by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 30, 2005 5:00 pm ET

(Bari, Italy) Pope Benedict XVI has met his first openly gay elected official - an outspoken LGBT activist recently elected governor of Puglia.

Nicchi Vendola, who lives with his same-sex partner and describes himself as gay, Catholic and communist, sports a gold earring and has frequently attacks the Vatican's position on gay marriage.

The meeting occurred in Bari on Sunday, as the pope made his first trip outside Rome since his election six weeks ago.

When the pontiff's helicopter touched down and Benedict stepped off, Vendola was all smiles, proclaiming that the papal visit was "a cause of joy for me and for all the people of Puglia."
But, the day before, Vendola in a local newspaper interview, assailed Rome's opposition to same-sex unions.

"Recognition of civil unions does not represent any threat to the institution of marriage and the family. There is a reality of loving co-operation which asks to be granted the dimension of a citizen's right," he said.

Before becoming pope, Benedict as Cardinal Ratzinger was the Vatican's most outspoken opponent of same-sex unions.

Ratzinger was the author of the a 2003 Vatican directive to priests around the world calling for a proactive stand to stop governments from legalizing same-sex marriage and for a repeal of those those already on the books that give rights, including adoption, to gay couples.

The 12 page document called on Catholic bishops and lawmakers to oppose the legalization of same-sex unions.

Ratzinger opposes contraception and the use of condoms to combat HIV/AIDS. He advocates a diminished role for women in the Church and has called for mandatory celibacy for priests.

In 1999 he ordered two Americans, Sister Jeannine Gramick and Father Robert Nugent, to end their associated with New Ways Ministry which provides educational programs for gay and lesbian Catholics nationwide.

In an open air mass on Sunday in Bari, the pope did not mention gay marriage, instead concentrating on his desire to resolve differences with the Orthodox Church in the east.

posted by Anthony  # 7:11 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 30, 2005 5:00 pm ET

(Bari, Italy) Pope Benedict XVI has met his first openly gay elected official - an outspoken LGBT activist recently elected governor of Puglia.

Nicchi Vendola, who lives with his same-sex partner and describes himself as gay, Catholic and communist, sports a gold earring and has frequently attacks the Vatican's position on gay marriage.

The meeting occurred in Bari on Sunday, as the pope made his first trip outside Rome since his election six weeks ago.

When the pontiff's helicopter touched down and Benedict stepped off, Vendola was all smiles, proclaiming that the papal visit was "a cause of joy for me and for all the people of Puglia."
But, the day before, Vendola in a local newspaper interview, assailed Rome's opposition to same-sex unions.

"Recognition of civil unions does not represent any threat to the institution of marriage and the family. There is a reality of loving co-operation which asks to be granted the dimension of a citizen's right," he said.

Before becoming pope, Benedict as Cardinal Ratzinger was the Vatican's most outspoken opponent of same-sex unions.

Ratzinger was the author of the a 2003 Vatican directive to priests around the world calling for a proactive stand to stop governments from legalizing same-sex marriage and for a repeal of those those already on the books that give rights, including adoption, to gay couples.

The 12 page document called on Catholic bishops and lawmakers to oppose the legalization of same-sex unions.

Ratzinger opposes contraception and the use of condoms to combat HIV/AIDS. He advocates a diminished role for women in the Church and has called for mandatory celibacy for priests.

In 1999 he ordered two Americans, Sister Jeannine Gramick and Father Robert Nugent, to end their associated with New Ways Ministry which provides educational programs for gay and lesbian Catholics nationwide.

In an open air mass on Sunday in Bari, the pope did not mention gay marriage, instead concentrating on his desire to resolve differences with the Orthodox Church in the east.

posted by Anthony  # 7:11 AM

by Fidel Ortega 365Gay.com Miami Bureau
Posted: May 30, 2005 8:00 pm ET

(Troy Michigan) Protests from conservative Christian parents over a poster in a Troy High School classroom that contained the message that "gay people are everyday people," has backfired.

Instead of forcing the school to remove the poster from the classroom other teachers have ordered copies for their rooms.

The poster had been on the wall in the English Department room for two years with no objections until earlier this month when a parent protested to the Troy School Board.

Anthony Cruz, 49, who has two daughters at the school said Troy High is supposed to concentrate on academics and leave other matters for after-school time and activities. Instead, the classroom poster has a "a captive audience," in students, Cruz said.

But Patricia Raezler, 55, a member of Parents Promoting Innocence in Bloomfield Hills, which supports Troy parents in the poster issue, said the school shouldn't be promoting sexuality of any kind.

"We are promoting innocence," said Raezler, whose children attend private school. "Once, these types of things were left up to the parents. Then there was a push to inform and let pupils know about sexuality. It hasn't decreased sexually transmitted diseases."

But, despite threats of retaliation by Cruz, 25 more posters have been ordered.

"Now there's going to be 26 at the school," Leslie Thompson, executive director of Affirmations Gay/Lesbian Community Center, which distributes the posters, told the Detroit News.

"I'm really rather proud of the district, the school and the teachers for standing by their gay students," she said. "(The poster) is really a strong message for those kids."

District spokesman Tim McAvoy confirmed that at least four new posters went up recently.
"The students requested the poster to show all people deserve respect and tolerance, and should not be harassed for any reason," McAvoy said. "The poster ensures student safety through a message of tolerance and respect."

But, Cruz isn't backing down, saying the posters promote a sexual lifestyle that is against Judeo-Christian beliefs.

"I am here to censor their attempts to promote that lifestyle on my children," he told the News. "We do not want them to try and change our children."

posted by Anthony  # 7:09 AM

by Ben Thompson 365Gay.com Ottawa Bureau
Posted: May 31, 2005 12:01 am ET


(Ottawa) Conservative Christian groups have grabbed control of nearly a dozen Conservative Party ridings across Canada and vow they will ensure the party adheres to a strict right wing agenda including an end to same-sex marriage.

Candidates with close ties the Canadian branches of groups including Focus on the Family and other American evangelical groups have won party nominations in three provinces: Four in British Columbia, three in Nova Scotia, and one in Ontario. The groups also have succeeded in having their members win votes to become riding association presidents elsewhere in the country.

And they say that it is only the beginning.

The Globe and Mail reports that the groups are preparing to put up candidates for Conservative Party nominations in other regions as the country prepares for an election late this year or early in 2005.

Even though the Conservative Party is the only federal party to oppose same-sex marriage, the right wing groups say they want to be assured that if a bill currently before Parliament to legalize gay marriage is passed it would be repealed by the next government.
But, not all Tories are in favor of the plans by FOC and others.

"The difficulty, from a party perspective, is that it begins to hijack the other agendas that parties have," Ross Haynes told the Globe and Mail. Haynes lost the Conservative nomination in the riding of Halifax to one of three "Christian, pro-family people" recommended by a minister at a religious rally this spring in Kentville, N.S.

Tristan Emmanuel, a Halifax evangelist with ties to Focus on the Family, makes not apologies.
"It's time we stopped apologizing and started defending who we are," he said. "The evangelical community in Canada, by and large, and socially conservative Catholics, are saying we have been far too heavenly minded and thus we have been of no earthly value for far too long, on too many fronts."

Darrel Reid, the Conservative Party candidate in Richmond, B.C., is a past president of Focus on the Family Canada. "The reason I entered this nomination contest is because I am really concerned about the direction our government is going," Reid told the Globe.

Rondo Thomas won the party's nomination in a suburban Toronto riding. Thomas is a top official with the Canada Christian College, which is run by Charles McVety, a senior director of the Defend Marriage Coalition.

Focus on the Family, based in Colorado Springs, Colorado has reportedly sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to its Canadian affiliate to wage an anti-gay campaign and the Roman Catholic Knights Of Columbus in the US recently spent nearly $100,000 to print two million postcards to be distributed in Catholic churches across Canada for people to send to Members of Parliament opposing gay marriage.

The growing number of anti-gay candidates is making some moderate Conservative MPs nervous. "It's making the party look extreme and making me nervous," said one MP who asked that his name not be used.

But, the growing coziness between Christian conservative groups and the party should not be a surprise.

In April Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper addressed a rally on Parliament Hill organized by many of the groups now trying to take control of the Tories.

At the time he told the 15,000 people bussed in from across Canada that if his party is elected to govern he would would abolish the same-sex marriage law.

Harper and the Conservatives have been receiving help from the Republican Party. GOP advisers and consultants have been working with the party for more than a year.

Earlier this month moderate Conservative MP Belinda Stronach left the party and joined the Liberals. Stronach, who supports same-sex marriage said she had become disillusioned with the Tories and accused Harper of pandering to extremists.

posted by Anthony  # 7:08 AM

by Mark Worrall 365Gay.com San Francisco Bureau
Posted: May 30, 2005 8:00 pm ET


(Sacramento, California) Legislation to allow California gays and lesbians to marry is coming down to the wire. The bill must gain approval in the Assembly this week or die.

It is one of dozens of pieces of legislation that must pass by Friday, forcing lawmakers to scramble to finish their business. With a week already shortened by the Memorial Day holiday the Assembly has extended its sessions throughout the week.

The marriage bill received final committee support last week. If it survives a vote in the Assembly it would still need to pass the Senate before moving to Gov. Schwarzenegger.
Equality California, the state's largest LGBT rights organization expressed optimism Monday that the bill would pass.

“It takes hard work to maintain a strong relationship and raise a family," EQCA Executive Director Geoffrey Kors told 365Gay.com.

"This legislation makes tens of thousands of relationships stronger and provides much needed protections to stay a family. We are very hopeful legislators will take a stand this week for equality for all families.”

The legislation is called the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act, and was authored by openly gay Assemblymember Mark Leno ( D-San Francisco).

The bill would require local clerks to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples but allow people opposed to gay marriage to refuse to conduct weddings.

A similar bill last year was pulled by Leno when it became obvious there were not enough votes to pass it. This time though, the measure has the support of Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez and other key Democrats. Last month the California Democratic Party passed a resolution supporting same-sex marriage.

Opponents of gay marriage are vowing a fight and have called on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to come out publicly against the legislation.

So far Schwarzenegger has sent mixed messages about whether he would sign the legislation if it were passed.

In a January meeting with the editorial board of the San Francisco Chronicle Schwarzenegger suggested that this may not be the best time to push gay marriage, saying that a legislative push to fully recognize marriage rights for gays might backfire.

"Eventually in a few years from now, you can readdress it again and see what the people of California think,'' he told the paper. "You cannot force-feed those kind of things.''

Last year in a Tonight Show appearance Schwarzenegger said gay marriage would be "fine with me" if it were enshrined in state law or ruled legal by the courts.

The issue of same-sex marriage also is slowly heading toward the California Supreme Court. Last month a San San Francisco judge ruled that state laws preventing gay marriage are illegal.

Meanwhile, a a conservative group called the "Voters' Right to Protect Marriage Initiative" has begun collecting signatures to have a proposed amendment to the California Constitution banning same-sex marriage placed on the 2006 ballot. If approved by voters it would not only bar gays and lesbians from marrying but also void the state's landmark domestic partner law.

Last week, LGBT groups and their supporters announced a broad coalition to combat any attempt to amend the Constitution.

posted by Anthony  # 7:07 AM

by Ben Thompson 365Gay.com Ottawa Bureau
Posted: May 31, 2005 12:01 am ET
(Ottawa) Conservative Christian groups have grabbed control of nearly a dozen Conservative Party ridings across Canada and vow they will ensure the party adheres to a strict right wing agenda including an end to same-sex marriage.

Candidates with close ties the Canadian branches of groups including Focus on the Family and other American evangelical groups have won party nominations in three provinces: Four in British Columbia, three in Nova Scotia, and one in Ontario. The groups also have succeeded in having their members win votes to become riding association presidents elsewhere in the country.

And they say that it is only the beginning.

The Globe and Mail reports that the groups are preparing to put up candidates for Conservative Party nominations in other regions as the country prepares for an election late this year or early in 2005.

Even though the Conservative Party is the only federal party to oppose same-sex marriage, the right wing groups say they want to be assured that if a bill currently before Parliament to legalize gay marriage is passed it would be repealed by the next government.

But, not all Tories are in favor of the plans by FOC and others.

"The difficulty, from a party perspective, is that it begins to hijack the other agendas that parties have," Ross Haynes told the Globe and Mail. Haynes lost the Conservative nomination in the riding of Halifax to one of three "Christian, pro-family people" recommended by a minister at a religious rally this spring in Kentville, N.S.

Tristan Emmanuel, a Halifax evangelist with ties to Focus on the Family, makes not apologies.
"It's time we stopped apologizing and started defending who we are," he said. "The evangelical community in Canada, by and large, and socially conservative Catholics, are saying we have been far too heavenly minded and thus we have been of no earthly value for far too long, on too many fronts."

Darrel Reid, the Conservative Party candidate in Richmond, B.C., is a past president of Focus on the Family Canada. "The reason I entered this nomination contest is because I am really concerned about the direction our government is going," Reid told the Globe.

Rondo Thomas won the party's nomination in a suburban Toronto riding. Thomas is a top official with the Canada Christian College, which is run by Charles McVety, a senior director of the Defend Marriage Coalition.

Focus on the Family, based in Colorado Springs, Colorado has reportedly sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to its Canadian affiliate to wage an anti-gay campaign and the Roman Catholic Knights Of Columbus in the US recently spent nearly $100,000 to print two million postcards to be distributed in Catholic churches across Canada for people to send to Members of Parliament opposing gay marriage.

The growing number of anti-gay candidates is making some moderate Conservative MPs nervous. "It's making the party look extreme and making me nervous," said one MP who asked that his name not be used.

But, the growing coziness between Christian conservative groups and the party should not be a surprise.

In April Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper addressed a rally on Parliament Hill organized by many of the groups now trying to take control of the Tories.

At the time he told the 15,000 people bussed in from across Canada that if his party is elected to govern he would would abolish the same-sex marriage law.

Harper and the Conservatives have been receiving help from the Republican Party. GOP advisers and consultants have been working with the party for more than a year.

Earlier this month moderate Conservative MP Belinda Stronach left the party and joined the Liberals. Stronach, who supports same-sex marriage said she had become disillusioned with the Tories and accused Harper of pandering to extremists.

posted by Anthony  # 7:01 AM

by Peter Moore 365Gay.com London Bureau
Posted: May 29, 2005 4:00 pm ET

(London) When Britain's new domestic partner law takes effect in December gay Anglican priests and their partners will be allowed to register, the Church has decided, but they cannot consummate their relationships.

The proposal has angered both gays and homophobes in the Church, but has the approval of Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams.

Same-sex domestic partnerships become legal in the UK December 5. Although they offer most of the same rights and responsibilities of marriage they cannot be called marriages.
Under the Civil Partnerships law, same-sex couples have inheritance rights to their partners' estates, hospital visitation rights, and the right to receive the spouses share of their partner's pension.

Anglican leaders in Britain say they have no choice but to follow the law. But, to register as a couple, a gay priest in a relationship will be required to provide his bishop with an assurance he will be celibate.

Conservatives in the worldwide Anglican faith have been battling what they see as a growing permissiveness toward gays since the election of Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire in the US in 2003.

In February leaders of the faith told the U.S. Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada to withdraw from the communion's councils temporarily, and to explain their attitudes toward gays.

The proposal to allow gay clergy to register their partnerships in Britain, but refrain from sex, must still be approved by the House of Bishops, the Church's highest body in the UK, but already it has renewed the animosity between conservatives and liberals in the Church and angered gays.

One gay priest labeled the plan as "preposterous".

The Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, and organization of LGBT Anglicans says that within the next five years it estimates that 1,500 gay clergy will have registered under the new law.

posted by Anthony  # 10:47 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 28, 2005 4:00 pm ET

(Austin, Texas) Legislation that would bar gays and lesbians from becoming adoptive parents in Texas has been dropped from a Child Protective Services and Adult Protective Services bill.
The bill, with the ban, had passed the House, but a Senate version passed without the provision.

Rep. Robert Talton (R-Pasadena) has been working to ban gay foster parents for the past two years.

"I don't think it is right for young children to be exposed to this type of behavior when they are young and innocent," Talton said during debate on the legislation last month.

"It is our responsibility to make sure that we protect our most vulnerable children and I don't think we are doing that if we allow a foster parent that is homosexual or bisexual."

The legislation would have required the Texas Department of Child Protective Services add a question to its forms for prospective foster parents inquiring whether the person is gay.
If the person answered yes they would be automatically disqualified.

The legislation also would have required the state to remove foster children already placed in the homes of gays or lesbians.

But, the provision ran up against tough opposition in the Senate.
A House-Senate committee, made up of five members from each chamber, that harmonized the bill so that it could be presented to each house for a final vote stripped out the anti-gay provision Friday.

"This bill was about reforming Child Protective Services and Adult Protective Services, and I certainly didn't want it to get side-tracked on an entirely different issue that was volatile," said Rep. Suzanna Hupp, R-Lampasas, who headed the conference committee with Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Lewisville, Senate sponsor of the legislation.

Talton refused to vote for the revised bill, vowing to bring a proposed gay ban back next year.
The new bill is expected to pass easily. It will provide for the hiring of more caseworkers, require better training and transfer duties for managing Child Protective Services foster care cases to private agencies as part of its effort to reform the troubled system.

posted by Anthony  # 10:46 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 28, 2005 4:00 pm ET


(Augusta, Maine) The Maine legislature is expected to debate a proposed amendment to the state constitution next week that would ban same-sex marriage.

But, if the reception the measure got in committee Friday is any indication, it will likely fail.
The Judiciary Committee split 7 - 5 along party lines with 7 of the eight Democrats voting against it and the 8th absent from the committee.

Even an attempt to "moderate" the amendment did not sway Democrats signaling its likely to be defeated in the Democratically controlled House.

The original provision would have not only banned gay marriage also block civil unions and domestic partner benefits. Under tough opposition from Democrats all but the marriage ban were removed. Even so, the measure got short shrift from Democrats.

Maine already has a so-called defense of marriage law that denies gays and lesbians the right to marry and Democrats say an amendment is not necessary.

"I have yet to see what the problem is," said Rep. Stan Gerzofsky (D-Brunswick). "I haven't had a groundswell of constituents in my town banging on my door or wearing out my e-mail on this issue."

"I understand how it might energize fundamentalist voters but I've yet to hear what public policy change will occur as a result of this bill," Rep. Sean Faircloth, D-Bangor, said after the vote.

But, Rep. Roderick Carr ( R-Lincoln) the bill's sponsor, said that "the traditional definition of marriage "establishes the foundation of our society."

Carr said that an amendment is the only way to prevent courts from one day striking down the current marriage ban.

Last year a similar measure was defeated in both houses on a largely party-line vote.

posted by Anthony  # 10:46 AM

by The Associated Press
Posted: May 28, 2005 12:01 am ET

(Minneapolis, Minnesota) A 27-year-old transsexual pastor will begin a two-year appointment as an outreach minister at Plymouth Congregational Church in Minneapolis.The Rev. Malcolm Himschoot is one of only a few openly transgendered clergy members in the U.S. But Plymouth leaders said they chose Himschoot for several other reasons."It speaks to us of the self-insight and courage that he has, but it was not the driver in our decision," said the Rev. James Gertmenian, Plymouth's senior minister. "He's got exceptional academic credentials. ... We were impressed he spent a year doing urban ministry in Denver, and he impressed us with the depth of his own spiritual vision."Plymouth, an independent Congregational church, is a liberal congregation with 1,800 members.For the past year, Himschoot, a Colorado native, has been associate pastor at Denver Inner City Parish, where he worked with students, seniors and ex-prisoners.He is getting the most attention for "Call Me Malcolm," a documentary about his bodily change from a woman to a man and about finding acceptance. The film was produced by the United Church of Christ, which ordained Himschoot.The film was well-received at recent film festivals in Los Angeles and Cleveland. It will have a two-week run at the Bell Auditorium in Minneapolis, starting June 24.Himschoot told the Star Tribune it will be interesting to see how much buzz the film gets before he moves to Minneapolis this summer. His job at Plymouth begins in August."We'll see how it goes," he said.Himschoot will move to town with his wife, Mariah Hayden.At Plymouth, Himschoot will focus on community programs. He'll work on affordable housing and at a drop-in center for the mentally ill. He also will preside at weddings, funerals, baptisms and other church events.Himschoot said he's looking forward to moving to Minneapolis and working at Plymouth, a church that he said "has a terrific history of neighborhood ministry and a progressive presence in the larger community."He said his own appointment was "a credit to the church that they looked at all applicants, including the transgendered one, equally."The Rev. Pat Conover, a transgendered UCC minister in Washington, D.C., and author of "Transgender Good News," said he wasn't surprised by Plymouth's decision."It takes some thought for a congregation to work this through, not necessarily because there's hostility. For a whole lot of people it doesn't make sense," Conover said.The United Church of Christ says it became the first mainline Christian denomination to ordain an openly transgendered minister a few years ago.Conover said he knows of four openly transgendered ministers and a few seminarians. But research and his own experience suggest congregations have been led by closeted transgendered ministers for years, he said.Conover said he wasn't open as a transgender person when he worked at a parish in the early 1980s."We did not have the word 'transgender' then," he said.Gertmenian said a number of people in the congregation have welcomed Himschoot's appointment. For others, he said, it may be harder."Realistically, we can say this is something that people will be interested in," he said. "We'll need to do some learning and adjustment. But the end of the story will be that we'll find out it doesn't matter."

posted by Anthony  # 10:45 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 27, 2005 7:30 pm ET


(Seattle, Washington) Microsoft announced Friday that it has severed ties with Ralph Reed, a conservative Republican lobbyist who once headed the Christian Coalition.

Reed a longtime opponent of LGBT civil rights had served as a political consultant to Microsoft.
He is is now running for lieutenant governor of Georgia. "It would not be appropriate to have a consultant on retainer that is seeking elective office at the same time," company spokeswoman Ginny Terzano said.

But, many within Microsoft and outside the company believe his departure has more to do with the massive public relations hit the computer software giant took with it was learned it had withdrawn its support for a gay civil rights bill in the Washington legislature.

The measure lost by a single vote in the Senate following Microsoft's move.

Microsoft's decision was taken after a meeting between company executives and the Rev. Ken Hutcherson, a Seattle evangelical minister and longtime associate of Reed.

Hutcherson allegedly threatened a national boycott of Microsoft if it did not disavow itself from the gay rights bill that would have made discrimination against members of the LGBT community illegal.

As details of the meeting emerged there was a storm of protest from Washington's gay community.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer then sent an email to employees claiming that the company had made its decision before the legislative session began that it should to narrow its focus on a shorter list of issues directly affecting the business.

But, that explanation, in light of details of the meeting between Microsoft and Hutcherson, failed to appease the company's sizable LGBT workforce or gays across the country. Even an attempt by Microsoft chair Bill Gates to quiet opposition failed.

"Next time this one comes around, we'll see," Gates told the Seattle Times on May 1. "We certainly have a lot of employees who sent us mail. Next time it comes around that'll be a major factor for us to take into consideration."

With the storm showing no sign of abating Microsoft came full circle, announcing that it would once again support LGBT civil rights

posted by Anthony  # 10:44 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 27, 2005 4:30 pm ET

(Denver, Colorado) Colorado Governor Bill Owens has vetoed a bill that would protect gays, lesbians and the transgendered against bias in the workplace.

The civil rights bill passed the legislature earlier this month. Similar bills were defeated in the Legislature for the past eight consecutive years.

In 1992 proposed civil rights protections were put to voters. The measure was passed but later struck down.

Republicans fought the current bill as it made its way through the legislature.

In the Senate, when it became clear they did not have the votes to defeat the legislation GOP lawmakers attempted to have protections for the transgendered removed.

House Republicans argued there was no need for the law, saying that businesses should have the right to fire an employee if the company fears the employee "could drive away customers."
After the legislation passed, conservative groups had appealed to Owens, a Republican, to veto it.

"The legislature sent a strong message against discrimination by passing this bill, unfortunately Governor Owens sent a stronger message by vetoing it," said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese.

"This veto is out of step with voters, and businesses across Colorado who stand against prejudice."

In announcing his veto Owens said that he would, however, sign an anti-hate crime bill that includes gays and lesbians that was also passed by the legislature, even though he does not support it.

Only one governor - then California Gov. Pete Wilson - has ever vetoed a measure prohibiting sexual orientation-based discrimination. Wilson then signed a measure adding sexual orientation anti-discrimination protections to the state's Labor Code law the next year.

Sixteen states and Washington, D.C., have laws that prohibit employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and six prohibit gender identity-based discrimination, including Colorado neighbor New Mexico.

posted by Anthony  # 10:44 AM

by Michael J. Meade 365Gay.com Boston Bureau
Posted: May 27, 2005 1:30 pm ET


(Boston, Massachusetts) The Supreme Judicial Court on Friday rejected a conservative bid to stop same-sex marriage in Massachusetts.

In a terse five sentence written ruling the court said that no new evidence had been presented that would alter the court's landmark ruling that allowed same-sex marriage to begin in the state just over a year ago.

"Nothing has transpired in the interim that materially changes the situation or which warrants the truly extraordinary measures sought now," the court wrote.

The suit had been brought by the Catholic Action League and its leader, C. Joseph Doyle.
Friday's ruling also noted that it had previously denied a bid to halt gay marriages by the League.

The league's lawyer, Chester Darling, told the justices in oral arguments earlier this month that same-sex marriage in the state should be halted until voters have a chance to decide the issue in a referendum.

The legislature voted last year to approve an amendment to the state constitution to ban same-sex marriage. The measure must get approval again in this session of the legislature before going to voters in 2006.

A vote by lawmakers will be held in the fall but it is uncertain if there are enough votes in the legislature to send it to the electorate.

On May 17, 2004 same-sex marriage became legal in the state. Since then about 6,200 same-sex couples have taken the plunge into matrimony.

Today's ruling was welcomed by Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders which won Goodridge, the original marriage case, at the Supreme Judicial Court.

“The court has affirmed our view that no harm has befallen anyone in the Commonwealth as the result of same-sex couples marrying in the state," said GLAD attorney Michele Granda. " Goodridge is the law of the Commonwealth, and nothing has happened to change that. Same-sex couples can continue going about their business and accessing all of the benefits, protections, and rights of marriage.”

posted by Anthony  # 10:43 AM

by Peter Moore 365Gay.com London Bureau
Posted: May 27, 2005 11:00 am ET
(London) Gay rocker Elton John and filmmaker partner David Furnish have ended months of speculation and announced the date they will exchange vows.
The celebrity couple will tie the knot on December 21 at their country home in Windsor.
“We are definitely going to do it and we’re not going to do it in secret,” John told Britain's ITV1.
Same-sex domestic partnerships become legal in the UK December 5. Under the civil unions law people entering into legal domestic partnerships must publicly announce their plans at least 15 days in advance.

Although the domestic partner registry offers most of the same rights and responsibilities of marriage they cannot be called marriages.

The couple has not said why they chose to enter a civil union in John's homeland rather than go to Canada where Furnish is a citizen and legally marry.

The 42-year-old Furnish is a noted film-maker. They have been together for 11 years.

"Meeting David has been the greatest thing to happen to me. Yes, we spend a lot of time apart and it's hard, but we make it work," Elton told a British newspaper last month, crediting Furnish with helping him get off drugs.

posted by Anthony  # 10:41 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 27, 2005 1:30 pm ET


(Albany, New York) New York State's highest court ruled on Friday that New Paltz mayor Jason West must stand trial on 24 counts of violating the state's domestic relations law for marrying same-sex couples without marriage licenses last year.

West performed the marriages in front of the village hall on Feb. 27, 2004.

The charges were dismissed last summer by a town court judge who said there were constitutional problems in banning same-sex marriages.

Ruling on an appeal from prosecutors, Ulster County Court Judge J. Michael Bruhn reinstated the charges earlier this year, ruling that the criminal case against West was not about the constitutionality of gay marriage, but whether West lived up to his oath of office to uphold the law.

West's lawyers sought to have the case heard directly by the New York Court of Appeals. In today's ruling the Appeals court said that the case must first be heard by lower courts.
West's attorney had no immediate comment on the ruling.

The mayor still has a motion to dismiss the charges "in the interest of justice" pending. The town court judge could dismiss the case.

Meanwhile, several cases by same-sex couples are working their way through the court system on their way to the Court of Appeals.

posted by Anthony  # 10:39 AM

May 27, 2005
New York Times
By GINIA BELLAFANTE
On a spring morning not long ago, Lura Stiller sat in her stocking feet in a sunny cottage in Cambridge, Mass., helping Cary Friedman and his partner, Rick Wellisch, calm their daughter, a 3-month-old in a pink T-shirt.

Ms. Stiller, 34, a homemaker from the Dallas suburbs, likes to say that the number of gay people in her acquaintance before she met Dr. Friedman, a psychiatrist, and Dr. Wellisch, an internist, amounted to zero. "Everything I knew about gay people I knew from TV, which meant that everything I knew about gay people I learned from 'Will and Grace' and 'The L Word,' " she said.

In December, Ms. Stiller gave birth to the baby, named Samantha, for Dr. Friedman and Dr. Wellisch, conceived with a donor egg and the sperm from one of the partners. (They chose not to know which.) In her decision to work with them Ms. Stiller is part of a small but growing movement of surrogate mothers choosing gay couples over traditional families.

As legislatures debate giving gay couples the right to marry - 14 states have amended their constitutions to prevent it - hundreds of couples are finding ways to create families with or without marriage through surrogates like Ms. Stiller, who are willing to help them have children genetically linked to them and to bypass the often difficult legal challenges gay men face in adoption.

The exact number of surrogates who have worked with gay couples is unknown, but close to half of the 60 or so agencies and law firms around the country that broker arrangements between surrogate mothers and prospective parents work with gay couples or are seeking to, through advertising.

Within the close-knit world of professional childbearers, many of whom share their joys and disillusionments online and in support groups, gay couples have developed a reputation as especially grateful clients, willing to meet a surrogate's often intense demands for emotional connection, though the relationships can give rise to other complications within the surrogate's family and community.

Many surrogates who choose to work for gay couples say they feel ill equipped or reluctant to deal with the sense of hopelessness and failure expressed by married women and men who have struggled unsuccessfully for years to bear children. Still others are drawn to men as clients because they fear the possible resentments and jealousies in working so closely with other women.

Surrogates, who are paid about $20,000 above and beyond medical expenses to carry a child, are responsible for approximately 1,000 births a year, according to the Organization of Parents Through Surrogacy, a nonprofit group in Gurnee, Ill., that records births brokered through agencies and privately over the Internet.

The many surrogates who choose not to work with gay couples frequently cite a spouse's disapproval or fears that their own children might be stigmatized by classmates and neighbors. In some instances surrogacy brokers bow to their own reservations. Ann Coleman, an adoption and surrogacy lawyer in Greenville, S.C., said she would not pair women with gay couples.
Though she once represented a lesbian couple in a custody suit against their former husbands, Ms. Coleman said she believed gay couples should pursue children through adoption, not surrogacy. "I don't know that I'd go to the extreme to help them do this," she added.

In the last 13 years, Ms. Stiller has had five children: one with her first husband, two with her current husband and two more as a surrogate.

Her first excursion into the world of surrogacy, for a Florida husband and wife, left her feeling unappreciated and depleted, she said.

Though the couple visited her in her 18th week of pregnancy and brought gifts for her children, Ms. Stiller sought a deeper relationship with the intended mother, a 40-year-old doctor.
"She would call me as if I were working on a project," Ms. Stiller said. "She wouldn't say: 'Hi, how are you feeling? Are you enjoying the weather?' Nothing. There was never any chitchat."
In her 37th week, Ms. Stiller experienced early contractions and called the woman, who drove to Texas right away, but Ms. Stiller remained displeased with her level of engagement.
"She was here for two and half weeks, and she never made an opportunity to share in my family," Ms. Stiller said. "It was very important for me to have my children see that we were helping to create a family, that Mommy wasn't giving away a brother or a sister."
A friend in the surrogate world suggested she find a gay couple through the agency Circle Surrogacy.

John Weltman, a Boston lawyer, had a challenging time finding women to carry children for gay men when he founded Circle Surrogacy a decade ago. Today, he said, 80 percent of the surrogate mothers who come to him say they would be willing to work with gay couples, and half prefer to work with gay couples.

In Los Angeles, Growing Generations, a company formed to help gay couples become parents through egg donation and surrogacy, is responsible for over 300 births, increasing from four births in 1998 to 108 within the last 17 months.

Dawn Buras, a Pennsylvania mother of four, has been to a fertility clinic in Los Angeles three times to receive embryonic transplants for a male couple in Milton, Mass. On each occasion the men accompanied her to the West Coast. They took adjacent hotel rooms, dined out and visited the set of "Desperate Housewives." The pregnancy attempts failed, but still the men try, refusing to work with anyone else.

And Ms. Buras remains committed, and plans to return for another attempt in June, despite the limitations their efforts have placed on her intimate life. According to her contract, Ms. Buras cannot have sex with her husband from one month before the transfer to one month after. Though her husband has been very supportive, she explained, "I can't say that it doesn't bother him, because it does."

Nearly all agencies require that surrogates already have children of their own and that they and their husbands undergo medical and psychological screening to determine that they can handle the strains surrogacy inevitably levies on families.

When Ms. Stiller sent her 13-year-old son to school with a strip of pictures of Samantha and her two fathers in his knapsack, the boy tucked the pictures of the two men away, worrying that he or the situation itself would be made fun of.

Dr. Hilary Hanafin, the chief psychologist at the Center for Surrogate Parenting in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Encino, the country's largest surrogacy agency, said many surrogates with teenage children shy away from working with gay couples for such reasons. "The mother does not want to show up for a middle-school track meet and say, 'I'm pregnant for a gay couple,' " Dr. Hanafin said.

And sometimes relatives cannot withhold their judgments. "I had one surrogate whose mother-in-law disowned her," said Amy Zaslow, a consultant in Acton, Mass., to surrogates and prospective parents. "She did not walk into the house through the entire pregnancy." At Christmas, Ms. Zaslow said, the woman's children went to their grandmother's house, and she was not invited along.

Most surrogates today, for heterosexual or gay couples, work as gestational carriers, meaning they bring children to term but not with their own genetic material. (Couples availing themselves of surrogacy typically get eggs from banks where donors are identified by their height, weight, College Board and I.Q. scores.)

For Ann Nelson, 36, a mother of four in Wheeling, W.Va., an urge toward surrogacy began to surface in college. The first couple with whom she tried to work, a man and a woman from New England, asked her to sign a contract before insemination that stipulated she would eat no processed foods or refined sugars during her pregnancy.

"I thought, 'Have you ever been to Wheeling, W.Va.?' " said Ms. Nelson, who decided not to go forward with that couple. "Where was I going to find these things?

"I knew that surrogacy was not going to be a cakewalk, but I hadn't expected and wasn't prepared for this level of micromanagement."

She has since borne three children for two gay couples.

The typical surrogate, according to the Center for Surrogate Parenting, is a woman of 21 to 37, who has had two children and 13 years of formal education. In many cases, she is motivated by a desire to be pregnant, as well as by a desire for attention.

Working with gay couples, psychologists say, minimizes the need for a certain kind of emotional vigilance that can displace the surrogate's own needs from center stage. "Surrogate mothers who work with heterosexual couples need to be incredibly sensitive to the loss and trauma that the infertile woman has suffered," Dr. Hanafin said.

Some surrogates also say they find the sense of defiance in providing gay couples with children meaningful.

"In all honesty, there's a bit of a rebellious nature in me," acknowledged Shannon Klein, a mother of three in Cypress, Calif., who home-schools her children. "I know that there are people who wouldn't approve of being a surrogate for gay parents, and that has made it more intriguing."

Ms. Klein has borne two children for two gay couples, and she is pregnant with twins for a third.
"When she initially approached me with this, I said, 'You want to do what?' " commented Ms. Klein's husband, Mark. "But we've developed friendships with these people, not fly-by-nights, but lifelong relationships with people we may never have met otherwise."

Ms. Stiller's visit to Cambridge in March was her second. She made her first, as a surprise to the future fathers, when she was 35 weeks pregnant, to reciprocate for the flowers they sent and the visits they made, including one for her ultrasound test. They cared for her children in Texas while she recuperated from giving birth to Samantha before Christmas. Seeing the baby for the first time, she said, "was like seeing the baby of your best friend."

Dr. Friedman said, "We didn't go into this saying, 'We want an intense relationship,' but I didn't necessarily expect that we'd develop the bond that we have."

They will have little competition for Ms. Stiller's affections. She will be working with no other couples in the future. When her husband, Keith, returned home last month from Iraq, where he had been stationed for a year, he told her he did not want her to work as a surrogate again.
"He was concerned for my health and emotional well-being," Ms. Stiller said. "For a year your life is devoted to someone else's.'

"And physically I think he wanted me to get back to my wonderful size 8."

posted by Anthony  # 7:44 AM

by Paul Johnson 365Gay.com Washington Bureau Chief
Posted: May 26, 2005 11:00 am ET


(Washington) New hate crimes legislation introduced today in the House would amend existing hate crimes laws that cover crimes motivated by race, color, national origin and religion to include crimes based on actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, disability and gender identity.

If passed, the legislation would allow the Department of Justice to assist local authorities in investigating and prosecuting cases in which violence occurs because of the victim's sexual orientation or gender identity.

For more than a decade bill have been filed almost annually to include gays in hate crime laws and each time they have died.

The first attempt to pass a hate crime bill failed in 1994 and further attempts have died almost annually since then.

The last attempt failed in October. The measure was contained in a massive defense department bill as add ons. It was stripped out during conference, the procedure where different versions of bills in the House and Senate are "rationalized" for a final vote.

The bill filed Thursday, by Reps. Barney Frank (D-MA), IIeana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), John Conyers (D-MI); Christopher Shays (R-CT), and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), is the first attempt, however, to include protections for the transgendered.

"We realized that we needed to make a small change to last year's bill by explicitly including transgendered persons for protection under this bill," Frank told a Capitol Hill news conference this morning.

"It is important to carefully identify those people who are most likely to be singled out for pernicious acts," said Frank.

Congressman Shays urged other Republicans to support the bill.

"Franklin Roosevelt once said, 'We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization.' That statement is no less true today than it was back then. The Hate Crimes Prevention Act provides an important safety net to ensure victims of hate crimes receive the justice to which they are entitled," said Shays.

"Transgender and gay Americans deserve the same clear protections against hate crimes as other Americans," said HRC President Joe Solmonese in a statement.

The 2004 bill, which did not include the transgendered, brought sharp criticism from transsexual groups.

"Given the pervasive nature of hate violence against transgender people, any hate crimes bill that fails to specifically include transgender people would be deeply flawed, both morally and from a law enforcement perspective," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

However, the Senate version of the bill does not include the transgendered.

"We hope the Senate will now update its bill with the new House language so that we can support it as well," Foreman said.

In April a report released by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs showed violence against members of the LGBT community is on the rise.

Overall, NCAVP’s report noted a 4% increase in reported incidents of anti-LGBT violence. Such incidents rose from 1,720 in 2003 to 1,792 in 2004.

Included in the rise in incidents for the year, was an 11% increase in anti-LGBT murders, which rose from 18 in 2003 to 20 in 2004. During 2004, the total number of victims rose 4%, from 2,042 in 2003 to 2,131 in 2004.

According to a 2002 Human Rights Campaign-commissioned poll, two-thirds of voters favor having hate crime laws that cover transgender people.

"The public support is there," said Solmonese. "Congress should act swiftly to ensure local law enforcement agencies have the tools they need from the federal government to combat hate crimes against the entire gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community."

The legislation also has the support of PFLAG.

"As a parent, I am painfully aware that our children could be targets of hate violence at any time just because of who they are," said Sam Thoron, PFLAG's national president.

"Many of us have already faced the murders of, or assaults on, our children and loved ones. Our families and friends don't deserve these attacks -- no one does."

posted by Anthony  # 7:41 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 26, 2005 1:00 pm ET

(Newark, New Jersey) A Newark judge has granted a lesbian couple the right to have both of their names listed on their child's birth certificate.

The ruling is the first of its kind in New Jersey and guarantees both women full parental rights to the child.

Superior Court Judge Patricia Medina Talbert said she based her decision on New Jersey's artificial insemination statute. The law protects a child's relationship to a non-biological parent who consents to his spouse's artificial insemination.

The case involved Kimberly Robinson and her partner Jeanne LoCicero who are registered under the state's domestic partner law. The couple also married in Canada last summer.
When they decided to have a baby, Robinson used artificial insemination through an anonymous donor. She gave birth to a girl, Vivian on April 30, 2005.

Although LoCicero could have become an adoptive parent to Vivian the couple believed it was in the child's best interests for both parents to be listed as birth parents.

The American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey argued that although the artificial insemination statute was written in terms of "husband" and "wife," the statute seeks to ensure the best interests of children, it must be read in a manner consistent with that purpose.

Judge Talbert agreed, noting in her ruling that any possible interest in limiting the statute to children of heterosexual couples only was not sufficient to overcome the best interests of the child.

New Jersey courts have long recognized that, in parentage cases, the best interests of the child are paramount and that a child should not be denied the right to have two loving parents regardless of the intended parents' sexual orientations.

"We are thrilled that the court gave legal recognition to our family, and we are relieved that we won't have the uncertainty and fear about whether our daughter would be protected if something happened to one of us," said Robinson.

"The court's decision ensures that Vivian's relationship to Jeanne is recognized as of Vivian's birth, rather than placing her rights in legal limbo while awaiting adoption proceedings," said William Singer of Singer & Fedun, who represented the couple on behalf of the ACLU-NJ.
"Delaying recognition of Jeanne's relationship to Vivian would have put Vivian's rights at risk, depriving her of being immediately acknowledged as having two parents who are responsible for her both legally and financially."

Because the question at issue was the relationship between Jeanne and her child (as opposed to the relationship between Jeanne and Kimberly), the court specifically did not address whether New Jersey should recognize an out-of-state same-sex marriage.

Rather, the significance of the couple's Canadian marriage was that it provided one more piece of evidence that established the couple has done everything possible "to declare and to be recognized as committed partners, a married couple, and a dedicated family."

posted by Anthony  # 7:40 AM

by Mary Ellen Peterson 365Gay.com San Francisco Bureau
Posted: May 26, 2005 2:00 pm ET

(Sacramento, California) Legislation to allow same-sex marriage in California will go to a full vote in the Assembly next week.

The measure was approved Wednesday night by the Appropriations Committee, the final step in getting to the floor for a vote. The legislation was one of a handful of bills earmarked for the lower house. The committee shelved 506 other bills.

"We have very high hopes it will prevail," Equality California spokesperson Eddie Gutierrez told 365Gay.com.

"But as every piece of LGBT civil rights legislation that reached this stage of the process -- from hate crimes to domestic partnerships - the vote will come down to the wire."
The legislation is called the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act, and was authored by openly gay Assemblymember Mark Leno ( D-San Francisco).

The bill would require local clerks to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples but allow people opposed to gay marriage to refuse to conduct weddings.

A similar bill last year was pulled by Leno when it became obvious there were not enough votes to pass it. This time though, the measure has the support of Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez and other key Democrats. Last month the California Democratic Party passed a resolution supporting same-sex marriage.

Opponents of gay marriage are vowing a fight and have called on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to come out publicly against the legislation.

So far Schwarzenegger has sent mixed messages about whether he would sign the legislation if it were passed.

In a January meeting with the editorial board of the San Francisco Chronicle Schwarzenegger suggested that this may not be the best time to push gay marriage, saying that a legislative push to fully recognize marriage rights for gays might backfire.

"Eventually in a few years from now, you can readdress it again and see what the people of California think,'' he told the paper. "You cannot force-feed those kind of things.''

Last year in a Tonight Show appearance Schwarzenegger said gay marriage would be "fine with me" if it were enshrined in state law or ruled legal by the courts.

The issue of same-sex marriage also is slowly heading toward the California Supreme Court. Last month a San San Francisco judge ruled that state laws preventing gay marriage are illegal.

Meanwhile, a a conservative group called the "Voters' Right to Protect Marriage Initiative" has begun collecting signatures to have a proposed amendment to the California Constitution banning same-sex marriage placed on the 2006 ballot. If approved by voters it would not only bar gays and lesbians from marrying but also void the state's landmark domestic partner law.

Wednesday, LGBT groups and their supporters announced a broad coalition to combat any attempt to amend the Constitution.

posted by Anthony  # 7:39 AM

by Mark Worrall 365Gay.com San Francisco Bureau
Posted: May 26, 2005 5:00 pm ET

(San Francisco, California) The California Supreme Court heard its second case in a week involving same-sex couples. Today the issue was whether a private country club could refuse to provide a family membership to a lesbian couple.

Lambda Legal represents B. Birgit Koebke and Kendall French, domestic partners who were denied the full benefit of Koebke's membership at Bernardo Heights Country Club in San Diego because they are not legally married.

Bernardo Heights Country Club's membership policy allows a spouse to be included in membership. Although Koebke and French have been domestic partners since 1993, Bernardo Heights Country Club refused to recognize the couple's relationship, limited how frequently they could use the course together, and forced them to pay additional greens fees whenever French seeks to play golf as Koebke's "guest."

Lambda Legal argued that the club's rules violate California's civil rights laws.

"The case basically asks whether businesses in California can provide benefits that are limited to couples that are married," said Lambda attorney Jon Davidson.

"So long as same-sex couples can't get married, you are essentially excluding all those couples. It means no gay people are ever going to be able to get the benefits."

Lawyers for the club argued that the rules do not amount to discrimination because they apply to all unmarried people.

Attorney John Shiner said the rules also have nothing to do with sexual orientation or gender, adding that the of issue of whether domestic partners should be treated on the same legal plane as married people "is a question for the Legislature to decide."

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer has filed a brief in the case, arguing that "treating registered domestic partners differently from married couples" violates the civil rights act.
The National Center for Lesbian Rights and the California Women's Law Center also filed an amicus brief with the Court urging it to find that the club's policy discriminates on the basis of gender and sexual orientation.

"The policy promulgated by the Bernardo Heights Country Club represents a long and continuing history of discrimination against women by golf clubs. This club policy perpetuates sexist stereotypes that continue to exclude lesbians and other women from political, professional, and business opportunities," said Kate Kendell, Executive Director of NCLR.
"Because same-sex couples cannot marry in the State of California, a policy that limits full membership benefits to married people discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation. That simply is unfair and unlawful."

The rights of same-sex couples at private golf clubs is also a question being debated in Georgia.
In December Atlanta mayor Shirley Franklin directed Atlanta's solicitor to fine Druid Hills Country Club $500 a day for each day, up to 180 days, it does not comply with a city LGBT rights ordinance after the club refused to grant a family membership to two same-sex couples. The club then filed suit against the city alleging the ordinance is illegal and the city's own solicitor refused to prosecute Druid Hills claiming the ordinance may be unconstitutional.

In addition to the country club suit at the California Supreme Court, a trio of cases involving the rights and obligations of same-sex parents were rolled together and argued earlier in the week.

posted by Anthony  # 7:38 AM

by Margo Williams 365Gay.com Boston Bureau
Posted: May 27, 2005 12:01 am ET


(Boston, Massachusetts) Massachusetts Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly, the leading contender for the Democratic nomination for governor, has run headlong into two serious, but opposing, potential stumbling blocks - supporters and opponents of same-sex marriage.

Reilly who less than a year ago opposed gay marriage now says he supports it. He announced that position earlier this month at the state Democratic Party convention where he said that it is time for the state to move on. The convention went on to endorse a platform that included a statement supporting same-sex marriage.

Reilly's remarks drew immediate condemnation from conservative groups opposed to gay marriage but praise from gay activists.

But, now, Reilly says his support for gay marriage does not include abolishing a 1913 state law barring out-of-state gay couples from marrying in Massachusetts.

A spokesperson for the Attorney General said that Reilly will continue to defend the law that was created after Massachusetts began allowing interracial marriages at the turn of the last century and states where it was still illegal complained that mixed race couples were going to Massachusetts to wed and then return home to fight the local bans.

The law had not been used since the US Supreme Court ruled that banning interracial marriage was unconstitutional in 1967 but was revived by Republican Gov. Mitt Romney after gay marriage became legal in Massachusetts.

The law is now being challenged in the Supreme Judicial Court and Reilly's office is in charge of fighting on behalf of maintaining it.

This week Republicans at the State House questioned whether after his statements in support of gay marriage Reilly could continue defending the law.

His office now says that he will vigorously argue for retention of the out-of-state ban.
That brought an angry response from LGBT civil rights advocates.

Arline Isaacson, cochair of the Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, accused Reilly of trying to play both sides of the issue in a "calloused" bid to garner support from both conservatives and gays.
''I think it is deplorable that the highest-ranking elected official of the Democratic Party in this state would act that way," Isaacson told the Boston Globe.

''Tom Reilly has to decide what he really thinks and feels about this issue. Defending an obviously antigay application of this law is reprehensible."

posted by Anthony  # 7:37 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 27, 2005 7:30 am ET

(Frankfort, Kentucky) Kentucky's constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage has been ruled valid.
The amendment, which was approved by voters last fall, bars gay and lesbian couples from marrying and forbids the state from recognizing civil unions or any "legal status identical to or similar to marriage.". It passed by a 3-to-1 margin.

Three Kentucky residents went to court arguing that the question put to voters was unconstitutional because it dealt with two separate issues - marriage and civil unions. Kentucky is one of a number of states which require ballot initiatives to deal with only one topic.

The Kentucky Fairness Alliance which opposed the amendment said that it would do far more than its supporters had said and could result in a ban on prenuptial agreements and other contractual arrangements between both gay and heterosexual couples.

Franklin County Circuit Judge Roger Crittenden, in a written judgment released Thursday evening, dismissed the suit, saying that the question was properly presented to voters.
"The need, wisdom and economic and social desirability of the amendment are not before this court," Crittenden wrote. "It would be overstepping judicial bounds to pass judgment on the value and worthiness of the legislative purpose."

Kentucky was among 11 states that passed same-sex marriage amendments last November.
"It's disappointing that we have not found a way to treat fairly all of the people in our communities and all the variety of life that they reflect," said the Rev. Albert Pennybacker, a Protestant minister who was one of the plaintiffs.

"I think the amendment is rooted in a kind of religiosity that's often judgmental and mean-spirited."

But, supporters of the amendment said they were not surprised by the ruling.

"The Kentucky electorate overwhelmingly wanted to protect marriage from any kind of redefinition, and so they amended the Kentucky Constitution," Kent Ostrander, executive director of the Lexington-based Family Foundation told the AP in a telephone interview.

posted by Anthony  # 7:36 AM

May 27, 2005
New York Times
By GINIA BELLAFANTE
On a spring morning not long ago, Lura Stiller sat in her stocking feet in a sunny cottage in Cambridge, Mass., helping Cary Friedman and his partner, Rick Wellisch, calm their daughter, a 3-month-old in a pink T-shirt.

Ms. Stiller, 34, a homemaker from the Dallas suburbs, likes to say that the number of gay people in her acquaintance before she met Dr. Friedman, a psychiatrist, and Dr. Wellisch, an internist, amounted to zero. "Everything I knew about gay people I knew from TV, which meant that everything I knew about gay people I learned from 'Will and Grace' and 'The L Word,' " she said.

In December, Ms. Stiller gave birth to the baby, named Samantha, for Dr. Friedman and Dr. Wellisch, conceived with a donor egg and the sperm from one of the partners. (They chose not to know which.) In her decision to work with them Ms. Stiller is part of a small but growing movement of surrogate mothers choosing gay couples over traditional families.

As legislatures debate giving gay couples the right to marry - 14 states have amended their constitutions to prevent it - hundreds of couples are finding ways to create families with or without marriage through surrogates like Ms. Stiller, who are willing to help them have children genetically linked to them and to bypass the often difficult legal challenges gay men face in adoption.

The exact number of surrogates who have worked with gay couples is unknown, but close to half of the 60 or so agencies and law firms around the country that broker arrangements between surrogate mothers and prospective parents work with gay couples or are seeking to, through advertising.

Within the close-knit world of professional childbearers, many of whom share their joys and disillusionments online and in support groups, gay couples have developed a reputation as especially grateful clients, willing to meet a surrogate's often intense demands for emotional connection, though the relationships can give rise to other complications within the surrogate's family and community.

Many surrogates who choose to work for gay couples say they feel ill equipped or reluctant to deal with the sense of hopelessness and failure expressed by married women and men who have struggled unsuccessfully for years to bear children. Still others are drawn to men as clients because they fear the possible resentments and jealousies in working so closely with other women.

Surrogates, who are paid about $20,000 above and beyond medical expenses to carry a child, are responsible for approximately 1,000 births a year, according to the Organization of Parents Through Surrogacy, a nonprofit group in Gurnee, Ill., that records births brokered through agencies and privately over the Internet.

The many surrogates who choose not to work with gay couples frequently cite a spouse's disapproval or fears that their own children might be stigmatized by classmates and neighbors. In some instances surrogacy brokers bow to their own reservations. Ann Coleman, an adoption and surrogacy lawyer in Greenville, S.C., said she would not pair women with gay couples.
Though she once represented a lesbian couple in a custody suit against their former husbands, Ms. Coleman said she believed gay couples should pursue children through adoption, not surrogacy. "I don't know that I'd go to the extreme to help them do this," she added.

In the last 13 years, Ms. Stiller has had five children: one with her first husband, two with her current husband and two more as a surrogate.

Her first excursion into the world of surrogacy, for a Florida husband and wife, left her feeling unappreciated and depleted, she said.

Though the couple visited her in her 18th week of pregnancy and brought gifts for her children, Ms. Stiller sought a deeper relationship with the intended mother, a 40-year-old doctor.
"She would call me as if I were working on a project," Ms. Stiller said. "She wouldn't say: 'Hi, how are you feeling? Are you enjoying the weather?' Nothing. There was never any chitchat."
In her 37th week, Ms. Stiller experienced early contractions and called the woman, who drove to Texas right away, but Ms. Stiller remained displeased with her level of engagement.

"She was here for two and half weeks, and she never made an opportunity to share in my family," Ms. Stiller said. "It was very important for me to have my children see that we were helping to create a family, that Mommy wasn't giving away a brother or a sister."

A friend in the surrogate world suggested she find a gay couple through the agency Circle Surrogacy.

John Weltman, a Boston lawyer, had a challenging time finding women to carry children for gay men when he founded Circle Surrogacy a decade ago. Today, he said, 80 percent of the surrogate mothers who come to him say they would be willing to work with gay couples, and half prefer to work with gay couples.

In Los Angeles, Growing Generations, a company formed to help gay couples become parents through egg donation and surrogacy, is responsible for over 300 births, increasing from four births in 1998 to 108 within the last 17 months.

Dawn Buras, a Pennsylvania mother of four, has been to a fertility clinic in Los Angeles three times to receive embryonic transplants for a male couple in Milton, Mass. On each occasion the men accompanied her to the West Coast. They took adjacent hotel rooms, dined out and visited the set of "Desperate Housewives." The pregnancy attempts failed, but still the men try, refusing to work with anyone else.

And Ms. Buras remains committed, and plans to return for another attempt in June, despite the limitations their efforts have placed on her intimate life. According to her contract, Ms. Buras cannot have sex with her husband from one month before the transfer to one month after. Though her husband has been very supportive, she explained, "I can't say that it doesn't bother him, because it does."

Nearly all agencies require that surrogates already have children of their own and that they and their husbands undergo medical and psychological screening to determine that they can handle the strains surrogacy inevitably levies on families.

When Ms. Stiller sent her 13-year-old son to school with a strip of pictures of Samantha and her two fathers in his knapsack, the boy tucked the pictures of the two men away, worrying that he or the situation itself would be made fun of.

Dr. Hilary Hanafin, the chief psychologist at the Center for Surrogate Parenting in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Encino, the country's largest surrogacy agency, said many surrogates with teenage children shy away from working with gay couples for such reasons. "The mother does not want to show up for a middle-school track meet and say, 'I'm pregnant for a gay couple,' " Dr. Hanafin said.

And sometimes relatives cannot withhold their judgments. "I had one surrogate whose mother-in-law disowned her," said Amy Zaslow, a consultant in Acton, Mass., to surrogates and prospective parents. "She did not walk into the house through the entire pregnancy." At Christmas, Ms. Zaslow said, the woman's children went to their grandmother's house, and she was not invited along.

Most surrogates today, for heterosexual or gay couples, work as gestational carriers, meaning they bring children to term but not with their own genetic material. (Couples availing themselves of surrogacy typically get eggs from banks where donors are identified by their height, weight, College Board and I.Q. scores.)

For Ann Nelson, 36, a mother of four in Wheeling, W.Va., an urge toward surrogacy began to surface in college. The first couple with whom she tried to work, a man and a woman from New England, asked her to sign a contract before insemination that stipulated she would eat no processed foods or refined sugars during her pregnancy.

"I thought, 'Have you ever been to Wheeling, W.Va.?' " said Ms. Nelson, who decided not to go forward with that couple. "Where was I going to find these things?

"I knew that surrogacy was not going to be a cakewalk, but I hadn't expected and wasn't prepared for this level of micromanagement."

She has since borne three children for two gay couples.

The typical surrogate, according to the Center for Surrogate Parenting, is a woman of 21 to 37, who has had two children and 13 years of formal education. In many cases, she is motivated by a desire to be pregnant, as well as by a desire for attention.

Working with gay couples, psychologists say, minimizes the need for a certain kind of emotional vigilance that can displace the surrogate's own needs from center stage. "Surrogate mothers who work with heterosexual couples need to be incredibly sensitive to the loss and trauma that the infertile woman has suffered," Dr. Hanafin said.

Some surrogates also say they find the sense of defiance in providing gay couples with children meaningful.

"In all honesty, there's a bit of a rebellious nature in me," acknowledged Shannon Klein, a mother of three in Cypress, Calif., who home-schools her children. "I know that there are people who wouldn't approve of being a surrogate for gay parents, and that has made it more intriguing."

Ms. Klein has borne two children for two gay couples, and she is pregnant with twins for a third.
"When she initially approached me with this, I said, 'You want to do what?' " commented Ms. Klein's husband, Mark. "But we've developed friendships with these people, not fly-by-nights, but lifelong relationships with people we may never have met otherwise."

Ms. Stiller's visit to Cambridge in March was her second. She made her first, as a surprise to the future fathers, when she was 35 weeks pregnant, to reciprocate for the flowers they sent and the visits they made, including one for her ultrasound test. They cared for her children in Texas while she recuperated from giving birth to Samantha before Christmas. Seeing the baby for the first time, she said, "was like seeing the baby of your best friend."

Dr. Friedman said, "We didn't go into this saying, 'We want an intense relationship,' but I didn't necessarily expect that we'd develop the bond that we have."

They will have little competition for Ms. Stiller's affections. She will be working with no other couples in the future. When her husband, Keith, returned home last month from Iraq, where he had been stationed for a year, he told her he did not want her to work as a surrogate again.
"He was concerned for my health and emotional well-being," Ms. Stiller said. "For a year your life is devoted to someone else's.'

"And physically I think he wanted me to get back to my wonderful size 8."

posted by Anthony  # 7:31 AM

By WAYNE PARRY, AP from Newsday.com on the Web, May 26, 2005

NEWARK, N.J. -- A lesbian couple has won the right to have both their names listed on a birth certificate as the parents of a baby girl born to one of the women through artificial insemination. The decision _ the first of its kind in New Jersey _ guarantees both women full parental rights to the child. Kimberly Robinson and Jeanne LoCicero registered in New York as domestic partners in 2003 and got married in Canada last summer. They bought a house together in Essex County, and decided they wanted to have a child together. Robinson was impregnated using sperm from an anonymous donor, and their daughter, Vivian Ryan LoCicero, was born on April 30. "We're thrilled," LoCicero, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey, said Thursday. "We always felt like a family; now it's nice to know the court thinks we are one, too." "We are relieved that we won't have the uncertainty and fear about whether our daughter would be protected if something happened to one of us," added Robinson. The ruling by Superior Court Judge Patricia Medina Talbert in Newark on Wednesday eliminates the need for LoCicero to go through adoption proceedings in order to have the same parental rights as those of the birth mother. Ed Barocas, the ACLU's legal director for New Jersey, said the case dealt with the state's artificial insemination law, which protects a child's relationship to a non-biological parent who consents to a spouse's artificial insemination. The statute was written with the case in mind of a man who consents to the artificial insemination of his wife with another man's sperm, but should apply equally to same-sex partners, Barocas said. "It definitely provides protection to the child based on the equal protection laws, that this child should be no less protected than a child of a heterosexual union," he said. In considering the case, the judge noted the many steps the couple has gone through to demonstrate their commitment to one another as proof that they formed a stable union in the child's best interest. In addition to registering as domestic partners and getting married in Canada, the women bought a house near their families and friends who would provide a support network, sought a sperm donor with physical characteristics approximating those of LoCicero so the baby might look like her as well as Robinson, and gave the child LoCicero's surname. Because the question at issue was the relationship of LoCicero and the child, and not LoCicero's relationship with Robinson, the court did not need to rule on whether their marriage in Canada is legally valid in New Jersey, Barocas said. "We do find ourselves in a time where the American family composed of mom, dad and two children applies, in fact, to only 23.5 percent of the American population," the judge wrote in her decision. "LoCicero is not required, under law or in equity, to take upon her the legal obligation of parentage. "Her commitment, one could argue, is only to Robinson," the judge wrote. "Her voluntary effort to be recognized as a parent under the law with its attendant obligations and responsibilities evinces her desire, intention and commitment to be a parent for Vivian Ryan."

posted by Anthony  # 12:55 PM

by Doreen Brandt 365Gay.com Washington Bureau
Posted: May 25, 2005 2:00 pm ET


(Washington) The man in charge of protecting the civil rights of federal workers told a Senate Committee that he will not protect LGBT employees.

Special counsel Scott J. Bloch was testifying about complaints his office has adopted an extreme conservative position and has reprimanded people in his own office who disagree with him.
Bloch has been under fire for more than year for stonewalling complaints of discrimination by LGBT federal workers.

In February 2004 he ordered references to sexual orientation removed from the Office of the Special Counsel website. Since 1998, when President Bill Clinton issued an executive order prohibiting bias in the civil service, the OSC has taken that to include sexuality.

A month after the references disappeared from the OSC website Bloch said gay workers were no longer protected.

After intense pressure from Federal Globe, an organization for gay and lesbian workers, and from Democrats on The Hill, the White House said it would honor an Executive Order signed by President Clinton.

But, last September, with Bloch's approval, several union contracts negotiated with various branches of the government removed the list of categories that are protected replacing them with the more nebulous phrase "any class protected by law."

Appearing before the the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs subcommittee on oversight of government management, the federal workforce and the District of Columbia, Bloch was grilled by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.).

Bloch told Levin that despite the Clinton Executive Order and the Bush administration's pledge to honor it, "We are limited by our enforcement statutes as Congress gives them."

Levin then reminded him of the statement issued by the White House last year that said, "Longstanding federal policy prohibits discrimination against federal employees based on sexual orientation. President Bush expects federal agencies to enforce this policy and to ensure that all federal employees are protected from unfair discrimination at work."

Levin asked Bloch if he did not believe the President's statement was binding on him.

"It is binding on me," Bloch said, "but it is not something I can prosecute in my agency. . . . I am limited by the enforcement statutes that you give me."

At that point Levin asked if Bloch would recommend Congress amend the law to add sexual orientation to the protections for federal employees. Bloch declined to take a position saying that it was a matter for Congress not him to comment on.

Bloch, who is a Bush appointee, drew fire from Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.)
"Many of us who disagree with President Bush on a wide range of issues were pleased when he announced that he would adhere to the policy set forward by President Clinton to ban discrimination based on sexual orientation in the workforce," Frank said in a statement.

"In fact, when this policy was challenged after its promulgation by President Clinton in 1998, the House voted by a 252 to 176 majority to affirm it. President Bush's continuation of this policy marked an important step in establishing a consensus on basic fairness in the United States. What Scott Bloch has done now is to shatter this agreement that employment in the federal workforce should be based solely on merit, and he has also unfortunately raised questions about the sincerity of President Bush's commitment, since he is a Bush appointee to the position which enforces this. It is essential that the President act promptly to do what is necessary to see that the policy he has announced is in fact enforced by his appointee."

The Human Rights Campaign also condemned Bloch's position.

"We continue to be dismayed at the fact that Scott Bloch is ignoring over 20 years of consistent interpretation," Praveen Fernandes told 365Gay.com.

Bloch’s actions mark a clear breach of a specific promise made to the Log Cabin Republicans by the Bush campaign during the 2000 election LCR said in a statement.

“As part of Log Cabin’s decision to endorse President Bush in 2000, the campaign pledged to Log Cabin that non-discrimination policies for federal employees would be respected. Log Cabin would not have endorsed Bush without this promise. We ask the Bush Administration to remain true to their word and put an end to this distraction,” said Log Cabin Republicans President Patrick Guerriero.

The White House has not commented on Bloch's remarks to the committee.

Federal GLOBE, which represents LGBT workers in the government said it no longer trusts Bloch.

"He persists in confusing civil rights law and the concept of 'protected classes' with the civil service law -- a law that has been interpreted under both Democratic and Republican administrations to provide protections to Federal employees against personnel actions based on sexual orientation -- most critically hiring and firing," Rob Sandler a Federal GLOBE board member told 365Gay.com.

" It astounds us that the White House continues to tolerate this rogue employee. It really is time for him to go."

posted by Anthony  # 7:30 AM

by Mark Worrall 365Gay.com San Francisco Bureau
Posted: May 25, 2005 5:00 pm ET


(San Francisco, California) Gay groups and their supporters announced a massive battle plan on Wednesday to combat a proposed amendment to the California Constitution to ban same-sex marriage.

At simultaneous press conferences in cities across California, representatives of more than 200 groups announced the formation of a coalition to oppose the amendment.

The coalition, which calls itself "Equality for All", will soon begin fundraising and organizing, its leaders announced.

A group called the "Voters' Right to Protect Marriage Initiative" has begun collecting signatures to have the proposed amendment placed on the 2006 ballot. If approved by voters it would not only bar gays and lesbians from marrying but also void the state's landmark domestic partner law.

“The sponsors of this initiative are ‘hate groups’ who have decided that they are not going to let lesbian and gay people be fully accepted and fully a part of our society,” pastor Cecil Williams of Glide Memorial Church told a rally in San Francisco Wednesday.

“We are not going to take this sitting down. This type of initiative and this type of discrimination should not exist in the 21st century.”

Victor Hwang of the Asian Pacific Islander Legal Outreach said the Asian American community knows a lot about discrimination.

"In the past, state and federal laws have barred Asian American women from entering this country, have prohibited marriages between whites and ‘negroes, mulattoes, or Mongolians,’ and have directed that any U.S. citizen marrying an Asian would be stripped of their citizenship
“If passed, this initiative would make California the most backwards state in our nation and turn back our clocks more than a hundred years," said Hwang.

The "Voters' Right to Protect Marriage Initiative" was filed with the state Attorney General's Office last week by the California Campaign for Children and Families, a group that has been involved in legal battles against same-sex marriage in the state.

Randy Thomasson the group's leader said that the CCCF decided to begin the initiative after state Assembly and Senate committees this month rejected a constitutional amendment.

Meanwhile, a bill that would allow same-sex marriage is moving forward. The Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act passed a key committee late last month. The legislation, sponsored by openly gay Assemblyman Mark Leno ( D-San Francisco) would allow gays to marry but also allow churches opposed to same-sex unions to refuse to perform the marriages.

It has the support of Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez and other key Democrats. Earlier this month the California Democratic Party passed a resolution supporting same-sex marriage.

posted by Anthony  # 7:29 AM

by Paul Johnson 365Gay.com Washington Bureau Chief
Posted: May 25, 2005 7:30 pm ET

(Washington) The Senate Wednesday confirmed the nomination of Priscilla Owen to the federal appeals court.

Owen is the first of three judicial nominees who will receive an up or down vote in the Senate following a controversial deal worked out between Democrats and Republicans on Monday to avoid a showdown over the use of filibusters.

The most contentious of the three nominations is that of former Alabama Attorney General William Pryor. A vote on his nomination is expected early next week.

During the 2003-2004 session of Congress, Pryor's nomination was blocked by Senate Democrats, who charged that he was too extreme to make impartial judgments. The president then went ahead and placed him on the 11th Circuit in a temporary assignment set to expire late this year.

In February and without comment, Bush resubmitted Pryor's name to the Senate.
In April Lambda Legal released a summary of Pryor's record showing he has repeatedly shown clear hostility to LGBT civil rights and a bias towards those with HIV, women, people of color, disabled people and others.

"William Pryor is the most demonstrably antigay judicial nominee in recent memory," said Kevin Cathcart, Executive Director of Lambda Legal.

"It's clear from his record that William Pryor does not belong on the federal appeals court."
While in his temporary position on the court Pryor cast the deciding vote to uphold Florida's outright ban on gay adoption. Florida is the only state in the country that explicitly bans children from being adopted by gays and lesbians.

As Attorney General of Alabama, he was the only attorney general outside of Texas to author an amicus brief in the Supreme Court defending Texas's anti-gay sodomy statute. Pryor argued that states have an interest in singling out same-sex relations for punishment, even though his own state's statute made no distinction between same-and opposite-sex relations. His brief also compared same-sex relationships to pedophilia, bestiality and necrophilia.

While he served at A.G. of Alabama Pryor had links placed on the state website to anti-gay organizations and other conservative groups but not to groups with a neutral or differing views.
The third nominee is Janice Rogers Brown.

In 2003, Brown was the only justice on the California Supreme Court to rule against recognizing the right of gay Californians to legally adopt their children. Brown argued that allowing a gay parent to legally adopt the biological child of their partner "trivializes family bonds."
The pact between Democrats and Republicans brought mixed reaction Tuesday from LGBT groups. While the Human Rights Campaign noted that the agreement preserves the ability to block extremist nominees which will be particularly important when a nominee for the Supreme Court is named, other LGBT groups opposed the move.

posted by Anthony  # 7:27 AM

by Malcolm Thornberry 365Gay.com European Bureau Chief
Posted: May 25, 2005 9:00 pm ET

(Zurich) Swiss voters will go to the polls June 5 in the first European election on same-sex unions. Elsewhere in Europe the decision of how to recognize gay and lesbian relationships has been decided by governments.

Holland and Belgium have legalized same-sex marriage. Most other European Union nations have varying forms of domestic partnerships.

The Swiss Parliament last June passed legislation to create a civil unions registry and grant limited rights to same-sex couples - mainly in the areas of pensions, inheritance and taxes. But, opponents - headed by a small conservative religious party, the Federal Democratic Union - collected enough signatures to force a referendum on the issue.

The FDU claims that granting any rights to same-sex couples would undermine traditional marriage.

But Justice Minister Christoph Blocher disagrees, pointing out that the domestic partner registry would not have the same status as traditional marriages and that same-sex couples would not be allowed to adopt children or have access to fertility treatment.

Registered gay partnerships already exist in Geneva, Zurich and Neuchâtel. In Zurich 483 gay and lesbian couples have registered since the cantonal law came into effect in July 2003.
Churches in Switzerland are divided on civil unions. The Roman Catholic Church is opposed while the Federation of Protestant Churches supports them.

posted by Anthony  # 7:26 AM

by The Associated Press
Posted: May 25, 2005 9:00 pm ET


(Madison, Wisconsin) The Wisconsin Legislature's budget committee has voted against providing domestic partner benefits to University of Wisconsin System employees, rejecting arguments from school officials that they are a needed recruitment and retention tool.
System officials had pushed for the change, saying they are losing needed employees because they can't offer health coverage to domestic partners, often pointing out UW-Madison is the only school in the Big Ten that doesn't offer them to employees.

But the Joint Finance Committee voted 13-3 to reject Gov. Jim Doyle's plan to give the UW System $1 million over the next two years to provide the benefits to same-sex and opposite-sex couples.

Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison, offered a motion to eliminate the extra money while allowing the system to find a way to pay for the benefits, saying it wouldn't cost the state anything. The committee rejected it.

Committee co-chairman Rep. Dean Kaufert, R-Neenah, said the governor underfunded his proposal and Pocan's motion would force the system to take money from other programs to pay for the benefits. The nonpartisan Legislature Fiscal Bureau estimates the plan could cost up to $2.2 million, depending on how many system employees sign up.

"The reality is there is a cost," Kaufert said.

Pocan, one of the Legislature's only openly gay members, accused Republicans of appealing to conservative Christian voters. He said the lack of domestic partner benefits insults system employees by sending them a message that the state doesn't consider their families legitimate.
He read a letter to the committee from one researcher who has brought in $2.5 million in outside grants since 2000 -- more than enough to offset the costs of the benefits -- but is considering offers to leave the university because it won't cover his partner of eight years.
A group of state employees filed suit last month seeking to force Wisconsin to provide them domestic partner benefits. Pocan noted Republican legislative leaders voted last week to hire a conservative Christian firm to represent lawmakers in the suit.

Rep. Scott Jensen countered it would be better to change pension benefits for UW System employees to improve retention and recruitment while appealing to more employees. Wisconsin is one of a handful of states that don't let university employees carrying their pension benefits with them from school to school, yet the governor has not proposed anything to address that.
The committee's vote eliminates the provision from the two-year budget it is currently crafting to fix Wisconsin's $1.6 billion deficit for the period through June 30, 2007. Expected revenues fall short of requested spending, and that imbalance must be made up through spending cuts, tax increases or both.

posted by Anthony  # 7:25 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 25, 2005 9:00 pm ET

(Phoenix, Arizona) Advocates on both sides of the same-sex marriage debate say they are encouraged by a new poll showing Arizona voters nearly evenly divided on proposed constitutional ban on gay marriage.

The statewide survey was conducted over the past week for KAET-TV, the Phoenix area PBS affiliate, shows that 49 percent of those asked said they would vote for the Protect Marriage Arizona.

But 41 percent said they oppose the amendment. Pollsters questioned 357 registered voters. The poll has a margin of error of 5.2 percent and could mean a virtual tie.

Protect Marriage Arizona said it was encouraged by the results noting that supporters of the amendment did not waver when told that it would not only would ban same-sex marriage but also would bar state and local governments from recognizing any legal status for unmarried couples whether gay or straight.

Opponents of the amendment are equally buoyed saying they believe they have a fighting chance to defeat the measure.

Pollster Bruce Merrill said the results show that the outcome could depend on voter turnout. Merrill said that same-sex marriage has polarized conservatives and older voters both of whom traditionally vote.

Gays on the other hand, he noted, will have to energize moderates many of whom do not regularly vote.

"The lower the turnout, the more it will help the religious right,'' he said.

Nearly three out of four Republicans with an opinion about the imitative said they would vote for the initiative. Independents were evenly split, with only a third of Democrats in support.
Protect Marriage Arizona will have to gather nearly 184,000 valid signatures over the next 14 months to put the issue on the November 2006 ballot.

Even though state law already outlaws same-sex unions, gay marriage opponents say further action needed "to protect the sanctity of families" by preventing judges from overturning the prohibition.

Last month, the Legislature passed a measure urging Congress to pass an amendment to the US Constitution banning gay marriage.

posted by Anthony  # 7:24 AM

by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: May 26, 2005 12:01 am ET


(Tempe, Arizona) Prejudice is a form of "common sense", hard-wired into the human brain through evolution as an adaptive response to protect our prehistoric ancestors from danger, according to a new study by researchers at Arizona State University.

"By nature, people are group-living animals -- a strategy that enhances individual survival and leads to what we might call a 'tribal psychology'," says Steven Neuberg, ASU professor of social psychology, who authored the study with doctoral student Catherine Cottrell.

"It was adaptive for our ancestors to be attuned to those outside the group who posed threats such as to physical security, health or economic resources, and to respond to these different kinds of threats in ways tailored to have a good chance of reducing them."

The study appears in the May issue of the "Journal of Personality and Social Psychology".
The study contends that, because human survival was based on group living, "outsiders" were viewed as – and often were – very real threats.

Unfortunately, says Neuberg, because evolved psychological tendencies are imperfectly attuned to the existence of dangers, people may react negatively to groups and their members even when they actually pose no realistic threat.

Neuberg and Cottrell had 235 European American students at ASU think about nine different groups: gay men, activist feminists, African Americans, Asian Americans, European Americans, fundamentalist Christians, Mexican Americans, Native Americans and nonfundamentalist Christians.

The researchers then had the participants rate these groups on the threats they pose to American society (e.g., to physical safety, values, health, etc.) and report the emotions they felt toward these groups (e.g., fear, anger, disgust, pity, etc.).

Consistent with the researchers' hypotheses, findings revealed that distinct prejudices exist toward different groups of people. Some groups elicited prejudices characterized largely by fear, others by disgust, others by anger, and so on. Moreover, the different "flavors" of prejudice were associated with different patterns of perceived threat.

Follow-up work further shows that these different prejudices motivate inclinations toward different kinds of discrimination, in ways apparently aimed at reducing the perceived threat.
"Groups seen as posing threats to physical safety elicit fear and self-protective actions, groups seen as choosing to take more than they give elicit anger and inclinations toward aggression, and groups seen as posing health threats elicit disgust and the desire to avoid close physical contact," says Cottrell.

"One important practical implication of this research is that we may need to create different interventions to reduce inappropriate prejudices against different groups," says Neuberg.
For example, if one is trying to decrease prejudices among new college students during freshman orientation, different strategies might be used for bringing different groups together.
"For instance, given that whites stereotypically perceive blacks as threats to physical safety, it would be inadvisable to suggest a game of outdoor night-time basketball, given that darkness heightens people's fear. Sharing a plate of nachos might be a better choice," Cottrell says. "But if the aim is to reduce prejudice against gay men – viewed to pose a health treat because of association with AIDS, and thereby eliciting physical disgust –sharing finger food might not be a good idea."

Neuberg and Cottrell are both adamant to point out that just because prejudices are a fundamental and natural part of what makes us human, that doesn't mean that learning can't take place and that responses can't be dampened.

"People sometimes assume that because we say prejudice has evolved roots we are saying that specific prejudices can't be changed. That's simply not the case," Neuberg says. "What we think and feel and how we behave is typically the result of complex interactions between biological tendencies and learning experiences. Evolution may have prepared our minds to be prejudiced, but our environment influences the specific targets of those prejudices and how we act on them."

posted by Anthony  # 7:23 AM

BY Matt Foreman, Executive DirectorNational Gay and Lesbian Task Force

Tuesday, May 24, 2005
MEDIA CONTACT:Task Force Communications Department
Roberta Sklar, Director of Communicationsmedia@thetaskforce.org646-358-1465



"We recognize that the deal reached last night rebuffed the extreme position of Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and the right-wing leaders who have been scripting him, and preserved — at least for now — some form of extended debate to protect minority interests. Nonetheless, we feel a deep foreboding that, with this compromise, the Senate may turn out to have lost sight of critically important trees with the hope of possibly saving the forest:

The wholly unlawful 'nuclear option' is retained, and Frist and his extremist allies have already threatened to use it.

Three of the most dangerous, extreme and activist candidates ever nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals will get votes on the Senate floor.

The time-honored and wholly constitutional Senate tradition of the filibuster — the last line of defense for minority interests — has now been conditioned to be used only in 'extraordinary circumstances,' which are to be decided, effectively, by 14 senators, possibly putting out of reach the ability to stop nominees who would change the Constitution as we know it.

"We hope that the actions of these senators will result in more constructive consultation between the White House and moderate Republicans and Democrats about judicial nominations, resulting in acceptable, mainstream nominees. Our hopes in this regard are not high.

"In the meantime, we will join with fair-minded Americans in working to defeat these three extremist nominees now cleared for a vote on the Senate floor."

posted by Anthony  # 6:43 AM

by Beth Shapiro 365Gay.com New York Bureau
Posted: May 24, 2005 8:00 pm ET

(New York City) A United Church of Christ television commercial banned by the big three television networks, was named Outstanding 2004 Commercial for its positive LGBT portrayal.
The presentation was made at the first Images In Advertising Awards sponsored by The Commercial Closet.

The 30 second commercial was aimed at attracting gays and others who feel alienated by other denominations.

The 30-second commercial features two muscle-bound "bouncers" standing guard outside a picturesque church and selecting which persons are permitted to attend Sunday services. Written text interrupts the scene, announcing, "Jesus didn't turn people away. Neither do we." A narrator then proclaims the United Church of Christ's commitment that: "No matter who you are, or where you are on life's journey, you are welcome here."
ABC, CBS, and NBC rejected the spots, calling them too controversial.

The ads were produced by Gotham Inc. They were accepted by some local stations across the country and by several cable channels.

The nonprofit Commercial Closet Association works to improve public opinion of the gay community through more informed LGBT portrayals in advertising.

The organization offers advertising sensitivity workshops and its web site, CommercialCloset.org, houses the world’s largest archive of LGBT-themed ads, with over 2,500 global examples, including ratings and analysis, Best Practices, and other resources.
Other awards presented at the event included:

·Outsta