"NewsWrap"
for the week ending September 22, 2007
(As broadcast on "This Way Out" program #1,017, distributed 9-24-07)
[Written by Greg Gordon, with thanks to Graham Underhill, and Rex Wockner with Bill Kelley]

Reported this week by Rick Watts and Tanya Kane-Parry

  The Ugandan tabloid newspaper “Red Pepper” has again outed several citizens as gay in an on-going campaign that began late last year.
Under the latest headline "HOMO TERROR! We Name And Shame Top Gays In The City," the Kampala-based paper called homosexuality "an unnatural habit that is eating up our beloved nation."
It named 40 individuals, by first name only, but in many cases provided details about their physical appearance, place of employment, neighborhood of residence, and the kind of car they drive.
A new online grassroots activist network called Gays Without Borders has been organizing various actions against the newspaper and protests to the Ugandan government.  But a spokesperson for the European Region of the International Lesbian and Gay Association has just returned from Uganda, and is urging the group to reconsider its campaign.  Programs Director Maxim Anmeghichean reported that "[The country's] coalition of LGBT organizations, SMUG, or Sexual Minorities Uganda, has decided to ignore the publication, as did even most of those who were outed," cautioning that actions by well-meaning groups outside Uganda could “support the idea promoted by the government that the fight for LGBT rights in the country does not belong to Ugandans and is promoted by the West.”
Human Rights Watch LGBT program director Scott Long also urged foreign activists to work through established Ugandan LGBT organizations, such as member groups of SMUG, both to be certain that the foreign assistance is welcomed, and because some individuals in Uganda have attempted to raise funds from abroad by setting up sham gay groups.

  In a long-awaited ruling, the highest court in Maryland, the Court of Appeals, decided 4-to-3 this week to uphold the U.S. state's law limiting marriage to heterosexual couples.  The American Civil Liberties Union and nine same-gender couples had challenged the restriction.
The four separate majority opinions, which took up 244 pages, about half written by Judge Glenn T. Harrell Jr., determined that while there was a fundamental right to heterosexual marriage, that right did not extend to same-gender couples.
The main dissent, encompassing more than 80 pages and written by Judge Lynne A. Battagli, agreed with the plaintiffs' assertion that denying marriage equality violates Maryland's equal rights amendment by discriminating on the basis of gender.  And Chief Judge Robert M. Bell's 10-page dissent insisted that it is the "right to marriage," not “same sex marriage,” that should have been under review, and that it must be extended to same-gender couples.
The majority opinion also followed a familiar pattern established by similarly divided recent high court anti-marriage equality rulings in New York and Washington, agreeing with state contentions that restricting marriage to heterosexual couples supports the state's interest in responsible procreation.
The Maryland ruling did suggest that the legislature could enact same-gender civil unions or marriage.  While lesbigay activists are considering their options, conservatives in the state are already talking about a constitutional amendment to prevent any legal recognition of same-gender couples.
There are three U.S. state marriage equality cases yet to be decided.  Connecticut's high court may be the next to rule, reportedly before the end of the year.  The California Supreme Court will hear oral arguments late this year or early in 2008 in what is probably the most significant of the marriage cases.  And an appeal of a lower court ruling on August 30th in favor of same-gender couples and their families in Iowa is eventually expected to come before that state's high court.

  Meanwhile, new research from the Netherlands shows that children raised by lesbian couples are as well-adjusted as those raised in heterosexual families.  The study's results, released this week, are nearly identical to similar research in the United States and Canada, according to the U.S.-based Rockaway Institute, a national center for public policy and research on LGBT issues.  Its Director Robert-Jay Green said in a statement that "Children do well in loving families, regardless of whether there are two moms or a mom and a dad involved."  He said more research needs to be done on gay fathers.
The Dutch study analyzed 200 couples with boys and girls ages 4 to 8.  Half of the parents were heterosexual, half lesbians.  Child adjustment and parental characteristics were measured by questionnaires, family observations by researchers, and diaries kept by parents reporting the amount of time they spent child rearing, working around the house, and working outside their home.  The results also showed that lesbian biological mothers were more satisfied with their partners as co-parents than heterosexual mothers were of their husbands.

  In other news this week, Ecuadorean Defense Minister Lorena Escudero has quit amid controversy over her plan to allow people in the military who come out as lesbigay to remain in the armed forces.  She said Ecuador's constitution, which bans discrimination based on sexual orientation, mandated the change in policy.  Escudero stressed, however, that she was not advocating that open gays and lesbians be allowed to join the military.
Reports said Escudero resigned after high military commanders expressed strong opposition to her proposal, and that she's since moved to a new job heading the government's Migrant Office.
New Defense Minister Wellington Sandoval said he has no plans to "politicize" the armed forces.

  After the Town Council of the small Canadian city of Truro, Nova Scotia was hauled before the provincial Human Rights Commission for refusing to fly the rainbow flag during LGBT Pride festivities in August, city leaders have decided to stop flying flags altogether -- except for the city, provincial and Canadian flags.
The Council in the city of some 12,000 people, located about 60 miles northwest of Halifax, had always welcomed temporary displays of flags representing various groups and organizations on the Civic Building's five official flagpoles. Mayor Bill Mills supported the 6-to-1 Town Council vote in August to reject the rainbow flag, saying of lesbigay people: "God says, 'I'm not in favor of that,' and I have to look at it and say, 'I guess I'm not, either.'  If I have a group of people that says pedophiles should have rights, do we raise their flag too? ... There doesn't seem to be standards anymore."
In adopting the total flag ban on September 10th, a majority of the Council also apologized to Pride organizer Charles Thompson for Mills' homophobic remarks, saying they didn't share his opinions.  Mills said he had no further comment.
Thompson told the “Chronicle Herald” newspaper that the new policy is a smokescreen and “sends the message that they still don't want to deal with us."

  And finally, researchers at two conservative U.S. colleges funded by the so-called "ex-gay" ministry Exodus International are reporting considerably mixed results in what they called the most ambitious study yet on whether so-called faith-based “therapy” can “cure” homosexuality.
A book trumpeted by Exodus leaders and published this week by psychologists Stanton Jones of Wheaton College and Mark Yarhouse of Pat Robertson University attempts to show the extent to which sexual-orientation change is possible though a study of 98 participants of various "ex-gay" ministries over four years.  They claim that fifteen percent reported substantially reduced homosexual desire and attraction, and that twenty-three percent said they'd experienced satisfactory reductions in homosexual desire but were living chaste lives.  Twenty-nine percent experienced only modest change in the desired direction but expressed commitment to continuing in their respective programs.  But fifteen percent experienced no change and were conflicted about the future, four percent expressed confusion about their identity but did not label themselves as gay, and eight percent reported change in what was called an "undesired" direction, apparently becoming more accepting of their gay sexual orientation.  Twenty-five of the original 98 participants had also dropped out over the course of the four-year study.
Jim Burroway, editor of the LGBT blog “BoxTurtleBulletin.com” told the “Gay.com” Web site that the last number is significant, noting, “we should have a clear understanding of why about a quarter of this study's participants dropped out before we write them off as irrelevant." 
Wayne Besen, Executive Director of the “ex-gay”-fighting Truth Wins Out, said that the research "was created to suit their political agenda, which is spreading myth that if one person can change, anyone can change,” and that its authors ignored documented harm that so-called “reparative therapy” has done to many lesbians and gay men.
Ironically, in an extreme but illustrative example of that, a counselor in one "ex-gay" program faced sentencing this week following his conviction on felony charges of sexually attacking his male clients.  43-year-old Christopher Austin worked in the "ex-gay" program Renew, operated out of the Church of Christ South MacArthur in Irving, Texas.  One of several victims who came forward, Mark Hufford, testified that Austin used "touch therapy" to ostensibly “cure” him of his homosexuality, a so-called “treatment” that progressed to include nude sessions and even oral sex.


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