The Harvey Milk LGBT club and Pride at Work organizations are holding a rally at noon today on Pier 33 in San Francisco in support of Vincent Atos, a union organizer and former deckhand on Hornblower’s Alcatrez cruises. He claims that he was let go for being “too gay.”

David Waggoner, a lawyer and co-president of the Milk Club said that it is alleged that Mr. Altos made inappropriate sexual comments of a gay nature in a work environment where such comments by his straight co-workers were common. He goes on to say that one manager even watched porn. The theory is that he was actually let go for being a gay union organizer.

More at SFWeekly

(photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/spyndle/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Rally today for union organizer fired for being “too gay” originally appeared on Gay Vantage on April 20, 2010.

Last week, Maryland Delegate Emmett Burns (pictured below) introduced legislation that would ban the recognition of same-sex marriages performed in other states and the District of Columbia, a neighbor of Maryland that recently passed same-sex marriage.

Delegate Burns submitted this bill in spite of the fact that Maryland’s Attorney General is researching the issue and that the Governor supports same-sex marriage recognition as long as it does not violate state law.  Based on the timing alone, it appears that Delegate Burns is trying to get the billed passed before the Attorney General returns his legal opinion, where any positive opinion would prevent enforcement.

The bill states that “marriages between individuals of the same sex are against the policy of the State.”  If passed, the bill would make sure that marriages performed in neighboring Washington DC or any other states with same-sex marriage laws will not be recognized in Maryland.

The bill is set to be heard in the Maryland House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, January 28th, 2009 at 1 PM in Room 100 in the Lowe Office Building located at 6 Bladen Street, Annapolis, Maryland 21401.

Equality Maryland is asking people to come out and show support for marriage recognition at the hearing. Please go here to RSVP.

I know a few couples and business owners that are so fed up with Delegate Burns bill that they vow to abandon the state, along with their businesses, if this bill passes.  A few that I spoke with fail to understand how a state, which is currently running with a budget deficit, could abandon the taxes that both they and their businesses pay in order to discriminate against them.

It is quite sad that Delegate Burns is more interested in discriminating against his constituents than fixing the budget problems the state is currently suffering through.  His priorities are obviously not aligned with the job he was elected to do, which is serve all of his constituents and the state that they live in.

Related:
Democrat introduces anti-gay bill in Md. [DC Agenda]
MD: House to Consider Anti Gay Marriage Bill January 28th – Marriage Equality Proponents Needed [Purple Unions]

Marriage Equality: Maryland Needs Help on January 28th! originally appeared on Gay Vantage on January 21, 2010.

One of the reasons we do not have any real idea how many LGBT people we have in the United States is become nobody has ever bothered to officially ask.

Credo hopes to change that by offering anyone that wants one, a free sticker designed to get Census Bureau officials attention.

Go here to get one sticker for free.  If you’d like more than your single free sticker, you can buy 5 for $5 or 50 for $25.  All profits will be donated to the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, which fights for full equality.

Stickers measure 4.6″ x 6″ and take 3 to 7 weeks to arrive.  The sticker is designed to be affixed to the outside of your census envelope.

At time of publishing, 14,169 stickers have been ordered.  Keep the movement going by getting yours now!

Get Your Free “Queer the Census” Sticker originally appeared on Gay Vantage on January 21, 2010.

As gay publications around the nation continue to fold, Atlanta will be getting a new one.  Laura Douglas-Brown and Chris Cash were editors at the folded Southern Voice.  That newspaper folded when Window Media collapsed last month, taking cherished gay publications along with it.

Just as the staff at the now defunct Washington Blade rose from the ashes to start the new DC Agenda, Ms. Douglas-Brown and Mr. Cash are launching a replacement publication to serve Atlanta called Georgia Voice.

The pair started a funding drive to raise money for the new publication.  They have also obtained a $12,000 matching grant from the Lloyd E. Grant Foundation in Atlanta.  They say that more seed money is needed and are hoping to raise it through the website that was setup to save Southern Voice, located at www.savesovo.com.

The goal is to launch Georgia Voice early next year.

(Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Atlanta Gets New Gay Voice originally appeared on Gay Vantage on December 9, 2009.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has announced that they have lost a donor that provided a $20 million gift each year.  The loss will cause a 25% drop in their annual operating budget and will force the organization to make more cutbacks.

The family that makes the annual anonymous donation notified the ACLU in September that they will miss the payment for at least a year.  They cited market conditions as the reason for having to make the cut.

According to the New York Times, ACLU board members have said privately that the donor was David Gelbaum, a gentleman that made his fortune as a hedge fund manager and who now invests in clean technology.

There is some help being provided by other donors such as the Leon Levy Foundation, the Open Society Institute, Peter B. Lewis (chairman of Progressive Insurance) and John Sperling (founder of University of Phoenix).  These donors have stepped up to kick in an additional $23 million spread over three years, but that money will have to be shared with state affiliates.

Last year, the ACLU laid off 10% of its national staff; trimming the headcount by 36.  Anthony D. Romero, the executive director, also agreed to a 15% pay cut.  To get its operations in line with the damaged economy, they also initiated a hiring freeze, cut travel and cancelled conferences.

According to the New York Times, Mr. Gelbaum began contributing about $50,000 a year to the ACLU beginning in the early 80’s and that his annual giving rose to $22.5 million by 2008.

The only condition that he placed on his annual gift was that he remain anonymous.

(via NYT)

ACLU Loses 25% of its Budget originally appeared on Gay Vantage on December 9, 2009.

Just when we think we’ve lost faith in churches because of organized religion’s fight against our rights, a heartwarming story comes out about how an Episcopal church is helping our LGBT youth.

City Room, a New York Times blog, posted today about the Ali Forney Center in New York City.  Open since 2002, the center, which helps to keep LGBT youth off the streets, has been struggling since the economic meltdown.  In fact, in the last year, its budget was forced to be slashed by $450,000.

Episcopal Community Services of Long Island recently gave a much needed $200,000 donation to the center.  The generous donation helped to create a new 16-bed shelter at Church of St. Andrews in Astoria.

Help like this is greatly needed around the country, as a 2007 survey found that 40% of the estimated $1.6 million homeless youth in America identified as GLBT.

The center, named after a gay homeless teenager who was killed in 1997, has been in the news a lot.  Bea Arthur — the lovable Golden Girl — also left $300,000 in her will to Ali Forney Center.  They plan on using that money to buy a new building to house more homeless GLBT youth.

The Ali Forney Center serves over 1,000 GLBT youth per year and would warmly welcome any type of donation you are able to make.

(Photo courtesy of the Ali Forney Center via The New York Times)

Church Helps LGBT Youth Shelter originally appeared on Gay Vantage on December 8, 2009.

Fred Karger, the founder of Californians Against Hate, is the man responsible for exposing churches, business and individuals that contributed to the effort to get Prop 8 passed in California.

He first went after a hotel owner in San Diego by exposing the fact that he donated $125,000 to get Prop 8 on the ballot.  He moved on to expose the owner of a self-storage company who donated $693,000.  Fred then hit pay dirt when he discovered that the Mormon Church donated a large portion of the money spent trying to repeal gay marriage in California.

Now, the groups Yes on 8 and National Organization for Marriage are suing him and asking for all records associated with his investigation.

Fred dishes out a lot more dirt at his site Five For Fred.  Head over to learn more about the people and organizations that took away our right to marriage and help Fred and his tiny organization fight back against these large groups that are opposed to equal rights.

Some of the things Fred discovered:

• Doug Manchester, owner of two hotels in San Diego, gave $125,000 in seed money to help get Proposition 8 on the ballot.
• Terry Caster, owner of A-1 Self-Storage with 40 locations throughout California, gave $693,000 to end gay marriage.  Terry Caster was quoted by a journalist as saying “those kind of marriages would create a ’sick society.’”
• William Bolthouse, the founder of Bolthouse Farms, gave $100,000 to Prop 8.
• The Garff family of Salt Lake City’s Garff Automotive Group gave $100,000 to Prop 8.
• Fred estimates that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (aka Mormon Church) gave approximately $30 million of the $40 million spent on getting Prop 8 passed.  He states that the church only reported $2,200 in non-monetary contributions.

Please donate to Californians Against Hate and join the Facebook group!

In semi-related news, NOM has been disqualified from a $5 million contest being held by Chase Bank.

(Photo courtesy of Five For Fred)

Prop 8 Hero is Being Sued originally appeared on Gay Vantage on December 7, 2009.

Osby Davis, the mayor of Vallejo, California made headlines when he called gay people sinful.  He didn’t make that comment in a small-town newspaper but rather Tn the New York Times, which has a large international audience.

Today, people struck back.  They arrived at city hall waving rainbow flags and signs demanding the separation of church and state.  Some of the signs even called for Davis’ resignation.

Times-Hearald is reporting that hundreds showed up — both supporters and detractors of the mayor.

Read the moving article at Times-Herald that describes the protests.

(Photo courtesy of Mike Jory / Times-Herald)

Protest Against Vallejo Mayor originally appeared on Gay Vantage on December 2, 2009.

Today is the 21st World AIDS Day — observed each year on December 1st.

The World Health Organization started World AIDS Day in 1998 to call attention to this devastating epidemic that is wrecking havoc throughout the world.

The goal is to provide governments, faith-based organizations, national AIDS programs, individuals and community organizations the resources and ability to raise awareness and focus attention on something that affects millions of people throughout the world.

It is estimated that over one million Americans are living with HIV.  Worldwide, that number jumps to 33 million.

Things you should do today:

• Get tested (visit HIVtest.org for resources)
• Practice safer methods to prevent HIV
• Decide not to engage in high risk behaviors
• Talk about HIV prevention with family, friends and colleagues
• Provide support to persons living with HIV/AIDS
• Get involved with or host an event for World AIDS Day in your community (search events)
• Become a fan of World AIDS Day on Facebook to help spread the word

Today is the perfect day to reflect upon all of the pain and suffering HIV/AIDS has caused and will still cause.  If you haven’t already done it, there is no better day than today to think about your own risks to exposure and develop a plan to reduce or eliminate them.

Today is World AIDS Day originally appeared on Gay Vantage on December 1, 2009.

I just stumbled across a great post named Don’t Ask, Don’t Give over at A Different View.

It is a take on the Don’t Ask, Don’t Give campaign and starts off with:

“Take the pledge, no donations to the DNC, Organizing for America, or the Obama re-election until the Democrats keep their promises to the gay community”

A year ago, the LGBT community, our families, friends and allies across the country were elated by the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States. We poured our hearts and wallets out to elect a Democratic president and Congress, and on November 4th, 2008 we had great hopes for the future of our country and our community.

Read the rest here.

Are you going to take the pledge?

I pledge not to donate to the Democratic National Committee, Organizing for America, or the Obama campaign until Congress passes, and the president signs, legislation enacting the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT), and repealing the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

Don’t Ask, Don’t Give originally appeared on Gay Vantage on November 28, 2009.