Scuffles Disrupt Funeral of Murdered Ugandan Gay Activist David Kato

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
Jan 28, 2011

Here is a revolting story about a funeral that only deranged minister Fred Phelps could admire--and inspire.

The behavior described in this story from Reuters (below) is about as blasphemous, disgusting, irreverent and anti-Christ as one could ever expect from a Christian clergyman--as wickedly perverted as Fred Phelps of the gay-hating Westboro church in Kansas, infamous for picketing funerals of deceased AIDS victims.

But this funeral behavior by an Anglican minister is perhaps worse since he was presiding over David Kato's farewell memorial at which deeply saddened, tearful and grieving friends and family had gathered. How base-minded can a person be to desecrate a funeral so. How 'gone wild' into bezerk blind dogma can a cleric be to de-humanize a deceased benevolent person with curses against homosexuality, claiming it is sin and saying David Kato should not be admired. (photo, David Kato)

It shows how low hate-filled religion can bring a person below humanity. Homophobia is a disease that has killed and will kill more in Uganda in it's destructive path. Not that the West is clean by any means but countries who donate money and aid to Uganda should think twice when state and church sanctioned bigotry is allowed to run rampant among its society.

This is a shameful day for the Ugandan Anglican church and for the government of Uganda.


Reuters story: Scuffles Disrupt Funeral of Murdered Ugandan Gay Activist
by Justin Dralaze:
See Reuters story

Mukono, Uganda
Scuffles broke out between locals and friends of a murdered Ugandan gay activist at his funeral on Friday after the pastor conducting the service berated gay people and villagers refused to bury the coffin.

During the funeral -- which was attended by about 300 people, including about 100 members of the country's gay community -- the pastor lashed out at homosexuality, provoking a strong reaction from friends of Kato.

"The world has gone crazy," the pastor told the congregation through a microphone. "People are turning away from the scriptures. They should turn back, they should abandon what they are doing. You cannot start admiring this fellow man..."

Gay activists, wearing T-shirts featuring Kato's face with sleeves coloured with the gay pride flag, then stormed the pulpit and grabbed the microphone. "It is ungodly," the pastor shouted, before being blocked from sight.

An unidentified female activist then began to shout from the pulpit, "who are you to judge others?" she shouted. "We have not come to fight. You are not the judge of us. As long as he's gone to God his creator, who are we to judge Kato?"

Locals intervened on the side of the pastor and scuffles broke out before he was taken away to Kato's father's house to calm the situation.

Villagers then refused to bury the body at which point a group of Kato's friends, most of whom were gay, carried his coffin to the grave and buried it themselves.

Read Val Kalende's fine eulogy of David.

U.S. Pastors Export Bigotry to Uganda

From:

Sharon Groves
Religion and Faith Program
Human Rights Campaign,
Washington DC

U.S. pastors are exporting bigotry to Uganda, with brutal results.

This is an issue close to my heart, because I've spent over a decade working for equality as a lay leader in my own church, and now, as acting director of HRC's Religion and Faith program – which helps religious leaders of all stripes speak out for equality and fight back when hatred is promoted in the name of religion.

On Thursday, that perversion of faith cost Ugandan gay rights advocate David Kato (on right in photo) his life. He was bludgeoned to death in his home after his name was among those listed in an anti-gay magazine, under the headline "Hang them!"

Since at least 2009, radical U.S. Christian missionaries have added anti-gay conferences and workshops in Uganda to their anti-gay efforts in the U.S. – and now they're beginning to ordain ministers and build churches across East Africa focused almost entirely on preaching against homosexuality.

These American extremists didn't call for David's death. But they created a climate of hate that breeds violence – and they must stop and acknowledge they were wrong.

"Stop Exporting Hate." Sign our petition to Carl Ellis Jenkins, Lou Engle, and Scott Lively.

We'll deliver your signature to three men who have gone out of their way to promote hatred:

• Scott Lively of Massachusetts held an anti-gay conference in Uganda with two other U.S. pastors. A few months later, a bill was introduced in Uganda that would make homosexuality punishable by death.
• Lou Engle, a Missouri preacher whose rallies draw tens of thousands in the U.S., spoke at a rally in Uganda this year that focused on praying for the bill's passage. (Engle claims not to support some parts of the bill, but internal documents show he came to speak about "the threat of homosexuality," and defend the Ugandan government's efforts to "curb the growth of the vice using the law.")
• And Carl Ellis Jenkins of Georgia is presiding over a group that's opening 50 new churches in Uganda to "help clean up bad morals, including homosexuality" according to his staff.

They have been stirring up hostility in a country where homosexuality is already illegal, violent attacks are common, rape is used to 'cure' people of their sexual orientation – and a shocking law has been proposed that would make homosexuality punishable by life imprisonment or even death.

And they're in lockstep with some of the largest and wealthiest right-wing groups in the U.S. When the U.S. Congress considered a resolution denouncing the grotesque Ugandan death-penalty-for-gays bill, the extreme-right Family Research Council – now classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center – spent $25,000 lobbying to stop the resolution from passing.

Religion should never be used to spread hate. These men do not speak for me or the millions of diverse religious people who support equality not in spite of our faith, but because of it

That's what our Religion and Faith program is all about: helping people of faith from all different traditions speak out so we can reclaim the core religious values we hold dear in America.

At the heart of every religious tradition is love of humanity and love of creator – not hatred for our neighbors. Creating a climate of hate runs contrary to the very idea of faith – but that's exactly what the right wing in America is doing.

Tell missionaries and radical hate groups: "Stop exporting hate."

Whether or not we're people of faith, we cannot stay silent or stand idly by while a radical minority pushes a hateful agenda in God's name. Please stand with us and speak out today.

One of Uganda's Finest Gay Rights Advocates is Murdered

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 27, 2011

In Memorium:
On February 26, 2011 one of Uganda's finest and most outspoken LGBT rights activist, David Kato, was murdered in cold blood in his home. Friends and activists called him the "grandfather of the kuchus", a self-applied label by Ugandan LGBTs.

GlobalGayz was privileged to interview him for our 'Gay Uganda' story in 2008. He was a brave and highly committed activist who pushed the struggle for gay rights since the 1990's. Over the years he was jailed for his advocacy work; he spoke at international conferences; he met with UN officials; and he was not afraid to go to public court to stop a tabloid from falsely outing suspected gays. He won. His work and his memory will go down in Ugandan human rights history.

This blog is dedicated to the memory of that braveheart, David Kato.
(Stories at NYTimes1, NYTimes2, The Guardian)

During our visit to Kampala in 2008, we were privileged to meet with several Ugandan gay rights activists who were leading the uphill battle for recognition and acceptance in their very homophobic country. The prejudice against gays was palpable. They asked us not to publish the location of their meetings but were still willing to speak their minds about the government, religious and media discrimination against them.

Physical assaults, police harassment, religious bigotry were common events in their lives. While we were talking to Victor Mukasa, another outspoken activist, his phone rang to tell him the police were at his house. Later that day FARUG leader Kasha Jacqueline spoke how she had a driver (funded by an NGO charity) to take her around town to minimize her public exposure because she was so outspoken for gay rights.

David Kato was also among this 'family' of brave 'human rights defenders' planning demonstrations, lobbying sympathetic government officials, soliciting needed funds from abroad and writing letters to the media to counter homophobic press stories. Our meetings were quiet, computers and phones were busy and we ate pizza together.

It was at this meeting that David--or possibly one of the others--wrote the following: "Many people are laughing at us, saying that we are wasting our time fighting for our rights because we may never live to see freedom. But I don't care at all not to see that freedom, if I am not around. The issue is , have I left a foundation for the future generations to carry on the struggle? The answer is YES!"

It's hard to describe in words the daunting conditions under which these courageous activists labor. The Ugandan government treats them with disdain; the police have fun ridiculing and abusing them; religious leaders make money by attracting crowds of 'believers' with anti-gay sermons and news interviews; American fundamentalists have traveled to Uganda to urge anti-gay sentiment and gay-hating legislation. Sometimes the activists have to hide or leave the country if things get too pressured and threats are made against them.

David Kato lived in fear but did not let that stop his march for human rights and justice. For him it was the right thing to do--it was the only thing to do. This was a man who made a real difference to move the world from darkness into light. His last message to us was, "Thanks for your visit to Uganda.
That was nice of you to give your time to us and I hope the data you collected will be of great use."

What David said and did will be of much greater use. May his spirit ever shine.

Read Val Kalende's fine eulogy of David.

Top Brass Resist New Military Gay Policy

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 26, 2011

So said President Obama in his State of the Union Speech last night:

"Our troops come from every corner of this country -– they’re black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American. They are Christian and Hindu, Jewish and Muslim. And, yes, we know that some of them are gay. Starting this year, no American will be forbidden from serving the country they love because of who they love. (Applause.) And with that change, I call on all our college campuses to open their doors to our military recruiters and ROTC. It is time to leave behind the divisive battles of the past. It is time to move forward as one nation." (Applause.)

During the two pauses for applause, the TV cameras zoomed in on two sets of military chiefs sitting with their hands folded on their laps in their richly decorated uniforms with faces looking like Mount Rushmore, unmoved and unhappy. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Michael Mullen, Air Force General Norton Schwartz, Marine Corps General James Amos, Navy Admiral Gary Roughhead, Army General George Casey--not one clapped.

They looked old and worn. They are old and worn just as their ideas about gays in the military are backward and irrational. Despite the overwhelming evidence from actual military forces in 41 countries that gay troops have no negative impact on troop cohesion or discipline; despite the fact that 26 countries that participate militarily in NATO (including UN Peacekeeping troops) more than 22 permit gay people to serve; despite the military's own internal study that "no research has ever shown that open homosexuality impairs military readiness."

These top brass commandos still deeply think "by policy, we would be condoning what we believe is immoral activity" (to quote Gen. Peter Pace, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) to allow gays to serve openly. The terrible irony in this comment -- that training troops to kill is not immoral but men (or women) loving other men (or women) is immoral -- is almost too painful to bear. It is a horrible prejudice against human nature in general and against the true nature of sexuality in particular. It shouts loudly of ignorance, and worse, of a refusal to enlighten that ignorance with modern insight and understanding about human sexual orientation.

So there they sat in front of their much more open-minded Commander in Chief as he expressed modern thought for his modern forces. "It is time to move forward as one nation," said Mr. Obama. But seen in the faces of these top brass, so encrusted with archaic irrational opinions, was their resistance to moving on. They will move on, of course, by command, and issue orders to accept gays in the service.

What they don't see is that their private commitment to bigotry and close-mindedness is the real impairment to military readiness. Lower-rank officers and enlisted troops take their orders and cues from the top where these brass sit. If they don't 'like' something, despite obeying orders, it is well known down the ranks and it's this unspoken prejudice against gays that will continue to feed homophobic behavior in the ranks. Just as it is with some religious leaders who spew anti-gay venom in sermons, speeches and writings that sanction violence and hatred among less educated followers.

These decorated veterans of too many combats don't realize how their unmoving arms and hands--seen by millions in two 5-second TV shots--perpetuates division and weakens cohesion among countless troops looking to deal with the new policy of gays in the military. This is poor leadership and, yes, smacks of disobedience toward their superior. Minimal applause on their part would have spoken far better for this country than their stone-faced denial of what the President said.

Times change, policies change, people change. If these well-paid generals can't accept that, then resign now before they perpetuate more discrimination and injustice.

A Homophobia-Free Zone in Copenhagen

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 22, 2011

A recent extended stay in Copenhagen allowed me to explore with some depth this pretty, efficient and tolerant city on the north coast of Europe. Denmark is a highly gay-tolerant country compared to most others in the world, with more than two dozen LGBT (gay) venues, organizations and festivals throughout the cites and the year. For a population of only five million, that's a lot of LGBT energy in one small country.

Yet, as well and not surprising, is the degree of homophobia and dislike of gay society among some members of the broader population across the land, despite protective anti-discrimination legislation at the federal level. Denmark is not a highly religious country but there are clearly a lot of Lutheran steeples across the land and historically the protestants have not liked us any more than the Catholics or Jews or Muslims.

Prejudices are handed down in families and cultures for decades even if diluted over each successive generation. Homophobia is generally diluted in Denmark but still discernible and occasionally rears its ugly such as in a 2009 book by a well-known Danish-Polish football (soccer player) in which he says "…I cannot sit down with someone who is gay. To see them kiss each other. It is so disgusting. I've never met a gay in a football team. It is not possible."

Not surprisingly, after the publication of the book the player was fired from the team. It is not uncommon for certain immigrants (clearly not all) from eastern Europe or from Islamic countries to bring their anti-gay attitudes when they emigrate to Denmark. Such opinions are usually kept behind closed doors but now and then--when drunk or in an aroused social state (in groups)--they break out into public voice or action.

But mostly such disdain is governed by legal and political restrictions against homophobic discrimination. And most LGBT citizens do not wave flags from their windows or hold Pride festivals in the suburbs or small towns. It's a quiet and acceptable arrangement given that long-standing prejudices against sexual minorities do not dissolve easily.

Although homosexuality was legalized in 1933, it was not until 1977 that the age of consent was equalized (age 15) for gay and straight citizens. In June 2006, a majority in Folketinget voted for abolishing a law that since 1997 had banned lesbians from insemination. Allowing same-sex couples to jointly apply for adoption was only approved in parliament as recently as May 2010.

Good as these measures were, the point is that as recently as 2010 there were still some barriers and resistance to full and equal rights for LGBT citizens in Denmark. Residual homophobes opposed the notion of homosexuals as complete and equal citizens. Sexual prejudices die hard even in open-minded cultures.

But in Copenhagen there is an fine exception to such overt and covert homophobia--Christiana Freetown Village.

Chistiania is an 81-acre city within a city that was founded in 1971 by 'alternative' people--hippies and others seeking a freer lifestyle and a place to live. They invaded and took over an unused military compound against much government resistance. It's been a forty year off-and-on struggle to keep the authorities at bay, sometimes losing, but ultimately winning the right to stay and organize their version of communal living.

Among these thousand souls who inhabit Christiania today are a small population of LGBT Christianites who have made a gay 'house' for their community; it's called Bossehuset (gay house).

Gay house is a large interior space in one of the many brick warehouse-style buildings of Christiania. A purpose space for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons for cultural events, theater performances, exhibitions, recreational activities and celebrations--dancing, singing, music or drag shows. The ongoing activities of gay house are managed by 'Monday Meeting' which takes place every Monday to approve, plan and organize all activities in the 'house'. (See photo gallery)

The photo left shows the entry door with its hand painted rainbow in the usual graffiti style common to the village. The words say there is a bar and lounge inside, accompanied by a little cartoon of an over-dressed person, hinting at the occasional high drag shows in the house.

The organization is communal. The look is typical of Christiania. The attitude is cooperative and respectful. But what's qualitatively different here, inside the village, is the absence of homophobic thought and action. There is no discrimination, no covert disregard for gay villagers, none of the usual sub-text of disdain for variant sexual orientations that's present in the larger Danish population.

Christiania is not a majority-rule, religion-infused, hierarchical heterosexist society where sectarian dogma and beliefs make some people 'normal' and other abnormal. It is not governed by 'traditional family values'. A resident who is prejudiced against the LGBT community will not last long here; such thinking usually carries other prejudices that are toxic to the spirit of cooperation in the village. So homophobes need not bother to apply to live here.

The place is intended to be a village of positive egalitarian opportunity, a place of color and respect. A homophobia-free zone in Copenhagen.

It was an instructive visit to Copenhagen. And we stayed there for free. Find out how.

See other stories about gay Denmark.

Gay and Straight at the Malmo, Sweden Train Station

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 11, 2011 (1/11/11)

Imagine this: arriving at the Malmo, Sweden train station (30 minutes east from Copenhagen) for the first time and looking around at the kiosks, cafes, ticket offices, bustling commuters. Nothing unusual--until I wandered into the variety store (called Interpress, a la 7-Eleven) and beheld a blizzard of print--probably a thousand different magazines neatly displayed on dozens of shelves across seven or eight large racks.

I've never seen so many 'zines in one place--ever. Topics ranged from hard core goth to feminist mags, from quilting to horse, dog and baby care. Computers and gardens, politics and boating, race cars and cooking...and on and on to virtually every interest area known to humankind, from race cars to tattoos and strange titles such as Nexus, Wired and Imagine; even one called Facebook.

(Photo right is the famous Turning Torso residential/office tower in Malmo, 623 feet tall, 55 stories. Stunning from all angles. Some call it Scandinavia's biggest erection.)

This is Sweden and these periodicals reveal the range of knowledge choices a person has in this country. A wide open mind makes for a desirable culture: consider how many eastern Europeans and Middle Easterners yearn to come here.

Not surprising, among the mass of titles from feminist to fetish to the usual girlie soft porn there were half a dozen gay flavored mags sitting near National Geographic, Der Stern and Paris Match. I saw at least five queer and homoerotic magazines: Hero, Out, Winq, Attitude, Bang, Mate.

The high end glossy lifestyle called Winq comes from Amsterdam and is head and shoulders above most gay lifestyle magazines, in Europe or America. It is so glossy (and informative) it weighs more than the others. It drips with carnality while handling heavy issues such as Catholic church hypocrisy and pondering the nature of 'Faith.'

Clustered together are the others.


Hero is virtually all fashion and mood photos of pouting models with so much studied attitude that one wonders if they suffered more than a little getting into contrived poses and expressions of upper class ennui.

Not a smile for page after page. Is that how we want to be seen? What is the message here--sultry unhappiness amidst all that luxury? Do the editors or production directors realize the paradox here? Being well groomed and well off produces lassitude and languor?

My favorite cover was is Bang, actually a feminist magazine that is up front with their ideas and intentions. Two naked men kissing, lip-locked. I think the editor wants us to be slightly shocked by this image (in public!) but also wants to convey the latest trend in metro-sexuality--straights getting off on gays. Already hip youngsters in stylish cities go to gay discos because the music and decor are better.


In Japan gay male comix are the most popular magazines sold, bought mostly by young hetero girls just budding in their sexuality in a country that restrains such energy and expression.


Mate, from Australia is not as bold as Bang. It's also a lifestyle and fashion mag posed by the most fab guys with the most fab abs. I am continuously intrigued by the endless positions that photographers can find to disport their models. How much near-nudity--down to pubics--does one need to advertise a wrist watch!?

How much can a reader take? Apparently a lot. The urge is infinite and beefs sells.

I flip through the shiny pages and see a circus of gorgeous (and often androgynous) tattooed models holding artificial body angles enhanced by tinted camera filters, wrinkle-free body creams that intend to create sensuous and sexy mood tones and desire for products such as perfume, jewelry, furniture, travel destinations, or fashion clothing sex accessories, dating sites, underwear and pro-gay airlines (Lufthansa, American)--page after page we love pretty faces and bodies.

And don't forget personality cults and fan clubs. This month in Attitude, Ricky Martin holds center place with his belated coming out story that we've all heard fifty times in other magazines--People, Us, Teen and Oprah. Let's wring one more feature out of this gay father pop singer before he fades into early middle age.

(Add to these six publications a seventh, across the Oresund Sound in Copenhagen, the free LGBT monthly 'Out & About' with more stories, happenings and flesh.)

I also observe that hardly anyone notices, in this public train station, in Sweden, where near-nude anatomy in print is like cucumbers and tomatoes in the supermarket. It's so available it's taken for granted-- the lifestyle periodicals have to keep trying harder and harder to gain attention. More skin! This is a country where women recently won the right to swim topless in public pools--because men do; a very egalitarian society.

Here in 'heathen' Scandinavia it is more than proven that men and women do not go wildly out of control seeing flesh above the ankles. Let a few Arabic governments learn from this and lighten up and stop thrashing their women for such exposures.

Cape diem--it doesn't get much better than this in the next life despite how many virgins are promised to the panting believer. Browse the magazine kiosks and enjoy the view of ourselves. It's who we are--gay, straight and in between.

On visiting a working-class neighborhood in Copenhagen

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 10, 2011

Copenhagen, Denmark
The first thing I notice are the tall stacks of apartments--dozens of buildings similar in design, height, facade, graffiti-scarred exterior doors--thousands of apartments neatly built on top of one another. Some have views of the local park, most look out onto windows of other apartments, row upon row.

It feels like cage living even though there is freedom to move; few do because living here in this working-class neighborhood is what they can afford and convenient to the city center.

Here there are also small neighborhood stores, cafes, a butcher shop, an ethnic restaurant, food markets to supply the locals with daily bread and veggies, places to park bikes and bus lines streaming to work in the city. The daily routine for the employed or home-maker is waking up, breakfast, out to work or food shop, walk the baby in a carriage, take the dog for a walk on a leash, clean house, work at the business office, back home for dinner (when people can see into many windows at others' domestic order).

As generally organized and tidy, quiet and friendly as things appear I also notice how diverse is the neighborhood with a mix of younger scraggly unemployed males, Middle Eastern women under headscarves, middle class Danes with kids and big strollers, wobbly oldsters with walkers, trendy twenty-somethings in black, some LGBT couples, Muslim-owned small-variety-shop keepers, white Lutherans and a Danish Thai soup place near a Vietnamese eatery.

A person acclimates to his or her own life, circumscribed by work, relationships, dwelling, neighborhood, money, political/social system. We go to school, or not, get a job that suits us, more or less, have kids, ready or not, and develop a daily routine, for the most part, that provides us with an acceptable level of comfort or ennui.

And we go on as we can. Generally satisfied or accepting our acclimatized life and don't look, or do look, for more than what we can achieve by our own efforts. Here in Denmark socialized medical care also helps maintain an appearance of contentment. So life continues with the heralded Skandic quality lifestyle so admired around the world.

Things work well here--the buses, the clocks, the electricity, steam heat, the opera house, Tivoli, the Queen's appearances and even the self-regulating-dope-dealing affairs in Christiania alternative village across the canal; books in the ultra-modern King's National Library are checked out electronically and all across town freshly made bread and pastries each early morning fill the window shelves of the bakeries. Crime is low (incarcerated criminals get paid for labor at standard wages).

And yet I doubt I should choose to live in this efficient society and city full time, much as I admire efficiency and reliable infrastructure. It's much like Switzerland here, which is a good thing.

My hesitation is that it's all so predictable, repeatable, so well ordered and self-perpetuating that after a while I crave a bit of Asian disorder and African unreliability. The street kitchens of Bangkok woking food at one in the morning or a noisy crush during a Buddhist holiday or a public water dousing at Songkran (photo right). Or the chaos of Lusaka's (Zambia) bus station when a seven AM departure really means eight-thirty and crossing the border from Mozambique to Malawi means a pot-holed dirt road and an indolent customs agent eating breakfast from a plastic bag as he fondles my passport (or tells me to come back tomorrow). Or a color-splashed Nepalese festival--take your pick of 40!

Compare that to the ultra-sleek, on-time, spotless Danish trains that cross the Oresund Sound underground between Denmark and Sweden exactly every thirty minutes with no suggestion of a passport.

I seem to fall within that range of interest and desire that wants both the best and worst of civilized life, today's convenient technology and yesterday's uncertain self-reliance. Clean and gritty. A sinfully delicious Danish pastry (photo above left) and the mystery of a Chinese dim sum or Nepalese politics.

As Ralph Waldo Emerson once suggested, "a foolish consistency is the hobglobin of little minds." That's not really true--but something in that direction.

Congress Gets 4th Openly Gay Member

From: Washington Blade, Jan 05, 2011
http://www.washingtonblade.com/2011/01/05/congress-gets-4th-openly-gay-member/

Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) (Blade photo by Michael Key)

Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) was sworn in Wednesday, becoming the fourth openly gay member of the 112^th Congress and only the seventh out gay person to serve in the House.

He joins gay Reps. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) and Jared Polis (D-Colo.), who were reelected in November.

“I am thrilled to be the next congressman from Rhode Island’s First District and so grateful to the members of the LGBT community who supported my campaign,” Cicilline said on election night. “I look forward to going to Washington and fighting for the issues important to all of us — creating good jobs, protecting Social Security, working to fight global climate change and, of course, fighting for full equality for our community.”

The former Providence mayor succeeds Rep. Patrick Kennedy, who retired. He ran in a Democratic stronghold and was a powerhouse fundraiser. According to Federal Election Commission reports, Cicilline raked in nearly $1.7 million over the course of his campaign.

Cicilline earned the endorsement of many national LGBT organizations, including the Human Rights Campaign and the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund.

“This is an historic day for LGBT Americans, and another step toward a government that truly reflects our country’s diversity,” said Chuck Wolfe, president and CEO of the Victory Fund.

Michael Cole, an HRC spokesperson, said on election night that he was “thrilled” that Cicilline will join the 112^th Congress.

“No doubt he will carry on the record of retiring Rep. Patrick Kennedy in ensuring Rhode Island’s first district is represented by an effective congressman in promoting equality for all people,” Cole said.

Cicilline defeated John Loughlin, a Rhode Island State Assembly member, who was accused by some of using gay-baiting tactics late in the campaign. Loughlin ran ads emphasizing that he’s a husband and a father — possibly a reference to the fact that Cicilline is gay and single — and defended “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” during a debate.

Cicilline was the only one of three prominent openly gay congressional candidates to emerge victorious in a tough night for Democrats. Steve Pougnet, who’s gay and mayor of Palm Springs, Calif., lost his bid to unseat six-term incumbent Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.). And Ed Potosnak, a schoolteacher and former staffer for Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.), lost his bid to unseat Rep. Leonard Lance (R-N.J.), a one-term incumbent.

Home Swapping Across Continents--California & Copenhagen

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 7, 2010

The most interesting objects of desire, curiosity, fascination and entertainment for humankind are other people. We spend our entire lives entwined with others, either of our liking or not.

And when we get a chance to see other people from different perspectives, from the inside, sideways, in public or private we usually go for it. We want to know how others live, feel, work, cook, party, raise kids, dress and have sex (but won't admit it).

Well, there is a highly legitimate, socially approved way to snoop in on others and see how they live, to an extent. It's call a Home Exchange--swapping one's primary residence with others who are interested in the same switch.

For LGBT (gay) couples and singles there are a handful of home exchange websites with listings of willing swappers around the world. The two most popular are Home Around the World and Mi Casa Su Casa. For a small sign-up fee, members can list their condos, cottages, mansions, houses, or tepees for others to view and select for an exchange, usually between a week and a month's stay. From Paris to Auckland, members post photos and descriptions of their property and short bio's of themselves along with their e-mail addresses. It's that simple. (See this page for more home swap websites.)

Of course both parties have to agree on a commonly convenient time but once that's done the process goes fairly easily, as it did recently for my partner and me when we agreed to swap with another gay couple, they from Copenhagen and we from Laguna Beach in southern California.

After a few e-mail messages of greeting and sharing ideas about the deal our dates were set and airline tickets purchased. Some swappers prefer to meet their new friends by overlapping a day or two, at the beginning or end of the stay, to get acquainted and orient them to the new 'home'.

So it went; we both left home and arrived, with instructions, to the others' casa and settled in for three weeks, agreeing to overlap in Copenhagen at the end. Answering further questions (where's the laundry soap? where can we buy pancake mix?) was easy by Skype or e-mail.

A distinct part of the fun is encountering the many differences, from obviously large to minute, beginning with the type of home: ours is a one-story, two-bedroom house with an ocean view; theirs is a fifth-floor (walkup) two-story, one bedroom condo with a view of a park/cemetery (Hans Christian Andersen in there). Both have the requisite WiFi. The kitchen is the hardest to navigate given all the utensils, dishes, food spaces and food types at our disposal. Theirs is Danish which means modern appliances such as the touch-control stovetop that took us three days to figure out.

After a few days of finding the grocery markets, schwarma shops and a Thai soup kitchen (Copenhagen is very culturally diverse) and getting our bus passes to discover the best routes into the city center (about two miles away) we were off to the many museums, royal palaces, architectural gems, high and low fashion shops, churches, the ultra-stylish national library on the harbor front and indoor swimming pools.

We felt as if we lived here and could relax knowing we were not wasting a couple hundred dollars a day for a hotel bed. Each day brought variation and variety: the design and organization of the excellent bus system; the risks of stepping into the designated bike traffic lanes and the many types of bicycles (child carriers) and the garb of the riders (a woman wearing a mink coat); the short days when the night comes on about 4:30-5:00PM; the church concerts; gay venues such as Oscar cafe/bar and the national LBL LGBT organization; and one day coming upon the Danish Queen Marguerite's coach and horsemen departing in full regalia from a formal function back to their not-so-humble palace.

The smaller details of others' lives are intriguing as well: the books our hosts have on their many living room shelves (the second story living room has a cathedral ceiling with large slanted skylights that look out onto the park). The photo of an Indian guru (Sri Sri Ravi Shankar); modern Danish-Ikea table, chairs, lamps and sofa; wooden floors; the neatly hung and piled clothes in the walk-in closet, gym bags, sports equipment, an office with desk, in-out trays. computer and printer, an ironing board and two menorahs (but only one with wax drippings).

Among the impressive features here is the heating system--hot water radiators--that are heated not in this apartment building from a cellar furnace boiler but from across the city on the other side of the harbor by the huge steam generating plant (natural gas fueled) backed up by giant modern windmills (for 20% of Denmark's power). The entire city area is heated by this plant making the air quality of Copenhagen one of the cleanest of world cities. (The steam plant is seen in the background of the mermaid photo above.)

And of course, it snowed one night while we were here, three inches on top of the four already on the ground. In the morning the city was a hushed landscape of whiteness. From our apartment the park and cemetery looked almost sacred in their soft white purity. Dark skeletal deciduous trees, lonely park benches, frosted evergreens bowing with the weight above the gravestones.

Later the city came alive with people and vehicles making scars and foot holes in the snow as they trudged and drove (and bicycled!) to work among the architectural charms of this city of half a million.

A must-mention is the firework display that took place here on New Year's night, a spectacular colored blitzkrieg of (legal) individual firings of rockets bursting in mid-air, loud bursts, bangs and crackling of noise. Thousands of light flashes and explosives across the entire cityscape, seen perfectly from our big fifth-floor windows. The spectacle went on for over an hour. Firecrackers and fire, sound and light. It was dazzling. Another wondrous difference about this foreign culture.

Needless to say home-swapping has it rewards and recommendations--even in the middle of winter in Copenhagen. And for all the obvious and subtle differences, this gay couple's home was very similar in quality, class, style and comfort to the gay home we traded off to them. Once again, I am reminded of how much more similar people are than different.

On Visiting Copenhagen in Winter

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 7, 2010

Snow fell three inches yesterday with fine white ground coat across the park in front of my apartment. On the other side of the park is a leafy evergreen cemetery which is really an extension of the park. It's a fine time to take a walk across the mono-colored land making my own pathway, not following one.

In the cemetery the headstones stand above the snow, each carved with the name and dates of a once live person. Some were merchants, or professors or artists.

Among the silent crowd here are three who made it onto the world stage of achievement: Hans Christian Andersen whose imagination created tales of the unreal but enjoyed by children worldwide.

More dense and intense are the works of Niels Bohr, a Nobel Prize physicist who studied quantum mechanics and atomic structure and was a contributor to the development of the atomic bomb.

The third luminary is Soren Kierkegaard, a complex Danish philosopher, theologian and religious author whose writing and talks focused on human psychology."Much of his philosophical work deals with the issues of how one lives as a "single individual", giving priority to concrete human reality over abstract thinking, and highlighting the importance of personal choice and commitment.

I stand in front on the silent stones of these great Danes and wonder at the influence of their lives on the world. Would present things be any different if they had not written or spoken? Was there change as a result? Perhaps with Bohr who helped develop a huge weapon that helped to halt war madness--for a while.

Soren was bright and challenged people's self-limited thoughts regarding religion, politics and individuality. Dancing between the realms of objective observation and subjective faith he challenged both with his intellect. "…the crucial thing is to find a truth which is truth for me, to find the idea for which I am willing to live and die."

Hans wrote for delight, for entertainment, for playful diversion and to educate others with his travelogues. These employ documentary and descriptive accounts of the places mixed with philosophical musings on topics such as being an writer, human mortality and immortality, and the nature of imagination.

The uses of the mind can be seen carved on numerous gravestones as I tread my way across the snow: artist, musician, professor, doctor--and mostly just anonymous names that had anonymous jobs to support their families in this northern city where vikings once roamed. I walk slowly among the stones, leaving my temporary tracks, my singular path.

The day after the snow fell and made the city 'of one white piece' the citizens had tracked their own ways across the city, by bike, bus, train, car and on foot, each going to and from, then from and to, each weekday, months into a year. Doing what they want or must to live a modern life.

This is a city that's well organized, civil, mostly honest, stylish, young and restless, tolerant of the Royal Family and their horse-drawn carriages, tolerant of same-sex affections and immigrants from Asia and the Middle East. High taxes yes but also health care for all.

And many museums with countless more works of long-dead Danes--sculptors, painters, jewelers, musicians and the craftsmen who designed and constructed the magnificent buildings. Enough artifacts of a thousand years to remind a visitor that this is no mere small kingdom but a vital part of the developed world, as best it can be for now.

Ingenuity is what makes this place function and shine. The entire city is steam heated by a central generating station on the east side of the harbor. Transporting people is an art--bikes, buses, trains, subways, cars, are all integrated, orderly, on time and systematized. There are bike lanes on virtually every road. Bus stops are clearly marked with bus numbers, schedules and sometimes digital timers that tell when the next bus is due.

Elegant palatial hotels dot the city along with spotless cheap hostels catering to budget travelers. There are public sculptures, parks and places to sit.

Opera, live theatre, ballet, pop and rock concerts; wealthy mansions house the landed gentry and poor struggling tenements house newly arrived immigrants from Turkey or Philippines. Problems abound but there are committees and proposals and programs to wrestle them toward a solution.

It's another fine example of what peaceful civilization can be, along with such places as New Zealand, Switzerland and Canada--at any time of the year.

Gay-Straight Alliances Blossom in Utah

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
January 2, 2011

Some cheerful new this New Years week as reported in the New York Times today:

The new Gay-Straight Alliance Club in the conservative town of St. George, Utah, "is part of a drastic rise this past fall in the number of clubs statewide, reflecting new activism by gay and lesbian students, an organizing drive by a gay rights group and the intervention of the American Civil Liberties Union, which has threatened to sue districts that put up arbitrary hurdles."

Last January, only 9 high schools in Utah had active Gay-Straight Alliances; by last month, the number had risen to 32.

"It was a turning point here and for the state, where administrators, teachers and even the Legislature have tried for years to block support groups for gay youths, calling them everything from inappropriate to immoral…"

(Photo right by Jim Wilson for the NY Times; 'Love is Louder' on a student's hand.)

To read the arguments and tactics of opponents of these clubs is to see 1950's-style tabloid exaggerations and nonsensical irrationality. Some call the clubs "satanic" or claim they are a "gay recruiting tool".

State legislators tried to suppress them with laws forbidding any discussion of sexuality. (And conservatives fear socialism!?)

Ironically one of the useful defenses against such conservative repression is the federal Equal Access Act, a law passed by Congress in the 1980s, mainly to protect Bible study groups in schools. The law has become a prime tool for protecting Gay-Straight Alliances from arbitrary hurdles.

Not to be dissuaded in their homophobic efforts, conservative groups pushed back with the state-approved Student Clubs Act of 2007 aimed at the alliances that requires parental permission to join all school clubs and says they can be barred to “protect the physical, emotional, psychological or moral well-being of students and faculty.”

The greater irony in this statute is that it grossly ignores ever-present discrimination that occurs against the well-being of LGBT students and, indeed, subtly encourages the opposite of protecting the physical, emotional, psychological well-being of gay students.

The law itself is a blatant form of bullying and sends the message to other unthinking students and families that homosexually inclined people must be legislated against because their presence is somehow a threat to the superior morality of straight students.

Little do these God-fearing conservatives realize the depth of their irrational homophobia and the mean-spirited use of religious beliefs to desecrate the dignity and rights of LGBT students. In the process they are defiling their religion as well with behaviors and attitudes which their 'Founder' never intended.

Who are they really listening to: the Loving Saviour ("love thy neighbor") or the Hateful Satanist ("do evil against others").

From 32 Alliances let's go for 64 in 2011.

Let there be Bible study clubs and Gay Straight Alliances.

It's the right thing to do.

Family History and My 95 Year-old Aunt

By Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
New Years Day 2011

My Aunt Grace turned 95 today, a remarkably long life. Her mind is sharp and her body in reasonably good health, although she complains of not being able to turn the soil in her garden--by hand. Her house is immaculate, her grooming stylish and her memories of her personal history are mostly intact. Occasionally she drives her 1984 Cadillac (17,000 miles) to the local store. She has a daughter and three grandsons who visit occasionally--but not often enough, she says. Her husband died many years ago of Parkinsons.

She is the sole remaining member of my preceding generation, the last witness to my father (her brother) and her four sisters. The sole surviving offspring of her parents whose births were in the 1880's, a hundred and thirty years ago--well over a century of our family's history. It feels like a very long time, hinged on this one remarkable lady. (photo right, Grace's grandfather Frederick)

For me, she is the final personal reach back into ancestral life and times that were hard, fickle and fatal. Her grandfather immigrated from Switzerland in 1883, a poor farmer with little education whose wife took her life shortly after the birth of their sixth child. The hapless widower had to (chose to) put the kids into a children's home where they were probably abused. Somehow (the family history is vague) two of those children died before the age of ten. A fortunate third one was adopted and was taken away.

The remaining three (Grace's father, uncle and aunt) survived to adulthood until the beloved uncle was killed in World War I at the age of thirty. Her father Francis and his wife Cora also produced six children (one son, my father, and five daughters, who were, in turn, abused by their father, emotionally and/or physically. What comes around goes around. (photo left, Grace's father Francis)

After marriage, life for Grace and her siblings was better, for a while. All had children (my cousins) and reunions until my father took his life at 51 and, later, three sisters developed fatal diseases, leaving Grace and one older sister to survive into their late 80's. Now only Grace has continued, to 95. Four generations (including mine), eight premature deaths, four elder deaths--and the usual family secrets.

No one kept a diary or confessed their inner thoughts. John who went to war wrote the only letters, from boot camp and the battlefront in France. Otherwise the personal history of the family has fallen away chip by chip, one person at a time. (photo right, Grace's uncle John)

I would like to have known these people. I do know a few stories of love, lust, anger, war heroics, bisexuality--but would they have wanted me to know more? The whole truth? In spite of living comfortable middle-class lives, their shadow memories kept them partially hidden, part of their truth shuttered.

"Why do you want to know these things" an elderly uncle once asked when I probed into the past. I said because this is where I come from, it's family history. It mattered little to him that I sought a deeper connection with these familiar strangers called family.

Such invisible strings that pull on my life today, still at the age of 70, are part of the fabric, the cloth of my soul. Knowledge of the 'outside' world, of history, politics, religion, society shape my dealings with the world; the unseen forces of my family's 'private parts' shape the quality and substance of those dealings, in my relationships, career choices, emotional reactions, aesthetic pursuits, incessant traveling and intellectual attractions, including my deep curiosity about my family. I am always coming from that heritage as I create my present moment.

My past is more than a hierarchy of people's names, dates of birth-marriage-death, half-told tales, childhood recollections and whispered gossip. In the larger scheme of things, among all the massive scattered 'data' out there on the internet and in media and books that enters my brain, understanding my small personal portion of the planet feels like the only reality in a wide deep universe of indifference. (photo left, Grace's nephew Richard Ammon)

I'd like to unroll Aunt Grace's 95 years and view the drama she's seen, heard and felt living with the events and family in her life since 1916.

Happy birthday Grace to you amid all your memories.