Sharing LGBT books a passion for teen

One day in the seventh grade at the Nueva School in Hillsborough, Amelia Roskin-Frazee walked into the library, past the rows of colorful spines and sat down at a computer – out of sight of her classmates.

In her brief moment of privacy, she typed the keywords “gay, lesbian, LGBT,” waiting expectantly to see what the library’s catalog had to offer. But it was a fruitless search: The only thing listed on the screen was an outdated parenting guide, gathering dust on the shelf.

Two years later, as part of her new organization’s mission, Amelia, now 15, personally delivered a box of books to the same library.

The Make It Safe Project, born in November, donates boxes of 10 fiction and nonfiction books on LGBT themes to schools and youth homeless shelters where such resources are otherwise unavailable. So far, Amelia’s initiative has made available more than 250 volumes to 45,000 kids in more than 15 states, not to mention the first international delivery to a school in Mauritius.

“Kids look up to books,” says Amelia, a student at San Francisco’s Lick-Wilmerding High School. “They see (literature) as stories that they can believe in, characters that they can identify with. When there are no books with LGBT characters, it gives LGBT (and questioning) kids the message that it’s not normal, that nobody else is like them, that something is wrong with them. And that’s a really dangerous thing.”

Sex education

Because schools’ health curricula rarely cover topics outside the scope of heterosexual relationships, nonfiction books are also crucial for basic sex education as well as advice on how to come out in a positive way.

Entering her sophomore year, Amelia has already been recognized by the Advocate magazine as one of the “Top 40, Under 40 LGBT Activists of 2012.”

The summer before she discovered her library’s dearth of LGBT literature, Amelia’s mother had assured her that there was nothing she could say that would grant her permission to stay up any later. Amelia answered, “What if I told you I’m gay?” Bedtime was indeed delayed.

“You can only come out once!” her mother, Annie Roskin, tells her now when it’s time to hit the hay. But mostly Annie recalls the little dance that Amelia did after the liberating sentence slipped out. “It was only one person, but I felt free,” says Amelia.

A dispute broke out among her classmates the following year when someone made a homophobic remark online. Before she knew it, Amelia was arguing the case for her rights rather than equal rights. She had come out to her entire class by accident over the Internet, but didn’t regret it. “I think subconsciously it was on purpose because I wanted people to know, but in the moment, I was just making my points.”

Since then, Amelia has done far more than engage in virtual debates. As the first openly gay student in Nueva School history, Amelia says, she also founded its Gay-Straight Alliance, the Rainbow Connection, and served as its president when she was in eighth grade. Then she took the leap into high school – and national advocacy, as a student ambassador for the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network.

During a gathering of the network, she discovered she wasn’t the only one whose school lacked LGBT literature – all 17 of the other student ambassadors from across the country had encountered similar obstacles.

Fight against bullying

The network’s goal is to end bullying of any form, with a focus on LGBT youth. Amelia works toward it with literature, giving kids somewhere to turn for answers. She named her project Make It Safe because “all students – regardless of race, sexual orientation, gender identity – deserve to be able to go to school and feel safe.”

Books must uphold a rigorous set of criteria to make it into a Make It Safe book box. In addition to being accessible, accurate, realistic and age-appropriate depictions of LGBT life that are well written and give helpful advice, they have to be “kind and accepting of all religions and political views,” Amelia says, rattling off her meticulous list of requirements.

Titles like “Annie on My Mind,” a love story about two teenage girls in New York City, hold special meaning for her, having been pivotal during her own coming-out experience.

Her parents, teachers and most of her classmates have been supportive of her activism. “She seems to me unusually courageous,” her mother says. Amelia wants “the environment to be more hospitable for kids to be whoever they are. … (I am) proud and honored to be her mom.”

But Amelia has received her share of e-mails from strangers who are angered by her work. Mature beyond her years, she says, “There are always people who are going to disagree. But at the end of the day, they are on the wrong side of history with this kind of thing.

“People are beginning to learn that books like this don’t just provide comfort,” she adds, “they actually save lives.”

Amelia has been touched by the heartfelt messages that began appearing in her in-box – kids thanking her for making it safe and giving them hope. “I’ve had teens that got the books e-mail and say it helped them not kill themselves,” she said.

Amelia hopes that Make it Safe, which is on its way to becoming a registered nonprofit organization, will eventually reach all 50 states and go international on a larger scale, giving 100,000 kids in schools and LGBTQ-inclusive youth homeless shelters around the world access to books within the next couple of years.

As if that’s not enough, she also plays in a professional steel drum band, the San Francisco Panhandlers; designs costumes for her school’s participation in San Francisco Carnaval; goes to San Francisco Shakespeare Festival’s Shakespeare camp; and hangs out with her friends.

Oh, and she writes novels, too. One of them – about a girl who writes her dead girlfriend back to life – has reached full length and is in its sixth, and nearly final, draft.

For more information about the Make It Safe Project, including how to donate, visit www.makeitsafeproject.org.

Read the original story at SFGate

Texas’ first LGBT legislator comes out as ‘pansexual’

Mary Gonzalez refuses to be limited to bisexual label.

by Christine Roberts, New York Daily News

Representative Mary Gonzalez, D-Texas

Mary Gonzalez, the Texas legislator who garnered international attention this summer as the state’s first openly lesbian lawmaker now says she identifies as a “pansexual.”

Pansexuals do not believe in “gender binaries,” meaning that their feelings of attraction are gender-blind, Gonzalez said in an interview with the Dallas Voice.

The 29-year-old’s admission makes her the only U.S. legislator to openly describe her sexual orientation as “pansexual.”

Gonzalez, who will serve in the Texas House of Representatives next year, said that she’s decided to clarify her sexual orientation because “gender identity isn’t the defining part of [her] attraction.”

Gonzalez came out as a bisexual when she was 21, though she has dated transgender and “gender-queer” people, as well as women.

“As I started to recognize the gender spectrum and dated along the gender spectrum, I was searching for words that connected to that reality, for words that embraced the spectrum,” Gonzalez told the Dallas Voice. “At the time I didn’t feel as if the term bisexual was encompassing of a gender spectrum that I was dating and attracted to.”

The lawmaker’s sexuality was widely talked about during her Democratic primary campaign for a Texas House seat. Several members of the media called her the “Latina lesbian lawmaker.”

Gonzalez won against two opponents in the May primary. She faces no Republican opponent in the fall.

Gonzalez said that she chose not to come out as pansexual during that campaign, even though she didn’t fully identify with bisexuality, because many people don’t completely understand the term.

“During the campaign if I had identified as pansexual, I would have overwhelmed everyone,” Gonzalez told the Voice. “Now that I’m out of the campaign, I’m completely much more able to define it.”

Robyn Ochs, a well-known gender and sexuality educator, commended Gonzalez’s decision to come out.

“To not use that word because people don’t know what it means is never going to move us forward,” Ochs told the Dallas Voice. “By using language, we change understanding. We create understating.”

Read the original story at New York Daily News

Dancehall Homophobe Beenie Man Calls Gays Child Molesters In Advocate ‘Apology’

Today, The Advocate posted an exclusive interview with notorious dancehall singer Beenie Man, in which he allegedly “apologizes” for song after song calling for the death of gay people. Oh, and promotes his new album.

In the intro, writer Akim Bryant discusses how Beenie (born Anthony Moses Davis) went on YouTube earlier this year to issue a mea culpa for his past bigotry:

“However, back in May 2012, Beenie Man took to YouTube posting the first-ever apology video by any dancehall artist to date, in which he said, “Let me make this clear…I have nothing against no one. I respect each and every human being regardless of which race or creed, regardless of which religious belief…regardless of which sexual preference you have including gay and lesbian people.”

Actually, that’s not an apology. It might be a change of opinion, or a clarification, but we don’t see anything about Beenie, 38, being sorry for contributing to violence perpetrated against the LGBT community.

In fact, Beenie didn’t think it was either: In follow-up interviews he said “I never apologized,” and “I told them to leave us alone, to try to understand where we are coming from.”

If you want to understand where Beenie’s coming from, take a look at some of his lyrics: In “Mi Nah Wallah”, he chants about about cutting the throats of all gay men. In another song he sings “I’m dreaming of a new Jamaica, come to execute all the gays.”

And we can’t stop singing “Take a bazooka and kill batty-fucker,” when we’re in the shower.

The New York Times’ Kelefa Sanneh found some real zingers:

In “That’s Right,” the infectious chorus begins, “We burn chi-chi man and then we burn sodomite and everybody bawl out, say, ‘Dat right!’”

And in “Han Up Deh,” Beenie Man cracks some jokes (“Man a save yuh from drowning is a lifeguard/ Man a watch a man batty, him a batty-guard”), then delivers an anti-gay party chant, asking listeners to raise their hands if they agree: “Hang chi-chi gal wid a long piece a rope/ Mek me see di han’ a go up, mek me see di han’ a go up.”

Beenie likes to say he’s being persecuted for songs he wrote as a wayward youth: “Do not fight against me for some song that I sing 20 years ago.” But these murderous lyrics come from tracks that were all released after 2000. (“Batty Man Fi Dead,” or “Faggots Must be Killed,” was released in 2004.)

And he’s performed many of them well into the new millennium.

Maybe Beenie spells it out in the actual Q&A? Bryant asked the Jamaican dancehall star what prompted him to do the YouTube “apology” (Bryant’s word not ours).

“…If you want people to love your music, all you have to do is respect people for who they are. So when I go to Europe now, me have 30 shows—10 of them canceled. People come out and they protest.

…The next reason is I have done a song with Janet Jackson and it being taken off the charts, video taken off MTV. Now this song with me and Nicki [Minaj]. We textin’ and everything (she says) you need to stop it and make people understand that’s not who you are right now.”

Either Beenie isn’t media-savvy or he doesn’t want to bullshit the reader—he’s making it pretty clear he’s changed his tune to stop the boycotts against him, not because he realized hatred and violence are wrong.

It only gets worse from there, folks.

When Bryant asks what kind of change Beenie has seen since talking about treating gays fairly, he replies “the shows that we used to get banned from, we are now booked.”

When he asks Beenie about the homophobia that still rages in his homeland, his response is exasperating:  “I can’t be concerned about Jamaica and small-minded and one-track, ya understand?”

Worst of all, Beenie suggests gays in Jamaica rape children—and Bryant leaves it unchallenged:

“You have place in the Caribbean where gay and lesbian is legal like Barbados and a few more places. But Jamaica is a place where it’s just bent one way because gay in Jamaica is not like it is in America. It’s mostly big men with money going down in the ghetto and turning the local youths so you call that statutory (rape) or child molestation.

They convince the youth that they are this way…and me know enough youth this way. That’s why when it comes to gay murder in Jamaica, it’s so vicious. With local youth, they can’t go back to their life that they used to know. And then [the rich men] use them and go find the next youth to use. So people need to understand that in Jamaica it’s a different lifestyle. It’s not like two men come together and say I like [to date men]. That’s not the way it is in Jamaica.

So right now until that finished and the youth stop getting kidnapped and found raped and thrown in a bush…until that stops and gays and lesbians speak out against child rapists and all of these things, then the government will see where they’re coming from.

You can’t beat up on the government when you don’t understand what the government is fighting for. They’re not fighting against [gays]. In the government in Jamaica right now, me sure you can find a few gay people. But the whole Caribbean needs support because the [rapes] have to stop.”

Instead of addressing that claim—and trying to sort out the truth from malicious myths—Bryant next asks Beenie about appearing on The RuPaul Show back in 1996. Who gives a damn about RuPaul (sorry, Ru)?!? The man just said gays in Jamaica don’t deserve equality because they’re child rapists!

Maybe Bryant and his editor just wanted to let Beenie hang himself with his words. But that’s not what comes across—not with a headline like: “Beenie Man Apologizes: The king of dancehall music is sorry for his past homophobic lyrics and says his view on LGBT equality has evolved. “

Toward the end of the interview, Bryant asks Beenie if he’d ever perform at an LGBT event. “Ya know, I just can’t answer that,” the singer replies. “When I get there, I get there, seriously.”

We’ll save you the trouble, Beenie. We don’t want you.

Read the original story at Queerty

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Beenie Man Apologizes

The 1990s introduced the U.S. and Europe to a new style of reggae music known as dancehall. It originated from Jamaica and much like the early days of hip-hop, dancehall was instantly popular, yet very controversial. Homophobic lyrics littered many chart-topping international hits by artists like Buju Banton and Beenie Man, the reigning king of dancehall. In their songs, they boasted about committing violent acts against homosexuals including murder. To this day, Jamaica is still described by many human-rights organizations as the most homophobic place on earth.

However, back in May 2012, Beenie Man took to YouTube posting the first ever apology video by any dancehall artist to date, in which he said, “Let me make this clear…I have nothing against no one. I respect each and every human being regardless of which race or creed, regardless of which religious belief…regardless of which sexual preference you have including gay and lesbian people.”

In an exclusive interview with The Advocate, Beenie Man explains how he arrived at his current view on gay rights, whether he believes Jamaica will ever be accepting of the LGBT community and how he would respond if his son grew up to be gay.

The Advocate: What prompted you to do the YouTube apology video?
Beenie Man: What really motivated me to do something like that is the love of the music and the respect for people. I’m a Jamaican, see. I’m from a place called Waterhouse so you’re dealing with all Jamaicans there. So as a youth growing up, what them say that we have to say cause children do what they learn. When you start to learn how the world run and how the world situated right now, people is people and people do what they want to do. They live their own life. And if you want people to love your music, all you have to do is respect people for who they are. So when I go to Europe now, me have 30 shows – 10 of them canceled. People come out and they protest. In a sense, they can’t come to my show and judge me for what I did 15 years ago because nobody is the same person who they was 15 years ago. The next reason is I have done a song with Janet Jackson and it being taken off the charts, video taken off MTV. Now this song with me and Nicki (Minaj). We textin’ and everything (she says) you need to stop it and make people understand that’s not who you are right now. This is who I am, and this is where I’m going, and this is where my head space is. Want to make people understand, we are dancehall music and we sing music for the people. And if we sing music for one set of people…and the next set of people not listen to the music, it don’t make sense. That mean you’re off way in the world.

You’ve got to be the voice for the people, right?
That is the reason why I did it.

What effect has it had since the video was posted?
Well, I did it for Europe and the United States and Canada, I never did it for Jamaica, but it have a (positive) effect all over the world. The shows that we used to get banned from, we are now booked. You have a place like Barcelona, which they offer government [protection] for gay people so once they ease up you realize what is going on. They wanted me to explain to them why I was singing these songs and why do I expect them to support me. So I think they got the message.

So does the negative reaction in your homeland of Jamaica concern you at all?
I live in Jamaica. I can’t be concerned about Jamaica and small-minded and one-track, ya understand? You have intelligent people in my island, people who understand everything. The reaction in the media was a good thing for dancehall music. Everybody who supposed to respond [positively], respond great so you know you not get all good response. A few man say this and a few man say that, but what a few men say is nothing to what the majority say.

Do you believe there will ever be a time when gays and lesbians will be accepted in Jamaica?
Well I don’t know that. That is not my thing. Me cannot tell you that. You would have to talk to the government cause I am not government.

So laws would have to be passed?
You have place in the Caribbean where gay and lesbian is legal like Barbados and a few more places. But Jamaica is a place where it’s just bent one way because gay in Jamaica is not like it is in America. It’s mostly big men with money going down in the ghetto and turning the local youths so you call that statutory (rape) or child molestation. They convince the youth that they are this way…and me know enough youth this way. That’s why when it comes to gay murder in Jamaica, it’s so vicious. With local youth, they can’t go back to their life that they used to know. And then (the rich men) use them and go find the next youth to use. So people need to understand that in Jamaica it’s a different lifestyle. It’s not like two men come together and say I like (to date men). That’s not the way it is in Jamaica. So right now until that finished and the youth stop getting kidnapped and found raped and thrown in a bush…until that stops and gays and lesbians speak out against child rapists and all of these things, then the government will see where they’re coming from. You can’t beat up on the government when you don’t understand what the government is fighting for. They’re not fighting against (gays). In the government in Jamaica right now, me sure you can find a few gay people. But the whole Caribbean needs support because the (rapes) have to stop.

You appeared on The RuPaul Show back in 1996. Did you receive backlash for making that appearance?
Of course, I live in Jamaica. But from then I don’t care, music is music. Promotion is promotion. TV is TV. I sing “Dancehall Queen.” RuPaul is a drag queen. Him love the song. Him invite me and Chevelle Franklin to do the show. What am I gonna say? No? Are you crazy?

One of the biggest trepidations straight people tend to have about supporting gay rights is that the public will then think he or she must also be gay.
Yeah, this is already going on because of the video I did. But, ya see, gay lifestyle is not what I am because I’m a straight man. But it’s not for me to condemn it cause every man have a right to decide their destiny. And it’s not for you to (then) condemn me. Some straight people make the same mistake some gay people make. Jamaican people are afraid of what they don’t know like every (other) people in the world.

Did it make a difference for you when President Obama spoke out in support of gay marriage?
It don’t make no difference to me because still the world go on. It definitely helped, but if the world don’t agree, what is anyone going to do? Turn a blind eye? You have to do these things or get left behind.

Now, there’s still a lot of speculation on the internet about whether you actually signed the Reggae Compassionate Act of 2007 renouncing homophobia.
Yeah, me sign it. Me sign it like seven years ago and we still getting backlash regardless of what we did. Gay people still come out and demonstrate. They printed me signature in newspaper in Jamaica. I was the first one to sign it.

Yes, it was you along with Sizzla and Capleton. Now, would you ever consider performing for an LGBT event or festival?
Ya know, I just can’t answer that. When I get there, I get there, seriously.

If the opportunity presents itself, you’ll deal with it, but until then, no comment?
No comment.

Typically when it comes to gay rights, it’s tough for heterosexual people to understand the issue unless they know someone personally who is gay. Is that what also helped you change your view?
I know a few gay people and I work with them. They keep them life to them and we work together. It’s all about work, not sitting around talking about gay issues. I know what it is. A man love a man, that’s his feelings, his heart, his passion, ya understand? Let’s say (hypothetically) I have a cousin who’s gay. I’m not gonna kill him. I’m not gonna hate him. I have to support him with a choice that he make. He have to have somebody to support him cause if the whole family turn they back against him, he end up committing suicide cause he might think he made the wrong choice. Your choice is your choice. Your decision is your decision. It’s not mine. It’s not for me to tell him that you’re wrong. But I cannot say that I have a brother or a cousin or somebody close to me [who’s gay]. I am from Waterhouse…Kingston, Jamaica. That is a serious question that you ask me, ya know? But I have been working with a lot of these people. It’s not my business. I look past it.

So how would you personally feel if your only child, your son, turned out to be gay?
Well I can’t feel no ways. He’s my son. I love him already. It’s not gonna make me hate him. All left to do is to support him and guide him through.

And of course, we can’t forget about the music. You have a new album coming soon, right? What can people expect from the new Beenie Man?
Yes, the single is out called “Summer is Here.” I have a new album coming out. It’s called King in Control. This is a dancehall reggae album. All of the hip-hop artists we’re putting on this album will be on a reggae beat…Will Smith and LL Cool J cause we’re all veterans in it so we work with the big people.

Read the original interview at the Advocate

Sally Ride’s Final Public Act: A Gift To LGBT Community

“In addition to Tam O’Shaughnessy, her partner of 27 years, Sally is survived by her mother, Joyce; her sister, Bear; her niece, Caitlin, and nephew, Whitney; her staff of 40 at Sally Ride Science; and many friends and colleagues around the country.”

That was the final sentence of the announcement on the Sally Ride Science website of the death this past Monday of the first American woman to travel into space. Most newspaper obituaries, including the obituary in Sally’s local newspaper, U-T San Diego, quoted the sentence nearly verbatim, and failed to answer any questions a reader might have about the sentence.

But one journalist was more inquisitive that day. Chris Geidner, who works at BuzzFeed.com, talked to Sally’s company and to Bear Ride, her openly lesbian sister, and confirmed within a couple of hours that there was a breaking news story hiding inside a humble obit: An American hero had just come out of the closet publicly.

Even before Geidner’s reporting, I’d emailed U-T editors to note what may not have been immediately obvious: That Tam is a woman and the obituary didn’t seem to mean business partner. I also asked the U-T editors, “Does it matter?”

A short while later, I realized it does matter. While, on the one hand, public figures coming out is no big deal nowadays – did anyone spill their coffee over Anderson Cooper’s recent revelation? – this may well be the first time that someone who is already in the schoolbooks has come out of the closet.

A sentence or two now will be added to those history books, and that will matter a whole lot to gay and lesbian young people who have to cope with the harsh environment of high school, where any kind of difference, but particularly being gay, still can make one a target for bullying and abuse. (California actually has a law requiring that lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, or LGBT, history be included in textbooks.)

This was a gift that Sally Ride, said by her family to be a very private person, gave to other LGBT people upon her passing.

“Sally never hid her relationship with Tam,” Bear Ride told The San Francisco Chronicle. “Sally’s very close friends, of course, knew of their love for each other. … Sally had a very fundamental sense of privacy – it was just her nature – because we’re Norwegians.”

Bear told the Chronicle she hopes Ride’s revelation “makes it easier for kids growing up gay that they know that another one of their heroes was like them.”

Fierce debate erupted on gay-activist listservs within moments of the announcement of Ride’s death. Some people scolded Ride for not coming out during her lifetime, arguing that that would have made a bigger difference in the world. Others defended her decision not to take that step into the limelight.

Yes, Ride could have come out if she felt like it. Current-day La Jolla is not at all an unsafe place for same-sex couples. But she had no obligation to do so, and neither does any other public figure.

Not every gay or lesbian person wants to be an activist, and when a public figure comes out, he or she can be thrust into that role by the media, which start asking the individual’s opinion on every gay topic of the day.

Not every gay or lesbian person even considers his or her sexual orientation one of the most important pieces of his or her identity. For some, it’s just another thing, like being left-handed, or Episcopalian.

If anyone deserves a bit of scolding, it’s the news media, which went about its business for around 24 hours before realizing that this obituary was not a run-of-the-mill obituary and that there was a surprise, and breaking news, lurking in the list of survivors.

By the second day, there were stories everywhere about Ride’s coming out.

And I suspect this piece is one of several on Sunday op-ed pages around the country today.

American hero Sally Ride did one more great thing the day she died. She showed America, again, that LGBT people really are everywhere, including even in outer space and already in our history books.

Read the original story at UT San Diego

Team LGBT: Gay Athletes In Olympic History

There’s no doubt that hundreds, if not thousands of LGBT athletes have competed in the modern Olympics. Here are a few who have made us proud.

Now that the Olympic torch is ablaze in London, we can’t help but think about all of the gay athletes, out and closeted, to represent their countries doing what they do best. Outsports has compiled more than 100 athletes who have done just that, and what’s impressive is that 52% of LGBT-identified athletes on their list have earned at least one shiny piece of medal.

And for the record, the gayest Olympic sports — that is, the sports with the most openly gay Olympic athletes — are soccer, track & field, swimming, and equestrian. Click through for ten members of the historical Team LGBT.

Gay Games founder Tom Waddell – USA, Track & Field

Natalie Cook – Volleyball, Australiam 1996, 2000, 2012

Natasha Kai – USA, Soccer, 2008

Sheryl Swoopes – USA, Basketball, 1996-2004

Carl Hester – UK, Equestrian, 1992, 2000, 2004, 2012

Bruce Hayes – USA, Swimming, 1984 (with Jack Mackenroth, right)

Conchita Martinez – Spain, Tennis, 1992-2004

Babe Didrikson Zaharias – USA, Track & field, 1932

Rennae Stubbs – Australia, Tennis, 1996 – 2008

Edinanci da Silva – Brazil, Judo, 1996-2008

Read the original story at the Advocate

LGBT Hate Crime in Nebraska Spurs National Support for Victim

*Blogger’s Note: This one is literally too close to home for me. I live in Omaha, Nebraska.

A woman in Lincoln, Nebraska was accosted in her home this week by three masked men. Police have announced that they consider the incident an LGBT hate crime after they discovered derogatory words for lesbians painted on the walls of the woman’s home. Some friends also said that more slurs were painted throughout the woman’s basement.

CNN reports that the victim’s hands were tied, and words had also been cut into her body, but investigators did not announce what those words were. The woman, who is reportedly a 33-year-old, was able to get to her neighbor, Linda Rappl’s, house and ask for help. It was apparent to Rappl that the woman had been subjected to torture for some time.

Investigators also noted that gasoline was poured around the woman’s house and someone had lit it in an attempt to set the house ablaze. Fortunately, the fire did not substantially damage the structure or the woman, although the attempt was made to destroy the house. The woman lives openly as a lesbian and acquaintances have maintained that she is a committed community member.

News of the hate crime spread rapidly across the internet, spurring support for the victim and spawning statements against LGBT hate crimes. Twitter was awash with statements regarding the woman’s attack. One woman said, “Some people make me sick. Why can’t we all respect and appreciate each other?” Another said, “Why is this stuff still happening?”  Yet another said, “This. Has. To. Stop.”

The local community of Lincoln, Nebraska has also taken a stand against the hate crime. Mayor Chris Beutler stated on Monday that:

Hate crimes are despicable and appalling to me and to all Lincoln residents… Lincoln strives to be a community that embraces tolerance and equality. We stand united with our gay and lesbian citizens in denouncing violence directed at any group.

Members of the community also organized a vigil for the victim of the crime on Sunday, which about 500 people attended. Police officials have stated that they will pursue the case until justice has been served.

The woman is reported to be recovering steadily and is now out of the hospital and at an emergency shelter. LGBT rights organizers have stated their faith in the police force to follow the course of the investigation to its conclusion. Although investigators were at first reticent to state that the crime was a hate crime, they later officially announced that they classified the attack in that category.

Read the original story at Care2

Palm Springs Pride goes big in San Diego, London

 

 

Four months before their annual Pride festival and parade take place in Palm Springs, Coachella Valley residents are doing their part to promote marriage equality and celebrate LGBT culture around the world.

Earlier this month, Palm Springs Pride President Ron deHarte led a local contingent before an international audience in the World Pride Parade in London, England.

“Participating in other Pride parades provides an opportunity to raise awareness for equal rights, show support to other Pride organizatoins and showcase Palm Springs as a welcoming, LGBT friendly destination,” deHarte says in a press release.

Spectators reacted with enthusiasm and surprise to see the desert city represented, deHarte says. The parade entry of inflated palm trees and a brightly colored banner followed New York City’s entry, the only other U.S. city that participated.

Local Pride officials made even more of a splash Saturday during the San Diego LGBT Pride Parade. In addition to the Palm Springs Pride banner, the entry spotlighted four couples.

Participants led two towering balloon couples along the route. They resembled wedding toppers, with the male couple dressed in black suits and the female couple attired in traditional white dresses. The balloons were about 20 feet tall.

 

Both parade contingents were organized through a partnership between Greater Palm Springs Pride and the Palm Springs Bureau of Tourism.

Balloon cake-toppers were a part of the Palm Springs contingent during San Diego’s LGBT Pride parade Saturday.

Balloon cake-toppers were a part of the Palm Springs contingent during San Diego’s LGBT Pride parade Saturday.

The balloons were accompanied by Lilia Marodi who also wore a wedding dress and marched with Becky Marodi, the woman she hopes to marry someday.

Showing their support for same-sex marriage, Cathedral City Councilman Sam Toles and husband Matthew Toles rode in a convertible as a part of the festivities.

The Marodis’ and Toles’ presence “helped put real people in front of the freedom to marry issue,” deHarte says.

 
Read the original story at My Desert

Sally Ride didn’t want to be a gay icon

Sally Ride showed Generation X girls the sky’s the limit — literally.

 

In this Oct. 7, 2009 file photo, former astronaut Sally Ride speaks to members of the media. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais – Associated Press)

We could do anything boys could do and sometimes better. If we wanted to go into space, our gender couldn’t — and wouldn’t — stop us. If we studied hard enough and trained our brains, the glass ceiling could be shattered.

Amid all the girl power that Ride taught women, one barrier the first American woman in space chose not to break was sexuality. When she died on Monday at age 61 from pancreatic cancer, it emerged that Ride had a partner. As one friend on Facebook wrote, in jest, “That lady astronaut was gay.”

Yes, Sally Ride, a theoretical astrophysicist, American hero and feminist icon, was a lesbian.

She had a partner for 27 years. According to some news reports, Ride didn’t keep her relationship secret. Perhaps not, but the world certainly didn’t know about it. Most of us learned that tidbit of Ride trivia when her obituary was written.

Ride lived a quiet life, a throwback to another time not so long ago; when someone’s personal life wasn’t splashed all over television or Facebook. There’s a reason it’s called “a private life.”

Ride’s partner was Tam O’Shaughnessy, a professor emerita of school psychology at San Diego State University. She and Ride wrote several books together, and O’Shaughnessy was also chief operating officer and executive vice president of Ride’s company, Sally Ride Science, where girls receive encouragement to learn about engineering, math, science and technology.

When she became the first woman in space, she was married to astronaut Steve Hawley. They divorced in 1987.

He said in a statement on Monday, “Sally was a very private person who found herself a very public persona. It was a role in which she was never fully comfortable. I was privileged to be a part of her life and be in a position to support her as she became the first American woman to fly in space.”

She didn’t have an easy ride into space amid media scrutiny. Some reporters back then in the 1980s asked her if she would wear a bra into space. Others asked if she planned on having children. Ride hated that she was asked such sexist questions at NASA news conferences while her male counterparts weren’t.

Ride may have tolerated ridiculous inquires in the quaint ‘80s, but the decade also shielded the shy astronaut. She wasn’t politicized or trending on social media. If she was married, we didn’t obsess over it like we would now in a celebrity-obsessed world. We didn’t become oversaturated with tales of Sally Ride, but we did take a lesson from her.

In death, Ride has already become politicized. Progressive and gay blogs are lamenting the fact that O’Shaughnessy will not receive Ride’s federal benefits because of the Marriage Act (DOMA) and blaming Republicans.

Ride obviously didn’t want to be a gay icon. If she had, she could have easily sat down with Oprah or Ellen and told the world about her sexuality, her private life and her love for O’Shaughnessy, whom she had known since she was 12.

Instead, Ride lived in a world where we should all live, a place where we celebrate someone for her accomplishments and not her sexual orientation.

Read the original story at Washington Post

Team LGBT Goes for the Olympic Gold

About 10,500 athletes will compete at the Olympic games in London this summer. Which ones are gay?

 

 

In the four years since the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, athletes on all levels, from high school to pro, have come out, creating more examples of diversity within the world of sports. But while the locker room doors have opened a little wider, the globally shared experience of the Olympic games still lacks a deep roster of openly LGBT athletes.

To be fair, it’s not like we didn’t try. Gymnast Josh Dixon, hammer thrower Keelin Godsey, and boxer Patricia Manuel all made noble attempts for trips to London. We also lost Stephany Lee, the no-holds-barred wrestler who qualified for the U.S. team but was later disqualified after traces of marijuana were found in her system. And as much as a stereotype it is, the number of lesbian and bisexual athletes like Vicki Galindo and Lauren Lappin could have been even higher if softball was not eliminated from the games.

Nonetheless, there are as many reasons cited to be closeted as a world-class athlete as there are closeted world-class athletes. Some countries might condemn gays and lesbians, let alone those who act as international representatives. And that’s why British activist Peter Tatchell has called on Olympic organizers to ban countries that allow antigay discrimination.

“Why isn’t homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia being challenged by the Olympic authorities?” said Tatchell, the head of the Peter Tatchell Foundation. “It is wrong that in over 150 countries LGBT athletes are forced to hide their sexuality in order to get selected and compete.”

But for what it’s worth, we’ve identified a handful of athletes from the U.S. and around the world competing in London this summer. They will represent not only their respective national teams but also Team LGBT.

If you know we’re missing any openly LGBT athletes competing in this year’s Olympics, please let us know in the comments, so we can keep you updated on their progress throughout the games.

Seimone Augustus, WNBA, Minnesota Lynx

 

Seimone Augustus: Basketball, U.S. 

WNBA champion and star Minnesota Lynx player Seimone Augustus came out publicly to The Advocate earlier this year. The motivation? Her engagement to her fiancée, LaTaya. Competing internationally, whether she’s playing in Russia or on the Olympic court, is familiar to Augustus.

“Every country is out to beat Team USA,”she said earlier this year. “If they beat us, it makes their year, it makes their life, it makes their career. I have Russian teammates that I played against in 2006, when they beat us in the World Championships, and they still talk about that now. So beating Team USA is everything to the other countries because we set such high standards for ourselves.”

Matthew Mitcham

 

Matthew Mitcham: Diving, Australia 

“I remember the things that I was thinking on the platform before the dive, and I remember what happened as soon as I hit the water,” Matthew Mitcham recalled a few months after taking home the gold in the 10-meter platform dive in 2008. “The dive itself is a bit vague. It felt good, although I wasn’t exactly sure. I did wait underneath the water a bit, thinking, I wonder…I wonder…I wonder… Then I popped my head out and the crowd was going wild. I looked over at Chava and he looked excited. It was the most far-out experience. It just completely took me over and I just lost it. And I think everybody loved that I lost it.”

Ever since Matthew Mitcham’s adorable reaction to winning his gold medal win in Beijing, he’s been busy. He’s won several competitions around the world, he was named an ambassador to the 2014 Gay Games, and he has an endorsement deal with Australian telecommunications provider Telstra and swimwear line Funky Trunks. It’ll be fascinating to watch a wiser, more experienced Mitcham make another attempt at the gold medal.

Megan Rapinoe

Megan Rapinoe: Soccer, U.S.

Midfielder Meghan Rapinoe will break from her spot on the Seattle Sounders to play for the U.S. national team. No doubt this is a win for Nike, with which Rapinoe has a lucrative endorsement deal. On her decision to discuss her sexual orientation openly, Rapinoe told Out, “I feel like sports in general are still homophobic, in the sense that not a lot of people are out. I feel everyone is really craving [for] people to come out. People want — they need — to see that there are people like me playing soccer for the good ol’ U.S. of A.”

Coach Pia Sundhage

Pia Sundhage: Soccer, U.S. (coach)

Pia Sundhage would surely tell you the Olympic games are just as significant for coaches as they are for athletes. The Scandanavian coach said that she has had no problem as the “openly gay head coach in the USA team,” and that her partner Marie “and I have had a wonderful reception.” According to SheWired, Sundhage scored 71 goals in 146 caps for Sweden in a 22-year national team career that began in 1975 at age 15, but the U.S. job was her first as a coach.

Marilyn Aghotti

Marilyn Agliotti: Field Hockey, Netherlands 

Marilyn Agliotti also took some gold home from Beijing. As a member of the Netherlands’ national field hockey team, Agliotti is no stranger to success. Wearing signature bright orange, the Dutch team has excelled in field hockey since 2008, winning the European Championships in 2009 and 2010, and a silver medal at the world championships. Agliotti told Heroes magazine that more needs to be done to promote acceptance of lesbian players. “In my opinion,” she said, “the hockey world is at peace with lesbian players, as long as they remain in the background.” She also encourages her colleagues in the field hockey world to “become your own hero. Be proud of yourself and the things you do.”

Written by Michelle Garcia

Read the original story at the Advocate