Box Turtle Bulletin

Heterosexual Agenda: Strippers at a Golf Course

Maybe I should start a regular feature. Here’s the latest: Strippers at a Pennsylvania golf course.

I wonder if that golf course has any automatic public toilet doors?

Electric Shock Therapy “One of My Funniest Stories”

Dr. Bob Crummie served as Doctor for the Day for the North Carolina General Assembly, volunteering his services in case anyone needs medical assistance. In that position, he’s not supposed to do any lobbying, but he took the opportunity to distribute his book Dr. Bob’s Grocery Store Medicine and Healthy Life Anecdotes to lawmakers. Jim Morrill of the Charlotte Observer found some interesting gems in that book:

“There is no such thing as a homosexual. The Gay Movement is a hoax,” Crummie writes. “Individuals who act out homosexually are at best very neurotic and at worst psychotic. Most of them are character disorders.”

In what he describes as “one of my funniest stories,” Crummie tells how he once put a stop to homosexuality at an N.C. prison when, as superintendent, he threatened to give electric shock therapy to anyone caught in the act. With several inmates present, he demonstrated the procedure on one inmate who was severely depressed, he writes.

I happen to know two people personally who have undergone electric shock therapy. As one friend began to describe his experience, he gripped the arms of his chair so tightly I though they would break. He never did finish his story. His last time on the electrodes was in the late eighties, and he still can’t talk about it. Needless to say, neither of my friends were “cured.”

Since I read about Crummie’s “funny story” this morning, I’ve struggled all day to figure out how to find the words to sufficiently register my disgust. I can’t. But I’ll say this anyway: If he thinks my friends’ experiences are “funny,” then he doesn’t possess even the slightest shred of humanity. Not even the slightest.

Hat tip: Matt Hill Comer at Pam’s House Blend.

So, You Wanna Read Russian?

Ruslan Porshnev passed along a great tip yesterday as we were coordinating his guest post from twelve timezones away. Google has an automatic translation service which works surprisingly well. It’s by no means perfect, but it makes Ruslan’s post about Box Turtle Bulletin reasonably understandable. Already, it looks like a raging debate is taking place over the Russian title for “The Heterosexual Agenda” Maybe they find it too provocative? I don’t know. What do you think?

Update: I neglected to mention how grateful I am to Ruslan for the tremendous effort he put forth in translating the pamphlet and laying out the whole document so that it retains the same look and feel of the original. That’s a very impressive accomplishment. Thank you Ruslan for doing such a fantastic job.

If anyone else out there wants to tackle it in Spanish, French, Portuguese, German, or any other language, I’d be very interested in lending a hand.

AntiDogma: Against All Odds

Hello, my name is Ruslan Porshnev. I represent the Russian LGBT project AntiDogma.

Why the name “AntiDogma”? According to the German humanitarian and philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach, “dogma is nothing but a prohibition to think.” This project is dedicated to social, moral and spiritual recovery of lesbians, gays, bi’s and transgender people, as well as implementing methods of non-violent resistance and refuting common prejudices about LGBT’s. In Russian, people with sexual orientations other than heterosexual are called ones with “nontraditional” orientation. The project’s logo, a paradoxical triangle inspired by M.C. Escher‘s drawings and impossible to construct in reality, resembles the “weirdness” of LGBT’s image in today’s Russia: it exists only on paper, screen and in people’s minds, but not in reality.

AntiDogma’s Inspiration

My first thoughts on a project like AntiDogma date back to the late 1990s. That’s when I first stumbled upon Rembert S. Truluck’s Steps to Recovery From Bible Abuse, dedicated to biblical verses used for religious condemnation of gays. In spite of the fact that there was barely anyone interested in a topic like that in the early times of post-Soviet Russia, Truluck’s website and his ideas caught my eye and eventually got me thinking. Needless to say, my sense of my own “nontraditional” sexuality during my personal soul-searching in a complete vacuum was perplexing then, too. Mind you, the 1990s in Russia was also a time when criminal prosecution of gays hadn’t been canceled until 1993 and psychiatric diagnosis wasn’t deleted until 1999.

Since the late 1990s, a couple of large and popular Russian LGBT web-projects have emerged onto the scene, featuring personals, news, literature, online shops, etc. However, what I had in mind then was a more educational and analytical, interdenominational project targeted at a wider audience than just gays, lesbians, bi’s and transgender people. The project intended to help everyone to get to know each others’ point of view and establish a comfortable place for peaceful, relaxed dialog. Even today it’s hard to imagine a straight Russian going into popular gay resources for accurate information or discussion on homosexuality. Partly it’s due to peculiar graphic material, and the promotion of services and goods of a rather explicit nature on these websites. Once I’ve discovered excellent blogs like Ex-Gay Watch and Jim Burroway’s Box Turtle Bulletin, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. One of the other project’s goals was to form an online community which would also include concerned straights. In time, I hope, this group would probably embrace relatives and friends of LGBT too.

Making An Impact In Russia

Although relatively young (a bit older than a year), AntiDogma has already been featured in a number of online and offline media. It got a warm welcome from general-audience magazines like TimeOut and from the more gay-oriented BesfFor and Kvir; also online from GayNews and Gay.ru. Specifically, TimeOut recently stated that “the most thorough gay LiveJournal community, Antidogma talks about homosexuality in a rare, decent tone.­ Here homosexuality is discussed from political, scientific and cultural points of view, and articles are backed up, if not with references to sound studies, then at least to Wikipedia”.

GayNews mentioned my personal request to officials on same-sex partnerships. The answer was that “this kind of partnerships is not on current agenda and interests of Russian Federation”. The current agenda was stated as “solving demographic problems”. And our annual 2006 ironic “hit list” of most homonegative occurrences in Russian mass-media (there were and are plenty) got into view of activists of Russian human rights portal HRO.Ru. This list featured Oscar-like nominations for the most outrageous homophobic or controversial episodes in press, TV, radio, politics, etc. Instead of Oscars, we “gave” the winners silly things (as New Year’s gifts) which reflected the stupidity of these speeches and controversies.

The Climate for LGBT’s In Russia Today

Sadly, most negativity comes from Russian Orthodox clergy, politicians and some celebrities as well. Calls to ban gays in education, prohibit gay protests in the streets, proposals to criminally prosecute so-called “gay propaganda” (which, of course, nobody can clearly define), restrictions for registering LGBT-oriented social organizations, blaming gays for the demographic crisis, refusing to consider same-sex partnerships and to acknowledge ones registered abroad — all this is widespread and common. According to a number of different nationally representative polls, the majority of Russians think that being gay is certainly not okay.

Countering the Myths

The project’s initial goal of providing accurate information and news for wider audiences proved itself right. Our substantial and easy to read FAQ on homosexuality continues to receive positive feedback from people of all kinds, regardless of orientation. At some point, a volunteer HIV expert, Tatiana Solomatina, Candidate of Medical Science, has joined the community, conducting a number of brilliant discussions and answering questions on possible risks and protection. Among our active members acting as moderators, there are professional psychologists Roman J.Karter and Daria Kutuzova, and also people with a background in psychiatry, like lj-user Kandinskiy. (That’s his LiveJournal user name. Conditions do not allow him to use his real name.)

Meanwhile, the membership has been growing steady: today there are more than 500 subscribers. Several articles, like “Myths and Facts On Gay Parades” (PDF), posts on hate crime victims from times of Nazi camps until present days and also about “Love in Action” shutting down, have reached Yandex Top 30 of all popular posts in Russian-spoken blogs.

This fact shows a great lack of and interest for well-balanced, thorough and unbiased analytics on LGBT’s targeted toward the general public. However, even a resource like that can often be unfairly accused of so called “gay propaganda” and “recruitment.”­ It needs to be mentioned that LiveJournal in today’s Russia, unlike other countries, acts heavily as an alternative news source, free from any kind of censorship. For those who don’t have a LiveJournal account, AntiDogma is available through RSS subscription.

AntiDogma is a non-commercial community, solely volunteer-operated and supported. We’re using the free LiveJournal service, but plan to move onto our own domain name www.anti-dogma.info soon and eventually expand further. Our community is also a part of the national Russian LGBT Network, consisting of several organizations throughout Russia, with headquarters in Moscow. It helps members to make coordinated position statements and requests to officials (English link). Also, the Network, formed in 2005, runs a project on monitoring of discrimination and conducts public events like conferences and pickets.

The Heterosexual Agenda

Among other popular articles at AntiDogma, there is a Russian-language version of Jim Burroway’s “The Heterosexual Agenda: Exposing the Myths,” which I’d also like to introduce today for the Russian-speaking readers of Box Turtle Bulletin. I find this pamphlet’s approach and information extremely important for today’s Russian situation on LGBT rights.

There are already a bunch of homonegative projects like Love Against Homosexuality and Overcoming-X, which aggressively use many biased and flawed “masterpieces” of Paul Cameron, Jeffrey Satinover, Joseph Nicolosi and other so-called scientists in their public rhetoric. It seems like with the Russian Orthodox Church gaining more power there’s a lot more yet to come, so we better get ready. I’d like to thank Jim for letting me translate his work into Russian and introduce it to another large audience.

I’d be glad to answer any questions in comments. Thank you.

Ruslan has a partner and lives in the Southern Urals region of Russia, in Chelyabinsk. He holds a master’s degree in engineering and analytics, and he currently works in marketing communications.

New Mormon Tract on Homosexuality

With about eight million members, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons) is among the ten largest denominations in the country.  It is also one of the largest funding sources of anti-gay initiatives and a strong lobbyist against fairness and equality for gay citizens.

Some would look at the history of discrimination against Mormons and find it sadly ironic that they would seek to demand conformity on issues of religion and marriage.  But sociologists tell us that it is not uncommon for those who face social inequalities to be among the most ardent at upholding inequalities against others.

This week the Mormon Church issued a publication on homosexuality that is, in some ways, an improvement on previous positions but which are far from the welcoming or reconciling traditions adopted by some mainline churches.  In synopsis, the LDS church states that same-sex people are welcomed but that such persons should avoid “inappropriate thoughts” or “sinful behavior”.  The church also recognized that reorientation is not necessarily to be expected in this life but demands celibacy and a rejection of “flauting homosexual tendencies”.

Some statements of the pamphlet could be taken right out of the writings of any conservative mainstream Christian church:

God has provided the plan of salvation, or plan of happiness, to help you receive the blessings of eternal life. This plan is set forth in the scriptures; men and women cannot rewrite it to accommodate their desires. … Eternity is long, and mortality is short.

Others have concepts that are foreign to those who are not familiar with Mormon theology:

Heaven is organized by families, which require a man and a woman who together exercise their creative powers within the bounds the Lord has set. … Without both a husband and a wife there would be no eternal family and no opportunity to become like Heavenly Father. … As we follow Heavenly Father’s plan, our bodies, feelings, and desires will be perfected in the next life so that every one of God’s children may find joy in a family consisting of a husband, a wife, and children.

The new writings reflect the recognition that regardless of effort many people cannot reorient, but it still states the unsubstantiated (and in my opinion cruel) claim that “many Latter-day Saints, through individual effort, the exercise of faith, and reliance upon the enabling power of the Atonement, overcome same-gender attraction in mortality”.  Not only does this claim appear to be without ready example, but I believe it reinforces the notion that a failure to reorient is as likely to be due to a inadequate individual effort or faith as it is the will of God.

Overall, I find this tract to be more compassionate than some by other conservative denominations. However, it makes assumptions and recommendations that I believe are more likely to result in isolation and misunderstanding than in peaceful resolution: no gay friends, immersion in church activities, avoiding too close of friendships, showing “love and kindness” to church members who are rejecting you.  Further, when coupled with such hostile and agressive language as is found elsewhere (e.g. “But we cannot stand idle if they indulge in immoral activity, if they try to uphold and defend and live in a so-called same-sex marriage situation.”), I don’t see it as any indication that the church will cease to fund its attack on my life.

I cannot forgive the Mormon Church for its multi-million dollar efforts to deny civil equality to non-LDS gay citizens. But this tract did help clarify some of the motivation behind their anti-gay activities and some has given me some compassion for those raised in this church.  With a theology that requires heterosexuality and procreation in order to become like God, there is little wonder that so many gay men that I have met who have had a Mormon upbringing are so deeply conflicted about their sexuality.

ADDENDUM: For an interesting discussion from the perspective of LDS members, see here.

British Tourism Agency Changes Message

VisitBritain is changing how they are marketing the United Kingdom to gay Americans:

Gays and lesbians eyeing travel ads for Great Britain aren’t seeing muscular male models flexing their pecs promoting hot times in the UK this year. Instead, the ads show a gay couple walking hand-in-hand along a beach, a lesbian couple with a child looking at Buckingham Palace, Palace guards dressed in the rainbow colors, and pictures of the London Flower Show.

VisitBritain, the government financed tourism agency, says the change reflects the way the American gay community now sees itself – more family oriented.

VisitBritan noticed that the old sexy, circuit-party ads weren’t working anymore, so they conducted focus groups of gay Americans. And they were surprised to learn that Americans were offended by the assumption that all they were interested in was sex. It turns out that popular draws weren’t circuit parties, but the Chelsea Flower Show, the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh and the Crufts Dog show in Birmingham. Surprised? Me neither.

Hat tip: AntiDogma.

Georgia’s Homophobia Shuts Down Rally For Diversity

Human rights group Century 21 was planning a rally for diversity and equality in Tbilisi, Georgia. A careless reporter for the Georgian newspaper Alia confused Century 21 with a Georgian gay rights group which is also located in the same office building, and that paper unleashed a threatening, homophobic rant, mistakingly characterizing the rally as a “gay pride” parade:

“Let’s just see how ready our country will be to host a gay parade,” said the report in Alia. “But if the government gave them permission to do so, nothing can prevent them. Moreover, our police will defend the security of the pederast men decorated with jingling jewellery.”

The head of the Georgian Orthodox Church denounced the human rights rally as “an exhibition of Sodom and Gomorrah” and warned that it would lead to violance. A radio station denounced president Mikheil Saakashvili, saying he was “experiencing a strong allergy to all things Russian, old-fashioned, and imperial, will allow homegrown sodomites and a many-coloured assault of world pederasty on the streets and prospects of Tbilisi.” Century 21 called off the rally after receiving numerous abusive telephone calls, emails and threats of violence.

While Georgia no longer criminalizes homosexuality, violence against gays and lesbians is widespread in the former Soviet republic.

A “Love Won Out” Makeover?

It looks that way. This is what the “Love Won Out” web site used to look like. Now it’s been replaced with this.

“Love Won Out,” the ex-gay roadshow put on jointly by Focus On the Family and Exodus International is sporting a new web presence, but it looks like the changes are only slightly more than just skin deep. The line-up of speakers has changed, and NARTH president Joseph Nicolosi is missing. He’s apparently been replaced by Joe Dallas, past president of Exodus International and current director of Tustin, California-based Genesis Ministries. NARTH however, continues to be listed as a recommended resource for “Love Won Out.”

Maybe Nicolosi’s performance in front of CNN cameras in Phoenix last February was the final straw, as that was the last time he appeared at “Love Won Out.” Joe Dallas occupied the keynote position normally reserved for Nicolosi’s address when “Love Won Out” went to Omaha last April. Dallas’ address was very different from Nicolosi’s, delivered without Nicolosi’s signature line, “We advise fathers, if you don’t hug your sons, some other man will.”

In fact, Dallas’ presentation was a generally kinder-and-gentler version of Nicolosi’s deficient-father syndrome as an explanation for male homosexuality, replacing the strident blaming of fathers for their sons’ sinful ways with the sons’ perception of having been rejected by their deficient fathers. Sexual abuse, however, remains a conspicuous topic as a “cause” for homosexuality. Melissa Fryrear’s not giving that one up very easily.

The “Frequently Asked Questions” page on “Love Won Out’s” new web site indicates a similarly less strident approach. Gone are the promises to change anyone’s sexuality. Instead, they say that they are simply offering ways to “overcome” their sexual desires. What’s more, they say that they’ve been simply misunderstood all along:

They also like to claim we want to “fix” or “convert” gays and lesbians and that we believe people can “pray away the gay.” Such glib characterizations ignore the complex series of factors that can lead to same-sex attractions; they also mischaracterize our mission. We exist to help men and women dissatisfied with living homosexually understand that same-sex attractions can be overcome.

Of course, that’s not what the web site used to say not so long ago:

Focus on the Family is promoting the truth that homosexuality is preventable and treatable — a message routinely silenced today. We want people to know that individuals don’t have to be gay.

Maybe “Love Won Out” is guilty of mischaracterizing “Love Won Out.”

But if the new web site now sports a softer touch, it doesn’t look as though it will carry over to the conference itself. After all, if they’re only interested in helping men and women dissatisfied with being gay, why the emphasis on political matters and the furtherance of the ongoing culture wars? The agenda for upcoming conferences (the next one is August 4th in Portland, Oregon’s City Bible Church) is very similar to past conferences, and culture-war politics is an increasingly important part of the conference.

The overtly-political sessions carried over from previous conferences include the 11:15 breakout session, “Teaching Captivity? The Pro-Gay Agenda in Schools” by Dick Carpenter. He also presents the 1:15 plenary session, “Why is What They’re Teaching So Dangerous,” in which he scares the living daylights out of the audience over the supposed homosexual infiltration of public schools and dominance in the general culture. Also carried over from previous conferences is the 2:45 breakout session, “Straight Thinking on Gay Marriage” by Focus on the Family vice-president Bill Maier.

But if you wanted more evidence that the real purpose of “Love Won Out” is more political than ever before, check out the new breakout session scheduled for 3:45, “Lifting the Veil on Gay Activism.” Because it’s new, I don’t know who’s teaching it and the links to the documents for the Portland and Irvine, California conferences aren’t working yet. Also still under construction is a page reserved for “Culture,” which, I’m sure, will provide little of interest to those who are merely dissatisfied with their sexuality.

And this leads me to conclude that while some of the faces at “Love Won Out” are changing, the message is still the same.

See Also:

Prologue: Why I Went To “Love Won Out”
Part 1: What’s Love Got To Do With It?
Part 2: Parents Struggle With “No Exceptions”
Part 3: A Whole New Dialect
Part 4: It Depends On How The Meaning of the Word “Change” Changes

OC Weekly On Exodus and Ex-Gay Survivor’s Conferences

The OC Weekly yesterday published Janine Kahns’ excellent report on the Exodus and Ex-Gay Survivor’s conferences held in Irvine last month. She provides Michael Bussee’s detailed history with Exodus, and the years since he left Exodus with fellow ex-gay volunteer Gary Cooper when the two of them became life partners.

She also provides a good description of the two conferences, including highlights from Alan Chambers’ opening remarks at Exodus, a description of the workshop I gave at the Survivor’s conference, and interviews with attendees from both conferences.

Paul Cameron in EDGE New York — and NARTH

EDGE New York published an article by Arielle Chavkin about Paul Cameron’s “Scandiavian Gay Lifespan Study.” Her report includes several observations by Jason Cianciotto and yours truly.

And speaking of Paul Cameron, Ex-Gay Watch’s David Roberts noticed that NARTH has added yet another link to a study using Paul Cameron’s research. Just scroll down a bit on NARTH’s front page and you’ll see this in the center column:

7.25.07 – Distortions of Science
Studies of Homosexual Parenting: A Critical Review [link]

That handy little link will take you to a paper by George Rekers and Mark Kilgus that was published in the Regent University Law Review back in 2002. Regent University, if you’ll remember, is the school established by Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson. That same law review issue contained two other articles which cite Cameron, Child Molestation and the Homosexual Movement (PDF: 76 KB/16 pages) by Stephen Baldwin (not the actor), and Homosexuality: Innate and Immutable? (PDF: 340 KB/42 pages) by A. Dean Byrd and Stony Olsen, 2002. Meanwhile, NARTH continues to maintain their own articles citing Paul Cameron on their web site.

These are just a few of Paul Cameron’s many collaborators who are complicit in not only perpetuating his pseudo-science, but who also help to support his stated agenda for gays and lesbians.

I Get Email…

Date: July 5, 2007
Subject: Love Won Out

Mr. Burroway,
I am anticipating ‘Part 5’ of your series after having read the first four. Will it be released any time soon?

That’s much better than the emails I usually get. Not a single clobber passage anywhere.

Yes, I’m terribly delinquent. I responded to that message by saying Part 5 was in the works and should be ready the following week. That was four weeks ago. But I promise Part 5 will be arriving sometime next week. Probably not Monday. Maybe Tuesday. It better be by Thursday or I’ll be deeply embarrassed.

But if you want a small preview of what will be in Part 5, you can mosey on over to Peterson Toscano’s blog. He already stole a little bit of my thunder with the quote he selected from Alan Chambers. (Actually, he didn’t exactly steal it; I sort of lent it to him.) And he bounces that quote against his own experience in trying to change in Part 2 of his three part series, “Change Was NOT Possible.” And unlike this humble scribe, he actually appears to be completing his series.

A Second Snark Attack In Florida

It’s been almost a full month since someone misused an apology. I’m referring to Exodus president Alan Chamber’s snide “acceptance” of the apologies from Darlene Bogle, Michael Bussee, and Jeremy Marks, former Exodus and Exodus-affiliated leaders. If you remember, they apologized for the harms they had done to their clients while acting as ex-gay leaders.

Well, the snarks have returned again, but not to Orlando. This time they headed to the coast, where we find Ft. Lauderdale mayor Jim Naugle responding to demands that he apologize for his unfounded allegations that gays were having sex in public toilets. You see, Naugle has a problem. Sgt. Frank Sousa of the Ft. Lauderdale police department says, “There’s no evidence, no reports or arrests made for any men having sex in any restrooms.” So what is Naugle’s next move?

Mayor Jim Naugle issued a public apology on the steps of City Hall Tuesday afternoon, but it wasn’t the apology the gay community was looking for. Naugle apologized for underestimating the problem of men having sex with each other in public restrooms, and urged people to call police to complain when they come upon it.

EDGE Boston Examines Reparative Therapy

EDGE Boston has published David Foucher’s third part of his four part series on the ex-gay movement. I’m very impressed with this series — he really did his homework. In this especially well-written installment, Foucher examines the pseudo-Freudian theories underlying the ex-gay movement in general and reparative therapy in particular — theories which Robert-Jay Green of the Rockway Institute points out aren’t very well proven. Although Warren Throckmorton doesn’t agree with Dr. Green that these theories have been “disproven” (in Dr. Green’s words), he does broadly agree that these theories aren’t compelling in the way the ex-gay movement uses them:

“When I read the research, what appears to me to be the best rendering of it is that different factors operate differently for different people,” he explains. “In an environment like that, when you don’t know the answer to what causes sexual orientation, it’s really not proper in my opinion to inform clients of anything different than that. The reparative therapists inform clients that their attractions are due to childhood dynamics. The gay-affirming therapists may go the other way and say that sexual orientation is an intrinsic aspect of who you are, it’s because of your genetics or it’s prenatal, and that it would be harmful to try to alter it in some way. I don’t think the research would allow either dogmatic conclusion.”

Fourcher also uncovers what ends up being the very essence of what it means to be ex-gay: the naming and labeling of homosexuality. Jack Drescher is quoted this way:

“You can switch identities, they’re not fixed. But sexual orientation is not as flexible as identities. A person can come out, say they’re gay, change their mind, say they’re not gay, change their mind again, say they’re gay again. It has nothing to do with their perceptual feelings – because people who call themselves gay don’t have all the same sexual feelings, and people who call themselves ex-gay don’t have all the same sexual feelings either. These are just labels.”

But towards the end of the article, where Fourcher discusses the APA’s task force to examine conversion therapies, he gets this whopper from NARTH president Joseph Nicolosi:

“We do not want to diminish the rights or civil liberties of gays or lesbians — they have a right to pursue their lives, their happiness, their dreams; those rights should not be limited in any way,” (Nicolosi) counters. “But for those who are unhappy for any reason, for those who want a conventional sexuality, a conventional marriage, we want to help them achieve that.”

That stated position may not be completely supportable; as of this writing the top article on NARTH’s homepage is titled, “Marriage as Culture: The Case Against ‘Same-Sex Marriage'” – a clear indication that NARTH is embroiled, at least philosophically, in more politically-charged issues surrounding gay and lesbian rights.

“People such as Joseph Nicolosi might today claim that they do not take a pathologizing perspective on homosexuality,” (Clinton W. Anderson, Director of the APA’s Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Concerns Office) agrees. “But if you look at the history of their careers and what they have advocated, that’s just not a credible position. They do seem to bring a prejudiced attitude towards homosexuality to the table.”

This is turning out to be one of the best articles I’ve seen on conversion therapies in a long time.

See also:

EDGE Boston Features Love In Action

Update: Where Has Daniel Been?

I’m sure a couple of you have been wondering what I’ve been up to since the recent flurry of activity at the Survivor’s Conference and Survivor’s Initiative.  The answer; moving to Denver.

Why? Because despite having zero debt, zero dependants and working full time as an architect I can’t afford so much as a 600 SF studio condo here in LA, and that’s unacceptable.

Denver was selected because it’s the intellectual, financial and cultural capital of the west with beautiful historic urban fabric, excellent mass transit, and laws which protect me from discrimination.  Oh and the job market is booming, I spent a week hunting for jobs there recently and had TWELVE interviews.

Some of you may complain Denver is sooooo expensive — Go tell that to someone who’s not coming from a place where the median home price is 234% higher than Denver.  In case you’re curious here’s what $190,000 will buy you in Compton, a 582 SF house that’s been gutted by a fire.

My last day of work is Friday and I begin at one of Denver’s largest, oldest and most prestigious firms on August 13th. 

Lastly, it didn’t exactly factor into my decision but I have to add it’ll be nice to be an hour’s drive from Focus On The Family.

New Mexico Same-Sex Couples Can Marry In Massachusetts

The Massachusetts Department of Public Health and Registry of Vital Records and Statistics issued a notice last Thursday, July 18 allowing same-sex couples from New Mexico to apply for marriage licenses, according to Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD). Massachusetts law forbids out-of-state couples from marrying if their marriage would be illegal in their home state. New Mexicans join Rhode Islanders in being allowed to marry in Massachusetts.

Meanwhile, Massachusetts opponents of same-sex marriage said Monday they won’t try to put a constitutional ban on the ballot in 2010. Instead, opponents vow retribution on state legislators who voted against the ban in the upcoming 2008 elections. Their game plan is to bring the ban before a new legislature after 2008, a legislature they hope will be more to their liking. This means that the earliest such a proposed ban can go before the voters is 2012.