NewsWrap
for the week ending February 13th, 1999
(As broadcast on This Way Out program #568, distributed 2-15-99)
[Compiled & written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill,
Brian Nunes, Jason Lin, Martin Rice, Rex Wockner, Chris Ambidge,
 Greg Gordon & Lucia Chappelle]

Anchored by Cindy Friedman and Leo Garcia

  New Zealand's High Court this week confirmed that a lesbian must make
support payments for the children her former partner conceived through
artificial insemination.  The justices found that the gender-neutral wording
of the Child Support Act of 1991, which refers to people living "in the nature
of marriage," was broad enough to include same-gender relationships.  The
couple were together for 14 years and had three children.  The biological
mother said, "I see [the ruling] as a plus for children conceived to lesbians.
It protects their rights, and they will be taken care of if the relationship
breaks down."  But the co-parent found it perplexing that while she had not
been able to legally marry her partner or adopt the children when the
household was intact, she is now considered a legal stepparent.

  In South Africa this week, the Cape High Court ruled that the same-gender
foreign partners of gay and lesbian citizens must be granted the same
immigration rights as binational married couples.  The Court rejected
provisions of the Aliens Control Act as unconstitutionally discriminatory.  It
also criticized the Department of Home Affairs for its treatment of the six
plaintiff couples in the case filed by the National Coalition for Gay and
Lesbian Equality.  The court said that the Act's preference for "certain forms
of life partnership over others" cannot be justified.  The Cape High Court's
ruling still requires confirmation by the Constitutional Court.

  U.S. gays and lesbians demanded recognition of their relationships this week
in nearly 70 actions in more than 30 states, observing the second annual
National Freedom to Marry Day on February 12th.  A variety of actions from
pickets to distributing candy and literature at a mall were designed to
increase public awareness of the legal rights, responsibilities and benefits
that discriminatory marriage laws deny gays and lesbians.  Some specific
targets included state bills and initiatives to deny legal recognition to
same-gender marriages, immigration laws that keep same-gender couples apart,
and church rules against celebrating gay and lesbian unions.  Supportive
clergy and politicians as well as friends and families joined gays and
lesbians in seeking equal marriage rights.

  But legislatively there were setbacks this week for U.S. gay and lesbian
couples.  One Colorado state Senate committee passed a measure to deny legal
recognition to same-gender marriages another state may someday perform, while
another killed a bill to recognize gay and lesbian domestic partnerships for
purposes of inheritance.  The City Council of Columbus, Ohio, which just two
months before had voted unanimously to become the first city in the state to
extend spousal benefits to its employees' domestic partners, this week voted
unanimously to withdraw them.  Opponents had collected enough signatures to
put the question before voters, and if that referendum had repealed the
benefits, they could not have been considered again except by another ballot
initiative.

  But in Louisiana, a state appeals court struck down the state's almost
200-year-old "crimes against nature" law.  The unanimous opinion said, "There
can be no doubt that the right of consenting adults to engage in private non-
commercial sexual activity, free from governmental interference, is protected
by the privacy clause of the Louisiana Constitution."  The case before the
court involved a man who had been accused of raping a woman, but was convicted
only for having her perform fellatio.  Gay and lesbian groups became involved
as the primary targets of the laws against anal and oral sex, even though the
statutes are gender-neutral.  However, state prosecutor Tim McElroy said the
case is not about gay and lesbian rights but about the rights of the victim,
and promised to appeal to the Louisiana state Supreme Court.

  Mississippi's sodomy law was one factor in a custody decision against a gay
father this week by that state's Supreme Court.  A minority opinion by Justice
Charles McRae in the 6-to-3 ruling charged that, "[The majority seem] blinded
by the fact that [the child's] father is gay.  The [trial judge] and the
majority believe a minor is best served by living in an explosive environment
in which the unemployed stepfather is a convicted felon, drinker, drug-taker,
adulterer, wife-beater, and child-threatener, and in which the mother has been
transitory, works two jobs and has limited time with the child.  The [trial
judge] makes such a decision despite the fact that [the child's] father has a
good job, a stable home and does all within his power to care for his son."
Yet the majority of the Supreme Court shared the trial judge's concern for gay
father David Weigand's "moral fitness," in part because he does not send his
15-year-old son to church as the boy's mother Machelle Houghton does.  With
the help of the American Civil Liberties Union, Weigand had filed for custody
after the boy had to call 911 when his stepfather Jeff Houghton threatened to
kill both him and his mother.  But although Houghton has twice been convicted
for hitting Machelle, the state high court believed her hope that that
violence would not be repeated or extended to her son.  However, the
Mississippi Supreme Court did remove the trial judge's requirement that
Weigand's partner of ten years leave their California home when the boy
visited.

  Britain's gay-only "gross indecency" law remains in force, but an appeals
court this week reduced the sentences of five of its most notorious violators,
some of the so-called Bolton 7.  Those were men who had a group sex party in a
private home, when the law says that no third party can be present during sex
between men.  They were caught when a disgruntled tenant turned over to police
a home video they'd made at the party.  Because the law is clearly
discriminatory, with no equivalent law affecting heterosexual acts, activists
had hoped that the Court of Appeals would follow the European courts in
finding that no sentence could be enforced.  But the court not only rejected
all arguments based on the European Convention on Human Rights, it went out of
its way to justify the trial judge's sentences even though it reduced them.
Each of the five men had received combinations of community service hours and
probation; the appeal court eliminated all the community service hours
requirements and in two cases reduced the probation.  More typical gross
indecency violations, in which a police officer arrests two men having sex in
a public bathroom or park, are usually punished with only a modest fine.

  And finally ... it was a week of honors for gays and lesbians in film.
"Aimee and Jaguar", based on the true story of the love between a German woman
and a Jewish woman during the Holocaust, opened the prestigious Berlin Film
Festival.  Derek Jacobi received the coveted Brit Award for his performance as
the late gay Francis Bacon in "Love Is the Devil".  And there were three major
Academy Award nominations for "Gods and Monsters", based on gay Christopher
Bram's novel "Father of Frankenstein" about real-life gay film director James
Whale.  Writer and director Bill Condon was nominated for Best Screenplay -
Adaptation, Lynn Redgrave for Best Supporting Actress, and Sir Ian McKellen
for Best Actor.  Although non-gay actors have been nominated for and won
Oscars for playing gay roles, McKellen is the first openly gay actor to be
shortlisted for playing a gay man, and he's a very strong contender to win.

                  Tinky Winky - The THIS WAY OUT Interview
Cindy:  For "This Way Out," I'm Cindy Friedman, with Leo Garcia.  The most
widely-reported gay story in U.S. media this week was the "outing" of the star
of an international television show which has spun off a marketing empire of
best-selling videos, audio recordings and other items.  Here to speak for
himself is
Tinky Winky -- and if you could tag on an "eh-oh," so much the better]
Cindy:  Former leader of the now-defunct Moral Majority Jerry Falwell has
published in his "National Liberty Journal" this "Parent Alert":  
Leo:  “The sexual preference of Tinky Winky, the largest of the four
Teletubbies characters on the series that airs in America on PBS stations, has
been the subject of debate since the series premiered in England in 1997.  The
character, whose voice is obviously that of a boy, has been found carrying a
red purse in many episodes.”
Cindy:  Teletubbies' producers insist that the so-called purse is in fact a
magic bag.  Mr. Winky, would you care to comment?
[uh-oh!]
Leo:  “Now further evidence that the creators of the series intend for Tinky
Winky to be a gay role model have surfaced.  He is purple -- the gay-pride
color; and his antenna is shaped like a triangle -- the gay pride symbol.”
[uh-oh!]
Leo:  “Furthering Tinky's "outing" was a recent "Washington Post" editorial
that cast the character's photo opposite that of Ellen DeGeneres in an
‘In/Out’ column.  This implies that Ellen is ‘out’ as the chief national gay
representative, while Tinky Winky is the trendy ‘in’ celebrity.”
[again-again]
Leo:  Tinky Winky is the trendy "in" celebrity.
“These subtle depictions are no doubt intentional and parents are warned to be
alert to these elements of the series.”
[uh-oh!]
Cindy:  Mr. Winky, I understand that you first became aware of Falwell's
charges watching CNN on the TV screen in the belly of one of your Teletubby
colleagues.  Bernard Shaw introduced the story telling the audience he wasn't
sure he could get through it without laughing.  But I'm sure it was no
laughing matter for you.  When Falwell charged that "role modelling the gay
lifestyle is damaging to the moral lives of children, how did your colleagues
react?
[big hug]
Cindy:  In our review of some 40 mainstream press reports and columns, Falwell
has been universally ridiculed.
[again-again]
Cindy:  Falwell has been universally ridiculed.  After two days of media
assault, Falwell told NBC that he didn't really mean that you are gay, but
that if you were, he is concerned.  While gays in Montreal staged a
demonstration insisting that you are not gay, some San Francisco gays have
embraced you, voting that you should be a grand marshall of their Lesbian and
Gay Freedom Day Parade this year.  There are also those who maintain that as a
Teletubby you are only vaguely human and cannot be considered to have sexual
attributes at all, much less a sexual orientation.  Mr. Winky, I must ask you
the question that has so obsessed America this week:  are you gay?
[giggle]