Saturday, February 2, 2008
OUUT Movie for Feb 10 is Cruising
Running Time:
102 mins
Complete Cast:
Al Pacino - Steve Burns
Karen Allen - Nancy
Don Scardino - Ted Bailey
James Sutorius - Jack
Randy Jurgensen - Detective Lefransky
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Rhode Island Churches Back Marriage Rights
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
By Bruce Landis
Providence, R.I., Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Religious leaders from several denominations reaffirmed their support for same-gender marriage yesterday and announced an advertising campaign intended to get that word out and to dispel any impression that religion doesn’t support the policy change.
“We wanted to make the point that there are religious folks who are in favor of same-gender marriage,” said the Rev. Eugene T. Dyszlewski, pastor of the Riverside Congregational United Church of Christ and chairman of the Rhode Island Religious Coalition for Same-Gender Marriage.
“It’s a different kind of pulpit,” Dyszlewski said of the advertising campaign. “We want to put a public face on it.”
A dozen religious leaders and supporters showed off their signs on buses at the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority headquarters on Elmwood Avenue yesterday afternoon. The advertisements will run on 10 RIPTA buses for a month, the agency said. The advertisements depict two dozen religious leaders and carry the message, “Rhode Island Religious Leaders Supporting Same-Gender Marriages.”
Sunday, July 1, 2007
OUUT Second Sunday movie for July 8 Hate Crime
Full Synopsis:
A quiet community reveals an ugly underside in the wake of a horrible crime in this independent drama. Robbie Levinson (Seth Peterson) and Trey McCoy (Brian J. Smith) are a gay couple who've been together for six years; they've been sharing a comfortable home in suburban Dallas most of that time, and are planning to get married once the legalities work themselves. Robbie and Trey are good neighbors who get along well with the other folks in the community until Chris Boyd (Chad Donella) moves in next door. Chris is a youth pastor at a church run by his father (Bruce Davison), a fundamentalist Christian who preaches often and with great vehemence about the evils of homosexuality. Chris doesn't keep his feelings about gays to himself, and when Trey is found dead in a nearby park, the victim of a sadistic beating with a baseball bat, Robbie believes Chris may be involved. However, Chris' father and mother provide an alibi for him, and the police hand the case from Detective Fisher (Farah White), who investigates hate crimes, to Sgt. Esposito (Giancarlo Esposito) in the homicide department. Robbie is appalled to discover he's now the leading suspect in the murder, and begins making his own investigation into Trey's death. Hate Crime was the first feature film from writer and director Tommy Stovall. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Running Time:
- 104 mins
Saturday, June 2, 2007
2nd Sunday movie for June 10
Running Time:
104 mins
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Nebraska Dept of Health and Human Services Bans Discussion about Gay Parenting
In fact, Nebraska state HHS leaders recently ordered a Lincoln-based diversity committee to remove one speaker from an informational forum focusing on family diversity because the woman was in a same-sex partnership. The team was told to remove the speaker involved in same-sex parenting from the lineup, even though the agency policy statement says the team should promote and encourage the appreciation of human diversity in the workplace and communities served by HHS, said Cathy Kingery, diversity committee co-chairwoman.
The forum was neither condoning nor condemning gay life but simply recognizing its existence and the special circumstances families may encounter, Kingery said in an e-mail description of the issue. The administration was unwilling to waiver, she said.
Concerned they were being asked to discriminate when their goal was to recognize and encourage appreciation of diversity, 11 of 18 committee members, including the two co-chairmen, resigned. In Omaha, at least 10 of 24 team members quit when administrators stopped a program and panel focusing on gay and lesbian issues.
One of the invited speakers said the administration first stopped a daylong training and then said the group could not host a shorter program offered after work hours.
Committee members were told they could not discuss gay, lesbian and transgendered issues on state time, said Betty Dorr, past president of Omaha PFLAG, a group representing parents, family and friends of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered persons.
"This is just another episode of the state denying an opportunity for stories to be told by the wonderful gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people we have in our community, in Nebraska," Dorr said.
HHS CEO Chris Peterson says the agency’s diversity teams must limit topics to the protected classes in federal law, which does not include homosexuals.
In response to a request for a short interview with Heineman on the diversity controversy, the governor’s chief spokesperson said: "I don’t think that is going to happen."
"I don’t think the governor is interested in commenting," spokeswoman Jen Rae Hein said. "The governor believes the director is handling it appropriately."
Hein was also unwilling to say whether Heineman agreed or disagreed with the policy.
"The governor does not want to interject himself into this discussion," she said repeatedly, offering a one-note answer to a number of questions about the governor’s attitude on the issue.
"He is not going to interject himself into this discussion."
At their most logical, these assaults on gay rights and the "gay lifestyle" are meant to make members of the LGBT community rethink their own identity... to second guess themselves. And in this sense they have succeeded: they have convinced many bright young men and women to question their identity as Nebraskans.
And who can blame them? If the wingnuts leading this anti-homosexual crusade really believed their rhetoric (that gay marriage is a threat to civilization itself, that gay adoption is a pox upon the children) there would be no need to silence this discussion. Those confident of their positions don't shy away from debate, they embrace the opportunity to respond and persuade.
But the anti-gay rights movement isn't about discussion; isn't about debate. It isn't really about anything. It's a senseless and classless attempt to use the law to bully a population that makes some people uncomfortable.
And it's worked. Discrimination is enshrined in our state constitution. It is a cornerstone of our campaign rhetoric. It is the undeniable, unquestionable, fundamental truth of Cornhusker politics.
But it is not Nebraska. Not the Nebraska I know. And not the place I call home.
web links:
DailyKos: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/5/12/161650/821
New Nebraska Network: http://newnebraska.net/2007/05/state-agency-bans-discussion-about-gay.html
