Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Maria Sampedro-Iglesia has delivered the third ruling against Florida’s ban on gay adoption, allowing a lesbian couple to adopt an infant relative. While the 1977 law remains in limbo, Sampedro-Iglesia’s ruling suggests some state court judges already have made up their minds about gay adoption, a thorny political issue in a state with a significant social conservative streak. ‘There is no rational connection between sexual orientation and what is or is not in the best interest of a child,” Sampedro-Iglesia wrote in her order. ‘The child is happy and thriving with [Alenier]. The only way to give this child permanency . . . is to allow him to be adopted’ by her. In her ruling, Sampedro-Iglesia declared Florida’s adoption law ‘unconstitutional on its face.’ For Alenier, who shares a home near downtown Hollywood with her longtime partner, Melanie Leon, the ruling made formal what she already knew she had — a family.” During my doctoral studies, I conducted a Cost/Benefit Analysis on the ban and just how much money the ban is costing Florida’s taxpayers. Although the data are several years old, take a look at the study under the Professional Research and Reports Heading under the “Research” tab on my Web Site.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Saturday, January 16, 2010
I Hate to Say I Told You So, But…
A state ban on gay marriage is costing the city of San Francisco millions of dollars a year in lost revenue and increased services, an economist testified Thursday in a lawsuit aimed at overturning the prohibition. Chief city economist Edmund Egan said married people accumulate more wealth and have more to spend on property and consumer goods, which bolsters tax revenue. He also said the city must spend more on health care for uninsured workers because same-sex couples are not always covered under their partner’s employee health care plans.
“It’s clear to me that Proposition 8 has a negative material impact on the city of San Francisco,” he said. “These are impacts that are hard to quantify, but over the long term they can be powerful.” Egan testified during the fourth day of a federal trial on a lawsuit challenging Proposition 8, the ballot measure approved by statewide voters in 2008.
The city was allowed to join the suit to demonstrate that governments bear some of the costs of the ban. Peter Patterson, a lawyer for Proposition 8 sponsors, challenged Egan’s methodology and had him acknowledge during cross-examination that he based many of his estimates on assumptions drawn from the spending habits of opposite-sex couples. The case is being heard by Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker, who said Thursday he was abandoning his push to have the trial broadcast on the Internet because he didn’t want the broadcast issue to distract from the trial itself. Walker disclosed the decision a day after the U.S. Supreme Court indefinitely blocked his plan to record the trial so it could be transmitted to other federal courthouses.
On the witness stand, Egan said San Francisco has seen higher mental health costs because of discrimination against gays and now spends $2.5 million a year on specialized services for them. “I believe that the prohibition of marriage of same-sex couples is a form of discrimination, and it’s reasonable to assume that if that prohibition were removed there would be over time a lessening of the discrimination those individuals see in their daily lives,” he said. Egan acknowledged he could not quantify many of the potential revenue and savings benefits if same-sex couples could marry. The most solid estimate he cited was $2.6 million the city was losing in hotel and sales tax revenue every year from weddings that can’t take place.
He based the figure on the 5,100 marriage licenses San Francisco issued to same-sex couples during a five-month period in 2008 when gay marriage was legal, as well as on wedding industry data on how much couples spend on average when they tie the knot. “Certainly San Francisco experienced an uptake in weddings (in 2008), and I can conclude with that the economic activity associated with weddings increased as well,” he said. A Columbia University social scientist testified Thursday that his research on how social stigma makes gays more vulnerable to depression, suicide and substance abuse. Ilan Meyer said Proposition 8 provided another source of distress that could create similar mental health problems.
“Basically having a constitutional law say to gay people, ‘You are not welcome here’ the opposite of that would clearly say, ‘You are welcome here, your relationships are valued, you are valued, we don’t approve of rejection of you as a gay person as a state that has a lot of power,” Meyer said. A lawyer for the measure’s sponsors, Howard Nielson Jr., used Meyer’s own research showing that black and Latino gays had fewer mental health problems than white gays to try to undercut the professor’s assertion. Meyer had hypothesized in his study that black and Latino gays would have more mental health issues because of their dual minority identities.
Nielson also challenged Meyer’s statement that California‘s domestic partnership law, which grants same-sex couples the same legal benefits and responsibilities as married spouses, was itself a source of stigma and emotional distress. Equality California, the state’s largest gay rights group, sponsored the 2003 law. “Do you believe Equality California would sponsor legislation that would stigmatize (gay) individuals?” Nielson asked.
“No, but that doesn’t change my answer,” Meyer said. “Having a second type of an institution that is clearly not the one that is designed for most people clearly is stigmatizing.” The trial is scheduled to resume Friday with testimony from Michael Lamb, a Cambridge University psychologist who will discuss gay and lesbian parenting and the benefits to children of allowing same-sex couples to marry. (Courtesy, Associated Press).
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Republican Representative Threatening UAB Partner Benefits
Alabama Representative DuWayne Bridges is garnering support from fellow Republicans to pass state legislation to take away domestic partner benefits from employees at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). UAB recently added domestic partner benefits, including health insurance, to its benefits package, citing their inability to attract top candidates to become Faculty in their College of Medicine because the top Universities in the United States offer such benefits. “I don’t think the university should waste money by making a liberal or politically correct statement,” Bridges said. I wonder what kind of “conservative statement” will be made if the Republicans pass these laws, leaving hundreds of people without health insurance having to rely on taxpayers to foot the bill of their health expenses. Don’t you just love it? MORONISM at its best! Go Republicans–What a joke!!!
Thursday, October 29, 2009
President Obama Signs Federal Hate Crimes Legislation
After over a decade of fierce resistance from Bush and his fellow Republicans, today President Obama signed the first ever federal legislation mandating the inclusion of sexual orientation in all hate crimes statutes. Shortly after midnight on October 7, 1998, 21-year-old Matthew Shepard met Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson in a bar. McKinney and Henderson offered Shepard a ride in their car. Subsequently, Shepard was robbed, pistol whipped, tortured, tied to a fence in a remote, rural area in Laramie, Wyoming, and left to die. Still tied to the fence, Shepard was discovered 18 hours later by Aaron Kreifels, who initially mistook Shepard for a scarecrow. At the time of discovery, Shepard was still alive, but in a coma.Shepard suffered fractures to the back of his head and in front of his right ear. He had severe brain stem damage, which affected his body’s ability to regulate heart rate, body temperature and other vital functions. There were also about a dozen small lacerations around his head, face and neck. His injuries were deemed too severe for surgeons to operate. Shepard never regained consciousness and remained on full life support. He was pronounced dead at 12:53 A.M. on October 12, 1998, at Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort Collins. Police arrested McKinney and Henderson shortly thereafter, finding the bloody gun as well as the victim’s shoes and wallet in their truck.
Championed by Shepard’s surviving mother and father, the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act has been debated within the Congress, Senate, and Presidency for over a decade. Even though thousands of gay men and women are victims of violence because of their sexual orientation every year, Republicans denounced the bill and implied the Act gave gay and lesbian victims of hate crimes “special rights.” I personally wrote letters to my then Republican Congressman Tom Feeney begging him to pass this important legislation. Each time, I received a reply thanking me for sending my letter but he would not be supporting “special rights” for gays and lesbians. To show just how much has changed, in a resounding defeat, Democratic Congresswomen Suzanne Kosmas replaced the corrupt Republican. The reply I received from her said she resoundingly supported the legislation and believed strongly that when any class of persons is targeted with violence, the response should be swift and provide the most severe punishment permitted by law. It’s a refreshing change to see intelligence, empathy, and understanding slowly begin to erode the ignorance, stupidity, and idiocy we’ve all had to endure for the past several years. Thank-you President Obama. We are all grateful that you have signed this vital bill into law. The thousands of gay men and women who have been victims of hate crimes can now have the justice they have been sorely missing.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Lower Education Levels Key to Passing of Florida’s Amendment 2
A study released today from Dr. Dan Smith, a political scientist at the University of Florida indicates lack of education at the college-level was a significant factor in how Florida’s ban on gay marriage was passed at the ballot box in November. Nearly 62 percent of Florida voters cast ballots in favor of Amendment 2, which amended the state constitution to define marriage as a union between a man and woman. Controlling for political and socioeconomic factors, the study found each additional 1 percent of a county’s population with bachelor’s degrees correlated with a 1 percent decrease in support for the amendment. “There’s a lot of evidence showing increased education leads to greater tolerance,” Smith said. While this research is definitely important, it’s not shocking. There is a multitude of social science studies, including my own, indicating a major difference in attitudes towards gay persons among people who are college-educated versus those who are not. The sad point here is that ignorance and lack of education permitted the passing of a statewide amendment that took away civil rights of thousands of people who will lose health insurance and other vital benefits. Of course, all of this to “protect” marriage does nothing more than increase the burden on taxpayers who will now have to subsidize health and social services for these people. Conservative moronism continues to cause major social problems for everyone.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
NYC GLBT Homeless Shelter Named in Bea Arthur’s Honor
The late television actress Bea Aurthur will be remembered for her hard work and dedication to the well-being of GLBT youth when the Ali Forney Center will name one of its residences after her after her memorial on September 14th:
In November of 2005, Bea flew to New York City from her home in Los Angeles in order to give a special benefit performance of her one-woman show. The performance raised over $40,000 for the Ali Forney Center. In an interview for Next Magazine Bea explained her decision to offer her support “I’m very, very involved in charities involving youth and the plight of foster children. But these kids at the Ali Forney Center are literally dumped by their families because of the fact that they are lesbian, gay, or transgender – this organization really is saving lives.” Bea continued to offer her support, both as a donor and as an advocate. In one of her very last interviews, published in the New York Blade in May 2008, Bea spoke with pride of having done the benefit for AFC, and indicated that she would do anything to help gay kids disowned by their parents.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Federal Lawsuit Challenges Prop 8
Former US Solicitors Theodore B. Olson and David Boies (interestingly, who represented Bush and Gore in the contested 2000 election) have joined forces to fight anti-marriage equality at the federal level. The two announced yesterday they will challenge California’s Proposition 8 (upheld by their Supreme Court yesterday) in federal court. While personally I don’t think now is the time to do this (Obama hasn’t had a chance to balance the Supreme Court just yet and I doubt the bigots appointed by Bush will support marriage equality), I agree with Olson’s sentiments:
“I personally think it is time that we as a nation get past distinguishing people on the basis of sexual orientation, and that a grave injustice is being done to people by making these distinctions. I thought their cause was just. It is our position in this case that Proposition 8, as upheld by the California Supreme Court, denies federal constitutional rights under the equal protection and due process clauses of the constitution. The constitution protects individuals’ basic rights that cannot be taken away by a vote. If the people of California had voted to ban interracial marriage, it would have been the responsibility of the courts to say that they cannot do that under the constitution. We believe that denying individuals in this category the right to lasting, loving relationships through marriage is a denial to them, on an impermissible basis, of the rights that the rest of us enjoy I also personally believe that it is wrong for us to continue to deny rights to individuals on the basis of their sexual orientation.”
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Idiocy at Its Best
As if the Republican Party isn’t a laughing stock as is, their fearless new leader, Michael Steele, is really becoming quite an embarrassment. Steele, attemping to defend the anti-gay marriage equality sentiment of his party, said the following in a speech to Georgia’s Republican Party last week: “Now all of a sudden I’ve got someone who wasn’t a spouse before, that I had no responsibility for, who is now getting claimed as a spouse that I now have financial responsibility for. So how do I pay for that? Who pays for that? You just cost me money.”’
Using Steele’s logic, I guess we can safely assume the Emancipation Proclamation was completely off-base because surely it has cost so much money! And ending racial segregation in the public school system was so expensive that I assume Steele would rather see this reversed? PATHETIC!!! Watching the train wreck that is the Republican Party continue to implode on nearly a daily basis is really entertaining…Kieth Olbermann agrees: