Evergon

It happened just this way ...

"When I went for the job in Ottawa, my mother (I wasn't sure that I wanted
the job)-my mother is sometimes really quite amazing-she said, "Oh just wear
drag, they'll never hire you in drag." So I just got dressed up in some of my
finest drag and went off to the job interview. And they hired me! So I thought,
if I got hired in drag, I can now work in drag, so for the first few years that
I taught at the University of Ottawa I was in drag every day. And knock wood I
never got the shit kicked out of me. I'm a big man, so people didn't quite know
what to do with a big man with a beard in a dress." - Artist Evergon in an interview at the Ontario College of Art & Design, Toronto, by Bill Pusztai

Think about that, in 1972 this man went to a University dressed in drag everyday and taught his students. Evergon is one of Canada's most famous photographic artists. What's the chance that would happen today in Canada, and just for fun, what is the chance it would happen in the USA?

evergon, Politics, Queer, GLBT,gay,art

NHL Hockey is going Pink

Hockey is going Pink

Yep tonight and Sunday hockey players, as many as four hundred of them in the NHL will use Pink Sticks. Now Pink is not a colour one expects in the NHL, what with all the macho boys there. It's not what you may think.

In an effort to raise awareness and money for breast cancer, Hockey manufacturer TPS Hockey, is spending $50,000 to fund the "think pink" movement, which came to fruition shortly after the death of Phyllis Gretzky, Wayne's mother, who died from cancer this year and owner Paul Walker's sister.

The company is contributing the $50,000 cost of the sticks and paint. Sydney Crosby and Mats Sundin are in the pink. The sticks used in games this weekend will be sold at auction for Breast Cancer research.

And if your are interested in Gay guys playing hockey, (they don't use pink sticks) you can check it out here at Gay Hockey International.

You can also take in some top rate hockey this summer as gay and lesbain hockey players take part in the 1st World Out Games in Montreal this summer!

Brokeback Mountain Roadtrip!

Brokeback Mountain was filmed in Alberta and now Travel Alberta offers up the Brokeback Mountain road tour. The tour has maps and details of the shooting. Go have a look if you want to see where it all happened.

For instance, the opening scene, the highway shot was done on Highway 22 - see Brokeback Mountain take 3. Want the clothes off of Jake and Heath's back, go to the retro/vintage clothing store, Divine Decadence, in Calgary and Edmonton.

And did you know what Ang Lee's favourite dining place is? Anywhere? It's Dairy Queen. According to Travel Alberta that was the first place he ate in America. Who knew.

Check out the map at Travel Alberta here!

Brokeback Mountain, Movies, Films, Gay, heath ledger, Current Affairs, Alberta

Colorado sticks it to gays

A domestic-partnership license in Colorado will set you back five times what a marriage license costs. Now what would be the logic in that. One is tempted to say "Only in America" when you see this kind of thing happening.

Marriage licenses $10.
Domestic-partnership licenses $52.
Republican mean spiritedness Priceless

The rational used to charge a fee 5 times more for a domestic partnership is to create a defense fund within the Colorado Civil Rights Commission. The State of Colorado is charging a minority group a fee to protect their rights when its the duty of the State to protect everyones rights.

The Rocky Mountain News reported that some people likened it to a "poll tax once charged to Southern blacks during the segregation era to exercise their right to vote".

Republicans added the measure claiming the State would have to deal with discrimination cases as a result of the rights afforded gays, lesbians and Trans people. Republican Rep. Bill Crane told Rocky Maountain News, "Some people would view these types of relationships as abnormal and would not want their taxpayer dollars used in this endeavor."

I was tempted to say "Only in America" instead I think I will say "God Bless only straight America".



gay, GLBT, civil rights, Politics, Current Affairs, Colorado

Health care tough for Gay Seniors

Its tough out there for Gay Seniors. Now that is hardly news to me and many of you come here.

A report released today out of McGill University has a study to prove what so many have known within the gay community.

"People were once forced into psychiatric institutions ... so going to a doctor was a very fearful experience for many people," said Bill Ryan, a researcher from the McGill School of Social Work. "There were also instances where health care professionals reacted in "disgust when someone says that they're gay or lesbian in front of a health care professional."

The study will help address the problems faced by the LGBTQ communities by shedding light on homophobic attitudes within the health care system from Mental health to emergency wards to llong term care.

In my work largely with gay men I would often askj if they had told their Doctor they were gay. More often than not they had not shared this information. The reasons were similar, scared, they would tell my family, I live in a small community, he's anti gay.

Now having been an out gay guy for years I have made sure my Doctor knew I was gay, I saw the need to let my doctor know. Yet many before and since are still scared. The gay seniors grew up with being classed as suffering with a mental illness at best, as a pervert at worst.

So while many gays entering the health care system have good experiances, too many don't.

Read more here...

$364 million to keep gays out

Since 1993, about 10,000 otherwise qualified servicemembers have been forced out, including those in crucial occupations such as code-breakers, intelligence and medical specialists, air traffic controllers and translators. At a time of tight budgets and stretched-thin forces, the Defense Department has spent $364 million to recruit and train replacements for those discharged, says a blue ribbon panel that includes former Defense secretary William Perry. - USA Today, March 9, 2006

I guess we can say one thing about Republicans and some of those chicken Democrats attitudes toward gay Americans, no amount of money or lack of common human decency can be spent on keeping gays in the closet!

My own experiance growing up was that people that knew me before they found out I was gay liked me. I worked hard to be good at my work, to help others because if I did that maybe they would see a decent nice guy there in front of them and then maybe they would not be so quick to "hate" who or what I was.

The problems usually came when someone discovered the nice guy they have come to know was gay. It seems they figured I had misled them. Being gay means having to come out of the closet every day of your life if you want to avoid accusations you are not trying to deceive.

The Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy of the US Military is a catch 22 for gays. When you are with your buds and they are ask why you don't have a girlfriend, why you don't want to go to the strip club, why you don't talk about getting some hot chick to bed, you can't tell them you are gay can you. If you do you are breaking the rules. If you don't tell them you are lying to them or at least that is what your buds feel.

One can always say you are saving yourself for the right girl, a lie, or join in the banter, another lie, or try to ignore it. If you would like to try this try to imagine you can't tell someone you like girls, you can't talk about your "lust" for that woman that walked by or talk about the little woman at home. Imagine what that would do to you. I bet it can't be done.

Submissions leading Tolerance

What is Tolerance? We have come a long way Baby! Some people providing great classroom materials are looking for your ideas, your work in this field. I repost below a request for submissions from the Southern Poverty Law Center. Please forward this request to your friends, to teachers, to those that may be interested. We cannot leave this work to Brokeback Mountain or to someone else...

T E A C H I N G T O L E R A N C E

A project of the Southern Poverty Law Center
March 2, 2006

GET PUBLISHED!

Do you have a tolerance-related classroom activity other teacherscould use? Teaching Tolerance magazine seeks innovative classroomactivities using active, hands-on, experiential learning techniquesthat can be implemented in one or two class periods.Selected activities will be published in the magazine, which reachesmore than 500,000 educators twice a year; or in a new Activity Exchange booklet, to be released this fall. Interested in submitting a manuscript or seeing examples?

You can also e-mail ( cobrien@splcenter.org) or mail your submissions:
Colleen O'Brien, Curriculum Specialist
c/o Teaching Tolerance
400 Washington Ave.
Montgomery, AL 36104

Tolerance, education, Family, school

Texas Tickle or the new Texas Two Step

By now most of you have heard the lyrics to Willie Nelson's recording of "Cowboys Are Secretly, Frequently (Fond of Each Other)". And that has tickled some Texan folks a bit the wrong way. Wonder why that would be hey cowboy? How can you argue with Willie many would ask? I mean who is more Texan - George W Bush or Willie Nelson? Does George junior match the iconic stature of either Willie or his buddy Darrell Royal, the famed head coach of the University of Texas Longhorns...

"Willie is a character, but he's ours" is the heading of a column written by JOHN KELSO of Cox News Service this past Thursday, March 02, 2006.

What set Scott off was a song Willie came out with recently called "Cowboys Are Secretly, Frequently (Fond of Each Other)." Hey, I would have preferred it if Willie had done a song called, "How 'Bout That Bears Game?" But what the heck? "I don't hate the guy," Scott said. "But then, when he came out with that song. And he says cowboys want to show their feminine side. Give me a break."

Now don't get the wrong idea here. I am not sugggesting Willie or Darrel have something going so to speak, they happen to be buddies and if Willie Nelson can sing about gay cowboys even if he isn't one and can be buddies with one of the gridiron's favourite sons and two straight actors can make us believe they are in love with each other over there on Brokeback Mountain, you have to accept that this just might be the beginning of the end of the compassionate conservative world as we know it.

I may be ahead of myself here as lots of work lays ahead of us. GWB still sits in the White House and he has enough friends in Congress that suffer from self inflicted gag responses at the mere mention of cowboys making out with each other. Heck even some good ole boys in the Donkey party gag.

Now all we need would be a few of you queer boys and Brokeback cowboys to get involved, sign up and work in 2006 to defeat some of these gagers. I have a whole list of links to Help America posted at Politics in BC. You will find them in the sidebar.

Politics, Queer, Lesbian, GLBT, Brokeback Mountain, gay, Willie Nelson