LGS HOME PAGES: http://www.josken.net

ISSN 1446-4896

"If you've come to help me, you're wasting your time. But if you've come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together." Lilla Watson, Aboriginal educator and activist.

MUSIC, DANCE, SONG, STORY TELLING AND A BUSH TUCKER DINNER. Organised by GAYS AND LESBIANS AGAINST RACISM, as part of the Mardi Gras Festival, celebrating the International Year of Indigenous People

Over 5000 gay men, lesbians, transgendor persons, and supporters, rallied to the "ALL I WANT FOR XMAS..." march and rally on Saturday 28 November '92. This testifies to the fact that we are far from having achieved full equality before the law or our full rights in society. The march was impressive, stretching all the way from Taylor Square to Whitlam Square.

Our march and rally also enjoyed the full support of Women's Abortion Action campaign, the Democratic Socialist Party, Resistance, Jura Books, the International Socialist Organisation, the Black Deaths In Custody Watch Committee, the New Left Party, and othor non gay/ lesbian organisations.

It augurs well for future struggles and successful coalition building.

Our thanks to all those who signed the petition and to those who helped collect signatures. The petition, totalling 450 signatures from all over Australia, was forwarded to our comrades in Nicaragua.

LGS sent the following letter to the Cuban Consulate in Sydney:

While supporting the gains of the Cuba Revolution and publicly being in solidarity with the people of Cuba against the constant threat posed by US imperialism, we must protest against the Cuban government's treatment of people with HIV/AIDS.

Incarceration is not a rational, humane way of dealing with the HIV virus, people with HIV/ AIDS still have a right to enjoy their social and political freedom; the only appropriate rosponse to the deadly virus is educational, with the provision of all things necessary for the responses success: the availability of condoms, dental dams, lubricants; a non-judgemental approach to people with HIV/ AIDS and to behaviour which might place people at risk; the denial of a policy which criminalises homosexuality and drug injection.

Equally reprehensible on the part of the Cuban government is the arrest of Dr Omar del Pozo Marrero, who wrote about your government's treatment of people with HIV/ AIDS in the London based medical journal The Lancet. We protest his arrest and demand his release.

With the Cuban revolution being in the greatest danger in decades, it is stupid and suicidal for the Cuban government to bury its head in the sand. Its persistence in its present HIV/AIDS policy is costing the Cuban people much needed support from people with HIV/ AIDS, gay and lesbian activists and human rights activists the world over.

We reiterate our support for the Revolution while refusing to accept your HIV/AIDS policy, which is condemnable.

Wo trust you will convey this letter to the appropriate authorities in Cuba.

At its November 12 meeting, LGS resolved to send the following response to Down Under '98 regarding the bid to host the 1998 Gay games in Sydney:

We received your letter asking for our endorsement of the bid for the 1998 Gay Games to be hold in Sydney. After discussing your request we decided to decline form endorsing it.

We did so for a number of reasons, but our main concern is the fact that our communities are being asked lo come up with some AUS$6 million. We do not believe that organised sport should receive support let alone such a huge sum of money.

Our communities have a lot of pressing needs, ranging from more facilities and services for PLWHAs to infrastructural needs such as a Pride centre and a Lesbian Centre. We think that AUS$6 million would be much better spent on these needs. In our view cultural events merit funding; sports do not

While the Games will draw in large amounts of money, it will not go to our communities but to businesses, gay or otherwise. Let the business fund the games. Not us.

We are especially concerned that there is a certain amount of collaboration between DownUnder '98 and Sydney 2000 (the bid by Sydney government and business to host the Olympics). Everybody should question tho existence of the Olympics, which are all about Big Money (sports being the incidental excuse for transnationals to make a few financial killings.) The result is always a huge loss for the population of the host city/ country. Such collaborations also puts in doubt the avowedly non nationalistic nature of the Gay Games.

In the interest of what we perceive to be the good of our communities we decline to endorse tho bid for the 1998 Gay Games."

Baryulgil is an Aboriginal mining community created by the asbestos mining magnates. The Bundjalung people, traditional custodians of the land, were dispossessed by the pastoralists last century. From the early 1940s to 1979 these Kooris were employed as asbestos miners and were forced to ingest lethal doses of asbestos which contaminated the air, food, water, ground, and buildings - as they produced incalculable profit for the industry owners.

They are now fighting for compensation and medical treatment for terminal diseases contracted from their years of exposure to asbestos.

James Hardie Industries (owned by the Reid Family) claims that it is not liable. So the miners have organised themselves into the NSW Asbestos Ex-Miners Aboriginal Corporation, to fight a compensation case against the company.

Notwithstanding a favourable report by the House of representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs in 1984, both Commonwealth and NSW governments rejected the Committee's recommendations, while the law and the course are obstructing the Baryulgil claim.

A salient aspect of this case is the blatant racism involved: while in other cases (as in the case of the Navy) asbestosis has been officially recognised, in the case of Baryulgil the authorities are dealing with Koories, another case of the gonocidal nature of the conquest of Australia. Not in 1788, but today.

The community is putting a submission for funding to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) which would enable them to employ a Community Development Worker and open an office from which to organise their claim.

LGS has written a lettor of support to the NSW Asbestos Ex Miners Aboriginal Corporation as well as letters to ATSIC officials supporting their application for funding.

Letters of solidarity can be sent to:

Letters supporting their funding application can be sent to: Ian Watson. Regional Director ATSIC Level 2, 75 Magellan St, LISMORE. NSW. 2480

Gerry Moore. Commissioner ATSIC P O BOX 4010. NOWRA, 2480

ATSIC Commissioner, 234 Sussex St, SYDNEY, NSW. 2000

GAYWAVES Thursday nights. 8pm to 10.30 pm. 2SER FM 107.3MHz. Gaywaves needs more lesbians on its collective. Call on 330 3080 during the broadcast
WILDGALS Saturday nights. 7pm to 10 pm. 2RSR FM 88.9 MHz

Melbourne monthly newsletter of gay and lesbian activism. Contact: P O BOX 108. NORTH CARLTON, VICTORIA. 3054. Subscriptions; $15 one year. $6 concession.

Gay Men and Lesbians, who are of Middle Eastern origin, to form a social group. Contact Tony Nicholas, PO BOX 139. CAMPSIE. NSW, 2194.

Second Thursday of every month, at the Newtown Community Centre (opposite the railway station) at 8pm. Next meetings: January 14. 1993. February 11. 1993. and March 11.1993.

CURRENT NEWSLETTER AND ARCHIVE OF PREVIOUS NEWSLETTERS

Mannie has a personal web site: RED JOS: HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVISM

Mannie's blogs may be accessed by clicking on to the following links:

MannieBlog (from 1 August 2003 to 31 December 2005)

Activist Kicks Backs - Blognow archive re-housed - 2005-2009

RED JOS BLOGSPOT (from January 2009 onwards)

This page updated 18 SEPTEMBER 2014 and again on 26 APRIL 2017

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