Saturday, June 11, 2011
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Today in Gay History
Happy 81st Birthday!
Harvey B. Milk
May 22, 1930 - November 27, 1978
Harvey Milk was the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in the United States (and only the second openly homosexual, after Massachusetts State Assembly member Elaine Noble). His tragic assassination in San Francisco's City Hall made him the American gay liberation movement's most visible martyr.
I ask my gay sisters and brothers to make the commitment to fight. For themselves, for their freedom, for their country ... We will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets ... We are coming out to fight the lies, the myths, the distortions. We are coming out to tell the truths about gays, for I am tired of the conspiracy of silence, so I'm going to talk about it. And I want you to talk about it. You must come out. Come out to your parents, your relatives...
Stonewall anniversary speech 1978
Thursday, April 28, 2011
On April 28, 1990 -
A pipe bomb exploded in Uncle Charlie's, a Greenwich Village Gay bar, injuring three people. In protest, Queer Nation mobilized 1,000 protesters in a matter of hours. Angry marchers fill the streets, carrying the banner "Dykes and Fags Bash Back."
Credit GayWisdom.com and White Crane Institute
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Today in Gay History
Happy 128th Birthday
JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES
1946 - the British economist John Maynard Keynes died on this date (b. 1883). Also known as 1st Baron Keynes, his ideas have had a major impact on modern economic and political theory as well as on many governments' fiscal policies. He advocated interventionist government policy, by which the government would use fiscal and monetary measures to mitigate the adverse effects of economic recessions, depressions and booms. His ideas are the basis for the school of thought known as Keynesian economics. Time magazine named him as one of the greatest minds of the 20th century. Keynes's early romantic and sexual relationships were almost exclusively with men. Attitudes in the Bloomsbury Group, in which Keynes was avidly involved, were relaxed about homosexuality. One of his great loves was the artist Duncan Grant (they're together in the photo above), whom he met in 1908, and he was also involved with the writer Lytton Strachey.
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Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Today in Gay History
Happy 121st Birthday
Justice Frank Murphy
b. April 13, 1890
Former Michigan governor and U.S. Supreme Court Justice FRANK MURPHY was born April 13, 1890 (d. 1949). Born William Francis Murphy, he was a politician and jurist from Michigan. He served as First Assistant U.S. District Attorney, Eastern Michigan District, Recorder's Court Judge, Detroit. Mayor of Detroit, the last Governor-General of the Philippines, U.S. High Commissioner of the Philippines, the 35th Governor of Michigan, United States Attorney General, and United States Supreme Court Associate Justice. Murphy was pretty beloved in Michigan.
Murphy was elected the Governor of Michigan in 1936 and served one two-year term. During his two years in office, an unemployment compensation system was instituted and mental health programs were improved. The United Automobile Workers engaged in an historic sit-down strike at the General Motors' Flint plant. The Flint Sit-Down Strike was a turning point in national collective bargaining and labor policy. After 27 people got injured in a battle between the workers and the police, including 13 strikers with gunshot wounds, Murphy sent the National Guard to protect the workers. The governor didn't follow a court's order requesting him to expel the strikers, and refused to order the guards troops to suppress the strike. Murphy successfully mediated an agreement and end to the confrontation; G.M. recognized the U.A.W. as bargaining agent under the newly adopted National Labor Relations Act. This had an effect upon organized labor. In the next year the UAW saw its membership grow from 30,000 to 500,000 members. As later noted by the British Broadcasting System, this strike was "the strike heard round the world."
Murphy was first nominated by Franklin Delano Roosevelt to be Attorney General and then in 1940 Roosevelt promoted him to the Supreme Court where he served till his death in 1949. Murphy authored 199 opinions: 131 majority, 68 in dissent and took an expansive view of individual liberties, and the limitations on government he found in the Bill of Rights.
Opinions differ about him and his jurisprudential philosophy. He has been acclaimed as a legal scholar and a champion of the common man. Justice Felix Frankfurter disparagingly nicknamed Murphy "the Saint", criticizing his decisions as being rooted more in passion than reason. It has been said he was "Neither legal scholar nor craftsman" who was criticized "for relying on heart over head, results over legal reasoning, clerks over hard work, and emotional solos over team play."
Murphy's support of African-Americans, aliens, criminals, dissenters, Jehovah's Witnesses, Native Americans, women, workers, and other outsiders evoked a pun: “tempering justice with Murphy.” As he wrote in Falbo v. United States (1944), “The law knows no finer hour than when it cuts through formal concepts and transitory emotions to protect unpopular citizens against discrimination and persecution.”
The reason Murphy's being mentioned here is for his lifelong companion and roommate, Edward Kemp. The two met while in college, attended law school together, started a law practice together and were basically inseparable for Murphy's entire life. They travelled overseas together, and lived together before and during Murphy's time on the Supreme Court. Kemp said he was only Murphy’s personal assistant and political advisor. That's odd because Justices have clerks for personal assistants and, with lifetime tenure, Murphy had little need for political advisors. We can at least hope they were happy together.
CREDIT: Entire text to~ Dan Vera of GAY WISDOM for Daily Living... from White Crane Institute
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Thursday, April 7, 2011
Today in Gay History
HAPPY 99th BIRTHDAY APRIL 7TH
Harry Hay
(April 7, 1912 – October 24, 2002)
Chief Founder of the Mattachine Society and Radical Faeries.
"We pulled the ugly green frog skin of heterosexual conformity over us, and that's how we got through school with a full set of teeth," Hay once explained. "We know how to live through their eyes. We can always play their games, but are we denying ourselves by doing this? If you're going to carry the skin of conformity over you, you are going to suppress the beautiful prince or princess within you."
For a great deal more, see previous post here
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Today in Gay History
On March 19, 2010 celebrity Kathy Griffin headlined a rally at Freedom Plaza in DC calling for the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Openly gay West Point graduate, Lt. Dan Choi, and Capt. James Pietrangelo marched from the rally site to the White House and handcuffed themselves to the fence. They were arrested and spent the night in jail, being denied the right to make a phone call and bail until the next day. "But what I was taught at West Point and learned in war is -- hope is not a strategy. As officers, James and I both find it a dereliction of our moral duty to remain silent while thousands of our brothers and sister are not allowed to serve openly and honestly." Within a year, the Democratic Congress voted to repeal the 18 year old policy, and before he signed the bill into law, President Obama stated that ending the ban will mean that "thousands of patriotic Americans" won't be forced to leave the military "despite years of exemplary performance, because they happen to be gay…" and that gay people will no longer be be "asked to live a lie in order to serve the country they love."
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Today in Gay History
On March 10-12, 1987, ACT UP is founded by Larry Kramer.
Credit to GayWisdom.org
1987 - ACT UP was formed [on March 12,1987 following a meeting-speech on March 10th] at the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center in New York. The writer Vito Russo wrote at the time that "living with AIDS in this country is like living through a war that's happening only for those people in the trenches. Every time a shell explodes you look around to discover that you've lost more of your friends. But nobody else notices, it isn't happening to them." Larry Kramer had been asked to speak at the Lesbian and Gay Community Center as part of a rotating speaker series, and his well-attended speech focused on action to fight AIDS. Kramer spoke out against the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC), which he perceived as politically impotent. Kramer had actually co-founded the GMHC but had resigned from its board of directors in 1983. According to Douglas Crimp, Kramer posed a question to the audience: "Do we want to start a new organization devoted to political action?" The answer was "a resounding yes." Approximately 300 people met two days later [March 12] to form ACT UP.
They became confrontational about the government's complete lack of urgency towards the plight of the thousands of Gay men dying of AIDS. That was the face of AIDS at the time and no one seemed to care that so many were dying. And many were actively blocking (as many still do) the use of condoms for AIDS prevention. They called out Ronald Reagan and Cardinal O'Connor and Pope John Paul for their responsibility in the deaths of millions while they prevented treatment and prevention. Because of ACT UP, political leaders and the media were forced to pay attention to what was happening. Because of ACT UP things moved for the care and treatment of people living and dying with AIDS. Their work is not finished and their model is one that has been replicated by many dealing with entrenched hostility and animus.
Credit to GayWisdom.org
1987 - ACT UP was formed [on March 12,1987 following a meeting-speech on March 10th] at the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center in New York. The writer Vito Russo wrote at the time that "living with AIDS in this country is like living through a war that's happening only for those people in the trenches. Every time a shell explodes you look around to discover that you've lost more of your friends. But nobody else notices, it isn't happening to them." Larry Kramer had been asked to speak at the Lesbian and Gay Community Center as part of a rotating speaker series, and his well-attended speech focused on action to fight AIDS. Kramer spoke out against the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC), which he perceived as politically impotent. Kramer had actually co-founded the GMHC but had resigned from its board of directors in 1983. According to Douglas Crimp, Kramer posed a question to the audience: "Do we want to start a new organization devoted to political action?" The answer was "a resounding yes." Approximately 300 people met two days later [March 12] to form ACT UP.
They became confrontational about the government's complete lack of urgency towards the plight of the thousands of Gay men dying of AIDS. That was the face of AIDS at the time and no one seemed to care that so many were dying. And many were actively blocking (as many still do) the use of condoms for AIDS prevention. They called out Ronald Reagan and Cardinal O'Connor and Pope John Paul for their responsibility in the deaths of millions while they prevented treatment and prevention. Because of ACT UP, political leaders and the media were forced to pay attention to what was happening. Because of ACT UP things moved for the care and treatment of people living and dying with AIDS. Their work is not finished and their model is one that has been replicated by many dealing with entrenched hostility and animus.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Today in Gay History
March 11, 1967 – Today is the birthday of Scottish singer, actor, and activist JOHN BARROWMAN. Best known for his role as Captain Jack Harkness in the science fiction series Doctor Who and Torchwood. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, Barrowman and his family emigrated to the U.S. when he was nine. Growing up in the state of Illinois, his high school teachers encouraged his love for music and theatre and he studied performing arts at the United States International University in San Diego before visiting the United Kingdom and landing the role of Billy Crocker in Cole Porter's Anything Goes in London's West End.
Barrowman met his partner Scott Gill in 1993 and in 2005 they registered as civil partners under British law. They do not call their relationship a marriage: "We're just going to sign the civil register. We're not going to have any ceremony because I'm not a supporter of the word marriage for a Gay partnership." Barrowman explained later: "Why would I want a 'marriage' from a belief system that hates me?" A small ceremony was held in Cardiff with friends and family, with the cast of Torchwood and executive producer Russell T Davies as guests.
In 2009, Barrowman published I Am What I Am, his second memoir detailing his recent television work and musings on fame. In the book, Barrowman reveals that when he was just beginning his acting career, a Gay producer told Barrowman that he should try to pretend to be heterosexual in order to be successful. Barrowman was offended by the incident, and it made him more aware of the importance of his role as a Gay public figure: "One of my explicit missions as an entertainer is to work to create a world where no one will ever make a statement like this producer did to me to anyone who s Gay." To this end, Barrowman is active in his community supporting the issues that matter to him most. He worked with Stonewall, a Gay rights organization in the UK, on the "Education for All" campaign against homophobia in the schools. In April 2008, the group placed posters on 600 billboards that read, "Some people are Gay. Get over it!" Barrowman contributed his support to the project asking people to join him and "Help exterminate homophobia. Be bold. Be brave. Be a buddy, not a bully." In the same month, Barrowman spoke at the Oxford Union about his career, the entertainment industry, and gay rights issues. The event was filmed for the BBC program The Making Of Me, in an episode exploring the science of homosexuality
In 1998, Barrowman was nominated for an Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical, and in 2006 he was voted Stonewall's "Entertainer of the Year."
credit gaywisdom.org
Barrowman met his partner Scott Gill in 1993 and in 2005 they registered as civil partners under British law. They do not call their relationship a marriage: "We're just going to sign the civil register. We're not going to have any ceremony because I'm not a supporter of the word marriage for a Gay partnership." Barrowman explained later: "Why would I want a 'marriage' from a belief system that hates me?" A small ceremony was held in Cardiff with friends and family, with the cast of Torchwood and executive producer Russell T Davies as guests.
In 2009, Barrowman published I Am What I Am, his second memoir detailing his recent television work and musings on fame. In the book, Barrowman reveals that when he was just beginning his acting career, a Gay producer told Barrowman that he should try to pretend to be heterosexual in order to be successful. Barrowman was offended by the incident, and it made him more aware of the importance of his role as a Gay public figure: "One of my explicit missions as an entertainer is to work to create a world where no one will ever make a statement like this producer did to me to anyone who s Gay." To this end, Barrowman is active in his community supporting the issues that matter to him most. He worked with Stonewall, a Gay rights organization in the UK, on the "Education for All" campaign against homophobia in the schools. In April 2008, the group placed posters on 600 billboards that read, "Some people are Gay. Get over it!" Barrowman contributed his support to the project asking people to join him and "Help exterminate homophobia. Be bold. Be brave. Be a buddy, not a bully." In the same month, Barrowman spoke at the Oxford Union about his career, the entertainment industry, and gay rights issues. The event was filmed for the BBC program The Making Of Me, in an episode exploring the science of homosexuality
In 1998, Barrowman was nominated for an Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical, and in 2006 he was voted Stonewall's "Entertainer of the Year."
credit gaywisdom.org
Thursday, March 10, 2011
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