Columnists (23)
As I wrap-up my third wedding "season"…I feel the need to talk about and share my thoughts about the "T" in LGBT…especially when it comes to weddings and all the "issues" now.
These issues are at the root of all transgender advocacy. Many of them reflect the current state of the legal system in America. In working to overturn this legislation, groups like NTAC are committed to not only bettering the lives of gender variant people through less discrimination—they are also focused on changing the status quo of tolerance and acceptance in society as a whole.
A couple of months ago, something unexpected arrived in the mail: a wedding invitation from a Cedar Rapids lawyer friend and his wife. Their daughter was getting married.
Why was the invite a surprise?
The Gay Wedding Planner : Remembering Jeff Jacox
Written by Beau FodorAs I sit in my office at the New LGBTQI Center, temporarily at 1300 Locust Street, in downtown Des Moines, my eyes are drawn to a matted and framed copy of an April 30th, 2009 DSM Register article, about my launching a business called “Gay Weddings with PANACHE”.
This past weekend I attended the 2011 Mr. Olympia Contest and Expo at the Las Vegas Convention Center where, being a mere five-foot-nine and only one hundred and eighty pounds, I must have—in proportion to the other expo attendees—looked like a hobbit with a camera.
I was actually very excited by this event. A friend went with me and we both descended upon the convention center with the full expectation of filling bags and bags with free samples of fitness products. After thoroughly sweeping each vendor’s booth, feeling very much like children collecting candy at a Halloween party where the theme was Too Many Muscles! Enough With the Muscles Already!, we left with our arms loaded with hundreds of performance-enhancing compounds—the legal kind. We had protein bars and antioxidant drinks and tissue oxygenators and whey cookies and amino acid jelly beans and vaso-muscular volumizationalazines [or something like that], all of which do pretty much nothing and taste just like construction putty. Whoo hoo!
On December 16th, 2009 Rwanda’s legislative body announced that they were considering legislation similar to what was proposed by David Bahati, a member of Uganda’s parliament. The proposed Bill 18 in Uganda would make homosexuality—which is already illegal in Uganda—punishable by life imprisonment or death by hanging. The proposed law criminalizes attempted gay acts, requires the immediate reporting of suspected homosexuals, and would censor or fine any Ugandan agency that publicly supported gay rights. The reach of the proposed law also extends beyond Africa by demanding the extradition of homosexual Ugandans living abroad.
For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction; this rule is something by which we are all bound regardless of our knowledge or perception of it. The purpose of this column is to explore the actions and reactions we have to the decisions and questions raised in our ever-adapting world. The reactions here are intended to stimulate debate in the hope that through it, we can better see what unites us in the face of our differences.
Yet in the 17 years since DADT was passed, more than 13,000 men and women have been voluntarily or forcibly discharged. This number includes decelerated pilots like LtCol Fehrenbach, war heroes like Eric Alva, human intelligence collectors like Alex Nicholson, and linguists like Lt Dan Choi. There are those like RADM Steinman who, for the 25 years until he retired, suffered silently, and those like Joseph Rocha whose careers and pride were silenced by those the policy empowered to humiliate and degrade them. Make no mistake, even today gay servicemen fill every billet, are in every branch, and occupy every rank. As Senator McCaskill put it, “the issue isn’t whether or not gay and lesbian Americans are serving in the military; it’s whether or not we talk about it.”
Ellen Krug, Inside Out: "Listen to Yourself; You May Hear Something Important"
Written by Ellen Krug
Listen to Yourself; You May Hear Something Important
This is my first column for Accessline as Ellen Krug. It has taken me a hell of a long time to get to the point of being able to write those words, Ellen Krug. I had been someone else, a male imposter, for so long that I almost did not get the chance to be Ellen. I’ve learned that do-overs don’t come easily.
You see, I’m working on a second chance, a new life. In short, I’m changing my physical sex, adjusting my career of 28 years (well, I am calling it "semi-retiring"), moving 300 miles to a place where I hardly know anyone, and deeming myself a writer even though Ellen Krug has never published a single word. A life turned literally inside out. A lover once said to me, "your life is like an Adirondack chair with a seatbelt." How appropriate, I thought.
Brett Edward Stout, Action Reaction: The Gay War for the South
Written byFor every action there is an equal and opposite reaction; this rule is something by which we are all bound regardless of our knowledge or perception of it. The purpose of this column is to explore the actions and reactions we have to the decisions and questions raised in our ever-adapting world. The reactions here are intended to stimulate debate in the hope that through it, we can better see what unites us in the face of our differences.
On February 4th, 2010, Juin Baize walked into Itawamba Agricultural High School (IAHS) and in less than 4 hours was suspended and sent home. Those 4 hours would be the only ones that Juin would be a student at IAHS. A month later, a story exploded in the media as another IAHS student, Constance McMillen, attempted to bring her girlfriend to prom resulting in the school canceling the official prom and holding a secret (and private) prom that Constance was not invited to. Soon after this, in nearby Georgia, Derrick Martin was thrown out of his home by his parents when he won the fight to bring his boyfriend to his prom. And, as the 2010 school year came to a close, Ceara Sturgis, an honor student in Jackson, Mississippi opened her year book to discover that every trace of her had been deleted because she chose to wear a tuxedo in her senior portrait.
This certainly wasn’t the first time a gay or lesbian student tried to bring their partner to prom. This also wasn’t the first time a trans student attended class dressed as they felt comfortable nor was it the first time a lesbian student didn’t wear a dress in her yearbook photo. In 1980, Aaron Fricke and his same-sex date attended prom in Rhode Island. Despite external predictions of violence and fire from the heavens, the couple remembers the prom as being as uneventful as most proms are.
A Letter to Senator Chuck Grassley from Marine Corps Veteran Brett Edward Stout, re: Don't Ask, Don't Tell
Written byThe following is in response to the standard "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" form letter sent from Senator Chuck Grassley to Marine Corps Veteran Brett Edward Stout; Mr. Stout received the form letter in response to his appeal for Senator Grassley's support of S. 3065, the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2010.
Dear Senator Grassley:
Thank you for responding to me. I appreciate hearing your objection to S. 3065, the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2010, which would enable gays and lesbians serving in the military to do so openly. I request that you reconsider.
I was taken aback by your reference to Elaine Donnelly’s “Flag and General Officers for the Military” list of 1,100 retired high ranking military officers. A review of this list has revealed that many of the generals and admirals have denied ever signing this list, that many others have asked that their names be removed, and that several more were deceased at the time it is claimed they signed it. Additionally, very few of those on the list served under the current policy.
There has never been any empirical evidence suggesting that gays serving openly harms good order and discipline, unit cohesion, morale, or recruitment and retention. Gregory M. Harek Ph.D. testified in 1993 that “The research data shows that there is nothing about lesbians and gay men that makes them inherently unfit for military service, and there is nothing about heterosexuals that makes them inherently unable to work and live with gay people in close quarters.”
The current Department of Defense policy is based on a long-standing presupposition. An assumption, even a traditional one, is not good foundation for policy. Currently gays and lesbians serve in every branch, at every rank, and in every billet; many of them are serving openly. Knowing a servicemember is gay in no way negates the service they are already providing. While there are civilian behaviors that are not allowed under UCMJ, those behaviors are only disallowed specifically because they impede a unit’s efficacy. Being gay does not correlate to the other dischargeable offenses like murder, drug abuse, or desertion.
It is cause for concern that the military continues to actively recruit convicted felons, drug abusers, high school dropouts and individuals as old as 42, while simultaneously discharging highly competent men and women from our armed services who are gay or lesbian despite their intelligence, physical abilities, and leadership skills.
You aptly point out that our national security trumps popular opinion and issues of fairness. This current divisive law’s code of silence stands in direct conflict with the principles of honor and integrity the uniform stands for. This policy was the reason I did not reenlist. I could not ethically serve under a policy that stands in opposition to the ideals of the nation I pledged myself to defend. As a result, our military is without my mission-critical skills as a Russian linguist, weapons marksmanship instructor, and warrior in a critical time of war.
I look forward to your further comments on this matter.
Semper Fidelis
Brett Edward Stout
Brett Edward Stout. Photo: Adam Bouska
On March 12th, 2010 the Texas Board of Education ruled 10-4 (with one opposing member storming out in protest) to enact new social studies textbook guidelines. Final approval of the decision will come in May. The Board is entrusted with doing so every 10 years and that the vote occurred was not in and of itself abnormal. However, the decision they made that day is considered by some to be the most terrifying power play the Religious Right has ever perpetrated. But why should the actions of the Texas Board of Education deserve a national reaction? What do the content of textbooks matter in an Internet age where print media seems ever more obsolete?
Attacks on school curriculum by the Religious Right are not new and have had questionable success. In 1954 “Under God” was successfully legislated as an addition to the Pledge of Allegiance, but then in the 1960s school prayer was successfully halted. Most recently, in the 2005 case of Kitzmiller v. Dover, public schools were barred from religious challenges in science classrooms but the battle over history has just begun. The following year, David Barton started to gain notoriety for “educating” religious institutions with his theory that the United States was created as a “Christian experiment.”
His work was soon heavily criticized, most notably in Chris Rodda’s book Liars for Jesus: The Religious Right’s Alternative Version of American History.
