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Minneapolis couples’ wedding photos targeted by hateful email chain

Andy Birkey
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“I don’t get how so many people took it as a personal attack, because it was our wedding, it was something personal to us,” Jamil Smith Cole told Southern Voice. Pictures of the wedding of Michael Cole Smith and Jamil Smith Cole, who both live in Minneapolis, were used in some homophobic email chains and on blogs in the last week.

The pictures were posted on Bossip.com under the heading “What the hell is wrong with these pictures?” followed by a number of homophobic comments.

Bossip.com bills itself as “the leading celebrity online property which has an urban sensibility and the fastest growing urban-focused new media property on planet earth.”

In addition, Sandra Bradley, an administrative assistant at Morehouse College in Atlanta, passed them on in an email chain. She said:

I can’t believe this wedding. It’s 2 men. They don’t smile in a lot of pictures and they look like a few brothers I’ve seen in the streets looking STRAGHT. Black women can’t get a break, either our men want another man, a white woman (or other nationality that’s light with straight hair), they are locked up in jail or have a ‘use to be’ fatal disease. I’m beginning to believe Eve was a black woman and we Black women are paying for all the world’s sins through her actions (eating the apple)

Vanessa Crites, an Atlanta lesbian who received the homophobic email told the Voice, “I almost started to cry. I almost could not believe what I was looking at, and I thought that [Morehouse President] Dr. Franklin needed to know,” Crites said. “I think she covered all biases, she’s discriminating against gay black men, she’s discriminating against white women, she’s discriminating against people with HIV.”

The college promises swift action and fired an employee responsible for the email:

Morehouse College has a no-tolerance position on discrimination, including discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and the College has taken great strides toward building a diverse and tolerant community. After investigating the matter, the College has disciplined the persons involved in the incident, and one of the implicated employees is no longer with the College. In addition, the College has reminded its staff that the Morehouse e-mail system is College property, should be safeguarded as any other College property, and that e-mails that are discriminatory, inflammatory, or derogatory to any group are prohibited at the College.

Michael Cole Smith and Jamil Smith Cole were married in Minneapolis on Sept. 13. Michael Cole Smith owns and operates the well-known Talk of the Town Salon on Nicollet Ave. He’s done work for many local celebs including Prince, the Minnesota Timberwolves, the Minnesota Vikings and Mayor Sharon Sayles Belton.

AIDS Funding Bill Advances, Despite Procrastination

James Sanna
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David Iliff, Wikipedia Commons
David Iliff, Wikipedia Commons

It’s an open secret that Congress has bigger priorities than re-authorizing federal funding for the nation-wide network of organizations that provide services to HIV-positive Americans. On the day when the Ryan White Act was originally set to expire, the Senate committee overseeing health care (including our own Al Franken!) finally got around to approving the re-authorization bill and passing it on to the full Senate for a vote. The House is still working on their version of the re-authorization legislation.

But don’t worry – funding for HIV/AIDS care and prevention funding is not about to dry up due to official procrastination. According to Amy Brugh, Public Policy Director of the Minnesota AIDS Project, both houses of Congress have passed what are called “Continuing Resolutions” that keep the money flowing until a final re-authorization bill can be passed and sent to the President.

“The reason for it coming down to the wire has nothing to do with politics or with HIV, but with the way Congress works,” Brugh told us earlier this week. A spokesperson from Rep. Betty McCollum’s office (D-MN) explained that, because of several issues including the health care reform debate, Congress has not yet had time to deal with the legislation. McCollum sits on the House’s Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriations Subcommittee, and is a leader in Congress on HIV/AIDS issues.

Iowa Activist Accused of Stealing for the Cause

James Sanna
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Prominent Iowa LGBT activist Phyliss Stevens has just been arrested and charged with embezzling $5.9 million from her insurance company employer over the last five years. Stevens is chair of the Iowa chapter of Marriage Equality USA while her spouse, Marla Stevens, is the public policy director of the LGBT Fairness Fund and an original contributor to the Billerico Project. Stevens was also a contributor to the campaign of Ashwin Madia who ran unsuccessfully for Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional district.

As Joe.My.God puts it: “This is gonna hurt.”

The federal government is charging Phyliss Stevens with money laundering and wire fraud, while the conservative blog The Iowa Republican is calling on Iowa organizations and politicians to return any money donated by the couple in the last five years. According to the Billerico Project (who has not recieved any money from either Stevens), since October of 2005, Phyliss Stevens gave $14,669.07 in state political contributions, and since January of 2007, she has donated $15,213 to federal candidates including $2,300 to Madia’s campaign.

Marla Stevens is not being charged yet, but both have been named in a civil suit filed by Phyliss Stevens’ employer, Aviva USA, to recover the stolen $5.9 million, because the embezzlement scheme paid into an account held by both women.

The political fallout is still unclear, but with Iowa progressives battling conservative attempts to void the state’s Supreme Court decision allowing same-gender marriage, loosing a pair of prominent funders and activists before the worst of the battle is joined can’t be good.

Isa, Guante Headline a Concert to Get You “Up in Arms”!

James Sanna
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soy logoGet fired up! Shades of Yellow, Minnesota’s only Hmong LGBT organization, is sponsoring a night of hip-hop and spoken word at Macalester College on Saturday night, in memory of Fong Lee, and in opposition to police brutality. (Poster with lineup here)

“Regardless of our race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation/gender identity, and/or age, we all need to come together to support this cause,” wrote Kevin Xiong in an email advertising the event. Xiong is the new Executive Director of SOY

Lee was shot eight times – three in the back, five in the chest – by Minneapolis Police Officer Jason Anderson as he ran from officers on a summer night in 2006. Officers say the 19-year-old was holding a gun, but Lee’s family accused the police of planting the gun next to Lee’s dying body. Minneapolis Police Chief Tim Dolan awarded Anderson the department’s Medal of Valor for his actions, but fired Anderson a few months later because he was accused of assaulting his wife. A grand jury later absolved Anderson of guilt in the case, but many in the Hmong community remain unconvinced, and Lee has become a poster child for police brutality towards the Twin Cities’ minority communities.

Headliners for the show, to be held at Mac’s Kagin Commons, include Magnetic North, and several local hip-hop powerhouses including Maria Isa and El Guante. Doors at 7:30 / $5-$10 suggested donation.

Minneapolis, MN – 10/01/09

TheColu.mn
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Pentagon Leadership Sympathetic to End of DADT?

James Sanna
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An essay arguing for a repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was published in the military leadership’s “flagship” journal, after being reviewed by Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The Boston Globe reports that the article written by Colonel Om Prakash, a member of Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ staff, lays out an extensive argument against the law, which bans non-heterosexual members of the military from serving openly. Conservative arguments against a repeal frequently cite a danger to “unit cohesion” if units are made up of although it is not always clear if those arguing are trying to protect straight soldiers against gay cooties, or if they fear that non-heterosexual soldiers will try to seduce their colleagues during battle.

“After a careful examination, there is no scientific evidence to support the claim that unit cohesion will be negatively affected if homosexuals serve openly,’’ Prakash writes. “Based on this research, it is not time for the administration to reexamine the issue; rather it is time for the administration to examine how to implement the repeal of the ban.’’

The Obama administration has so far resisted calls by LGBT rights groups to end the policy, for fear of repeating President Bill Clinton’s experiences when he tried to end anti-gay discrimination in the military in 1993, only to meet howls of protest from Congress and the military establishment.

Looking back at the Laramie Project at the Guthrie

Andy Birkey
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laramieposter

On October 12, more than 120 theater companies around the country will host performances of the Laramie Project: 10 Years Later. In Minnesota, the Guthrie Theater, the Duluth Playhouse, the Phoenix Theatre in Red WIng, and the Blake School in Hopkins, will perform a reading that examines Laramie, Wyo., ten years after the murder of Matthew Shepard.

10 years later, Moisés Kaufman and members of Tectonic Theater Project returned to Laramie to find out what has happened over the last 10 years. Has Matthew’s murder had a lasting impact on that community? How has the town changed as a result of this event? What does life in Laramie tell us about life in America 10 years later? And how is history being rewritten to tell a new story of Matthew Shepard’s murder, one that changes the motivation of his killers from homophobia to a “drug deal gone bad” despite all evidence to the contrary?

The event is a reading of interviews conducted in Laramie in June 2008, a reflection of the powerful play, and soon HBO movie, that featured interviews from Laramie in the months following Shepard’s murder.

The Guthrie reading will be directed by Associate Director of Studio Programming Benjamin McGovern and feature actors Mark Benninghofen, Michael Booth, Bob Davis, Melissa Hart, Charity Jones, Tracey Maloney, Kris L. Nelson and Michelle O’Neill. Following the reading, there will be a panel featuring the key individuals involved in The Laramie Project: 10 Years Later through a satellite uplink.

Tickets are $15 and available through the Guthrie Box Office at 612.377.2224, toll-free 877.44.STAGE, 612.225.6244 (Group Sales) and online at www.guthrietheater.org.

In Duluth, the Duluth Playhouse will host a similar reading featuring members from Working Class Theater, students from Hermantown, and the Duluth Playhouse, who have read at the original readings over the last nine years: Dan Averitt, Nathan Carlblom, Pat Catellano, Allison Hartl, Jody Kujawa, Priscilla Manisto, Carrie Mohn, Kelly Mullan, Katina Petsoulis, John Schmidt, Jack Setterland, Cheryl Skafte, Kevin Walsh and Amanda Wenberg.

It begins at 7 pm and tickets are $10 suggested donation, but no one will be turned away if they cannot pay. Proceeds will benefit Together for Youth a local organization that provides support and safety to LGBTQ teens in the Northland. Reservations can be made by calling the Duluth Playhouse Box Office at 218-733-7555.

The Phoenix Theatre production will be held at the Sheldon Theatre of Performing Arts in Red Wing at 7 pm with an encore reading on Oct. 17th at 7 pm. Tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for students. Proceeds will benefit PFLAG which is producing the performance, and Goodhue Wabasha Sexual Assault Services.

At the Blake School in Hopkins, fourteen Blake students and staff will present the reading at 7 pm. It’s sponsored by The Blake School Gay Straight Alliance and all proceeds will go to the nonprofit Avenues for Homeless Youth. Tickets are $5 and can be reserved by calling Blake’s theater box office at (952) 988-3822.

Minnesota’s gay men claim large endowments

Andy Birkey
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Manhunt.net, a popular gay social-sexual networking website, compiled an average of self-reported penis size statistics for each of the 50 states. Minnesotans ranked their ‘endowments’ as 10th biggest in the nation at 7.34 inches — bigger than Wisconsin, Iowa and the Dakotas. Even bigger than Texas where everything is bigger. And bigger than the actual average penis size, 5.08 inches, as determined by the Journal of Urology.

Penis envy affects men’s health. Annabel Chan, a PhD student at Melbourne’s Victoria University, has been tracking health and perception of penis size. She found that men tend to look at the size of other men when gauging their own, a trend she calls the “locker room effect.” She found that “Men with larger than average penises also reported higher levels of self-esteem, better general health and higher overall body satisfaction.”

Of course when everyone is trying to one up each other and report very ‘optimistic’ penis sizes on their Manhunt profile, it becomes impossible to determine what is actually average. We will call that the “Manhunt effect.”

Minnesotans are only ranked 10th in terms of lying about penis size. Here are the states that said they had bigger packages than Minnesota:
1. District of Columbia – 7.59 inches
2. New York – 7.50
3. California – 7.45
4. Florida – 7.44
5. Kentucky – 7.42
6. Georgia – 7.41
7. North Carolina – 7.39
8. Pennsylvania – 7.39
9. Rhode Island – 7.38
10. Minnesota – 7.34

Minneapolis, MN – 09/29/09

TheColu.mn
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Maine Catholic Churches Collecting to Fight Marriage Equality

James Sanna
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bishop MaloneWhen is politics not politics? When the Catholic Bishop of Maine is asking for money to help the Church wade into the political marriage equality battle.

For the second time this month, the Bishop of Maine, Richard J. Malone, addressed Sunday mass at many Catholic churches in Maine through a video-recorded speech, imploring parishioners to pray, to donate to Stand for Marriage Maine, to volunteer for them, and vote “yes” on November’s ballot Question 1, the referendum question that, if passed, would overturn a law passed by the state legislature earlier this year to permit same-gender marriage.

You’d think this kind of lobbying would be illegal for a religious organization – after all, they can’t take sides in an election, and have to limit their lobbying activity, so how is this different? In the eyes of the IRS, any organization classified as a “church” can engage in a limited amount of lobbying for or against a piece of legislation, but will only get in trouble if “a substantial part of its activities is attempting to influence legislation (commonly known as lobbying),” according to the IRS.

Too much lobbying, and the church could loose its 501(c)3 tax-exempt status. But what do you do with a mammoth organization like the Catholic Church, which runs a large social service network and otherwise does many things not relating to same-gender marriage, but which could mobilize an enormous amount of resources in the service of hate, but pass the “substantial part” test by dint of their sheer size?

A spokeswoman for the Diocese said she didn’t know how much had been raised by the Bishop’s appeal, because parishioners were asked to mail donations directly to Stand for Marriage Maine in donations passed out in the pews.

In other news, 80 pastors took part in the Alliance Defense Fund’s second annual “Pulpit Freedom Sunday” this past weekend. Pastors called on the IRS to end these same 501(c)3 restrictions on religious authorities’ ability to “speak about biblical truths,” as the ADF’s Erik Stanley put it, regarding candidates’ and elected officials’ positions.

(h/t Joe.My.God)

Photo: Wikipedia/User Circle4809

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