Washington:
Who we are: Approve Referendum 71 is the campaign to preserve domestic partnerships in Washington State. By voting to approve, voters retain the domestic partnership laws that were passed during this year’s legislative session, including using sick leave to care for a partner, adoption rights, insurance rights, and more.
What we need: We need phone bankers to get our supporters out to vote. Washington is an all mail-in ballot state, and we need to ensure our supporters put their ballots in the mail. Also, youth turnout is a critical component of our campaign, and youth turnout historically drops in off-year elections. So we need a lot of help to turn them out.
How you do it: Sign up here to make remote calls for Approve 71. We’ll then contact you for a training, and you can make GOTV calls.
Maine:
Who we are: The No On 1/Protect Maine Equality campaign is working to protect Maine’s recently-passed law legalizing marriage equality for same-sex couples. Our opponents have put the issue on the ballot for Nov 3, 2009. Because of Maine’s early voting election laws, people are already voting at the polls, so we need help immediately to turn out our side at the polls.
What we need: We need you to devote a few hours to Call for Equality. Call for Equality is a virtual phonebank set up so that you can call Maine voters wherever you are. Much of Maine is rural, where canvassing isn’t effective, so we need to reach these voters- along with other supporters- by phone. All you need is a phone and internet connection. No experience required! We’ll provide the training, and all you need is a a few hours to help get a win in Maine.
How you do it: Click here to sign up for a training and your shift. There are lots of times available for your convenience.
Kalamazoo, MI:
Who We Are: The Yes on Ordinance 1856 / One Kalamazoo campaign is working in Michigan to support the City Commission of Kalamazoo’s twice approved ordinance for housing, employment, and public accommodation protections for gay and transgender residents. Opponents forced a public referendum on the ordinance so dedicated local volunteers, led by former Stonewall Democrats Executive Director Jon Hoadley, are working to ensure voters say YES to fairness and equality and keep Ordinance 1856.
Why The Urgency: In the final weeks, the opposition has gone all out with aggressive disinformation and misleading red herrings to try to defeat the ordinance. This includes signs that say “No to Discrimination” (even though voting No actually supports continued discrimination of GLBT residents), transphobic door hangers and fliers, and now radio ads that falsely suggest that criminal behavior will become legal when this simply isn’t true. The Yes on Ordinance 1856 supporters are better organized but many voters who want to vote for gay and transgender people are getting confused by the opposition.
How To Help:
1) Help the One Kalamazoo campaign raise a final $10,000 specifically dedicated to fight back against the lies on the local TV and radio airwaves and fully fund the campaign’s final field and GOTV efforts.
Give here: http://www.actblue.com/page/3-2-1-countdown
2) If you live nearby and can physically volunteer in Kalamazoo sign up here. If you know anyone that lives in Kalamazoo, use the One Kalamazoo campaign’s online canvass tool to remind those voters that they need to vote on November 3rd and vote YES on Ordinance 1856 to support equality for gay and transgender people.
Contact voters: http://www.onekalamazoo.com/tellfriends2
Some people have commented about the recent incident in Florida where five boys set fire to another. They expressed their “outrage” about why isn’t it called a hate crime when the victim is white. Details revealed that this was not a “hate crime” and that race had nothing to do with the incident.
“Crimes of hatred and prejudice-from lynchings to cross burnings to vandalism of synagogues… the term “hate crime” did not enter the nation’s vocabulary until the 1980s, when emerging hate groups like the Skinheads launched a wave of bias-related crime. The FBI began investigating what we now call hate crimes as far back as the early 1920s, when we opened our first Ku Klux Klan case. Today, we remain dedicated to working with state and local authorities to prevent these crimes and to bring to justice those who commit them.”
The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 requires the United States Sentencing Commission to increase the penalties for hate crimes committed on the basis of the actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, ethnicity, or sex of any person. In 1995, the Sentencing Commission implemented these guidelines, which only apply to federal crimes. Following the passage of the Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990 and at the request of the Attorney General, the FBI has gathered and published hate crime statistics every year since 1992.
The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, passed as the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009, expands existing federal hate crime law to include crimes motivated by a victim’s actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability, and drops the prerequisite that the victim be engaged in a federally-protected activity. The language passed refers to “Crimes of Violence.” It specifically includes transgendered individuals and makes it explicit that the law does not restrict people’s freedom of speech or association.
Basis of the hate crimes reported in 2007 (FBI data) :
| Basis of Crime | % of Crimes Reported | Sub-Category | % of Category |
| Race | 52% | Anti-black | 69% |
| Ethnicity | 14% | Anti-Hispanic | 62% |
| Religion | 17% | Anti-Jewish | 69% |
| Sexual Orientation | 16% | Anti-LGBT | 98% |
| Disability | < 1% |
Note: The FBI has noticed a 30% increase of crimes against the homeless since 1999, 75% of which were perpetrated by persons under the age of 25.
Per Capita rate of hate crimes, 2005 (FBI data)
| Sexual Orientation | Incidents | Adult Population | Incidents per million |
| Gays | 621 | ||
| Lesbians | 155 | ||
| Homosexual | 195 | ||
| Total | 971 | 10.9 mil | 89.1 |
| Bisexual | 25 | 6.5 | 3.95 |
| Heterosexual | 21 | 200.4 | .10 |
- Data based on 2005 FBI hate crime report assumes adult population of 217.8 million.
- Assumes 92% of all adults are heterosexual, 5% are homosexual and 3% bisexual.
Note: Some religious and social conservatives with their own anti-LGBT agendas, believe this figure is much lower. Some LGBT groups and their supporters believe the percentage is much higher. - Assumes all victims were adults, 18 or older.
- Based on FBI data, a homosexual is about 850 times more likely to be the victim of a hate crime motivated by his/her sexual orientation than is a heterosexual.
Note: The number of reported hate crimes in 2007 is 8% higher than the 2005 figures.
How accurate are these figures?
One study of gay, lesbian and bisexual adults showed that 41% reported being a victim of a hate crime at sometime during their life after the age of 16. Assuming that 8% of all adults are LGBT, at the time of the study, this means that about 7,000,000 had been victimized during their lifetime out of a total of about 17,000,000,000 individuals. This annualizes to at least 100,000 hate crimes against LGBTs per year (7,000,000 divided by 60 years).
Even this number may be a low estimate. I have been the subject of anti-gay hate crimes on three separate occasions and physical and verbal assaults twice, but they were either not reported or not treated by law enforcement as hate crimes. Many times, even if the crime is reported, the police may refuse to recognize it as such, hence the provisions in the new law, or had no law on the books in their jurisdiction to do so.
Because only about 1,500 hate crimes based on sexual orientation are actually recorded by police per year on average, one must conclude that a miniscule percentage of hate crimes are actually reported to the police by gays and lesbians.
Regarding enhanced penalties for hate crimes, according to former Chief Justice Rehnquist: “this conduct is thought to inflict greater individual and societal harm…. bias-motivated crimes are more likely to provoke retaliatory crimes, inflict distinct emotional harms on their victims, and incite community unrest.”
Some people object to penalty-enhancement and federal prosecution laws because they believe they offer preferred protection to certain individuals over others, saying that “all crimes are hate crimes.” This is categorically not true. Mugging someone at random to steal a wallet or purse for monetary gain is not a hate crime. Beating someone senseless because of who they are is.
President Obama’s speech at the HRC fundraiser on Saturday evening, October 10th was met with much cheering, applause and standing ovations, especially after his statement that “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” WILL be repealed. The discharges, however, continue at the rate of TWO PER DAY.
DADT
Rachel Maddow interviewed Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, a decorated U.S. Air Force fighter pilot who received notice last September that he was being discharged due to the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. Fehrenbach served in both the Iraq and Afghanistan theaters, was just two years away from retiring with a full pension, and estimates that the U.S. military spent roughly $25 million training him. When he received word of his discharge, Fehrenbach decided to fight, hoping that, if elected, Obama would quickly change the policy.
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/05/20/pilot-dadt-discharge-obama/
From:
Well, it’s been said, “it takes a village”, and the village of Humboldt came together and moved a mountain. We were able to reach Carol Bruno from People Productions this morning and had a nice conversation with her about our concerns.
She had met with Gil Miracle, the owner of Nocturnum, and they decided to cancel the Buju Banton performance scheduled for this Sunday night, October 11, 2009 due to all the negative feedback they have received. We want to thank everyone who took the time to email and call Carol and Gil with their concerns. We received many copies of emails that were so well written, coming from the hearts of our community members. It was very touching to read them all. Carol and Gil sent me this letter shortly after our phone call this morning:
October 5th, 2009
TO: Todd Larsen/ Queer Humboldt
FROM: Carol Bruno/ People Productions Gil Miracle/ NocturnumGreetings Todd, This email is to confirm to you that after lengthy consideration, Gil and myself decided that we will cancel the upcoming Buju Banton concert at the Nocturnum Nightclub scheduled for the October 11th, 2009. We have been diligently speaking with the management and various activists over the past two weeks in an effort to help establish a dialogue for discussions. We care about our local gay community.
Buju did issue a statement today that we have forwarded to you today, but it doesn’t change our decision. We will continue towards positive, constructive solutions. We regret any inconveniences this has caused to our community. We are very appreciative that Carol and Gil heard the community’s concerns and took this action. As you may or may not know, we are not alone in having Buju Banton’s concert’s cancelled. Just take a look at the list of cities that have cancelled his performances for his most recent tour: http://cancelbujubanton.wetpaint.com/ Buju Banton releases a press release today that can be found here: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/buju-bantons-rasta-got-soul-us-tour-a-success-63562192.html. Buju’s record company’s press release includes the statement:
“Throughout my travels as an artist, I have witnessed first hand the senseless atrocities being suffered by innocent people around the world and my heart goes out to them. I do not condone violence against anyone, including gays, and I have spent my career rallying against violence and injustice through music. At this point, I can only hope that my body of work speaks for itself and that anyone still offended by the lyrics of my youth will take the time to explore my catalog or come to one of my shows before reducing my character and entire musical repertoire to a single song.” While we think this is a good first step, it certainly doesn’t address all his documented anti-gay statements and relatively recent performances taken place after “the lyrics off his youth” of his hateful song, “Boom Bye Bye”.
For details on the lyrics of the song, visit: http://www.jamaicancaves.org/boom-bye-bye-lyrics.html – Or hear him sing on YouTube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWa7fzeX3xo
We also want to recognize some of the local representatives we have here in Humboldt that were drafting a letter today in support of cancelling the performance. Supervisor Mark Lovelace, Supervisor Bonnie Neely, Eureka City Councilwoman Linda Atkins and Arcata City Councilman, Shane Brinton were the first to sign on to a drafted letter that was to be presented tomorrow at the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors 1:30pm meeting.
We also want to thank our local print and radio outlets. KMUD this morning featured David Cobb on the NoHum report speaking about Buju Banton’s scheduled performance. Tomorrow, Times Standard Reporter, Thadeus Greenson, will have an article in the Times Standard on the performance cancellation. And Bob Doran at the North Coast Journal has been in touch with us all weekend. We are lucky to live in such a wonderful community as we have here in Humboldt. Thank you all for your quick and genuine concern to this issue.
