lgbtQnews will be on vacation for a few weeks

You’ll notice a significant slowdown in posts during the next few weeks. I’ll be visiting family in Montana during that period and will often be away from a reliable internet connection. I may be able to sneak in a few posts now and then, but the update schedule will become a trickle.

But please feel free during this time to post a message (or two) on the site’s Facebook fan page about what you like and don’t like about lgbtQnews.

You’ll see a summary of our posts on the Facebook page when I return. Write a note on the “Wall” and tell me what you think.

You could also subscribe to our RSS feed, or follow our Twitter feed (which, by the way, includes far more news than what you’ll see here).

While I’m away from the pressing need to copy-edit news stories, I’ll take some of my time  to tweak the site in a few ways, including adding some of the features that were almost-but-not-quite ready when this version of the site premiered this spring.

Posted by NewsEditor -- 27 Aug 2009 4:37 PM (PT)

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Harvey Milk to be added to ‘California Hall of Fame’

   ::: Harvey Milk, the slain gay-rights activist and former San Francisco City Supervisor, will be one of 13 Californians added to the state’s Hall of Fame because they “embody California’s innovative spirit and have made their mark on history,”  Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver announced Tuesday. Last year, Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that would have established a statewide day of recognition for Milk. He said, at the time, that Milk’s “contributions should continue to be recognized at the local level by those who were most impacted” in San Francisco. Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) plans to put Harvey Milk Day legislation on the governor’s desk again this year – in hopes of a different result. President Obama honored Milk with the Presidential Medal of Freedom earlier this summer. 

Source: Harvey Milk tapped for state Hall of Fame | L.A. Now | Los Angeles Times

Posted by NewsEditor -- 27 Aug 2009 12:46 PM (PT)

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Florida state lawyers say ‘best interest of children’ should be ignored

Lawyers for Florida’s Department of Children and Families (DCF) yesterday told an appeals court panel that an adoption should be denied even though they admitted that the adoption would be in the best interest of the children involved.

DCF’s lawyer argued that the gay man who has raised two two half-brothers for five years as a foster parents should not be able to adopt them because a state law – the most restrictive one in the nation – bars adoption by LGBT people.

During a hearing yesterday before a three-judge panel of the 3rd District Court of Appeals, Judge Vance Salter told DCF’s attorney that the state is espousing contradictory messages, Law.com reports via Daily Business Journal. 

“The state doesn't contest that this is in the best interest of the children,” Salter observed, referring to the proposed adoption by the boys’ foster father.

“We do not,” replied Deputy Solicitor General Timothy Osterhaus, who argued for DCF.

But Osterhaus argued that gay men and lesbians as a group can nonetheless be excluded from adoption because of what he asserted are on higher rates of domestic violence, psychiatric disorders, and breakups.

DCF brought the two boys who are now at the center of this dispute to Martin Gill in December 2004 when the boys were 4 years and 4 months old. The trial judge who granted Gill’s adoption petition concluded the older boy was the baby's primary caregiver when the state interceded and they clearly had been poorly taken care of.

The trial judge, Cindy Lederman, ruled in favor of Gill’s adoption last November, saying Gill and his partner have provided the boys with a stable and nurturing home.

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Posted by NewsEditor -- 27 Aug 2009 11:27 AM (PT)

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NJ Catholic bishops target marriage equality

Catholic bishops in New Jersey have launched a campaign against marriage equality in anticipation of a possible vote on the issue by state legislators sometime after the November election, the Star Ledger reports. Bishops in the state last week directed Catholic priests throughout the state to print in parish bulletins a 2,300-word letter opposing marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples. They also directed priests to speak against equal marriage rights from the pulpit after Labor Day. The document, signed by five Roman Catholic bishops and a Byzantine bishop, takes a less critical view of civil unions for gay couples. Those legal arrangements are currently available in New Jersey. The arrangement was meant to grant same-sex couples the same rights as married heterosexual couples, but several reports have said it the program falls short of that goal. “Same-sex civil unions may represent a new and a different type of institution, one in which government grants to same-sex couples benefits and protections, but same sex unions are not marriage,” the bishops write.

Source: N.J. bishops target same-sex unions - NJ.com

Posted by NewsEditor -- 27 Aug 2009 10:18 AM (PT)

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After lawsuit, NY school district agrees to step in against bullying

Posted by NewsEditor  at 9:38 AM (PT)
In: law, schools
Thursday August 27, 2009
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School administrators agreed this week to take steps to protect a 14-year-old student at an upstate New York high school from the escalating harassment he’s faced for the past two years.

But the agreement came only after a lawsuit was filed against the school by New York Civil Liberties Union.

Jacob, a 14-year-old student at Gregory B Jarvis Junior/Senior High School in Mohawk, NY, endured escalating harassment the past two years for his sexual orientation and for not conforming to masculine stereotypes, according to a statement released today by NYCLU.

NYCLU filed suit against the school district last week.

The lawsuit says that the student, who is identified only by his first name, suffered near-constant verbal assault from other students at the school. His personal property has been defaced and broken, and he was regularly pushed and had things thrown at him, according to the lawsuit. This past year, a student knocked Jacob down the stairs and sprained his ankle. Another student brought a knife to school and threatened to kill him.

“We are pleased the school district has finally recognized that it must act to protect our client’s safety, but this agreement is just a first step,” said Donna Lieberman, NYCLU executive director in a statement.

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El Paso, Texas adds benefits for unmarried city employees

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After a week of heated demonstrations against the benefits by conservative religious groups, the El Paso city council voted 7-1 Tuesday to extend health insurance coverage to the unmarried partners of city employees.

More than 40 people spoke briefly before council members voted 7-1 in favor of the benefit program, El Paso Times reports.

El Paso is the third large city in Texas to offer health care to partners of unmarried city employees, according to the Times. Similar benefit programs are offered in Dallas and Austin.

Because the proposed ordinance had come under fire from several area preachers, Equality Texas issued an action alert on its website early this week urging local supporters to contact El Paso city council members.

“I simply came here today to ask you to consider all of us as equals,” said a woman who attended the meeting with her husband. 

“Jesus always was on the side of the oppressed,” said Van English, a gay man, who urged council members to approve the benefit plan, the Times reports.

Some people in the packed crowd wore pictures of Jesus on their T-shirts and waved bibles, KFOX TV reports.

“God created marriage between one man and one woman. God clearly tells us that sexual immorality undermines marriage,” said Barney Field, executive director of El Paso for Jesus.

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Posted by NewsEditor -- 27 Aug 2009 8:30 AM (PT)

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Attacker convicted in brutal Dallas gay bashing

Posted by NewsEditor  at 4:14 PM (PT)
In: crime, hate crimes, trial
Wednesday August 26, 2009

Source: Dallas Voice, Dallas Morning News

image Jimmy Lee Dean told a jury that his face had to be “meshed together” by doctors after a brutal July 2008 attack

Bobby Jack Singleton was found guilty today by a Dallas jury of aggravated robbery for a gay-bashing attack that has been called one of the most brutal anti-gay hate crimes Dallas has seen in recent memory

In July, 2008, Singleton, 31, and Jonathan Gunter, 33, both of Garland, brutally beat Jimmy Lee Dean shortly after midnight in a neighborhood about a block away from a strip that includes several gay clubs.

Gunter was convicted in March of aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon and sentenced to 30 years in prison for the attack.

Although Dallas Police categorized the assault as anti-gay hate crime for FBI reporting purposes, the prosecutors office said last year that the Texas hate crimes statute would not allow prosecutors to ask for longer sentences. They said both men would face the maximum 99-year sentence for the “aggravated robbery”.

A witness to the attack told jurors Tuesday during Singleton’s trial that the two assailants shouted anti-gay epithets both during and after the attack.

They beat Dean in the head and face with a 9mm handgun and kicked him as he lay on the ground, the jury was told.

Prosecutors played for the jury this morning an audio recording of a phone call from jail in which Singleton told the person on the other end of the line that he was going to lie and say he was gay so that prosecutors couldn’t say he attacked victim Jimmy Lee Dean because Dean is gay, Dallas Morning News reports.

On the recording, he also laughs when talking about the beating, according to the News.

Earlier in the trial, prosecutors entered into evidence a signed statement by Singleton in which he admitted to taking part in the attack.

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White privilege / gay ‘community’

At Queerty, of all places, appears a must-read commentary entitled, “Lest You Forget, the Whitewashed Image of Gay Americans Is Wholly Inaccurate”.

The post has set off a flurry of comments on the site and on Twitter that, in many ways, reinforce the point of the article.

The timely article, written by Chris MacDonald-Dennis, is brief and too the point, like most posts at Queerty, but far from the kind of snarky take on a subject that is the site’s expected style.

MacDonald-Dennis writes:

White privilege is a set of advantages that white people benefit from on a daily basis not afforded to people of color. White privilege can exist without white people’s conscious knowledge of its presence and it helps to maintain the racial hierarchy in this country. The biggest problem with white privilege is the invisibility it maintains to those who benefit from it most.

It’s a useful reminder, given the much-publicized examples of offended white privilege that were seen during the  confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and during all-too-many of the recent “town hall” mobs that were ostensibly about health care reform.

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Posted by Robin Evans -- 26 Aug 2009 2:05 PM (PT)

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Gay captain’s promotion in SoCal shows barriers are falling for gay cops

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Being openly gay and working in law enforcement hasn't always been easy, the highest-ranking openly gay man in one of the nation's largest sheriff's departments, told his local, generally conservative, newspaper after his recent promotion to captain in the Riverside County Sheriff's Department.

Raymond Gregory told the Riverside Press Enterprise that the Sheriff's Department and society have come a long way since he first joined the department. He told the paper’s reporter, Sonja Bjelland, that he and his family have been accepted into the social society that comes with being in law enforcement, but he has also heard rumors of a station not wanting him to work there.

As long as people believe it’s a choice to be gay, Gregory said, according to Bjelland, they are still going to believe they do not have to honor diversity.

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Posted by Robin Evans -- 26 Aug 2009 12:46 PM (PT)

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Anchorage Assembly doesn’t have votes for rights veto override

   ::: The Anchorage Assembly met Tuesday night without making a move to override the August 17 veto by Mayor Dan Sullivan of the city’s expanded anti-discrimination ordinance. The measure would guarantee equal rights in employment, housing, finance, and public accommodations for LGBT people. The Assembly has 21 days after the veto to vote on a possible override, but so far there are not enough votes to do so. The measure passed on a 7-4 vote, but eight votes would be needed to override the veto. Assembly Chairwoman Debbie Ossiander is considered the most likely swing vote, but she told Anchorage Daily News before Tuesday’s meeting that she still opposes the measure, despite a flood of letters and emails urging her to vote for an override. “At this point, I can’t amend it, as much as I’d like to,” she said of the ordinance. “It’s either take this or leave it.” She made it clear she’s ready to leave it.

Source: Assembly makes no move to override gay-rights veto: Anti-Discrimination ordinance | adn.com

Posted by NewsEditor -- 26 Aug 2009 11:45 AM (PT)

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