“NewsWrap"
for the week ending March 7, 2009
(As broadcast on "This Way Out" program #1,093, distributed 3-9-09)
[Written by Greg Gordon, with thanks to Rex Wockner with Bill Kelley]

Reported this week by DonnaAnn Ward and Rick Watts

  Jamaica’s Prime Minister Bruce Golding said this week during parliamentary debate on a new sexual offenses bill that his country will not decriminalize consensual adult homosexual acts, and that he has a duty to "protect" the country.  "We are not going to yield to the pressure,” he told the lawmakers, “whether that pressure comes from individual organizations, individuals, whether that pressure comes from foreign governments or groups of countries, to liberalize the laws as it relates to buggery.”
But gay journalist Rex Wockner reports that new regulations issued by Jamaica's Broadcasting Commission now prohibit the airing of songs and videos that depict sex acts, or glorify arson, rape, shooting or murder, which would presumably ban homophobic dancehall music that lyrically advocates violence against gays and lesbians.  LGBT activists have campaigned for years against what they call the "murder music" of Jamaican artists such as Sizzla, Bounty Killer, Elephant Man, Vybz Kartel, Beenie Man, Buju Banton, T.O.K. and Capleton.
Rampant anti-queer hatred is evident in the wider culture of the Caribbean island nation, however, with almost-routine reports of mob attacks against gay men.  According to J-FLAG, the Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All-sexuals and Gays, more than 30 gay men have been murdered there in the past decade.  International human rights organizations have described Jamaica as one of the most homophobic countries in the world.

  Elsewhere, however, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and his wife Sarah held a reception at 10 Downing Street this week to celebrate the work of LGBT equality activists.
It was the first time any Prime Minister has held a formal reception for LGBT people at the official residence.  Politicians, civil servants, activists, entertainers, teachers and clergy were among those invited to the event.
The P.M. paid tribute to the “enormous courage” of community activists, saying that he was "really proud" of the achievements that had been made over the years in breaking down barriers based on homophobia and discrimination.  He told the cheering crowd that “we will keep taking legislative measures to protect you."
Taking on California’s Proposition 8, he said that "You cannot legislate love."  He called the voter-approved revocation of marriage equality "unacceptable."

  And California’s Supreme Court heard more than 3 hours of oral arguments on March 5th in combined lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of that November ballot initiative.
The Justices, by a 4-to-3 margin last May, ruled that the state constitution guaranteed the right of same-gender couples to marry.  According to most reports about the mu ch-anticipated hearing this week, however, the justices may be reluctant to overturn the voter-approved Proposition 8, which reversed their ruling by a 52-to-48 margin in November.
But there was general consensus that the high court would not annul the almost 19,000 same-gender marriages that took place during the few months that they were legal last year.  Proposition 8 defenders had also asked the Court to void those marriages.
The other basic question the judges considered was whether the ballot initiative was an amendment to the Constitution, which requires a simple majority vote of the people, or a revision to that document, which would require approval by two-thirds of the legislature and then a popular vote.  Anti-Prop 8 lawyers argued that the ballot measure changed the fundamental equal protection provisions of the California constitution, and was therefore a revision, requiring the more arduous process.
Shannon Minter of the National Center for Lesbian Rights was the lead lawyer for the groups seeking to overturn the marriage ban.  "A simple majority cannot be permitted to take away rights from a historical disadvantaged minority,” he argued, “without substantially altering the very operation and purpose of equal protection, and the court's ability to fulfill its core constitutional function of enforcing equal protection."

  The justices appeared hesitant, however, to overturn a popular vote.  They repeatedly interrupted presentations by anti-Prop 8 attorneys with sharp challenges to thei r legal arguments, while the lead attorney for Proposition 8 defenders, Kenneth Starr � yes, the same special prosecutor who went after the Clinntons in the 1990s � was given freer reign.
Chief Justice Ronald George, who wrote the majority opinion in last year’s decision that granted marriage rights to gay and lesbian couples, noted that the California constitution has been amended hundreds of times since its inception in 1849, while the U.S. Constitution has been amended only 27 times.
Justice Joyce Kennard was reportedly the critical fourth vote in the May 2008 4-to-3 marriage equality ruling.  She said the issue presented in that case addressed “the court’s authority to interpret a statutory provision in light of the state constitution,” and that the Proposition 8 case was “completely different.”
“We have a pretty well established body of law in California pertaining to what is and what is not a revision,” she said.  “Those decisions do not give strong support to your position... the right of the people to alter or change the provision of the state constitution has been a basic right,” Kennard added, “but you would have us choose between these rights... the inalienable right to marry and the right of people to change the constitution as they see fit.”

  Lead Prop 8 defender Kenneth Starr argued that the measure was valid because "The people do have the raw power to define rights... The people are=2 0sovereign and they can do very unwise things, and things that tug at the equality principle."  When Chief Justice George asked whether an amendment taking away the right to free speech would be valid under his reasoning, for example, Starr said it would, “as long as it is in fact clear to the people what they’re voting on.”
The California Supreme Court has 90 days to issue its ruling.

  U.S. President Barack Obama’s campaign promises included the repeal of the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, which forbids recognition by federal agencies of legally-married same-gender couples, and repeal of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, which allows military service by gays and lesbians, but only if they remain in the closet.  He’s necessarily focused his energies since taking office less than 2 months ago on the global economic crisis and healthcare reform, but efforts to repeal those 2 federal laws were initiated this week.
The first serious challenge to DOMA, enacted in 1996 during the Clinton administration, was filed in federal court by the Boston-based Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, or GLAD, which led the legal battle for marriage equality in Massachusetts.  The group represents 8 couples and 3 surviving spouses who were legally married in the state, but have been denied federal benefits such as Social Security spousal payments and the right to file joint federal tax returns.  Same-gender partners who wed in Massachusetts can fi le state tax returns as married couples, but DOMA requires them to file federal returns as individuals and subjects them to much higher tax rates.
Some equality activists have warned that a legal challenge to DOMA would be perilous at this moment in history, and that its likely journey up the judicial ladder would ultimately reach a less-than-welcoming U.S. Supreme Court.  GLAD, which may be counting on a more hospitable federal judiciary as President Obama appoints new judges, is also calling for a parallel political effort to overturn DOMA in Congress.

  And a bill to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” implemented in 1993, also during the Clinton administration, was filed this week in the U.S. House of Representatives.  Lead sponsor Ellen O. Tauscher, a California Democrat, said the Military Enhancement Readiness Act would replace the ban on military service by open gays and lesbians with new provisions prohibiting discrimination in the Armed Forces based on sexual orientation.  A similar version of the bill had 149 bipartisan cosponsors in the House last year, although then-President George W. Bush was expected to veto the measure if it had reached his desk.
Dr. Nathaniel Frank, senior research fellow at the Palm Center at the University of California � Santa Barbara, and the author of “Unfriiendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America,” told openly lesbian Rachel Maddow on her MSNBC cable show this week that the so-called “unit cohesion” argument its proponent advanced to defend “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was “based on nothing.”  He said military officials he spoke with told him that “It was rooted in their own prejudices and fears.  They even said they didn't know what sexual orientation meant.”
“We now have the research,” he said, “showing that openly gay service doesn't have any negative impact on the military.   And, in fact, the policy itself is what's causing us to lose soldiers and to force service members to lie to one another.  And that's bad for unit cohesion.”

  And finally, in a strange bit of irony, organizers of a planned mid-February anti-homophobia demonstration in the Central Square of Gomel, Belarus have filed suit over the city's ban of the event.  Organizers had agreed to be responsible for public order and safety, to ensure onsite access to medical services, and to clean the area afterward.  Their complaint says the city’s action violated organizers' right to freedom of assembly guaranteed by the eastern European nation’s constitution.
It’s reportedly the first time that LGBT activists in Belarus have sued for their constitutional rights in the country’s courts.





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