"NewsWrap"
for the week ending July 21, 2007
(As broadcast on "This Way Out" program #1,008, distributed 7-23-07)
[Written by Greg Gordon, with thanks to Graham Underhill, and Rex Wockner
with Bill Kelley]
Reported this week by Dean Elzinga and Greg Gordon
Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern repeated promises this week that his
coalition government would push for civil partnership legislation for same-gender
couples this year. His remarks came as he officially reopened the LGBT
OUThouse Community Center in central Dublin, a facility that’s survived two arson
attacks.
The refurbished OUThouse has a cafe, library and office space for 70 groups
working on LGBT issues. It receives more than 25,000 visitors annually.
The Prime Minister said that, "This Government is committed to providing a
more supportive and secure legal environment for same-sex couples." He noted
that a special commission had recommended that lesbian and gay couples be given
all the rights and responsibilities of their heterosexually married
counterparts.
OUThouse manager Louise Tierney called the lack of legal recognition "a
barrier to real equality," adding that "It engenders discrimination and puts gay
people at distinct disadvantage when it comes to basic rights." She said that
many elderly LGBT people are particularly reluctant to utilize senior care
health services because they fear discrimination.
She also called for resources to set up a childcare area in the OUThouse for
working lesbigay parents.
A lesbian couple currently living in Ireland may need childcare. A man who
donated his sperm to them won a legal fight this week to keep his biological
son in the country -- at least for the time being.
The lesbian couple - one Irish and the other an Australian enteredd into a
civil partnership in January 2006, soon after they became legal in the United
Kingdom. The Irish woman became pregnant by the Irish sperm donor, and they
signed a contract giving him visitation rights with the boy, who was born in May
2006. But both sides’ lawyers have said that tensions quickly grew. The
couple soon restricted the man's access to the boy, then told him that they
planned to go to Australia for up to a year, and that they were considering a move
there. Neither side has been identified, following Ireland's policy of
anonymity in family law cases.
Justices Susan Denham and Joseph Finnegan ruled that the child’s best
interests required him to stay in Ireland near his biological father, limiting the
couples’ Australian trip with their son to a maximum of six weeks. The third
judge, Justice Nial Fennelly, disagreed. He said that no evidence was offered
that the toddler would be harmed by leaving Ireland. "The case is utterly
unique and unprecedented," Fennelly wrote in his dissent, noting that neither the
parental rights of sperm donors nor lesbian couples are defined in Irish law.
The biological father filed two lawsuits - one to limit the duration of the
trip, and another seeking joint custody. The Supreme Court majority limited
the couple’s travels outside Ireland with the boy until the custody claim is
argued, which is expected later this year.
In the U.S., a county circuit court judge decided this week that Oregon
state laws granting parental rights to heterosexuals unconstitutionally
discriminate against families headed by same-gender couples.
Multnomah County Judge Eric Bloch cited a landmark 1998 Oregon
anti-discrimination law to rule that offering benefits based on marriage, while not
permitting same-gender couples access to the same benefits, constitutes illegal
discrimination.
He also found that the Oregon Family Fairness Act also called the Domestic
Partnership law would resolve the problem, provided it goes into eeffect as
scheduled on January 1st. However, a signature-collection effort currently
underway by the rightwing Constitution Party is intended to delay the law’s
implementation, and put it to a public vote on the November 2008 ballot.
Meanwhile, almost three out of four Hebrew-speaking Jews living in Israel
would accept a gay or lesbian child.
Of those polled in a recent Y-net/Gesher poll, 43 percent said they’d feel
bad about the situation but accept the child and his or her partner anyway,
while 30 percent would "have no problem with it." 15 percent of the respondents
would be very angry with the child and would maintain only minimal contact, and
the final 12 percent would end contact completely.
Women polled more lesbigay-friendly than men, 79 percent to 66 percent. Not
unexpectedly, ultra-Orthodox Haredi Jews were the most homophobic. 55 percent
said they’d fully cut off their child.
Pollsters also asked a question about "problematic" neighbors. Twelve
percent would not want to live next to a same-gender couple, 13 percent don't want
Christian neighbors, 18 percent would prefer not to live next to a Haredi
family... and 38 percent don't want a noisy musical family living next door.
In other news this week, Hong Kong's highest court has overturned a ban on
gay sodomy in what are considered to be public places.
The case stemmed from the prosecution of two men who acknowledged engaging in
sodomy in a parked car on an isolated road at night. The men challenged
their arrests, and lower courts ruled in their favor, but the Government appealed
to Hong Kong's Court of Final Appeal.
The case was the first prosecution of a 1991 law criminalizing gay sex in any
other than a private place, and carried a maximum prison term of five years.
A panel of five top judges unanimously dismissed the Government’s appeal this
week. Chief Justice Andrew Li said in the ruling that the law targets only
gay men and "does not criminalize heterosexuals for the same or comparable
conduct," and is therefore discriminatory.
Last year a 20-year-old Hong Kong gay man successfully challenged the Chinese
territory’s unequal age of consent law, which punished men under 21 who
engaged in sodomy with up to life in prison. The consensual age for heterosexual
intercourse in Hong Kong is 16. A local judge ruled in 2005 that the law
infringed on the rights of gay men. The Hong Kong government also unsuccessfully
appealed that ruling.
The court rulings overturning these laws haven’t automatically removed them
from the books, however. Hong Kong legislators are still required to formally
repeal them, although they’re now virtually unenforceable. Some observers
believe the Government will drag its feet on official repeal to avoid an outcry
from conservative religious groups and other traditionalists.
A defamation and libel conviction against Austria's leading lesbigay
organization Homosexual Initiative Vienna and its secretary general Kurt Krickler
has been overturned by the Vienna Regional Criminal Court.
Austrian People's Party Member of Parliament Walter Tancsits filed the
lawsuit after Krickler called him a "mental descendant of the brown Nazi minions" in
a press release condemning the lawmaker for spearheading the exclusion of
gays and lesbians from the Nazi Victim Compensation Act.
A lower court convicted Krickler in April 2006, sentencing him to three
years' probation and the choice of a fine of 240 euros -- about 329 U.S. dollars --
or a month in jail. Under the terms of the conviction, Krickler wouldn’t
have had to pay the fine or serve time if he didn’t commit another crime during
the probationary period.
But the appeals court decided Krickler's denunciation of Tancsits was simply
the expression of an opinion, which is permissable, rather than stating as
fact something that is untrue, which can be libelous.
Krickler called the acquittal a "great victory for freedom of speech and
human rights in Austria" and noted that Tancsits now has to pay all legal costs of
both parties.
Hundreds of LGBT people marched on July 7th in the sixth annual Pride
parade in Lima, Peru.
They demanded passage of the proposed Law of Equal Opportunities between Men
and Women, and urged that the measure specifically include protections for
lesbians.
Organizers also condemned anti-queer violence, claiming that there were at
least 600 homophobic attacks in Peru last year, and that many of them were
committed by police officers.
Gay Pride in the Maltese capital of Valletta attracted only about 50 people
on July 6th, fewer than at the first march four years ago.
Marchers included British Member of the European Parliament David Bowles,
Education Minister Louis Galea, Labour M.P. Evarist Bartolo and Alternattiva
Demokratika Party Chairman Harry Vassallo.
Malta Gay Rights Movement coordinator Gabriella Calleja told the "Times of
Malta" newspaper that LGBT people there are afraid to come out publicly. "At
the recent pride party there were about a thousand people or more," she said,
"but here, given the cameras and journalists and in broad daylight, it's a
different story."
And finally, every four years the South Pacific Games hosts athletes from
22 countries in multi-sport competition. The 13th quadrennial Games kick off
on August 25th this year in the Samoan capital of Apia, with over 5,000
athletes and spectators expected -- but it won’t be without a bit of controversy.
Team Samoa issued a memo in early July to its athletes and officials warning
them not to have gay or lesbian sex during the Games. The "Samoa Observer"
newspaper published the full text of the memo banning homosexual activity, which
said in part, "Do not embarrass yourself, your family and your country by
trying this in the village." It went on to say, "Best not to even think about
this. It's against the law of God!"
Outrage ensued, prompting South Pacific Games Organizing Committee Chairman
Tapasu Leung Wai to quickly contact the press to say that the policy was simply
part of a draft of the rules, and that it hadn’t been officially approved by
the Committee.
Homosexual "indecency" in Samoa, however, is punishable by up to five years
in prison. But, said Wai, "we do not have any hard feelings about anybody,
whatever you do. We respect whatever status you have."
Let the games begin.
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