¡ IGUALDAD DE DERECHOS A COMO DE LUGAR !

(Honolulu) Six gay couples in Hawaii are filing a lawsuit Thursday asking for the same rights as married couples, three weeks after Gov. Linda Lingle vetoed a same-sex civil unions measure.

The lawsuit doesn’t seek the titles of “marriage” or “civil unions” for gay partners. Instead, it requests that the court system extend them the benefits and responsibilities of marriage based on the Hawaii Constitution’s prohibition against sex discrimination.

“We continue to be discriminated against,” said plaintiff Suzanne King, who has been in a relationship with her partner for 29 years. “We’re a family unit, and we live our lives just like everyone else, but we aren’t treated the same.”

The legal action in state court comes as a response to the Republican governor’s veto July 6, when she said voters should decide whether to reserve marriage for couples of a man and a woman.

Five other states and the District of Columbia permit same-sex marriage. Five more states essentially grant the rights of marriage to same-sex couples without authorizing marriage itself.

Hawaii passed the nation’s first “defense of marriage” constitutional amendment in 1998, giving the state’s legislature the power to reserve marriage to opposite-sex couples. The amendment is silent on civil unions and rights for same-sex couples.

Most Hawaii residents don’t want the government to endorse equal rights for gay couples, said Garret Hashimoto, chairman for the Hawaii Christian Coalition.

“I feel insulted. They keep bringing up Martin Luther King, black rights and women’s sufferage. This is not about that. This is about two males or two females practicing sex,” he said. “It’s behavior. It’s no different from smokers or drinkers.”

The office of Hawaii Attorney General Mark Bennett declined comment Wednesday because it hadn’t yet been served with the lawsuit.

The state grants some rights to gay couples through its reciprocal beneficiaries system.

But they lack the same legal priviledges and obligations of adoption, child support, alimony and access to family court, said Jennifer Pizer, senior counsel for Lambda Legal, which is bringing the case along with the American Civil Liberties Union.

“This case is not about marriage. It’s about the right of same-sex couples to at least have a system that is understandable and complete,” Pizer said. “The state’s equality guarantee at least has to mean same-sex couples should have the same rights and responsibilities, even if it’s segmented off into a system that isn’t as respected, understood and revered as marriage.”

The case likely won’t be settled until it reaches the Hawaii Supreme Court, or if state lawmakers and the next governor approve a new civil unions bill, Pizer said.

Advocate.com-Associated Press/07.29.2010

Protesta en el Capitolio: Presión a Pelosi

Todos arrestados...

Eight people were arrested during a sit-in staged by the direct action group GetEqual in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol Wednesday as part of an effort to push House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to take a vote on the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, legislation that would outlaw workplace discrimination against people based on their sexual orientation and gender identity.

“In March, GetEqual held a sit-in in Pelosi’s office asking her to bring ENDA to the floor for a vote. At that point, we said we would keep coming back until it was voted on," explained Heather Cronk, GetEqual spokesperson, who participated in the protest as an observer. "So this is us making good on our promise, asking her to make good on her promise over the last few years on ENDA.”

A spokesperson for the Speaker said ENDA was still in the queue for a vote but encouraged activists to focus their energy on the Senate.

“Passing ENDA this year is a top priority for the Speaker, but we believe that passing ENDA before DADT repeal has been finalized, jeopardizes both initiatives," said Drew Hammill. “Until then, the LGBT community should encourage the Senate to develop a course for ENDA to ensure that when the House passes the legislation, the Senate can move quickly to send the legislation to the President’s desk.”

The group of about 20 LGBT activists entered the building as part of a routine tour through the Capitol. Upon reaching the rotunda, they pulled out signs reading, “Pass ENDA Now” and “Pelosi: This Is Your Reminder.” Before sitting down in the center of the rotunda, they began a variation on their signature chant, "Speaker Pelosi ... I am ... somebody ... I deserve ... job protections."

Eight people volunteered to risk arrest in the action, with the other half present to provide support including a couple legal observers. But the support people along with tourists and reporters were quickly removed by Capitol police, according to Cronk, leaving only the eight "riskables" seated in the rotunda. The eight who were arrested include: Orelia Busch, Charles Butler, Sean Carlson, Shannon Cuttle, Robert Diesu, Erika Knepp, David McElhatton (legal name: Sarah McElhatton), and Zack Rosen.

Pelosi told attendees at last weekend’s Netroots Nation conference for progressive bloggers that they should hold her accountable, though she stopped short of promising a vote on ENDA.

“I can’t give you a time, but I can tell you that it is a priority,” Pelosi said during a Q&A in a room of roughly 1,000 conference attendees. “To do it this year, we have to finish ‘don’t ask, don’t tell.’ And hopefully we can do them both this year.”

Cronk said the group chose the rotunda because it symbolizes “America’s commitment to justice, equality, and freedom.” At the beginning of the tour, she noted they had been shown a film with narration stating, “This is the core – the center – of our experiment with political freedom.”

But she added that GetEqual plans to take its show out of Washington and on the road during the August recess (Aug. 9 – Sept. 10), when lawmakers will be back in their home districts.

“We’ll be taking our actions into the states,” she said. “We plan to hold other lawmakers accountable and we intend to help those lawmakers who haven’t made a commitment to ENDA yet to do so.”

Cronk said GetEqual was consulting with other national organizations, researching the public whip count at Act on Principles, and getting feedback from other LGBT advocates who walk the halls of Congress to determine whom to target.

Advocate.com/July 28, 2010/Kerry Eleveld

JUEZ FEDERAL SORPRENDE A LA COMUNIDAD GAY EN ARIZONA

Un juez federal sorprendió a todos hace unos días con un “injunction” contra el estado de Arizona, la acción judicial evita que el estado ponga en vigor una ley que quitaría los beneficios a parejas domésticas lesbianas y gay emplead@s por el estado.

Palabras del Juez Federal John Sedwick: “Contrario a lo que el estado sugiere, es desigualdad (no equitativo) el atribuír el déficit presupuestario a los empleados homosexuales tanto como lo sería el atribuírlo a cualquier otra clase única, como lo serían empleados de ojos verdes o pelo rojo”. Según AZCentral.

La ley tendría efecto el 1ro de octubre y hubiera quitado la cubierta de beneficios a toda pareja doméstica, homosexual o heterosexual (no casados) y a los hijos de estas parejas. Advocate.com/July26,2010/ Michelle Garcia

CORTE SUPREMA NEW JERSEY SOBRE EL MATRIMONIO GAY

(Trenton, NJ) The New Jersey Supreme Court has declined to hear a case from six same-sex couples seeking the right to marry, saying the case needs to wind its way through the lower courts first.

Gay couples unsuccessfully sued New Jersey four years ago for the right to marry. They claim that by creating civil unions, the state has not fulfilled a court order to treat them the same as heterosexual couples seeking to marry.

The Supreme Court said Monday that it cannot consider whether the civil union law provides equal rights to gay couples until there is a trial record.

The justices were split 3-3, one vote shy of the four needed for the motion to be granted.

365gay.com-Associated Press/July26,2010/

MAINE y La Igualdad en el Matrimonio

Una derrota nos deja marcadas lecciones que nos ayudan en el camino sobre todo al hablar de un tema tan importante como lo es la campaña sobre igualdad en el matrimonio. Jesse Connoly, jefe de la campaña en Maine; sorprendentemente es heterosexual pero más aun sorprende su incansable compromiso con la causa, llamándola “su causa de vida”. Hoy examina los tramos y detalles de la campaña derrota para lograr un triunfo en el futuro. Veamos lo que este líder tiene que aportar…

The manager for the "No on 1" campaign in Maine that sought to keep voters there from overturning marriage-equality legislation last fall pondered the lessons of the unsuccessful effort at a Netroots Nation panel in Las Vegas on Thursday.

“This is still very painful for us to talk about. We put forth a campaign that we thought was going to be the first one in the nation to win,” he said of him and his fellow panelists, Julia Rosen with the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Adam Bink of OpenLeft.com, and Joe Sudbay of AmericaBlog.com, all of whom worked closely with the campaign in different capacities.

Connolly thanked the room of activists for engaging so thoughtfully in rehashing the effort. “This is something that, for a straight ally like me, is one the most important things in my life — to figure out how we win these campaigns,” he said.

Connolly spoke to The Advocate following the panel.

During the panel you said that you thought running a marriage equality campaign during an off-year election was disadvantageous. Why?

If you look at some of the voter turnout rate, we had to spend a lot of our time and resources pushing people to get out and vote, and that took away from resources that we could have otherwise used to persuade persuadable voters. It’s always helpful to have other things that voters are excited about. Equality might be important for them but might not be the one thing that gets them out to vote.

Of course if you look [at the bill that added nondiscrimination protections in Maine], it failed in '98 and failed again in 2000, and then finally we passed it in 2005. So there’s no guarantees, but I think it’s a helpful framework for these campaigns.

What do you think the other side did best in terms of messaging?

Well, they did a lot of things well. But the one ad that I think was an interesting play for them was an ad in the last week to 10 days; it was uplifting and said gay and lesbian families have all the rights they need [through that state’s current domestic partnerships], so it’s OK to vote “yes” [and overturn the marriage equality law].

After they hammered us on schools and the idea of gay sex being taught in the schools, they switched to this uplifting tone that I thought was very strategic on their part — basically giving voters permission to vote against us without feeling bad about it for those that might have been on the fence.

Have you had any second thoughts about your own messaging?

I think the messaging that we put forth was very strong, I think the consulting team that did our TV spots did a great job of executing the message we were running on.

I think the bigger question is around the timing of the election, wondering why our supporters didn’t go vote. Those are more burning questions versus the coulda/woulda/shouldas on messaging. We were trying to boost turnout and put messages up there that encouraged people to go voted. But as we look through our data, there was a swath of voters who didn’t go vote and we need to try to understand why they didn’t.

Advocate.com/July 22,2010/Kerry Eleveld

Notas Sueltas...de Méjico y de Hollywood

MÉJICO: DEPTO DE TURISMO CON NUEVA OFICINA TURISMO GAY

Asegura el secretario de turismo dicha entidad que el sector turístico gay gasta casi un 50% más que el turismo familiar o de otro tipo.

El Secretario de turismo de la ciudad de México, Alejandro Rojas Díaz, estuvo presente en el acto de inauguración de dicha oficina.. En el acto, declaró que la ciudad de México merecía una oficina así desde hace tiempo, porque tiene todos los elementos necesarios para convertirse en el destino latinoamericano gayfriendly preferido.

“Este sector de la población es importante puesto que gasta un promedio de 47% más que un turista convencional” aseguró Rojas “además, a este segmento corresponde el 15% del total del turismo mundial. Si se contemplan mil millones de turistas anualmente en el mundo, 150 millones son turistas LGBT” aseguró el funcionario.

El secretario también dijo que la Ciudad de México se ha ido convirtiendo en uno de los lugares preferidos por los visitantes homosexuales porque promueve la convivencia entre ese sector, lo que queda demostrado con la reciente legalización del matrimonio entre personas del mismo sexo en esa ciudad.

Jaime Rogel, uno de los integrantes del comité que se hará cargo de la nueva oficina, dijo que según estudios de la IGLTA, al menos el 55% de la población homosexual, viaja tres veces por año y un 33% lo hace cinco veces en el mismo tiempo. Universogay.com/24 de julio,2010/Valentina

Qué bien, al fín se acepta públicamente la realidad de que la población gay tiene más tiempo y dinero para gastar en vacaciones. ¿Me pregunto si esa será también la motivación de otros gobiernos para cambiar sus leyes? Cualquiera que sea la motivación, bienvenida sea porque es un cambio positivo en la historia y a la postre re-obtenemos derechos que nunca hemos debido de perder y que son inherentes a cualquier ser humano...

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De Hollywood…

El publicista Howard Bragman decidió producir una nueva serie televisiva con el tema “Saliendo del Closet”/ “Coming out of the closet”. ¿¡Se copiaron del Cecilia La Luz!?

Bragman, quién también es gay, ha sido el representante de celebridades tales como Chaz Bono, Chely Wright y Meredith Baxter las cuales salieron del closet mientras estaban vinculadas con Bragman.

El nombre del show será “Saliendo”/“Coming out” y aparentemente la misión del mismo será perseguir celebridades que estén en el closet para sacarlos a “La Luz”públicamente. ¡Y dale con Cecilia La Luz!

¿Me pregunto si será esto ilegal, la persecución de celebridades en sus viajes? ¿Será que en otros países escaparán de ser acusados de hostigar gente famosa? Veremos que se tren entre manos.

En Los Ángeles, durante el Outfest : Gay & lesbian Film Festival, Bragman como panelista del mismo, se pronunció acerca de la vida de una celebridad en el closet, diciendo que era triste ver que una celebridad en el closet. “Que si había actores varones en el closet y tenían un valor de $100 millones y su vida entera no era real, no había nada más triste que eso”. Además se reportó que Bragman anunció al público presente que le hicieran referidos de figuras públicas que quisieran salir del closet para que así tengan un gran oportunidad en TV. 365gay.com/July23,2010/Shamecca Harris.

A los que creemos que la encuesta a los militares es una injuria...

¡ Según Maquiavelo, la historia se repite y esta encuesta NO es la primera!

When the Department of Defense distributed 400,000 online surveys to enlisted troops to gauge their opinions on gays in the military, there was an uproar. Many argued that nobody would have surveyed soldiers about racially integrating the military 60 years ago.

Well, the Pentagon corrected this misconception last week when it revealed that in fact, soldiers were surveyed about integrating blacks and whites in the military.

“Prior to President Truman’s 1948 executive order integrating the armed forces,” said DOD spokesperson Cynthia Smith, “Our preliminary research shows that branches of the armed forces undertook a number of modestly sized surveys of the attitudes of enlisted and nonenlisted troops concerning racial issues, integration, and morale.”

A 1947 survey to enlisted soldiers found that “An overwhelming majority of the men feel that Negro and white soldiers should be separated both during and after training.”

The survey also asked for soldiers to agree or disagree with the statement: “There is nothing good about Jews.” Eighty-six percent of enlisted troops agreed.

The survey found that “four out of five white enlisted men are opposed to the idea of having Negro and white soldiers in the same units even if they do not eat in the same mess or sleep in the same barracks.”

Just seven percent thought the military should be integrated. The survey was collected in 1947; the next year, President Truman mandated the military to be integrated. This was twenty years before the last laws prohibiting interracial marriage were repealed.

On Thursday, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow commented on the survey and its relation to the recent survey of soldiers about gays in the military.

“There are rights that are guaranteed to us all by the constitution. These rights are not up to a vote,” said Maddow. “This is America and the rights of man are inalienable no matter what skeeves you out.” “The results of that survey will be interesting, but they will also be completely irrelevant of whether or not this policy should and will be changed.”

365gay.com/July23,2010/Celeste Lavin