Historic Firsts for LGBT Community This Election

Amidst all the election madness, the first bi-racial president, and the marriage and adoption bans along with the wave of protests there is some refreshing news to report for the LGBT community. Silverton, a small town in Oregon with a population of 7,414 has elected Stu Rasmussen the first transgender mayor in the country. Colorado has elected Jared Polis for congress, the first openly gay person to get elected to the house. Kate Brown has become the first openly bisexual to become Oregon's Secretary of State. Barack Obama has opened up the road for blacks to gain positions of power, even as high as the commander in chief! Harvey Milk, Tammy Baldwin, Barney Frank the hero's listed above, and other LGBT icons are paving our way to true equality and government representation.

Queering Up History: Sept 25th

Queer Events On This Day In History...

1791 As part of the French Revolution, France adopts a new law code which decriminalized sodomy by making no mention of sex between consenting adults.

1969 Six teens in London beat a gay man to death with clubs. A London newspaper published a statement by "fag basher" who stated that beating up queers is safe because they can't go to the police.

1983 Paul Jacobs, a pianist with the New York Philharmonic, dies of complications from AIDS at age 53.

1989 Actress Zsa Zsa Gabor says she is afraid of going to jail because "they are all lesbians in jail, and I'm so scared of lesbians." She also implies that the officer who arrested her did so only because he was gay and jealous of her beauty.

1993 Twenty-two members of Lesbian Avengers protests at the dedication of Focus on the Family's $30 million headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Three are arrested. Convicted Watergate figure Charles Colson, a featured speaker at the dedication, said that the battle to defeat the "gay agenda" "makes Watergate look like child's play."

1997 In the San Francisco Examiner, aging evangelist Billy Graham is quoted as saying "Their lifestyle, I'm going to quote from the Bible, is a sin. But why jump on that sin? There are worse sins."

2005 Allison Brewer becomes the first out lesbian to lead a political party in North America as she is elected to lead the left-leaning New Democratic Party in the Canadian province of New Brunswick.

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Queering Up History: Sept 24th

Queer Events On This Day In History...

1731 In Amsterdam, 22 men are executed for sodomy.

1951 Christine Jorgensen entered the hospital for the first sex change surgery.

1981 A Toronto judge acquits a gay school teacher of a charge of keeping common bawdyhouse in own home.

1981 A report at Toronto city council calls for a permanent police/gay dialogue committee. It takes many years for police to grudgingly agree.

1984 Conspiracy charges laid against three gay bath owners in connection with the Feb 5, 1981 Toronto police raids, were settled by plea-bargained fines, without trial.

1984 A New York psychiatrist announces his belief that AIDS is caused by depression.

1985 Right-wing opponents of a law to lower the age of gay sexual consent to 16 in New Zealand stage a "Nuremberg Rally" on the steps of New Zealand's parliament in Wellington. The present a petition claiming 810,000 signatures to oppose the proposed legislation (in a country of about 3,000,000 people), but it later comes out only 350,000 of the signatures were valid.

1992 The US House of Representatives passes a resolution by a vote of 235-173 to allow a Washington DC ordinance which extends spousal health insurance benefits to same sex partners of district employees to remain on the books, but prohibited money to be spent on its enforcement. The US Senate had already approved the measure.

1992 The Twin Cities chapter of Dignity, an organization for gay and lesbian Roman Catholics, is evicted from its meeting space at St. Stephens Church in Minneapolis. Archbishop John Roach ordered that the organization could not use church space unless it publicly said it agrees with church teaching that homosexuality is an intrinsic moral evil.

1992 The Kentucky supreme court overturns the state's sodomy law with a vote of 4-3 in the case of Wasson v. Kentucky. In the majority decision justice Charles Leibson wrote "We need not sympathize, agree with, or even understand the sexual preference of homosexuals in order to recognize their right to equal treatment." Dissenting judges claimed that the ruling would increase homosexuality, incest, and prostitution.

1993 The University of Michigan's school board votes 7-1 to adopt a ban on anti-gay discrimination.

1994 OutRage, a London direct-action group, stages a zap against The Courage Trust's Open Day and Chorleywood, an event aimed at parents of lesbians and gays to persuade them that their children could be cured through conversion to Christianity.

1994 The Exhibition "Becoming Visible: The Legacy of Stonewall" closes at the New York Public Library. It had been there just over three months.

2004 Nova Scotia became the sixth Canadian province or territory to allow gay marriages as the provincial Supreme Court rules that banning same-sex marriage is unconstitutional.

2005 A general election in New Zealand results in a record number of openly gay parliamentarians getting elected, five LGBT MPs in a national Parliament of 122 seats.

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Queering Up History: Sept 22nd

Queer Events On This Day In History...

1975 Doug Wilson, graduate student in education at University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon (Canada), is prevented from practice teaching because he was publicly active in the gay movement. The university president calls it a "managerial decision."

1975 Oliver "Billy" Sipple, a Vietnam veteran, saves the life of president Gerald Ford in San Francisco by lunging for a revolver held by Sara Jane Moore. Harvey Milk (who had not yet been elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors) outed him to the press, which destroyed Sipple's relationship with his family.

1984 For the first time on Polish television a discussion on homosexuality is broadcast.

1987 Sir Elton JohnElton John appears on the US television show, "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno." In response to the suggestion that he star in his own sitcom, he turned to fellow guest Tim Allen and said, "I could do Homo Improvement with you."

1990 The Black Lesbian and Gay Group of London, England, and other gay groups picket the Brixton Police Station protesting police discrimination.

1990 British gays in London deliver a protest letter to gay pub Brief Encounter over their ban on same sex kissing in the bar.

1991 Film director Derek Jarman is canonised by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence as St. Derek of Dungeness of the Order of Celluloid Knights.

1992 The Advocate, a US magazine, runs a story about US Rep. Jim McCrery whose voting record on gay issues had taken a sharp downturn. The article included statements from several men who had sex with McCrery.

1993 British gays demonstrate against advertising by Benetton HQ, resulting in the arrest of 'The Benetton 9', who are all subsequently acquitted. But the court case implied that one gay group, OutRage, had been under surveillance by the British secret services.

1995 Eigel Axgil dies in Copenhagen at age 71. He and his partner, Axel Axgil, formed the National Homosexual Association in 1948, which was among Europe's earliest post-war gay rights groups. In 1989 the two were the first to register their relationship when a Danish law went into effect allowing same sex couples to do so.

1999 Richard Socarides, US President Bill Clinton's liaison to the gay and lesbian community, announces that he would leave his position for a media job.

2005 Amnesty International releases a damning report accusing American police nationwide of being "criminals" in their abusive treatment of LGBT Americans.

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Queering Up History: Sept 20th

Queer Events On This Day In History...

1958 Barbara Gittings founds the East Coast chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis (an early lesbian organization in the US) in New York City. Less than a dozen women attended the first meeting which was held at the offices of the local Mattachine Society.

1973 Lesbian tennis star Billie Jean King defeats misogynist Bobby Riggs in "Battle of the Sexes" tennis match.

1978 Ronald Reagan publicly states his opposition to California's Proposition 6, also known as the Briggs Amendment. It would have banned gays and lesbians from teaching in public schools, as well as anyone who openly supported civil rights for gays and lesbians.

1994 Houston assistant police chief Art Contreras admits that police officers violated policy by wearing ski masks during a series of raids on gay bars.

1995 Human Welfare and Community Action Commission in Berkeley votes to include transgendered people in its anti-discrimination policy.

1996 US President Bill Clinton signs the Defense of Marriage Act which defines marriage in the United States as a union between a man and a woman.

1996 Twenty-four Filipinos in Saudi Arabia receive the first fifty lashes of a 200 lash sentence for homosexual behavior. After the sentence was completed they were deported.

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Queering Up History: Sept 19th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1963 The first gay rights demonstration in the USA took place at the Whitehall Induction Center in New York City, protesting against discrimination in the military.

1964 The Homosexual League of New York and the League for Sexual Freedom demonstrated in front of the US Army Whitehall Induction Center in New York City to protest the military's exclusion of gays and lesbians.

1975 A three-member US Air Force panel recommended that Sgt. Leonard Matlovich be given a general discharge for being openly gay.

1985 Aids makes the A-List in Hollywood as $1.3 million is raised at a benefit sponsored by Los Angeles AIDS Project. It was organized by Elizabeth Taylor, and among those attending were Betty Ford, Burt Lancaster, Shirley MacLaine, Sammy Davis Jr, Linda Evans, and Burt Reynolds.

1992 Frederick Combs, who played Donald in the 1970 film version of "The Boys in the Band," dies of complications from AIDS at age 57.

2003 California passes a law giving gay couples many of the same rights as straight couples, but not marriage.

2005 Less than a week after the Vatican announced a witch hunt to identify homosexuals in the US Catholic priesthood, Pope Benedict XVI, a former Nazi, approves a new policy document which says men with homosexual tendencies should not be ordained as Catholic priests anywhere."

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Queering Up History: Sept 18th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1977 A 4-hour unprecedented benefit for gay and lesbian rights was held at the Hollywood Bowl.

1980 The US National News Conference convened a panel to investigate claims of deceitful, distorted and biased reporting by CBS for "Gay Power, Gay Politics." The panel voted 9-2 in agreement with the complaint, which claimed that focusing on sexual extremes such as S & M, glory holes, and sex in parks was unfair and reinforced stereotypes. It would result in a public apology on CBS Reports.

1980 The Toronto Board of Education amends its policy to ban discrimination on basis of sexual orientation, but adds clause forbidding "proselytizing of homosexuality in the schools."

1985 A class action suit is filed by Steve Horn of Arizona to overturn the state's sodomy law. He was fired from his job with the Mesa Arizona police department after he came out despite a perfect service record. Police Chief Joe Quigley cited the sodomy law as the reason.

1988 During a speech by US Rep. Bob Dornan (Republican), his wife Sallie Dornan screams "Shut up, Fag!" at a heckler.

1989 The Corcoran Gallery issues an apology for canceling an exhibit of Robert Mapplethorpe photography.

1992 In an interview published in the San Francisco Examiner, attorney John Schlafly, son of conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly, says that he is gay but he supports his mother's right wing politics. He also says it is not hypocritical of her to fight against equality for gays and lesbians while knowing he is gay.

1995 The Canadian House of Commons votes 124-52 to reject a measure introduced by openly gay Real Menard which would have extended legal recognition to same-sex marriages. But times changed quickly. Five years later the House of Commons voted to recognize same-sex spousal rights in common-law relationships.

2003 Canada's Parliament passes a law making it illegal to promote hatred of gays and lesbians in speeches, publication,s radio, or TV. The day before the same House of Commons narrowly defeated an opposition motion to declare marriage was only between a man and a woman.

2003 Britain's notorious Section 28 law, which forbade "the promotion of homosexuality" in schools and was passed by Margaret Thatcher in 1988, is officially repealed.

2003 The United States denies entry to the US to Canada's first legally married gay couple, whose marriage was made legal by a landmark court case three months earlier, because the two men had filled out a single customs form as a family."

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Queering Up History: Sept 16th

Queer Events On This Day In History...

1730 In Amsterdam, Lourens Hosponjon is executed for sodomy.

1992 Robert Sawyer of Brattleboro Vermont pleads not guilty to charges that he murdered his ex-girlfriend, Judith Hart Fournier, after she left him for a woman. She had a restraining order, but Sawyer violated it repeatedly. The case sparked a demand for anti-stalking legislation.

1992 Fifty-eight year old Roy Downs files a complaint of brutality against the Ft Worth Police Department. He was arrested during a series of raids on gay bars, and officers beat and verbally abused him.

1994 Richard Hongisto, a former San Francisco police chief, is convicted of civil rights violations. He had ordered the removal of an issue of Bay Times, a gay newspaper, from the stands.

1997 Alberta singer K.D. Lang is invested as an Officer of the Order of Canada, a high official Canadian government award recognizing national achievement.

2004 Manitoba becomes the fourth province in Canada to allow gay marriage as the Court of Queen's Bench rules in favour of same-sex weddings in the western province.

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Queering Up History: Sept 15th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1954 The Wolfenden Committee meets for the first time to study homosexual offenses in Britain and the treatment of those convicted. They would meet several times over a three-year period. Twelve of the 13 who served the full three years recommended that private, consensual homosexual behavior no longer be considered a crime. They suggested that the age of consent be set at 21, and stated that homosexuality cannot be legitimately considered a disease.

1967 The first issue of the monthly US gay magazine The Advocate premiered.

1969 In the backwash of the the Stonewall riots earlier in the year, the first issue of Gay Power is published in New York.

1983 After four years of legal wrangling, Toronto's gay newspaper, The Body Politic, finally wins its appeal against the Crown's attempt to try it in court for sending indecent material through the mail.

1986 Former US Air Force Sgt. Leonard Matlovich, whom the US military turfed out for being gay, is diagnosed with AIDS.

1989 Maud's in San Francisco, described as the world's oldest lesbian bar, closes after 23 years.

1994 Colorado attorney general Gale Norton confirms that Dr Paul Cameron had been paid to testify in defense of Amendment 2. The testimony was never used. She refused to disclose the amount, but Denver gay newspaper OutFront said the fee was $10,125. Cameron was expelled from the American Psychological Association in 1983 for falsifying research data about gays and lesbians, and was barred from practicing in Nebraska, the only state in which he had been licensed.

1996 The European Parliament approves a resolution urging an end to discrimination and unequal treatment directed toward homosexuals in every country in the European Union.

1997 US Vice President Al Gore gives a speech at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force's annual gala. Among those honored at the event were Coretta Scott King, AFL-CIO president John Sweeney, and the Mautner Project, a service organization for lesbians with cancer.

2000 Five male Toronto police officers raid a lesbian bathhouse filled with 300 female patrons. The constables toured the facility for an hour but no charges were laid, although the names and addresses of about 10 women were recorded. It was the first police raid of a bathhouse in Toronto since the infamous 1981 raids in which more than 200 men were arrested and subsequently acquitted."

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Queering Up History: Sept 14th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1969 In New York City, the Gay Activist Alliance protests police harassment by staging a "zap" of Mayor John Lindsay.

1971 The first gay organization in Canada's capitol, Ottawa, is formed.

1979 In the small Canadian town of Smeaton, Saskatchewan, an education arbitration board orders teacher Don Jones reinstated to the teaching job from which he was fired for being gay.

1989 AIDS activists disrupts the New York stock market trading to protest the high cost of AZT.

1990 A gay man in Denver Colorado is brutally beaten while walking his dog. Nearly every bone in his body was broken, and his dog was also beaten.

1992 The Cambridge Massachusetts city council approves a domestic partner registry.

1994 Mica England settles a lawsuit with the Dallas police department out of court for $73,000. She had been denied a job as a police officer because she was a lesbian."

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Queering Up History: Sept 13th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1974 The first lesbian writer's convention convenes in Chicago sponsored by Womanpress.

1977 The American TV series Soap debuts on ABC with (straight) actor Billy Crystal in an ongoing gay role.

1985 About 20,000 march nation-wide in New Zealand in support of a homosexual law reform bill which proposed to reduce the age of consent for gay sex to 16.

1985 Rosemary Curb and Nancy Manahan are thrown out of their Dublin hotel after appearing on "The Late Late Show" on which they identified themselves as lesbians and former nuns.

1989 The US House of Representatives rejects a proposal by right-wing Senator Jesse Helms which sought to deny federal grants to art projects which included homoeroticism.

1992 Two gay men in Manhattan are attacked by at least twenty-five teenagers. New York City mayor David Dinkins condemned the attack and urged state and federal legislation to prevent gay bashing.

1993 Washington DC repeals its sodomy law.

1993 British gays demonstrate at Bromley Council meeting over alleged HIV discrimination.

1994 A domestic partner registration is approved unanimously by the Carrboro North Carolina board of aldermen.

1996 The US Senate votes 49-50 to defeat the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

1999 A man filed a lawsuit against Starbucks, the huge US coffee-shop chain, charging same-sex harassment by a supervisor.

2001 Two days after the terrorist destruction of the World Trade Center in New York City, American right-wing homophobe Rev. Jerry Falwell on his TV show blames gays and lesbians (along with pagans, abortionists and the American Civil Liberties Union) for the terrorist attack. After a media uproar he apologizes the next day saying his remarks "were taken out of context."

2004 Fifteen months after gay marriage was first legalized in Canada, the country's first gay divorce is granted to two lesbians as an Ontario Superior Court judge strikes down the Canadian Divorce Act's definition of marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

2004 Olympic silver medalist Amelie Mauresmo, 25, a lesbian from France, becomes the world's officially top-ranked woman tennis player."

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Queering Up History: Sept 12th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1772 Marquis de Sade was burned in effigy after being sentenced to death for committing sodomy with his manservant and poisoning prostitutes. Six years later his death sentence was commuted. He would die in a lunatic asylum in 1814.

1969 Less than three months after the Stonewall riots, Gay Liberation Front protests at the offices of the New York Village Voice to oppose their policy of allowing writers to refer to gays as "fags."

1976 Outspoken Episcopal Rev. Malcolm Boyd, author of "Are You Running With Me, Jesus?" comes out in an interview with the Chicago Sun Times. He later wrote "Gay Priest."

1985 Fifteen Chicago police who entered a gay bar with a warrant to arrest the bartender storm in with their guns drawn, ordered all the patrons on the floor, searched them, photographed them, interrogated them about their personal lives, beat one man, and detained them over three hours. After the ACLU filed suit charging unreasonable search and seizure, violations of freedom of association, and illegally obtaining personal information the police settled for $226,500 to be divided among the men. Police also agreed to return all photographs and items confiscated and to expunge the incident and all information collected from their records.

1992 Actor Anthony Perkins, best known for his role as Norman Bates in Psycho, dies of complications from AIDS at age 60, but not in his shower.

1993 Raymond Burr American TV actor Raymond Burr dies at age 76. Starred in Perry Mason and Ironside series.

1995 Des Moines, Iowa, school board member Jonathan Wilson, an openly gay man, is defeated in his bid for re-election by a candidate backed by the religious right.

1997 Bernard Widmar and Henry Korn of Boise Idaho hold a party with 200 guests to celebrate their golden anniversary. They met in Chicago while they were both in college on the G.I. bill.

2000 The Netherlands becomes the second country in the world (after Denmark) to recognize gay marriages as the Dutch parliament votes 109-33 to approve gay/lesbian marriages, allowing gays and lesbians to convert previously registered same-sex partnerships into full marriages complete with divorce guidelines and adoption rights.

2004 The Los Angeles Times reports that Paul Crouch, 70, the founder of the world's largest Christian television network (Trinity Broadcasting Network), paid $425,000 to a former male employee of the network to hush up an affair they had eight years earlier."

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Queering Up History: Sept 11th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1779 Alexander Hamilton writes to John Laurens, "Like a jealous lover, when I thought you had slighted my caresses, my affection was alarmed and my vanity piqued."

1932 In a book review of "Sappho of Lesbos" by Arthur Weigell, reviewer Florence Finch Kelly praises the author for focusing on the beauty of her poems and not condemning her by current morality standards. The reviewer explained that since the Greeks "had no sexual morals whatsoever" Sappho was merely a product of her environment.

1961 "The Rejected," the first US television documentary about homosexuality, was aired on KQED, a San Francisco public station. Guests included anthropologist Margaret Mead, Episcopal Bishop of California Rev James Pike, several members of the Mattachine Society, and Dr Evelyn Hooker, the first psychologist to prove that male homosexuals were no more likely to suffer from mental illness than heterosexual males. Producer John Reavis had a budget of less than $100 to work with. The purpose was to challenge stereotypes and common misunderstandings about homosexuals.

1975 New York City council rejects a gay rights ordinance.

1976 The convictions of two California men arrested for lewd conduct for kissing in public are upheld. They were forced to register as sex offenders under California law.

1986 The Gay and Lesbian Archive of New Zealand is damaged by arson just weeks after gay sex is legalized in the country.

1989 US magazine OutWeek publishes its second list of closeted homosexuals, this time with 31 names.

1990 Joseph Wills of Wisconsin is arrested and charged with murder for shooting a gay man to death. He states that if another man made a pass at him he would do the same thing.

1993 The Association of Latin Men for Action, a gay and bisexual men's organization in Chicago, marches in the city's Mexican Independence Day parade. It was the first time a gay organization had participated in the event.

1994 Pete Wilson, governor of California, vetoes a bill which would have allowed limited recognition of relationships between same-sex partners and unmarried heterosexuals. He said it would undermine heterosexual marriage.

1999 The US gay-support group Parents and Friends of Lesbians And Gays ended its partnership with US bookstore chain Barnes and Noble, apologizing to independent booksellers for supporting a corporation that has forced smaller stores out of business.

2001 More than 3,000 are killed as the twin-tower World Trade Center buildings in New York City are destroyed by a pair of hijacked planes which crash into them, while a third hijacked plane allegedly crashes into the Pentagon in Washington, DC. A fourth hijacked plane crashes into a Pennsylvania field after gay rugby player Mark Bingham (pictured above) and other passengers fought the hijackers for control of the plane. Also killed in that plane was co-pilot David Charlebois a member of the National Gay Pilot's Association. Berry Berenson, photographer, and the lover of the late of actor Anthony Perkins is among those who die in the WTC crash. While conspiracy theorists blame the attacks on the US government, the US government itself blamed Osama bin Laden for the tragedy which resulted in an American military invasion of Afghanistan."

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Queering Up History: Sept 9th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1707 William Huggins of England is indicted for sodomy and would be found guilty.

1980 A federal judge orders the US Air Force to reinstate Leonard Matlovich. The Air Force offered a settlement of $160,000 to avoid reinstating him; he accepted in order to pay the legal bills accumulated during his five-year fight.

1980 Toronto's Metro Council, governing body of greater Toronto area, refuses to pass Metro Bill of Rights which includes sexual orientation.

1987 A San Francisco Superior Court jury awards palimony in the amount of $2.28 million to James B Short for the 19 years he lived with realtor Charles Gale. It was believed to be the first gay palimony case to be decided by a jury.

1994 In California, three white supremacists are arrested in the kidnapping and beating of Thomas Lee, who they believed was gay. Lee was threatened with a shotgun, beaten with a baseball bat, stripped, and tied to a tree.

1994 Jurists rule that Lynne Tucker of Salt Lake City Utah could not be declared an unfit parent solely on the basis that she lives with her lesbian lover.

1994 Oregon activists working for the defeat of Measure 9, which sought to ban gay rights laws, stage news conferences in Portland, Eugene, and Bend.

1995 A federal judge in Omaha Nebraska temporarily blocks the Air Force from discharging a gay Captain, Richard Richenberg.

1999 The Times of London publishes an article in which ex-government minister Michael Portillo is quoted as saying that he had 'homosexual experiences' in his youth.

2005 What would have been Great Britain's first gay TV channel, Faze TV, folds for financial reasons before even transmitting (broadcasting) its first show."

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Queering Up History: Sept 8th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1292 John de Wettre, a knife-maker, is executed for sodomy after being condemned at Ghent (present-day Belgium). He was burned to death at the stake. It is the earliest known record of an execution for sodomy in Western Europe.

1504 Michelangelo unveils his famous statue of David. The model for the sculpture was his boyfriend.

1906 In an essay published in the St Louis Medical Review (vol. 54 #10 pp. 213-215) titled "The Problem of Sexual Variants," Dr T.H. Evans claims there are two causes for the increase in homosexuality. 1) The decreased need for propagation of the species, and 2) changes in the sexual division of labour had an impact on erotic interest.

1975 Openly gay US Air Force Technical Sergeant Leonard Matlovich appears on the cover of Time magazine.

1983 In San Francisco, the Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals rules that homosexuals cannot be refused entry into the US solely on the basis of their sexuality.

1992 A fundamentalist minister and two of his followers are sentenced to 18 days in jail for protesting outside a church where President Bill Clinton attends services. They had been arrested for trespassing and harassing the congregation by shouting, "Do you want your son to marry a queer? Do you want your daughter to marry a lesbian?"

1995 The Magnus Hirschfeld Center for Human Rights in New Jersey files a complaint against the Costa Rican government before the Organization of American States. It charges that Costa Rica failed to enforce protection for gays and lesbians after complaints of anti-gay harassment and discrimination.

1995 At the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, about twenty women halt one of the sessions by draping a 25 foot banner reading "Lesbian Rights Are Women's Rights" from the top gallery of the meeting hall.

1996 The offices of the Pink Paper, a London weekly paper, are damaged in an arson attack."

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Queering Up History: Sept 6th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1935 Dr. Louis W. Max of New York University addresses a meeting of the American Psychological Association and reports that he had successfully treated a case of homosexuality by using electro shock therapy delivered at "intensities considerably higher than those usually employed on human subjects."

1970 The play "The Boys in the Band", with openly gay characters, closes after 1,002 performances. By this time a film version had also been made.

1971 The National Organization of Women's annual convention passes a resolution acknowledging the oppression of lesbians as a concern of feminism.

1976 Fourth Annual Gay Conference for Canada and Quebec closes in Toronto.

1990 Twentysix-year-old Charles Dougherty of Colorado Springs, who had not only managed to enroll at Coronado High School as a female transfer student named Cheyen Weatherly but also made the all girl cheerleading squad, is arrested on charges of criminal impersonation. He is sentenced to two years probation during which time he would receive counseling, despite the demands of some parents that he be given the death penalty.

1995 According to a San Francisco Chronicle poll, openly lesbian San Francisco mayoral candidate Roberta Achtenberg had the support of 47 percent of gay and lesbian voters, and challenger Willie Brown, a long time supporter of the GLB community, had 29 percent. The Alice B Toklas Lesbian and Gay Democratic Club had recently endorsed Brown.

1997 Sir Elton JohnElton John plays a rewritten version of Candle In The Wind at the funeral of Princess Diana at Westminster Abbey. The charity record of the song became the biggest-selling single of all time"

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Queering Up History: Sept 5th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1967 The American television series N.Y.P.D. now includes gay characters.

1970 Columbia "decriminalizes" "homosexual behavior" changing it from a felony to a misdemeanor with the maximum penalty reduced to "only" three years.

1981 The 5th Gay Softball World Series closes in Toronto with teams from 11 cities participating.

1982 The first Gay Games close in San Francisco. 1350 athletes from 179 cities in 12 countries participated in 14 events.

1987 The Homomonument, a group of three pink granite triangle stones which commemorates all gay men and lesbians subjected to persecution because of their sexual orientation, opens in Amsterdam. The memorial idea dated from 1970, when Dutch gay activists were arrested for attempting to place a lavender wreath at the National War Memorial on Dam Square in the centre of Amsterdam. The wreath was removed by local police and denounced as a disgrace.

1990 Gays in London, England, hold a Kiss-In at the Eros statue, Piccadilly Circus, to demonstrate against police harassment of public displays of gay affection.

1991 US AIDS activists inflate a 35 foot condom on the roof of anti-gay US Senator Jesse Helms's house.

2001 Canada's first gay television station, PrideVision, begins broadcasting on national cable TV."

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Word of the Gay: "Stonewall"

"Stonewall" refers to the historic event and location at a gay bar/inn in New York City that was raided by the police on June 28th, 1969. Police raids were common on homosexual establishments, but the "stonewall riots" were significant because gay men, and transgender women stood up to police brutality by fighting back. It has become a defining moment in queer history where LGBTQ people decided to fight back, get political, and demand social justice with actual results and community unity.

Mitcham Dives Way into Gay History!

The openly gay and openly gorgeous ;) diver, Matthew Mitcham of Australia has made gay and Olympic history today. He has won the gold medal in the men's 10m platform. The competition was a shock and a huge upset to his close in score, Chinese competitors. He has produced the highest scoring dive in Olympic history! Mitcham was cheered on by his partner Lachlan courtesy of a Johnson & Johnson Olympic sponsorship.

More info on Matt Mitcham - http://www.mattmitcham.com/

Thank Johnson & Johnson for supporting Matthew Mitcham & his partner and for their sponsorship and support of LGBT initiatives. Click for E-contact Form

Queering Up History: "Lawrence v. Texas"

Happy five year anniversary to the major decision by the U.S. Supreme Court on Lawrence v. Texas. On June 26th 2003 the high court struck down the anti-sodomy law by a 6-3 vote officially decriminalizing homosexual sex within the United States.