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queerVOICE
Two Apologies Needed
James Duggan
copyright 2009
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"I don't respect you and you're gay and stop being
such a faggot." With these words, directed at Will.I.Am of the Black
Eyed Peas, openly gay blogger Mario Lavandeira (aka, Perez Hilton; the Queen of
All Media) stepped into a mine field with apology demands coming from all
directions including the Gay &Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD)
who, according to their statement
(6/22), "have reached out to Hilton and asked him to apologize for promoting
this anti-gay slur."
Rather than apologize Hilton issued a statement that seemed to simply justify
his use of this anti-queer slur by stating that he "chose the most hurtful word
I know to hurl at him . . . I wanted to hurt him [Will.I.Am] with the word I
chose, not anyone else." Hilton added, "I wish none of it had happened. I can't
take it back. I did what I thought was best at the moment to stand up for
myself in a non-violent yet still assertive way."
In his non-apology statement, Hilton completely
missed the point that his use of the derogatory, anti-queer word, "faggot", is
indeed a violent (albeit nonphysical) attack on another individual and,
therefore, not only needs to be condemned but also needs to be repudiated by
him.
Some are trying to support Hilton's use of the word as simply a reappropriation
of it; however, the concept of reappropriation of words is to remove their
sting as hate words. Something Hilton claims that he did not do. Clearly, he
meant to use this term in an attempt to hurt Will.I.Am.
I, more then most perhaps, know that in the heat of a moment, fueled by raw
emotions, fear or deep convictions, words are spoken that are better left
unsaid. When hate words are used, a clear apology needs to follow. Such
an apology is required so as to give weight and authority to the position that
specific "hate words" like "faggot" are unacceptable for use in a
civil society.
Hilton claims that he is not "a spokesperson for the gay community," but his
celebrity calls him to be responsible to it. Hilton's use of the word
"faggot" for the sole purpose of hurting another individual (perhaps
understandable considering his perception of the situation) is, nevertheless,
unacceptable. Hilton's apology is still outstanding . . . we are waiting.
[Update:
Perez Hilton issues second apology
statement)
Another demand for an apology is being directed at
Pennsylvania Senator John Eichelberger (R-30), who, during a debate on WHYY
(6/19) with Sen. Daylin Leach (D-17) on their competing same-sex marriage legislation
. . . Eichelberger is seeking a constitutional amendment banning same-sex
marriage and Leach's will allow it . . . stated that same-sex couples are
"dysfunctional" and that "we're allowing them (homosexuals) to
exist."
During the exchange, Leach asked Eichelberger: "Should our only policy towards
those couples (same-sex) be one of punishment, to somehow prove to them that
they've done something wrong, or should we help them live their lives?"
Eichelberger's response; "They're not being punished. We're allowing them
to exist, and do whatever every American can do. We're just not rewarding
them with special designation.
I'm sure I don't need to go into depth on why this man is completely wrong, but
clearly any person who believes that the government has the right or power to
allow and, thereby, to disallow, any citizen the right to exist is simply unfit
to serve as an elected official in any government, let alone one that is
governed by the United States Constitution.
Eichelberger is claiming that a politically active group is going around the
country targeting people like him who are involved in the anti-same-sex
marriage issue, believing that these people "intentionally misportray the
truth."
Hogwash, I listened to Eichelberger's words and clearly the truth is this man
is not just a bigot but a fool. Along with believing that queers are being
"allowed" to exist, he believes that same-sex relationships are "dysfunctional,"
that "there's no reason to encourage that kind of behavior in Pennsylvania,"
and that "there is no evidence that this [same-sex marriage] will be good for
our society."
Eichelberger is the poster child for all the anti-queer attitudes and behavior in
the Commonwealth
of Pennsylvania.
His beliefs and actions need to be repudiated, rejected, and condemned by a
just people. His apology would be nice, his resignation even better, his
defeat in his next election our goal.
A Call to Action:
Contact Senator Eichelberger at 717.787.5490, or email to jeichelberger@pasen.gov
Go online and tell Senator Eichelberger: No one "allows" us to
exist.
Comments: james@QUEERtimes.net
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What It Looks Like From Here
Thom Cardwell
copyright 2009 |
 Vampires seem
to be cropping up everywhere these days! At first, I thought that it was simply my imagination,
a heavy dose of my own wishful thinking, because, you see, I have a real
"thing" about vampires and of course,
I'm willing to admit right away that one of my alter egos, on my darker side, is Count Dracula.
Okay, let me repeat that, I have a REAL
thing about vampires. Yes, I have my own Count Dracula's opera cape, and
everything else to go with it. Yes, I have dressed up as the Son of Dracula (Son of the Devil, Son of
Satan) more times in my life than I can recall, for Halloween, as an easy
excuse, to assume my alter ego.
My passion (okay, my obsession, for
all things vampire and Dracula) has even entered into my professional life.
 During my career as an educator in private boarding
school in New Hampshire, I once taught a course in vampire literature, using
the annotated edition of Bram Stoker's
Dracula, incorporating films, from "Nosferatu" by F. W.
Murnau to "The Fearless Vampire
Killers" by Roman Polanski
(there wasn't the novels or film versions of Anne Rice's "Interview with a
Vampire" and the others). At the end of the course, the students and I all
ended up following Vlad the Impaler
(the real life historical figure upon which Stoker based Dracula) through Romania (then a nation behind the
Russian "Iron Curtain") and Transylvania!
 Right now, on the big screen, the craze is all about "teen vampires" (something that previously was frequently relegated
to genuine "B-movies"). Heartthrob, Robert
Pattinson, 23, played the lead male role in "Twilight," based upon the romance novel, of the same name, by
writer Stephenie Meyer. In the sequel,
"New Moon," also from Meyer's other
novel, currently in production, Pattison doesn't have a major a part but as the
critics are saying "all eyes are upon
him." For the record, Pattison plays, in both films, the "dreamy
bloodsucker hero Edward Cullen"
(METRO, June 19-21, 2009).
The young actor's life has literally been transformed by Hollywood. These days he told interview Talia Soghmonian that he no longer can
go out in public. "I don't walk in the street anymore, and when I do, I'm in disguise,"
Pattison said.
"Where you surprised that 'Twilight' became such a phenomenon." asked
Soghmonian.
 "It never ever fails to shock me--even
here [on the set of "New Moon"]. Yesterday there were 300 people outside the
set. It's just crazy. Every day
every single person I meet knows someone who has a very strong attachment to
the books. It's very difficult to put your head around."
On the small screen, the new season of HBO's "True Blood," is a yet another series that centers on vampires
living in a small Louisiana
town where Sookie Stackhouse, a
Southern waitress, chronicles her vampire-loving exploits. The series, created
and produced by "Six Feet Under's" Alan
Ball, is based upon the popular novels of writer Charlaine Harris.
Thirty-eight year old British actor Stephen
Moyer plays opposite costar (and real life girlfriend) Anna Paquin as the "interpersonal drama" unfolds exploring their
relationship in the normal and supernatural worlds.
 Interviewer Amber Ray (METRO, June
19-21, 2009) describes the "True Blood" leads on screen love scenes as "jaw-dropping." "The couple's
uninhibited, uncensored sex life, has become even more scintillating now that
the real-life relationship of Moyer and
Paquin has become public."
"When we have sex in front of them
[the crew, on set] it's very ordinary and normal. All right, so we have some
weird, crazy mud sex, and there's some very odd, weird biting and some odd
blood sucking and blood swapping, but ultimately
it's a love story," laughed Moyer.
So, once again, vampires aren't only extremely popular in our entertainment
culture, they're also sexy, steamy and
hot! And I couldn't be more delighted, thrilled and, yes, satisfied, that
my obsession with vampires (perhaps it's a kind of fetish?) is being fed quite
regularly.
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Colin's Queer Life on the Qt!
June Pride
Colin McCullough
copyright 2009
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 June is Pride Month. In cities across the country and around the
world, floats decorated with rainbow balloons and populated with hairy men
dressed in tight leather vests, buffed boys in Speedos and beautiful drag
queens wearing extremely high heels make their way down city blocks and flaunt
their pride.
I love these events and celebrate LGBTQ pride. June is also a popular month to wed. Whether a groom is preparing to marry his
bride or another groom or a bride is preparing to marry her groom or another
bride, weddings are hectic, chaotic, and lots of fun. I've been a guest at weddings and am seeing
my sister prepare for her wedding this fall.
I love the whole process. I am an
out young gay man who loves weddings.
This is perhaps a cliché but I'll own it proudly.
Weddings, marriage, and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
Transgender and Queer pride are all linked together as the struggle for
equality heightens. This is a very
simple issue to me that many people needlessly complicate. If the state is to recognize one marriage
over another based on gender, then the government is practicing
discrimination. With that said, I'd
rather politics not be invited to my wedding, but at this time in history, is
there a way around it?
I want my marriage to be institutionally
recognized, but I would like attendees or friends to not ask what state I will
marry in. Instead, I want them to ask me
where I am registered. I would rather
not display a sign up sheet for the Human Rights Campaign newsletters on the
dance floor of my reception. I would
like the dance floor to be lit by a gigantic disco ball and draped with Calla
lilies.
In silent thoughts and prayers, I will thank the
Barney Franks and Barbara Gittings of the world but, in public, I will thank my
parents, friends, and my caterer or if my money situation doesn't improve, the
guy behind the Subway counter.
As fun as romantic fantasies are, dreams of
equality are more present in my mind than a wedding. It would be more fun to focus on a wedding or
marriage but I can't deny the reality of discrimination. Discrimination is often a painful sting many
LGBTQ folk feel in their daily lives. If
I meet the man of my dreams and move to Arkansas,
like one of my heroes Hillary Rodham Clinton did, then I am certain not to be
privileged to the same rights that heterosexual couples are. This is blatantly unfair and if this were to
happen; I would have to view marriage politics more personally. For the time being though, I live in the Northeast
where many of our states recognize same-sex marriage (Pennsylvania not being one of
them-yet). I am very fortunate for this
and the gay rights activists that have come before me.
In my personal dreams, politics are not invited to
my wedding. I hope that one day in any
state I won't have to worry about federal or local recognition. Maybe one day I can register at my favorite
department store, go over guests list with my mother and not have an attorney
present. That day is not here yet. This may work to benefit being that I have
not met the boy I am going to marry. I
am still in the idealistic dreaming phase of planning life's rites of
passage. But with or without legal
recognition, my wedding may just look like a gay pride event. Leather daddies can sign guests in at the
door, drag queens can be the flower girls, and I'm sure rainbow colored
balloons will find their way in, too.
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Thom's Table on the Qt!
Thom Cardwell
copyright 2009
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Chef/restaurateur Georges Perrier is like a superstar these days as far as the media
(and foodies) is concerned. He's in the news--literally--every week about something,
from recent awards that have been bestowed upon him in France and closer to
home in the region to his recession-proof dinner offer to diners at the world-renowned
Le Bec-Fin, during the month of
July, to pay what you wish, for his delicious chef's summer tasting!
 Out in Wayne,
PA, Perrier has been operating Georges,
503 W. Lancaster Avenue, Spread Eagle
Village, for a number
years. Currently, Jeremy Duclut serves as the executive chef at the suburban
restaurant, creating a dynamic menu that reflects the culinary ideology of the
Perrier tradition and approach to food and wine.
As a way to kickoff the summer season in the suburbs, Georges is hosting a Trimbach Wine Dinner, a prix fixe, five
courses, paired with wines, for $85 per person, all-inclusive, including tax
and gratuity, 7 pm, June 26.
For
information, call 610.964.2588; or visit georgesonthemainline.com
 Owners Rob and Maggie Wasserman will be hosting "Live at Rouge," a live jazz series, every Tuesday, July 7-August
25, at Rouge,
205 South 18th Street,
on the city's lively Rittenhouse Square.
Renowned vocalist Barbara Montgomery
with her band will perform two one-hour sets, 6:30-7:30 pm and 8-9 pm.
The veteran performer has been appreciated by audiences and critics alike. One
called her, "the ice cream blonde with
the black coffee jazz voice" for the six acclaimed albums that she has
produced featuring many songs that she wrote herself.
Montgomery will be joined by lineup of gifted musicians, including Tom Lawton, Adam Faulke and Dennis
Fortune on keys, Lee Smith and Leon Boykins on bass and Monnette Sudler on guitar. Montgomery's "music is a
lively, sophisticated addition to our beautiful park-side restaurant," said Rob
Wasserman.
Chef Matthew Zagorski's tantalizing
summer menu will be the perfect compliment
to the jazz nights at Rouge at 60-seat bistro, serving classic cocktails,
meals and late night bar menu seven days a week. For more information,
call 215.732.6622; or visit rouge98.com
 Though the legendary chef/restaurateur Susanna
Foo has now closed her signature restaurant along Philadelphia's Restaurant Row, happily for
area foodies, she hasn't retired completely. In fact, she is busy focusing upon
her suburban location, Susanna Foo Gourmet Kitchen, 555 East Lancaster Avenue, in Radnor, PA.
Her attention and energy at Susanna Foo Gourmet Kitchen has turned to offering affordable, local organic, healthy
Asian cuisine to diners.
For the summer months, the restaurant is hosting weekday "Happy Hours," with half off dumplings, sushi and sake starting at
$3, and half off on Susanna Foo
Gourmet Kitchen's menu items, Monday through Friday, 5-7pm, along with daily specials such as dumplings
starting at $3, on Tuesday and Thursday, and half off sushi and dumplings
on Friday. Drink specials all five
days include: bottled beer at $3, glasses of wine at $5 and cocktails at $6.
On Sundays, Susanna Foo hosts BYOB with no corkage fee. All dumplings
are half off in addition to the la
carte dinner menu featuring handcrafted dumplings, special sushi and
creative Asian and Chinese dishes.
Foodies can even enjoy al fresco dining at the Radnor property. For more information,
call 610.688.08808; or visit susannafoo.com
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What They Said:
copyrighted 2009 |
 Queer literary giant and "Beat Poet" Allen Ginsberg
("our good gay poet in America"
being after his mentor and first "good gay poet in America," Walt Whitman) needs to be
acknowledged during National Gay Pride Month. The angry queer man of the 1950s
who wrote the groundbreaking poem, "Howl," that revolutionized several
generations of youth, waking them up from the sleepy Eisenhower years to the
tumultuous and energetic Kennedy years, and admired by all who entered his
circle, closeted queer, out or hetero allies, never stopped writing and
criticizing his nation and his people. Called "the most important cultural
networker of the American 20th century," biographer Bill Morgan of "I Celebrate Myself: The Somewhat Private Life of
Allen Ginsberg" (Viking, 2006), explained that the poet "more than one person but several people . . . some of them even
cohabited . . . there was that savvy marketer of his friends' work . . . an
instinctive, status-conscious social climber . . . and the idealistic
self-abnegator."
____________________________
 Gay-friendly hottie actor Peter Sarsgaard
will be starring in the greatly anticipated release this summer of the film,
"The Mysteries of Pittsburgh." adopted from the debut novel by queer writer,
Michael Chabon. Sarsgaard assumes the
complex role of Cleveland in "The Mysteries" who has been described variously
as "sexually ambiguous," "bi-curious," "charismatic" and "dangerous." The
actor actually told interviewer Dorothy Robinson (METRO Newspapers, April 9,
2009) about his approach to portraying the lead character and staying true
to the integrity of the novel's depiction of him, Sarsgaard explained, "Cleveland
was so singular and autonomous from everything. That's what got me going. A lot
of people are commenting on the bisexual aspect of it, but I never saw it like
that. I just thought about it as a guy who was an omnivore. As long as it felt
good, he didn't care."____________________________
 Queer creative director/designer Christopher Bailey
of Burberry (the British titan fashion house that boasts $2 billion sales a
year) has his hands full these days with his own signature line for the
longtime established traditional label that went well-suited up for a
contemporary twist, now is going further in that direction with Prorsum, what
Bailey himself calls, "Crumpled Classics." Of his collection, Bailey likes to
explain (OUT, November 2008) "To me, a
disheveled, unpolished look is far more beautiful than a pristine look of
perfection." The complex and
intellectually thinking fashion designer takes his inspiration from a curious
and unexpected mentor, queer legendary British filmmaker Derek Jarman, lost to
AIDS in 1994. Bailey who is admittedly drawn to English eccentrics and
mavericks such as the Duck of Windsor, David Hicks, Ossie Clark, David Hockney,
and last year's inspiration, the painter L. S. Lowry, seems a most unlikely
heir to the founder of the 150-years-old of the company, Thomas Burberry, who
founded the high-performance clothing lines for polar explorers, military men
and early aviators. Of Jarman, Bailey confessed, "There are certainly things I can relate to, things I look at and think
I really understand--that feeling or that passion, that suffering or that
dedication."
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Events on the Qt! |
June 5 - July 31 (Friday, Saturday, Sunday only) Art Show on
AIDS and Spirituality
"Through the
Window: Insight into the Spirituality
of AIDS"
June 5th
to July 31st (Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays only)
3:00 p.m. to
6:00 p.m.
Penns
Park United Methodist Church, 2394 2nd Street Pike, Penns
Park, PA
For special view times call 215.598.7601
Special artist's reception will
be held on Saturday, June 20th from
6:00 to 8:00 pm. Refreshments will be served.
Penns
Park United Methodist Church is hosting an art show located in the
Church Fellowship Hall during the months of June and July 2009.
The exhibition titled "Through the Window: Insight into the Spirituality of AIDS" is a
collection of works by artist, educator and minister, Lois Wilson. The exhibition features a series of 12 works, each a collage
framed in a salvaged window frame. Every collage was inspired by the stories
and words Lois heard from people living with AIDS.
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Economy got you down?
Freelance Job Busters!
Looking for extra income?
Commission for Sales!
BUCKmonkey is seeking people-oriented, sales-driven, freelancers to sell advertising and sponsorships for online, print and special events (some annual, well-established, corporate and nonprofit, and some one-time only, niche marketing for LGBT and mainstream) on a lucrative commission-only tiered basis. Individuals must be personable, professional and be motivated to make money through sales. Experience good but not required if willing to learn, positive attitude and highly motivated. Start immediately. Must be willing to work some evenings and some weekends. Home office encouraged. Send one-page resume, with references to Thom.Cardwell@BUCKmonkey.net
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Raise the Colors
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