"Our campaign has been a huge success," says Dr. Donald Kilhefner of West Hollywood, a pioneering gay liberationist. "Many Outfest patrons told me that they hadn't bought Coors in twenty years and weren't about to start now. I saw several patrons actually refuse to attend Outfest, despite the fact they had paid for tickets, because they were so disturbed over the festival's endorsement of a known community enemy."

However, at Outfest's Friday gala, hundreds of gay men and lesbians were observed drinking Coors beer. The Coors name glowed from the marquee of the Los Angeles Theater, and flapped on Outfest banners in West Hollywood. The Coors' logo was imprinted on thousands of festival programs and schedules. But when the Coors name was showed on screen, many film-goers booed.

Activists are outraged that Outfest has accepted at least $20,000 in sponsorship money from Coors Brewing company. Since 1977, gay and lesbian consumers, bars, and organizations have boycotted Coors products because the Coors family has positioned itself as America's premiere funders of Radical Right causes -- causes which regularly attack the rights of gays, lesbians, and people with AIDS.

"Gays and lesbians must not be seduced into financing their own oppression," says Kilhefner. "Coors has mounted a slick public relations campaign to break the boycott and regain the gay market. They are using tactics of deceit to confuse the gay public. They offer chump change to a few gay organizations but pour millions and millions of dollars into the politics of hate and homophobia. We won't add to their anti-gay war chest."

Outfest officials have stated on the record that Coors is a publicly traded company and that the Coors family should not be punished for the actions of a few homophobic stockholders unrelated to Coors. But according to current documents from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Adolph Coors Family Trust owns 100% of the company's voting stock. Coors family members hold key positions on the Adolph Coors Family Trust, the Coors Brewing Company, the Adolph Coors Foundation, and the Castle Rock Foundation, which funds conservative organizations which regularly attack gay movement gains in policy, law, and media visibility.

"The Coors boycott is alive and well and living," says Morris Kight, a member of the L.A. County Human Relations Commission who initiated gay participation in the boycott 20 years ago. "No single organization can break the boycott because Coors marketers bribe them to do so. Only the gay and lesbian public can decide whether to contribute to their sworn enemies. I know they are wise enough not to do that."

The Coors family has been zealously homophobic for three generations. According to a 1988 Los Angeles Times report on the Coors dynasty, writer Bella Stumbo reported, "Joe Coors' sons are in agreement on at least one other point: Homosexuals are an abomination in the eyes of God." These same sons control the Coors empire of businesses and foundations.

Profits from Coors fund the $58 million Castle Rock Foundation, chaired by William Coors. Castle Rock was created in 1993 with millions of dollars from the Coors Foundation in an apparent effort to protect the family name from its ongoing tradition of Radical Right and anti-gay activism.

Castle Rock funds conservative organizations, including the Heritage Foundation, which supports an outright ban on gays in the military, and the Free Congress Foundation, which recently filed an amicus brief against same-gender marriage. The brief refers to homosexuality as "repugnant " and "a violation of the laws of God and nature." Anti-gay conservatives including Tom Coburn (R, OKLA), who advocates HIV contact-tracing, are heavily funded by PACE (Political Action Coors Employees). PACE recipients have uniformly voted against the Ryan White Care Act and against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would protect workplace rights for gays and lesbians.

Representatives from Outfest have stated that Coors deserves to be rewarded because of its adoption of domestic partnership benefits for gay employees two years ago. Activists reply that more than 500 companies offer domestic partnership benefits, and that these limited benefits do not outweigh the greater evil of Coors' massive funding of the Radical Right.

In a letter dated July 10, 1997, Outfest Board chairman Bruce Cohen states that "the Board of Outfest did a lot of research on the issue before we made our decision to welcome Coors as a presenting corporate sponsor." Cohen has agreed to release his research to those interested in arriving at an informed decision about the propriety of what critics call "Sleeping with the Enemy."

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In 1977 the Lesbian and Gay community began boycotting Coors products. They did so largely because Coors profits fund America's most virulent homophobes. Coors still sponsors anti Gay, Lesbian and HIV policy and law with beer profits. But a few from our community are helping our enemies break the boycott and increase Coors sales.

They did it for money. The L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center took $34,000. $20,000 was taken by Outfest/Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. These community leaders sold us out cheap! They helped Coors' aggressive public relations campaign. It's based on lies!

•LIE: THE COORS BOYCOTT IS OVER

• FACT: The overwhelming majority of gays and lesbians refuse to buy Coors beer and most of our bars refuse to sell it. Many community newspapers refuse to take Coors ad money. The boycott must continue until Coors stops sponsoring Gay-bashing.