IDAHO 2009: One Voice, One Message, Heard Around the World.

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Fidelity: Don't Divorce ...

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Angels in America

"While we have come a long way since the Stonewall riots in 1969, we still have a lot of work to do. Too often, the issue of LGBT rights is exploited by those seeking to divide us. But at its core, this issue is about who we are as Americans. It's about whether this nation is going to live up to its founding promise of equality by treating all its citizens with dignity and respect."

-- Barack Obama, June 1, 2007

We all know that we judge people based on first impressions, and it is this reason that last night I was rather mad. For those of you who don’t know, Bishop Gene Robinson was the first openly gay Bishop to be ordained in the Anglican Church. He was a major tremor in the schism of the worldwide Anglican community. Another thing you might not know is that he led an invocation during Sunday’s welcoming concert for the new president. He was offered the position after severe criticism of Barack Obama’s choice of Pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at Obama’s inauguration. Rick Warren is an evangelical conservative, which in this situation translates as being strongly against gay marriage and strongly against the homosexual agenda.

The problem was that while offering the position to Bishop Gene Robinson was a sensible olive branch to the gay community, the invocation was not televised on American broadcaster HBO, even though the rest of the concert was. It was later reported that this was due to an execution error on behalf of Obama’s inaugural committee and that amends are being made, including the invocation being screened at later dates. For a man being hailed as the true representation of diversity in America, this slip up will undoubtedly have some major repercussions with sceptics.

We all also know that people can be very different when you get to know them, and that looks can be deceiving. During his inauguration, President Barack Obama announced the launch of a new website, Whitehouse.gov. On there, under the topic of Civil Rights, are eight promises made by Obama to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community. These are, in no particular order, to repeal ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’, the policy banning gay people from the military; to support full civil unions and federal rights for LGBT couples; to promote AIDS prevention; to expand hate crime legislation to include LGBT people; to tackle workplace discrimination; to expand adoption rights to be inclusive of LGBT couples; to oppose a constitutional ban on same sex marriage; to empower women to prevent HIV and AIDS.

These are not bold promises. All but one of these are laws or policies already in place in the UK, the exception being empowering women (arguably the least LGBT related point as well). That, however, is not the point. The statement itself sends a direct positive message to the LGBT community, whose faith might have been starting to waiver.

As one of my favourite gay opinion sites boldly states, ‘Obama is not the Gay messiah’, he is just a man, one with the responsibility of the world on his shoulders. As a community, we need to offer the new President our trust. Gay rights in America will not change overnight, but we need to offer the benefit of the doubt that eventually it will happen.

“Bless us with patience and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be fixed anytime soon and the understanding that our next president is a human being, not a messiah.”

-- Gene Robinson, January 18, 2009

Wow 2009

Wow, 2008, a very different year. 2008 was the year I started my first proper full time job, one which, even though I started as agency staff, I have managed to obtain permanently. 2008 was the year where I expanded my volunteer positions to much more senior ones. 2008 was the year where family became more important than friends again.

To me, 2008 was very different to 2007. 2007 was my first proper gay year and in comparison, 2008 was less fun. It was also much more of an eye opener. I feel that i’ve matured to more than the slightly naive, overly trusting boy that I was. I’ve made mistakes but i’ve learnt from them. I’ve made successes and i’ve learnt from them as well.

As i’ve said somewhere else, 2009 will be a different year. It’s the year I finish uni, and all that came with it, including various societies and Union positions. Obviously i’ve had a full time job last year, so that’s not a new experience to get my head around, but it will be the year I start to look for my future career for the next 40 to 50 years. I predict I won’t keep contact with a lot of friends, but will make more of an effort with other ones. I possibly take out a mortgage on my house. I imagine i’ll quit one of my volunteering positions in a flaming explosion of an exit, but I don’t know which one. It might be the year for my first proper long term boyfriend, but i’m unsure about that still.

My New Year’s resolution is to get up earlier. I’ve stuck to it so far (one morning down, 364 to go). Don’t think I stuck to many of my previous year’s resolutions. 08. Two of three apparently, not bad. Actually, some of my predictions came true as well. Guess I should make some for 2009.

1. A large Gay charity will dissolve itself. I would put money on the GMFA (Gay Men Fighting AIDS). They lost a lot of their London contracts this year to THT (Terrence Higgins Trust), and as they’ve failed to nationalise themselves very well, I think they will lose more this year.

2. The single equality bill will make steps forward this year, but this will be to the detriment of LGBT rights, which will step backwards this year, due to political instability, religious influence, far right extremism and the current financial situation.

3. One or more religious groups will slip up and be criticised by groups other than LGBT groups, namely groups tackling racism, sexism and disability discrimination.

4. Pride events will be less commercially successful than in 2008, however IDAHO (the International Day Against Homophobia) will have its most successful year yet, acting as a political alternative to Pride.

5. A premiership footballer will come out, around about the same time as the FA launch their anti homophobia campaign. Negative press reaction will result in the footballer quitting his profession.

6. America, even under Barak Obama, will become more homophobic, particularly due to the aftermath of Proposition 8, whereby all previously legal gay marriages will be annulled.

7. There will be riots in Australia by LGBT right activists, due to the abandoned government promise on equality for LGBT people, as well as religious influence.

8. There will be a high profile killing of a young gay male. Probably not in London.

9. A number of local authorities will be criticised by LGBT campaigners due to them abandoning funding for LGBT youth groups due to the financial crisis.

10. Queer Youth Network will finally be nationally recognised (ok, maybe hopeful :P).

Enjoy 2009. I hope it brings you what you want.

Why Do I Do This?

A couple of days ago, someone accused me of being a CV hunter. For those of you that don't know me too well, here's a list of things I do in my spare time. I write the intranet pages for Merseyside Police's Gay and Lesbian Support Network. I volunteer for the committee of my Student Union LGBT group. I'm chair of my Student Union Council. I'm a course rep. I volunteer for St John Ambulance and i'm on the Union Society Committee. I write for my Student Newspaper. Obviously i'm a Category Moderator on here. I'm the young person rep for the Liverpool LGBT Network. And most recently, i've become a volunteer for Stonewall's youth participation programme, where i've also volunteered to be on the steering committee.

I guess a while ago I did some of these things for my CV, though mainly I did them because I enjoyed doing them and they meant a lot to me. But to have it flung back in my face like that, as if I wasn't appreciated, really hurt. You'd be hard pressed to find someone who does as much as I do, though perhaps QYN would be one of the few places where actually you would, but otherwise, a lot of the positions i've stood for i've managed to get uncontested, because assumedly no one else was interested in doing them.

I realised, when I took a gap year last year, that all the volunteering in the world will still end up being only one page on your CV, while the rest is qualifications and past work experience. To put it bluntly, i'm not going to get a Stats job just for being a gay activist.

So why do I do it all? I do it because I enjoy doing it, because it feels really good to be doing something that other people appreciate, because it's been my primary way of meeting new people since uni, and because i'm not one of those students who spends all their student loan on alcohol and take aways. I want to make something of my life, and not just for my CV, but for me, so I can look back on my life and say that I really have made a difference.

I'm still considering whether to post this on Facebook (most of my blogs are posted both here on QYN and then on blogger, which in turn goes on Facebook), because if I do that then I suspect the person that offended me so will read this, and i've not told him yet that actually he really offended me when he said that, and perhaps he doesn't know, or perhaps he does.

So for a change, i'm actually going to ask for responses to my problem.

Thanks.

And as this is now on Facebook, it's because people have managed to convince me to post this.

I’m Coming Out

Coming out (verb) - The scariest seconds of a gay person’s life


October 11th is National Coming Out Day, that is to say, a day where support, information and guidance on coming out is provided. Not like Halloween, we don’t all come out of the woodwork and prowl town looking for innocent victims. That’s Pride. Approximately 7% of the population is estimated as being lesbian, gay, bisexual or trans (LGBT), or every 1 in 15 people. Meaning a third of student flats should have a gay person in them.

For some people, they would have already come out before, so coming out at uni would have been a breeze. They probably did it when they first met their flat mates, over a drink in the kitchen before a big night out. For others, they might not have come out back home, but wanted to at uni, so they got paralytic and blurted it out to their flat mates along with the vomit. For a few, it’s probably still a secret. They’re still measuring up their flat mates, calculating what their reactions could be, when they should come out, how they should do it, in fact, agonising over every little detail to act almost as an excuse for not doing it.

I’m going to promise you now, that coming out is really easy. Scary perhaps, but easy. You can do it in just two words. Repeat after me. I’m gay. There, done. Now the scary part is coming, peoples reactions. When I came out in first year, I didn’t do it with all my flat mates around. In fact, I was in a taxi going into town with a few of the guys from my flat and some of girls from the flat opposite. It was, I guess, a little scary, but the topic of conversation just turned to people being gay, and seeing this once in a conversation opportunity, I blurted it out, ‘I’m gay you know’, as if they should have known. ‘Cool’ I think was the response, as adequate a response as I could have hoped for, and the conversation moved on.

If you want some good tips on how to come out, then I’ve got a few. If you’re a guy, play that Diana Ross song, very loud, on repeat. Your flat mates will get the message. If you’re a girl, join the rugby team. If you’re bi, do both. If you want some less stereotypical and borderline offensive ways of coming out, try wearing rainbow colours, or ask your flat mates if they’ll come to the LGBT society meeting with you, go buy a gay magazine (or get a free one on the second floor of the Students Union), watch Rick and Steve on E4, Wednesday at 10:30, invite your friends for a pint at The Lisbon. The list is endless.

So I may have painted a pretty picture of how it’ll all be ok when you come out, but in reality, I know that sometimes people just aren’t accepting. If that’s the case, talk to someone, be it the university student support service, the advice centre at the Union, someone from the LGBT society, your personal tutor, anyone that can point you in the right direction. There is a lot of support out there, you just need to access it.

I just wanted to take a minute as well to give my support to anyone coming out as trans at uni. In the 21st Century, society is definitely becoming more accepting towards gay people, but trans acceptance is a good twenty years behind. To those reading this, even if you don’t understand trans as anything more than a girl wanting to be a guy, or vice versa, I really hope that if a new flat mate of yours does come out as trans, you can accept them for who they are.

Final words, don’t come out on a post it note. No one will believe you.