As every day passes that Don't Ask Don't Tell is not repealled, the army continue to lose talented soldiers who are not able to serve because of their sexual orientation.

This week, Katerine Miller tendered her resignation, coming out as gay to her superior officers at West Point. Her letter is incredibly moving, and I've decided to repost a portion here, rather than summarize her words.

"… I have created a heterosexual dating history to recite to fellow cadets when they inquire. I have endured unwanted approaches by male cadets for fear of being accused as a lesbian by rejecting or reporting these events. I have been coerced into ignoring derogatory comments towards homosexuals for fear of being alienated for my viewpoint.  In short, I have lied to my classmates and compromised my integrity and my identity by adhering to existing military policy.
While at the academy, I have made a deliberate effort to develop myself academically, physically, and militarily, but in terms of holistic personal growth I have reached a plateau. I am unwilling to suppress an entire portion of my identity any longer because it has taken a significant personal, mental, and social toll on me and detrimentally affected my professional development. I have experienced a relentless cognitive dissonance by attempting to adhere to §654 [colloquially known as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”] and retain my integrity, and I am retrospectively convinced that I am unable to live up to the Army Values as long as the policy remains in place."

She's been anonymously blogging about her expereinces at Velvet Park. You can find out more about her case at Knights Out.

The race for District 76 of the State Assembly in California just got really interesting. Both candidates running in November are openly gay. Let me repeat that. When voters go to the election both in November, they will not be able to vote for a straight candidate.

Openly gay candidates and elected officials are still underrepresented, however Republican gay candidates and officials are even more rare. Ralph Denney has been a member of the Log Cabin Republicans of San Diego for over a decade and is running as a “family man” and “moral Republican Christian.” You can find out more information at the Gay and Lesbian Times.

This race is good for progressives who are concerned about LGBTQ equality. The battle for full equality is one that involves changing hearts and minds, and if the only politicians talking about equality are Democrats, we are missing a major audience. Moderate voters in California might not be swayed by Rachel Maddow or Barney Frank, but someone like Ralph Denney may appeal and speak to them. The LGBTQ community cannot afford to continue to perpetrate the stereotype that straight conservatives somehow hold a monopoly on “family values”, and Denney may be an important step in the right direction.

I’ve written before about Kurt and his father’s relationship on Glee, and I feel compelled to write again after this Tuesday’s episode. Their relationship should be held up as a model of how pop culture can depict the challenges of coming out of the closet with honesty.

Kurt’s father has been dating Finn’s mother, and as a result he has been spending a lot of time with Finn. Finn likes sports and girls, two things that Kurt does not. Kurt’s father and Finn start to hang out a lot, and Kurt begins to get incredibly jealous. Kurt feels that his dad does not want to hang out with him because he is gay. In a fit of anger, he belts out the classic “Rose’s Turn” from Gypsy. His dad wanders into the theatre and sees the end of Kurt’s song. He confronts Kurt in a scene that deals with the struggles that both men face in their relationship.



Do I wish that Kurt’s father accepted Kurt’s homosexuality unequivocally, no questions asked? Of course. Is that the reality for many gay youth coming out in America today? No, and our pop culture should reflect the challenges of coming out in America today.

On Thursday night, I had the privilege of seeing the new Broadway play Next Fall. Next Fall tells the story of Adam, who finds himself at a loss when his boyfriend Luke, who he has been with for four years, is hit by a taxi driver and rushed to the hospital in a coma. Luke’s friends and family quickly descend upon the hospital waiting room. Adam knows that Luke is not out to his parents, and tension quickly rises as Adam desires to see Luke, but also knows that he has no right to visitation.

Ironically enough, when I returned to my hotel room that night, I had several e-mail alerts notifying me that President Obama had ordered hospitals to grant same-sex couples visitation rights. I sat staring at my computer, slightly dumfounded. After attending a play that evening that dealt with issues of same-sex visitation rights, it was exciting and thrilling to see President Obama take action on this important issue.

At the same time, there is still a great amount of work that needs to be done for full gay equality in America. The President promised a repeal of the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy in his State of the Union address, stating, “This year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are. It's the right thing to do.” In addition, it is time Congress moved forward to support and pass an inclusive Employment Non-Discrimination Act. The time for this action is this summer and this fall, not next. With Republicans likely gaining seats in both the Senate and the House this fall, Obama may miss a golden opportunity to pass important legislation that will benefit the LGBT community.

Obama should be applauded for supporting visitation rights for same sex partners in hospitals, however it’s time that he stood up and pushed for legislation that will protect all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered individuals from discrimination in the workforce.

This weekend, I am attending the Sexuality Education Advocacy Training in Washington, DC, hosted by the Unitarian Universalist Association, along with other faith communities and Advocates for Youth. I’m joined by two other advocates from North Carolina. I’ll be blogging more as the conference goes on about the work that we are doing, but I wanted to reflect on a moment that happened yesterday during lunch. Delsie and I had McDonalds for lunch, and I decided to order a happy meal. Since I am 20 years old, I decided to lie and pretend like I was ordering the meal for a child in the car. After I placed the order, I was asked if the Happy Meal was for a girl or a boy. McDonalds is offering two toy options right now, Barbies or Lego cars. I was taken aback at first. I replied boy, not really thinking about it, and got my food a couple minutes later.

We discussed later that it was unfortunate that McDonalds works under the assumption that all boys who order Happy Meals will want the “boy toy” and all girls will want the “girl toy”. Our sex does not determine how we choose to act out our gender. If a girl likes Star Wars, she should not be made to feel that she is selecting a toy that is not intended for her sex.

I’ll continue to be blogging and tweeting about the conference as it goes on. You can follow all three NC advocates at our Teen Health Now Twitter page during the next three days: http://twitter.com/TeenHealthNow

As part of The Great American Condom Campaign, I donated 200 condoms to my friend Alexis Dennis, for an alternative spring break trip to the Mississippi Delta to teach sex education in the rural community of Sunflower.  Alexis founded this trip as a special project of the Black Student Movement at UNC.  Alexis is a junior, and led the trip for the first time last spring.

The second batch of participants is headed off this weekend. I sat down with her last week to talk about the importance of the trip and the need for more medically accurate information in rural communities.

Lee: When did you first have the idea to lead this trip?

Alexis: During the summer after my first-year of college, I spent the summer teaching with the Sunflower County Freedom Project in Mississippi, an educational nonprofit that uses the Civil Rights movement to inspire its students. My co-workers and I quickly noticed several things:

First, many students did not understand or know how to vocalize when they were being sexually harassed. Secondly, many of the kids did not know how to take care of themselves during puberty. We decided to spend a couple of hours one day to teach the high-lights of sex education.

To our surprise, the lesson wound up taking six hours! The students had little understanding of their basic reproductive anatomy because they were not taught this information in schools. After leaving, I decided I wanted to find a way to go back and try to fill in some of these imperative gaps in understanding. 



Lee: What can trip participants expect?

Alexis: University students spend half of their time getting to know the area and learning about the history, culture, and social issues of Mississippi. After taking trips in the morning, students will teach a health and self camp with the students at the Sunflower Freedom Project. We teach goal setting, values, communication, anatomy, STIs/HIV, information about contraception, and the difference between healthy and abusive relationships, amongst other topics.

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Earlier this week, the New York Times printed an article about the challenge that women face finding a single man in college. The article argued that women were disadvantaged in college, because far more women were entering college compared to men.  The article specifically focused on UNC, where the female to male ratio is approximately 60-40.

I’ve heard these complaints from straight female friends on countless occasions. The New York Times article attributes this gender gap to several reasons. Women tend to have higher grades and are more qualified students in high school, and men are more likely to drop out once they get to college. Once the first year class arrives at college, other problems arise. Some of the men are in relationships, and some, as one of my friends would argue, “are just gross.” As a result, you have a large number of women competing to date with a small number of eligible men.

One factor contributing to a lack of eligible men for women to date is that surprise… some men want to date men. The New York Times failed to account for any gay population at UNC. There is a joke amongst students at UNC that the main reason that women have such a hard time finding a date is that so many men are gay. Intrigued that The New York Times failed to mention this point, I decided to run an informal poll amongst my friends to see what percentage of men they thought were gay at UNC. Some of the responses are below:

“FAR above the national average.”

“I think it could easily be 40…”

“30%. I think that as one of the more progressive schools in the south the school attracts lgbtiq people. They think that our progressive climate will be more accepting.”

“Coming from the Midwest, I used to think about 90%! But when I realized the difference in demeanor and style, maybe 10-15%?”

“A LOT… A LOT”

While there is no formal polling done on the number of gay men at UNC, it is likely to be a significant number. It’s unfortunate that the NYT article failed to mention the gay population as a reason that straight women at UNC can’t find men. If we assume that just 20% of men at UNC are gay (the average of my informal responses, and a number that could be accurate based on my experience) that means that instead of 40%, we are looking at 32% of the population being available to single straight women to date, not including men who are in relationships.

In many ways, it may seem trivial to complain that gay men were ignored in this article. Regardless, the majority of people at UNC are straight, so doesn’t this idea speak to the dominant culture? In actuality, ignoring and silencing a minority culture is dangerous. The article implies that everyone at UNC is heterosexual and that everyone is looking to find an opposite sex partner to date. A moderate person who doesn’t care about gay rights and reads this article has no reason to reevaluate their views. Let’s say that this hypothetical person has no gay friends, and their closest exposure to gay men is watching a couple episodes of Will and Grace. By no fault of their own, they live in a world that does not expose them to sexual minorities. This article reinforces the views they have, and fails to depict the reality of experiences of college students at UNC by ignoring gay students. Journalists and the media should not ignore minority groups. For too long, minorities have been made invisible by a culture which fails to tell their stories. We live in a diverse world, and to assume that every female at UNC is

Straight
Goes out to bars on the weekend
Desperately wants to find a man

Does as much disservice to women as it does to assume all men at UNC are straight.

Cross Posted at BlueNC

Two cities in North Carolina are on the brink of beginning historic debates about the role of government in supporting equality and monitoring the private lives of their employees. Early next week, the Asheville City Council is set to debate providing domestic partnership benefits to city employees. Newly elected city council member Gordon Smith has long championed this policy, and he along with the two other new members of council are supportive of the policy. Smith only needs to convince one more member of council to support domestic partnerships, and with several sitting members of council already on the record leaning in favor of the policy, it’s not a matter of if the measure will pass, but by how much.

Providing domestic partnership benefits for city employees is a no-brainer. Not only is it the fair and just thing to do, it makes the city of Asheville more competitive when searching for new hires. Already several cities and counties provide these benefits, and it’s not hard to imagine that a highly qualified woman who identified as a lesbian would choose a job in Durham or Chapel Hill if her partner would not receive basic benefits if she accepted a job in Asheville.

While the city of Asheville is finally moving into the age of wisdom, Wake County is taking a step backward in foolishness by considering not covering abortion in their health plan for city employees. Recently the city of Apex (also in Wake County) decided to no longer cover abortion services in their health insurance plan for city employees, and it appears that other municipalities in North Carolina are now considering a similar action. The ridiculousness of this plan is appalling. Could you imagine the uproar if city leaders decided to arbitrarily cut another benefit, like dental coverage or the co-pay for the flu vaccination? City and county leaders in Wake County are throwing women’s health under the bus for political gain. Let’s hope that Wake County leaders don’t make the same foolish decision as their counterparts in Apex.

Cross Posted at BlueNC: http://www.bluenc.com/tale-two-cities

I am always inspired by the dedication of college students to service and political action, but some days reaffirm those convictions more than others. This year’s Martin Luther King Day of Service was one of those days. I’ve been really fortunate to do work with the Young Democrats chapter at UNC Chapel Hill, and our volunteers did amazing work today. We led several events throughout the day, to both celebrate and commemorate Dr. King’s commitment to public service and social justice.



I began the day with five other Young Dems volunteers at a trash-pick up at the Planned Parenthood office in Chapel Hill. We cleaned the parking lot and highway that ran near the health center. On our exploration we found some epic trash, including a rusty metal pipe, tires, an orange traffic cone, and a sign advertising White Tiger Tae Kwon Do. We also found the typical beer bottles, fast food wrappers and cigarette butts.

In the afternoon, other members went to a can food drive led by Organizing for America and the Orange County Democratic Party. One of my friends commented that it was an incredibly rewarding volunteer experience. People from across Chapel Hill and Orange County brought bags and bags of food, and our members had the opportunity to collect and sort the food for one of the local social justice centers.

We rounded out our day with a phone-bank to contact voters in Massachusetts about the Senate Race. As I’ve blogged about before, tomorrow’s race means a lot for the future of legislative politics in America. If Martha Coakley loses, her Republican challenger has promised to vote against healthcare reform, and he has a less than stellar record when it comes to issues of sexual health and reproductive justice. While the polls are close, I was inspired by the voters I talked to. One woman commented, “One thing’s for sure, after George Bush, I’m never voting for a Republican again!”



While it’s great that students in Young Democrats and at UNC Chapel Hill felt inspired to perform service on MLK Day, it’s important to remember that service needs to be done year round, and our desire to politically engage and speak in support of candidates who reflect our values should not wait until the day before an election. While it is great that we as a country can commit to performing service on MLK Day, our desire to give back to the communities we live in is hopefully not a once a year occurrence. I’m proud that Young Democrats continues to perform service projects throughout the year, and I hope those of you who volunteered in your community this year will not wait until MLK Day next year to do it again.

This Tuesday’s election in Massachusetts will make or break President Obama and the Democrat’s legislative agenda for the next year. Democrat Attorney General Martha Coakley is running a surprisingly competitive race against Republican State Senator Scott Brown to replace Ted Kennedy in the US Senate. Many pundits and experts never expected this race to be competitive for the Democrats. Massachusetts is a notoriously liberal state, and a Republican has not represented Massachusetts in the Senate for decades. Yet Brown and the Republican Party have capitalized on Republican anger and Democratic apathy in this race, and current polls show Brown within striking distance of winning.

If Brown is elected, he has promised to vote against and filibuster the healthcare reform bill. Brown’s election would mean that the Senate would likely move to a standstill. In the current 60-vote culture of the Senate, 41 Republican votes would mean the Republican Party could filibuster any meaningful legislative efforts.

Those of us who care about reproductive and sexual health should also care about Brown’s voting record. In 2005, Senator Brown sponsored an amendment to a bill which allowed doctors to dispense emergency contraceptives to rape victims. His amendment exempted hospital employees from complying with the law if they had religious justification. Many believed that Brown’s amendment would have weakened the final bill to create a major loophole. Even Republican Minority Leader Brian Lees denounced Brown’s effort, saying: “I can't believe what we're doing to this bill. Talk about a poison pill amendment, no pun intended. This is unbelievable. We are saying to women who have been through a traumatic experience, 'by the way there may be some folks in hospitals that don't want to help you so you might have to go somewhere else.’” Major reproductive health organizations in Massachusetts, including NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts, Planned Parenthood, The Massachusetts Women’s Political Caucus and Massachusetts NOW have all endorsed Coakley and criticized Brown’s record on issues related to women’s health.[1]

We don’t make formal endorsements on Amplify for political candidates, but if you feel moved to get involved before the election on Tuesday, you can help, even if you don’t live in Massachusetts. Organizing for America is providing opportunities for activists to phone bank in support of Martha Coakley from their home to voters in Massachusetts. I’ve already made some calls, and hope to make some more on Monday.

You can find that link here- http://my.barackobama.com/page/votercontact/login?requested=/page/votercontact/make_calls%3Fcampaign_id%3DfnrU

In the name of being bi-partisan, here is a link to Scott Brown’s website. His campaign is also running phonebanks from home.

 http://www.brownforussenate.com/

For the last week, I have spent time sleeping on the floor in a community center in Lumberton, North Carolina. Lumberton is located in Robeson County, which is the poorest county in NC. Robeson is a very diverse community, and the Lumbee American Indian tribe makes up a large percentage of the population.

I visited Robeson County with eight other students participating in an Alternative Winter Break Trip, run by the APPLES Service Learning Center at UNC. We spent the week learning about the culture, visiting non-profits in the area, and performing service in the community.

On Friday, we visited Sacred Pathways, a soup kitchen and social justice center in Penbroke, the neighboring city to Lumberton. As we walked around the center, I couldn’t help but notice that there were several posters displayed about sexually transmitted infections, and brochures and condoms were laid out with other educational material.

During our question and answer time, I asked Dr. Ruth Woods, the director of Sacred Pathways, about her experience doing work on health and sexuality with a low socio-economic status population. She commented that Sacred Pathways brought an AIDS testing van to the center every three months. They provided the people who came to their soup kitchen with a bag of grooming products as an incentive to get tested. If participants did have a positive test result for HIV, Sacred Pathways had staff members who could sit down with them and explain to them the resources and options in their community. “This is taking it to the streets!” she commented.

Dr. Woods also mentioned that she had attempted to get the AIDS van taken into the public schools and housing centers in Robeson County, but had faced protests by members of the school board and directors of the community housing centers. She commented that at times social justice work was a “constant struggle against a system that keeps people oppressed.” I was inspired and excited by the work that Dr. Woods does. She feeds dozens of homeless and hungry people every week, and she and the rest of the staff at Sacred Pathways also invest their energy in creating a world where the disadvantaged have the basic resources and necessities that they need.

For more info on the APPLES Program at UNC, visit this link- http://www.unc.edu/apples/. 

On a recent episode of One Life to Live, history was made. On the December 30 episode of the popular soap opera, Kyle Lewis and Oliver Fish had sex for the first time. While this was not the first time that a gay couple has had sex on a soap opera, is was the first time that a gay sex scene was actually AIRED on daytime television. No the scene wasn’t soft core porn. Lewis and Fish were treated the same as any other couple might, with their encounter preceded by shots of them lighting candles, undressing each other, and touching passionately.

 

Gay characters have increased in appearance and visibility in soap operas over the last couple of years. Luke and Noah have become a staple on As The World Turns, facing the same kind of struggles that heterosexual couples would face. Faked marriages, blindness, infidelity, hospital visits, and rocky relationships with a father who attempts to kill the love of your life? These were the challenges that Luke and Noah faced, and they were just as outrageous as the challenges the heterosexual couples faced. The soap opera The Young and The Restless has also featured several gay characters as well.

As I’ve posted on Amplify before, our personal lives are political. Visibility in the popular media is just as important as political gains. When moderate voters across the country vote on ballot initiatives or politics that impact LGBTQ individuals, they are more likely to vote for equality when they have gay or lesbian friends. If you watch As The World Turns, you have seen Luke and Noah onscreen as their relationship develops for several years. Is that the same as having a gay best friend? No, not necessarily. But if you do not know any openly gay people, I’d rather you have some exposure to gay and lesbian characters through popular culture. As Oliver and Kyle’s relationship continues, let’s hope their trials and tribulations are just as shocking as other couple’s on the show. Anyone up for an appearance by Kyle’s twin sister who he didn’t know he had who now identifies as a man?

I have a confession to make. I love animated films! Everything from classic Disney to Pixar, from Miyazaki to Wallace and Gromit, I love them all. Unfortunately, as one ages, it no longer is socially acceptable to attend animated films that are indented for children. Fortunately, I have a large group of friends, many of whom like animated films just as much as I do, who don’t mind going along.

 

I was recently snowed in at college and was not able to brave the long drive home to the mountains, so my friend and I decided to take in a showing of “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” at the local second-run theatre in town. Today I went to see “The Princess and the Frog” with Olivia and Emma, two of my friends from home. After reflecting on these movies, it is interesting to think about the message that these modern animated films send to young audiences.

“Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” tells the story of a young nerdy scientist. He constantly invents new contraptions which fail miserably, and is frequently teased and tormented by his peers. He never feels like he fits in amongst people his own age. His mother tells him that she will always love him and he should stay true to himself. The female lead in the film tries to hide her nerdiness by not wearing glasses and pretending not to like science, but by the end of the film chooses to embrace her inner nerd. Halfway through the movie, I turned to my friend and said, “I get it. This is all just an allegory for being gay in America in the twenty-first century!” She laughed and we continued to watch the movie. At the close of the film, we discussed the symbolic nature of the piece. While we first laughed off our initial thoughts about the films statements about homosexuality, in reality the piece did have something important to say to young people. Be true to yourself. Cheesy, I know, but this is an important message that young people need to hear. While I read the film as being about feeling uncomfortable about one’s sexuality, another young person might think the film speaks to their insecurity as a person of color, or as a non-able bodied individual. It’s fantastic that so many animated films of today send youth the message that they are perfect in their body, and don’t need to change.

 

I left “The Princess and the Frog” having an interesting discussion with Olivia and Emma. They are both in middle school, and the target audience for this film. As we left the theatre, Olivia commented that she preferred the movie to the usual Disney fair.

 

“It was more realistic.”

“No it wasn’t! People don’t turn into frogs!” said Emma.

“No, ok that wasn’t realistic, but I appreciated that she was rewarded for working hard.”

As many people have already commented, “The Princess and the Frog” depicts a heroine who is not afraid to roll up her sleeves and get to work. Not only that, but the film also challenges our standards of beauty. In the film, Tiana and the prince visit Mama Odie, a vodo priestess who lives in the swamp who can help them become human again. Mama Odie tells them that they might be happy staying frogs. She comments that they may need to reconsider their priorities, commenting in her song Dig A Little Deeper that

“Don't matter where you come from,
don't even matter what you are!
A dog, a pig, a cow, a goat;
We got em' all in here!”

Mama Odie’s message is something all young people can take to heart. It’s nice to see animated films that feature characters with large personalities, who grapple with, and are ultimately comfortable with their identities. We’ve come a long way from Snow White!

This week, the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender – Straight Alliance at UNC Chapel Hill held a discussion about the state of testing for Sexually Transmitted Infections at UNC. Currently students at UNC can receive a blood test for HIV free of charge. The test results take two weeks to return from the lab. This is the only test that Campus Health and Wellness administers free of charge. Other tests, from an instant oral swab for HIV to Chlamydia, cost anywhere from $20-$60. Many of our peer institutions, including the University of Michigan and the University of Wisconsin provide STI testing to their students free of charge.

Should all STI testing be free? Several arguments were discussed and analyzed. A representative from Campus Health and Wellness explained that the message they have received from administrators at Health and Wellness is that the services they provide free of charge are services that all students can take advantage of. All students have a number of free counseling sessions, and basic meetings with doctors are covered. Above and beyond that, services that an individual student and their medical provider decide they need, such as X-rays, require students to pay at least a portion of the costs. Providing STI testing free of charge would require students to pay more in student fees, and not all students are sexually active, thus we are requiring some students to pay for a service that they will not use.

In reality, we have plenty of student fees that not everyone takes advantage of. Students at UNC pay fees that keep the gym and fitness center operating, and provide for free tickets to athletic events and theatrical performances. Student fees pay for a diverse range of speakers throughout the year, and students are able to attend these events free of charge. While I appreciate all of these services, some of my peers have never set foot in the gym, or they have no interest in attending an artistic piece. Last year the students voted to increase funding to support a childcare initiative for students with children. I am unlikely to benefit from this service, yet I don’t resent paying for it because I benefit from plenty of student fees that students with children may not.

When it comes down to it, what we choose to pay for through student fees is symbolic of what services we choose to value. At UNC we value the arts, fitness, and we definitely value athletics. At this time, we don’t value testing our students for sexually transmitted infections. Not paying for all STI testing reinforces the taboo of getting tested and unfortunately, makes students less likely to get tested. Making people pay money does not discipline or force people to be abstinent; it causes them to forgo testing.

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The television show Glee has become a favorite of young people across the country. Many appreciate Glee for its catchy musical numbers and larger-than-life characters, yet underneath Glee’s glossy appearance is a story that defies stereotypes while challenging our pre-conceived notions of geeky students in high school.

The character of Kurt for several episodes of the season seemed to exist as nothing more than the stereotypical closeted yet feminine high school male. Yet as the season has progressed, the creators of the show have allowed the character of Kurt to emerge from behind his label and become a fully realized human being. At the beginning of the season he came out to his friend Mercedes, and several episodes later he came out to his father, in a moment that was both honest and heartbreaking. Kurt’s father works in a mechanical garage, and the writers set up the audience to think that Kurt’s father’s gruff exterior would mean that he would disapprove of his son’s gay identity. Yet when Kurt finally told him, his father stated that he had known all along, and while he may be slightly uncomfortable about his son’s sexuality, he can start to be accepting.

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