NewsWrap for the week ending September 2, 2000 (As broadcast on This Way Out program #649, distributed 09-04-00) [Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Chris Ambidge, Brian Nunes, The Gender Advocacy Information Network (GAIN), Jason Lin, Rex Wockner, Greg Gordon & Lucia Chappelle] Anchored by Chase Schulte and Cindy Friedman Allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in Britain's Royal Navy "has not caused any great difficulty," the Navy's head of personnel policies said this week. Admiral James Burnell-Nugent, who as Assistant Chief of Navy Staff is number two in the hierarchy, said it had actually been less trouble to lift the long-standing ban on gay and lesbian service than it had been to allow women to go to sea ten years ago. Burnell-Nugent said that although not everyone was happy with the policy change, "on the whole it has not caused a great upset among the services." He added that, "If we want to be in an armed force that preserves democracy at home and promotes it around the world then part of that is to be signed up to democratic principles ourselves." Britain switched to a gender-neutral policy on servicemembers' relationships in January following a European Court of Human Rights ruling in September. But gays still can't wear the uniform of the Boy Scouts of America, and there was a political uproar this week when conservatives learned that the U.S. Department of the Interior was reviewing its ties with the Scouts for compliance with a Presidential order against discrimination. The executive order issued in June prohibits sexual orientation discrimination in federal education and training programs. The Department of the Interior was the first government agency to seek guidance from the Department of Justice regarding an organization's compliance with the order, and the Department of Justice is still in the process of developing guidelines. But conservatives took the review process as an "attack" on the Scouts and quickly made it a campaign issue. Republican Presidential nominee Texas Governor George W. Bush said he was "troubled" at the suggestion "that the Clinton-Gore administration might sever the federal government's long-standing relationship with the Boy Scouts of America." Campaign aides to Democratic Presidential nominee Vice President Al Gore responded that should he be elected, the Scouts would be able to use federal land. Before the Department of the Interior had even submitted the materials it was gathering for the review, Attorney General Janet Reno announced her ruling that the Scouts' activities were not in fact federal education and training programs, and therefore were exempt from the executive order. Concerns about child prostitution and sex tourism led police in Thailand to raid a British businessman's birthday party in Bangkok this week. Police found about 100 foreigners and almost 30 young Thais in various stages of undress at the Colony Sauna, but no illegal activity. After taking many of the guests in for questioning, they charged the club's manager and the man whose birthday it was and released them on bail. While the police told reporters that the Thais ranged in age from 10 to 16 years, the Briton insisted that none were under 18. He says he was charged with organizing an "immoral sex party" because his name was on the cake, but that actually friends had set up the party to surprise him. Another party guest believed that the children's rights activist who called in the police and camera crews had herself been tipped off by a local gay who was miffed at not being invited. Just ten days before, police had raided a gay party at a bar in Silom, arresting a Frenchman and more than twenty young Thais. A child who attended kindergarten as a boy but tried to enroll in first grade as a girl has been removed from her home by child welfare authorities in Ohio. The six-year-old has insisted that she's female since she was two and was formally diagnosed with gender identity disorder by the Cincinnati Children's Medical Center in November. Officials seem to question the diagnosis, but the parents accept their child's female identity, and their attorney believes that recognition and understanding of it has improved life for the whole family. The parents will attempt to regain custody at a court hearing in mid-September. One transwoman's legal defeat in Texas is leading to another's victory over the state's ban on same-gender marriages. In the notorious case of transwoman Christie Littleton, a state appeals court had decided that chromosomes rather than genitalia determined sex, voiding Littleton's seven-year marriage to a man and denying her status to sue for medical malpractice in his death. The Texas Supreme Court declined to review that ruling, and the U.S. Supreme Court will decide this month whether to take it up. Meanwhile, Littleton's attorney, transsexual activist Phyllis Frye, is encouraging Texas transsexuals in gay and lesbian relationships to marry, reasoning that if they can't legally marry someone of their birth gender then they can marry someone of their surgically reassigned gender. The first couple to take the plunge are transwoman Jessica Wicks and her female partner Robin Manhart Wicks, who'll be getting a marriage license in Bexar County this coming week. In practice, and even in Littleton's case, Texas does not examine marriage license applicants' chromosomes or genitalia, but only their driver's licenses or birth certificates. Ireland is also in a muddle about a transsexual's marriage, discovering it has no relevant legislation. Russian transman Nicholas Krivenko last year married his longtime German female partner in Limerick, and this year applied for legal residence in Ireland based on that marriage to a citizen of a European Union member nation. Normally the marriage would qualify him for residency because Ireland is also an EU member. But Ireland's Department of Justice has not granted it because of what it called "serious concerns" regarding the legality of his Irish marriage. Krivenko's attorney is determin ed to take the matter to court one way or another if his residency is not granted, and that legal case will be the nation's first of its kind. At least one politician has called on the Irish parliament to update and reform family law to respond to such situations, rather than leaving it up to the courts. A gay male couple in Montreal has filed a lawsuit claiming that Quebec's law against same-gender marriages is unconstitutional. Michael Hendricks and Rene Leboeuf have been a couple for 27 years. They applied to register a civil marriage first in 1998 and again in July of this year and were rejected. Their attorney believes Quebec's law exceeds the province's jurisdiction and violates both provincial and Canadian laws against discrimination. Their lawsuit is particularly significant in Quebec, because although gay and lesbian couples are legally entitled to the same recognition as unmarried heterosexual couples, unmarrieds have very little legal recognition in this province. Israeli gay and lesbian activists were bitterly disappointed this week to discover that one of their political allies had drafted a bill to create civil marriages without including them. Israel does not have civil marriage for heterosexuals, although it recognizes those marriages when performed in other countries. Justice Minister Yossi Beilin called his bill "a revolution" that he thinks has a chance of passage, but he called legal recognition of same-gender couples "a second revolution" that he did not want to "endanger the first." Beilin did indicate he would support recognition of gay and lesbian couples in the future. Openly lesbian Tel Aviv City Councilor Michal Eden said after meeting with Beilin this week that, "I find it strange that a bill intended to correct the injustice caused to many sectors of the public excludes homosexuals and lesbians and thus perpetuates the existing discrimination. It is even more disappointing that Yossi Beilin, known for his contribution to equality in Israeli society and for his fight for human rights, is responsible for this bill." A call for legal recognition of same-gender couples was issued in the UK this week by Steven Norris, the failed candidate for London Mayor who has now been named Vice Chair of the national Conservative Party. He condemned his own party colleagues for what he called a "polite form of racism and homophobia" and said they must learn to be more inclusive to succeed as a national party. Long a champion of equal treatment of gays and lesbians, Norris declared this week that he saw "no moral barrier" to giving same-gender couples the same inheritance rights and tax breaks as married couples. But the Conservative Party has vigorously opposed gay-friendly law reform in the Parliament, and Parliamentary leader William Hague was quick to say he disagreed with Norris' proposal. But Hague added that it was part of Norris' new job to change the public perception of the party as homophobic. A Labour Party spokesperson said Norris should not allow himself to be used as "a liberal fig leaf for a Conservative Party that is more extreme than ever." And finally, one more item about marriage proposals. Lots and lots of them have been coming to American Richard Hatch. As the million-dollar winner of the TV show "Survivor" he’s now one of the most famous openly gay men in the world. But the marriage proposals have been coming to Hatch from both men and women. He said, "I don't know what those women are thinking!"