SF Gay Papers Prove No Traffic
Blocked by GetEQUAL?

Last Friday the popular gay news site Towleroad ran this headline:" GetEQUAL Blocks Traffic in San Francisco."

That was based only on a release from GE, and Towleroad referenced the supposed traffic blocking, in their write up: "At this posting the traffic blocking was beginning, according to Twitter posts. More as it develops..."

The photos used for that posting showed protestors standing on the sidewalk at Castro and Market streets, not actually in the roadway.

Today, both local gay newpapers, the Bay Area Reporter and the Bay Times, both ran photos and stories on the action a week ago, and after looking at the photos, one is forced to ask a question. Where is the blocked traffic?



The photo above was snapped by the BAR's freelancer Matt Baume, and shows not a single auto, truck, motorcycle or bike being blocked by GE. The buses on the slope are parked there because it's a bus route terminus. Looks to me like the police helpfully diverted the traffic, so drivers weren't inconvenienced much, a standard tactic to keep traffic flowing and allowing protestors to carry out their performance art.



This uncredited photo ran on the front page of the Bay Times, showing a great panoramic view of Market Street, all six lanes of it, at Castro Street, with a street care and the rainbow flag blowing in the wind, and the protestors's banner visible. Where is the blocked traffic? No vehicles, either moving or stopped, appear in the image.

Here's a radical notion. Let's ask GE, and the blogs that carry their releases and photos, to prove their claims. This would greatly help move GE out of the Astroturf category it now resides in, and help popular blogs play something of an accountability role toward the org.

If anyone has a photo clearly showed vehicular traffic blocked by GE folks last Friday, please share it.

Dobbs: GetEQUAL's DADT Stand?
Let Queers Kill, Too

GetEQUAL, an organization with a neutral position on America's wars, staged a disruption this morning in Washington, as part of their effort to help make more soldiers for the war machine.

I've lost count of how many zaps and whatevers GE has staged fighting to join the military, but I know this: they have never organized an action opposing the wars, nor have they demanded that the trillions being spent on the wars be diverted to domestic programs, like AIDS cocktails and affordable housing for gay seniors.

Longtime gay peace and justice advocate Bill Dobbs of New York City, today offers up a cogent complaint about the spinelessness of GE leaders and supporters. Here are his reactions to GE's zap this morning:

Mainstream gay politics in the 21st century: disrupting a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing -- not with hopes of stopping war -- but so that 'patriotic Americans' can help the US-led war(s) and occupation(s) of Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. To this crowd, war and the carnage wreaked by US foreign policy is nothing against the need to repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell (DADT). Repeal proponents now wreathe their cause in civil rights rhetoric.

Equality means out queers just want to kill, too.
Equality as a goal means other aspirations shrivel and even vanish.
Equality is now the worldview of the organized gay realm.
Equality uber alles.

How did a movement that stood for transformation, large-scale structural change - fall so far?

Following the money gives some clues - Get Equal got going thanks to its very rich openly gay patron, Jonathan Lewis, a Democrat, who has been writing big checks; the group pays high salaries and is closer to Astroturf than grass roots.

Get Equal uses militant tactics but its agenda evokes Human Rights Campaign, the lavishly funded gay lobby group. HRC's former public relations honcho, Brad Luna, is doing the Get Equal press work.

Revolting is the only word that comes to mind.

Time for progressives and leftists to stop giving gay agenda items a free
ride.

When will GE differentiate itself from HRC's neutrality on the wars? Probably about the same time they develop an effective strategy and genuine transparency.

HRCer Phil Attey Launches
Useless Catholic Org

(Mr. Attey. Photo credit: Todd Franson of Metro Weekly.)

For the longest time, I was convinced the tightly-wound conservative gay lobbyist Phil Attey, a staffer at the Human Rights Campaign for a number of years, and devout Catholic, was a plant from the Vatican. I'm convinced his agenda is to keep righteous gay anger from hitting the church's leaders, and that he's puts his religious agenda first, gay issues second.

Phil was in a tizzy last year, with a web site ChurchOuting.org, since taken down, in which he meekly threatened/promised to out clergy working against gay marriage. Not a single priest was outed, but Phil captured some straight media and gay blogger attention for his efforts.

He has a new, recently-launched, and useless gay niche advocacy org, Catholics for Equality, and it's riddled with support from other HRCers, a matter upsetting others. Members of the Rainbow Sash Movement have created a YouTube video, and this note accompanies it:

There is some concern among Gay Catholics that Catholics for Equality are unduly influenced by HRC. There are ethical questions being raised about not only the vetting process being used for leadership positions, but also about the relationship between Board appointments and HRC.

The video:



The Spero News, a religion and values site, last month delved into key players at the start of the org and one board member:

For his part, Palaicos is a board member of Catholics for Equality and also political co-chair of the HRC’s D.C. Steering Community. [...]

Other attendees at the Catholics for Equality organizing meeting included Joanna Blotner, coordinator of the HRC’s Religion and Faith Program; Sharon Groves, deputy director for the HRC’s Religion and Faith Program; [...]

With Attey at the helm, a local HRC co-chair on the board, and two members of HRC's religious arm helping to launch the org, it's no wonder the Rainbow Sash folks are pointing out the heavy influence of HRC.

What is the agenda of the org? According to Phil's release, it is:

[T]o support, educate, and mobilize Catholics in the advancement of freedom and equality at the federal, state, and local levels for our lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered family, parish and community members.

Sounds like the HRC agenda, with the word Catholics thrown into the mix. Not sure why this agenda isn't already part of HRC's religious arm and why Phil just didn't go work for his old boss. Interestingly, a board member, Father Tony Adams, today on Bilerico explained a key missing component of the new org:

Personally, I don't like that fact that the group has decided that C4E [Catholic for Equality] will not try to change the Catholic Church.

Oh. Then. What. Is. The. Point?. Frankly, the Vatican must be quite pleased with what is not on the org's plate.

HRC: 1-Year After Hate Crime Law Signed?

(Last month, with hate violence spiking in Queer Mecca, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, Goddess bless 'em, launched a poster campaign. Image credit: SPI.)

It's been almost one full year since the U.S. Congress passed and President Obama signed the Matthew Shepard Hate Crime Law, representing a bright feather in the cap of the Human Rights Campaign, the Democratic gay org that had pushed for the law for over a decade.

HRC was greatly aided and abetted in pursuit of the legislation with Matthew Shepard Inc, which includes his family, the org in his name, plays, movies, concerts, merchandise, books and audio CDs, and every other profit-making enterprise, and there are many, linked to Shepard's death.

The end of October will mark one-year since Obama put his signature on the bill, and I was reading some history, provided last year by Law Dork blogger Chris Geidner:

Will the legacy be that with its passage, the White House and Congress passed a watershed moment in LGBT equality to be followed in short order by action on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act; the elimination of Don't Ask, Don't Tell from our Armed Forces; and significant movement toward the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act?

As Elizabeth Birch, the former head of the Human Rights Campaign, said at the [October 28, 2009, signing-day] reception, "This was the moment that was required in order to have new laws follow."

Or, will this be, like so often in legislative struggles, the single trinket doled out to a loyal constituency group until the next time the group demands action?

Expressing gratefulness for today's signing, Judy Shepard, attending the signing ceremony, said that today meant "everything" to her and her family.

Where to start? The legacy of the hate crimes law signing didn't usher in urgency on ENDA or DADT in Congress, Birch's wacky doctrine has not happened, and the only people who really seem to have benefited from the law are those who work in Matthew Shepard Inc or donate to it.

Who else wrote something over the 2009 signing, worth looking at again? Blogger Andrew Sullivan said:

I predict that this congress will be up for re-election with this as the single legislative achievement for gay equality. Which is how HRC lives for another fundraising cycle. And how they get their Democratic paymasters off the hook from the community.

But we'll see, won't we? Once again, I'd dearly love to be proven wrong. So make a fool of me. Please.

Just between us gays, I would love to see HRC make a laughing stock of Andrew, and all the other critics who also aren't impress with HRC or the Democrats. I may be 420 medicated, but I ain't dumb enough to think in the weeks leading up to the November midterm elections that fag love is gonna break out in DC.

Speaking of hate crimes, have you heard the latest from San Francisco, almost one-year after we got the federal law? Assaults of all sorts have gone up, up, up, to such a degree the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence have in recent weeks lead marches and marketing campaigns to increase security and safety for fags in the Castro. Read this excellent piece in the Bay Times, for details on rising hate crimes here.

Hey HRC and gay community, how's that hate crime thing working for you?

Gay Serb Plea:
Photos, Videos Needed of Oct 8 NYC Protest

(Activists from Serbia's gay community, reporters and TV crews at a summer news conference announcing initial steps for October's pride parade. Photo credit: Belgrade Pride Facebook page.)

A key lesbian organizer for the October Gay Pride Parade in Belgrade, a lesbian Serb sent me a plea to make sure we American gays who will stage a protest two-days before the parade, record our protest in photos and videos, and quickly send them to Belgrade.

It is crucial that we document our action, to better help the gay Serbs as they face down extremist threats, and show the Serbian politicians, newspapers and TV stations, and the general population, that American gays stand with our brothers and sisters in Belgrade.

Here is what I need: Volunteers in New York with still and video cameras, to agree to be at the October 8 protest, and then make sure pics and vids are soon thereafter posted to the web and shared with the gay Serbs.

Don't be shy. Step up for one of these important tasks. Or put me in touch with anyone who knows about mobile live streaming. Thanks in advance, for whatever help you can offer now, or in other ways to make the October 8 Serb UN Mission protest a success.

From our lesbian friend in Belgrade:

Thank you for posting this first announcement of the NY protest on October 8th.

Allow me to express our hope for gathering as many of you at Belgrade Pride 2010. It would be of high importance to welcome you here in Belgrade, walking the streets together with us.

However I do understand some are prevented to come due to time shortness and we appreciate very much your effort to raise the voice at Serbian Mission to the UN. Please, keep us posted on your progress. How many people you expect to be able to recruit?

As for the protest itself, I believe you would be able to make your own photos (regardless to those of news agencies), even maybe some short video report?

Bearing in mind the time difference, it would be of great help if you could send the report from the protest by the end of the day (October 8th), to make sure to have it here in Serbia by Saturday morning [late Friday afternoon NYC time], and be able to pass it to local medias in time, just a day before the Pride.

That would certainly raise the attention and awareness of both the Government and society.

Maybe 20 at GetEQUAL/Iraq Vets Against War
Rally at the White House

(Activists on September 10 at the White House fence. Photo credit: Geoff Millard.)

Did you know that GetEQUAL and the Human Rights Campaign share the same neutral position about the Iraq and Afghanistan war?

I was reminded of GE's wimpy neutrality by Geoff Millard of Iraqi Veterans Against the War (IVAW), in a phone conversation today. He was at the emergency rally on Friday at the White House, and after three days of not hearing back from the five paid co-directors of GE or their media consultant, I reached out to IVAW for details of what happened and a pic.

After chatting a good bit about his opposition to the Iraqi war, Geoff agreed to send me a report and pic. Googling him, I found out he is quite the radical pro-peace activist, with some controversial baggage of his own. One thing I like about Geoff is his public views on the war, healthcare and other important matters, unlike too many other gay vets who have tunnel vision only for Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

But I digress. Let's get to his report on the September 10 action. Maybe GetEQUAL leaders will take some time, provide their own report back to the community on the protest on their web sites, and also give us an explanation as to how another small-in-attendance event is moving the gay agenda at the federal level.

GetEQUAL might also stop acting like Switzerland during WWII, and take a firm stance against America's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

From Geoff:

The protest on Friday was the first time that IVAW has done any event officially with a LBGTQ organization and I am very glad that it was with Get Equal. I have only been "out" as a queer veteran for about a year, although most of my friends have known for years.

As for the protest there were a hand full of us, maybe 20 max, although most of the veterans from Service Members United did not want to be photographed with IVAW, so they kept their distance. We held signs, chanted, and did the regular for a protest that was very much in the spirit of reaction and excitement about the chance for an end to DADT.

Pelosi, Drag Artiste, Partied
While GetEQUAL Protested

(The swellegant Speaker Pelosi and Romana Bracco at Friday's grand opening of the new opera season. Photo credit for both images: Catherine Bigelow, SF Chronicle.)

This past Friday, with only a few hours notice to mobilize the local gay community, GetEQUAL staged a 5:00 PM protest about federal employment protections for gays at Castro and Market streets. The intended target of the action was Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, but where in the world was she at that time?

Down at our gorgeous City Hall, also starting at 5:00 PM, was the pre-party for the opening of the new San Francisco Opera company's season. Our local Congresswoman and her handsome husband were there, as they usually are for this kick-off to the fall cultural season.

Also in attendance, and looking simply fab and ravishing, was Donna Sachet, local drag artiste and tireless supporter of many gay and HIV causes. Here she is at the opera ball, in a lime green gown and a bouffant hair creation, with her pals the dashing Richard Sablatura, and the glamorous Lisa Breakey.

While looking for other photos from the gala opera events, I stumbled upon this info, from SF Mike's Civic Center blog:

San Francisco Society has seen just about everything at their opera openings over the years, from the four-hour-late curtain when Domingo flew in for "Otello" cross-country in 1983 to the year ACT-UP disrupted the proceedings with yells and whistles during the overture to "Barber of Seville" later in the decade. Those disruptions were nothing, of course, next to the noisy and persistent anti-fur protestors of the 1960s through 1980s.

Can imagine the political and media impact gay rights protesters would have had on the steps of the War Memorial Opera House on Van Ness Avenue, as Pelosi and the other opera-goers had to pass a picket line, or the blocking of limousines? Heck, since GetEQUAL has hundreds of thousands of dollars in their budget, they could have easily purchased a few seats inside the opera house, disrupted the performance and really sent a message directly to the Speaker of the House.

But GetEQUAL supporters were far, far away in the gay ghetto, delivering their demands to the Castro community.

State Department:
Attacks on Gay Serbs = 'Serious Problems'

The 2009 country report on human rights practices and violations from the U.S. State Department for the Republic of Serbia, which was issued in March, contained a lengthy section on the extreme violence, and constant threats of assault, perpetrated against gay Serbs.

I've excerpted key passages, in an effort to build better understanding among American gays, including myself, regarding the situation for our brothers and sisters in the Balkan nation. Click here for info on the October 8 rally in NYC at the Serbian Mission to the UN.

From the State Department:

Violence and discrimination against gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender persons were serious problems. Societal perceptions of homosexual conduct and attitudes towards the LGBT population continued to be negative. Several Serbian-based neo-Nazi Web sites, nationalist Web forums, and Facebook pages hosted anti-LGBT forums and groups. [...]

Members of the LGBT community continued to be targets of attacks. Psychologist and Professor Zarko Trebjesanin estimated that 25 percent of the country's population believed homosexual conduct was a disease that needed medical treatment. [...]

In January Marko Karadzic, state secretary of the Ministry of Human and Minority Rights, announced that representatives of LGBT organizations experienced constant threats and attacks by "organized profascist groups." During the year there were several attacks against gay clubs in Belgrade and against LGBT individuals on public transportation and on the streets.

On February 26, management of the state-owned Sava Center in Belgrade did not allow the NGO Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) to hold a press conference on its premises. The broader NGO community, the Liberal Democratic Party, the League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina, and the Social Democratic Union strongly criticized the decision, and the Sava Center director, Dragan Vucicevic, and Belgrade's mayor, Dragan Djilas, eventually issued public apologies to the GSA.

On March 9, a group of approximately five masked individuals broke windows and attempted to enter the Student Cultural Center in Kragujevac during a press conference held by the GSA to present its annual report on gay rights in Serbia. This was the press conference that was supposed to have been held in the Sava Center.

The GSA alleged that the attackers had been emboldened by the government's decision to withdraw a draft law against discrimination from parliamentary procedure in response to pressure from the Serbian Orthodox Church and right-wing groups. [...]

Organizers from the LGBT community cancelled a pride parade scheduled for September 20 after the government proposed an alternate venue away from downtown Belgrade, citing security concerns. In advance of the event, right-wing and nationalist organizations openly threatened violence against the participants. The nationalist movement "1389" also sent a letter to the press offering to buy close-up photographs of the parade participants for future posting online so that "parents will be able to recognize sexually deviant persons and protect their children from this harmful influence." [...]

Although the broadcasting law prohibits discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, some media carried slurs against LGBT persons. The tabloid press continued to publish articles with hate speech against the LGBT population and interviews with homophobic right-wing groups. The anti-LGBT campaign peaked before the March adoption of the law against discrimination and again before the Belgrade pride parade planned for September. The right-wing organization Nasi continued its campaign against the LGBT community through leaflets and articles on its Web site.

Gays Protest at Serb UN Mission Oct 8 in NYC;
Activists Demand Safe Belgrade Gay Parade

(Leaders of Serbia's gay community last week held a news conference about their upcoming pride parade. In the center is Lazar Pavlović, on the left is Boban Stojanović, and Adorjan Kurucz on the right. Photo credit: Belgrade Pride 2010.)

NEW YORK CITY (September 13) --The activist organization Gays Without Border/USA chapter will stage a protest at the Serbian Mission to the United Nations next month. The action will be undertaken in the wake of violent threats by extremists that were made when Serbia's gay community announced plans for an October Gay Pride Parade in Belgrade.

The protest will take place on Friday, October 8 at noon at the Serbian Mission to the United Nations. The building is located at 854 Fifth Avenue at 67th Street in New York City.

This October's parade would be the first Belgrade gay rights march since 2001, when extremists forced the event's cancellation. An attempt was made for a parade in 2009, but was called off hours before it began, because bodily harm was threatened against the gays.

From Serbia, gay community organizer Lazar Pavlović, who is also president of the Gay Straight Alliance, welcomed the October 8 protest in Manhattan:

"We really and strong appreciate your solidarity with us and our problems after threats we are receiving from extremist groups. Authorities made responsible political decision to support Belgrade Pride verbally and, now, in concrete way,"Pavlović said. "Police promise to protect Gay Pride Parade. All we need in next period is that authorities do not change their decision. You and other our international friends are gonna be crucial to make political pressure on the authorities in Belgrade. Your plans to make protest at Serbian UN mission in NYC are great!"

Gays Without Borders/USA member Michael Petrelis, a veteran gay rights activist and organizer of the October 8 action, promised full American gay support for gay Serbs, in their non-violent push for peaceful assembly in the streets and safety from homophobic attacks.

"We will not be silent in the month leading up to the Gay Pride Parade," Petrelis said. "We have a simple message for the Serb Mission to the United Nations, and all Serb leaders: We are watching how you protect the human rights of your gay citizens. We demand that you do all in your power to guarantee a violence-free march and rally in Belgrade next month."

Human rights activists everywhere are encouraged to organize their own solidarity demonstrations, prior to the parade. For more information contact:

Lazar Pavlović
Republic of Serbia
Phone: +381 (0)11.262.46.08
Email: lazar.pavlovic@gsa.org.rs

Michael Petrelis
United States of America
Phone: 1-415-621-6267
Email: MPetrelis@aol.com

# # #

How Much Lack of GetEQUAL
Follow-up Will Gays Tolerate?

For an organization that has taken in close to a million bucks, pays its top executive a just-under six-figure salary, boasts of its young hip wired paid co-directors, and promised to be a grass roots org accountable to the community, they've done a piss poor job again this week with follow up.

Let's start at the top of GetEQUAL's actions this week over the Employment Non Discrimination Act. GE gave only a few hours notice to San Francisco activists that a traffic blocking was scheduled to send a message to Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and got much uncritical attention from A-List gay bloggers beforehand. The action took place at evening rush hour at Castro and Market streets. A few dozen protesters, a dozen arrests, a few minutes of traffic blocking.

As noted by the SF Chronicle, GE wrote a generic notice on the protest before it happened. No, GE doesn't break into a sweat to give any details about what actually happened at their supposed rally. Just a bunch of standard quotes from paid advocates. And forget about any explanation as to how the action influenced Pelosi. Essentially, GE failed to properly report back to the community.

The leaders think a photo showing the usual small number of GE protesters and canned releases are accountability. They aren't, especially when GE has contracted (care to disclose the compensation, Robin?), with former Human Rights Campaign propagandist and now-"independent" consultant Brad Luna.

Showing their laziness and cookie-cutter approach to communication with the community, GE's release about their zap of Congressman George Miller included one photo from the action, and bare bones statement that an action had occurred. No fresh details on what took place, and just like the Pelosi release, GE spouts on about stale stats and canned rhetoric. Info regarding how the zap pushed Miller on ENDA is omitted.

In Pennsylvania, three GE members staged a sit-in, with no arrests, at Congressman Chris Carney's office. That link is to a Google search on the sit-in. There is no info on the action on GE's own site. Why bother having a web site and not sharing basic, but comprehensive follow-up and all actions?

Over at the GE Facebook page, they have shared more pics, vids and tidbits of info on the Pennsylvania action, namely, that the Congressman's office was ignoring the sit-in and that a local news radio station wasn't covering the action. Additional details on the other zaps. Nothing about how it all added up to a hill of beans.

GE ended the week with an emergency 3-hour rally at the White House over Don't Ask, Don't Tell being declared unconstitutional by a federal judge. Not sure what deemed the "emergency" action, but it was more than 24-hours ago, and I've not seen a single pic, vid or written report, and not even a canned Brad Luna release, on either GE's site or Facebook page.

It must be asking too much of Robin McGehee, as the chief executive of GE, to give a cogent report on how all of her org's zaps and rallies last week collectively moved the gay agenda forward. She fails in this regard on a par with HRC's Joe Solmonese.