’s preamble:

Slavery had a disastrous impact on African-American families, yet sadly a child born into slavery in 1860 was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household than was an African-American baby born after the election of the USA’s first African-American President.

Never mind the abject ignorance of that statement — slave marriages weren’t legally recognized in the south and families were routinely split up and sold, making the likelihood of actually being raised by a mother and a father rather shaky — that part of the preamble was criticized by the left and right alike for its suggestion that African-American children were better off under slavery. Late Saturday night, Family Leader bowed to criticism and quietly removed that statement from its preamble. But by then, Rep. Michele Bachmann had already raced to put her signature on the document, only to be followed a very short time later in a photo finish by Sen. Rick Santorum.

Bachmann’s campaign has been fending off criticisms for signing the racially-offensive document ever since.

A Bachmann spokeswoman said earlier Saturday that reports the congresswoman had signed a vow that contained the slavery language was wrong, noting it was not in the “vow” portion.

“She signed the ‘candidate vow,’ ” campaign spokeswoman Alice Stewart said, and distanced Bachmann from the preamble language, saying, “In no uncertain terms, Congresswoman Bachmann believes that slavery was horrible and economic enslavement is also horrible.”

Totally understandable when you think about it. I bet almost none of our founding fathers like John Quincy Adams paid much attention to the Preamble to the Constitution before they signed it either.

The Daily Agenda for Monday, July 11

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Newt Gingrich Tours With Family Leader: Pella and Iowa City, Iowa. Former House speaker and GOP presidential aspirant Newt Gingrich will deliver a series of lectures today in events organized by the anti-gay group Family Leader. The tour begins at noon with an invitation-only Leadership Roundtable at Pella Christian High School, followed by a lecture and press event beginning at 1:00. The party then moves to the University of Iowa in Iowa City for another invitation-only Leadership Roundtable followed by a lecture at 5:00 p.m.

Family Leader has led efforts to impeach the state’s Supreme Court and overturn its decision declaring a ban on marriage equality unconstitutional. Bob Vander Plaats, who heads Family Leader, has positioned himself as a gatekeeper between presidential candidates and Iowa “value voters.” Previous GOP candidates who have already participated in lecture tours include former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Reps. Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann, former Sen. Rick Santorum, and Godfather Pizza magnate Herman Cain.

Last week, Vander Plaats began asking candidates to sign an anti-gay pledge calling for the enactment of a federal marriage amendment. It also contains a controversial point claiming that African-American families were better off under slavery than they are under America’s first African-American President. That statement was quietly redacted late Saturday night, but not before Rep. Michele Bachmann and Sen. Rick Santorum had already signed it. The pledge’s requirement that candidates uphold marriage “through my personal fidelity to my spouse” poses a thorn for the thrice-married Gingrich, who was cheating on wife number two while demanding President Bill Clinton’s impeachment over the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
Dorothy Wilde: 1895. She was born in London three months after her uncle Oscar Wilde’s arrest for homosexuality, and she inherited her uncle’s talents for witty conversation and charm, talents which held her in good stead in the salons of Paris between the wars. She first traveled to France in 1914 to serve as an ambulance driver during World War I, and it was during the war that she had an affair with another ambulance driver, Standard Oil heiress Marion “Joe” Carstairs, who after the war become a renowned speedboat racer (“the fastest woman on water”). Her longest relationship though began in 1927 and lasted until her death, with the American writer Natalie Clifford Barney. Dolly was a gifted storyteller and writer, but she never pursued a career in writing. Her drinking and addiction to heroin may have gotten in the way. In 1939, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, but refused surgery. The next year when Germany invaded France, Dolly fled to London, where she died in 1941 of “causes unascertainable,” a probably allusion to a drug overdose or to alternative treatments she sought for her cancer.

Tab Hunter: 1931. Born Arthur Gelien in New York, he was given his stage name by his first agent. His good looks quickly made him a teen idol in the 1950s as he appeared in more than forty films throughout his career. That career was threatened however when, in 1955, Confidential magazine reported Hunter’s 1950 arrest in an innuendo-laden article. But Hunter’s studio-arranged “romances” with Natalie Woods and Debbie Reynolds. In his 2005 memoir, Tab Hunter Confidential: The Making of a Movie Star, Hunter talks about his relationships with Anthony Perkins, Rudolph Nureyev and champion figure skater Ronnie Robertson, along with many anecdotes about the stars that he met: Roddy McDowell, Tallulah Bankhead, Robert Mitchum, Fred Astaire, Linda Darnell. But by 1959, his career was on the downhill slope towards spaghetti westerns and dinner theater. But his career was revived when he co-starred with Divine in John Water’s Polyester and my favorite, Lust In the Dust, making him a new kind of icon. “Making out with Divine, that’s beyond the bravery of coming out,” he said. “But he had a sense of humor about the glamour he was caught in. He’s a great sport, and a great star.” He described his work with John Waters and Divine as “a high point in my professional life.” He now lives near Santa Barbera with his longtime partner of more than thirty years.

Yevgeny Kharitonov: 1941. Born in Novosibirsk, he embarked on a very brief career as an actor, but went from there to playwriting. Although none of his works were published in his lifetime by the Soviet press, he is now recognized as a founder of modern Russian gay literature. His sexuality, which was criminalized at the time, mirrored the Soviet experience in which the mere existence of a lot of people was grounds for state repression. . His dissident writing and his sexuality made him a double target, and he was placed under close surveillance by the KBG. When he was called to the KGB for his first “interview,” he fainted. When he died of a heart attack in 1981, many believed that his death was hastened over the pressure of official scrutiny. When he died, he was carrying a manuscript for “Under House Arrest,” which scattered and blew down the street when he collapsed. Other versions of the manuscript survived and was published several years after his death.

Kharitonov claimed his sexuality as a gift that gave him special insight into the human condition. In his brief gay manifesto, The Leaflet, Kharitonov compares the repression that gay people experienced in Russian society to the anti-Semetism experienced by Russia’s Jews. He also saw the artistry of Russia’s Jews and gays as being the product of that repression. “The best flower of our shallow people is called like no other to dance the dance of impossible love and to sing of it sweetly.”

Vito Russo: 1946. He was an LGBT activist and film historian, best known as the author of the 1981 book The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies. The book was the result of a live lecture with film clips that he had presented at colleges, universities and small art-house cinemas throughout the 1970s. His concern over how LGBT people were presented in the popular media led to his becoming a co-founder for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD). He died in 1990 but his work continued to gain a wider audience when HBO created a documentary film version of The Celluloid Closet narrated by Lilly Tomlin. Earlier this year, a family-authorized biography by Michael Shiavi, Celluloid Activist: The Life and Times of Vito Russo, was published by the University of Wisconsin Press.

Esera Tuaolo: 1968. The Samoan from Hawaii was an NFL linebacker defensive lineman for nine years, beginning with the Green Bay Packers and the Minnesota Vikings. After a stint with the Jacksonville Jaguars in 1997, he went to Atlanta, where he reached the Super Bowl in 1999. He ended his career the following season with the Carolina Panthers. In 2002, he announced that he is gay on HBO’s Real Sports, making him the third NFL player to come out (after David Kopay and Roy Simmons). In 2006, he released his autobiography, Alone in the Trenches: My Life As a Gay Man in the NFL, and he has actively campaigned on ending homophobia in sports. In 2010, he was arrested on a domestic violence charge with his boyfriend, but those charges were dropped with his boyfriend saying it was all a misunderstanding.

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