NewsWrap
for the week ending March 24, 2001
(As broadcast on This Way Out program #678, distributed 03-26-01)
[Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Chris Ambidge, 
Brian Nunes, Jason Lin, Rex Wockner, Greg Gordon & Lucia Chappelle]

Anchored by Chase Schulte and Cindy Friedman

  Open gay Bertrand Delanoë was elected mayor of Paris this week.  Paris 
becomes the biggest city in the world ever to elect an openly gay or lesbian 
mayor, far surpassing the previous leader, Winnipeg.  Thousands of gays and 
lesbians danced under a rainbow flag outside city hall in celebration.  Most 
of France is less impressed with Delanoë's sexual orientation than by his 
leftist politics -- he's the first Socialist to win Paris in about 130 years.
In the first round of voting a week earlier, Delanoë took almost one-third of 
the vote, and then formed a coalition with the Green Party to ensure his 
victory in the final vote over more conservative candidates.
Fifty-year-old Delanoë has held offices since 1977 as a Paris city councilor, 
Member of Parliament and Senator.  He only publicly identified himself as a 
gay man in 1998, while the national parliament was heatedly debating the 
registered partnerships known as PACs, Pacts of Civil Solidarity.  He was 
only the second French politician to come out.
France's first openly gay elected official, Andre Labarrere, was easily 
re-elected mayor of Pau in the first round of voting.  He's been Pau's mayor 
since 1971 but only publicly identified himself as a gay man in 1997.
Openly gay independent Philippe Meynard was the leading vote-getter for mayor 
of Barsac, but without a majority his success depends on party negotiations.
Paris also elected France's first transgender officeholder, making Camille 
Cabral the city councilmember for the 17th District.

  Election results were less happy for gays and lesbians in Uganda, where 
anti-gay President Yoweri Museveni was reelected this month.  Two years ago 
Museveni called on police to search out, arrest and prosecute gays and 
lesbians.  Some gays were arrested, while others went into hiding or fled the 
country.  The maximum sentence for homosexual acts in Uganda is life 
imprisonment.

  Namibia's President Sam Nujoma this week renewed his calls for a police 
crackdown on gays and lesbians.  Warning students at the University of 
Namibia against what he called "foreign influences," Nujoma said, "The 
Republic of Namibia does not allow homosexuality [or] lesbianism here.  
Police are ordered to arrest you and deport you and imprison you too."  In 
fact, while sex acts between men are illegal, the status of sex acts between 
women is not clear.  Namibia's gay and lesbian group Rainbow Project res
ponded that Namibia's constitutional protections from discrimination do not 
exclude sexual minorities, although they do not explicitly include them.  
Namibia's National Society for Human Rights also spoke out in defense of gays 
and lesbians, charging Nujoma with using homophobia as a "diversionary 
tactic" to take the public spotlight off pressing social problems.

  Former British Speaker of the House of Commons George Thomas, Lord 
Tonypandy, was posthumously outed this week.  His friend Leo Abse has written 
in a new book "The Man Behind the Smile" that he himself had repeatedly saved 
Thomas from extortion threats when homosexual acts were still criminal in 
Britain, once paying a blackmailer 800 pounds for his silence.  Politicians 
from both sides of the aisle roundly criticized Abse for making allegations 
when the popular Thomas could no longer rebut them.

  Lawmakers in the Mexican state of Aguascalientes this month voted 
unanimously to enact civil rights protections for gays and lesbians.  Only 
Mexico's Federal District, where Mexico City is located, has a similar law.  
The Aguascalientes legislature acted in part in response to international 
interest last year in a sign at a park in the city of Aguascalientes saying 
"No dogs or gays".

  Israeli parliamentarians spoke out both for and against gays and lesbians 
this week.  Nissim Zeev of the far-right Shas Party called homosexuality "a 
disease that requires the parents to sit shiva," a Jewish ritual for mourning 
the dead.  But ten Members of the Knesset joined the parliamentary Committee 
for the Advancement of the Status of Women in its 10th annual celebration of 
gay and lesbian pride, which this year also observed the 25th anniversary of 
the national Association of Gays and Lesbians.  MK Yael Dayan of the Meretz 
Party was the only member of the ruling coalition in attendance, and MK 
Eliezer Sandberg of the Shinui Party was the only member of a right-of-center 
party there.  At the gathering Zeev's remarks were denounced as ignorant and 
unenlightened.

  Israel's Supreme Court this week overruled a rabbinical court to allow a 
lesbian family to unite.  The Chief Rabbinical Court had ruled in favor of a 
lesbian's ex-husband who sought to block their children from seeing his 
ex-wife's lesbian partner, denouncing the women as immoral and their behavior 
detrimental to the children.  But the national Supreme Court found the 
rabbinical court had exceeded its authority because the divorce had already 
been settled.

  The German state of Bavaria will be going to the constitutional court 
seeking to block new federal legislation creating registered partnerships for 
gay and lesbian couples.  Bavarian Justice Minister Manfred Weiss this week 
called the new law an attack on the special status of marriage in the German 
constitution.  The state of Thuringen had previously announced a legal 
challenge to the partnerships in a lower court.  The partnerships law will go 
into effect in August, extending legal recognition in areas including 
inheritance, insurance and tenancy.  Surveys have found that most Germans 
support the new law.

  A U.S. District Court in Kentucky this week completely rejected a religious 
right challenge to civil rights laws protecting gays and lesbians in 
Jefferson County and the City of Louisville.  Both laws were enacted in 1999, 
with Louisville's the first such law in the state.  But the American Center 
for Law and Justice filed a lawsuit on behalf of a local gynecologist who 
claimed that the laws would infringe on his constitutional rights to freedom 
of religion, speech and association by forcing him to hire a gay or lesbian.  
Despite its resounding defeat, the Center is likely to appeal the ruling.

  A challenge to Arkansas' gay-only sodomy law succeeded this week in Pulaski 
County Circuit Court.  The current law prescribes up to one year in jail and 
a fine of $1,000 for homosexual acts between consenting adults even when 
performed in private.  Judge David Bogard found the law to be an 
unconstitutional infringement on both privacy rights and the right to equal 
treatment before the law.  The state has not yet decided whether to appeal.  
The lawsuit was brought by the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund on 
behalf of seven Arkansas gays and lesbians.  Only Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas 
currently have gay-only sodomy laws in force, while more than a dozen other 
states prohibit oral and anal sex regardless of the gender of the parties 
involved.

  Saint Patrick's Day parades in the U.S. were not without controversy this 
year, but protests were muted.  
New York City's big annual event was once again protested by the Irish 
Lesbian and Gay Organization, whose members have been barred from marching as 
a unit, but there were only three arrests compared to a peak of over two 
hundred arrests in their past civil disobedience actions.  
The previous week in New York, a number of Catholic groups boycotted parades 
in Queens and Staten Island because they included gays and lesbians.

  In Tucson, Arizona, a gay and lesbian contingent were miffed at their 
placement at the tail end of the Saint Patrick's Day parade.
In Savannah, Georgia gay and lesbian groups didn't even try to register for 
the Saint Patrick's Day parade they've been excluded from in the past, 
preferring to direct their energies towards a bill against discrimination in 
city employment.  

  In Macon, Georgia the gay and lesbian group Macon Pride marched happily in 
the city's annual Cherry Blossom Festival parade.
But in Tacoma, Washington a float that didn't even say "gay" or "lesbian" but 
only "pride" has been rejected from next month's Daffodil Festival parade.  
Parade organizers say they based their rejection on standards against entries 
reflecting political or social issues, but the Pierce County Pride Foundation 
believes it's a matter of homophobia.

  U.S. gay and lesbian newspaper group Window Media has added the "New York 
Blade" and the long-established "Washington Blade" to its stable, making it 
reportedly the world's largest gay and lesbian newspaper group.
The United States' two biggest gay and lesbian Internet portals, PlanetOut 
and Gay.com, are also now in the process of completing a corporate merger.

  And finally... a key to the success of NBC's gay-led hit sitcom "Will & 
Grace" has been the irrepressible character of Will's friend Jack, played by 
Sean B. Hayes.  But it seems there is a real-life model for the energetic, 
self-involved, sex-driven gay with no visible means of support -- Jack 
Deamer, who has served as a creative consultant for the series.  "Will & 
Grace" creators David Kohan and open gay Max Mutchnik have said publicly that 
Deamer was the basis for the Jack character.  Deamer says he was "chagrinned, 
embarrassed and devastated" when he realized the flamboyant character was a 
caricature of himself.  He asked that Jack's name be changed, but was told it 
was too late.  Now Deamer is suing the show and the network, claiming that 
Mutchnik had promised him a house and a car if the show was successful, but 
that he's received nothing to date.  Deamer is seeking $500,000 -- and that 
is a lot of jack.