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How Does It Feel? Asks Rolling Stone
The Aug. 6 issue of Rolling Stone features a 14-page special report, "To Be Young and Gay," in which author David Lipsky uses stories from across the country to create a broad and compelling portrait of Lesbian, Gay and Transgender youth. The piece is referenced in an inset box on the cover. Even on the contents page, Rolling Stone manages to set this article apart by inserting a half-column commentary by Managing Editor Robert Love. Love writes: "'To Be Young and Gay' is the result of Lipsky's six reporting trips (more than 10,000 miles of travel), during which he was threatened by the police, Gay organizers and by one boy's very irate father," continuing to quote Lipsky himself, who says "I decided I had to keep going back because I wanted to get a sense of the extremes that these kids find themselves in. Some had left school, others had been asked to leave their homes. I found their bravery inspiring."
Lipsky begins the piece light-heartedly, describing a fifteen-year old who came out in front of a national audience when he appeared on CBS' 48 Hours some time ago. The boy told Lipsky, "My mom said, 'I know you [smoke]. But I just don't want to see you on national TV smoking.'" Lipsky writes, "In 1998, parents might be more unhappy having friends and relatives know that their child smokes than that their child is Gay." But Lipsky does not take lightly the plights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender youth, specifically addressing the discrimination, the harassment, the increased rates of destructive behavior and suicide attempts such youths face. At one point, Lipsky writes, "I walk out of the [restaurant]...and there are a couple of cowboys sitting on the front bumper of a truck. They look me over coolly. I think for a second that I'm going to get beaten up. It's the first time I've ever had that feeling." Lipsky details the experience of Jamie Nabozny, a young Gay man who made history last year when he sued the Ashland, WS school district where he attended high school, and with whom he settled the case for $900,000 as compensation for years of mental, emotional and physical brutalization. He uses Nabozny's case as a springboard for comparing legislative protections for Lesbian and Gay youth in different states, as well. He speaks with Kelli Taylor and other Salt Lake City students about a 1996 controversy involving their attempts to form a Gay-Straight Alliance in their high school, and asks them about the suicide of one of the group's founders, Jacob Orosco. One of Jacob's schoolmates tells him that "There's just that feeling...with everything he'd done and gone through: 'Well, if Jacob was this stud of a guy who was so out there and so ready to take on the world and he couldn't do it, what makes me think that I can?" Lipsky also goes to youth group meetings, joins the kids for coffee and meals, and shows them to be--above all else--human.
Please thank David Lipsky, Robert Love, and Rolling Stone for prominently facilitating a dialogue about the continuing plights of our nation's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender youth, and for sensitively highlighting the courage of these teens. Contact: Robert Love, Managing Editor, and David Lipsky, Contributing Editor, Rolling Stone, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, 2nd Fl., NY, NY 10104, fax: 212.767.8203, E-mail: letters@rollingstone.com. [GLAAD]
The Third Annual
Club Skirts Labor Day
In Monterey Women's WeekendMaria T Presents, the San Francisco based premiere Lesbian event company, is proud to announce the 3rd annual Club Skirts Labor Day In Monterey Women's Weekend, Sept. 4 - 6, featuring recording artist Jill Sobule in a rare acoustic set. The Hyatt Regency, a luxurious hotel on 25 sprawling acres, is home to this fast growing and very popular Lesbian weekend.
Considered by some "an innocent variant of the circuit party," the Club Skirts Labor Day in Monterey Women's Weekend attracts Lesbian attendees from all over the country to its weekend of mega-parties, go go dancers, national recording artists, live bands, celebrities and a golf tournament to benefit the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Community Center.
The weekend kicks off with a comedy show featuring local favorite Karen Ripley, New York City funny girl Michele Balan, and headliner Karen Williams from Ohio. A go go dancer studded dance event follows the comedy show in the Hyatt's East Grand Ballroom.
Saturday features the golf tournament on the acclaimed old Del Monte golf course, while that night its Marooned!, featuring DJ Page Hodel, state of the art light and sound and a special live performance by dance diva Tia, singing her top ten hits, "Slip And Slide" and "Cars".
Sunday, at the private Mark Thomas Pool area, an estimated 1,000 Lesbians will see Jill Sobule, that zany national recording artist, perform her hit singles, "I Kissed A Girl" and "When My Ship Came In". Also featured in a vendor expo, Los Angeles' all girl band, Cause for Concern, and San Francisco's hot band, Flo Stigmata and the Icons. Sunday night the weekend winds down with the last mega-dance-the Rescue Party.
Detailed brochures outlining the activities may be obtained by calling 1.888.5.SKIRTS. To reserve a room, call the Hyatt Regency Monterey directly at 408.372.1234. Callers must mention "Club Skirts" to reserve a room.
The Smooch Of Success
Already a sold-out favorite in Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco, Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss is quickly becoming the Gay-themed independent movie of the summer. The film stars Sean P. Hayes (from the upcoming NBC comedy Will & Grace) as Billy, an aspiring LA photographer who falls head over heels for his new model, Gabriel (Brad Rowe). The two get along glowingly, with only one small glitch:, Billy is not sure if Gabriel is straight or Gay. The movie deals touchingly with unrequited love, and the intricacies of coming out as the film's characters search for companionship and love.
On Aug. 7, Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss will open in an additional 18 cities nationwide, including Boston, Houston, Miami and Seattle. Further cities will follow throughout Aug. and Sept. For more information on the film's release, visit www.billyskiss.com. Check out Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss, then tell Trimark Pictures what you think. Contact: Trimark Pictures, 2644 30th Street, Santa Monica, CA 90405-3009, fax: 310.392.0252.
Not What They Said
But What They Didn't SayA July 26 report by The Associated Press (AP) on Washington state congressional candidate Margarethe Cammermeyer focuses on her sexual orientation and makes only peripheral reference to other attributes she may bring to the campaign.
The headline reads, "Decorated Lesbian Runs for Congress." The story, which identifies Cammermeyer as the Democratic primary front-runner, says, "On the campaign trail, she doesn't talk homosexual rights." At a recent event, says reporter David Ammons, "Cammermeyer spoke about education, health care, the environment and countering a Republican Congress she considers radical and heartless." He also quotes her as saying, "I'm an everyday person who has a health-care background and an education background. I am a mother, a grandmother and served in Vietnam."
With the exception of those sentences, however, Cammermeyer's sexual orientation is the only topic covered in the 23-paragraph piece.
In addition, the AP incorrectly identifies the Victory Fund as "a Washington, D.C., group that backs homosexuals for public office." instead of a national, Washington-based agency which contributes to the campaigns of selected candidates of any sexual orientation. It ends by noting that one of Cammermeyer's primary opponents "mailed a fund-raising letter saying her campaign is being underwritten by the national homosexual movement."
Please let the AP know that its chosen headline serves to ghettoize and make one-dimensional a candidate of considerable, diverse and well-documented accomplishments. Tell the wire service that its focus on Cammermeyer's sexual orientation is of far less import than the opportunity it missed: to acquaint voters with her position on issues that could impact their lives for decades. Contact: Julia Rubin, News Editor, Associated Press, 50 Rockerfeller Plaza, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10020-1666, fax: 212.621.7520. [GLAAD]
Sex Cultures Scrutinized & De-Pathologized
At San Fran ConferenceA controversial track of workshops focused on "Health Issues Facing Gay Men's Sexual Cultures" at this year's National Lesbian and Gay Health Conference drew hundreds of energized participants to workshops on circuit parties, leather sex, and "safer" barebacking, and also attracted a large and cross-generational crowd to a community forum on Viagra use among Gay men held in San Francisco's Castro District. Hart Roussel, a conference participant from Albuquerque, NM, captured many Gay men's feelings about this breakthrough track: "These workshops demolished the good Gay/bad Gay dichotomy and discussed Gay men's sex cultures thoughtfully, even critically, yet without pathologizing them."
Organized by a group of Gay male health activists-including Eric Rofes, author of Dry Bones Breathe: Gay Men Creating Post-AIDS Identities and Cultures, Michael Scarce,coordinator of LGBT resources at University of California, San Francisco; Tony Valenzuela, Los Angeles-based author and activist; Chris Bartlett of Philadelphia's Safeguards Project, Richard Elovich from New York's Gay Men's Health Crisis, and Race Bannon, an organizer in the San Francisco leather community-the workshops were among the highlights of this year's health conference and generated extensive discussion and debate among conference participants. The purpose of the workshop track as stated by the conveners in the introductory session was "neither to judge nor engage in endless debate about whether drugs, muscles, leather, or sex are 'right' or 'wrong.' Instead, we hope to move the discussion to another level and assist health providers working with Gay men in addressing the health promotion and harm reduction needs of Gay men who participate in these diverse subcultures within our communities."
Some of the workshop session discussions became highly-charged and a bit contentious. "Sure there were tensions in the room when Gay male HIV prevention workers talked about their own experiences using drugs or attending bareback parties or circuit events," said Jonathan Martin of Boulder County AIDS Project in Colorado. "It's so hard for people to separate their own experiences from those of the community, even when space is provided. Our communities forget we're part of the sexual cultures we're working with."
Eric Rofes and Chris Bartlett organized a one-day pre-conference institute which drew over 100 participants. The institute focused on Rofes' controversial book and a discussion of "post-AIDS" or "post-crisis" HIV prevention work with Gay men in the United States and provided the theoretical frame for the track. Rofes explained that his book argues that "the event of AIDS as developed in urban Gay centers in the mid-1980s-and characterized as "crisis"-no longer fits most Gay men's everyday experience of the epidemic, even as the disease of AIDS continues." Bartlett then discussed the transformation of Philadelphia's Safeguards program from one focused specifically on HIV prevention to one focused largely on Gay men's health, broadly-defined. "The SafeGuards Project has taken on crucial Gay men's health issues, including hepatitis prevention, intergenerational support, and health care access," declared Bartlett. "This work compliments our HIV prevention in a powerful way."
Perhaps the most controversial workshop was Michael Scarce and Tony Valenzuela's "Reducing the Risk of Doing It Raw: Strategies for Barebacking Harm Education," which moved beyond the typical "Is barebacking good or bad" conversation and focused on how health providers and activists could assist barebackers in reducing their risk of acquiring HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases should they decide to forgo the use of condoms. Scarce said, "By and large, AIDS prevention efforts have written off barebackers, demonizing them as the posterboys of unsafe sex, rather than meeting them where they are. We need a concrete and specific harm reduction approach that might not always include condom use." Scarce circulated a draft document titled "Possible Barebacking Harm Reduction Strategies," which included key information including: popper use dilates blood vessels in the rectum and leaves men more vulnerable to infection; lubricant should always be used, not just spit, as it helps prevent small tears which allow infection transmissions between tops and bottoms; early withdrawal before ejaculation can substantially reduce risk but is not a foolproof method of prevention transmission of HIV and other STDs; and, "rationing your barebacking over time can limit the number of exposures and sex partners."
Scarce's draft also included discussion of negotiation with partners, before and after-care (i.e. appropriate times for douching and washing), and monitoring of immunity.
"We wanted to move past moral judgments of bareback sex," said Tony Valenzuela, a panelist, "and provide supportive and useful information to meet these Gay men who bareback where they are at. And, not surprisingly, we quickly realized that barebackers were not simply out there-a small, hidden pocket of the community-but here at the health conference and among HIV prevention workers and Gay male health providers."
On Tues., July 28, Valenzuela chaired a workshop titled "Bad Boys Du Jour" which focused on the circuit party phenomena and included Dr. Drew Mattison, San Diego-based co-author of The Male Couple; Alan Brown, publisher of the circuit culture e-zine Electric Dreams frequently dubbed "the voice of the circuit," Don Spradlin, a San Francisco based party producer, and Dr. Chris Carrington, from San Francisco State University. Carrington and Mattison are engaged in ongoing research into the circuit and presented early, tentative findings of their studies. Mattison's preliminary data suggested many men attending circuit party weekends may not engage in sex throughout the weekend, though substantial numbers of men at the events engage in substance use.
Other key events in the track included a Viagra Forum in the Castro, Sex and Queer Liberation, Leather Health, and Drugs in Party Land which focused on harm reduction.
The organizers announced plans to return to next year's National Lesbian and Gay Health Conference in July 1999 in Dallas and facilitate a similar track of workshops.
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