Lesbian High Schooler May Be Allowed To Take Girlfriend To Prom

By Sergio Quintana

An Alabama high school student who was told she could not bring her girl friend to the prom may be able to take the date of her choice after all.

Cynthia Stewart: May Be Allowed To Bring Girlfriend To Prom

Seventeen year old Tharptown High School junior Cynthia Stewart devoted lots of time and energy to the event.  She even helped create the theme of the prom for Tharptown High.

But according to American Civil Liberties Union attorney Christine Sun, the teenager got some bad news from her principal when she asked about bringing a date.

“She asked the principal if she could bring her girlfriend who goes to a different high school to the prom,” Sun said in a telephone interview, “and the principal told her no.”

Sun said the seventeen year old Stewart and her guardian asked school superintendent Gary Williams and members of the school board to reconsider the decision… to no avail.

Stewart and her guardian contacted the Alabama ACLU.  Within days Sun and her co-council sent a letter to the school demanding that Stewart be allowed to bring her girlfriend to the prom.

Included in the letter was a court decision on a similar case.

“There was a very recent decision in an Alabama State Court holding that gay students have a right to bring a same sex date to the prom,” Sun said.

Gary Williams: School System Considering What To Do

Reached by phone, Superintendent Gary Williams did not want to grant a full interview, but he did offer a few quick remarks.

“The school system has not said anything about this.  I think her school has made this decision,” Superintendent Williams said, “we just received the letter and we are considering what to do.”

He also said, based on the lawsuit that was included in the letter from the ACLU, the school system may have to reconsider their decision on this matter.

According reports by local media, the school system was trying to handle the situation before the ACLU got involved.
But ACLU Attorney Sun says she’s still waiting to hammer out details on the school systems decision.

“I still remain concerned that they will find some other so called non-discriminatory reason to disallow her from bringing her girlfriend to the prom.  So we’ll continue to monitor the situation,” Sun said.

Dancing With The Gays

By Sergio Quintana

The tag line for the “California Dreaming” dance competition offers a brighter variation on the 60′s Mamas And The Papas ballad: “All the leaves are brown and the skies are Gay.”

The ballroom dance-off gives amateurs and professionals the opportunity to show their skills… but in a same sex setting.

“It’s something that’s barely breaking the surface, I just feel it’s really important that everyone has a chance to dance with a partner they like,” event judge Chris Beroiz said.

Beroiz is also a choreographer for ABC Television.  He says he’s served as dance judge at several same-sex ballroom competitions across California.

“California Dreaming” is one of three major same-sex ballroom face offs in the state.

Event co-producer Jeff Chandler says the Bay Area is often the anchor of the ballroom universe on the West Coast.

“Prior to this… this competion has happened twice before, and it’s been in the East Bay in Oakland,” Chandler said, “and we really wanted to bring it into the city, and this is the first year we’ve done that.”

More than 150 competitors, some from other states, converged on the Landmark Hotel Whitcomb.   The day’s events include dozens of dance competions in several different ballroom styles.

“Everything from Waltz, Foxtrot, Tango, Quickstep, Samba, Cha Cha, Rumba,” Chandler said, “everything they do on ‘Dancing with the Stars’, we’ll do here.”

Among the competitors is amateur dancer Le Truong.  He’s been dancing for five years, and for this competition he’s paired with professional dancer Heintje Soriano who has been dancing for more than fifteen.

Truong and Soriano have spent most of their dance careers paired with women.

“Same sex competions, I’ve done only one other one,” Truong said as he prepared for his heats.

The two have only been working with each other for a month.  Soriano says he’s spent much of his career teaching female competitors.

But he says same sex ballroom is actually more difficult than opposite sex competitions.

“In same sex competition it’s different because you basically switch leads and follows,” Soriano said, “so you have to find a partner who knows everything and knows what they’re doing.”

Chandler said these competitions offer dancers and audience members a chance to be who they really are, and get recognized for skills they may have taught others, but never got to celebrate in other settings.

“The same sex thing, I mean it’s so stark in Ballroom Dancing, you know the Fred and Ginger type ideal, ” Chandler said, “and to see two men do a beautiful Waltz, or two women do a romantic Rumba, it really strikes home for a lot of people.”

GAY EQUAL RIGHTS ISSUES AT STAKE IN MAINE, WASHINGTON AND KALAMAZOO, MICHIGAN

By Sergio Quintana

Maine Voters will cast ballots to issue a people’s veto of a law passed in April legalizing gay marriages, or affirm the law making it the fifth state to allow same sex weddings.

The closely watched election has drawn supporters and financial support on both sides of the issue from across the country.

But according to the Associated Press, supporters of Same Sex Marriage have raised more than double what opponents have raised.  The AP reports supporters of Same Sex Marriage have raised about $2.7 million.  Supporters of the ballot measure hoping to defeat Same Sex Marriage have raised about $1.1 million.  The campaign against gay marriage is also in debt by about $400-thousand.

In San Francisco a team of volunteers from Equality California worked the phones encouraging people in Maine to vote to defeat “Question One” on the ballot.

“From what everything I’ve heard it’s neck and neck,” volunteer coordinator Michael Keiser-Nyman said, “All the phone calls that we’re making today will make a difference in terms of getting our supporters to the polls.”

Several local opinion surveys leading up to Election Day showed both sides of the issue within a few percentage points of each other.

Coordinators of the “No on One” campaign say they’re encouraged by the support they’ve seen across the country.  But they say they’re most encouraged by the support they’re seeing from Maine voters.

Mark Sullivan with the “No on One” campaign says they’ve been working hard to build grass roots support leading up to the legislative action in April that passed the bill in the first place.

He says opponents of Gay Marriage have run a formidable campaign if not very original.

“We’re disappointed that they presented a campaign that basically was based on the playbook that was used in California with Proposition 8,” Sullivan said.

Scott Fish, a spokesman for “Stand for Marriage Maine” said they want to protect marriage as a union between one man and one woman.  He says many in his campaign support domestic partnerships for gay and lesbian couples.

“A Yes On One win in Maine will say that the people of Maine care about the tradition of marriage, that they recognize that there really is no substitute for a mother, father, child relationship, that they recognize that not all families fall into that category, and that those families deserve equal dignity and respect, and with domestic partnerships whether they be gay or straight that if there are inequities in the law lets correct them.”

DOMESTIC PARTNERSHIP BENEFITS IN WASHINGTON

Washington Voters will cast their ballots on Referendum 71 which will make domestic partnerships between gay couples and senior couples over 62 legally equivalent to marriages except in name.

Here is how the referendum reads on the Washington Ballot:

This bill would expand the rights, responsibilities, and obligations accorded state-registered same-sex and senior domestic partners to be equivalent to those of married spouses, except that a domestic partnership is not a marriage.

Should this bill be:

Approved ___ Rejected __

A vote in support of the issue would expand domestic partnership rights in Washington.

According to an October 26th poll conducted by researcher Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, 53% of the people surveyed said they would vote to expand domestic partnership rights.  37% said they would reject the measure.

GAY RIGHTS ORDINANCE IN KALAMAZOO MICHIGAN

Kalamazoo’s city ordinance 1856 granted equal rights protections for gays and lesbians.  Section B of the ordinance also granted protections for religious organizations not to hire gays and lesbians if that goes against their beliefs.

But opponents of the ordinance still managed to collect enough signatures to put city leaders in a tough position.

Instead of rescinding the law, city leaders put it on the ballot for voters to decide.

Low voter turnout on odd numbered election years does not usually bode well for progressive candidates and issues.  So, organizers supporting the equal rights ordinance have been targeting college students who are yet to go on fall break to turn out and vote.

Merry Queer Christmas

It’s been years since the Castro in San Francisco closed down the streets to traffic and held a city sanctioned celebration of All Hallows Eve.

But even without a formal event, thousands crammed into the Gayborhood to celebrate Halloween, a holiday some consider “Queer Christmas”.