 |
|
Pen Points
Letters to Gay Today |
|
Backroom Bush Screwed by Salvation Army
I am growing VERY angry over this so-called administration's eagerness to brush aside the rights of citizens, just to try and advance the idiot's misguided agenda. Not to mention their eagerness to totally subvert the will of the voters who put those anti-discrimination laws on the books! The upside, though, is that Shrub has just singlehandedly killed any chance of his "faith-based" bullshit being enacted in any meaningful form. Even the Democrats (including Joe Lieberman) who were willing to go along -- with some serious amendments -- have reacted to this cynical deal with outrage and harsh condemnation. Not harsh enough, in my opinion. Any man who calls himself President and then attempts to revoke the Constitutional rights of citizens has violated his oath and is guilty of malfeasance of office! The Democrats should demand Bush's resignation, and I have written to a number of them urging that exact course of action. The Dems have just been handed a perfect excuse to demand an impeachment trial. If trying to cut a secret deal to revoke the Constitutional rights of American citizens isn't "high crimes and misdemeanors," then I don't know what is! I am just appalled at the apparent willingness of the public to simply roll over for this kind of outrageous bullshit. Do they think, "Oh, it's just a bunch of faggots, who cares?" Don't they realize they could be next? That if one group of citizens can have their rights brushed aside, then ANY group can have their rights brushed aside? It all makes me so very angry, and that in itself makes me angrier still. This kind of crap should NOT be happening. Such a deal should not have even been considered for a millisecond, not by any intelligent official with the slightest respect for the rule of law and the will of the people. The only thing that gives me any pleasure in this is the certainty that this asshole is burying himself, and the misguided right-wing of his party, with just about every action and public statement he makes. He threatened publicly to veto a Patient's Bill of Rights, although more than 70 percent of voters favor it. He's threatened publicly to veto campaign-finance reform, although more than 70 percent of voters favor it. He's praised drilling for oil in Alaska and the Gulf, although a huge majority of voters oppose it. What is it with this moron -- is he out to intentionally destroy his own party?!? My favorite incident, so far, is when he announced that the practice-bombing on Vieques Island would end -- a surprise to everyone else, since he had not consulted or advised the Joint Chiefs OR his own staff about his decision or his intent to announce the decision -- and Ari Fleischer actually fainted in public at the press conference, he was so stunned!!! The right-wingers exploded over Shrub's comments that since the Puerto Ricans didn't want us there, we'd leave. I knew Shrub was an idiot, but I figured his handlers would keep him in line as a quiet little puppet. No fucking WONDER Dick Cheney needs a pacemaker! >grin< Ted Snyder The 10 Most Influential Gay/Lesbian Publications
Kudos to Gay Today for Paul D. Cain's recent article on the ten most
influential gay/lesbian publications.
As a journalism historian, a gay man, and the author of the only book on the history of the gay/lesbian press that's ever been written, I strongly believe that our newspapers and magazines have played a vital role in helping to energize the movement and, therefore, reduce discrimination. I'm disappointed, though, that so little attention, in my opinion, has been paid to this important contribution by the gay/lesbian press. So I was very pleased to see Mr. Cain's informed and insightful article. Good job!
Rodger Streitmatter The New York Native
Dorothy Allison, Dennis Altman, Allan Barnett, Arthur Bell, Jay Blotcher, Larry Bush, Michael Callen, Robert Chesley, Tim Dlugos, Marty Duberman, Robert Ferro, Brad Gooch, Rich Grzesiak, Stephen Greco, Michael Grumley, Wallace Hamilton, Terry Helbing, Hank Henry, Amber Hollibaugh, Andrew Holleran, Karla Jay, Brandon Judell, Charles Jurrist, Arnie Kantrowitz, Seymour Kleinberg, Larry Kramer, Toby Johnson, Barry Laine, Stan Leventhal, Neil Allan Marks, Lawrence Mass, Marcia Pally, John Preston, Darryl Yates Rist, Allen Roskoff, David Rothenberg, Vito Russo, Tobias Schneebaum, George Stambolian, Scott Tucker, Kate Walter, Edmund White, and George Whitmore. And this list is by no means exhaustive. Far from being a paper about "bulging sex organs," the Native was a serious publication that was critical to the health of both the NYC and national gay communities in the early 1980s, when it carried the first reporting about AIDS, helped defend the community against innumerable attacks from both the Koch and Reagan right, and was home to spirited and in-depth debates about issues and groups as diverse as Women Against Pornography and the North American Man Boy Love Association. It is the case that the Native occasionally ran covers that featured attractive young men, usually bare-chested actors from plays that were reviewed in that issue, but I would hardly call that pandering. Readers liked those covers, which were sex- and gay-positive and which increased ever so slightly newsstand sales. And speaking for myself, I would far rather read a journal whose cover portrayed sexy guys as objects of desire than one which did the same for guns, or automobiles, or the goals of the Republican Party. After Brett quit the Native in the spring of 1984 over publisher Ortleb's firing of left-wing columnist Doug Ireland, Ortleb increasingly used the paper to promote his belief that HIV was not the cause of AIDS. But neither the intermittently sexy covers nor Mr. Ortleb's advocacy of unorthodox medical theories can take away from the very real accomplishments of the Native under Brett Averill. I was also surprised to see that Mr. Cain or his sources forgot to mention that when David Goodstein bought out the Advocate, Goodstein fired every writer whose ideas might have been even a little to the left of Mamie Eisenhower's. That included thinkers like philosopher and Gay Lib pioneer Arthur Evans. Goodstein's actions were extremely damaging to both the national gay community and the national gay press, and in my view both have yet to recover from them. As a consequence, most of the gay press today, like the American press it apes, is little more than a mindless celebration of celebrity - we have few genuine journals of ideas, and they aren't much read. Bill Weintraub |
A general gives the Salvation Army salute and the finger to gays and lesbians
© 1997-2002 BEI