Gay City News: 2006 Progress Reports

The online edition of this week's Gay City News has just popped out of the oven. It includes their first annual "Progress Report" in which they have asked 16 community leaders to write essays on "where we are, what our challenges are, the opportunities we must avail ourselves of, and where we are headed."

Highlights include:

• "What We Should Expect from Our Friends," an essay by Empire State Pride Agenda Executive Directo Alan Van Capelle on public accountability by our elected representatives.
• "Serving the City and Continuing the Community's Battles" by New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn.
• "Our Family, Past and Present" by Doug Robinson on raising two sons with his partner Michael Elsasser.

Other essays on court battles, religious movements, arts, homeless LGBT youth, workplace issues, business enterprises and HIV prevention and transmission can be read here.

I was also honored to ne asked to submit an essay by the paper's editors. You can read my essay here:

• "Putting Resources into People of Color Grassroots Efforts"

Thoughts and reactions welcome.

Gay City News launches First Annual Progress Report

On Thursday Gay City News will publish their "First Annual Progress Report" on LGBT issues facing New York City.

This year they have chosen to focus on "community movers and shakers" and have requested opinion pieces from several community leaders including OutPOCPAC Co-chair Doug Robinson, Stonewall Democrats of New York Board of Governors Co-chair Bob Zuckerman, Michael Adams from the ACLU, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Empire State Pride Agenda Executive Director Alan Van Capelle, amongst others.

I was also honored to be asked to contribute to the issue and have written a piece on the need to engage local Latino LGBT grassroots organizations in efforts to get community support for the right for same-sex couples to get married.

I'm sure there'll be a few interesting pieces in the bunch so tune in on Thursday. I'll post a link to my piece once the issue is out.

A great editorial: The Vatican and US Catholics

Some people have the notion that Latino communities are, on the whole, more homophobic than the general population. But, while the current Republican government has used gay issues as a way to split minority communities, sometimes you find stuff like yesterday's El Diario La Prensa editorial that makes you wonder if it's the Anglo-Saxons who are more homophobic than Latinos. To wit:

El Diario La Prensa
Monday, October 3, 2005

THE VATICAN AND U.S. CATHOLICS

A document that the Vatican has not even released yet is already causing controversy and concern among Catholics and non-Catholics in the United States. The forthcoming church document reportedly will ban gays from the seminaries.

In the wake of the child molestation scandals in the United States Catholic Church, it would seem more appropriate for the church to first confront the issues of pedophillia and sexual misconduct. The scandals involved adult men sexually assaulting children, and the vast majority of pedophiles are heterosexual men, not gay men. The Vatican must also address sexuality in general in a church that demands celibacy from its priests.

Instead, the first major policy reform following the scandal addresses homosexuality, effectively perpetuating the false and biased belief that homosexual men, not heterosexual men, are the problem. Exactly how will Vatican officials determine who is gay? Will the seminaries become "outing" grounds for homosexuals?

The move to prevent gays from joining the priesthood is said to be part of the Vatican's efforts to "purify" the church. But a person's sexual orientation is separate from their ability to be a good priest. Most Catholics will concede - at least privately - that they know a gay priest. The Kinsey report from the 1950's said that 10 percent of the general population is gay. Today's estimates are higher. And it is estimated that 30 percent of priests are homosexual.

The barring of homosexual priests would be a devastating blow to a church that already has an insufficient number of priests around the world. In Latin America alone, the ratio of Catholics to priests is 6,364 to 1. By barring homosexuals from the priesthood, the Church would turn away dedicated spiritual, intellectual and community leaders and further limit its own ability to serve the faithful in the United States and around the world.

Newspaper watch: Hoy New York and same-sex marriage

Yesterday, the New York City edition of Hoy (one of the two largest Spanish- language newspapers in the city) published an opinion column by Mexican writer Carlos Ruvalcaba titled "Minority Rights: Puritan Double Morality."

In the article, Mr. Ruvalcaba argues that for a city as cosmopolitan as New York, marriages between same-sex couples should be legalized but that, despite a favorable New York State Supreme Court ruling by Judge Doris Ling-Cohan, same-sex marriage advocates continue to meet insurmountable obstacles.

He says that those who want to keep gays from getting married are "the same who oppose abortion but that give licence to Bush so that the armed forces kill and continue killing children, women and innocent elderly people in Iraq and Afghanistan."

It is not the first time that the newspaper publishes an opinion piece that argues for the right of same-sex couples to marry but, in recent months, the newspaper seemed to back away from the issue after the presidential elections.

Editorially they have also shown some temerity: When Mayor Mike Bloomberg decided to challenge Judge Ling-Cohen's ruling in the courts, an Hoy editorial congratulated the Mayor for his pragmatism in dealing with a difficult issue... but then stayed away from editorializing on the issue itself.

To date the editorial board at Hoy has not gone on the record as to whether they endorse the right to marry for same-sex couples (to be fair, their competitor - El Diario La Prensa - also has stayed mum). [in contrast, Los Angeles La Opinion, the third of the major Spanish language newspapers in the nation, has editorialized on the issue twice and given same-sex marriage a ringing endorsement].

Unfortunately, as great as it is to see Hoy accepting positive editorials on this issue once again, in his arguments the author makes several mistakes:

1. The author argues that there should be a constitutional amendment allowing same-sex couples to marry. Ah, no. The United States constitution supposedly guarantees equality for all and those seeking an amendment are doing so to LIMIT the right to only a specific number of couples. The issue here is NOT adding amendments to the United States constitution, it's to make sure that the country does what it says it does: Guarantee equal rights for all.

2. The author argues that Mike Bloomberg or, should he become mayor, Fernando Ferrer, should legalize same-sex marriage in the same way that Gavin Newsom did in San Francisco. Ah, no! Gavin Newsom did not - and does not have the power to - legalize same-sex marriages and nor does the Mayor of New York City. They can interpret existing law and allow public offices to release marriage certificates if the law says that it's legal, but sometimes even interpretation can be faulty as even Gavin Newsom found out when all the same-sex marriages that took place in San Francisco were invalidated.

3. Mayor Bloomberg and Ferrer on same-sex marriages: While mentioning Judge Ling-Cohen's court ruling, the author seems to totally disregard that it was Mayor Bloomberg who decided to use the power of the Mayor's Office to challenge that same ruling while Fernando Ferrer has long been on the record for unequivocally supporting the right of same-sex couples to marry. While in one of the debates Ferrer went as far as saying that, should same-sex marriages be legalized in New York, he would officialize at same-sex weddings as a public official, Bloomberg is not about to say the same thing.

As flawed as the opinion column is, at least it is an endorsement of the issue. Now, if only the editorial board could right the wrongs in the column and editorialize on behalf of the right for same-sex couples to marry as their Los Angeles counterpart has done!