MARCH 24 2017 VOLUME 1 ISSUE 1 A M E R I C A S LGBT NEWS SOURCE LOSANGELESBLADE.

COM

#RESIST
PHOTOGRAPH JON VISCOTT WWW.VISCOTTIMAGES.COM

LA Pride embraces call for protest march, PAGE 12

Schiff alarmed by Trump Honoring ally Katy Perry Why Im suing Frontiers

PAGE 4 PAGE 8 PAGE 28

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Schiff: Absolute sense of alarm over Trump administration
Los Angeles Democrat
is leading the
resistance in Congress
By KAREN OCAMB
kocamb@losangelesblade.com
Theres a war going on for the soul of
American democracy. Since Donald Trumps
election last November, more and more U.S.
citizens and foreign leaders have expressed
deep concern over what appears to be the
deliberate dissolution of governmental
institutions and constitutional laws, ethics
and values, once a beacon to the world.
At the heart of the resistance to the
encroaching Trump tyranny is the ght
over Russias role in disrupting the election
and whether breaches and cyber-bots are
continuing to do damage.
Leading the fact-nding resistance in
Congress is Rep. Adam Schi, whose 28th
District stretches from West Hollywood to
Pasadena. A former federal prosecutor,
Schi is the ranking Democratic chair of
the House Permanent Select Committee
on Intelligence.
After the March 20 hearing during which
Schi and his colleagues questioned FBI
Director James Comey and Adm. Michael
S. Rogers, the director of the National
Security Agency, the New York Times
wrote: As attack dogs go, Representative
Adam B. Schi, Democrat of California,
is more labradoodle than Doberman, his
partisanship disguised by a thick fur of
intense preparation, modulated locution
and gentle accusations.
To which Schi replied on Twitter:
Prefer to think of myself as a Churchillian
bulldog, but Ill accept labradoodle from
the @nytimes.
Comey might really consider Schi
more of a well-trained pit bull. Schis
lawyerly probing got Comey to admit that
the FBI had no evidence to back up Trumps
claim that former President Obama wire-
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Rep. ADAM SCHIFF at The Abbey in West Hollywood in 2012.
tapped Trump Tower and that Trumps
repeated lies about surveillance were
damaging relations with the countrys
allies. Additionally, Comey conceded that,
in addition to the Russian hacking of the
election, the Trump campaigns possible
collusion with Russian ocials is under
federal investigation.
Is it possible that all of these events
and reports are completely unrelated and
nothing more than an entirely unhappy
coincidence? Schi asked. Yes, it is
possible. But it is also possible, maybe
more than possible, that they are not
coincidental, not disconnected and not
unrelated and that the Russians use the
same techniques to corrupt U.S. persons
that they employed in Europe and
elsewhere. We simply dont know, not yet.
And we owe it to the country to nd out.
These are not just rhetorical ourishes
so Schi can get a sound bite on MSNBC
or CNN. Hes the real deal, checking in
with his constituents when no cameras
are around. And he knows many of his
constituents are terried of Trump.
There is an absolute sense of alarm
at how this administration is conducting
itself and whether the president of the
United States, who makes repeated false
statements, can be believed in times of
LOS ANGELES BLADE PHOTO BY KAREN OCAMB
national crisis. I think its a very deep
concern for members of both parties,
Schi told the Los Angeles Blade in a
phone interview March 17.
Believe me, I understand it and I feel
that acutely, he said. The day after the
election, I went to the LGBT Center in
the district.[H]undreds of people were
deeply worried about what this new
administration would mean. Youve now
seen that Center defaced with hateful
grati. Youre seeing a rise in anti-
Semitism around the country and hate
in many forms. Youre seeing members
of Congress like Steve King express white
nationalist sentiments that would be
unthinkable at other times. And I think its
alarming to millions of Americans.
Schi has also discussed LGBT rights when
he travels to foreign countries, including the
Baltics. He is keenly aware of attempts by the
American religious right to create alliances
with conservative foreign governments
based on anti-LGBT sentiment.
I think this is really part of a propaganda
campaign that has many centers of
gravity, Schi said. But one of the most
prominent is coming out of Moscow and
this is a line that the Kremlin is pushing as
part of its nativist agendathat the West is
decadent, that it doesnt observe family or
LO CA L N E W S
conservative values. This is something the
Russians are trying to use in Eastern Europe
and in the Baltics as a way of developing
support for pro-Russian parties.
When I was in the Baltics a year or two
ago, he continued, this was an issue I
raised with some parliamentarians who
were pursuing legislation modeled after
bills in the Russian Duma to discriminate
against the LGBT community. So these
eorts are going on. I think the Kremlin
considers it a wedge issue they can use
to wedge people away from the United
States but also cause internal conict
within Eastern European societies in
hopes of weakening them.
While Schi says there must be a strong
pushback, especially among members of
Congress with their counterparts in Europe,
support from the State Department and
the White House is uncertain.
Two words I have yet to hear in
combination from the president are human
and rights. And if hes not going to talk
about human rights at all and make it clear
to authoritarian and other governments
around the world that thats not a priority
for the United States any more, Schi said,
then what hope do we have for the White
House to be advocating for a policy that
LGBT rights are also human rights?
Still, there is hope. Ive been urging
people to pick one or two issues that
they really care about and to nd out
how they can make a dierence in those,
Schi said. They can be LGBT issues
or climate change or concerns over
voter disenfranchisement in minority
communities. Figure out how you can use
your skills as a layperson, as a lawyer, as a
teacher, as a writer to contribute to resisting
the ill-thought-out and discriminatory
policies of the administration. We each
can make a dierence and the challenge
is to gure out where each individual can
have the most value. But there are lots
of opportunities and the country deeply
needs it right now.
0 6 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Griffin to Trump: Support the Equality Act
HRC president says
a good businessman
would endorse measure
By KAREN OCAMB
kocamb@losangelesblade.com
Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine set the disturbing
scene of America today.
We are living in a stress test of our
constitutional democracy, Hillary Clintons
vice presidential running mate told the
packed ballroom at the Human Rights
Campaigns Los Angeles gala March 18. We
have taken this thing in for the 230-year
checkup to see whether the institutions
that were put in place in 1787 still exist.
And if Congress does, and the courts do,
and the press does, and the citizens do
the roles that we were intended to do, this
chapter will have an end. And the end of
the chapter will be that our system was
vindicated over any temporary occupant
of any of the positions in the Constitution.
HRC President Chad Grin, an Angelino,
painted a more vivid picture.
We are going to hold Donald Trumps
tiny little hands to the re every day,
he said to laughter and applause. We
wont stand by as he waves a rainbow
ag while undermining equality behind
closed doors. We wont stand by while
he denies asylum to LGBTQ refugees
eeing persecution, violence or even
death. Or while he deports thousands of
undocumented LGBTQ immigrants living
in America today.
Drawing a sharp contrast between the
previous and current administrations was
a running theme.
This is one of the few times when I think
all of us have realized that although the
hands of time go forward, sometimes they
can go back, said California gubernatorial
candidate and former L.A. Mayor Antonio
Villaraigosa, who has been a strong LGBT
ally since he was Assembly Speaker in
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
HRC President Chad Grin speaking at the HRC Gala March 18 at the JW Marriott L.A. Live
1994. We need to ght for the notion that
America has always strivedas President
Obama used to say so eloquentlyto be
a more perfect union. To stand up for
equality for all of us.
L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti noted that power
ows from the cities to Washington and its
time to not just resist but to take this country
back. Since L.A. is a sanctuary city, the Los
Angeles Blade asked about undocumented
trans immigrants terried of being caught
in ICE deportation sweeps. We will protect
them! Garcetti said forcefully.
Gay Rep. Mark Takano told the Blade
that the Equality Caucus intends to re-
introduce the Equality Act. I have no
illusions of it passing the House or getting
through the committee with jurisdiction,
which is my committee, the Education and
Workforce committee, he said. But rest
assured (Rep.) David Cicilline and I and the
other members of the Equality Caucus are
doing everything we can to increase the
number of co-sponsors.
Takano said the Equality Act would
not be amended to include a religious
liberties provision as a sweetener for
Republicans, a strategy once considered
for passing the discarded Employment
Non-Discrimination Act. The Equality Act
LOS ANGELES BLADE PHOTO BY KAREN OCAMB
adds sexual orientation and gender
identity to the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Its
a very simple, elegant bill, Takano said.
Why would we want to dilute it with
religious freedom exceptions? After the
Hobby Lobby decision and seeing how the
Supreme Court operates, we dont want to
pass an Equality Act that in turn will be full
of a loophole. So, no, I would be very much
opposed to that.
For Grin, the Equality Act will soon
put Donald Trump on notice. When we
announced the Equality Act, out of the box,
we had more corporate support, more
business partners than we had on any piece
of legislation in our history, Grin told the
Blade. So we continue to grow that coalition
and our endorsers from the business side
are truthfully some of the biggest job-
creators in the country today.
And therein lies the rub for Trump, who
promised to be the nations biggest job-
creator, says Grin.
The job creators of this country are
standing up, more so than ever before,
he said. It is a unied force of businesses
standing up and speaking out, whether
thats in North Carolina or whether its
in the state of Texas with the hateful
legislation thats being thrust upon us
LO CA L N E W S
there, or nationally as it relates to the
Equality Act because it impacts their
employees and its good for business.
I think this is a test of Donald Trump,
Grin said. Despite his actions, he has
continued to pretend that he is an ally to
our community. This will be the test. If hes
actually an ally, hell endorse the Equality Act.
Grins comments are not just dust
in the wind. Just days after last years
HRC gala where he called upon the
entertainment industry to shun states like
Georgia that were proposing anti-LGBT
legislation, Disney, Marvel, the Weinstein
Company and Netix announced they
would not allow movie or TV production in
the state if the anti-LGBT HB 757 became
law. They joined other corporations such
as Apple and Salesforce and the prized NFL
in also threatening a boycott. Georgia Gov.
Nathan Deal vetoed the religious liberty
bill. This year, HRC worked to defeat anti-
LGBT North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory
over HB2 and it threatens to come after
any other anti-LGBT legislators.
The entertainment industry is uniquely
positioned to elevate the voices of real
people that are harmed and impacted
by Donald Trumps hateful policies, said
Grin. Theres a great example in this
room. Donald Trump has a tiny little Twitter
account (29.9 million personally; 16.2 under
POTUS). Katy Perry has a massive Twitter
account (96.6 million). Then you add Katy
with America (Ferrera) and everyone else
in this roomthis is a powerful community
and this community plays a critical role
in changing hearts and minds by telling
stories and we need more of it.
Grin is unconcerned about apparent
continued divisions within the Democratic
Party. The Republican Party of today
is the party of Trump that rejects every
single minority group in this country,
Grin said. We now have one big bold
enemy: Donald Trump has unied the
pro-equality majority in this country like
Ive never seen it before.
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HRC honors Katy Perry, America Ferrera
Gala embraces humble
appreciation for
the work ahead
By KAREN OCAMB
kocamb@losangelesblade.com
Sometimes a turning point must be
forced, a crowbar jammed into the stuck
gears of history to get progress going
again. At other times, a change may
be underway with no discernible clues
to pinpoint the transformation, except
perhaps a subtle shared feeling. That was
the sensation during the Human Rights
Campaigns March 18 gala in Los Angeles,
at which singer/activist Katy Perry and
actress/activist America Ferrera were
honored as LGBT allies.
The main ballroom at JW Marriott L.A.
Live was lled to capacity. But the setting
was decidedly no-frills and instead of
the usual A-Gay air kisses and preening
competition, the atmosphere was warm
with appreciative camaraderie and a kind of
pervasive humility, a knowing community
gathering before an ugly storm. The still
shell-shocked LGBT checkbook activists and
allies are terried that Donald J. Trump will
strip away hard-won rights in the blink of
a right-wingers eye. Its happened before,
when Prop 8 repealed the constitutional
right to marry for same-sex couples in
2008. Everyone wanted to do something
to stop the madness.
Former vice presidential candidate
Sen. Tim Kaine roused the crowd, as
did HRC President Chad Grin, former
L.A. Mayor and gubernatorial candidate
Antonio Villaraigosa and L.A. Mayor Eric
Garcetti. The transgender community
was visible, starting with HRC LA Dinner
Co-chair Jessica Bair, born in Utah to a
Mormon family, who now holds a senior
management position in cybersecurity at
Cisco. HRC Board member Ashley Thomas,
whod own in from Austin, Texas, said
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Singer KATY PERRY dedicated her HRC Award to her gay longtime manager, BRADFORD COBB
(pictured) at the HRC Gala in LosAngeles on March 18.
she felt physically sick with fear after
the election. Everything weve achieved
everything is in jeopardy, she said. Their
hate is historic and very real. To be honest,
this is bullshit.
The audience felt that, too, exing their
checkbook activist muscle for the HRC Super
Pac, which is targeting six Republicans who
had been reelected by slim margins in
districts won by Hillary Clinton, including
anti-LGBT Rep. Darrell Issa. $102,477 was
raised in under ve minutes.
Then came another almost imperceptible
moment: gay men fully embraced the
power of women, something HRC has
quietly done for ages, says longtime HRC
board member Gwen Baba.
Were a little bit of everybody. We
reect the LGBT community, says Baba.
But Chad is surrounded by strong women
at HRC.
Lena Dunham, actor, writer, director,
creator and star of HBOs groundbreaking
feminist series Girls, was heartily cheered
when she came onstage to introduce her
best friend, Ugly Betty and Superstore
star America Ferrera. It feels nice to
hear the initials HRC, Dunham joked,
LOS ANGELES BLADE PHOTO BY KAREN OCAMB
referencing Hillary Rodham Clinton. HRC
had been a big and early backer of HRC.
Dunham shared how the two spent
election night together until Dunham
went home. America stayed. She was
determined to be a part of history. The
next morning, through tears, she told me
and she told our friends that we could not
stop ghting. And Americas friends would
do anything for her and so we wont.
It felt as if Dunham was talking about
America her friend and America her country.
Ferrera didnt bounce out like a
cheerleader. She seemed vulnerable
as she accepted HRCs Ally for Equality
Award. She noted how Superstore
celebrates and values humor in the lives
of black, brown, Asian and white people,
undocumented, gay, disabled, born-again
Christian and struggling teen mothers
and that such representation matters.
I didnt grow up seeing a lot of examples
of short, brown, chubby, poor daughters
of immigrant parents [who] grow up to be
successful actresses and loud activists,
said Ferrera. But, unlearning what culture
has taught us about who we are or ought
to be can be changed by claiming and
LO CA L N E W S
living in our own power.
Ferrera revealed she had been a lonely
outsider, saved by her lesbian high school
drama teacher, Sue Freitag, who was in
the audience.
In my senior year of high school, when
I struggled with feelings of depression and
isolation, she created a safe space for me,
the 32-year-old said. I will never forget the
rst time she invited me to eat my cold pad
Thai with her in the drama theater room. It
was the rst time that entire year I felt like
I was gonna make it through high school.
She still gets depressed. Some days I
feel tired and inadequate, incapable of
making a dent, Ferrera said. There are
days I would rather crawl under my bed
with a box of Captain Crunch and all six
seasons ofDawsons Creek.
But she reaches out. Its dicult to
persist in light of attacks on our rights, in
light of attacks on our communities physical
safety, and in light of attacks on our spiritual
well being, Ferrera said, embracing the
historic moment. We are all being called
to rise up to a level of consciousness and a
level of action that we never imagined we
would be called to. We are being called to
stand together, to ght together, breathe
together, rejuvenate together.
Ferrera beamed. Anything Ive ever
done on behalf of the LGBTQ community, I
did in service to myself, she said. Anything
I ever did for the rights of this community I
did because I believewith every ber of
my beingthat my liberation is bound up
in the liberation of my LGBTQ brothers and
sisters, and in the liberation of my black
brothers and sisters, and in the liberation
of immigrants, and refugees, and Muslims,
and sikhs, and women all over the world,
and the incarcerated, and the criminalized,
and the uneducated, and the poor, and the
hungry,and, and, and, and, and.
The room erupted in cheers. But the
night was not done. Singer/activist Katy
CONTINUES ON PAGE 9
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HRC gala honors allies Perry, Ferrera

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 8
Perry was also revealing, suggesting she
had been bi-curious growing up.
Im just a singer-songwriter, honestly. I
speak my truths and I paint my fantasies
into these little bite-size pop songs. For
instance, I Kissed a Girl and I Liked It.
Truth be told, I did more than that, she
said. But how was I going to reconcile that
with the gospel singing girl raised in youth
groups that were pro-conversion camps?
What I did know is that I was curious, and
even then, I knew that sexuality wasnt as
black and white as this dress.
Perry acknowledged that she hasnt
always gotten it right, but she also knew
that her 2008 hit started a conversation
and a lot of the world seemed curious The Crouches preached prayer. Most truth. Oh, my goodness, what a revelation!
enough to sing along to. of my unconscious adolescence, I prayed And not the last chapter of the Bible!
Perry grew up on anti-gay Orange the gay away at my Jesus camps, Perry Perry choked up talking about Cobb,
County-based televangelists. My rst revealed. But then in the middle of it all, one of the greatest champions of my
words were mama and dada, God and in a twist of events, I found my gift, and my life for almost 15 years. My life is rich in
Satan, Perry said. Right and wrong were gift introduced me to people outside of my every capacity because of [LGBT people].
taught to me on felt boards and, of course, bubble. My bubble started to burst. They are trusted allies that provide a safe
through the glamorous Jan Crouch crying Perry befriended LGBT people, including space to fall, to not know it all and to make
diamond teardrops every night on that her manager, Bradford Cobb, to whom mistakes, she said. I hope I stand here
Vaseline-TBN television screen. When she dedicated her award. These people as evidence for all that it doesnt matter
I was growing up, homosexuality was were nothing like I had been taught to where you come from, it is about where
synonymous with the word abomination fear, Perry said. They were the most you are going. Real change, real evolution
and hella place of gnashing of teeth, free, strong, kind and inclusive people I and real perception shift can happen if we
continual burning of skin and probably have ever met. They stimulated my mind open our minds and soften our hearts.
Mike Pences ultimate guest list for a and they lled my heart with joy, and they People can change believe me.
barbecue. No way! No way! I wanted freaking danced all the while doing it. The LGBT community may need to
the pearly gates and unlimited fro-yo These people are actually magic, and they believe and work on that to win over
toppings. are magic because they are living their Trump voters before the 2018 elections.

Equality California welcomes

The Los Angeles Blade!
In a time of misinformation, alternative facts, war on the free press,
and attacks on underrepresented communities, it is more important
than ever that the LGBT community has robust, LGBT-owned
media outlets, like The Los Angeles Blade, committed to excellent
independent journalism. The health, safety, and well-being of every
LGBT American depends on media outlets dedicated to reporting on
the most important LGBT news and stories.

Equality California is the nations largest statewide lesbian, gay,

bisexual, and transgender civil rights organization focused on
creating a fair and just society. Through electoral, advocacy,
education and mobilization programs, we strive to create a broad
and diverse alliance of LGBT people, educators, government officials,
communities of color and faith, labor, business, and social justice
communities to achieve our goals.

Learn more at: www.eqca.org.

1 0 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17 W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Groundbreaking on The Anita Rosenstein campus.
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE LOS ANGELES LGBT CENTER
LAs LGBT Center breaks
ground on $118 million project
The Los Angeles LGBT Center broke ground March 18 on the $118 million
Anita May Rosenstein Campus, a facility that will provide support services for
LGBT youth and seniors. Plans call for 100 aordable housing units for seniors
and transitional support for homeless LGBT youth.
Nearly a decade ago, we began to dream of a project unlike any other: a
beautiful multi-generational campus with new and expanded social services,
together with aordable housing for seniors and youth, said Center CEO Lorri
L. Jean. More than that, we dreamed of uniting it with The Village at Ed Gould
Plaza, our arts, cultural and educational facility. Combined, the two locations will
oer more integrated services for LGBT people than any other place in the world.
Im enormously grateful to the many donors, community and elected leaders,
and nancing partners who are making the dream a reality. The need for the
Anita May Rosenstein Campus has never been greater and so is the need for the
health and mental health services that well be able to expand in our McDonald/
Wright Building when we relocate sta and programs to the new campus.
The groundbreaking was attended by dozens of community notables,
including Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, Council member David Ryu, and the
donor for whom the project is named, Annetta May Rosenstein. Rosenstein has
pledged more than $7 million to the project.
The Center has raised $35 million of the $118 million needed to complete the
130,000 square foot project. The Rosenstein campus will be the largest of eight facilities
operated by the center and will also become its new administrative headquarters.
TROY MASTERS
LO CA L N E W S
Equality California opposes Gorsuch
Equality California has sent a letter to members of the United States Senate urging
them to oppose conrmation of Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch.
In the letter, Equality California disputes Trump administration claims that Gorsuch is a
moderate. In fact, Gorsuchs legal opinions are rooted in originalism, the belief that the
Constitution should be interpreted in a manner consistent with those who drafted and
ratied it nearly two and a half centuries ago, Equality California said in a statement.
He is far to the right of the majority of Americans who believes in womens reproductive
freedom, marriage for same-sex couples and the separation of church and state. He sided
with employers in two federal cases supporting an employers right to refuse to pay for
contraception as part of employee health coverage if doing so violates the employers
religious beliefs. This viewpoint regarding religious liberties has serious implications for
LGBT people.
The letter to senators states in part:
On behalf of our 800,000 members, Equality California is deeply concerned about Mr.
Gorsuchs judicial rulings and philosophy and his zeal to expand religious liberties, as
demonstrated by his signature argument in the Hobby Lobby case. In his opinion, Mr.
Gorsuch supported the denial of birth control coverage for employees in their company-
provided health plans if an employer claims that denying such coverage is based on
religious beliefs Merely signing an ACA opt-out form, Gorsuch wrote, posed a moral
dilemma for such employers because it made them complicit in something they found
sinful.
The letter to all 100 members of the United States Senate was signed by Equality
California Executive Director Rick Zbur and National Policy Director Valerie Ploumpis.
STAFF REPORTS
San Diegos Out at the Park set for April 21
San Diego Pride announced plans to team up with the Padres for OUT at the Park, as the
Padres take on the Miami Marlins at 7:10 pm on Friday, April 21 at Petco Park.
San Diego Prides event at Petco Park has been held for many years. Memorably, at last
years event, a technical error resulted in a recorded female soloist singing the National
Anthem instead of the San Diego Gay Mens Chorus members who were in center eld.
According to a statement from San Diego Pride, Emerging out of this incident has come
a deeper dialogue between the San Diego Padres and the LGBT community, which has
primed San Diego for what promises to be the best OUT at the Park to date.
The San Diego Padres have been amazing, said Bob Lehman, executive director, San
Diego Gay Mens Chorus. They partnered with our LGBT community this past year to
make incredible things happen. The Padres have now set the gold standard for LGBT
inclusion among all professional sports. We are so proud to return to Petco Park to sing
the National Anthem together with them and our entire community.
The Padres are grateful to San Diego Pride and the San Diego Gay Mens chorus for their
guidance and collaboration in strengthening our relationship with the LGBT community
over the past 10 months, said Padres Vice President of Community Relations Sue Botos.
We are proud of the partnership that has grown from a series of very honest and genuine
conversations, and we look forward to standing together at Petco Park in April.
Each $25 OUT at the Park ticket purchase includes a seat in the OUT at the Park section,
a commemorative Padres hat, a $5 donation to San Diego Pride or the Americas Finest
City Softball League and access to the pre-game VIP space in Park at the Park.
STAFF REPORTS
 Bringing a 50-year commitment to journalistic excellence to Los Angeles

Be part of this exciting

new publication serving
LGBT Los Angeles from
the team behind the
Washington Blade,

newspaper. From the

freeway to the Beltway,
weve got you covered.
1 2 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Back to the future resistance
Inspired by Womens
March, LA Pride organizers
embrace protest movement
By TROY MASTERS
tmasters@losangelesblade.com
Resistance is the stu LGBT Pride was
once made of.
Los Angeles in the late 1960s, like much
of America, was a hotbed of resistance of
every kind: the womens movement, the
hippie movement, the antiwar movement
and, yes, even a nascent movement for
LGBT rights, all combined here to fuel the
winds of change. The LGBT community in
Los Angeles, as in New York and around
the country, lived under constant threat
of ocial violence and the oppression of
pervasive hostility.
In 1966 Los Angeles, aection between
men was ocially condemned as a mental
illness and viewed as a moral disorder.
Sexual relations between people of the
same sex even hand holding was
a crime. Careers were destroyed by
whisper or innuendo and extortion was
rampant. There were precious few safe
social spaces for LGBT people other than
a dozen or so nightclubs in close proximity
to one another near Silver Lake Black
Cat, Rams Head and Stage Door and a
couple, like The Patch near Long Beach.
And so when routine police raids on
these establishments escalated and
turned violent, the community was deeply
traumatized. Finally, a breaking point came
on New Years Eve 1967 when a celebration
at Black Cat turned into a bloodbath; at
ve minutes past midnight, plainclothes
police ocers began tackling patrons,
swinging billy clubs and pool sticks,
dragging people into the streets, pulling
bartenders facedown over broken glass
across the bar, chasing patrons down the
streets, breaking bones and doing severe
bodily injury to some, arresting 16 people
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Rev. TROY PERRY was one of the founders of Christopher Street West.
who were charged with lewd conduct for
simply kissing, according to witnesses of
the time and published accounts.
A community that had long hidden
in the shadows suddenly found itself
seeking intersectional allies. Police
violence against civilians was attracting
more attention than ever and activist
groups, like Personal Rights in Defense
and Education (PRIDE) distributed iers
that read, PRIDE DEMONSTRATION:
join Negroes, Mexicans, hippies and
demonstrate against the Establishment
war on minorities. The Southern California
Council on Religion and the Homophile
urged action by activating a phone-tree
with the message that Homosexuals, who
have always been dependably meek, are
ghting back.
An unprecedented number of people
turned out one of the rst mass gatherings
in the United States protesting police
PHOTO BY JONATHUNDER; COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA
harassment of LGBT people protesting at
the corner of Sunset and Hyperion.
Until recently, the action, groundbreaking
though it was, has rarely been hailed as
such. It has been almost buried in LAs
psyche. Even Troy Perry, one of the founders
of Christopher Street West, says he never
viewed the Black Cat as a demonstration for
LGBTQ rights but as an action against police
brutality at that time in LA.
Two and a half years later, in June 1969,
a police raid on New Yorks Stonewall Inn
captured the attention of the world, however.
Six powerful days of resistance in
1969 between young gay, lesbian, and
transgender people and the New York
Police Department continue to dene
who we are as a people, a movement and
a community. After an intense escalation
of brutal police raids on gay bars in New
York City, patrons of the Stonewall Inn,
a Christopher Street bar in Manhattans
CO V E R ST O RY
West Village, fought back and won.
Though police turned re hoses on the
crowd, it swelled to thousands; chorus
lines of drag queens and lesbian and
gay youth overtook barricades, taunting
police with campy chants and performing
a Rockette-like show for the jaw-dropped
police. Occupy take over, take over
they shouted. Fag power! Liberate the
bar! Were the pink panthers! They pulled
cobblestones from the streets, smashed
windows, threw bottles, even uprooting
parking meters and cornering terried
policemen while singing a campy version
of We Shall Overcome.
While news of the riots spread quickly
around the world, Angelenos Rev. Troy
Perry, Rev. Bob Humphries and Morris Kight,
formed Christopher Street West (CSW) to
honor the uprising in New York and to tap
into a burgeoning sense of gay power by
launching the worlds rst Gay Pride Parade.
On June 28, 1970, thousands of jubilant
people celebrated and danced their way
west along Hollywood Boulevard, some
chanting two, four, six, eight, gay is just
as good as straight and hoisting placards
calling for equality and justice.
At the time we had no idea what we were
creating, we just wanted to acknowledge a
courageous group that stood up to being
bullied by police. It was a microcosm of
what was taking place throughout the
country and we thought, what better way
to make noise, get attention and excite
our community than by dressing up and
putting on a parade, said Perry.
Over the years the event evolved along
with the community.
It moved to West Hollywood and
became a fee-based, three-day festival to
help pay the growing expense of the event.
It was never without controversy, but fast-
forward to 2016 and both the festival
and the parade had nearly collapsed in
the heat of withering criticism over the
CONTINUES ON PAGE 14
1 4 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
LA Pride embraces call for protest march
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 12
direction of the event and whether history
or LGBT identity even matters.
From its founding in 1970 to 2016,
the parade reected the concerns of
a community ghting for basic dignity,
political rights, against violence and for
government recognition of a health crisis
that killed hundreds of thousands of gay
men. In recent years, as the community
enjoyed civil rights victories and gained
social, cultural and political power, the
Parades identity began to blur.
Last year, when CSW attempted to
rebrand the three-day festival into a
Music Festival, critics derided the group
for attempting to turn LA Pride into Gay
Coachella. CSW, they said, was hell-bent
on ignoring the events legacy and on
edging out more senior members of the
community. CSW President Chris Classen,
perhaps unintentionally, reinforced that
notion while addressing the controversy
to the West Hollywood City Council,
saying that by adding the word music to
the title of L.A. Pride is a subtle welcome
to a younger generation who does not
inherently understand the historical
context of the event.
Indeed, his plan, by rearranging or
removing sacred elements of the festival,
seemed to minimize the visibility of
lesbians, transgender, Latino and leather
community members and paid no homage
to seniors or to history. Even country-
western people felt theyd been given the
boot in favor of a post-gay Music Festival.
Groups formed to protest CSW and
critics blasted the organization at the
groups open board meetings and City
Council meetings. Ivy Bottini, a 90-year-
old lesbian resident of West Hollywood
demanded change: I consider the board a
lame duck board...It doesnt feel like CSW
understands what Pride is.
CSW corrected most of its mistakes
and issued a mea culpa. Last May, CSW
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
LA-based philanthropist, activist and entrepreneur BRIAN PENDLETON called for a protest march.
issued a statement saying it had made
a few missteps along the way that have
left valued members of our community
feeling left out or underappreciated. This
was never our intention. Weve heard your
concerns and objections and we sincerely
apologize. It seemed to work.
But events conspired to remind
everyone about the historical context
of the event a response to violent
oppression that gave rise to Christopher
Street Wests existence.
Mourning for Orlando
Los Angeles, like everyone in America,
was stunned to wake up on the morning
of June 12, 2016, to the news that a
madman had opened re on the dance
oor of a gay nightclub in Orlando,
killing 49 people and wounding dozens
more. That morning, Santa Monica Police
PHOTO COURTESY OF PENDLETON
Department arrested 20-year-old James
Wessley Howell, an Indiana man, who was
found with an arsenal of assault ries,
ammunition and explosives in his car; he
told police he wanted to harm people at
the Los Angeles Pride festival.
A pall was cast over the annual LA Pride
Parade but in a deant move, Christopher
Street West chose to continue with the
Parade and it quickly became a march
honoring of the victims in Orlando.
But questions about CSW just wouldnt
go away.
In late 2016, it was revealed the
organization had lost several hundred
thousand dollars, renewing outrage and
provoking allegations of mismanagement.
West Hollywood Mayor Lauren Meister,
concerned about city involvement
with potentially troubled non-prot
organizations, required nancial
disclosure from subsidized organizers.
CO V E R ST O RY
LA Pride has for years been partially
subsidized by West Hollywood because
it is estimated to generate more than
$5,000,000 in tax revenues.
Complicating matters for CSW, in
January 2017, several senior board
members resigned and complained
publicly that the top-down management
style of the board resulted in making
their service useless. Chief among their
complaints was the requirement of non-
disclosure agreements that prevented
board members from discussing
organizational matters outside the board.
The board members who resigned were
representative of the issues that sparked
the most concern in 2016; a prominent
transgender woman, a senior man, a
documentarian of LGBT history, a legacy
CSW president and a Latino man and
chairman of LA Leather Pride Week.
The resignations resurrected
community frustrations about CSWs
direction yet the organization appeared
to be singularly focused on the impact the
closure of West Hollywood Park had on
its Music Festival plans. But the election
of Donald Trump and his anti-LGBT vice
president, along with the installation of an
almost uniformly anti-LGBT cabinet was
top of mind for the community at large.
#resistmarch
Enter LA-based philanthropist, activist and
entrepreneur Brian Pendleton, inspired by
the womens march (which attracted several
hundred thousand people to downtown LA)
seized on what he saw as pent-up demand
for action that he, perhaps incidentally,
felt could give LA Pride revitalized mission.
He posted a frustrated comment on
Facebook, before my rst cup of coee,
declaring that the parade should be turned
into a protest march.
A Facebook page and other social media
CONTINUES ON PAGE 15
CO V E R STO RY
Trumps attacks on minorities inspire protest movement
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 14
using #resistmarch was created along
with a website, https://www.resistmarch.
org, and the idea went viral. More than
33,000 people have joined.
Pendleton found himself on the board
of CSW.
There was a hesitation to have me join
the board, he said. CSW has policies
and procedures about how to add board
members and in order for me to join, I
understand, the board had to waive those
procedures. But once the groundswell of
grassroots support became so strong it
was clear that it made the most sense for
CSW to add me as an exception.
He refused to sign the controversial
non-disclosure agreement.
The idea has been adopted by
Christopher Street West, sending the
parade o into a whole new direction that
more closely resembles the intentions of
its founders.
The march will even begin at the 1970
founding location at Hollywood Boulevard
and Highland to La Brea before continuing
onto Santa Monica Boulevard and into
West Hollywood.
Over the past 40 years, local merchants
have grown to rely on the events ability
to attract more than 100,000 people and
generate millions of dollars in income,
according to studies by the City of West
Hollywood. Organizers are hoping to at
least double the participation this year.
Signicantly, the Resist March idea
requires outreach to allied communities
and that work is in full swing. Among
the growing number of signees: Equality
California, Los Angeles LGBT Center, APLA
Health, Human Rights Campaign, The
Trevor Project, Family Equality Council,
Asian Pacic AIDS Intervention Team, City
of West Hollywood, Women Against Gun
Violence, IBEW Local 11, UNITE HERE! Local
11, CA NOW, National Council of Jewish
Women NARAL Pro-Choice California,
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
The last LGBT march on Washington was the National Equality March on Oct. 11, 2009.
Hollywood N.O.W., California Womens
Law Center, Victory Institute, The Next
Family, LASC, Project Angel Food, Tegan
and Sara Foundation, Trans Can Work,
West Hollywood City Council members
Heilman, Duran and Horvath, Christopher
Street West, Los Angeles County Board of
Supervisors, Los Angeles County Oce of
the Assessor, Los Angeles City Attorney,
and Gina Belafonte.
Pendleton told City Watch, This year,
because of the political winds and forces,
were sort of wrapping the iconic rainbow
ag of LGBTQ around women ghting for
reproductive rights, the dreamers who
want to stay in this country and recent
immigrants who want to come here,
anyone who feels impacted by the forces
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
against human rights.
Weve been ghting for our rights for
decades now but the last eight years,
weve had wind in our sails and seen
tremendous progress. Not wanting to
have any of our rights rolled back, we
stand up with our trans brothers and
sisters whose fates are being decided
by state governments. In South Dakota,
LGBTQ people can no longer adopt. We
want our rights restored.
The idea has spread around the country.
In New York City, Matt Foreman, the
former executive director of the National
Gay & Lesbian Task Force, has also been
advocating for a Resistance March there.
On Facebook he wrote: WTF Heritage of
Pride?! Why do people have to plead with
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 1 5
you for the Resistance to be front and
center in this years pride march?! YOU
should be taking the lead and embracing
the legacy of Stonewall. Arent you
humiliated that LA Pride is ahead of HOP
on this? Why court controversy and retreat
into the dank well of process? Come on
folks, youre better than this!
Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., a
National March is taking shape, planned
for Sunday, June 11, that was instigated by
a New York activist who also took to social
media to call for a march.
David Bruinooge, 42, a Brooklyn, N.Y.,
resident, said he was inspired to create
a Facebook page announcing the march
on Jan. 21 while he was watching the
Womens March on Washington at home
on television.
I was watching the events unfold on TV
and I was very proud and inspired by all the
women, the strong women in our country
who were kind of taking this to the street and
getting their voices heard, he told the Blade.
And in the back of my mind as an openly gay
man I thought the gay community should be
doing something like this to follow up on the
momentum, he said.
He said he intentionally chose June 11 for
the march because its the same day that
D.C.s Capital Pride Festival is scheduled to
be held on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. near
the U.S. Capitol. Bruinooge said his thought
was the march would start in the morning
and end at the site of the Pride festival.
Rev. Perry said in a statement to the
Los Angeles Blade, As the co-founder of
Christopher Street West, I am thrilled to see
them change the 2017 pride parade to a
human rights march. For me its always been
about humanizing our community, standing
up for those who need us most, and giving a
voice to those who are sometimes invisible.
Marching for human rights ts squarely
within the principles of CSWs founding. Ill
see you all on June 11th!
LOU CHIBBARO JR.
contributed to this report.
1 6 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Gorsuch calls same-sex marriage settled law
But LGBT advocates object
to nominees record in
Hobby Lobby case
By CHRIS JOHNSON
Amid opposition from LGBT rights
supporters to the conrmation of Neil
Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court,
President Trumps nominee referred to
same-sex marriage as settled law, but
was otherwise relatively tight-lipped about
his views during his conrmation hearings.
Grilled by members of the Senate
Judiciary Committee about his judicial
philosophy, U.S. Circuit Judge Gorsuch on
Tuesday maintained equal justice under
the law words enshrined at the top of the
Supreme Court building was a radical
idea, but one hed uphold, when asked
about application of the law to LGBT people.
Pressed by Sen. Al Franken about
marriage equality specically, Gorsuch
replied, It is absolutely settled law, but
added, theres ongoing litigation about its
impact and its application right now.
When Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) asked
the nominee about his views on LGBT
people, Gorsuch seemed irritated and
responded, What about them? and as
Durbin sought to clarify, the nominee
retorted, Theyre people.
Asked by Durbin to point to a statement
or decision favorable to LGBT people,
Gorsuch oered his judicial philosophy
that all individuals are entitled to equal
treatment under the law.
Ive tried to treat each case and each
person as a person, not a this kind of
person, not a that kind of person a
person, Gorsuch said. Equal justice
under law is a radical promise in the
history of mankind.
Durbin pressed Gorsuch to clarify
whether that applies to sexual orientation,
prompting Gorsuch to invoke the 2015
Obergefell v. Hodges decision in favor of
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Judge NEIL GORSUCH
same-sex marriage.
The Supreme Court of the United
States has held that single-sex marriage
is protected by the Constitution,
Gorsuch said, using single-sex marriage
terminology commonly cited in Europe,
but rarely in the United States, to refer to
marriage equality.
Durbin brought up LGBT people in the
context of questioning of John Finnis,
whom Gorsuch identied as a mentor
during his time at Oxford University. A
conservative one-time law professor,
Finnis delivered a deposition in the
early 90s in favor of Colorados anti-
gay Amendment 2, a law that prohibited
cities from enacting non-discrimination
ordinances based on sexual orientation.
The Supreme Court struck down the law in
the 1996 Romer v. Evans decision.
Referencing a passage in which Finnis
compared same-sex relationships to
bestiality and said antipathy toward LGBT
people is based not just on religious
reasons, but societal views, Durbin asked
Gorsuch whether he was aware of his
mentors statements.
I know he testied in the Romer case,
Gorsuch said. I cant specically recall the
specics of his testimony or that he gave a
deposition.
When Durbin sought more information
from Gorsuch on the impact Finnis had on
his views, Gorsuch referred to rulings he
made on the bench as a member of the
U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.
I think the best evidence is what Ive
written, Gorsuch said. Ive written or
joined over 6 million words as a federal
appellate judge. Ive written a couple of
books. Ive been a lawyer and a judge for
25 or 30 years, and I guess Id ask you,
respectfully, to look at my credentials and
my record.
In another exchange with Franken,
Gorsuch conceded the issue of same-
sex marriage is settled law, but
acknowledged subsequent litigation is
ongoing on its impact and kept his cards
close to his vest on his personal views.
Referencing Gorsuchs help with former
President George W. Bushs 2004 re-
election campaign in Ohio as a member
of Lawyers for Bush, Franken noted
NATIONAL NEWS
WASHINGTON BLADE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
that was the year the state had an anti-
gay amendment on the ballot and asked
the nominee whether same-sex marriage
should be subjectedto popular vote.
Senator, I dont recall any involvement
in that issue during that campaign,
Gorsuch said. I remember going to Ohio.
When Franken asked the nominee if he
wasaware of the marriage issue in 2004,
Gorusch replied, Certainly, I was aware
about it.
Pressed further by Franken for his views,
Gorsuch added, Any revelation about my
personal views about this matter would
indicate to people how I might rule as a
judge. Mistakenly, but it might, and I have
to be concerned about that.
When Franken pointed out the U.S.
Supreme Court has ruled in favor of
same-sex marriage nationwide and asked
Gorsuch how his views have changed since
2004, the nominee remain tight-lipped.
My personal views, if were to begin
speaking about my personal views on this
subject, which every American has views
CONTINUES ON PAGE 17
NATIONAL NEWS W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 1 7

Gorsuch tight-lipped, but says marriage is settled law

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16
on, would send a misleading signal to the
American people, Gorsuch said.
The Minnesota Democrat sought to
move on to another topic as Gorsuch said
he wanted to nish his thought about not
being able to disclose personal view, but
Franken said, Youve given a version of
this answer before. I understand.
The issue of marriage equality came
up later in the hearing when Sen.
Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) brought it up
when asking Gorsuch about his views
on whether the Constitution protects
intimate and personal choices. Gorsuch
again declined to express his personal
views, but underscored the importance of
the Obergefell decision as precedent.
Obergefell is a precedent of the United
States Supreme Court, Gorsuch said. It
entitles persons to engage in single-sex
marriage. Thats a right that the Supreme
Court has recognized. It is a precedent of the
United States Supreme Court entitled to all
the deference to precedence of the United
States Supreme Court, and thats quite a lot.
Much of the concern over Gorsuch
concerns his subscription to the judicial
philosophy of originalism in which jurists
seek to determine lawmakers original
intent of enacting statutes before ruling
on them, a practice criticized as a means
to deny justice to minority groups,
including LGBT people. The late U.S.
Associate Justice Antonin Scalia advocated
that judicial viewpoint in his dissents to
major gay rights cases, such as the U.S.
Supreme Court decision in favor of same-
sex marriage.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) sought
clarication from Gorsuch on originalism,
referencing, among other rulings, the
1996 Virginia Military Institute decision,
which determined the states exclusion replied, A good judge applies the law
of women from the school violated
the right to equal protection under the
14th Amendment. Scalia, in his dissent,
wrote the decision was creating a new
Constitution, not keeping to the original
meaning of the U.S. Constitution.
Asked by Klobuchar whether the ruling
was based on the original meaning of the
Constitution, Gorsuch kept his views to
himself and said, The majority in that case
argued that it was. Gorsuch repeated
his view the concept of equal protection
under the law is quite signicant.
When the Minnesota Democrat asked
Gorsuch whether hed apply that approach
to minority groups, such as women, LGBT
people and racial minorities, Gorsuch
without respect to persons. Thats part of
my judicial oath.
Seemingly unsatised with the response,
Klobuchar pressed Gorsuch further,
prompting him to reply, I dont take account
of the person before me. Everyone is equal
under the eyes of the law.
CONTINUES AT LOSANGELESBLADE.COM
1 8 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17 W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM NATIONAL NEWS

Rainbow ag stomped outside congressmans office

Capitol Police
investigating incident
By LOU CHIBBARO JR.
U.S. Capitol Police are investigating
an incident on March 15, in which a
visitor to a congressional oce building
in Washington removed a rainbow ag
hanging from the wall beside the door to
the oce of Rep. Alan Lowenthal (D-Calif.)
and repeatedly stepped on the ag.
The unidentied male visitor acted
on his displeasure with the ag minutes
after he entered Lowenthals oce and
angrily exclaimed his belief that the Pride
ag outside the oce was inappropriate
alongside the American ag, according to
a statement released by Lowenthals oce.
The man left the Congressmans oce,
removed the Congressmans Pride Flag
from its holder, threw it to the ground,
Rep. ALAN LOWENTHAL (D-Calif.) displays a
Pride ag outside his oce.
PHOTO BY THOMAS WASPER; COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA
and proceeded to repeatedly stomp on
it, the statement says. Other visitors in
the hallway verbally reprimanded him and
after he left, replaced the ag, it says.
They then notied the Congressmans
sta, who caught up to the man, veried
he was the one who had stomped on
the ag before escorting him into the
custody of Capitol Police ocers, the
statement states.
Eva Malecki, a spokesperson for the
Capitol Police, told the Washington Blade
the matter was under investigation. She
said Capitol Police have a policy of not
releasing additional details about ongoing
investigations, including the name of an
individual being investigated.
Keith Higginbotham, Lowenthals
communications director, said the
sympathetic visitors who witnessed the
incident at the Cannon House Oce
Building told Lowenthal sta members
that the attacker was visiting from North
Carolina and was with his family members
when the incident unfolded.
Higginbotham noted that the rainbow
ag, which his oce refers to as the
Pride Flag, has been displayed outside
Lowenthals Capitol Hill oce since
2013 along with an American ag and a
California state ag.
Lowenthal represents Californias 47th
congressional district, which includes the
city of Long Beach, located about 25 miles
south of Los Angeles. He is a longtime
LGBT rights supporter and has marched
in LGBT Pride parades in his district
beginning when he served previously as
a state senator and assemblyman and
as a Long Beach City Council member,
Higginbotham said.
This shocking demonstration of hate
is just another example of the shadows
of intolerance that have grown longer
in recent days, Lowenthal said in a
statement. To all our brothers and sisters
who endure through these hateful acts:
we stand with you, and we will continue to
ght for you.

LGBT juror non-discrimination bill reintroduced

Prohibits rejection of jurors
based on orientation,
gender identity
By LOU CHIBBARO JR.
LGBT supportive members of the U.S.
House and Senate last week reintroduced
legislation that would prohibit
discrimination against LGBT people in the
process of selecting jurors for trials in the
nations federal courts.
In the House on March 13, Rep. Susan
Davis (D-Calif.) introduced the Juror Non-
Discrimination Act of 2017, which calls
for amending an existing law that bans
discrimination against prospective jurors
on the basis of race and sex to cover
sexual orientation and gender identity.
Two days later, Sens. Jeanne Shaheen
(D-N.H.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) jointly
introduced the Senate version of the same
bill but which bears a dierent name, the
Jury Access for Capable Citizens and Equality
in Service Selection, or ACCESS, Act of 2017.
Both bills state that their intent is to
prohibit the exclusion of individuals from
service on a federal jury on account of
sexual orientation or gender identity.
As of early this week, three other
senators signed on as co-sponsors, Sens.
Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Patty Murray
(D-Wash.), and Ed Markey (D-Mass.).
Sixteen House members 14
Democrats and two Republicans signed
on as co-sponsors of the House version of
the bill as of early this week.
Legal observers have pointed out
that during the jury selection process
in trials attorneys for plaintis in civil
cases and prosecutors in criminal cases
as well as attorneys for defendants have
an opportunity to strike or disqualify a
limited number of potential jurors without
providing a reason.
Although the Supreme Court has ruled
that using such challenges to exclude
jurors based on their race or gender is
unconstitutional, the high court ruling
did not apply to sexual orientation or
gender identity. A federal law expanded
the Supreme Court ruling by banning
discrimination in the selection of jurors
based on race, religion, sex, national origin,
and economic status but also did not cover
sexual orientation or gender identity.
Meanwhile, in a development hailed
by LGBT rights attorneys, the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in
Northern California ruled in 2014 that its
unconstitutional for a potential juror to
be excluded solely because of his or her
sexual orientation. But that ruling covers
only the seven western states and Hawaii
that are in the 9th Circuit.
Supporters of the Juror Non-
Discrimination Act and the Jury ACCESS
Act say the legislation is needed to extend
the 9th Circuit ruling nationwide.
Aaron Hunter, a spokesperson for Davis,
said Davis and other House supporters of
the legislation are hopeful that it will gain
traction in the current 115th Congress
even though it has never made it out of
committee since it was rst introduced in
2012. The 2017 version of the legislation
has been referred to the Republican
controlled Judiciary Committees in the
House and Senate.
LO C A L N E W S
HHS seeks to dump LGBT elders from U.S. health survey
Trump administration
questions reliability
of sample
By CHRIS JOHNSON
LGBT advocacy groups are opposing the
Trump administrations announced plans
to remove questions seeking to identify
gay, lesbian and bisexual elders in a U.S.
health survey, saying the move represents a
systematic plan to undermine LGBT progress.
Services & Advocacy for LGBT Elders
announced Monday the launch of a
campaign to oppose the Department
of Health & Human Services proposed
elimination of the questions from the
National Survey of Older Americans Act
Participants, or NSOAAP. The survey is
intended to evaluate the eectiveness of
programs funded by the Older Americans
Act, such as services for home-delivered
meals, homemaker services and the
National Family Caregiver Support Program.
Michael Adams, CEO of SAGE, said
in a statement the proposed change
jeopardizes assurances LGBT elders will
receive benets under those programs.
Caring about our LGBT elders means
making sure they have access to publicly
funded senior services, which can be literally
life-saving, Adams said. Now, it appears
that the Trump administration wants to
make believe LGBT older people dont
exist, by erasing them from this critically
important survey. We insist that this
decision be reversed and that the federal
government commit to serving all elders in
need, including those who are LGBT.
The Trump administration announced
plans to remove the sexual-orientation
questions from the NSOAAP shortly after
the conrmation of Tom Price as secretary
of health and human services.
As a U.S. lawmaker, Price had an anti-
LGBT record, including support for a U.S.
constitutional amendment banning same-
sex marriage nationwide and opposition to
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
HHS is seeking to eliminate a question for LGBT elders in a health survey.
hate crimes protections legislation, Dont
Ask, Dont Tell repeal and a version of the
Employment Non-Discrimination Act. In
2013, Price participated in an event call
hosted by Tea Party Unity and said a caller
was absolutely right about potentially
negative health and scal impacts of
measures promoting LGBT rights.
The declaration that HHS was
considering eliminating the notices was
published March 13 in the Federal Register,
the daily journal of the U.S. government
that includes rule changes.
LGBT elders or questions on U.S. surveys
are nowhere explicitly found in the notice.
Instead, the notice provides a link to
descriptions of previous surveys and a link
to a proposed draft of the 2017 survey,
incorrectly saying there will no change to
the new survey. But a look at the survey
reveals a change: The elimination of a
question on whether respondents identify
as lesbian, gay or bisexual, which had been
included in each annual survey since 2014.
According to the notice, federal agencies
are required under the Paperwork
Reduction Act to allow 60 days for a
public comment period on changes in the
collection of information and those are
due May 12.
Laura Durso, vice president for LGBT
research and communications at the Center
for American Progress, said in a statement
the proposed roll back makes it impossible
to know whether the Department of Health
and Human Services is equitably serving
LGBT people in need.
Without the information provided in these
surveys, we cant ensure that LGBT seniors
have equal access to important government
services or that LGBT people with disabilities
have equal access to independent living
services that empower them to live full and
self-determined lives, Durso said. We cant
ensure that the administration is fullling
its duty to eliminate the barriers that shut
vulnerable LGBT people out of the safety
net. By walking back data collection on LGBT
populations, this administration is saying
that they would rather erase disparities than
end them.
No question in the survey ever addressed
transgender status. Even during the
Obama years, the U.S. government never
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 1 9
included a question in its surveys seeking
to identify the transgender population
in the United States, citing diculty in
asking the questions and being assured of
responses. The absence of those questions
was a source of frustration at the National
Center for Transgender Equality, which
collected its own information on the
transgender population in its 2015 U.S.
Transgender Survey.
Kelly Mack, an HHS spokesperson, said
in response to the criticism the question
on sexual orientation was included in
previous surveys as part of a trial eort,
but is now being eliminated because it
didnt yield sucient information.
The questions have been included in
previous ACL surveys as part of a pilot
test, Mack said. These pilot questions
are no longer proposed for inclusion in
the surveys. The sample size of responses
to these questions while piloted has not
been sucient enough to date to allow for
reliability and reporting.
Mack added HHS will seek to receive
public comment on the proposed 2017
survey for an additional 30 days beyond
the 60 days required under the Paperwork
Reduction Act. A clarication for the Federal
Register notice, Mack said, will be out soon
to highlight the proposed changes.
The proposed elimination of the
questions on sexual orientation in the
NSOAAP is the latest move from the Trump
administration to reverse administrative
changes in favor of LGBT people seen
under President Obama.
Most notably, one such change was
the elimination of guidance to schools
assuring transgender kids have access
to the restroom consistent with their
gender identity. Earlier this month,
the Department of Housing & Urban
Development also withdrew plans seeking
to ensure homeless shelters notify
transgender people they cant be subject
to discrimination there and for a survey to
evaluate the eectiveness of the LGBTQ
Youth Homelessness Prevention Initiative.
2 0 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17 W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM I N T E RN A T I O N A L N E W S

A trans lawmaker in Honduras?

An activist in Honduras would
become the rst openly transgender
candidate elected in the country if
she were to win a seat in the Central
American Parliament.
Kendra Stefani Jordany, who
is a member of the Liberty and
Refoundation (LIBRE) party from the
city of San Pedro Sula, nished 18
State Dept. defends anti-LGBT activists appointment
among the list of 20 candidates for
the Central American Parliament who The State Department on Monday once again defended the decision to appoint a
received enough votes in the March representative of an organization that strongly opposes LGBT and intersex rights to the
12 primary to qualify for the general U.S. delegation to an annual U.N. womens conference.
election. The United States does seek to include individuals from civil society organizations with
Jordany is the rst openly trans diverse viewpoints and allow them to observe the U.N. in action during the Commission
person to ever win a primary election in on the Status of Women, acting spokesperson Mark Toner told the Washington Blade
Honduras. during his daily press brieng.
Its an immense historical The State Department last week announced Center for Family and Human Rights
achievement, she told the Blade on KENDRA STEFANI JORDANY is a Executive Vice President Lisa Correnti and Heritage Foundation Associate for Social Issues
transgender woman from San Pedro
March 17 during an interview from Sula, Honduras, who is running for a at the U.N. Grace Melton is among the members of the U.S. delegation to the conference
San Pedro Sula. seat in the Central American Parliament. that is scheduled to end on March 24.
The Central American Parliament, PHOTO COURTESY OF KENDRA STEFANI JORDANY The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated C-FAM as a hate group, noting its
which is part of the System of Central strong opposition to LGBT and intersex rights.
American Integration, promotes The Human Rights Campaign, the Council for Global Equality, Human Rights First and
human rights and political stability in the region. Honduras, El Salvador, OutRight Action International have urged Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to rescind the
Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and the Dominican Republic are members of appointments. C-FAM President Austin Ruse on March 15 described OutRight Action
the Guatemala City-based body. International as a radical homosexual group that has started a global campaign to
Honduras general elections are scheduled to take place on Nov. 26. Jordany have Lisa (Correnti) removed from the U.S. delegation in a fundraising letter it sent to its
told the Blade that she will hopefully be among the Central American Parliament supporters.
candidates who remain on the ballot. This radical group charges that C-FAM is a hate group because we do not accept the
Jordany, 28, began her advocacy more than a decade ago when she was 16. homosexual agenda, wrote Ruse.
She is currently studying journalism in San Pedro Sula. Jordany is also planning OutRight Action International has accused C-FAM of violating federal ethics laws with
to travel to the Dominican Republic next week in order to attend a conference its fundraising appeal.
the Gay and Lesbian Victory Institute is co-organizing. OutRight Action International Executive Director Jessica Stern on March 17 asked
Violence and discrimination based on gender identity remain commonplace in U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley to remove Correnti from the delegation and
Honduras. San Pedro Sula, which is located in the northwest corner of the country, ban C-FAM from the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women while their fundraising
ranks as one of the worlds most violent cities that is not in a war zone because of practices are under investigation.
street gangs and drug trackers and Honduras Military Police that target them. The question we are asking now is: Is it ethical for a civil society representative to
Ren Martnez, a prominent San Pedro Sula-based activist who was a member directly prot from the appointment to a U.S. government delegation, or is this a conict
of President Juan Orlando Hernndezs ruling National Party, was killed in June of interest, asked Stern in her letter to Haley.
2016. A trans activist in San Pedro Sula with whom the Blade spoke last month To us, this seems very much like a conict of interest, and we urge you, as head of the
said she has survived two assassination attempts over the last year. delegation and ambassador to the U.N., to please remove C-FAM from the U.S. delegation
Jordany told the Blade she has not received any threats because of her to the Commission on Status of Women, added Stern.
campaign or activism. She also said she would work on non-LGBT and intersex Toner on Monday did not specically respond to the Blades question about OutRight
issues if elected. Action Internationals allegation.
We must build alliances, said Jordany. He said Correnti and Melton can attend formal commission meetings and side events.
MICHAEL K. LAVERS Theyre not, however, authorized to negotiate or speak on behalf of the United States,
he added.
MICHAEL K. LAVERS
V I E W PO I NT W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Although Lebanon is one the most progressive countries in the Middle East regarding LGBT
issues, Article 534 of the Penal Codeprohibits sexual relations that are contradicting the laws
of nature.
PHOTO BY BERTIL VIDET; COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA
Lebanon plans LGBT sexual health week
LONDON Lebanon is hosting itsrst-ever LGBT sexual health week and will focus on
the marginalization of the community, Gay Star News, a U.K. outlet, reports.
The Lebanese Medical Association for Sexual Health (LebMASH) will run the health
week, which will focus on how the marginalization of the LGBTI community aects
mental health.
In a series of videos the health campaign tackles the myriad of issues LGBT people
face living in Lebanon.
One of the videos features Dr. Fadi (no rst name given), a sexual health specialist.
As a doctor, my mission includes raising awareness and not just treatment. But Im
unable to fulll my duties when it comes to the sexual health of (LGBT) people and
this worries me, he said in the video.
Fadi explained a lot of LGBT people avoid going to doctors for fear of mistreatment
and discrimination.
Although Lebanon is one the most progressive countries in the Middle East
regarding LGBT issues, it is still taboo. Article 534 of the Lebanese Penal Codeprohibits
having sexual relations that are contradicting the laws of nature.
But in January, Lebanon came one step closer to decriminalizing homosexuality.
A judge ruled that, homosexuality is a personal choice, not a punishable oense.
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 2 1
The ruling referenced Article 183: An act undertaken in exercise of a right without
abuse shall not be regarded as an oense.
Which means if youre exercising your freedoms and not hurting anyone, theres no
crime, Gay Star News reports.
Calif. strategizes against health care overhaul
SAN FRANCISCO Health care experts say the prognosis is not good for California
creating a single-payer health care system this year, even as fears grow over the
impact of Republican federal lawmakers plans to gut the Aordable Care Act, the
Bay Area Reporter reports.
Gay state Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) and lesbian state Sen. Toni Atkins
(D-San Diego) last month introduced their Californians for a Healthy California Act
(Senate Bill 562), which is backed by the California Nurses Association, to jumpstart
the process of creating a universal health care system that would cover all 39 million
Californians, including the estimated 3 million undocumented immigrants living in
the state.
They have yet to release a more detailed plan for how the state would achieve that
goal but have pledged to do so in the weeks ahead, the Reporter article notes.
Access to aordable and quality health care is not only critical, it should be a right
for everyone in California, Atkins said, according to the Bay Area Reporter. In light
of threats to the Aordable Care Act, its important that we look at all options to
maintain and expand access to health care. The Healthy California Act is an essential
part of that conversation.
Past attempts to do so have failed in California, such as when voters rejected a
statewide ballot initiative in 1994. And out former lawmakers have seen opposition
from insurance companies and other special interests sink their past legislation.
Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger twice vetoed bills carried by lesbian former
state Senator Sheila Kuehl, now a Los Angeles county supervisor. And gay former
state Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) saw his 2012 bill to establish a single-payer
health care system pass out of the Senate only to die in the Assembly, the Reporter
notes.
Conversion therapy voted down in Tampa
TAMPA, Fla. Local LGBT members celebrated a major win Thursday in the Tampa
City Council, ABC Action News reports.
Council members unanimously voted to ban mental health professionals from
using gay conversion therapy.
Supporters of the ban dressed in purple.
Under the ordinance, anyone caught providing conversion therapy to a minor
would be ned up to a $1,000. Repeat oenders would face a ne up to $5,000, ABC
reports.
Dozens shared their stories of personal trauma under the practice. At least one
opponent also spoke before council. Those providing strictly religious counseling like
clergymen are exempt from the ban under the rst amendment.
A second reading of the ordinance takes place next month, ABC Action News reports.
2 2 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Welcome to the
Los Angeles Blade
A commitment to
journalistic excellence
By TROY MASTERS
We are living in a paradigm shifting
moment in real time. You can feel it.
Sometimes its overwhelming. Sometimes
its toxic. Sometimes its perplexing, even
terrifying. On the other hand, sometimes
its just downright exhilarating. This
moment is a profound opportunity to
reexamine our roots and jumpstart our
passion for full equality.
In this rst issue of the Los Angeles Blade, we
report on the headiness of a renewed sense
of purpose that was palpable at the March 18
Human Rights Campaign gala in downtown
Los Angeles. We revisit the early days of local
LGBT activism and on Christopher Street
West, an organization that has appeared to
stumble in recent years, and which is poised
to bounce back by betting on a return to our
activist roots. We hear from famed lesbian
performance artist, Holly Hughes, about the
lessons she learned ghting demagoguery
around the embattled NEA and the need to
recommit to purpose in our own defense.
In fact, the very paper you are now reading
is an acknowledgement of the need for
rejuvenation in news for our local movement.
We feel the Los Angeles Blade is a gift
to the Los Angeles LGBT community. It
brings together my nearly 30 years of
award-winning work in the LGBT press,
both in New York City and in Los Angeles;
Karen Ocambs insightful acumen
resulting from an award-winning career
of reporting on LGBT and AIDS issues
over a 30-year period in California; and
the highly regarded, national reputation
of the Washington Blade, a nearly 50-year
old LGBT newspaper and online site that
serves our nations capital.
The Los Angeles Blade, headquartered
in perhaps one of the most expressive arts
and entertainment capitals of the world, will
also strive to bring you features and news
WWW .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
West Hollywood Mayor LAUREN MEISTER presented Los Angeles Blade publisher and editor TROY
MASTERS with a welcome proclamation at the March 20 West Hollywood City Council meeting. In
her statement, Meister said, Thinking about the current political climate when human rights are
under attack by our own government, we hope that the Los Angeles Blade will be a strong voice
locally, nationally and internationally. We welcome the Blade to the Los Angeles area where I am
sure they plan to spend a lot of time covering the City of West Hollywood.
coverage of LA Countys LGBT+ community
you might not nd anywhere else.
We are committed to providing the best
possible coverage in all its richness and
its many aspects. We are committed to
seeking the facts and also fair analysis.
The Los Angeles Blade and its sister
paper, the Washington Blade, are uniquely
positioned to bring you national and
international politics and news. The Blade
VIEWPOINT
PHOTO BY RICHARD SETTLE FOR THE CITY OF WEST HOLLYWOOD
is also a member of the White House
Correspondents Association, the only
LGBT media operation so credentialed.
This is a rare combination of promise
for any LGBT journalistic enterprise. As
proud members of the Los Angeles LGBT
community, we are excited to serve you.
TROY MASTERS is publisher/editor of
the Los Angeles Blade.
VOLUME 01 ISSUE 01
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V I E W PO I N T
Holly Hughes strikes back at
Trumps defunding of the arts
Legendary lesbian
performance artist
speaks out
By HOLLY HUGHES
Here we go again with the plans to
eliminate the National Endowment for
the Arts, the National Endowment for
the Humanities and the Corporation for
Public Broadcasting!
Republicans have been bent on
demolishing these agencies since the
rst year of the Reagan administration.
Because lots of this funding went to
institutions and individuals across the
country, the eort went nowhere.
But in the late 80s, the GOP tried
again, spurred by pressure from the
emergent religious right wing. Its hard
to remember, but there was a time when
the GOP was not synonymous with the
modern equivalent of the at earth
society. But in the culture wars of that
time, the religious right I think we can
just call them the right rose to power
by attacking public funding for arts.
This time, though, the right didnt
try to attack the arts in general; they
went after specic types of expression.
Feeding on the anxiety unleashed by the
AIDS epidemic, the critics focused on art
work by and about marginalized peoples
and their bodies. Targets included
Andre Serranos aestheticized photos of
religious icons and body uids, Robert
Mapplethropes portrayals of interracial
homoeroticism, on artists and writers
responding to the devastation of AIDS and
the callous response of the government. I
was one of the dozens of artists targeted
as one of the four performance artists
whose funding was revoked under
political pressure.
Though this group came to be known as
The NEA Four, we were originally labeled
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
HOLLY HUGHES is best known as one of the NEA Four, with whom she was denied funding from the
NEA, and for her work with the Womens One World Cafe.
Karen Finley and the three homosexuals,
a label that was more accurate. Three
of us were gay, two openly so, and the
poignant feminist rage of Karen Finley
rendered her queer as well. At issue was
never the work itself, though I doubt that
the late Sen. Jesse Helms would have
liked it, but our sexuality and gender
expression. Before yanking my funding,
the chair of the NEA described my work in
one sentence: Holly Hughes is a lesbian
and her work is heavily of that genre.
Twenty-seven years ago, I was very
active in trying to defend the NEA; the
media kept oering a platform, I felt it
was my responsibility to step up. It didnt
go well; a broader debate about the value
of arts funding, not to mention the entire
domestic budget, kept turning into a
referendum on the work of a few artists.
I was asked to speak in terms of personal
harm, to play such an appealing victim of
censorship that I could melt the hearts
of those who wanted to quarantine all
LGBT people. I was never given enough
time to put my story in a larger context
such as the destruction of the New
PHOTO COURTESY OF MONA MCKINSTR
Deal and Great Society safety net, or even
other censorship battles around parental
advisory stickers on hip hop albums or
the suppression of life saving information
about safer sex.
It didnt go well! I failed. The NEA
survived, but the budget was slashed
and most of the funding for individual
artists went away. Or I should say we
all failed. There were some other voices
speaking out as advocates for the arts
but they tended to present culture as in
this uncomplicated valentine of American
exceptionalism; Mom, apple pie, the ag
and modern art. It felt false, elitist and
unconvincing.
So much has changed, but the defense
of the NEA et al sounds so much the same.
The right is not carrying on about
the works of late David Wojnarowicz or
Marlon Riggs; but the champions of NEA
funding are making many of the same
arguments they made in 1990. Heartfelt
statements about the transcendent
power of the arts and humanities, of the
centrality of expression to the human
experience across time and cultures.
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 2 3
Examples of the power of the arts are
cited, usually canonical masterpieces or
workshops for children.
I cant argue with any of that. But the
elimination of the NEA plays well in huge
parts of the country. It taps into the anti-
intellectual and anti-elitism sentiments
that brought us Donald Trump. And stop
it with the statistics about how we only
pay 63 cents per person, or that we spend
less on the arts than some small country
in Europe. These folks want that 63 cents,
and they are happy to be the anti-Europe.
I also dont buy the voices that claim
the ght is peripheral. The budget
proposals, along with Trumps policies on
immigration and travel celebrate cruelty
and elevate greed. The harm enshrined
within cant be overstated. Peoples lives
are going to be upended. People are
going to die.
Do we mean it when we say that art is
central to the human experience? Then we
must connect our arguments for the NEA
to our opposition to these other policies.
Its lovely to spend an afternoon at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, but if we
cant locate the value of that experience
in some relationship our defense of public
health care and public education; and our
larger ideals such as our support for open
borders, for our desire to foster social
justice in a diverse society, our art habits
seem like escapist luxuries.
These arguments are hard to make.
I tried and failed. The case for the NEA
is not only the case for the NEA, or if it
is, we are going to fail. The case doesnt
lend itself to sound bites. It needs to be
more than the list of abstractions I gave
you above. The argument has to be artful,
doing what art can, fueled by empathy,
grounded in experience but charged with
imagination, an argument for the arts
must build these connections, raise the
questions, and can possibly provide a
larger blueprint for a broad opposition to
the entire Trump agenda.
2 4 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17 W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM VIEWPOINT

Nevertheless, I persist:
Why Im suing Frontiers
Tossed out to make way
for millennial writers
KAREN OCAMB is senior contributing writer for
the Los Angeles Blade.
I have been a professional journalist
for a long time and do not like inserting
myself into a news story. However,
after posting an announcement on my
Facebook page about being laid o from
Frontiers in late February 2016, I became
the embarrassed center of a whirlwind of
stories and comments.
Now another gust may be coming so,
as someone who believes in transparency
(Ive been clean and sober for 36 years), I
thought Id share with you directly whats
going on and why.
Last February, after I was anything-
but-lawfully laid o from Frontiers, I been red to having been laid o, even
was faced with a question of whether to
proceed with a lawsuit against Frontiers, a
company now facing bankruptcy issues, or
just move on.
I was undecided. My 12 Step program
suggests taking the winning out of
an argument to protect ones sobriety.
But then Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell explained why it was OK to
formally silence Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who
was reading a 1986 letter by Coretta Scott
King critical of Attorney General nominee published interview with the owner.
Je Sessions. She was warned. She was
given an explanation. Nevertheless, she
persisted, McConnell said.
That was a gut-check. I realized I had
silenced myself to be nice, to be fair, to
be brave all the learned traits growing
up female in a military family. The struggle
is apparent in my Facebook post where I
changed my announcement from having
though it felt like I had been red.
And it did feel like being red. Despite
my hard-earned reputation, despite
working diligently to contribute to both
the publication and the LGBT movement,
despite having to put up with what at
times wasa hostile working environment
where I was expected to shrug o antics
and comments and endure sneers when
I complained, I was tossed out to make
way for millennial writers according to a
I put on a brave face. I had a job prospect
but when that fell through, I didnt let
people see my depression. I eyed the
stash of Oxycontin left over from my knee
replacement surgeries. The 12 Step mantra
one day at a time, the emails and calls
from friends and the unconditional love of
my two rescue dogs pried open a pinprick
of light in the dark pall inside my head.
But Elizabeth Warren persisted. She
stepped outside the Senate chamber and
kept reading the King letter in the dim
light of Facebook live. Silence=Death, I
remembered. Why should I die inside to
avoid being called a nasty woman by
the bosses at Frontiers? Indeed, if I didnt
le my discrimination lawsuit, I would
be complicit in their eort to erase me. I
hugged my dogs, I gave my stash of Oxy to
my doctor and discovered that the answer
to my quandary got me to the same
conclusion.Nevertheless, I, too, persist.
Iled the lawsuit on March 21.
losangelesblade.com
@LosAngelesBlade
M A R C H 2 4 2 0 1 7 V O L U M E 0 1 I S S U E 0 1 A merica s L G B T N e w s S ource L O S A N G E L E S B L A D E . C O M 2 7

Jimmy Brooks as Yenny in bwoy.

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN G. YOUNG

On race and privilege in the LGBT community

Filmmaker John G. Youngs bwoy debuts in LA

By DAN ALLEN

People are properly amazed at what
Moonlight was able to accomplish with
its small $1.5 million budget, but consider
this: Thats 75 times what writer/director
John G. Young had to work with for his
latest feature, bwoy.
The tale of an upstate New York man
who, after tragically losing his young son,
escapes into his first gay relationship with
a much younger Jamaican man he meets
online, bwoy will open on Friday, March
31 at the Laemmles Music Hall for its first
limited engagement run. Young will be on
hand for Q&A sessions about the film and
its production process after the 7:30 p.m.
screening on March 31, and after the 9:55
p.m. showing on April 1.
bwoy is Youngs fourth feature, and his
first since 2009s Rivers Wash Over Me.
The Village Voice hailed Youngs first movie,
1995s Parallel Sons, as one of the most
promising independent films of the decade.
We spoke to Young about his latest, and
the challenges of working on a shoestring.
Los Angeles Blade: What inspired the
story for bwoy?
Young: It was inspired by several ideas.
First, that online relationships allow us
to mold how we present ourselves to
each other, that it can be about omitting
information as much as outright lying.
Second, how a virtual relationship can
still have intimacy, that real feelings and
affection can develop for people without
ever meeting physically. And finally,
how people who are dealing with grief
and denial can use anything to distract
themselves from dealing with who they
are and what theyre really feeling.
Blade: Where did the title come from?
Young: It refers to the Jamaican patois
for boy. But often bwoy is used in
conjunction with batty bwoy, a derogatory
phrase used against gay men in Jamaica.
Blade: Have you had a long-distance
online relationship like the one in the film?
Young: Ive certainly had long distance
ContinueS ON page 38
2 8 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
queery
Jorge Valencia
The Point Foundation leader
answers 20 gay questions
By TROY MASTERS
tmasters@losangelesblade.com
Jorge Valencia, executive director
of the Point Foundation, can work a
red carpet like a man on an important
mission.And he is.
His life has been about embracing
change. At 27, he came out in a public
way, something he had struggled to
do in part because he was raised a in a
traditional, albeit Mormon, Latino family.
The notion that I could love someone
of the same gender didnt even seem like
an option, he said. I didnt have any
role models, nor did I know of any LGBTQ
adults.
And so, when Jorge embraced being
a gay man, he did it with gusto and is
now doing everything he can to promote
a safe educational experience and
environment for LGBT kids.
I didnt realize so many people
around me as a kid were going through
the same thing, we were all living in
the closet for fear of being rejected by
families, communities and educational
institutions, he said. I never conded in
anyone.
As executive director of Point
Foundation, Valencia has devoted his life
to reversing that. He spends each day
making sure LGBTQ students can achieve
their full academic and leadership
potential despite the obstacles often
put before them to make a signicant
impact on society.
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
How long have you been out and who
was the hardest person to tell?
I came out 25 years ago.
The hardest people to tell were my
parents. I told them when they made a
visit to my sisters home in MD.
We had dinner, I told them and
I left so they had time to process
Whos your LGBT hero?
Ive always been inspired by the life of
Harvey Milk. When Point Foundation was
selected as one of the beneciaries of the
MILK premiere in San Francisco, I couldnt
have been more humbled.
Whats Los Angeles best
nightspot, past or present?
I only wish I knew! Its ever
evolving in Los Angeles.
Describe your dream wedding.
A small, intimate wedding with good friends
who are considered family. This became a
reality for me last February 2016.
What non-LGBT issue are you most
passionate about?
Im very passionate about doing all we
can to assist the helpless, like animals.
As such, the work of animal shelters and
animal adoptions move me.
What historical outcome
would you change?
2 0 G A Y Q U E ST I O N S F O R: J O R G E V A L E N C I A
I know its not very original, but Id have
wanted a dierent presidential outcome
this past November. Every day, I feel as
though were moving backwards.
Whats been the most memorable pop
culture moment of your lifetime?
Reality TV. Ill never forget Pedro Zamora
and what seeing his life on TV meant to
so many.
On what do you insist?
I insist on respect for oneself and each
other.
What was your last
Facebook post or Tweet?
On Facebook, I recently posted a
reminder of our upcoming New York
Point Honors event honoring Uzo Aduba
and Dustin Lance Black on Monday, April
3rd at The Plaza hotel.
If your life were a book,
what would the title be?
Gay, Mexican Mormons from Texas do
Exist.
If science discovered a way to change
sexual orientation, what would you do?
Absolutely nothing. Im proud to be an
out, gay man.
What do you believe in
beyond the physical world?
A sense of soul/spirit/intelligence. That
beyond the physical world or body, our
soul/spirit/intelligence existed and will
continue to exist.
Whats your advice for
LGBT movement leaders?
Listen.
What would you walk across hot coals for?
My family.
What LGBT stereotype annoys you most?
There arent any specic LGBT
stereotypes that annoy me. What does
annoy me is that we are quick to label
actions by some as stereotypes.
Whats your favorite LGBT movie?
Brokeback Mountain and MILK.
Whats the most overrated social custom?
Specic attire for events.
What trophy or prize do you most covet?
Nobel Peace Prize.
What do you wish youd known at 18?
I wish Id known at 18 that even when family
and friends may have rejected me for being
gay, that there would be a very loving and
supportive community to hold me up.
Why Los Angeles?
Why not? The weather.
F E A T U RE
Woof! LA Leather Pride Week is here
COMPETITIONS, PARTIES AND MORE SLATED ALL WEEK
The LA Leather Pride nalists.
LA Leather Pride kicks o 10 days of
celebration beginning with the Ms. Los
Angeles Leather Contest on March 24 and
culminating in the O-Sunset Street Fair
on Sunday, April 2, where record-breaking
attendance is expected.
LA Leather Pride is produced by the Los
Angeles Leather Coalition, a non-prot
organization.
We are about making a connection
between the producers of the (Mr. / Ms. LA
Leather) feeder contests, clubs, bars and
businesses in Southern California, said
Marlon Morales, chair of LA Pride 2017.
Our purpose is to showcase and create
a space to celebrate the amazing range
of fetish and kink interests that make
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
By STAFF REPORTS
the L.A. scene unique. In the end, we are
able to make meaningful contributions
to our charity partners: Tom of Finland
Foundation, ONE Gay & Lesbian Archives,
and SAGE.
Local bars and other organizations hold
contests to select their representative for
Mr. LA Leather. The winner is selected
at the Mr. LA Leather contest held on
Saturday, April 1 at The Globe Theatre,
followed by the ocial after-party. Other
ocial and not-so-ocial parties can be
found by visiting gayinla.coms calendar
section. Mr. LA Leather will compete in the
International Mr. Leather contest held in
Chicago on May 29.
This years theme is L.A. CODE; just
LA LEATHER PRIDE EVENTS
PHOTO BY DUSTI CUNNINGHAM
before the AIDS crisis Los Angeles was at
the center of a moment of sexual freedom
and American culture took notice. Many
of the fetish codes still in use today began
here. Make no mistake, the LA Leather
scene is thriving.
Whats striking about the LA scene is
we refuse to settle for mediocrity and
we encourage new forms of play, said
Morales. These are among reasons that
makes Los Angeles a unique place. We
believe you will experience our message
of renewed focus on unabashed fun,
playful, sex.
For more information about LA
Leather Pride, visit their web site:
losangelesleatherpride.com.
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 2 9
Ms. L.A.LeatherContest
Sat., March 25, 9p.m.-12 a.m.,
Sanctuary Studios LAX
www.facebook.com/
events/1168947176553084/
CODE: CONVERGENCE - The
Ms. L.A.LeatherVictory Party,
Mr. L.A.LeatherContestant
Introductions and L.A. Bootblack
Contest. Sun, March 26, 3-7p.m.
at Bullet Bar
VIP Cocktail Reception, Wed.,
March 29, 6-9 p.m., Tom House
Ocial Meet & Greet for Mr.
L.A.Leather2017, Thurs., March
30, 9-11 p.m. at Precinct
The Roast of Jerey Erdman Mr.
LALeather2016, Thurs., March 30,
10-11:30 p.m. at Precinct
The Assembly Uniform Reception,
Friday, March 31, 7-10 p.m. at
Rough Trade Gear
Maximus Cigar Social, Friday,
March 31,10 p.m.-12 a.m., Eagle LA
Den L.A. Presents:CODE!, the
Ocial LALeatherWeekend
Dance & Play PartyFriday, March
31, 9 p.m.-3 a.m. at Sanctuary
Studios LAX
AFTERMATH - LALeatherPride
After Hours, Friday, March 31,
9 p.m.- 5 a.m. at Threshold LA
LeatherDog Pound, Friday,
March 31, 9 p.m.-2 a.m.
at Bullet Bar
Mr. LALeather2017 Contest,
Saturday, April 1, 7-10 p.m.,
The Globe Theater
Legion Dance, Saturday, April 1,
10 p.m.-4 a.m., The Globe Theater
O-Sunset Festival, Sunday,
April 2, 11 a.m.-7 p.m., Santa
Monica Blvd. (between Myra Ave
and Gateway Ave)
Ocial L.A.LeatherPride Closing
Party and Victory Celebration,
Sunday, April 2, 5-10 p.m. at
The Faultline.
3 0 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Making waves on the airwaves
It was last Halloween weekend when
Joshua Johnson got the call that hed been
named Diane Rehms successor.
Rehm, who began her eponymous
National Public Radio call-in show
that shed hosted since 1979, retired
in December and as of Jan. 2, 1A is
broadcast in what had been The Diane
Rehm Shows timeslot.
Johnson had subbed for Rehm two
days last September and shadowed her
another day. Based in San Francisco for
the last six-and-a-half years where he was
morning news host for KQED while also
teaching podcasting at the University of
California (Berkeley), Johnson was in Palm
Springs visiting friends with Joe Gallagher,
his boyfriend of a year and a half, when
he got the call. He says its a moment hed
been working toward since age 6.
This wave of peace washed over me
and I just got very calm, says the 36-year-
old South Florida native. It was like my sts
nally unclenched after weeks of waiting.
I didnt have that moment of, Oh my God,
Im going to do the show. It was just kind of
like, Finally Ive been waiting on this for
my entire life and now its going to happen.
1A is a live, two-hour daily WAMU radio
program out of D.C. distributed nationally
by NPR each weekday at 10 a.m. that seeks
to provide deep conversation about the
thorniest issues of our time delivered with
insight, intimacy and personality. Its both a
new, freestanding show but also a successor
to the Rehm show, whose legacy of civil
dialogue and analysis its team hopes to
continue.In California, 1A airs on 90.3 KAZU
in Monterey, Salinas and Santa Cruz.
Producers were initially almost certain
theyd hire a woman to succeed Rehm.
We werent 100 percent sure, but you
know, sort of in the high 80s or 90s, says
Rupert Allman, 1As executive producer.
Johnson won the search team over, Allman
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
JOSHUA JOHNSON LEFT CALIFORNIA FOR NEW NATIONAL NPR SHOW
By JOEY DiGUGLIELMO
JOSHUA JOHNSON says launching a new daily two-hour radio show is a mountain of work even
under the best of circumstances.
says, with his huge relatability.
There was something about his own
curiosity and his manner that was really
appealing, he says. Especially the idea
that he was very much interested in civil
dialogue, taking time to develop arguments
and not always chasing the next shiny ball.
Those pieces came together and the stars
began to align and that was it.
Nobodys universally loved in this era
of Internet trolling, but early signs are
strong for Johnson. 1A is being carried
on 204 stations with more expected in
April (The Diane Rehm Show was carried
on 198) and WAMU says the show was the
No. 1 regional performer in its time slot
throughout January, the latest month for
which gures were available. WAMU says
it expects the show will have a weekly
audience of about 2.5 million soon based
PHOTO COURTESY OF NPR
on early numbers.
Johnson, as loquacious as youd expect, sat
with the Blade in a WAMU conference room.
His comments have been edited for length.
BLADE: How do you feel its going so far?
JOSHUA JOHNSON: Its going well. Very,
very busy. Theres no lack of things to talk
about for sure, but its good. Launching
a national show, any new show, is a
heavy lift to say the least, but we have an
amazingly good team and weve had lots
of support from listeners and stations.
Weve found interesting ways to talk about
whats going on in the world and to divert
from the headlines that have everyones
attention to talk about other topics that
may be getting lost in the shue around
the new administration. And weve also
found ways to take a breath and just do
F E A T U RE
topics that are fun or dierent as a little
relief from the top of the news cycle, so I
think its been good.
BLADE: Whats your strategy to turn
this into more of a Johnny Carson-to-Jay
Leno kind of succession as opposed to,
say, a Pat Sajak kind-of thing?
JOHNSON: The only thing we can do is
control each days program and thats what
I try to focus on. I never worry about the 37
years that came before me. Thats Dianes
legacy and thats solid and done. . If you
worry too much about the distant future, you
miss the opportunity to really knock out today.
BLADE: Has the learning curve been
about what you thought it would be?
JOHNSON: I tried to come in with very
few expectations other than it would be
really, really hard and it has been. . But
weve gone down from me working like 16-
17-hour days to more like 12-13, so thats a
big step forward. Its just a mountain of
work even under the best of circumstances.
BLADE: Whats been your favorite
episode so far?
JOHNSON: I dont have one. We did
a Sunday show a few weeks ago on the
immigration ban and we just let stations
air it if they wanted to. But we probably
havent done my favorite show yet or
even conceived of it. I think for me to start
grabbing onto favorites at this point would
set the bar too low for what we want to be.
I dont think what weve done in our rst
month will compare to what well be doing
a year from now or ve years from now.
BLADE: When things are crazy, do you
get energized or stressed by that?
JOHNSON: Probably a little bit of both. I
tend to be the kind of person that the crazier
CONTINUES ON PAGE 31
F E A T U RE
Joshua Johnson on succeeding an NPR legend
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 36
things are around me, the calmer I get, which
is how I survived breaking news. But you
have to be on the outer edge of your comfort
zone in order to grow, so I just accepted that
that was going to be the way it was going to
be some days or maybe even most days.
BLADE: Was it hard to leave San
Francisco?
JOHNSON: It was really, really hard
but this opportunity was worth it.
BLADE: Have you had any time to
explore Washington much yet?
JOHNSON: No. I live a few blocks from
the station here in Van Ness, so I walk to
work because I cannot take a snow day.
And everything I need is right here, the
grocery store, the gym and so on. Once I
get a better handle on the workload, Ill be
able to get out more and see the city.
BLADE: Were you intimidated to accept?
JOHNSON: Not really. . I think I was
more grateful and humble. I felt very
ready. Like, Yeah Ive been preparing
for this for 30-plus years.
BLADE: You say you had this dream
since age 5 or 6. How was this type of
thing even on your radar at that age?
JOHNSON: Well, Kermit the Frog played
a reporter on Sesame Street. . I grew
up seeing Ed Bradley on 60 Minutes
or Bernard Shaw on CNN or Dwight
Lauderdale on my local Miami ABC station.
Seeing those black men doing what I
wanted to do just instantly clicked for me.
I always had an anity for broadcasting. I
just didnt know what form it would take.
BLADE: So was it something you
chose or did it choose you?
JOHNSON: Well, it has to be both. Just
because destiny knocks doesnt mean you
have to answer. It went through a lot of
permutations of whether I would answer or
how I would answer and then eventually it
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
became that one thing that I knew if I didnt
go after, Id regret the rest of my life.
BLADE: Had you been a big listener of
The Diane Rehm Show?
JOHNSON: Yeah, I listened to her in South
Florida on the station where I grew up,
WLRN. I never thought Id be her successor,
but yeah, I listened to her for years.
BLADE: How do you decide on the
balance between meat-and-potatoes
news topics and lighter stu?
JOHNSON: I dont think its a matter of
balancing lightness against substance. The
show we did on country music was very
substantive. What were always trying to
gure out is what is it about todays show that
a fan would tell their friends, You gotta listen
to todays 1A. Why? How do you answer
that? if you start there and work backwards,
you can build a great show. So even if its a
lighter topic like country music today or the
Grammy Awards or the Super Bowl, we
never want it to feel like, OK everybody, we
know life is really hard so were just gonna
give you some sugar and candy for an
hour. Thats not good enough. Even if its to tell you what I think about the news. Im
not politics or not some trouble-in-the-world
topic, it still has to be time well spent. Plus, I
get bored easily, so I get tired of talking about
the troubles of the world all day. . It cant be
all sugar but it cant be all steak.
BLADE: Some people are saying
theres been more sugar though lately.
The Super Bowl show got some ak.
JOHNSON: It depends whose table youre
dining at. I think there are dierent ways
to talk about dierent things. I did have
a listener who got very snooty about the
Super Bowl show . but there are many
aspects to a cultural event like that that are
worthy of discussion. Just because people
listen to NPR doesnt mean they dont watch
football and just because they listen to NPR
doesnt mean they dont like pop music.
BLADE: True, but hasnt NPR always
sort of been that hub where you could
get something you couldnt just get
anywhere else? If ESPN is doing round-
the-clock sports coverage, do we really
need to hear about sports on NPR too?
JOHNSON: But we dont talk about the
Super Bowl like ESPN would talk about it.
We didnt get caught up in stats and whos
up and whos down. We talked about it more
broadly, about what was going on in Houston
and sort of the politics around the event, the
cost of buying an ad there and so on. We tried
to make it really fun. One thing public media
serves is to give people a diverse view on the
world. Anybody who thinks public media is
designed to be all meat and potatoes all the
time has clearly never heard Car Talk or
Wait Wait Dont Tell Me. These are just e-mails and Tweets and Facebook posts and
wonderful shows that are about interesting
things that make life worthwhile and we cant
pretend that doesnt matter. more communication, Im in touch with the
BLADE: Does the 1A format give
you more opportunity to weigh in than
other journalism posts youve had?
JOHNSON: No. My job is still to be an
analyst of the days events. This is not the
Joshua Johnson show. Its not my platform
much time we have left and so on.
still a reporter. But that doesnt mean I cant
call out inconsistencies. The other day we
had a guest who kind of fudged an answer
on climate change and I (called him out). But
I can do it in a way that hews to evidence and
fact and not just my belief.
BLADE: Theres so much obfuscation
in partisan discussions, though. How
do you press people for clarity without
sounding partisan, at least at times?
JOHNSON: The way weve been doing it
what we do works. You do your homework,
you do smart shows, you ask smart questions
and you dont worry about whether people
like you or are comfortable with it. Im here
to perform a service as a journalist. For me
to start worrying about it now is to doubt the
very reasons I came here. Facts still matter,
the truth is still the truth and there are still
such things as facts. People know and
understand what the NPR standard is and
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 3 1
outlets that dont follow that standard I
dont need to worry about people who deal
in that kind of foolishness.
BLADE: How do you decide if youre
going to pick up a thread after a break
or not?
JOHNSON: It depends whats coming up
after the break. If we have a guest we need
to get to or we have other questions that
segue into that thought. Being in the studio
is basically air trac control because we have
guests in the studio, remote guests, my script,
my questions, Im watching the clock, I have a
timer that counts down to certain elements,
then I have another screen that shows me
if we receive a voicemail during the show, we
can play that. I have my laptop, which has
control room and the newsroom upstairs
and its all happening at once. There are all
these dierent elements that I have to make
balance so its a lot of plate spinning. It will be
dierent every single day and I have to gure
out in the moment what were going to next
and if its duplicative of what we just said, how
BLADE: How many people work on
the show and are any of them veterans
of Dianes show?
JOHNSON: I think we have 11. Two of
them were former producers on her team.
The rest are new hires.
BLADE: Do you anticipate getting
more mileage out of the Trump
administration than you otherwise
would have?
JOHNSON: Theres more to life in
Washington so I dont look to any one sector
of the news as my bread and butter. Also,
public radio is very committed to the idea of
localism so we cant allow the current political
climate to eclipse all of that because then youre
basically saying that localism doesnt matter
anymore so we keep that all in perspective.
CONTINUES AT LOSANGELESBLADE.COM
3 2 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Artists and art advocates are apoplectic
that President Trumps proposed federal
budget, released last week, contains not a
cent for the National Endowment for the
Arts (NEA), the federal arts funding agency
that has beneted many LGBT artists.
It was reported in January that
Trump was considering privatizing the
Corporation for Public Broadcasting
and eliminating the NEA and National
Endowment for the Humanities as part
of a wider program of federal budget
cuts. While things are status quo for now
like most federal agencies, the NEA is
operating under a continuing resolution
for scal year 2017 that goes through April
many in the arts world are concerned.
The grants and programs that the NEA
administers are powerful examples of
how the arts are a vital and valuable part
of our everyday lives, Victoria Hutter,
assistant director for press/public aairs
for the NEA, wrote in an e-mail to the
Blade. In communities across the nation,
NEA-supported projects ensure that
the arts are accessible to all Americans
through arts education, healing arts and
arts-based community development,
as well as through projects that feature
dance, music, visual arts, literature, folk
and traditional arts and more.
Established by Congress in 1965, the
NEA is the independent federal agency that
works to give Americans the opportunity
to participate in and experience the arts.
Its funding is project-based and goes
to thousands of nonprots each year,
along with partnerships and special arts
initiatives, research and other support
that contribute to the vitality of our
neighborhoods, students and schools,
workplace and culture. The NEA is
the only funder, public or private, that
provides equal access to the arts in all 50
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
The arts in peril?
TRUMP SLASHING NEA COULD LEAVE LGBT ARTISTS SCRAMBLING
By JOEY DiGUGLIELMO
A scene from Cincinnati Operas world premiere production of Fellow Travelers by Gregory Spears
and Greg Pierce that depicts 1950s life for gays in the federal government.
states, the District of Columbia and U.S.
territories, supporting artistic endeavors
of all kinds.
For scal year 2016, the NEAs $147.9
million budget was about .004 percent
of the federal budget. About 80 percent
of that appropriation is distributed as
grants and awards to organizations and
individuals across the country. About 40
percent is awarded directly to states while
about 60 percent goes to organizations
and individuals directly. About 40 percent
of NEA-supported activities occurred
in high-poverty neighborhoods and
33 percent went to serve low-income
audiences, the NEA says.
Republican administrations have
previously been suspicious of the NEA.
Ronald Reagan reportedly planned to
eliminate the NEA when he came into
PHOTO BY PHILIP BROSHONG; COURTESY OF THE CINCINNATI OPERA
oce in 1981 but changed his mind.
Controversies such as Immersion (Piss
Christ), a photo by Andres Serrano that
shows a crucix photographed in a cup of
urine (it was a winner in an NEA-funded
art competition) have resulted in NEA
funding being down from where it was in
the 1990s.
To some arts organizations, NEA money
can be a huge boost. Theres no gay- or
LGBT-specic category of an NEA grant,
but LGBT artists and artists who make art
with LGBT themes have long beneted
from the funding.
This is unacceptable, says Tony
Valenzuela, executive director of the
Los Angeles-based Lambda Literary
Foundation. By eliminating this funding,
the administration is waging an assault
on free expression, on the impact the arts
F E A T U RE
have on the economy and the role arts play
in education, healing and innovation, he
said in an e-mail. Grants from the (NEA)
have aorded LGBT writers the time and
freedom to take risks and small presses the
opportunity to publish work that otherwise
may have never found an audience.
Last year, Cincinnati Opera received a
$35,000 NEA grant to support the world
premiere of Fellow Travelers, an opera
by composer Gregory Spears and librettist
Greg Pierce, adapted from the novel by
Thomas Mallon, that depicts 1950s life
for gays in the federal government who
were forced to stay in the closet or lose
their jobs. It enjoyed 10 nearly sold-out
performances last June and garnered
strong critical reviews.
We were planning to do this whether or
not we had the NEA grant, but it denitely
helped, says Ashley Tongret, director
of public relations for Cincinnati Opera.
It wasnt the largest source of funding
or even the tipping point, but it was a
wonderful piece of the elaborate puzzle of
fundraising that we did.
Other recent NEA grants that have gone
to LGBT-themed work include:
$60,000 in 2017 to Washington
National Opera, part of which will be used
to support performances of Champion by
Terence Blanchard and Michael Cristofer,
a two-act, jazz opera about welterweight
boxer Emile Grith, who was bisexual.
$10,000 in 2017 to the Chicago
Sinfonietta to support a concert program
featuring works that explore issues of
gender, sexuality and identity. Under
the direction of Michael Morgan, David
Contes work Elegy for Matthew, written
in memory of hate crime victim Matthew
Shepard, will be performed.
CONTINUES AT LOSANGELESBLADE.COM
F E A T U RE
NEED A QUICK GETAWAY FROM LA? PALM SPRINGS PACKS PLENTY OF HEAT
Tired of Los Angeles trac and looking
for a sizzling good time? Come to Palm
Springs and enjoy some of the biggest and
best events in the country. The weather is
almost sure to be sunny (the desert boasts
more than 350 days of sunshine per
year!), so dont forget your sexy swimsuit.
Youll denitely want to spend some
time lounging poolside. And many of the
upcoming events have sponsor hotels; be
sure to check out their websites for deals.
Palm Springs hosts two of the biggest
events of the year for the LGBT community:
White Party (May 58) and The Dinah
(March 29April 2). Jerey Sanker presents
White Party Palm Springs again this year,
and it promises be bigger and better
than ever. Each year this event seems to
improve. Its always popular and well run,
which makes it all the more enjoyable to be
a part of. The party kicks o on Friday, May
5 at noon at the host hotel (Renaissance
Palm Springs http://cwp.marriott.com/
pspbr/wp2017/)s enormous pool. There
will be plenty of music, sun, drinks, and
friendly men in bathing suits. The event
goes all weekend long, which means there
is something going on practically 24 hours
a day. Friday night at 10, Sanker teams up
with Eliad Cohen for the White Party Palm
Springs version of the Papa Party (https://
www.thepapa.party/), which Sanker calls
a decadent, bacchanal exploration of
music, leather, and fantasy.
Whats the perfect follow-up to a late-
night dance fest? A relaxing pool party,
of course. On Saturday, head to the
Renaissance, where youll nd yourself
Addicted to Boys (10 a.m.7 p.m.).
Enjoy a refreshing poolside cocktail while
watching a fashion show of hot models
previewing the new swimwear line from
Addicted (http://addicted.es/en/). Naturally,
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Rebooting in the Desert
By WINSTON GIESEKE
Jerey Sankers White Party Palm Springs this year teams up with ELIAD COHEN, pictured, for the
Palm Springs version of the Papa Partys decadent, bacchanal exploration of music, leather, and
fantasy.
there will be world-class DJs spinning to
keep everyone in the right groove. You
might even meet a new dance partner.
Everyone gets drafted for the Saturday
night Military Ball (10 p.m.5 a.m.), where
all good men will be wearing their dress
whites. DJs, dancing, awesome lighting,
and a surprise performer make this an
event that you wont want to miss. Looking
for an after event? Keep the party going at
Climax, which throbs until 8 a.m.
Sunday is another day and another pool
party. One Day In Heaven (10 a.m.4
p.m.) brings the popular London nightclub
to poolside Palm Springs. Be sure to relax a
bit before heading over to the Sunday Tea
Dance (3 p.m.10 p.m.). This amazing outside
event comes with plenty of hot bodies and
warm breezes and features a Ferris wheel
and a live performance by Belinda Carlisle
before ending with a bang with a spectacular
reworks show in the Palm Springs night sky.
White Party Palm Springs nal event,
PHOTO COURTESY OF PAPA PARTY
Closing (10 p.m.8 a.m.), is a high-energy
dance party with an amazing light show,
international DJs, and hot men from all
corners of the world.
Ladies wont want to miss The Dinah,
which kicks o with an ocial pre-party on
Wednesday, March 29 at 8 p.m. at Hilton
Palm Springs. This will provide plenty of
time to mingle, meet other partygoers,
and make plans with your new friends.
The ocial kicko party is Thursday, May
30 at Zeldas Nightclub, where there will be
plenty of hot women and live performances
by some of your favorite performers. Of
course, the Dinah dancers will keep you
motivated to get your groove on.
TGIDF! The rst pool party of the
weekend lets you know the weekend has
arrived Thank Goddess Its Dinah Friday!
Things get started at noon at the Hilton
Palm Springs. That night, enjoy the White
Party at the Hard Rock Hotel (beginning
at 8 p.m.). Let loose in your favorite white
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 3 3
outt and enjoy the live performances, the
Dinah dancers, and your fellow revelers.
Its not an April Fools Day joke: There
really are four dont-miss events on
Saturday, beginning at 10 a.m. with the
Wet and Wild Pool Party at Hilton Palm
Springs. Spend the day by the pool with
all the wonderful women attending the
Dinah and be prepared to be blown
away by the multiple performances and
appearances by many of your beloved
artists/celebrities. As the day gives way to
early evening, head on over to the Pond
Estate for the NCLR Palm Springs Garden
Party (www.nclrights.org/give/event/nclr-
palm-springs-garden-party/), hosted by
co-chairs Barbara Carpenter and Gary D.
Soto and the National Center for Lesbian
Rights executive director Kate Kendell.
This event, which runs from 57:30 p.m.,
will be your dose of seriousness, as one
of the discussion topics will be President
Trump and the challenges we face.
Ready for some laughter? The Dinah
hosts a comedy show on Saturday night
that begins at 8 p.m. at the Hard Rock
Hotel. Have a laugh and a cocktail while
enjoying the show. The Hollywood Party
is your Saturday night dance event and
after a hearty day of activities, dancing,
mingling, and meeting is precisely what
the doctor ordered.
The nal day of Dinah Shore weekend
goes out with a bang, beginning with
the Sunday Funday Pool Party at the
Hilton. Get wet with all your new friends
before cruising over to Zeldas at 9 p.m. on
Sunday for the closing night party.
While these two memorable weekends
kick o the 2017 party season in Palm
Springs, there is always something to do in
the desert oasis with its year-round events
and sunshine.
3 4 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17 W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM LO S A N G E LE S CA LE N D A R

E-mail calendar items to

tmasters@losangelesblade.com
two weeks prior to your event. Space is
limited so priority is given to LGBT-specic
events or those with LGBT participants.
Recurring events must be
re-submitted each time.

FRIDAY, MARCH 24

LA Leather Pride kicks o a week

of parties and related events. Visit
losangelesleatherpride.com or see page
32 for full details and ticket packages.
25th Annual Art of Motion Picture
Costume Design-FIDM Museum & Galleries
(919 S. Grand Ave., #250). FIDM Museums
annual exhibition has become a tradition
for LA locals and movie lovers alike. Runs
through Saturday, April 22, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.
Andy Warhol: RevisitedatBergamot
Station (2525 Michigan Ave. in Santa
Monica) is a touring exhibition making
its current home in Los Angeles. Runs
through Saturday, June 10, 11 a.m.-7 p.m.
New Frontiers: The Many Worlds of
George Takei at the Japanese American
National Museum (100 N. Central Ave.)
through Aug. 20, 12-5 p.m. explores the
life and career of the pioneering actor,
activist, and social media maven.
The LGBT Bar Association of L.A.s
38th Annual Gala, Taking Our Pulse:
The Beat Goes On at theNatural History
Museum of Los Angeles County (900
Exposition Blvd.), 7-11 p.m. honors the
Hon. Maureen A. Tighe, U.S. Bankruptcy
Judge, Central District of California with
the Co-Presidents Award.
Grunt party at Eagle LA (4219 Santa
Monica Blvd.) 8 p.m.-2 a.m. with DJ Ryan
Jones, $6 cover.
Braingasm Trivia Night @ Gym Sports
Bar (8737 Santa Monica Blvd.), 8:30-10
p.m. I Love the 90s Trivia party, $10 per
player or $40 per team.
SATURDAY, MARCH 25
Getting Ahead of the Gayme, book
launch and discussionatRockwell VT (1714
N. Vermont Ave.), 1-4 p.m. Join author and
professional matchmaker Mason R. Glenn
Andy Warhol: Revisited stops in LA through June 10.
for an informal discussion of his new book.
KinkFit! at The Stockroom (28091/2
Sunset Blvd.), 2-3 p.m. circuit train your
way through some of your favorite BDSM
practices. Whether youre new to the
lifestyle or looking to target more specic
areas of interest, this event will kick start
your mind into kinky shape.
Simply diVine - LGBT Food & Wine
FestivalatVillage at Ed Gould Plaza (1125
North McCadden Place), 6-9 p.m. Simply
diVine, the premier food and wine event
for LGBT people and their allies returns.
SUNDAY, MARCH 26
Impulse Drag Brunch at Flaming
Saddles (8811 Santa Monica Blvd.), 12-3
p.m. Start your day with friends, comedy,
food and mimosas.
Cuties Queer Carnival at Cuties
Coee Bar (710 N. Heliotrope Drive). A
sex-positive queer carnival with cheeky
games and services. 18+ only, $10 gets you
entry plus 5 tickets to use at the booths.
A Tennessee Williams Birthday
Salon at TOM House from 5-7 p.m. An
informal chat about Tennessee Williams
and Pancho Rodriguez plus readings
from short story Desire and the Black
Masseur. Tea and cake will be served, as
well as a complimentary whiskey shot. For
more information, and to RSVP, contact:
antebellum@earthlink.net
MONDAY, MARCH 27
La La Leather at MCC in the Valley
(5730 Cahuenga Blvd., North Hollywood),
7-10 p.m. A concert of classic and original
lm music performed in gear by members
of the Los Angeles Leather Community in
the tradition of the beloved Classic Meets
Fetish concerts held in Berlin. Fetish/
leather gear encouraged, $15.
TUESDAY, MARCH 28
Screening of Postcards from the Edge
at theLos Angeles County Museum of Art
IMAGE COURTESY OF BERGAMOT STATION
(5905 Wilshire Blvd.), 1-3 p.m. $2 members,
seniors (65+), and children (17 & under);
$4 general public. Note: Tickets can be
purchased at LACMAs on-site ticket Oces.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 29
Voter Phone Bank: Block the Budget
Reconciliation Bill with Los Angeles LGBT
Centers The Leadership LAB. Make strategic
phone calls to key senators to block the
bill, 5-9:30 p.m. Contact leadershiplab@
lalgbtcenter.org for details.
THURSDAY, MARCH 30
LAs raunchiest party, Big Fat
DickatFubar (7994 Santa Monica Blvd.),
9 p.m.-2 a.m.
Take it o Thursdays Absolut
Underwear Party at Faultline (4216
Melrose Ave.), 9 p.m.-2 a.m. No cover, free
pants check.
CALENDAR POWERED BY GAYINLA.COM.
P A L M S PRI NGS CA LEND AR
Southern Baptist Sissies by DEL SHORES is featured at the Desert Rose Playhouse.
FRIDAY, MARCH 24
Southern Baptist Sissies by Del Shores
Desert Rose Playhouse (The Desert Rose
Playhouse is located at 69-620 Highway
111, Rancho Mirage, CA) Storyteller Mark
Lee Fuller journeys through his pain while
creating love and acceptance in the church
and clubs of Dallas. March 24 26 and
March 31 April 2.
Women of Abstract Expressionism
at The Palm Springs Art Museum - (300
South Palm Canyon Drive, Palm Springs).
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
This exhibition presents the work of 12
American women artists active in New
York City and the San Francisco Bay area
in the late 1940s and 1950s. March 24
April 6.
On the Grid: A Look at Settlement
Patterns in the High Desert The
Architecture and Design Center, Edwards
Harris Pavilion (The Palm Springs Art
Museum, 300 S. Palm Canyon Dr.). Lay of
My Land, a major sculptural work by the
Joshua Tree-based artist Andrea Zittel.
March 24 April 6.
PHOTO COURTESY OF SHORES
Disgraced by Ayad Akhtar - Coachella
Valley Repertory Theatre at the Atrium
(69930 Highway 111, Suite 116 Rancho
Mirage) Pulitzer-winning drama about a
Pakistani-American couples conicted
identities. March 24 April 2.
Alan Jackson at The Show at The
Show at Agua Caliente Casino Resort Spa
- (32-250 Bob Hope Drive, Rancho Mirage)
Country superstar Alan Jackson brings
his Keepin It Country Tour to the desert.
March 24 March 25
MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 1 7 3 5
E-mail calendar items to
tmasters@losangelesblade.com
two weeks prior to your event. Space is
limited so priority is given to LGBT-specic
events or those with LGBT participants.
Recurring events must be
re-submitted each time.
SATURDAY, MARCH 26
Sunday Night Live Music at Wangs
March 26, April 2 at Wangs in the Desert -
(424 S Indian Canyon Dr.). Join Wangs every
Sunday for live entertainment on the Zen
Patio. Happy Hour goes all night long in the
bar and on the patio and there are several
small plate specials. March 26, April 2.
FRIDAY, MARCH 31
Chapatti by Christian OReilly Pearl
McManus Theater - (Palm Springs
Womans Club, 314 S. Cahuilla Rd., Palm
Springs). When Dan and his dog, Chapatti,
cross paths with Betty and her 19 cats, an
unexpected spark shows the importance
of human companionship. March 31
April 2
SATURDAY, APRIL 1
Grooves at the Westin - Peter White
The Westin Mission Hills Resort and
Spa - (71333 Dinah Shore Drive, Rancho
Mirage). Smooth jazz master Peter White
brings his endearing style and immense
talent on acoustic guitar back to Grooves
at The Westin. April 1.
Tower of Power & Average White Band
at The Show at The Show at Agua Caliente
Casino Resort Spa - (32-250 Bob Hope
Drive, Rancho Mirage). Known for timeless
instrumental mega-hits like Pick Up the
Pieces the bands songwriting stretches
across several Grammy winning decades.
MONDAY, APRIL 24
Lovesport, a New Comedy by Tony
Padilla Pearl McManus Theater - (Palm
Springs Womans Club, 314 S. Cahuilla Rd.,
Palm Springs) A witty, fast-paced comedy
from award-winning playwright Tony
Padilla. April 24 26
3 6 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
Gender illusionist wins skating competition
A Filipino Chinese gender illusionist
won gold at the 2017 Pacic Coast Adult
Sectionals ice skating competition earlier
this month in Burbank, Calif.
Serane Chinky Ong, 38, made the
sectionals her rst competition ever,
and is using the moment to come out
as a gender illusionist, rather than as
transgender, a title she nds dicult
accepting. In her view, people in that
spectrum often dont like their appearance
or physical attributes, feeling that they are
trapped in the wrong body, which causes
them to alter their features.
I just grew my hair, grew my eyebrows,
stayed t, thats pretty much it, whereas
most transgender [people] use surgery to
look more feminine. I am not doing that
because I am still the same person.
Born in the Philippines, shes the
youngest of 10 siblings and was raised by
an older sister after her father died. Her
sister, unable to care for her, placed her
in a boarding school where she says she
was physically abused by the high school
boys. She ran away several times only to
return. Ong internalized the abuse, not
knowing how to vocalize her suering
to family members who, she said, had
personal issues of their own.
It was rough growing up being dierent
but I stayed silent, Ong said. Not having
any role model aected my relationship
with family and peer groups.
Her other siblings were either married, in
college, or working in the family business.
As a young boy, she spent most of her
time with her sisters, but she never let
anyone know about the confusion she was
experiencing. The abuse from her school
put her in survival mode. She became an
introvert to family but allowed herself
to be an extrovert elsewhere. When her
mother moved to the United States and
remarried, she sent for her youngest child
to join her in San Diego.
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
ONG TAKES GOLD AT PACIFIC COAST ADULT SECTIONALS
By MELODY MUNDY
SERAFINE CHINKY ONG won gold at the 2017 Pacic Coast Adult Sectionals.
Years went by before Ong could tell her
mom about her situation.
I didnt know how to discuss my
situation with my mom so I had to gure
things out by myself, because I didnt
trust anybody.She knew already. She was
just hurt because she felt she wasnt an
adequate mom.
While time was spent adjusting to American
culture and dealing with her personal
transformation, she attended college, picked
up recreational ice skating, and worked in
the hospitality industry. Years later, she left
home to pursue her personal journey.With
the challenges of her new identity, she had
the opportunity to experiment with her alter
ego, Chinky, a female. This brought on a
SCREEN CAPTURE COURTESY OF ICENETWORK
whole new set of complications while looking
for employment.
In the Los Angeles ne dining business,
they would sometimes ask for headshots.
I saw the dierence when you came in
wearing a suit and tie, compared to when I
styled my long hair looking feminine, like an
exotic Asian beauty.You get more attention.
Although she never withheld information
about her gender, Ong wouldnt volunteer it,
either. She said shes been red from jobs by
managers who looked into her background.
I believe I lost my jobs because I dont
think they really worked with anyone in
the trans community except with those
that are amboyantly gaythats why I call
myself a gender illusionist because I just
SP O RT S
kind of blended in.
She left San Diego for more self-
discovery. Following her passion of
becoming a professional ice skater,
she moved to Venice, but later became
homeless and unemployed. When a
Good Samaritan gave her an opportunity
for shelter, she resumed working in the
restaurant industry. She used this new
freedom of keeping her gender choice
anonymous and to blend into society as
a female. Its also where she renewed
her love for ice skating. Working various
jobs, she managed to take lessons and
test up to the highest levels, but she never
competed because of her indecision
indicating gender.
Men didnt compete with women and
vice versa so the thought of lling out the
application brought on too much anxiety.
Even though shes adopted a typically
female appearance, she signed up as
a male competitor in this, her rst,
competition. She sought guidance from
other elite skaters and coaches hoping
to create less controversy signing up
competitively with men.
Competitively, I dont want to skate with
women because I logically feel that its not
the right thing to do.Professionally, I want
to have the exibility to skate both.
Her coach told her that if she was going
to compete, she better be ready. She
wasnt. Ong decided not to compete until
this month, at the Adult Sectionals, where
she won rst place in the gold category,
the highest level of the adult skating track.
I decided to skate because I wanted to
make my coach and my club proud.
She has felt comfortable in ice skating
appearing feminine while in practice,
while registering as a male in competition.
Her family and friends have accepted
who she is. When asked what she would
say to those that hurt her, she replied, Im
standing here with a rst-place trophy.
3 8 MA RCH 2 4 , 2 0 17
bwoy takes on race and privilege
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 27
relationships as well as online friendships.
It doesnt take much imagination to
combine the two. With the Internet you
can put yourself anywhere in the world
which means you can irt with others
as if youre living anywhere, even if youve
never been there.
Blade: Your lms have all focused on
biracial relationships. Assuming its no
coincidence, why is that an important
element in your work?
Young: Im denitely interested in the
way race, ethnicity, sexuality and privilege
work. Of course as Ive matured
Parallel Sons, my rst feature, was made
over 20 years ago! my vantage point has
changed. Yet Im still interested in these
themes, because theyre often the fabric,
however unacknowledged, of our lives.
Why and how do we objectify the other?
How do we act out unconsciously with and
towards others? How does sex interrupt
and confuse these questions? What does
it mean to have privilege in the LGBTQ
community?
Blade: Upstate New York also seems
to always feature in your lms do
you live there? What makes the area a
good lm location?
Young: I was raised in upstate New York
and have a weekend house there, so for
me the area is a great location, because I
have a strong emotional connection to it.
Ive also always been fascinated with the
fact that you can have areas of New York
State that are only several hours from NYC,
but feel more like rural Kansas. In bwoy,
I wanted to capture the gray bleakness
of winter upstate, something I know well,
and how it can contribute to isolation and
loneliness, another theme in the lm.
Blade: Do you tend to use local actors?
Young: Sometimes I use local actors in
small parts, but I really believe in nding
W W W .LOS ANG E LE S B LADE .C OM
Filmmaker JOHN YOUNG on the set of bwoy.
the best actors for the role in question. Id
much rather nd an actor who can really
inhabit the character, even if they dont
entirely t the physical description. of my lms have been made with what
Blade: Have you spent much time in
Jamaica, and do you feel connected to
the plight of gay people there?
Young: Id like to think that I feel
connected to the plight of marginalized
and persecuted people anywhere, but for
LGBTQ folks in Jamaica its still especially
dangerous: Consensual sex between men
can still be punished with up to ten years
of hard labor. Of course, Jamaica sells
itself as a paradise, an idea that appeals to
Brad, the lead character in my lm, whos
desperate to escape his life. The question
in the lm is: Who is a Jamaica a paradise
for? The wealthy tourists who often
dont leave the resorts they visit, or the
homeless gay teenagers who are forced to
live under bridges and in gullies?
Blade: Ive read that you made bwoy
with just $20,000, is that right? How
were you able to do it so cheaply? How
PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN G. YOUNG
does that compare to the budgets
youve had for other lms?
Young: Yes, bwoy was made for 20K.All
a debt of gratitude to queer lmmakers
is considered micro budgets. For this
lm I worked backwards, looking at the
physical resources I had and the money
I could raise. I then developed a story
around those resources. With budgets this
small, I look at the story itself as the actual
production value of course along with
the acting! Human pain can be explored
just as easily and just as profoundly on the
set of a multimillion-dollar blockbuster
as across a kitchen table in a no-budget
indie. Luckily, I was able to work with Novo
Novus Productions on this they have
a great track record of producing super-
low-budget lms, and are committed to
creating movies which feature stories
about LGBTQ people of color.
Blade: Do you prefer working with
small budgets? Are there things you
wouldve done dierently in bwoy if
your budget had been larger?
Young: Every indie lmmaker will tell you
A RT S & E N T E RT A I N ME N T
that the most important thing money buys
you is time. So there are probably a few
things that I would have done dierently
had I had more money, but mostly for me
it would have been having a few extra days
to shoot. On a 10-day schedule, two extra
days can make a big dierence.
Blade: What have some of your own
favorite lms been recently?
Young: Ahhhh! So many good lms! I
really appreciated Moonlight of course,
especially because of the conversation its
created between LGBTQ people of color
and those who dont identify as such. Im
fascinated by what constitutes a gay lm
and what doesnt. Does it matter in this
case if most of the actors and director
identify as straight? How do the characters
in Moonlight both reinforce stereotypes
and push back against them? Its been a
long time since any lm, let alone a Best
Picture winner, has created a place for
this kind of self-probing conversation. I do
want to mention that I think the lm owes
of color whove come before, including
Nisha Ganatra, Stephen Winter, Marlon
Riggs, Cheryl Dunye, Rodney Evans,
Dee Rees and Patrik-Ian Polk, to just name
a few.
Blade: What do you do besides
making lms?
Young: I teach screenwriting and
lm production at Purchase College in
Westchester, New York. But, I also love
to build things with my hands. Because
making a lm can take years, I really enjoy
the immediacy of creating an object in
several hours or days, and then being able
to have the results.
Blade: Whats your next project?
Young: Ive been working on a longtime
labor-of-love project that chronicles the
relationship between Juan Dubose and
Keith Haring during the heyday of New
Yorks East Village art scene.
 threatened. We are
When any Americans rights are under threat, all our rights are
s. We are people
LBGTQ+. We are people of color. We are people of dierent faith
. We are people
of all genders and no gender. We are immigrants. We are dreamers
tiful intersections
with disabilities. We are parents. We are allies. And we are beau
jeopardy. Forces
of these. But most of all, we are American. Yet our rights are in
basic human
are gathering in government that intend to take away our hard-won
peaceful protest
rights. Together, we must resist. On June 11, march with us in
from Hollywood & Highland to the heart of West Hollywood.

Join the resistance at ResistMarch.org

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