LGBT POV

Tony Perkins, head of the antigay Family Research Council, is “saddened” by the news about former GOP heavy weight Ken Mehlman coming out as gay, according to an email to supporters he sent during a break from his vacation.  Perkins (pictured) says that Mehlman has “chosen” to identify himself as gay. I guess Perkins didn’t read Mehlman’s interview with The Atlantic or skipped that part where it took Mehlman 43 years to “choose” that identity.

But there are so many other interesting tid-bits in Perkins’ email. Please click inside to read Perkins’ email and the questions that arise from it.

I had only a distant respect for the international group Human Rights Watch until HRW representatives came to Fairfax High School in Los Angeles for a major news conference in the early 2000s with LA Unified School District Supervisor (and former Colorado Gov.) Roy Romer, among other dignitaries.

HRW was there to release their new report on how they considered school bullying to be an abuse of human rights. When I kept asking about whether LGBT kids were included in the report, the representatives said yes – but I really had to get in touch with Scott Long, the founder and director of HRW’s LGBT division, about whom they couldn’t speak highly enough. Since then, Long’s extraordinary reports have placed LGBT human rights abuses in the larger context of human rights abuses which most world governments say they will not tolerate.

Monday, Aug. 23, Scott Long - who has a PhD from Harvard, among many other outstanding credentials –  resigned. Ironically, Long’s resignation comes on the same day that the first-ever report from the US State Department to the UN Human Rights Council is released in which the Obama administration admits that discrimination still exists in America – including towards LGBT people, according to the Associated Press.

Please click inside to see why Long resigned.

California Assembly Speaker John A. Perez, the nation’s highest ranking openly gay state official, was honored by Equality California at their annual gala at the Ritz-Carlton hotel downtown on Saturday. EQCA executive director Geoff Kors said the lobbying group changed venues from the Century Plaza Hotel because that hotel is part of the Hyatt chain under boycott by the Unite Here! union. The gay conservative group GOProud recently crossed the picket line by holding a reception at the Manchester Grand Hyatt in San Diego.

Perez comes out of both the labor and Latino political movements and powerfully explained to the EQCA audience why the LGBT community needs to build coalitions with the two groups. Perez is also a prodigious fundraiser and like former state legislator Sheila James Kuehl and current state Senator Mark Leno, he judiciously contributes funds to political candidates who he deems will be good on LGBT and progressive issues.

Here’s an excerpt from his EQCA speech:

“We have to recognize that effectively fighting for our rights is not simply a matter of holding press conferences or sponsoring legislation, or even precinct walking and phone banking; although those are important. It’s a matter of connecting to people on an emotional, personal and visceral level. This is something the Labor Community understands clearly.

One worker cannot stand up to the Corporation alone.  But every worker, standing together, presents a united front that cannot be ignored. Building on that, by recruiting allies, that Union’s strength and value is only magnified.

That’s a lesson Harvey Milk learned early on. How fundamentally different would our world be if labor leaders in San Francisco never made the decision to approach Harvey Milk about the Coors boycott.
[cut]

We still see the results of that early partnership today.  In a majority of states in this country, most of us in the room could be fired for simply being gay, lesbian or bisexual. And in almost every state, a transgender person could be fired for being transgender. There is nothing in the laws of those states protecting LGBT people.

But in every one of those states a union contract guarantees that protection. Wherever you find a union contract, you find a de facto ENDA.  That is a living, breathing example of the need for us to rededicate ourselves to those early lessons of coalition building.”

If that whet your political whistle – please click inside for the transcript of the entire speech. Video to come.

As I remember it, the Cronkite newsroom at CBS News was a place where facts ruled. Opinion and humor were in abundance, of course, but rarely did they find their way on air. That’s why the country and President Lyndon B. Johnson listened when anchorman Walter Cronkite broadcast his historic commentary that the war in Vietnam could never be won. By then he was known as “Uncle Walt,” the truth-telling most reliable man in America and Johnson decided not to seek re-election after “losing” Cronkite.

After he retired in 1980 – not happily, a victim of CBS’s mandatory policy of retirement at age 65 – Cronkite started expressing some of his own opinions. An Episcopalian, he became honorary chair of the Interfaith Alliance because, as he said in a public letter:

“I am deeply disturbed by the dangerous and growing influence of people like Pat Robertson and James Dobson on our nation’s political leaders.
Like you, I understand that freedom of speech is a founding principle of our nation, and I respect people with the courage to speak their minds. As a concerned person of faith, however, I have watched with increasing alarm as Religious Right groups manipulate religion to further their intolerant, political agendas. Over the years, they have gained considerable influence at every level of government…on local school boards, in the Administration, the courts, and in Congress. They have shrewdly twisted the traditional healing role of religion into an intolerant, political platform.”

It seems incredibly fitting therefore – and something that would no doubt warm Cronkite’s heart – that the Interfaith Alliance will bestow its 2010 Walter Cronkite Faith & Freedom award on MSNBC openly gay anchor Rachel Maddow for her work covering religion and politics. Chautaqua Institution Department of Religion Director Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell will also be honored at a gala dinner in New York in October.

The announcement says the award “recognizes individuals who courageously promote democratic values, defend religious freedom and reinvigorate informed civic participation.” The IA press release says:

“Walter Cronkite once told me that no less than the future of our nation was at stake in the work of Interfaith Alliance, and I can think of no two people who contribute more to advancing our mission than Rachel Maddow and Joan Brown Campbell,” said Interfaith Alliance President Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy. “Rachel’s passionate coverage of the intersection of religion and politics exhibits a strong personal intellect coupled with constitutional sensitivity to the proper boundaries between religion and government.”

Here’s an example of Rachel Maddow tackling politics, religion and the truth with “ex-gay” activist Richard Cohen:

Author Anne Rice, perhaps best known for her “Interview with the Vampire” and the series it spawned, officially announced via Facebook Wednesday that she is “quitting” Christianity because of the way Christ’s message has been turned into something ugly and antigay:

“For those who care, and I understand if you don’t: Today I quit being a Christian. I’m out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being “Christian” or to being part of Christianity. It’s simply impossible for me to “belong” to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten years, I’ve tried. I’ve failed. I’m an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else.”

Those Religious Right Christians didn’t quite know what to make of her, either.  But Anne Rice loves her gay son Christopher, also an author (and, incidentally, my neighbor in West Hollywood). USA Today did a wonderful story on the mother-son literary team. And like so many other parents – it became increasingly difficult to reconcile what she knew to be true about gays through her son and the very-un-Christ-like Christianity spouted by the Christian Right. Increasingly, mainstream religions are beginning to catch on that they are losing people over their antigay, anti-love positions – the Episcopal Church is facing an international schism, for example.

Anne Rice got that:

“As I said below, I quit being a Christian. I’m out. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.”

And:

“My faith in Christ is central to my life. My conversion from a pessimistic atheist lost in a world I didn’t understand, to an optimistic believer in a universe created and sustained by a loving God is crucial to me. But following Christ does not mean following His followers. Christ is infinitely more important than Christianity and always will be, no matter what Christianity is, has been, or might become.”

Welcome to our world, Anne Rice – the world where so many LGBT people love the message of Jesus Christ – the message of loving one another – but cannot abide the ugliness Christianity as a religion has embraced. What would Jesus do? Just what you did, I imagine. Leave the money-changers who’ve appropriated his name and stand with the outsiders like us. Thank you.

UPDATE: CHRISTOPHER RICE’S REACTION:

“For ten years I watched my mother bravely attempt to engage the hostile fundamentalist forces that dominate the leadership of almost every popular Christian denomination. She was met, in most instances with an iron wall of derision and scorn. Her departure from organized religion is a testament to the moral rot that exists at the politcized core of most church leadership. Throughout it all, her love and support of me as a gay man has never wavered and I love her just as much today as I did when she considered herself a member of the Catholic church.”

Mark Thompson, my friend and former editor at The Advocate, sent me this wonderful news about historian Stuart Timmons:

Longtime friends of author and community activist Stuart Timmons gathered last week to celebrate his remarkable recovery from a major stroke two-and-a-half years ago. Timmons, 53, is still wheelchair bound, but is now fully mentally alert and with the ability to speak and move about with assistance. He is expecting a return to his research and writing about GLBT history and is especially delighted with the invitation to participate in Centennial celebrations honoring the life and work of gay movement founder Harry Hay.

A two-day conference at City University New York and a major exhibition at the San Francisco Public Library are in the planning stages, with other cities soon to be included. Stuart wrote the award-winning biography on the legendary gay rights leader, The Trouble With Harry Hay, in 1990.  Harry Hay was born on Easter Sunday, April 7, 1912, in Worthing, England, although he lived many decades of his life in Los Angeles.

HRH Lee Mentley added:

Stuart is doing amazing well…, had a great lunch at “The Coffee Table” and he was alert with full memory correcting us on our history and although speaking slowly was participating in the conversation. Well on his way to full recovery! He spoke with Joey Cain on the phone and will be on the planning committee for the 100 Year Celebration for Harry Hay in San Francisco and New York City. It was a joy to be with him!

Actually, Harry Hay and John Burnside lived down the street from me in West Hollywood so I hope this city will be added to the tribute, perhaps at the new WeHo library with an event co-hosted by ONE Institute. Just a thought. I’d be happy to loan my video and photos of Harry and John.

Pictured in the photo are: (left to right) Mark Thompson, Stuart Timmons, Robert Croonquist and Lee Mentley.

In a guest post on the Victory Fund’s blog Gay Politics, California State Senator Roy Ashburn, who was outed last March after a drunk driving arrest, apologizes for his antigay votes. This is an important first step, not only for his own healing but also as a model for political reconciliation since Ashburn is a gay Republican.

Here’s an excerpt from “My journey, my party and LGBT rights:”

“I should begin with an apology.  I am sincerely sorry for the votes I cast and the actions I took that harmed lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.  Just as important to me, I am sorry for not stepping forward and speaking up as an elected official on behalf of equal treatment for all people.  For nearly 26 years, the voters in my area of California trusted me as their elected representative.  I look back now knowing there is so much more I could have done to inform the public about LGBT people and to fight for equal rights under the law.

Regrettably and selfishly, I took another path in my life and political career—I chose to conceal who I truly am and to then actually vote against the best interests of people like me.  All this was done because I was afraid–terrified, really–that somehow I would be revealed as gay.

My past actions harmed gay people.  In fact, all people are harmed when there is unequal treatment of anyone under the constitution and laws of our country.  I do not believe in discrimination, and yet my votes advanced unequal of treatment of gay people and promoted the suspicion and fear that limits people from being forthright and accepted in society.

Now, from what I have lived and learned, I want to do the best that I can to advance equality and freedom for all people.  Given the shame and confusion that many feel over their sexual orientation, perhaps my situation can serve as an example of both the harm that can come from denial and fear, and the opportunity to try to make things right.”

Truth Wins Out, Wayne Besen’s site devoted to debunking the Religious Right’s claim of “curing” gays of homosexuality, posted an exclusive video statement today from two former clients of “ex-gay” life coach Alan Downing (pictured) who allege inappropriate behavior. Downing is a big deal in the “reparative therapy” movement as lead therapist for Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality (JONAH), among other “change” and make-men-more-masculine money-making ventures.

Wayne says:

“The clients, Ben Unger and Chaim Levin, alleged that during individual therapy sessions, Downing made them undress in front of a mirror and touch their bodies while the significantly older therapist watched. Unger and Levin call the sessions a “psychological striptease” and believe they were harmed by what they consider unprofessional behavior and sexual misconduct.”

Please check out the TWO for this complete story. Here’s the video statement:

President Obama released a greeting today to Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela on the occasion of the great man’s 92^nd birthday. (See photos of Mandela celebrating with his family on the Nelson Mandela Foundation site.)

On behalf of the United States, I wish Nelson Mandela a very happy 92nd birthday. We are grateful to continue to be blessed with his extraordinary vision, leadership, and spirit. And we strive to build upon his example of tolerance, compassion and reconciliation. I also join the American people, the South African people, the United Nations, and the world in celebrating the first annual Nelson Mandela International Day. I encourage us all to heed the call to engage in some form of service to others, in honor of the 67 years of sacrifice and service Madiba gave to us. We strive to follow his example of what it means to truly give back to our communities, our nations, and our world.

The example we all strive to follow is his political activism opposing South African apartheid, leading to his arrest and conviction in 1962, with a sentence of life in prison. Upon his release on Feb. 11 1990, Mandela remarkably forgave his captors and lead his country through an unbelievable process of reconciliation and the first-ever multi-racial democratic process, which also elected him president from 1994-1999.

Mandela included sexual orientation in his Inaugural speech in Cape Town on May 9, 1994, a plank later written into the South African constitution:

“In 1980s the African National Congress was still setting the pace, being the first major political formation in South Africa to commit itself firmly to a Bill of Rights, which we published in November 1990. These milestones give concrete expression to what South Africa can become. They speak of a constitutional, democratic, political order in which, regardless of colour, gender, religion, political opinion or sexual orientation, the law will provide for the equal protection of all citizens.
 They project a democracy in which the government, whomever that government may be, will be bound by a higher set of rules, embodied in a constitution, and will not be able govern the country as it pleases.”

Today “apartheid” has been relegated to the history books. But many of us remember that cruel, total Nazi-like control the white Afrikaaners held over blacks and other people of color. To understand that context, please read this BBC report or take some time and watch this film about the June 16, 1976   youth-led riots in Soweto. I worked at CBS News at the time and I remember filmed horror that never made it to the evening news. I also remember white police officers unapologetically claiming they had “no choice” but to fire into the fleeing schoolchildren. By the end of the riots Reuters reported more than 500 killed (many youth shot and trampled), with thousands wounded. It took global outrage and sanctions to eventually stop apartheid and yield heroes such as Nelson Mandela.

Here is a BBC filmed report about Mandela’s release from prison:

Actress Cloris Leachman and human-rights activist Stuart Milk, founder of the Harvey Milk Foundation, may be the best known in San Diego’s LGBT Pride parade today.  But I salute the Pride organizers for recognizing transgender blogger Autumn Sandeen of Pam’s House Blend with their Champion of San Diego Pride honor. Sandeen made national news this year by standing in her uniform side by side with Lt. Dan Choi at the White House gate to protest Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.  I met Autumn when she came to LA for an event to interview Judy Chu (pictured), who was then running for Congress and was being honored by Equality California. She was also kind enough to contribute to this blog to help explain the “detransition” and sudden suicide of transgender L.A. Times sports columnist Christine Daniels/Mike Penner.

The LGBT community is lucky to have Autumn Sandeen standing as a champion for all of us. Congratulations – and thank you.

The race is on at CNN to replace retiring interview king-pin Larry King, who’s hosted “Larry King Live” for 25 years. But TheWrap, an important entertainment industry website, reports that jealousy from other anchors and low ratings may prompt Anderson Cooper to bolt, too:

“Speaking on background, one CNN on-air personality told TheWrap that most of the anchors were jealous that Anderson Cooper sucked up resources by going to Haiti and the Gulf of Mexico, leaving them unable to build their profiles at the network.

[cut]

Cooper has been frustrated that despite dangerous forays into disaster zones like Haiti, his ratings remain in the doldrums. And a high-level CNN staffer told TheWrap that Cooper is frequently in conflict with his executive producer David Doss.

He is also said to be entertaining offers from other potential suitors. Cooper’s contract with CNN expires next year.”

To which CNN spokesperson responded: “CNN will continue to do great journalism and will leave meaningless conjecture to The Wrap.”

Jon Davidson, Legal Director for Lambda Legal, has been named the recipient of the National LGBT Bar Association’s 2010 Dan Bradley Award, Lambda Legal announced Monday. The award is the Association’s highest honor, awarded to recognize outstanding members of the LGBT legal community whose work has led the way in our struggle for equality under the law.

“Jon Davidson is a brilliant lawyer who has been part of more victories in the battle for LGBT rights than most people can count,” said Kevin Cathcart, Lambda Legal Executive Director.  ”He is a respected leader and strategist–over two decades, his work has helped shape the legal landscape for the LGBT and HIV communities. We all owe him an immense debt of gratitude, and we’re thrilled that the National LGBT Bar Association has recognized his decades of hard work.”

I want to briefly step outside my bounds of “straight” reporting and offer a personal congratulations to Jon, as well.  Sometimes I get on a tear about how we LGBT people tend to discount our own. Call it internalized homophobia or just eons of having it pounded into our being that we’re second best in any profession other than the arts and fashion. This is just achingly disheartening. And Jon, I fear, has at times been among those brilliant minds whom we take for granted.

Please click inside to read more about my take on Jon Davidson.

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Janice Langbehn, the accidental activist most responsible for securing hospital visitation rights for LGBT families, will be a guest at the White House Pride event Tuesday night.  Lambda Legal represented Langbehn last September in a federal lawsuit against Jackson Memorial Hospital, which had refused to allow Langbehn to see her dying partner, Lisa Pond, until a priest was admitted for last rites. The lawsuit was rejected by a federal court in Florida because there is no law requiring hospital visitation rights for gay people and their families. (This photo was taken of the whole family just before they boarded the R Family Cruise, on the day Pond was suddenly stricken fatally ill.)

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel read about Langbehn’s story and brought it to President Obama, who signed a memo in April directing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to issue regulations to allow hospital visitation rights for LGBT families. Obama personally called Langbehn to say he was sorry for what happened to her. The HHS regulations are due to be published on June 25th.

But Langbehn is a proud woman and will probably not tell Obama or anyone else that she suffers from MS, is in constant pain from back surgery and other ailments, and is in financial trouble because she no longer has two incomes to help pay for her medical care and to take care of the couple’s three teenagers.  Her current situation underscores how important federal benefits such as Social Security are.

Langbehn discussed her situation with me for Frontiers as I followed up on a Human Rights Campaign initiative about rating hospitals. She has a fund set up on her website – but it has not been publicized.  Hopefully, members of the LGBT community can express their gratitude for her work getting hospital visitation rights by stopping by her website and making a contribution.

Please click inside to read my story on Langbehn’s dire situation.

Joe Mannetti shared this incredible story on Facebook www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=581755828 – which I would like to share with you. It is of Tyler McCormick wining and accepting Mr. International Leather 2010. Joe writes that “Tyler is the first ever Transgender FTM in a wheelchair to win the Mr. International Leather title! His speech lets you know why he deserved to win!”

Happy LGBT Pride Day! It seems somehow fitting and ironic to start this Sunday  marking the 40^th anniversary of the riots at the Stonewall Inn with an interview with Republican California State Senator Roy Ashburn, who you recall was outed after being arrested and getting a DUI following some fun at a gay bar.  Ashburn finally came out but a lot of questions remained. Here are some excerpts from a wonderful interview by my friend Patt Morrison, star reporter and columnist at the Los Angeles Times and on KPCC radio:

PM: For decades you worked so hard to keep your sexual orientation under wraps. This must have been a torment, but in another sense, was there an element of relief?

RA: I’m sensing relief now. I had not consciously decided to come out, but there’s no doubt looking back that I had become increasingly bold about attending gay events, like pride festivals, and going to dance clubs and bars. Last year I attended Las Vegas Pride and San Diego Pride

[Cut]

PM: At some point, you must have realized a public career was incompatible with being open about your sexual preferences.

RA: Something happened that I guess caused me to realize that. When I was in sixth grade, the police had a raid in the sand dunes [near San Luis Obispo] and a bunch of gay men were arrested, probably charged with indecent activity. That sticks in my mind — the publicity and the shame around it. One of my teachers was one of the people. The talk among the kids, the talk among the adults, the talk in the community, the press — at that time the choice was pretty clear: If you were gay and open, it was a life of shame, ridicule, innuendo about molesting and perversion. It was a dark life. Given that choice of whether you come out or whether you’re in secret, I mean, there really wasn’t a choice.

[Cut]

PM: A lot of people, gay or straight, are probably wondering why you voted even against issues like insurance coverage for same-sex partners.

RA: The best I can do is to say that I was hiding. I was so in terror I could not allow any attention to come my way. So any measure that had to do with the subject of sexual orientation was an automatic “no” vote. I was paralyzed by this fear, and so I voted without even looking at the content. The purpose of government is to protect the rights of people under the law, regardless of our skin color, national origin, our height, our weight, our sexual orientation. This is a nation predicated on the belief that there is no discrimination on those characteristics, and so my vote denied people equal treatment, and I’m truly sorry for that.

I’ve known Michael Kearns for over 20 years. We’re both writers, both Aquarians, the same age, our birthdays are just a week apart. And from the moment I first interviewed him about his extraordinary play intimacies, I knew I knew him at the depths of his soul, and he, me.

And yet there was this one thing about which we differed incredibly. I had long ago forsaken the idea of being a parent – my dogs were children enough. But Michael refused to concede to society’s absurd mythology that gays must be forbidden children. No – Michael, the actor/writer/AIDS activist, wanted – needed – to be a father, despite homophobia, adoption rules or his own HIV status at a time before HIV meds when dying was the norm. And 14 years ago, he found his daughter Tia – who, as he writes in this elegant and moving essay, is the love of his life.

Michael’s essay, “Bloodless but not Loveless,” is part of a larger collection of essays entitled What I Would Tell Her: 28 Devoted Dads on Bringing Up, Holding On To, and Letting Go of Their Daughters edited by Andrea N. Richesin. You can find the book on Amazon and please check out their trailer.

What better way to mark LGBT Pride than by celebrating the joy of being a father!  Michael Kearns and Nicki Richesin will be reading from What I Would Tell Her at Skylight Books on Saturday, June 12 at 5pm.

Skylight Books

1818 North Vermont Ave.

Los Angeles, CA

Please click inside to read Michael extraordinary and insightful essay about his love for his daughter Tia.

Last Thursday, May 20, I was among many who reported on the horrendous sentence of 14 years hard labor in prison for Steven Monjeza, 26, and Tiwonge Chimbalanga, 20, arrested last December for simply holding an engagement ceremony. This started out last year as a remarkable story about a same sex couple who wanted to marry so badly, they knowing put themselves at risk by holding an engagement ceremony in a country that abhors homosexuality.

Along the way, I noted that Tiwonge Chimbalanga identified as a woman. While I didn’t call Tiwonge “gay” in the body of the recent story on their sentencing – I did write “Malawai gay couple” in the title because that’s how most reliable sources upon whom I depended for information identified the couple. Last January, for example, The international Times online headlined their story: “We have been beaten in jail, say first openly gay couple in Malawi. The Huffington Post’s story last Friday , written by Navi Pillay, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, was entitled “Malawi sets grave example with conviction of gay couple.” The New York Times titled their story, “Gay Couple in Malawi Get Maximum Sentence of 14 Years in Prison.”

So truthfully, I didn’t think about any other way of identifying the couple. Until I read this comment on my blog post:

“Tiwonge identifies as a woman. I am not sure why I keep seeing this reported as if her and her husband are two gay men. their treatment by the court is still cruel and unacceptable either way… but this does not justify erasing her identity in the press (particularly the gay press).”

I thought the person who left the comment made an excellent point so I immediately contacted Peter Tachell, the longtime London-based gay human rights activist who has been trying so hard to help Steven Monjeza and Tiwonge Chimbalanga.

Please click inside to read more – as well as Peter’s response and how you can help the imprisoned couple.

Among the plethora of activities marking the first-ever Harvey Milk Day in California was the Harvey Milk Schools Project Concert by the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles, with the story written by Alastair Gamble with Academy Award-winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black (pictured here with “Milk” producer Bruce Cohen and Harvey Milk’s nephew, Stuart Milk).

The first part of the GMCLA concert at the Fairfax High School Auditorium in Los Angeles Saturday night featured songs from the chorus’ June 19-20 concert L’Amour: Music from the Movies of Baz Luhrmann at the Avalon Theatre in Hollywood where the stage will be transformed into the Moulin Rouge.

For the premier of the Harvey Milk Schools Project, however, the high school auditorium stage was a set of bleachers for the singers, colorful boxes and most importantly, the audience’s imagination. This is useful since, as GMCLA Executive Director Hywel Sims explained, the GMCLA’s Alive Music Project goes into local high schools as ambassadors of music education (music programs often the first cut in times of economic crisis) while carrying the message of equality and anti-bullying through their performances, story telling and post-concert conversations. The new Harvey Milk Schools Project is scheduled to go into a magnet school on Thursday, their first performance of the work following Saturday’s premier.

The audience laughed when West Hollywood Mayor Pro Tem John Duran, dressed in shades and an early 1970s fringed pullover (to the song “Joy to the World”), came onstage as Harvey Milk and spoke his first lines – in a New York Jewish accent. Please click inside to read more about the concert/play with some photos.

I’ve known performance artist, author and activist Tim Miller for many years now and when he tells friends that Steven Reigns’ Inheritance is “one of the fiercest and wisest memoirs I have read in a long time” – I listen. Tim says: “Though unsparing in its account of a gay boy’s journey through abuse, Inheritance exhilarates in the energy released when the story is told, claimed and transformed.” Tim has given me permission to post his interview with Steven – one artist interviewing another, feel the depth. Steven says: “Secrets are some of the worst things to inherit and I don’t intend to leave any behind in my will.” If you want to breathe in some authenticity in the midst of today’s boisterous banality – Steven’s book release party is Sunday, May 23 from 5:00–6:00 PM at the wonderful Skylight Books, 1818 N. Vermont Avenue, LA 90027.

Reading the Will: Sex, Hope and Heart in Steven Reigns “Inheritance”

By Tim Miller

Steven Reign’s extraordinary new book Inheritance sizzles with the unsparing heat of memory. Carrying the full heat of a memoir as well as the stiletto precision of an accessible autobiographical narrative-based poetic sensibility, this soulful collection displays a queer voice so precise and deft it leaves the reader almost singed by how close to the mark the words flare….

Please click inside to read the rest of Tim’s article. Here’s a book trailer:

The White House released this list of those who will attend tonight’s State Dinner with Mexican President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa. Note that openly gay Assembly Speaker John A. Perez is not only invited to attend, with a date – but he’s seated at President Obama’s table. And if my calculation is correct, he’s seated one space away from the president.

Please click inside to see the complete list of attendees.