The
editors apologise for the long delay between the last issue and this one.
This is due to the fact that we moved from Sydney and Newcastle to Melbourne
and are now established in our new premises and hope to resume normal production
of the newsletter.
1) WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE - MARXISM
AND GAY POLITICS:
This book, by Simon Edge,
(published in 1995 by Cassell) who was the editor of Capital Gay in the
UK until its demise a few years ago, is about being gay in organisations
such as the UK Socialist Workers Party (The International Socialist Organisation
in Australia). It is an interesting analysis of homophobia in a Marxist
organisation whose members are avowedly pro-gay and lesbian but fail to
understand the activism required to win rights for homosexuals in the communities.
Rights which have been won have been won by gays and lesbians own activism,
not always supported by left organisations such as SWP (and ISO). These
groups have claimed that workers' fights are all-embracing and gay and lesbian
issues are secondary to the main class struggle. Edge states that within
the groups, homosexuals are not permitted to actively participate in gay
and lesbian political organisations, because they distract from the main
struggle.
This was shown to be the case in Sydney during the last 10 years when the Sydney
branch of ISO instructed those of its members who were attending meetings
of Lesbian and Gay Solidarity to leave and not attend further meetings.
LGS at that time had about 20 members, and after the walkout was left with
about 10. So Edge's analysis would certainly seem to have been correct in
the Sydney context.
2) NEW BOOKS:
Living Out Loud, a history of gay and lesbian activism in Australia
- apparently the first attempt at a national perspective. The author, Graham
Willett, has been active in the gay and lesbian movement in Australia since
1979. Published by Allen & Unwin, $35
Australia's Homosexual Histories - Gay and Lesbian Perspectives V. Edited by
Phillips and Willett - a collection of papers from the first two conferences
on Australian Homosexual Histories in 1998 and 1999. Published by ACLGR
(Sydney) and ALGA (Melbourne), $25
Queer City - gay and lesbian politics in Sydney, edited
by Craig Johnston and Paul van Reyk, with foreword by Julie McCrossin. Published
by Pluto Press Australia, $32.95
3) BRANDON TEENA COURT CASE OUTCOME:
The mother of the real-life subject of the
film "Boys Don't Cry" won her legal battle against the sheriff
whose actions led to her child's murder. The Nebraska Supreme Court unanimously
ruled in April 2001 in favour of Brandon Teena's mother in her suit against
the sheriff who failed to protect her child - a transgendered 21-year-old
who was raped and murdered in 1993. Teena was born and raised as a girl.
But he was living as a man when two acquaintances, John Lotter and Thomas
Nissen, raped and beat him after discovering his biological gender.
Brandon Teena reported the crimes to Richardson County
Sheriff Charles Laux. Without offering Teena protection, Laux told Lotter
and Nissen of Teena's report and stopped deputies from arresting them. On
31 December 1993 the men murdered Teena and his two friends - crimes for
which Lotter was sentenced to death and Nissen to life in prison.
A lower court found the county negligent and
awarded Teena's mother, Joann Brandon damages. But she was awarded nothing
for the loss of her child. The Supreme Court changed the ruling of the lower
court and ruled in favour of Joann Brandon on all claims. The justices said
the lower court was wrong in reducing the damages and ordered them reinstated
in full. They also ordered the lower court to determine the compensation
due to her for the loss of her child and for any suffering caused by Laux's
behaviour.
The Supreme Court's decision read, "Based upon the
undisputed facts of this case, ---- Laux's conduct was extreme and outrageous,
beyond all possible bounds of decency, and is to be regarded as atrocious
and utterly intolerable in a civilised community." (PLANETOUT,
20 APRIL2001)
4) SOUTH AFRICA: THE OUTCOME OF THE PHARMACEUTICAL
LEGAL CASE AND THE AFTERMATH:
Few of South Africa's 4.7 million AIDS sufferers are
any closer to accessing affordable drugs, despite pharmaceutical companies'
decision to allow the importation of generic drugs.
South Africa's success in winning a landmark case against
the drug industry was tempered by signs that cheap AIDS medicines were unlikely
to flood quickly into a country ravaged by the disease. The decision by 39 of the world's most powerful
pharmaceutical companies to drop their legal action against Pretoria was
hailed by activists as a blow to profiteering and a potential lifeline to
Africa's 25 million positive people.
Treatment
Action Campaign, the AIDS activist group that supported the government
against the drug firms, has called on the health ministry to speed up implementation
of its Medicines Act, which was at the heart of the court action. (PLANETOUT,
20 APRIL 2001)
5) WHAT'S BEEN HAPPENING?
Since we came to reside in Melbourne we have managed to lend our support
to some marches, demos and protests - 7 APRIL, Justice
for Palestinian refugees still refused rehabitation by Israel; 15
APRIL Easter Sunday die-in outside St Patrick's Cathedral to
highlight Archbishop Pell's anti-gay statements and gay youth suicide; 27
APRIL Protest in the rain outside Police Headquarters over police brutality
at the S11 anti-globalisation rallies last year (2000); 1 MAY M1 May Day shut-down corporate Melbourne
march and rallies; and 1 MAY
late afternoon in the State Parliament Public Gallery to
hear debate on the gay, lesbian and transgender Domestic Partners bill to
give us some reasonable degrees of equality with hets. and it got passed
into law.
6) SPAIDS
UPDATE:
The next planting of the Sydney Park AIDS Memorial Groves Tree Planting
Project will take place on Sunday 29 July 2001 at Sydney Park, in the dedicated,
signposted AIDS Groves.
On Sunday 27 May 2001 there was a dedication ceremony
to unveil a plaque at the newly completed "Reflection Area". This site is just above the AIDS Groves
and was built as a result of South Sydney City Council's endeavour to create
some permanent focal point sites in the layout of Sydney Park. The plaque
was unveiled by the Mayor of South Sydney Council and Mannie De Saxe, co-coordinator
of the SPAIDS Project ably supported by six gay male nuns from the Order
of Perpetual Indulgence. About
70 people attended the ceremony, which also included further tree planting
to commemorate those people who have died of AIDS.
Sisters, Mannie & South Sydney Mayor after SPAIDS tree planting
|
SPAIDS reflection area |
7) GAY AND LESBIAN HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL PROJECT LAUNCH:
A dedication and presentation ceremony took place at Stonewall Gardens,
Green Park, Darlinghurst, in Sydney on Tuesday 27 February 2001. When the
Project was initiated in 1991, it was decided that the word Holocaust was
relevant to what the Nazis did to homosexuals in the death camps. However,
a subsequent committee, at an annual general meeting, decided to drop the
word as it might offend certain groups and thus reduce the fund-raising
ability of the Project. The monument is now known as The
Gay and Lesbian Memorial.
A member of LGS who was present at the ceremony reports as follows:
"I think it (the Project) should have kept the word
Holocaust in it. There was a slight change in design. (There had been a
design competition for the monument, but the final design differs somewhat
from the winning design). The pink triangle part of it is not metal. It
is still triangular, but more boxlike, with metal framing, thick strong
pink glass, lit up from the inside, with a photo of gay camp internees.
The speakers included John Fowler (Mayor of South Sydney Council which put
up 3/4 of the money), Luci Ellis, a past president (who was responsible
for proposing that the word Holocaust be dropped from the Project), John
Marsden, solicitor (who held the collected monies in trust while the Project
was in abeyance for some years) who spoke very well, Justice Marcus Einfeld,
who spoke at length, Kitty Fischer (child Holocaust survivor - her obituary
appears below) who spoke slowly, but obviously hasn't lost her ability to
tell a good story well, and Lou-Anne Lind, from Pride, whose organisation
will be the custodians of the Memorial."
This is a good place to mention a most important
book which relates to the Memorial. The book is called HIDDEN HOLOCAUST? Gay and Lesbian Persecution in Germany
1933 - 1945, edited by Gunter Grau,
published by Cassell
in 1995. This book is a most valuable research document,
but for some reason which we have not yet been able to ascertain, it was
published in small numbers and is now virtually unobtainable, being apparently
out of print. The book details the persecution of gays and lesbians during
the Nazi years but also explains how gays were still treated as criminals
at the end of the war and were kept incarcerated under the notorious Paragraph
175, which was only repealed in the 1960s. It would seem that the book was
not widely publicised because of its subject matter, which remains controversial
to this day.
8) OUTRAGE! LONDON ATTEMPTS CITIZEN'S ARREST:
Peter Tatchell, gay ex-pat and Outrage! campaigner tried to arrest the Zimbabwean
President Robert Mugabe, in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel in Brussels on
5 March 2001. Belgian secret service agents allowed Mugabe's Central Intelligence
Organisation CIO security men to beat up Tatchell until he blacked out and
fell into the gutter outside. Journalists and photographers were also assaulted.
Tatchell said his protest was an attempt to remind Mugabe that sooner or
later he will be arrested and put on trial for torture under the 1984 UN
Convention and other human rights abuses such as the massacres in Matabeleland
and the terrorisation of the judiciary and political opponents. According
to Belgian law, the authorities are under a legal obligation to arrest any
person in Belgian territory who has committed acts of torture anywhere in
the world under the 1984 UN Convention.
9) WHAT HAPPENS TO LESBIANS AND GAYS
when they get as old as grandma and grandad? As an activist have you given any thought to what might
happen to you in a nursing home perhaps when you're over the hill? Of course
you know there are nursing homes for the frail elderly but hardly aware
of any lesbians and gays who are in the age bracket of grandparents. But
there are plenty of us in that age bracket where discrimination is rampant!
Australia is lucky to have a lesbian like Jo Harrison
in Adelaide who has been researching and writing about issues relating to
ageing in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities in Australia
and the USA for the past 5 years. She is currently completing her doctorate
at the University of South Australia investigating the political process
which will lead to gay and lesbian older people being recognised in aged
care policy and practice in Australia in the future.
If you happen to be fast reaching retiring age with or
without a partner, you need to remember that our "rights which have
been won have been won by gays' and lesbians' own activism" (Simon
Edge, UK). That's why Jo Harrison's work is so important to us. It's also
why we ourselves need to take advantage of any discussion locally that focuses
on ageing and aged care facilities - hospitals, home care, even nursing
homes. It's a worry being open in public but when we've been open and out
during our paid employment life, retirement shouldn't force us back in the
closet. After all, we aren't seeking special consideration, just equal consideration
as older human beings.
10) DEATH OF KITTY FISCHER:
Kitty Fischer was born in Czechoslovakia on 12 July 1927. Her father had
been in the army during the first World War and had lost a leg. Despite
his handicap, he ensured that his wife and two daughters led a comfortable,
middle-class existence, which continued for a while under the Nazi occupation
of that country from 1939 onwards. However, the Holocaust finally caught
up with them and they were taken to Auschwitz in 1944. Kitty's parents were
immediately taken to the gas chambers, but Kitty and her younger sister
Eva, in their early to mid-teens somehow escaped being gassed and were saved
in the camp by a man with a pink triangle. Kitty thought this was some form
of religion because everybody in Auschwitz who was a prisoner wore a symbol
of some sort or another. The man explained that he was a homosexual, something
Kitty had not heard of at that stage.
The Homosexual man brought them potatoes
which kept them alive, and when there was an opportunity for them to be
sent to a factory to work, the man insisted Kitty and her sister volunteer
for the work. This saved their lives, because, on their return a few months
later, the gas chambers had been dismantled and the Russians arrived soon
afterwards and they were liberated.
Kitty and her sister ended up in Australia,
and, over the years, Kitty became involved with various gay and lesbian
issues, one being the formation of a Gay and Lesbian Holocaust Memorial
Project to build a memorial to those homosexuals murdered by the Nazis during
World War 2. Kitty was also an Ankali volunteer, which involved one-to-one
companionship for an hour a week for people living with AIDS. The irony
of this was that one of her clients was the son of Nazis and the son still
had Nazi sympathies. He eventually asked Kitty to stop being one of his
carers and she was very upset by the whole incident.
Kitty had many jobs over the years and also
involved herself in university education.
She also had a great deal of ill health which
took its toll on her activities, and she finally succumbed to acute leukaemia
and died on 7 May 2001, in Sydney, just two months short of her 74th birthday.
She will be long remembered for her many involvements and by her many friends.
Kitty is survived by a married son, Paul, now living in the USA.
10) GAY
AND LESBIAN HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL PROJECT LAUNCH:
A dedication and presentation ceremony took place at Stonewall Gardens,
Green Park, Darlinghurst, in Sydney on Tuesday 27 February 2001. When the
Project was initiated in 1991, it was decided that the word Holocaust was
relevant to what the Nazis did to homosexuals in the death camps. However,
a subsequent committee, at an annual general meeting, decided to drop the
word as it might offend certain groups and thus reduce the fund-raising
ability of the Project. The monument is now known
as The
Gay and Lesbian Memorial.
A member of LGS who was present at the ceremony
reports as follows:
"I think it (the Project) should
have kept the word Holocaust in it. There was a slight change in design.
(There had been a design competition for the monument, but the final design
differs somewhat from the winning design). The pink triangle part of it
is not metal. It is still triangular, but more boxlike, with metal framing,
thick strong pink glass, lit up from the inside, with a photo of gay camp
internees. The speakers included John Fowler (Mayor of South Sydney Council
which put up 3/4 of the money), Luci Ellis, a past president (who was responsible
for proposing that the word Holocaust be dropped from the Project), John
Marsden, solicitor (who held the collected monies in trust while the Project
was in abeyance for some years) who spoke very well, Justice Marcus Einfeld,
who spoke at length, Kitty Fischer (child Holocaust survivor - her obituary
appears below) who spoke slowly, but obviously hasn't lost her ability to
tell a good story well, and Lou-Anne Lind, from Pride, whose organisation will be the custodians of the Memorial."
This is a good place to mention a most important book
which relates to the Memorial. The book is called "HIDDEN HOLOCAUST? Gay and Lesbian Persecution in Germany
1933 - 1945", edited by Gunter Grau and published in 1995 by Cassell.
This book is a most valuable research document, but for some
reason which we have not yet been able to ascertain, it was published in
small numbers and is now virtually unobtainable, being apparently out of
print. The book details the persecution of gays and lesbians during the
Nazi years but also explains how gays were still treated as criminals at
the end of the war and were kept incarcerated under the notorious Paragraph
175, which was only repealed in the 1960s. It would seem that the book was
not widely publicised because of its subject matter, which remains controversial
to this day.
11) DEATH OF NKOSI JOHNSON:
Nkosi Johnson died in Johannesburg on 1 June 2001,of AIDS, at the age of
12 years. Nkosi was born with HIV and his biological mother died of AIDS
in 1997. Nkosi urged people to show compassion and love to those with the
disease, especially children. He was one of 2.5 million Africans expected
to die from AIDS-related causes this year. The UN estimates 25 million Africans are
infected with AIDS.
Nkosi's struggle against discrimination began
when he gained admission to a primary school that had tried to bar him because
he was HIV positive. He gained world attention last year (2000) when he
stood up at the international AIDS conference in Durban, South Africa, to
denounce his government's controversial stance on the disease.
Former South African president Nelson Mandela
said he was an example for the whole world to follow. "It's a great
pity that this young man has departed. He was exemplary in showing how one
should handle a disaster of this nature. He was very bold about it and it
touched many hearts."
BBC correspondent in Johannesburg Allan Little
said that Nkosi had shaken South Africa, where one in nine people are HIV
positive, out of a state of deep denial. Nkosi's funeral service was shunned by President
Thabo Mbeki and his senior ministers."The government is spending billions
to purchase guns and other military equipment but is turning a blind eye
to the plight of AIDS victims (sic)," said activist Vusi Zulu at the
funeral.
As a postscript to Nkosi's death from AIDS,
it was another scandal that the South African President Thabo Mbeki could
not bring himself to go to the UN AIDS conference held in the USA during
June 2001.
12) WOLA
NANI - EMBRACE:
is a South African organisation formed to help people living with
HIV/AIDS access the services they need, and to create opportunities for
them to help themselves. Wola Nani facilitates job creation programmes for
individuals and families affected by the virus and offers community support
services such as counselling and child care.
South Africa has chronic unemployment; discrimination
against people living with HIV/AIDS exacerbates the problem for those trying
to live and work with the virus. Wola Nani attempts to relieve this situation
by opening avenues for training and income generation for clients who are
engaged in low-impact craft production activities like paper mache and beadwork.
This enables them to continue working in times of poor health.
Should you wish to find out more about these
highly marketable crafts, which include beaded AIDS ribbons, bowls, bracelets.
necklaces and frames, contact Wola
Nani at P.O.BOX 16082 VLAEBERG, SOUTH AFRICA 8018, or
email: wolanani@iafrica.com
South Africa has an HIV/AIDS crisis worse
than most other countries in the world. The response by the South African
government has been extremely bad and education programmes and other support
systems are urgently needed to slow the crisis down. Your assistance to
organisations such as Wola Nani will have an immediate impact on assisting
people living with and dying from HIV/AIDS.
13) "GAY TRIAL" BEGINS
IN EGYPT:
On 18 July 2001, 52 men appeared in court after being arrested in May on
a Nile riverboat restaurant. Police alleged they were holding a gay sex
party. The men have been charged with a range of offences including contempt
of religion, falsely interpreting the Koran, exploiting Islam to promote
deviant ideas, debauchery and
immoral behaviour. Egyptian law does not
explicitly refer to homosexuality but a wide range of laws covering obscenity
and public morality are punishable by jail terms. Homosexuality is regarded
as a sin. All 52 defendants pleaded innocent. International human rights
groups have condemned the arrests. Some claim the defendants were targeted
for allegedly being gay.
14) UN AIDS PACT:
Islam and the Vatican reduce value of world AIDS policy. Australia's health
minister Wooldridge caves in to religious bigotry.
The Catholic Pope and the Islamic religious heads used blackmail
to derail the UN Secretary General's initiative on a crucial global pact
on fighting AIDS effectively. The HIV/ AIDS Declaration, drafted by Australia
at the request of the Secretary General, Kofi Annan, urged special health
measures to protect groups at most risk of the disease. On 25 June 2001
the Vatican and Islamic coalition demanded that unless mention of prostitutes,
drug addicts and homosexuals in the at-risk category was not deleted, they
would walk out of the 3 day UN special session on HIV/AIDS in New York and
not support the UN global programme on HIV/AIDS. The lousy politics of faith
got its way. So a secular body working for the health of the whole global
community tragically has its health policies defined and dictated by organised
religion.
15) NAMIBIAN CALL TO "ELIMINATE"
GAYS: The Rainbow Project has called on
the Namibian government to denounce its Home Affairs minister's remarks
on gays and lesbians. Home
Affairs minister Jerry Ekandjo called on 700 new graduates of the Police
Academy to "eliminate" gays and lesbians. Ekandjo lumps homosexual
acts with unnatural acts including murder. Such rhetoric has resurfaced
periodically in Namibia beginning with President Sam Nujoma in 1996 and including Ekandjo's own memorable call
for anti-gay legislation on the floor of the National Assembly in November
1998. However discrimination based on sexual orientation is explicitly prohibited
in Namibia's la bour code. (Planetout
2 October 2000)
16) DONATIONS: Thanks to those who have sent donations to help produce the newsletter.
17) COMING EVENTS:
Australia's 4th Homosexual Histories Conference
"Queer Federations" is to be held at Adelaide University, 19-20
October 2001, during the lesbian and gay cultural FEAST FESTIVAL. Information
and registration form see green insert.
Sydney Hiroshima Day Rally: Saturday 4 August 2001. Assemble 12 noon Hyde
Park Archibald Fountain for a march to Town Hall Square Rally at 1pm. Organised
by Hiroshima Day Committee (02)9982 4192
Melbourne Hiroshima Day Rally: Sunday 5 August 2001. Rally against the Nuclear
Cycle, 2pm State Library Steps, cnr Swanston and La Trobe Streets. Contact
Coalition for a nuclear free Australia (03)9444 8197
