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queerVOICE
Bisexual Enough
James Duggan
copyright 2010
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It sometimes appears to me that our
bisexual brothers and sisters are the black sheep of the queer
community. They are the elusive "B" in the LGBT acronym who often feel
that they are neither welcomed nor respected by the larger community. For years, I've heard from many gay men
that there is really no such thing as bisexuals. The common belief (really,
perhaps, the assumption) is that bisexuals are just confused gay men or
lesbians who refuse to accept who they really are.Bisexuals are
both scoffed at and belittled for their alleged sexual identity. Many believe that someone who claims to be bisexual isn't really
gay enough to be members of our community.
So goes the case of three bisexual men suing the North American
Gay Amateur Athletic Alliance (NAGAAA) because it deemed them not gay enough to
participate in the Gay Softball World Series held in the Seattle area two years ago.
The three plaintiffs played on a team called D2 that qualified for
the 2008 competition which stipulates that "each team can have no more
than two heterosexual players."
After a competing team complained, the lawsuit says, the alliance ruled the three
bisexual men were "nongay" and stripped D2 of it second-place finish,
The Seattle
Times reported.
The dispute erupted in the middle of the championship game and
play was stopped several times because of protests. The plaintiffs charge
that they were grilled in front of a crowd of about 25 people as to their
sexual attractions and desires, purportedly to determine their gayness.
The lawsuit alleges that one of the
plaintiffs was told: "This is the Gay World Series, not the Bisexual World
Series." The three men accuse the NAGAAA of violating Washington state law barring discrimination.
The alliance has no category or definition for bisexual or transgender people
in its rules, the plaintiff's attorney said.
This case is a clear example of the
struggles bisexual men (and, by implication, bisexual women) face in our
community.
Closer to home, there is an example of
one political candidate, Gregg Kravitz, who is running for the Pennsylvania
State Representative seat for the 182nd District, who publicly
states that he is a bisexual man. A fact I have no reason to dispute. But
his opponent, Babette Josephs, has publicly questioned, even challenged, the
legitimate status of his sexual orientation and identity and accused him of
lying to our community because he currently has a girlfriend. (For more
details, visit philly.com for the
"identity politics" article in The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 22, 2010, by
Thomas Fitzgerald.)Others have questioned weather he is gay enough to be recognized
as a member of our community.
What is wrong with us when it comes to accepting
bisexuals into our community? Why do we struggle so much with the reality
that some people maybe legitimately attracted to both sexes?
We need to get over our own "collective" sexual
phobia when it comes to bisexuality by recognizing and embracing the "B" in the
LGBT community. It's time for us to free ourselves of the personal
discrimination that we project on bisexuals.
We must embrace bisexuals in the larger sexual minority community--only
then can our community be fully accepted in society as a whole.
Equality must begin in our own community.
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What It Looks Like From Here
Thom Cardwell
copyright 2010 | I still believe in the written word. I continue to appreciate a well told and engaging story. I want to hold the book in my hands like the object that it also is. Despite the advent and popularity of the various new and dynamic ways that we can communicate electronically, with text messaging, emailing, blogging, twittering, facebooking (has that become a verb in the English language yet?) and other forms yet to be discovered and developed in the world of social networking, I adhere to the belief that the writer and the written word and the book will survive and even thrive. We need the value, appreciate, mentor, and support our writers. When we're talking about the queer written word, that's even more important and profound, it seems to me.  That's why the organizations like The Lambda Literary Foundation(LLF), the country's leading national nonprofit for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer literary community is so integral and important to our past, present and, indeed, future, in nuturing our writers. With perhaps less bravado and high profiling a the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) or the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), LLF provides vital services to queer voices. Most recently, the exciting news is that LLF has received a grant of $25,000 from Amazon.com to "support the Writers' Retreat for Emerging LGBT Voices,to be held August 8 to 15, at the American Jewish University in Los Angeles," proudly announced said Tony Valenzuela, LLF's Executive Director. Nicola Griffith
 | "Amazon.com's support of Lambda Literary reflects its ongoing commitment to the development of emerging voices in the LGBT community, and beyond," said Valenzuela, "The mission of the Writers' Retreat is to foster the continued vitality of LGBT writers whose work fully explores the LGBT experience, and [this] grant helps ensure the success of our efforts." Added Jon Fine, Director of Author & Publisher Relations for Amazon.com: "We share with Lambda Literary Foundation's commitment to developing great new authorial talent. We are proud to be able to support the Writers' Retreat as it nurtures the next generation of LGBT literature and writers." Established in 2007 as the newest program of LLF, Valenzuela explained that the Writers' Retreat is the first of its kind ever to offer queer writers a one-week intensive immersion in fiction, Ellery Washington
 | nonfiction or poetry taught by some of the queer community's most talented and celebrated authors and instructors. Students at the retreat will spend a week working on their manuscripts and attending lectures by publishing industry professionals."Writers' Retreat Fellows have gone on to publish and impressive array of works." he boasted.Valenzuela also announced a few of the distinguished writers who will be serving as at this summer's retreat. They include: Nicola Griffith, fiction, science fiction, mystery. Winner of the Nebula Ellen Bass
 | Award, the Tiptree Prize and six-time winner of the Lambda Literary Award; Ellery Washington, nonfiction. Winner of the PEN Center West - Rosenthal Voices Award and IBWA prize for short fiction; and Ellen Bass, poetry. Winner of the Elliston Book Award for Poetry, Nimrod/Hardman's Pablo Neruda Prize, The Missouri Review's Larry Levis Award, the Greensboro Poetry Prize, the New Letters Poetry Prize, the Chautauqua Poetry Prize, the Pushcart Prize and the Lambda Literary Award.So, take a bike ride or lovely spring walk in the city or park, and bring along in your backpack a stimulating good "queer" read by on of your favorite authors or discover a new one.What am I reading lately? "City Boy," a memoir of life in 1960s and 1970s in New York City by the brilliant Edmund White.
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Thom Cardwell
copyright 2010
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Well, events and
activities these days-literally-never stop at the Piazza at Schmidts, in
trendy and upscale Northern Liberties. Next weekend it's definitely the
place to be-and-be-seen and dine, drink, party and, above all, people watch
(and maybe meet new friends or even hook up).
 Equality Forum
(EF) guru Malcolm Lazin is
producing SundayOUT on May 2, the first-ever lesbian, gay, bisexual,
transgender, queer, major event in the Piazza at Schmidts, with a
dynamic outdoor fair and festival, complete with entertainment, vendors,
gatherings, gallery art shows, retail shops, meal deals, drag brunches, and
parties, parties, parties, of all kinds to suit every taste within our wide and
diverse community.
EF organizers are rightly
anticipated, based upon previous years;' attendance figures, more than 15,000
revelers who will, undoubtedly, immediately get the "wow" factor that city developer
Bart Blatstein has created as his creatively economic and cultural
vision.
Special events will range
from live performers presented by Q102 and My 106.1, a queer
fashion show, a historic look back and forward to "Gays in Hollywood"
compiled and produced by tlavideo.com and TLA Entertainment, a
cabaret performance by the Philadelphia Gay Men's Chorus and live dance
performances by some of the best and the brightest talents in our region and
beyond.
The street has been
expanded to feature more than 100 artisans, product and service vendors in
addition to many of the region's LGBTQ community-based organizations, special
interest groups and nonprofits, promoting everything from events, programs,
projects, initiatives and services, from health to sports to youth to seniors
to AIDS to politics to business to arts and culture. I'll be there promoting
the 16th Philadelphia
QFest 2010 along with Desiree
Hines, at her own booth, promoting Traverse Arts Festival.
There will be numerous
parties related to Equality Forum around the city, including the Gayborhood,
but the official special parties on May 2 with veteran promoters like Diane
Lusk hosting Ladies 2000 Party, at North Bowl, 5 to 8 p.m.,
nearby the Piazza, and two parties, one hosted by queer nightlife impresario Dan Contarino with SundayOUT party,
5 to 10 p.m, at Darling's Diner and, earlier, a SundayOUT drag brunch,
the likes of which this city has never seen before, from 11 a. m. to 2 a.m.,
also at Darling's Diner, and the other party running simultaneously, SundayOUT
Party, at P.Y.T., 5 to 10 a.m., also at the Piazza.
Do you think that getting
there and back is a problem? Parking in the
city either a hassle or expensive? Not
at the Piazza at Schmidts where there will be plenty of FREE PARKING! Hey, and if no one in your queer entourage
wants to play "designated driver," even better yet EF is providing FREE
SHUTTLE information, from popular hotspot, Knock, in the Gayborhood,
to and from Northern Liberties.
For more information,
visit Equalityforum.com
ARE you ready to be eat,
drink, shop, dance, party, show up in your finest queer gear at make the
incredible scene that EF SundayOUT will be this year-like one other event
before it?
Now let's talk more about
food! In conjunction with EF SundayOUT,
the business organizers of the Piazza at Schmidts are also hosting the
first-ever, "Restaurant Weekend at the Piazza," for two days, May 1 and
2.
The participating
restaurants at press time will include: PYT, El Camino Real, Keystone Kettle
Corn, Elevation Burger, Alex's Lemonade Stand, Bar
Ferdinand, Darling's Diner, Cichetteria 19, Varga Bar, Fado, Jim's Pretzels,
Hikari, The Latest Dish, Apollinare, Green Restaurant Association, Root Liquor,
Main Line Crepe Co., some dining destinations are located within the piazza
while others are located within easy walking distance, at Liberties Walk and
others nearby blocks.
According to the organizers of the Restaurant Weekend at the Piazza, "the
restaurants will be dishing out their favorite foods as a way of 'showing up'
their culinary creations and featuring the best on their menus." And, again,
there's FREE Admission and open to the public for an outdoor food tasting fest!
Vendors and restaurants
still wishing to participate should contact Amber Lynn at amberlynn@towerdev.com or call
215.467.4603.
So we all certainly won't be going hungry at EF
SundayOUT next weekend!
For more information, visit atthepiazza.com
comments@QUEERtimes.net
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What They Said and Did!
Thom Cardwell
copyrighted 2010
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For being courageous enough to come out as queer at
a very young age, being dismissed for outing himself at a youth ministry in Las
Vegas, surviving the intolerance, prejudice and alienation, and being  focused,
motivated and unafraid to pursue other interests, the 23-year-old queer
photographer is quickly making a name for himself in Los Angeles, where he has
lensed superstar Zac Efron, Tito Ortiz (of UFC) and Rex Lee (of Entourage)and
the NOH8 Campaign:
"I got kicked
out of the church when I came out. I got kicked out of the house. I ran away to
LA. I experienced a lot of hatred. I lost a lot of friends. But I think that's
what focused my work on love. There's still a lot of discrimination going on. I
want to somehow fix that with my photography."-Jon Carmichael (QVegas, March
2010).
________________________
For being the world's "queer icon," never being
afraid to share your highs and lows, your loves and losses, your talents and
failures, and always rising to higher and better places as an artist of
incredible  talents and gifts and as a person of courage and honesty, now
debuting your latest album, "All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu," in which,
you admit, you're "tackling your inner demons and temptations of drugs and alcohol":
"I
hate to say it, but my artistic life revolves around my personal life, and it
always works great. I might have certain personality issues and I might need
therapy for my childhood, but in terms of my writing songs there's always this
really symbiotic, powerful relationship that people enjoy. My life is just very
dramatic. I have a very, very dark past with drugs and alcohol, and I loved it.
It was a lot of fun, and part of me wishes it could still be that way. But I
decided to stay healthy. That being said, this force still exists and somehow
when it's very, very strong it turns into [actress] Louise Brooks. I just see
visions of her across the street asking me over for a martini."-Rufus Wainwright (Metro Canada, April
18, 2010)
________________________
For always being tres chic, ahead of trends,
defining fashion as your own, not copying or imitating anyone, and never
regretting your failures, perhaps embracing them, even more than your
successes,  being a "queer icon" for millions of gay males all over the world,
and never apprehensive or hesitant to say exactly what's on your mind, the
60-year-old model-turned-singer-turned actress (View To Kill, Vamp, among
others), had more than a few "choice" words to say on the subject of pop sensation,
Lady Gaga, perhaps a little catty, bitchy, and vampish, as she is wont to be:
"I'd just prefer to work with someone who is more
original and someone who is not copying me, actually. Well, you know, I've seen
some things she's worn that I've worn, and that does kind of piss me off. I
think that she [Lady Gaga] is an 'annoying copycat. I turned down her offer to
perform together. I wouldn't go to see her."-Grace Jones (The Guardian,
April 20, 2010) Editor's Note: Whatever
happened to the old adage-imitation is the greatest form of flattery?
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