Category — queer activism

  If Queers Without Borders could fly off to San Francisco we would be there for the protest against HRC’s annual dinner. We will be there in spirit, in solidarity sending out our good vibs for justice and freedom for all. We will be in the street with the Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club, And Castro 4 All, SF Labor Council, Pride at Work at what these groups are calling the “Left OUT Party.” I found this information on Kelli Busey’s site  (see link for planetransgender on our side bar) and she had a link to an article from San Francisco’s Alternative Online News. The article by Tommi Avicolli-Mecca can be found here. There are many fine articles stating QWB’s position on HRC. To sum it up in a nut shell, Fuck HRC!!!

On Tuesdays, Charlie Vazquez writes Gotham After Dark, a peek into what goes on in Manhattan’s queer nightlife, with club and event reports and profiles of fascinating New Yorkers.The Radical Homosexual Agenda-I loved the name as soon as I heard it and loved them even more when they gave the corporate presence at the Pride parade a good, old-fashioned NYC “fuck you”. It seems lifetimes ago that queer activism took to the streets to create the sexual revolution that pushed to create radical female sexuality and transgendered visibility-as well as demanding homosexual “equality”. The short-lived Chicago-based Society for Human Rights and the 1950s LA-based Mattachine Society were springboards for more militant groups such as ACT-UP and Queer Nation, but what do radical queers have now? [Read more →]

Received from our comrades at RHA

The JustUs Legal Collective has put together a Know Your Right Summer Training Series for folks heading to the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis/St. Paul or Democratic National Convention in Denver this summer. Join us for one of our Know Your Rights trainings. Click to view Flyer

The trainings will be held on:

Monday, July 14 - 7pm at Bluestockings, 172 Allen Street [Read more →]

To all of our friends outside of the Connecticut area in the U.S., and around the world who read the QWB blog a little explaining is in order about what is going on here and what has gotten QWB steaming. The Metroline is a GL magazine that is the oldest GL magazine in New England. Over the years folks in the GLBT community have had trouble with them over one thing or another. One time it was over the abundance of half naked young men on the cover and the bar rag quality of their reporting, and another time over their disrespect for the trans community. Once again around and around we go and we find that the Metroline is now once again displaying half naked young men on the cover and disrespecting the Trans community. The former editor explained to me that the advertisers (mostly bars) who pay the bills wanted to see only half naked young men, no women and no politics.  Another very political person who is much respected within all circles of the movement told me that the Metroline informed them that the group could no longer have any free space to publish updates on their important work since the Metroline was going back to being a skin variety magazine. Recently the Metroline’s editor, Mr. Joe DaBrow in a letter from the editor had this to say. [Read more →]

See also Anti-Gay Fascists Successfully Confronted at Chicago’s Gay Pride Parade

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“Want to define love, commitment, family, and sexual merrymaking on your own terms? Honey, that’s so last century.” Click here to read Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore thought provoking editorial from the San Francisco Bay Guardian published June 25, 2008.

“Now that the California Supreme Court has struck down the ban on same-sex marriage, everywhere we hear of couples who’ve been together 10, 20, or 30 years (or six months) rushing to tie the knot and proclaim: “finally … it’s … legitimate!” It’s hard to imagine a more wholehearted rejection of queer struggles to create defiant ways of living and loving, lusting for and caring for one another — methods not dependent on inclusion in the dominant institutions of straight privilege.”

The Hartford Gay and Lesbian Health Collective is please to announce that it has received a grant from the Susan G. Komen For the Cure Connecticut Affiliate for Breast Cancer Outreach, Awareness, Education, and Screening. The amount awarded is double the amount that the agency has received in the past. [Read more →]

With the recent Metroline crap still stinking I thought I would go back into my archives and tell a few of ourstories about when some of my friends and I stood up against anyone trying to revise, rewrite, ignore, omit, erase, suppress, or deny our people. Straight culture has used every trick in their book to deny our people, trying to take them from us and ignoring the fact that some of the greats of the arts and of this world were lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer persons. 

The extraordinary philosopher, movement builder, writer, folklorist, historical researcher, gay man and former communist Harry Hay in his essay, “The Hidden Ones, Christianity’s First Closet Case” seeks to reconstruct a part of our stories that have been hetrosexualized, namely the story of who were the real Adam and Eve. This important corrective reconstruction returns our people to their rightful place busts open the lies of straight societies religions and allows us to reclaim  our rightful heritage. I submit this to our readers as an essay to read and ponder to see how full of tricks the dominant culture can be. Read it and shake your heads over the oppression that has come out of that one little false story which through the political opportunism of the Christians first sculpted and then governed the guilt of Westerners for over 2,000 years. Robert Graves states in his book “Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis,” that Jehovah clearly did not figure in the original myth. As he puts it, “It is the Mother of All Living (Eve)…who casts Adam out of her fertile riverine dominion because he has usurped some prerogative of hers.” Adam the temple prostitute denying his true gay nature, betraying his scared oaths,his service to the great Mother and joining in with the invading wandering tribes. This dear friends was the original sin. Next time one of those religious ladies tells you it was Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve punch her in her nose. Lay her flat. She walks hand in hand with the oppressor. Give her a good one for all of our people who have been burned at the stake, condemned by religious authorities, marked off for extinction, eaten alive by dogs and wild beasts, castrated, electric shocked, jailed, sent to concentration camps, beaten on city streets and killed on country roads. Yes, go ahead give her a good one. If the powers that be lie to us about how human existence began on the earth what other lies have they told us?  [Read more →]

In this time where we wait for actual change, we write, we speak and hope that our words will send the spark that leads to an idea that brings on change. Real change. That needed condition.

But where today do we speak of revolution? Those who are filled with far too much now occupy the places that once were the breeding ground for action.

But some of us are reminded while some they sleep, that is days gone by, the bank burned on the corner was a testament to revolt and was worth more than our words, our writing, our thousands of leaflets and slogans that denounced oppression, and the way things are. [Read more →]

As we enter the month of June celebrating the 39th Anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion, we should take this time to reflect on the State of our Activism. The following is a video clip from the KQED documentary Outrage ‘69 (Series: A question of equality) that discusses a brief historical perspective of the Gay Liberation Front and the transformation to the beginnings of the reformist single issue, white male dominated, Gay Activist Alliance. Also linked below (2 pages) is the letter from Huey P. Newton to his Revolutionary Brothers and Sisters about the Women’s Liberation and Gay Liberation Movements. This letter is a remarkable evolution in stance of the Black Panther Party’s recognition of the need for a united front of oppresssed groups in forming a revolutionary movement and society!

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Greetings to all.

Our Blogger Registration is fixed and we invite each and everyone to post with us. We would love it. Just click on Blogger Registration.  When QWB started this blog we thought of this as a people’s blog much like our SPEAK OUT cart. Who speaks? We all speak. We would like this blog to become the Queer/LGBT and Ally forum of the area. Let’s talk multi-issue. 

An interview with gay rights hell-raiser Tamara Turner. Turner is a co-author of Gay Resistance: The Hidden History (Red Letter Press, 1997) and a cast member of the 1993 play “Hidden History: True Stories from Seattle’s Gay and Lesbian Elders.” Turner comments on decades of activism and shares her acerbic observations with FS writer Doug Barnes.

From the interview:

Q. So what lessons do we need to apply today?

A. “History tells us that if we don’t hang together we’ll hang separately. I think we need to build a broad, radical leadership that can expose this system and offer a vision of its replacement. A world where people are judged by their qualities as a person, as a human being rather than by skin color, what’s between their legs, their sexual orientation, or gender.” [Read more →]

PRIDE IS MORE THAN A TRINKET TRIBE

PRIDE IS ABOUT A REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT AND PEOPLE

June 2008 marks the 39th year after the rebellion at the Stonewall Inn in NYC. This marked the start of the massive LGBT movement in the United states. It was on those nights in June and early July that our people in New York’s Greenwich Village fought back against police harassment, injustice and opperssion that we faced daily. Next year will mark the 40th anniversary of this rebellion. It is never too early to reflect on where we as a people have been, where we are now, and where we are going.

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QUEERS WITHOUT BORDERS (QWB) 

Who we are. 

A small group of Queers activists who are active in the anti-war movement began meeting several years back to bring a queer presence to the many movements that we as individuals were involved in. Our name Queers Without Borders was taken from the slogan, “We are here, there and everywhere.”  It logically follows in our mind then that all issues are our issues. We stand with all who fight oppression. We work to build a new day of justice and a culture of peace. 

Over the years we have actively help to plan and to participate in all sorts of activities.  We firmly believe that for the lgbt community to not take a multi-issue stand is foolish and unwise and any single issue stand denies our true heritage. The following is just some of the events that we worked on. These are not listed in chronological order. [Read more →]

The first New England Transgender PRIDE March and Rally will be held Saturday June 7 in Northampton MA. The event is organized by members of the trans and gender variant community, and their allies with the intent of taking a visible and positive stand for transgender rights. Our own Jerimarie Liesegang will be speaking at the rally along with an impressive line up of others. Click here for details.

From the site: “We seek to educate and build awareness of the movement against gender-based discrimination. We promote self-acceptance and acceptance of our whole identities and lives. We gather to celebrate and affirm our individuality, diversity, and strength.”

Remember Stonewall. That was us!

With all our love and thanks to Sylvia Rivera..

Your spirit still guides us.

Even if none of us around here can fly off to San Francisco check it out–Mattilda’s book, which I believe is on of the more important works done in these days will be coming out in a expanded second edition. Mattilda will be celebrating this event and there will be “a dangerous and illuminating discussion.” That’s Revolting! Queers Strategies for Resisting Assimilation, will have its launch this Thursday June 5th. Info follows.

FORGET MARRIAGE, IT’S TIME FOR…

That’s Revolting!: Radical queer activism–past, present, and future.

Thursday June, 5, 6pm

San Francisco Main Library

Latino/Hispanic Meeting Room (downstairs)

100 Larkin Street

Co-sponsored by the National Queer Arts Festival.

Click here to read about the book launch this Thursday, 6p.m. Thanks Mattilda. Keep on keeping on!!!

Note: The following remarks are by Jerimarie Liesegang.  Jerimarie is the Director of Ct. TransAdvocacy Coalition and a founding member of Queers Without Borders, Hartford Ct. When the city announced that it was going to correct the problem Jerimarie chose not to give her speech. I publish it here as it is a damn good speech and shows our willingness to correct this situation. Thanks Jerimarie for your leadership on issues affecting our people and many others.

It’s a Travesty.

As one enters New York Harbor the Statue of Liberty proudly proclaims, “Give us your poor, tired, your huddled masses longing to be free.” As one approaches the front doors of the Hartford Public Library in a wheelchair you see the proclamation: “Give us your poor, your tired, your homeless, your sexual predators..and those in wheelchairs GO AROUND BACK for your are NOT Welcomed through these front doors!”

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Reprinted from the People’s Weekly World, “World Notes” May 24-30, 2008. www.pww.org.

Spain’s La Vanguardia newspaper recently interviewed Mariela Castro, director of Cuba’s National Center for Sex Education. Anticipating change, Castro believes that gay people’s rights will be protected under Cuba’s Family Code and will evolve through an educational and media strategy assisted by the Communist Party. A “legal union” formula will eventually guarantee the rights of homosexual couples.

All societies are patriarchal, Castro suggests, but violence against women has waned as women’s rights advanced under Cuba’s revolution. She envisions a future of reduced prohibitions, easy departures from Cuba, and expanded citizen participation in decision making. That’s the “principal objective of socialism,” she says: “the emancipation of human beings; their well being with fairness and social justice.” To view the entire interview with Mariela Castro, go to www.walterlippmann.com/docs1800.html. [Read more →]

“From the moment Nancy Pelosi became speaker she said impeachment is off the table. My slogan is as long as I am on the table, impeachment is on the table.” To regain our moral authority the American people have to make a statement that we don’t agree with what our president has done.”

“The Employment Non-Discrimination Act is suppose to be about non-discrimination right?” Yet they left out the T.  How is that not discrimination? It seems like discrimination to me, if she were fully representing the gay community’s interest Pelosi would have remembered the T.”

The above quotes are by Shirley Golub a lesbian who is running against Nancy Pelosi in the democrat primary in San Francisco. The article here was published in the Bay Area Reporter on May 15, 2008.

QWB would like to take this one step further and ask that Mr. Bush and all his cronies be tried for war crimes. 

California Supreme Court Says Same-Sex Couples Can Marry!

Today, in a historic decision, the California Supreme Court affirmed the dignity of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people, by ruling that same-sex couples can marry in that state. This momentous judgment profoundly supports same-sex couples and their families, and recognizes that two loving, committed people deserve the rights, respect, and equality that come with the freedom to marry. [Read more →]

Khadijah Farmer who describes herself as not the most feminine looking was asked to leave a woman’s restroom in the West Village NYC by a bouncer because she looked too much like a man. Ms. Farmer showed the bouncer her state issues ID which identified her as a woman but the bouncer insisted she get out. The group of people she was with were also asked to leave the restaurant Caliente Cab Company.

The Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund filed suit in October in the State Supreme Court in Manhattan against the restaurant asserting that Ms. Farmer was a victim of gender discrimination. The Legal Defense and Education Fund took up the suit because it touched upon many issues that transgender people commonly face and could set in the Fund’s words a “very interesting legal precedent. According to Michael D. Silverman the executive director of the defense fund this case, “really straddled the line of gender expression.” Caliente Cab Restaurant decided to negotiate and a settlement was signed last Friday. Ms Farmer will receive $35,000 and the restaurant also agreed to pay the Fund $15,000. The restaurant also must put in place workplace practices adding gender identity and expression to its corporate non-discrimination policy; to adopt a gender neutral dress code for its employees; and to amend its employee handbook to sate, “persons patronizing or employed at Caliente have the right to use the bathroom facilities consistent with their gender identity and expression.”

This e-mail was sent out from Jerimarie of Connecticut TransAdvocacy Coalition and I wanted to share it with all our readers. Jerimarie is also a founding member of Queers Without Borders, Hartford Ct.

 Session Ends…Bill Stalls In House.

Thank you for getting us this far.

Thanks to you we had a remarkable year with HB 5723 An Act Concerning Discrimination. We kicked off this short legislative session with an overwhelming turnout for Trans Lobby Day at the Capital. This was followed by testimony form Child Psychiatrists, Parents, Allies, Trans Folk, Executive Directors and many more that revealed the depth of growing support we have for Trans Equality! The Judiciary vote was an overwhelming bipartisan support for HB5723 and Trans Equality. Your calls, your advocacy and your support has moved more and more legislators in support of HB5723. Unfortunately, this bill was raised in a short session that saw many critical bills being raised as well as a challenging budget issue that time simply was not on our side this year. However, we are already preparing for next years session and your continued support and advocacy will be mandatory for us to secure Equal Rights. We recognize that achieving this equality is not as simple as waking up one morning and reading in the paper that HB5723 was passed. It requires a vital amount of public and personal advocacy, meeting and calling your legislator, mobilizing your friends and neighbors to become advocates and continually educating and increasing the drumbeat that this legislation is not about Special Rights but about Human Rights. [Read more →]

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Angela Davis will be speaking on Thursday April 24, 2008 at the Torp Theatre, Davidson Hall on the CCSU campus. COME OUT TO GREET OUR LESBIAN SISTER. Ms Davis will discuss “Are Prisons Obsolete?” which will be followed by a panel discussion by current and former Ct. policy makers and practitioners. This talk and discussion will be held at 2:00pm.

At 5:30 Ms. Davis will speak on “Race, Class and Gender Issues In American Society.” This talk will be followed by a question and answer period. Both events are free and open to the public. Free tickets are available for the 5:30 lecture by contacting Centix at 832-1989. Centix is located at the Information Desk in the Student Center.

Angela Davis is a socialist organizer and helped to found the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism which broke from the Communist Party in the 90’s. Ms. Davis  does not consider herself to be a prison “reformer” but an abolitionist and refers to the United States prison system as the “prison-industrial complex.” Her solutions include abolishing prisons and addressing the class, race,and gender factors that have led to a large number of Blacks and Latinos being incarcerated. Davis also speaks out against the death penalty. [Read more →]

TransAdvocacy Community Meeting, Thursday March 28th, 6 PM

Our next open community meeting for CT TransAdvocacy is on Thursday March 28th and the meeting takes place at the MCC Chapel, 155 Wyllys Street Hartford

. NOTE the change in venue! The meeting will be held down and in back of the Colt Memorial Parish House of the Good Shepherd Episcopal Church in the MCC Chapel.
 
The meeting starts at 6:00pm and will end at 8:00.
 
 The agenda is:
 
    * Legislative update
    * Trans Health and Law Conference
    * Fundraisers: Photographic fundraiser and Fashion Show
    * Moving our Community Meetings to the MCC chapel on Wyllys Street

    * Other business

We encourage all to attend to be a part of and contribute to the work that TransAdvocacy is doing these days!  As well as a great way to meet other folks in the community.

 ”1 LGBT Person has been murdered every 8 days so far this year and these are only ones we know about.” …Fight Out Loud

On May 15, 1988 Richard Reihl a gay man from West Hartford was murdered by two teenagers. By June 7th gays and lesbians of The Connecticut Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights formed a committee called the Anti-Violence Project in response to the murder. The Project’s mission was to monitor the Reihl murder case and assist the prosecution, educate the community on how to protect ourselves from violence and to combat hate crimes in Connecticut. An organization called Speak Out was formed to educate people by talking directly to many different groups about our lives. The only remaining active part of the original Anti-Violence Project is now called the Stonewall Speakers Bureau. The Bureau mainly goes into the schools for speaking engagements. [Read more →]

Late last week we learned that the Judiciary Committee has scheduled a public hearing on the transgender equality bill that the Connecticut TransAdvocacy Coalition is supporting in collaboration with CWEALF, Love Makes a Family and others in the Connecticut Anti-Discrimination Coalition.Last year, this bill (SB 1044) won strong approval in four legislative committees (Judiciary, GAE, Education, Higher Education) and passed in the Senate with a total vote tally of 111 in favor and only 13 opposed. Additionally a teachers amendment in Higher Education failed by a vote of 14 to 1. We need our voices to be heard to ensure that this bill passes through all of its committees quickly and without any harmful amendments! Take action : http://www.lmfct.org/transequality,  post on your blogs,  The Judiciary public hearing on HB 5723–An Act Concerning Discrimination, is Wednesday, March 19, 12 PM. See below regarding submitting your story for the Public Hearing. Fact sheet on HB 5723 Q&A on HB 5723 Please visit ourwebsite at ConnecticutADC.org for full details on this legislative effort. Your Stories and Testimony are Needed Today! For the March 19th Judiciary public hearing

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CALL TO ACTION

Tell HRC that Trans Rights=Queer  

Rights!

Join the RADICAL HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA and PROTEST the Human Rights Campaign’s betrayal of the Trans community at HRC’s annual gala fundraiser.

When : Saturday, Feb. 23 at 5:30pm
Where: Outside the Hilton Ballroom
6th Ave & 53rd Street.
Bring: Attitude! Drums! Flamboyant threads!

                             
 Why protest HRC?Instead of supporting a united queer community, HRC dumped transgender people from ENDA, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, a bill banning discrimination based on sexual orientation, but not gender identity. HRC executive director Joe Solmonese said, “We absolutely do not support and, in fact, oppose legislation that is not absolutely inclusive.” But behind the scenes, he worked to eliminate trans protections.ENDA passed in the House and went on to fail in the Senate. Yet HRC continues to hail the bill as a “victory.” But the real victory is that so many LGBTQ groups are rallying together to oppose HRC by telling them they can’t turn some of us into second-class citizens so others can get ahead. The real victory is that, from Stonewall to Seattle, trans folks have constantly battled on the frontlines for a better world, and now a clear majority of the queer community is standing in solidarity them.

Just recently I read these words,  “all that is happening right now is a perfect example of why organizations might prefer to be single issue!” I am not going to write about the whole flap that was happening but instead I wish to write and think about single and multi-issue movements within our TBLG stories.  This essay could well be called Around and Around and Up and Down and Back and Forth we go. [Read more →]

Why are we MAD!!

Its not only HRC’s continuing support of a non-inclusive ENDA bill and the disregarding and disrespecting of our Trans sisters and brothers that makes our blood boil, but also their support of Human Rights Abuses around the globe brought to the people by the Corporate world. [Read more →]

T. Trist who commented on one of the postings on QWB turned us on to a very interesting site. This site is called Faith of the Abomination. From the site are these words: “Faith of the Abomination is a provocative, independent documentary film created in Austin TX about the experiences of a lesbian couple who went undercover as a heterosexual couple inside a Evangelical Organization. The film is currently in post production.” The women also have a very interesting blog site at: http://faithoftheAbomination.com. You can also link from there to see a movie preview.

Thanks again to T. Trist for bringing this important work to the attention of QWB.