Are civil rights zero-sum?

We ask because of a story out of Ireland, where the High Court ruled that a gay sperm donor has no claim to the child he helped produce for a lesbian couple. In his ruling, Justice John Hedigan said that the lesbians should be considered a "de facto" family:

Mr Justice Hedigan said there was nothing in Irish law to suggest that a family of two women and a child "has any lesser right to be recognised as a de facto family than a family composed of a man and a woman unmarried to each other".

He said the rights of a man who acted as a sperm donor were at least no greater than those of an unmarried father. In considering his application for guardianship the child's welfare was the paramount consideration.

The ruling gives gay family rights a bit of a boost, but does it deprive the donor of his parental rights?

Citizen Culture publisher Jonathan Feit drops 768-words telling us what we already know: the media hopes to pocket the pink dollar. As historically gay media companies like PlanetOut attempt to keep up with the ever-changing queer culture, Time Warner Cable, Viacom and other giants have launched a war for gay viewers. This war, he says, provides an example of a "quiet media war" in which companies are both grabbing gays and avoiding right wing outcry. It's a delicate balance.

Well-written and thought provoking in terms of media as activism, Feit's "A Quiet Media War" also takes a stab at historical analysis:

…San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom compared today's equality struggle with the civil rights battles of the mid-20th century. Two key distinctions separate the otherwise parallel culture shifts: On-demand and globally accessible media has utterly revolutionized how we galvanize opinion. And unlike the African-American community 50 years ago, today's GLBT community commands intellectual and tangible resources that make it a sprawling, amorphous, international and upwardly mobile gatekeeper.

No wonder people are afraid of us! We gays sound horrifying, like some sort of pink gelatinous monster. The Glob?!

Ignoring over three hundred rights groups and thousands of activists, Human Rights Campaign, the NAACP and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights are pushing Congress to pass a non-inclusive ENDA.

CONTINUED »

There's some trend bucking in Baltimore, where a group of black activists have come out for gay marriage. Under the leadership of Elbridge James (pictured), the Maryland Black Family Alliance will push their peers to join the call for gay civil rights. Says James:

There's a scarcity of information on this issue in the black community. The black press doesn't cover it; talk radio doesn't cover it. … We have this sort of 'don't ask, don't tell policy' in our community.

As James talks gay rights, others question the parallels between gay and black social movements. Politico pastor Emmett C. Burns Jr objects to the correlation:

I get really bent out of shape when you talk about gay and lesbian rights as a civil rights issue. Whites can hide their gayness; I cannot hide my blackness.

First, that's not always true. Second, did Burns just imply that all gays are white?!

Raised in London and living in New York, Kirsten Price and her soulful voice seem poised to take the independent music scene by storm. Above you see the brand spanking new video for Price's "Freedom".

We recently dispatched editor Andrew Belonsky to chat with Price about this video, her unquantifiable influences and why people need to stop talking "gay".

CONTINUED »

The prisoner's rights debate takes on a new gay twist with two unrelated cases out of North and South Carolina.

A North Carolina prisoner named Joseph Urbaniak - who's serving up to 50 years after "taking indecent liberties with a child" - filed a suit against the state's Department of Corrections for denying him his favorite fag rags, like The Advocate.

Officials claim they have to withhold certain publications "for security and order in the prison". The ACLU, which wants the Department to provide a list of all banned publications, seems to sympathize with prison officials.

Spokesperson Jody Kent says, "Of course, the correction officials have a responsibility to protect the prisoner, so they often use that as a reason to ban certain materials." This argument holds water, yes, but only to a certain degree.

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"I do not speak for God. I felt at peace under God in writing the letter," a homophobic former pastor told the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission yesterday. Stephen Boissoin stands accused of inciting anti-gay violence a 2002 letter calling on readers to "take whatever steps are necessary to reverse [gay] wickedness".

Testifying yesterday, Boissoin maintained his innocence, insisting he just wanted to "stimulate conversation":

My opinion is that a man having a romantic relationship with a man, or a woman having a romantic relationship with a woman, is wrong. Yes, I do believe it's wrong. I hoped and knew this would stimulate conversation, to get people more educated to ask why and an opportunity to share my view.

We'd rather be blind than see through your eyes, mister.

CONTINUED »

Catholic Citizens' president Larry Cirignano got no judicial love this weekend.

Judge David Ricciardone tossed Cirignano's plea to toss a civil rights violation and misdemeanor assault and battery charges filed by Sarah Loy, a gay marriage activist Cirignano allegedly shoved during a December VoteOnMarriage event.

CONTINUED »

The Thai government just can seem to get it straight. The new government, which took over after last September's coup, promised to grants gays, lesbians and trans folk (referred to as "kathoey") equal rights.

One of the charter writers, Chirmsak Pinthong, said, "This council has already guaranteed equal rights for the disabled, so why can't we give the same treatment to those who have sexual preferences."

CONTINUED »

It’s been 231 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence. That signing marked the beginning of the democratic age. Those scrappy, ballsy American colonies took on the British Empire and actually won. Liberal democracy became the name of the game. As the Second Continental Congress' declared:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…

The government belonged to the people. The rule of law became the law of the land. Unfortunately, rule of law doesn't always rule for the people.

CONTINUED »

Some Floridian politico and police are bending space - and the Constitution - for this weekend's St. Pete's Pride celebration. St. Petersburg mayor Rick Baker and Police Chief Charles Harmon are considering "free speech zones" within the gay parade. Within these predesignated zones, anti-gay activists are free to air their anti-gay grievances.

While this may sound like a perfectly fine idea, the ordinance will violate the Supreme Court's 1995 case, Hurley v. Irish American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group. It its ruling, the Court ruled that St. Patrick Parade organizers can ban gays because a parade constitutes an expression of free speech. Gays, then, cannot interfere with the organizers' vision.

Baker and Harmon, however, chose to ignore that ruling when they endorsed a new city ordinance allowing for unregulated "free speech zones". These zones will be determined on an event-to-event basis. In this particular case, not only would homophobes be allowed to bark their objections in the midst of the fag's festivities, gays can be arrested for expressing their opinion outside predetermined districts.

CONTINUED »

Israel Ruben may wonder why Chicago Pride banned his anti-gay ways, but some gay activists are questioning queer communities' segregationist trend. Two discrimination-related news stories grabbed headlines this week. First came news that an Australian bar called The Peel Hotel won the legal right to exclude straights and lesbians. Then came word that a Montreal gay bar booted a woman named Audrey Vachon. Both cases rubbed us the wrong way. The idea that we as a marginalized social group could endorse discrimination while also fighting for our own rights borders on absurd.

Homo-journo Emil Steiner agrees. Comparing the The Peel Hotel case with the segregation affirming case, Plessy v. Ferguson, Steiner writes:

On the surface, certainly everyone deserves a place where they can drink freely, but the problem with requesting separate facilities is that it endorses the notion that our lifestyles are so disparate that co-existence is impossible. That stance is one that encourages intolerance and disunity with a treacherous and slippery slope. If the Peel is only "convivial" without heteros, perhaps Hooters is so only without gays, and Augusta National without blacks? Given how hard the homosexual community has battled to achieve their current level of acceptance, it seems not only short-sighted, but also self-destructive to take such a hypocritical stance.

We do ourselves a disservice by sponsoring segregation. Not only does it punch a hole through homo rights ideology, it deprives people the opportunity to meet people from different social groups. We're all about the gays, but we love our straight allies just as much. We'd hate for them to be left out in the cold while we party at a fags only bar.

Do we take it for granted that we're able to see through President Bush's anti-gay marriage agenda as a means to motivate his conservative voting block? Perhaps. But what's not so errily clear, at least until you look into the matter, is that the White House's efforts to boost sagging approval ratings – especially religious conservatives, where approval of the president "has plunged twenty-two percent among white evangelicals" – and gear up for mid-term elections is an old political trick, circa the Civil Rights Movement.

When it comes to the politics of distraction, Bush's decision to stoke fears among religious conservatives about gay sex is part of a historical pattern among Republicans. In fact, the last time the party fought a battle over "traditional" marriage — attempting to uphold state bans on interracial marriage during the 1960s — the political landscape was eerily similar. Sixteen states had laws on the books outlawing marriage between whites and blacks, and seventy percent of Americans opposed interracial marriage. Those are almost precisely the numbers that Bush marshaled to justify his call to ban gay marriage. "Nineteen states have held referendums to amend their state constitutions to protect the traditional definition of marriage," the president observed. "In every case, the amendments were approved by decisive majorities, with an average of seventy-one percent." The president also flashed the same kind of scorn that was heaped on the Supreme Court when it struck down bans on interracial marriage in 1967: "Unfortunately, this consensus is being undermined by activist judges and local officials who have made an aggressive attempt to redefine marriage."

As San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom so eloquently puts it: "Nothing has changed. It is the same playbook, and it is as shameful today as it was then."

The Politics of Fear [Rolling Stone]

And so it is — and just in time for Pride!

Wednesday's 49-48 vote fell 11 short of the 60 required to send the matter for an up-or-down tally. The 2004 vote was 50-48.

A majority of Americans define marriage as a union of a man and a woman, as the proposed amendment does, according to a poll out this week by ABC News. But an equal majority opposes amending the Constitution on this issue, the poll found.

Gay Marriage Ban Fails in Senate Vote [AP]

Laurel Hester, a New Jersey woman with terminal cancer, has worked for the Ocean County prosecutor’s office for 23 years. She will not be allowed to give her pension to her lesbian partner once she dies. Elected officials are denying her request.

Michael Jensen, editor at Big Gay Picture, begins a three-part interview with the dying woman today. Apart from a brief interview with the New York Times, this is Hester's first really in-depth interview. Check it out.

Gay Officer, Dying, Is Pulled Into Rights Issue [New York Times]
It's Laurel Hester's Wonderful Life, Part One [Big Gay Picture]