LGBT Spring-Summer 2013

THE QUEERS HAVE BEEN BUSY...

May 1st

• Same sex civil unions recognized in Colorado

June 26th

• Supreme Court ruled DOMA, the federal law banning marriage equality, unconstitutional.

June 26th

• Supreme Court ruled Prop 8 case inadmissible and defers to the 9th Circuit Court which found the California law banning marriage equality to be unconstitutional.

June 29th

• Russian President (autocrat) Vladimir Putin signs vague federal law banning the exposure of minors to "gay propaganda”, effectively making gay rights activism/support/acknowledgement jailable offenses.
• Multiple reports have confirmed numerous LGBT youth throughout Russia have been violently targeted by right wing gangs who document the torture of their victims and post it on the internet but the local police refuse to investigate.
• ALSO: The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled same sex marriages can resume in California in response to Prop 8 ruling by Supreme Court.
  

July 1st

• Same sex marriages begin in Delaware

July 16th

• Britain’s Federal Legislature ratified marriage equality by signing the Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) Bill into law.

August 1st

• Same sex marriages begin in Rhode Island and Minnesota

August 9th

• Bayard Rustin, gay activist, pacifist, civil rights leader, and 1963 March on Washington organizer, was posthumously conferred the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Barack Obama.

August 18th

• David Miranda, life-partner of political journalist Glenn Greenwald, was detained in London en route to Brazil because authorities suspected he might possess correspondence from American whistle-blower Edward Snowden containing classified documents.
• Germany passed a law that allows its citizens to leave gender unmarked on their children’s birth certificates.

August 19th

• Gov. Chris Christie signed legislation banning gay conversion therapy in New Jersey.
  

August 21st

• Pfc. Bradley* Manning was sentenced to 35 years in Leavenworth military prison (with the possibility of parole in seven years) for leaking more than 700,000 classified military files that document American military war-crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan including U.S. soldiers firing on unarmed civilian from an Apache helicopter.
• Pfc. Manning confirmed in a public statement that she is a transgender woman and asked that journalists refer to her as Chelsea.

*Any reference to Chelsea Manning as Bradley is meant to reflect the official court-martial reports which were issued prior to Chelsea’s coming out.

August 26th

• Albuquerque, New Mexico judge Alan Malott sent out a court order stating that “implying conditions of sexual orientation on one’s right to enter civil contracts such as marriage” was a violation of the equal-protection clause in the state’s constitution.  
• So far 6 counties in New Mexico perform same sex marriages. New Mexico is the only state in the Union with a constitution that neither specifically allows or disallows same sex marriage.

August 29th 

• The IRS announced that it will allow same sex married couples to file joint federal tax returns in accordance with the Supreme Court decision on DOMA in June.

It's the BS in BSA

The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) recently made a major change to their standards policy. Now gay young men are permitted to join, earn merit badges, and ultimately become prestigious card carrying Eagle Scouts. This also means Scouts who come out as gay will not be thrown out of the organization as many have been in the past, including my friend, Jay. 
Jay came out as gay when he was 15 and his scout leaders told him he was no longer welcome. That was five years ago.
My youngest brother is gay and just received his Eagle Scout Award a couple weeks ago. He still can't be "out" to his leaders and fellow scouts because his troop which is organized within a Mormon congregation remains an intolerant place for gay youth.  
Even though the BSA was forced to make concessions in its admittance standards gay men are still not allowed to be Scout Leaders at any level.
In 2000 the Supreme Court upheld a ruling in a New Jersey case where Assistant Scoutmaster James Dale was dismissed from his position in the BSA for being an outspoken gay activist. The Court ruled that the BSA as a private institution can discriminate against whomever it wants.
Since that ruling there have been numerous demonstrations against the BSA's bigoted policy. Several Eagle Scouts have returned their awards in protest, many parents have removed their children from the BSA and many corporate donors have cut their funding. Both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney denounced the ban on gay Scouts during the 2012 presidential campaign.
This pressure has exacted a heavy toll on the Boy Scouts and that's why the organization was compelled to allow gay youth to remain in their troops even though on principle the BSA delegates (most of whom are faithful Latter Day Saints) believe homosexuality is sinful:
   http://www.onmyhonor.net/impact-of-open-homosexuality-in-scouting/
Though many are applauding the new Scouting standards as progressive and a sign of greater equality to come the BSA will receive the Pink Brick Award at the 2013 San Francisco Pride celebration. The Pink Brick is a mock-award bestowed on those who have shown particular animus and/or disregard for the rights of gays and lesbians. It's named for the first brick that was thrown in the 1969 Stonewall Riots that kicked off the Gay Rights Movement.
http://sfpride.org/pink-brick/
Those delegates who succeeded in voting down the admittance of gay Eagle Scouts as adult leaders argued claimed that such men would be a threat to the BSA's young male participants. They asserted that it would be as irresponsible as allowing heterosexual men to serve as leaders of girl scout troops; that the camaraderie and camp-outs would prove too much of a temptation and opportunity for them to resist sexually abusing the Scouts. This skewed hypothesis won out at the annual BSA delegation on May 23rd, 2013 in Texas. This makes me wonder whether these men would trust themselves around a group of young women and girls or maybe they simply believe that gay men are pedophiles. There are several thousands of women serving as den-mothers, leaders and camp counselors within the BSA today and their orientation isn't scrutinized for a second.
The bottom line is that the Boy Scouts of America, unlike Scouts Canada and United Kingdom Scouting Association, remain intrinsically homophobic and discriminatory and if it doesn't fully commit to human rights soon it will shortly become obsolete.

I'll BE YOUR BEARD IF YOU'LL BE MY PANTYHOSE

WHY I ALMOST MARRIED MY GAY BEST FRIEND

[AND WHY I'M SO HAPPY I DIDN'T!]

The Mormon expectations for marriage and family are both impossible and unyielding to MoHo's (Mormon Homosexuals). In order to be a member of the church in good standing (with the hierarchy and the community) you've got to:

1. Marry someone of the opposite sex or
2. Be celibate. 

Period. That's it. If you're gay, you're fucked (and NEVER in a way you'd like to be!). Your only option is misery, you just get to choose if you're going to be miserable alone or with a buddy.

The only other option is to be excommunicated or leave the church on your own. To those who didn't grow up Mormon, door #3 seems like the obvious answer. Why stay when your community doesn't give you any viable options? When it's obvious they're not okay with you?  

MoHo's on the other hand understand what's at stake with option #3. This is my own personal list. 

• Your Family
• Your Friends
• Your education or your job (if you go to BYU, they'll kick your ass out). 
• Your sense of self (Mormonism is more a way of life than just a religion)
• Your ticket to heaven (you're taught denying the church is worse than never knowing about it at all)
• Your purpose (all that time and effort spent, all the tithing and temple sessions, the reason you've been doing whatever it is you do every day)

In one moment. With one decision. It could all be gone. You'll be forced to start from scratch.

That's why, as a MoHo, I was hell bent on fulfilling option #1 or #2 for so long. 

I've been there.

I'd been asking myself that miserably complicated question for YEARS!
"How the hell am I gonna marry a man when I'm a GIANT. DYKIE. LESBIAN?!"

By marrying a GAY man, of course!

[No please, don't. Just keep reading]

If we are both going to spend the rest of our lives miserable anyway... why not do it together? At least he understands what I'm dealing with. He likes boys, I like girls. We won't ever have sex [But that's ok, we grew up Mormon and we're used to suppressing that need], maybe we'll adopt some kids.

We'll be obedient, included, self-denying and in that closet forever!... [well at least until we die, because a lot of the Mormon leadership is certain that any gayness is "cured" in the afterlife. Which brings us to a 4th option that I don't actually want to get into right now because it deserves it's own post.]

JOE IS EASY TO LOVE...

He's quirky and kind; intelligent, gentle, adorable, absolutely HILARIOUS! 

AND OH! SO! GAY! 

We met in Provo, UT several years ago. He was dating my best friend (and love interest) at the time. A few years later Joe and I ended up getting engaged, but broke it off soon after. 

Together we journeyed from having a deep seated conviction to conform to our community's expectations... to making the choice to leave the church and be true to ourselves and rebuild our lives as  HAPPY Gay Ex-Mormons. 

These videos are an interview we did a few years ago explaining some of the details of our story in an effort to help others who struggle with similar circumstances. The videos were made in response to several gay suicides, as a type of  "It Gets Better" collection for gay Mormons. It was a 3 hour interview edited into a few ten minute segments. 

Disclaimer: The final segment feels like a cliff hanger... I'll do my best to finish the story below.

I think one of the most important parts in this video was when Joe says 

"losing my testimony of the Church was more healing than anything else." 

I completely agree. I think it was healing because the issue was no longer our morality, but the integrity of the Church and it's leaders. It's so much easier to walk away confident in your own worth and potential when you find out you've been living inside a make believe world of constant contradiction and double standards. 

The more we talked about the issues we had with the church and the more we studied it's history and doctrine, the more we came to realize that we'd been bamboozled. We felt betrayed and lied to. We were devastated. We were angry! 

But we were also relieved that we didn't have any reason to marry each other!

Out of devastation grew the courage we needed to walk away from Mormonism. When you see the man behind the curtain, he can tell you you're going to hell, and suddenly it's easy to flip him off and walk the other way. 

The community I'd been so afraid to lose; the place I was raised and for so long sought refuge and safety in, all at once felt like a vat of poison and misery that was trying to swallow me whole.

The most peaceful moment in my life was the day I told my bishop I was leaving the church. 

I told him "this is so weird. I was told if I ever left the Church I'd feel horrible inside. Instead I'm calm and at peace with myself. It's the most amazing feeling I've ever had in my life."

I came out to my parents in a letter and we've had several conversations over the years since then. We don't agree on everything but they're very supportive of me and very welcoming to my girlfriend. My siblings are totally cool with the gay thing [They were like duh! We know!] They stick up for me at church and with their friends and extended family members.

For Joe and I, losing our community and many of our friends when we left the Church was painful, but not debilitating. We've been able to replace them with others who allow us to be ourselves. 

Rebuilding a spiritual foundation has been a tricky and slow process, but we're not in a hurry and have little interest in any sort of religious experience. We've learned that purpose doesn't come from religious dogma or doctrine, but in our caring relationships and sharing our experience and journey with others. 

We're Gay and ex-mormon [and by the grace of whatever, not married to each other]

And Life is Fabulous.

PRIESTESSHOOD SESSION

http://ordainwomen.org

This Saturday, April 6th, 2013 (the 183rd anniversary of the LDS Church's founding) while faithful Mormon men the world over attended the man-datory Priesthood Session of General Conference, about 100 people (mostly women) gathered on the University of Utah campus in solidarity and support of female Priesthood ordination.

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/56117824-78/women-priesthood-mormon-lds.html.csp

The event-organizer for these unorthodox-orthodox Saints is faithful Mormon, Kate Kelly, a human rights attorney, who claims the founder of Mormonism, Joseph Smith, always intended for women to function fully and equally within the holy Priesthood he restored. Kelly notes that the female Relief Society was designed to function in perfect parallel with the male organization, with a President and 2 counselors who served, not for a short few-years term as they do now, but for life, just as the Apostles do. 

Kelly also highlights the fact that women often performed blessings of healing by the laying-on-of-hands in the first decades of the Restoration. 

And as all "endowed" women know, Temple matrons perform Priesthood ordinances daily as part of the Endowment ceremony. During the Washings and Anointings, women lay hands on other women's heads and invoke the Priesthood. The Endowment ceremony is essentially a Priesthood ordination and the "garment" you receive in that ceremony is properly called the Garment of the Holy Priesthood.

A memorable couplet repeated in every Endowment Session is "They are hereafter Kings and Queens, Priests and Priestesses". 

Is there any hope a grassroots campaign might eventually move the Brethren to change policy and afford faithful women a more equal place in the Church?

Surprisingly, yes...maybe.

Only 8 hours before the rally for Female Ordination was held, there was a momentous break with tradition when Sister Jean Stevens offered the first female led prayer in an LDS General Conference, only 4 few months after an online campaign was launched to "Let Women Pray":
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/mormons-gather-utah-semi-annual-conference-18896328#.UWHeG6JkybA

The Church insists that the Spring Conference itinerary was selected long before the social-media outcry, but only Sister Stevens can confirm that she was asked to give the invocation before "Let Women Pray" was launched.

Does this historic prayer signal a new day in gender egalitarianism within the Church?

Well...

Shortly before Sister Stevens rose to the pulpit, Elder Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said this to a global Mormon audience:

"Men and women have different but equally valued roles... Just as a woman cannot conceive a child without a man, so a man cannot fully exercise the power of the priesthood to establish an eternal family without a woman."

(Scientific Aside)

What if we were to tell Elder Ballard that many women have conceived children without ever having had sex with a man?
(He'd probably argue that they still used a male donor.)

But what if we showed him that scientists have fertilized a female mouse's ovum with another female's DNA, producing completely healthy female offspring?
http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Look-Moms-no-dad-Mice-born-in-Japan-from-2789992.php
(He'd probably insist it required a male scientist!)

And the Virgin Mary?!
(He'd probably say that the virgin birth was a miracle by God and God's a dude.)

There's just no arguing with some people.

Tackling this issue head on in behalf of all progressive Mormons is Joanna Brooks on her blog Ask Mormon Girl:
http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/joannabrooks/7008/

A post soon to follow this will address the ever strained relations between the Church and LGBT rights.

-Joe

THANKS FOR ASKING

A family friend recently asked me over Facebook what I thought about the new mormons and gays website the Mormon church created a few months ago.

This was my response:

1. I consider it damage control on behalf of the church. If they say they love the sinner and hate the sin enough... maybe people will stop calling them bigots and blaming them for young, gay, Mormon suicides. They probably noticed people google "gay and mormon" a lot and they're attempting to stay at the top of search engines to limit the bad press and PR.

2. I guess I'm grateful they're trying to reach out to gays who've decided to stay in the church... I'm glad the language is softer than in the book the Miracle of Forgiveness where homosexuality is called the "sin against nature"...and the author laments that homosexuality doesn't carry the death penalty... anymore.
 
3. I have no idea if it will do anything to relieve the shame and pity my parents endure from members of their community.

4. In one of the videos on that site ("Our Common Humanity") they talk about how people shouldn't define themselves by their homosexuality because straight people don't define themselves by their heterosexuality... which is just a load of bull shit. 

Everything in this world... movies, books, school, religion, the way we dress, our attitudes, likes, dislikes...all of social life revolves around fitting/shaping people into gender boxes, hetero sex symbols, husbands, wives, ballerina's and firemen. Every aspect of my life is continually at odds with, and affected by the fact that I DO NOT FIT into these socially-assigned categories.

LGBTQ culture exists because we are not allowed to freely or fully exist anywhere else. 

Comments like: "stop flaunting your gayness" or "don't focus on your homosexuality"  are just euphemisms for "get your ass back in that goddamn closet, you're making people uncomfortable!" 

When you're OBVIOUSLY GAY, like I am... you can't just turn it off. 

5. This website seems to be an act of desperation by the Church. They realized it's no longer acceptable to wish a death sentence upon me or tell me I'm going to burn in hell [like those Westboro folks], so instead they're going to try and kill me softly by feigning compassion, disenfranchising my Queerness and slowly suffocating my self-worth and identity until my light goes out.

The good news is, it only works if you buy into it. 

Thanks for asking. No one ever does.
-Gwen

THE BRETHREN'S BRIEF

At the bottom of this post is a link to a short article by Deseret News, an LDS-owned SLC-based paper, which highlights the submission of twin briefs jointly filed by the LDS Church, and multiple socially conservative religious institutions, that argue against repealing Doma, the federal Defense of Marriage Act, and Proposition 8, the California voter initiative that ended the legal practice of same-sex marriages in 2008.

Though the LDS Church is just one of the signatories to the brief defending Prop. 8 the well known fact within Mormondom and elsewhere is that a disproportionate amount of time, energy, and funds leading to the discriminatory law's passage came from the LDS Church; nearly 24 million dollars in advertisement, more than half the total amount spent on Prop. 8 promotion.  

I can only speculate as to the pro-Prop. 8 brief's content. I have not read the brief but I have encountered many statements from the Brethren opposing marriage equality. These statements are voiced most frequently and fervently by Elder Oaks, the LDS Apostle, former Utah Supreme Court justice, and fierce defender of the yet untested "religious liberty" argument.

Before Prop. 8 was hauled before the Supreme Court or even the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, it was ruled unconstitutional by Northern California District Court Justice Vaughn Walker. Walker dismissed the law's validity as it violates 2 clauses of the 14th amendment; Due Process and Equal Protection. In Walker's assessment, Prop. 8 defenders failed at any point during the trial's proceedings to demonstrate "proof of harm" caused by same-sex marriage. Vague appeals to children's welfare and preserving the hallowed institution of historic marriage fell flat in the face of blatant discrimination.

After the ruling, Prop. 8 defenders touted Walker's own long-term gay relationship as a conflict of interest as Walker and his partner would potentially/directly benefit from the reinstatement of marriage equality in California. 

At this stage in the game, it appears Prop. 8's survival hinges on a change in course. As Walker thoroughly explains in his opinion, there is no demonstrable proof or empirical evidence that indicates gay couples marrying each other has any adverse impact on society. For those who insist gay marriages haven't been around long enough for the negative outcomes to manifest, they'd have to contend with the data coming out of countries like Canada and the Netherlands where gay couples have been marrying for over 10 years. To date there are no signs that society and morality are disintegrating within the ever growing community of nations that have ratified marriage equality.

Therefore, if it is not the case that gay marriages diminish straight marriages and that they do not undermine our national morality or the well-being of our children, those who would see Prop. 8 upheld must claim victimization. If gays are allowed to marry in California then the 1st Amendment rights of the plurality that voted against gay marriage will be trampled. This argument quiet helpfully puts gay marriage on the same level as Loving v. Virginia, the high watermark of Supreme Court marriage equality cases.

My hope is that the outcome will be the same, that prejudiced discrimination will be seen for what it is and be overturned. I don't believe, sadly, our highly partisan Supreme Court will vote as decisively against bigotry as did the 1967 court. With staunch Republican apologists like Alito, Thomas, Roberts, and, worst of all, Scalia, there will likely be a fierce battle ahead. But it may be that Justice Kennedy, an intractable conservative-libertarian, will fall on the side of gays and lesbians' right to self-determination in the face of majority rule. Kennedy was essential in ending draconian sodomy laws nationally in 2003.

However the Court rules, the Church will remain opposed to marriage equality, as comically hypocritical as it is for the Brethren, many of whom are direct descendants of polygamous unions, to now stand as the ultimate defenders of "traditional marriage".

-Joe

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865572385/LDS-Church-files-brief-in-gay-marriage-cases.html?pg=all