Los Angeles LGBT Center celebrates Supreme Court landmark decision to protect LGBT employees BY ORLY LYONNE In response to the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) decision last month in three employment discrimination cases that employees cannot be fired because of sexual orientation and gender identity, the Los Angeles LGBT Center issued the following…
How Little Things Got Us Here “Everyday I leave my house there’s a realization that today could be the day some local cop takes their insecurities and lack of training out on me. Making me the honoree of America’s next big protests and riots.” BY SULLIVAN LEWIS You want to know the most ridiculous thing…
How Did That Happen?! I would have bet a magnum of vintage Krug that we would lose our Title VII GLBT workplace discrimination cases in the Supreme Court last month, and I’ve rarely been so happy to be so wrong. But my God, you guys! It seemed impossible. Of course we still had the remnant…
Honoring Harvey Milk, the first openly gay person ever elected into public office. Governor Gavin Newsom issued a proclamation last month declaring May 22, 2020 as “Harvey Milk Day” in the State of California. Milk was the first openly gay person ever elected into public office in the US. “Milk stood firm in his belief…
“Before we know it, life will return to something like normal, and we’ll look back on these days as a dreamlike interval. November will come, and the pure ecstasy of putting an end to the Trump presidency will lift our spirits beyond imagination.” INDULGING IN THE HISTORY CHANNEL Oh my God. How is it possible…
“ … Can I confess, as a loyal me-too feminist, that I can’t stand Tara Reade, the Russia-phile Biden accuser who has switched up the details of her story more often than a fifteen-year-old caught sneaking in the house at three am.” PUG POSITIVE! Hello FIGHT readers. Would you like to know what I’ve accomplished…
Statewide moratorium on evictions for renters. BY VICTOR MELAMED California Gov. Gavin Newsom has placed a ban on the enforcement of evictions for renters affected by COVID-19, enacting a state-wide moratorium last month. Under this rule, landlords cannot evict nonpaying tenants in the state if they are affected by the coronavirus pandemic by prohibiting “enforcement…
SAN DIEGO TODD GLORIA FIRST OPENLY GAY CANDIDATE IN SD MAYORAL PRIMARY Todd Gloria, a 41-year-old Democratic assemblyman, recently won the most votes in the mayoral primary in San Diego with nearly 79,000 votes, or 40,2% of the total vote, possibly making him the first openly gay male mayor in San Diego, California’s second largest…
We read the latest best seller about Churchill and then watched three World War II movies, feeling better about our current predicament which seems quite a bit better than the blitz. WHAT HAPPENED? I always check my previous column before I start a new one in order to make sure I don’t repeat a topic…
Their Lives “I love it when I know something I wrote softened the parents who had banished their son and daughter from their lives when they came out to them as gay and lesbian.” —Playwright Terrance McNally (Love! Valour! Compassion!, The Spider Woman) in a speech accepting the lifetime achievement award at the 2019 Tony…
Did you ever think you’d miss Scalia? Romney? McCain? George W Bush? Me neither. COURTING DISASTER Our crucible continues at the High Court, where the justices have just decided to hear a case that pits Catholic Social Services (CSS) against the city of Philadelphia’s gay rights policies. The Catholic group stands alone among Philly contractors…
Equality California endorses Mayor Pete Buttigieg for President. BY VICTOR MELAMED Equality California, the nation’s largest statewide LGBTQ civil rights organization, and its Nevada-based affiliate Silver State Equality announced their endorsement of Mayor Pete Buttigieg for President of the United States last month. The decision was reached unanimously by the groups’ joint presidential endorsement committee…
Jeanette Barrera decided to empty her personal savings and launch her own campaign. And she’s winning. BY TEHLERE SPELLING Long Beach City government routinely comes under fire for corruption. Current 2nd District City Councilwoman Jeannine Pearce has violated the city’s conflict-of-interest policy, had an embarrassing run-in with LBPD, and is now under state investigation. Yet she’s still serving…
“The world is falling apart, dear Readers! Unfortunately I used up my lifetime allocation of verbatim references to Yeats’ The Second Coming during Trump’s first year. Seriously. This works on the honor system. You simply cannot parrot lines from a single poem more than a hundred times. It’s a rule.” TO THE POLLS! One third…
THE FIGHT TO POSTHUMOUSLY PARDON GAY CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER BAYARD RUSTIN California lawmakers called on Gov. Gavin Newsom last month to posthumously pardon Bayard Rustin, a confidant of Martin Luther King Jr. who helped organize the March on Washington, for his conviction in the 1950s under a state law frequently used to target gay men,…
It’s time for the GLBT community and allies to make the case that hostility towards gays and transpeople is not a legitimate tenet of any faith. LOUNGING BY THE POOL WITH OUR LAPTOPS The new California law that is meant to protect contract workers from exploitation by companies like Uber is threatening freelance contributors to…
BY PAULO MURILLO LOS ANGELES JUSTIN WELLS, WESTWIND RECOVERY TREATMENT CENTER CEO, FOUND DEAD. RIP Justin Wells, the co-founder and CEO of Westwind Recovery Treatment Centers and Sober Livings in Los Angeles was found dead in his home last month by his husband Zack Ament, who is Chief Operating Officer at Westwind Recovery. No official…
