GLBT DIGEST - December 20, 2006

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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org


Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, NY, December 19, 2006

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061219/OPINION02/612190326/1039/OPINION

Give gay couples right to marry, to be bound by marriage vows

Jacqueline Siwicki, guest essayist

It is hard in this day and age to really believe in commitment and thesanctity of marriage. The entertainment industry bombards us with messagesthat put a negative spin on marriage. On the TV show The Bachelor, a manshops from a display case of women to marry. These "marriages" never last,but the couple keeps the prize money. And, of course, endless numbers ofcelebrities marry and divorce within hours, days or months. These lovelessunions make headlines, but little sense.

The reality of marriage is just as grim. The New York Times has reportedthat for the first time in U.S. history, there are more unmarried loversliving together than married couples. And, 50 percent of marriages end indivorce.




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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: December 19, 2006
Luis Vizcaino | Phone: 202/216.1547 | Cell: 310/869.5700
Brad Luna | Phone: 202/216.1514 | Cell: 202/812.8140

President Signs Ryan White Reauthorization

WASHINGTON - The following statement was made today by Joe Solmonese,President of the Human Rights Campaign, upon signage by the President ofthe United States of the reauthorization of the Ryan White CARE Act.Before adjourning for the year, Congress passed this critical life-linefor over half a million low-income Americans living with HIV/AIDS.

"We are pleased that a bipartisan Congress and the President were ableto come together and agree on the reauthorization of the Ryan White CareAct and officially sign it into law today," said Joe Solmonese,President of the Human Rights Campaign. "This critical life-savingpiece of legislation will help over a half million low-income Americansliving with HIV/AIDS continue to receive the medical care they sodesperately need. However, as we head into a new year and a newCongress we will aggressively push to ensure that the years ofinsufficient funding of this program be corrected. If our government isserious about combating this epidemic we must not allow rhetoric to maskitself as real action."




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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org


Lambda Legal Files Lawsuit on Behalf of Woman Whose Job Offer Was RevokedBecause She is Transgender

'When the HR Director found out the company offered a job to a transgenderperson, the offer was rescinded.'

Source: Lambda Legal

http://www.lambdalegal.org/cgi-bin/iowa/news/publications.html?record=2098

(Houston, Texas, December 18, 2006) - Today, Lambda Legal has filed papersin federal court in the Southern District of Texas on behalf of atransgender woman whose employment offer was rescinded because she istransgender.

"When the HR Director found out the company offered a job to a transgenderperson, the offer was rescinded," said Cole Thaler, Transgender RightsAttorney at Lambda Legal. "Even though Izza was the best applicant for thejob, the company decided that it didn't want a transgender employee andclaimed that she 'misrepresented' herself."


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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org


New Brunswick Home News Tribune, NJ, December 19, 2006

http://www.thnt.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061219/OPINION01/612190398/1079

Editorial--Approval of civil unions is big step in journey

It is a sign of how quickly mores and mind-sets change that although NewJersey is on the brink of becoming just the third state in the nation torecognize civil unions of homosexual couples, the legislation - whichwhizzed through the Legislature in little more than a week following anorder from the state Supreme Court and is expected to be signed promptly bythe governor - already is being viewed as a disappointment by gay couples.Civil unions might once have been the substance of all things hoped for. Nowsame-sex couples want the word and the institution that has come downthrough the generations; they want nothing less than marriage.




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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org



365Gay.com, December 19, 2006

http://www.365gay.com/Newscon06/12/121906vaAbuse.htm

Virginia Group Receives State Grant To Study Gay Domestic Violence by
365Gay.com Newscenter Staff

(Richmond, Virginia) Equality Virginia has received state money to establishan anti-domestic violence project, even though Virginia has what isdescribed as the most repressive laws barring the recognition of same-sexrelationships in the country.

The funding comes from the Virginia Sexual and Domestic Violence Victim Fundat the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services.

It will support the initial two years of the program and will allow for astatewide needs assessment survey of GLBT Virginians and will help identifyresources for those affected.




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The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/19/AR2006121901282_pf.html


Episcopalians Against Equality

By Harold Meyerson
Wednesday, December 20, 2006; A23

Don't look now, but Virginia is seceding again.

On Sunday nine Episcopal parishes in Virginia, including the one whereGeorge Washington served as a vestryman, announced that they had voted to upand leave the U.S. Episcopal Church to protest its increasingly equaltreatment of homosexuals.

In 2003 an overwhelming majority of the nation's Episcopal bishops ratifiedthe selection of a gay bishop by the New Hampshire diocese. This past Junethe church's general convention elevated Nevada Bishop Katharine JeffertsSchori to the post of presiding U.S. bishop. Jefferts Schori is the firstwoman to head a national branch of the Anglican Church. Worse yet, she hasallowed the blessing of same-sex couples within her diocese (which includesthe ever theologically innovative Las Vegas).

Whether it was the thought of a woman presiding over God's own country clubor of gays snuggling under its eaves, it was all too much for a distinctminority of Episcopalians. The dissident parishes in the Virginia diocesecontain only about 5 percent of the state's parishioners. But it's thechurch the defectors have latched on to that makes this schism news.




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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com

http://uk.gay.com/article/5212


Papal assault on pro-gay woman
Hassan Mirza
GAY.COM
18 December, 2006
more articles by Hassan Mirza

A gay marriage supporter was viciously attacked near Boston when shedemonstrated against Catholic Citizenshop's anti-gay rally.

Sarah Loy, 27, a straight female gay marriage supporter, went to a rallyorganised by conservative groups VoteOnMarriage and Catholic Citizenship inWorchester, Massachusetts, the only state where gay marriage is legal.

Loy, who attended with her husband, and a few other gay supporters, went tothe rally and staged a counter-protest. Loy held a sign saying "Nodiscrimination in the Constitution" in reference to Conservative efforts toabolish gay marriage on a federal level.



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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com

http://www.365gay.com/Newscon06/12/121806haggard.htm


Haggard's Church Begins Hunt For Other 'Wrongdoers'
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff

Posted: December 19, 2006 - 12:01 am ET

(Colorado Springs, Colorado) The church of disgraced pastor Ted Haggard isencouraging its members to blow the whistle on others in the mega church whohave committed 'sexual indiscretions' or other misdeeds.

And it didn't take long for a name to surface.

Christopher Beard, who headed a ministry the New Life Church that trainedyoung adults in leadership skills, has stepped down after admitting to anincident of sexual misconduct several years ago and a series of decisionsdisplaying poor judgment.

Church elders declined to disclose what the sexual misconduct involved,except to say it did not involve minors.



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Anything But Straight
by Wayne Besen
http://www.waynebesen.com/


http://www.waynebesen.com/2006/12/science-strikes-back.html
December 19, 2006

Science Strikes Back

University lecturers left their classrooms this week to lecture Focus on theFamily's James Dobson to tell him he has no class. The tenured were teed offand staged a revolt because they were revolted by how Dobson had pervertedtheir work in TIME magazine. In a guest column criticizing Mary Cheney,Dobson justified his trashing of gay families by citing the work of renownedresearchers. But instead of allowing their work to be distorted, thescholars hollered and told Dobson to stop lying for the Lord.

The first professor to profess her displeasure was Dr. Carol Gilligan, arenowned psychologist and author of In a Different Voice. Gilligan has alsotaught at Harvard and University of Cambridge and has more degrees than athermometer. She is so well-respected that Dobson tried to justify hisargument against same-sex families in TIME by citing her work. The deviousgoal of Dobson was to force reasonable people to think, "If a learnedscholar likes Gilligan says gay families are harmful, maybe Focus on theFamily is right."



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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com

http://www.ajc.com/search/content/edchapa1218.html


How religious beliefs shape today's issues

By Rebeca Chapa
San Antonio Express-News
Published on: 12/18/06


It takes guts to do what Joel Hunter did two weeks ago.

The president-elect of the powerful Christian Coalition of America steppeddown from that lofty post because the organization was unwilling to take onthe "issues that Jesus would want us to care about," Hunter said at thetime.

Those issues include poverty, AIDS, pollution and climate change.

Hunter resigned during a board meeting. The coalition, created in 1989 byPat Robertson, later released a statement that cited "differences ofphilosophy and vision."

Hunter told the media: "They pretty much said, 'These issues are fine, butthey're not our issues, that's not our base.' "

Hunter is also a signatory to the Evangelical Climate Initiative, astatement that acknowledges a human role in climate change and a moralobligation to address it.


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