Exhibition OpeningChosen Familias: Bay Area LGBTQ Latinx Stories
Friday, June 77:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members A new exhibition at the GLBT Historical Society Museum brings together photos, ephemera and text to center biological and chosen Latinx LGBTQ families as sources of hope and resilience. By queering the traditional family photo album, the show reframes historical documentation of mothers, daughters, fathers, children, siblings, aunts and uncles. “Chosen Familias” also features video interviews and footage of Bay Area LGBTQ Latinx activists and artists of the past four decades. Curated by Tina Valentin Aguirre, chair of the society’s board of directors, the exhibition expands the definition of LGBTQ family to encompass not just biological relatives, but also mentors, coalition members and the networks of people that have supported Latinx LGBTA people in the Bay Area. Light refreshments will be served. Tickets are available online here.
Walking TourOUT of Site: SoMa — Produced by Eye Zen Presents
Saturday, June 8: 12:00–2:00, 3:00–5:00 p.m.Sunday, June 9: 1:00–3:00 p.m.Saturday, June 15: 12:00–2:00, 3:00–5:00 p.m.Sunday, June 16: 1:00–3:00 p.m.Howard Langton Community Garden10 Langton St., San Francisco$25 | $10 for studentsFrom the original Native American inhabitants, to the tent villages of gold miners, to the SROs housing factory workers, to the formation of an LGBTQ and leather community in the 1960s, to its current tech-fueled redevelopment, San Francisco’s SoMa District has been ever-changing. “OUT of Site: SoMa” is an immersive walking tour cosponsored by the GLBT Historical Society that offers a panoramic view of the transformation of this neighborhood. The walk lasts approximately two hours and covers about one mile. The tours are a project of Eye Zen Presents, a San Francisco-based theater company committed to honoring the stories of queer ancestors, histories and sites through performances and community-building events. More information is available here. Tickets are available online here.
Book LaunchRainbow Warrior: The Memoirs of Gilbert Baker
Tuesday, June 115:30–7:30 p.m.San Francisco Main LibraryKoret Auditorium100 Larkin St., San FranciscoFree San Francisco artist and activist Gilbert Baker (1951–2017) created the globally adopted rainbow flag as a symbol of the LGBTQ community in 1978. Baker’s life and work will be explored, illuminated and celebrated in this unique event organized for the posthumous release of his memoirs, Rainbow Warrior: My Life in Color (Chicago Review Press, 2019). Cosponsored by the James C. Hormel LGBTQIA Center at the San Francisco Public Library, the program will feature a short film about Baker’s life, selected readings from the memoirs and a discussion with social justice activists. The evening will begin with a reception and end with a book signing. More information is available here.
Panel DiscussionPreserving San Francisco’s Queer Historic Places
Thursday, June 136:00–7:30 p.m.San Francisco Main LibraryKoret Auditorium100 Larkin St., San FranciscoFree San Francisco’s queer culture is deeply intertwined in urban life, and it has not been immune to the changes in our city. Carving space in the urban landscape has been essential for queer survival, for building community and obtaining political and cultural power, and, quite simply, for finding each other. Some of those essential queer heritage institutions, sites and even whole neighborhoods now are being erased by hypergentrification. A panel including academics and community leaders will join GLBT Historical Society Executive Director Terry Beswick and senior public history advisor Gerard Koskovich to reflect on the status of San Francisco’s queer historic places and living cultural heritage and to consider what may lie ahead for them. The program is cosponsored by the James C. Hormel LGBTQIA Center at the San Francisco Public Library, More information is available here.
Living History DiscussionThrill Spot: The Raid on Tommy’s Place
Thursday, June 137:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members The 1954 police raid on Tommy’s Place, a lesbian bar in San Francisco’s North Beach, is the stuff of legend. Lurid headlines describing the seduction of teenage girls in a “vice academy” were followed by sensational stories teeming with swaggering butches, police graft and political intrigue. Lambda Award–winning author and visual artist Katie Gilmartin shares her research about this event, as well as excerpts from the draft of the fictional account inspired by the raid that she is currently writing. She’ll also offer reflections on how archives and oral histories serve as the basis for historical fiction imagining the lives of LGBTQ ancestors. The program is offered in collaboration with Openhouse and is made possibly by grants from the Queer Cultural Center and the Creative Work Fund. Tickets are available online here.
Film ScreeningStarman: Freddie Burretti, the Man Who Sewed the World
Monday, June 177:00 p.m.The Roxie Theater3117 16th St., San Francisco$13 Join us at San Francisco’s Roxie Theater for a special benefit screening of Lee Scriven’s 2018 documentary Starman, which details the fascinating story of Freddie Burretti, a close friend of David Bowie and his key Ziggy Stardust costume collaborator and stylist. By creating a sensational and inspiring onstage and offstage wardrobe, Burretti helped Bowie challenge British culture, fashion, homophobia and a skeptical rock music industry. All proceeds from the screening go the GLBT Historical Society. Tickets are available here.
Book LaunchThe Routledge History of Queer America
Tuesday, June 187:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members The Routledge History of Queer America (2018), the first comprehensive overview of the field of United States LGBTQ history, is a landmark work. Edited by Don Romesburg, professor of women and gender studies at Sonoma State University and former cochair of the GLBT Historical Society Board of Directors, the anthology features more than 20 authors and nearly 30 chapters on essential themes in queer history from colonial times to the present. In this roundtable organized in celebration of the release of the new paperback edition, Romesburg will be joined by a panel of historians who will evaluate the state of the field of queer American history. Tickets are available here.
Performance¡Aplauso! Live Storytelling & Performances
Friday, June 217:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members An impressive group of Latinx queer artists and performance artists will stage dances, enact theater scenes, read poetry and show short films celebrating the culture and diversity of the queer Latinx community. Performers include transgender artist Donna Personna; artist, oral historian and activist Mason J.; drag queen Foxxy Blue Orchid; performance artist Xandra Ibarra; Chicana writer Natalia M. Vigil; activist, filmmaker and dancer Dulce; and writer and historian Juliana Delgado Lopera. This event is being held in conjunction with the exhibition “Chosen Familias: Bay Area LGBTQ Latinx Histories,” opening at the GLBT Historical Society Museum on June 7. Tickets are available online here.
Living History DiscussionLGBTQ Art, Film, Poetry & Dance in San FranciscoSaturday, June 222:00–3:30 p.m.De Young MuseumPiazzoni Murals Room50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Dr., San FranciscoFree for San Francisco residentsOrganized by the GLBT Historical Society in collaboration with San Francisco’s De Young Museum, a group of artists and culture makers will engage in an intergenerational discussion on LGBTQ people in the arts in San Francisco from the 1960s to the present.
For the second year in a row, uniformed police officers will not be able to participate in Sacramento, California, Pride at the request of organizers.
The Sacremento LGBT Community Center asked city officers to participate in the parade without wearing their standard uniform.
The group argue that their presence while uniformed would make others feel uncomfortable.
What happened?
The center organizes Sacremento Pride as an annual festival. This year, it’s scheduled for 8-9 June.
But in a statement on their Facebook page posted 1 June, the center asked that police officers who wish to attend during pride do not wear their uniforms.
‘To honor the pain and marginalization of community members who have been harmed by police violence,’ the statement read, ‘we have asked Sacramento Police not to participate in uniform for the 50th anniversary of Stonewall.’
The post then clarified that officers will be on duty during the parade march. Which begins on the corner of 8th and T street, just off Southside Park.
Moreover, the post then added that there will be ‘private security and identifiable community safety monitors’ throughout the march.
Officers react: ‘Disappointed’
In a statement sent to local newspaper, The Sacramento Bee, the police department said it was disappointed that the center ‘does not want our officers attending upcoming public community events while in uniform.’
‘We support our LGBTQ officers who proudly serve our community on a daily basis,’ it added.
‘Sad that inclusion doesn’t really mean everybody,’ Captain Norm Leong of the Sacramento Police Department wrote in a Facebook post.
‘Worse part is to hear how much this hurt our LGBTQI officers who looked forward to participating.’
‘A step in the journey toward better inclusion’
Moreover, the center went onto add an amendment to their original post on 2 June. The group clarified they collaborated with authorities on the decision.
‘They didn’t participate last year at all, welcoming them to participate as members of the community, out of uniform, this year was a compromise.
‘Rejection of the compromise fails to acknowledge the pain and historical abuses police institutions have inflicted on the most marginalized in our community.
‘This is not the end. This is a step in the journey toward better inclusion, affirmation and safety for all LGBTQ+ people here and beyond.’
When the first Los Angeles Pride parade hit the streets of Hollywood in 1970, the world was experiencing a crisis of contradictions. When it came to gay identity, things were changing. The Stonewall Riots of the year before gave way to protests all across the country, led by people who were sick of being treated like second-class citizens. The Black Cat demonstration in L.A. in 1967, along with the Cooper Donut riot of 1959, laid the groundwork for a new generation of activist gays who weren’t content to be shoved around, targeted and violently harassed by the police. – Advertisement –
Christopher Street West was formed, in part, as a response to the need for action and visibility. At a time when gay sex was still illegal in most parts of the country and the AIDS epidemic was still a decade away, America was trying to figure out how gayness, and openly gay identities, fit into its identity as a free speech-loving, yet vocally conservative, country. So the parade happened in Los Angeles, and then in New York. But these celebrations, as the surviving images show, were full of queens, leather daddies, go-go boys and folks generally unconcerned with respectability politics. Perhaps it was for this reason that the Pride parade was never televised. It couldn’t have been treated with the same level of interest, the same pomp and glamour and bizarre gaudiness as a Macy’s day parade.
Today is another era, of course, and while the people currently running our country may wish to harken back to a simpler, straighter, whiter time that never, in fact, existed in America, the people who live here are ready for this yearly celebration of gayness to be broadcast out to the world. Or at least, to greater Los Angeles.
In a historic deal with Southern California news station KABC, Christopher Street West has signed onto a three-year contract to televise the L.A. Pride festival, as well as the famous West Hollywood parade.
The live coverage of the parade will be co-hosted by the beloved (yet controversial) Raven-Symone, along with KABC regulars Ellen Leyva and Brandi Hitt for a special two-hour broadcast on June 9.
A protestor fights against the controversial Briggs Initiative, a measure that would have made it illegal for LGBTQ+ teachers to work in schools, in 1978.
“I am honored to be a part of this year’s Pride celebration,” Community Grand Marshall Phill Wilson said to CSW. “The LGBTQI community has come a long way in the last 50 years. It has not been without heartache, pain, sacrifice, and growth. I am humbled to be among such a powerful and diverse group of grand marshals. Together we represent how much stronger we are when we celebrate all of what we are.”
The Los Angeles LGBT Center, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year with the opening of a new Senior Campus, will take the role of Organizational Grand Marshal.
“We are humbled and honored to have Phill Wilson and the Los Angeles LGBT Center serve as the Grand Marshals for LA Pride 2019.” said Estevan Montemayor, CSW Board President, in a press release. “Together, these people and the organizations they represent have made an indelible and important mark on the LGBTQ+ community that has improved and enriched the lives of many individuals who have faced so much adversity. Our grand marshals inspire us, empower us and are examples of how to unite our community. We are so excited that KABC is here to increase the awareness of our grand marshals and LA Pride.”
There’s no denying that the queer community has come a long way since the early days of the parade, when you could still get booked for a blow job. With queer and trans rights currently under attack by the Trump administration, the show of support, optimism and pride might be just what the community needs to see on small screens everywhere.
“We’re proud to bring the L.A. Pride Parade celebration to viewers across Southern California,” Cheryl Fair, president and general manager of KABC, told Deadline. “Our collaboration with LA Pride is a commitment to reflecting and serving the diverse communities that represent our audience.”
Ten years ago, Rafeal “Nephew” Bankston landed in solitary confinement in San Quentin State Prison for refusing a gay cellmate.
“Where I grew up, we called it gay bashing,” he said. “We hated them, robbed them,” Bankston added matter-of-factly.
On a Wednesday afternoon in April, he told that story to a classroom of 15 other inmates. About half of them were LGBTQ. Photos of LGBTQ icons — Janet Mock, Ellen Degeneres, James Baldwin — smiled down from a whiteboard at the front of the room.
Rafeal “Nephew” Bankston is an inmate at San Quentin State Prison. Kate Sosin
No one said a word. Lisa Strawn, 60, a transgender woman, was sitting next to Bankston and didn’t move.
Bankston, 37, was smaller than most of the others in the room. He wore plastic-frame glasses and a blue prison shirt that looked several sizes too big. Like many in the room, he has spent more than half of his life behind bars. He entered prison at 18 and said he learned at a young age to hate gay and trans people.
Half a life later, he wants to talk about Jussie Smollett. He wants to know how his LGBTQ peers feel about Smollett now that the TV star’s reported anti-gay hate crime has been refuted by Chicago Police.
“When we walked out of here, here, everybody was pulling for him because it was wrong, how he got treated,” Bankston said. “Do you all still feel that way?”
He posed the question to members of Acting With Compassion & Truth, or ACT, a restorative justice group that meets weekly at San Quentin. Restorative justice is an alternative to punishment, one in which offenders and victims try to heal together.
‘I didn’t know where I fit in’
Each week for a year, LGBTQ and straight inmates meet for two hours in a small yellow classroom. They talk about everything from what it means that Janelle Monáe came out as pansexual to how to respect intersex people. Their goal is simple: heal together and work toward a better world for LGBTQ people.
Inmates Michael Adams and Juan Meza currently lead the group. The lessons have been designed by LGBTQ prisoners.
The group is as diverse as the world on the outside. Ages range from 25 years to late middle age, and races and ethnicities vary. Almost all of the attendees are what are referred to as “lifers,” those convicted of felonies so serious that their sentences range from many years to life in prison. These include murder and sex crimes.
Three of the group’s attendees are transgender women. Lisa Strawn is among them.
Lisa Strawn is a transgender inmate at San Quentin State Prison.Kate Sosin
Strawn, who prefers no pronouns, entered prison 25 years ago on three-strikes burglary charges and has served much of that time at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville, another men’s prison. Strawn transitioned to female at age 18 but has always been housed with men.
That’s because in most prisons across the nation, transgender inmates are housed according to their birth sex, despite federal requirements in the Prison Rape Elimination Act that inmates be housed on a case-by-case basis.
Strawn has grown accustomed to navigating men’s prisons as a woman.
San Quentin is California’s oldest prison, built in 1851 by prisoners at the edge of the San Francisco Bay in Marin County. The views from the entrance are so heavenly it is often remarked that it’s astonishing the prison has not been flattened and divided up for real estate.
San Quentin State Prison overlooks the San Francisco Bay.Kate Sosin
The 600-man cell block looms at six levels. There is no air-conditioning in the unit, and fans run in the background. Cells are just wide enough to stand in sideways. They house two people each and the sum of their possessions, crammed into cubbies above bunks. At one end of the cell block, men make calls from a line of pay phones. At the other end, they shower out in the open.
With a blond ponytail and carefully-applied eyeliner, Strawn decidedly stands out at San Quentin.
“Honestly, I’ve had problems, but then I guess myself personally, I think a lot of it is how you carry yourself,” Strawn said. “Every time I walk into a room I better own it.”
San Quentin State PrisonKate Sosin
At Vacaville, Strawn helped establish an LGBTQ group. Leaving that a year ago to come to San Quentin was devastating.
“I hated this place when I got here,” Strawn said. “I didn’t know where I fit in, and I knew where I fit in there. But when I came here, I got into ACT.” Aside from the restorative justice group, Strawn also got into journalism by writing for the San Quentin news outlet, The Beat Within.
Transgender women like Strawn report exceedingly high rates of violence behind bars, according to data from the National Center for Transgender Equality. The 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey found that transgender people were nine times more likely than the general prison population to be sexually assaulted by other inmates.
Trans Inmate Holly Stuckey participates in San Quentin’s restorative justice group.Kate Sosin
It was due to that hostility that trans women approached the Insight Prison Project in 2015, where Billie Mizell was then serving as executive director. Inmates asked Mizell to support the formation of an LGBTQ education program at San Quentin. They didn’t want a support group.
“What I kept hearing from them was, ‘We live our lives here every day surrounded by thousands of people who have been for the last 20 or 30 years who haven’t had exposure to the evolution that we know is happening out there,’” Mizell explained, noting that the transgender inmates wanted to “bring that inside” the prison’s walls.
Working with several inmates, Mizell brought a yearlong curriculum to the prison. She has been leading the Acting With Compassion & Truth group as a volunteer at San Quentin ever since.
Billie Mizell leads San Quentin State Prison’s Acting With Compassion and Truth group, a restorative justice program. Kate Sosin
This year, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation allowed her to replicate the program on San Quentin’s death row, which remains intact despite California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recent decision to halt executions. That group, comprised of five people, meets Tuesdays. It is not open to reporters.
ACT is entirely voluntary, although many admittedly come to the Wednesday class because it looks good for the parole board. Mizell, however, won’t let anyone in who is not genuinely committed to the lessons.
Still, the resulting class presents a strange juxtaposition. Prisoners, some convicted of extreme anti-LGBTQ hate crimes, spend a year in close proximity with the prison’s most vulnerable LGBTQ population.
‘I was so ashamed’
Among the group’s founding members is Phil Melendez, who faced 30 years to life in prison for two counts of second-degree murder, partially motivated by animus against a lesbian.
In 1997, Melendez’s father was stabbed while collecting a drug debt. Melendez justified avenging the assault because one of the assailants was a lesbian. On a phone call with NBC News, Melendez, who has since been released from prison, rattles off the slurs he used as he burst into a house and killed two people.
In prison, Melendez said he had a lot of time to think, not just about the crime he committed at 19, but about the homophobia behind it.
“I noticed that there was that element of LGBTQ bias in the slur that I used,” he said. “In that slur, I was actually dehumanizing a human being.”
When the country debated marriage rights for LGBTQ people, he said found himself frustrated.
“I actually took offense at people who were against gay marriage,” he said.
So in 2015, when ACT started forming, Melendez took his own life experiences and used them to help design a curriculum for other straight peers in the class. Two years ago, Melendez was released. He is now a national advocate for restorative justice and LGBTQ rights.
Among those who benefit four years later from his work inside are attendees like Lee Xiong, who was struggling to face his younger brother who he suspected was gay. Trying to grapple with that, Xiong found ACT last year.
“I always thought that transgender or gay were nothing,” he says. “I thought it was a choice.”
Lee Xiong, center, participating in San Quentin’s restorative justice group.Kate Sosin
Xiong has spent more than a year unpacking those feelings. When his brother came to visit him at San Quentin, Xiong asked his brother to come out to him. It took him five minutes to even reach the question.
“I was so ashamed,” he tells the group. “I asked him that question. Is he going to get hurt? Or is he in fear to tell me? But he just came out and said, ‘Yes man, I know what you’re going to ask me.’”
His brother told him that when he came out to their parents, they told him to “get the f–k out” and disowned him.
“I told him that, “You know what, don’t worry man, when I get out, we’ll talk to my mom,’” Xiong said.
This story, of straight prisoners connecting with LGBTQ family because of their time in ACT, is highly common. Bankston’s sister came out to him as transgender.
“I cut off communication,” Bankston said. “I don’t want to talk to you more. I don’t know what to say to you. Nobody likes you.”
But Bankston recently picked up the phone and called his sister. He asked how she was.
“He, excuse me, she ran with the whole rest of the conversation,” Bankston said, correcting himself on his sister’s new pronoun.
“It’s going to take some time and to adjust to my sister’s new lifestyle,” he explained. “I got some struggles with that. I’m not perfect.”
In May, Bankston’s sister agreed to come visit him at San Quentin for the first time since he entered prison 17 years ago.
The planned visit was a moment for the group to reflect on how far Bankston had come, according to Mizell. When he entered ACT, he was looking for a “chrono,” or a positive write-up to help his parole case. “And now I am out here being an ally, raising awareness and answering questions,” he said.
‘I was able to be authentically me’
Straight prisoners aren’t untangling their homophobia and earning parole at the expense of LGBTQ inmates in the group. For those who are LGBTQ, the group can be deeply healing.
“There was a time I would be deathly afraid of someone like Nephew,” 52-year-old Adams, tears pushing at his eyes, said of Bankston.
“This group is the first time I was able to talk about my lived experiences, as related to being a member of the LGBTQ community,” Adams said. “It was the first time I was able to be authentically me and also feel safe. That’s a profound feeling of humanity.”
Adams, who has been incarcerated for 19 years, struggled for years before coming out as bisexual publicly on San Quentin’s podcast, Ear Hustle, last June.
He noted that not a single man in ACT identifies as gay. “In here, it’s life or death,” he said of coming out.
The group aims to ease some of those challenges by adding to the number of allies on the inside.
In order to build this empathy, Meza tries to draws parallels between straight inmates and their LGBTQ peers.
Juan Meza uses “The Genderbread Person” as a learning tool during a session of San Quentin’s Acting With Compassion and Truth group.Kate Sosin
He shows the class “The Genderbread Person,” a visual tool for talking about gender identity that resembles a Gingerbread man. He draws kind of a stick figure on the whiteboard. The group labels the person by distinguishing where different LGBTQ identities live: Anatomy is on your body; gender and sexual orientation are in your heart and brain.
“My culture would say that I’m a ‘two spirit,’ because I have the spirit of the masculine and the feminine at the same time,” Meza explained. “So it just really has to do with how I express myself and how I know myself.”
The group is then asked to rattle off words used to hurt marginalized groups: racist terms, sexist words, anti-LGBTQ slurs and hurtful terms for the incarcerated. Adams and Meza drew lines between the groups of terms, noting that insults hurled against prisoners, like “punk,” are also used to hurt LGBTQ people.
Nythell Collins is an inmate at San Quentin. Kate Sosin
Meza noted that using the wrong pronouns for a transgender person can be just as harmful as a slur.
“We’ve said it many times, when we can’t express ourselves for who we are … a lot of the community ends up killing themselves,” Meza warned.
Class in April goes well over the allotted two-hour time. Egypt Senoj Jones, 25, a transgender, sings a song she composed herself, called “I Know.” She stands in the center of the arranged tables, her arms outstretched, tilts her head up toward the low ceiling vents and closes her eyes.
“I know what I gotta do,” she sang. “Now that I know the truth, there is no excuse.”
She sang about growing up in foster care, transitioning to female, dropping out of college and popping pills. She is snapping her fingers. By the end, the whole group is singing the chorus with her. She finishes and they erupt into applause.
Outside in the yard, Strawn poses for the camera in the sinking sunlight. Strawn beams in a movie-like pose, sunglasses glinting against the glare.
“This is how we do it at San Quentin,” Strawn said playfully.
As property prices and rents continue to skyrocket in San Francisco, the need is a greater than ever to preserve the heritage of the city’s threatened queer spaces. One response has been the creation of six cultural districts, each defined by the City as “a geographic area or location within San Francisco that embodies a unique cultural heritage.” Achieving this designation qualifies the area for resources to sustain and promote its cultural assets. Two LGBTQ-related cultural districts have already been established: Compton’s Transgender Cultural District in the Tenderloin and the Leather and LGBTQ Cultural District in SoMa. An internationally recognized center of LGBTQ culture since the 1970s, the Castro will soon join them. After more than two years of effort, legislation creating the Castro LGBTQ Cultural District was introduced to the Board of Supervisors on April 9. Sponsored by District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, the legislation was proposed and developed by a working group convened by the GLBT Historical Society that includes neighborhood organizations, businesses, residents and supporters. Historical Society Executive Director Terry Beswick responded to our questions about the project.
Why is the GLBT Historical Society invested in the Castro LGBTQ Cultural District? The GLBT Historical Society has always had a strong interest in place-based history and has worked to document and preserve queer cultural assets. The cultural district initiative focuses on preserving the living culture of a specific population, and that includes more than buildings. It includes people and everything that makes it possible to live, work and play in the neighborhoods they have claimed as their community’s home. The cultural districts program looks at how we can support affordable housing; cultural centers and events; human services; jobs for groups under greatest threat of displacement; and in general, anything the community decides is important to sustain and improve the queer culture of the Castro.
What process is involved in getting the district established? We called a community meeting of diverse neighborhood leaders, business owners, nonprofits and residents at the beginning of 2017 on the back patio of the Castro Country Club. At that time, many had never heard of cultural districts and did not know about the districts as a proposed source of hotel tax funding. We took a straw poll, and everyone was in favor of forming a Castro LGBTQ Cultural District. The process for establishing cultural districts in the city has changed since the first one was created, and that led to quite a number of open community meetings where we discussed our priorities and the boundaries of the district. I personally facilitated a lot of the process and just tried to keep the train moving.
How can the designation of the Castro LGBTQ Cultural District help maintain the area’s visibility outside of San Francisco, including internationally? Well, I’m not sure that’s the goal so much. The concern is that as we work to support and encourage the external trappings of queer culture that make it more attractive to tourists, new residents and businesses, property values and rents will continue to climb. Often, that means fewer people of color, fewer trans and young queer people. My hope is the Castro LGBTQ Cultural District planning process will be set up in an inclusive way that brings together all the stakeholders and that we will be intentional about what we want to achieve. People have been involved in this project for a variety of reasons, but I think we all agree there is value in maintaining an inclusive place for all LGBTQ people to feel completely safe and free. If that continues to attract people from around the world, then that’s beautiful, too. For more information about the Castro LGBTQ Cultural District, click here. To follow the Facebook page, click here. Nick Large is an LGBTQ, API and Japanese American activist with a particular interest in LGBTQ movements and place-based organizing in San Francisco. He serves on the GLBT Historical Society Board of Directors.
America’s ‘first’ homeless shelter for trans young people has opened in San Francisco.
The three-bedroom house has room for six people between the ages of 18 to 24. It opened quietly nearly two months ago, according to reports from the San Francisco Chronicle.
Five trans young people currently live in the refuge, which will allow its residents to stay for two years, offering them a safe haven from transphobia and abuse.
Christopher Rodriguez, a manager at the house, explained that trans youth have more complex needs than the rest of the LGBT+ community.
“Transgender youths have more medical needs, and they have a whole added extra layer of trauma,” said Rodriguez. “Many need hormone therapy, surgeries, preparation for surgeries,” he told the SF Chronicle.
Transphobia rife in homeless shelters
Rodriguez added: “They’re outed more easily than others — a gay man can pass as not gay if he wants to, but generally not someone who’s trans. So they get more attention, and not the good kind. And more violence. That takes a lot of careful work to heal.”
One of the residents spoke to the SF Chronicle about their past experiences of homeless shelters.
22-year-old Bobby Perez, whose parents are homeless, was staying in a Larkin Street shelter when she was told about the trans house. At one of her previous shelters, someone left tampons on her bed to taunt her.
“Now that I’m stable in a safe place, it’s about, ‘Who am I?’” Perez told the SF Chronicle. “I want to see where I can go. I just have to find a passion now.”
Larkin Street Youth Services, which is the leading homeless-youth agency in the city, is renting the house and running the trans program.
90% of homeless trans youths rejected by their families
Lewis’s organisation, True Colors United, ran two surveys in 2012 and in 2015, which showed that 75% of LGB homeless youth are rejected by their families, and the figure is 90% for trans youths.
About 40% of the 1.6 million homeless youths are LGBT, and 3% are trans, according to True Colors United.
In Equality California’s 20th anniversary year, the nation’s largest statewide LGBTQ civil rights organization has introduced its most aggressive, robust package of pro-equality legislation yet. The organization’s priorities include a number of first-in-the-nation bills and are primarily focused on supporting LGBTQ youth and families, increasing access to HIV prevention medication and protecting the civil rights of transgender and intersex Californians.
Equality California is sponsoring the following 2019 bills and resolutions in the California Legislature and has experts available for comment or background briefings:
Safe and Supportive Schools Act – AB 493 by Assemblymember Todd Gloria and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony ThurmondAB 493 will give teachers and school staff the tools and training they need — and want — to support LGBTQ students who may be facing harassment or lack of acceptance at school, rejection at home or discrimination in the broader community. Public school teachers and staff are on the front lines of providing a safety net against the effects of discrimination and lack of acceptance for the LGBTQ community, which can result in higher dropout rates, lower economic success and a number of other disparities in health and well-being that LGBTQ people continue to face. If LGBTQ students have support in school, their likelihood of overcoming these disparities and succeeding in school and life increases significantly. Equality California is cosponsoring AB 493 with State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond.
Status: Passed by the Assembly Education Committee 5-0. Referred to the Assembly Committee on Appropriations.
LGBTQ Young People Nondiscrimination – SB 145 by Senator Scott Wiener and LA County District Attorney Jackie LaceySB 145 will address the state’s discriminatory practice of treating LGBTQ young people differently than their non-LGBTQ peers when engaging in voluntary sexual activity. Currently, for example, if an 18-year-old boy has voluntary sex with his 17-year-old girlfriend, he isn’t required to register as a sex offender. But if an 18-year-old boy has voluntary sex with his 17-year-old boyfriend or an 18-year-old girl has voluntary sex with her 17-year-old girlfriend, they’re automatically required to register as sex offenders, no matter the circumstances and without any opportunity for a judge to provide discretionary relief from the requirement. SB 145 only applies when a teenager age 14 or older has consensual sex with a partner who is within 10 years of age. The bill will simply allow the older partner to request — and a judge to grant — relief from the registration requirement. Equality California is cosponsoring SB 145 along with Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey.
Status: Referred to the Senate Public Safety Committee. Scheduled for hearing on Tuesday, April 9.
PrEP and PEP Access Expansion – SB 159 by Senator Scott Wiener and Assemblymember Todd GloriaSB 159 will reduce barriers to accessing HIV preventative medications. This legislation will authorize pharmacists to furnish pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) to patients without a prescription. Pharmacists are already authorized to furnish birth control pills without a prescription. The legislation will also prohibit insurance companies from requiring patients to obtain prior authorization before using their insurance benefits to obtain PrEP or PEP. Equality California is cosponsoring SB 159 along with the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, the Los Angeles LGBT Center and California Pharmacists Association.
Status: Referred to the Senate Committee on Business, Professions, and Economic Development.
Intersex Autonomy – SB 201 by Senator Scott WienerSB 201 will protect the rights of intersex Californians — “intersex” being a term used for people born with variations in their sex characteristics — by ensuring they can provide informed consent before medically unnecessary, often irreversible and potentially harmful procedures are performed on them. SB 201, at its core, is about giving people born with variations in their sex characteristics autonomy over their own bodies. The bill does not prohibit treatment or surgery when it is medically necessary; it will simply delay elective surgeries that often performed on babies in an attempt to “normalize” their bodies until they have the ability to make their own informed decision. Equality California is cosponsoring SB 201 along with interACT and the ACLU of California.
Status: Testimony heard by Senate Committee on Business, Professions, and Economic Development on Monday, April 1. Scheduled for vote on Monday, April 8.
Homeless Youth Grant Program – AB 307 by Assemblymember Eloise Gómez Reyes and Senator Scott WienerAB 307 will require the development and administration of a grant program that would, primarily, support nonprofit organizations or continuum of care administrative entities in serving youth experiencing homelessness. Funding will go toward an array of supportive services, including rental assistance, drug abuse prevention, health care and employment assistance. All programs funded under AB 307 will be required to have the cultural competence to serve youth who identify as LGBTQ. Equality California is cosponsoring AB 307 along with the California Coalition for Youth, Tipping Point Community, John Burton Advocates for Youth, Housing CA and Corporation for Supportive Housing.
Status: Passed by the Assembly Human Services Committee 8-0. Referred to the Assembly Committee on Appropriations.
Affirming Records – SB 741 by Senator Cathleen GalgianiSB 741 will update the law to allow transgender Californians to update their marriage certificates and the birth certificates of their children to accurately reflect their legal name and gender, while still protecting their privacy. Current state law allows transgender people to petition courts to change their legal name and gender to conform with their gender identity. The law then allows such a person’s old birth certificate to be sealed and a new one issued as an original to protect the person’s privacy and respect their identity. This legislation would simply align the process for updating transgender people’s marriage certificates and the birth certificates of their children with the process for updating their own birth certificate. This will help to prevent discrimination when a transgender person enrolls their child in school, applies for a loan or seeks to make medical decisions on behalf of an incapacitated spouse.
Status: Referred to Senate Rules Committee.
Bias-Free Child Custody Determinations – SB 495 by Senator Maria Elena Durazo
SB 495 will add language to the California Family Code to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity of a parent, legal guardian or relative when granting custody of a child. While there are examples of California case law to the effect that “sexual preference” should not affect child custody determinations, this language is outdated, unclear, and has not been codified within the California Family Code. This lack of clear and comprehensive policy allows local Family Court mediators, investigators, and judges to make recommendations and rulings based on their own biases about how sexuality and gender may impact the “well-being of the child.” All parents deserve the right to be considered in matters of custody without their sexual orientation or gender identity being used against them. Equality California is cosponsoring SB 495 with the Women’s Policy Institute and the Long Beach Bar Association. Status: Passed by Senate Judiciary Committee.
Updating Transgender Students’ Academic Records – AB 711 by Assemblymember David ChiuAB 711 will ensure that local educational agencies in California update the records of former students who identify as transgender, making certain that their legal name and gender are accurately reflected on critical documents like high school diplomas and school transcripts. This includes reissuing high school diplomas and high school equivalency certificates, as needed. This bill seeks to close a gap in current law to ensure that all transgender people who have attended California educational institutions have the same rights and protections. Equality California is cosponsoring AB 711 with Transgender Law Center.
Status: Referred to the Assembly Committee on Education
Strengthening California’s Equal Pay Act – AB 758 by Assemblymember Wendy CarrilloAB 758 will strengthen California’s equal pay laws by requiring that employees of all genders are paid equitably to their counterparts for substantially similar work. This bill will also address unjustified workplace pay differentials for employees who do not conform to the gender binary. California’s Equal Pay Act prohibits employers from paying an employee less than an employee of “the opposite sex” for substantially similar work. AB 758 will update the California Equal Pay Act’s outdated binary language to align with the Gender Recognition Act of 2017 (SB 179, Atkins), which enabled Californians to obtain state issued identity documents that reflect their gender identity by creating a third, nonbinary gender marker.
Status: Referred to Assembly Committee on Labor & Employment.
Transgender Respect, Agency, and Dignity Act – SB 132 by Senator Scott Wiener SB 132 addresses a very real problem facing incarcerated transgender individuals, namely, transgender people being housed according to their birth-assigned gender, not their gender identity or perception of safety, resulting in significant risk of violence. Transgender women housed in male facilities face particular risk of rape and assault. SB 132 will change state law to require incarcerated transgender people in the custody of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation be classified and housed based on their gender identity, unless the incarcerated person’s evaluation of their own safety is that another housing placement is safest. SB 132 also requires that the preferred first name, gender pronoun and honorific of the incarcerated individual be used by facility staff in all written and verbal communications. By housing incarcerated transgender people based on their gender identity or perception of health and safety, transgender people will be housed in institutions that decrease their likelihood of experiencing targeting and violence, and they will have access to the programming and work opportunities that will best promote and support their health and safety.
Status: Referred to Senate Committee on Public Safety. Scheduled for hearing on Tuesday, April 23.
Honoring Bayard Rustin – ACR 27 by Assemblymember Wendy CarrilloACR 27 honors the legacy of civil rights, labor and LGBTQ leader Bayard Rustin. Born on March 17, 1912 in West Chester, Pennsylvania, Rustin dedicated his entire life to advancing justice and dignity for all. He was a close advisor to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., organized the historic 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and promoted equity through nonviolent protests. An openly gay African American, Rustin understood the intricate intersections of marginalized identities and fought tirelessly for progress and opportunity.Status: Adopted by the Legislature on March 19, 2019.
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Equality California is the nation’s largest statewide LGBTQ civil rights organization. We bring the voices of LGBTQ people and allies to institutions of power in California and across the United States, striving to create a world that is healthy, just, and fully equal for all LGBTQ people. We advance civil rights and social justice by inspiring, advocating and mobilizing through an inclusive movement that works tirelessly on behalf of those we serve. www.eqca.org
In 2017, West Hollywood’s Plummer Park hosted an exhibit titled Lesbians to Watch Out For: ’90s Queer L.A. Activism. – Advertisement –
On display were banners, pamphlets, radical texts and street flyers that told of a time gone by in Los Angeles: a time when the lesbian scene wasn’t just thriving but on the verge of creating major social change. Though it’s disheartening to think about how the city has changed in regard to holding and maintaining lesbian spaces, it’s something we shouldn’t allow ourselves to gloss over and forget. At least, not if we want the community to thrive.
Before the Internet came and rapidly commodified all queer identities, L.A. was more than just a lesbian hub. It was a lesbian destination spot. It’s difficult to take into account just how prevalent gay girl identity was before the bars started closing and the neighborhoods started closing themselves off to more radical, less commercially-viable ways of fighting against the Man. From the Girlbar L.A. dance party (possibly the inspiration for “The L Word’s” ‘Shebar”) to 1940s and ‘50s favorites like Joani Presents and The Star Room, this town was chock full of places where ladies could be in the company of ladies (and more than a few drag kings.) Needless to say, the glory days of the lesbian bar have come and gone. In a recent Twitter thread between L.A. writer and editor Trish Bendix and novelist Roxane Gay, the lack of lesbian bars in the city was starkly exposed.
“Are there any lesbian bars in L.A.?” Gay tweeted. “If this was something I could find with Google I wouldn’t have asked. Guess what? There aren’t any. So it’s not a crazy question.”
“Just pop-up parties,” Bendix replied, “weeklies and monthlies or other sporadic events. There’s not a go-to spot where you’re guaranteed to find queer women en masse on any given day. But if you want to come play dominoes with a group of dykes tonight in Eagle Rock, I got you.”
How did it come to this? How did Los Angeles change from a dyke mecca to a town where you have to settle for Domino night?
Perhaps the answer lies in some of the artifacts from the past. If you can get past the initial depression brought on by the constant reminder of better days long past, you’ll be able to see not just the sheer volume of lesbian activism and social activities on offer, you’ll also get a sense of just how diverse it was. A flyer from Lesbian Visibility Week in 1990 promotes a “Dykes and Their Dogs” pet show. Notices from the late ‘80s and ‘90s promote marches, ACT UP meetings, all-girl dance parties, and get-togethers that do what dykes do best: promote social justice and activism while having an amazingly hot time on the dance floor.
So what happened to the ground-breaking feminism of the early ‘90s? What happened to the protest signs reading “Dykes Reclaim the Universe” and “Eat Pussy, Not Cow?” While queer activism hasn’t died, it looks a whole lot different in this century. While queer spaces and events like Folklore Salon, Cuties, Project Q, Lez Croix, and Dyke Day exist to provide social justice-oriented queer folks with a community, many of the specifically lesbian-identified events only pop up a few times a year, usually during Pride Week. If you want to go to a lesbian bar, you’ll have to hit Long Beach or settle for a few more fluid options in Los Angeles proper, such as Akbar or Oil Can Harry’s.
Maybe we’ll never get back to the glory days of Dyke activism. But one thing’s for certain: When it comes to the L.A. social scene, there should always be at least a handful of places for girls who love girls to hang out in, party in and change the world in.
A state bill designed to provide intersex individuals with informed consent for medical treatments regarding their sex characteristics has been pushed to a vote in 2020- Advertisement –
Last week, Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) announced that legislation to ensure intersex individuals—a term used often used by people born with variations in their sex characteristics, including genitalia—can provide informed consent before any medical treatments or interventions that could irreversibly affect their fertility or sexual function, will be pulled from the 2019 legislative session and pushed to 2020. After hearing testimony on the bill last Monday, the Committee decided to postpone the vote to see if consensus could be reached between the bill’s supporters and medical associations that had previously refused to negotiate with Senator Wiener.
Senate Bill 201 would give individuals the opportunity to delay medically unnecessary, potentially harmful, irreversible procedures until they have the ability to make an informed decision for themselves.
“SB 201, at its core, is about giving people born with variations in their sex characteristics autonomy over their own bodies and lives. When it comes to choosing deeply personal interventions for an individual when they may not be wanted, acting is risky, while waiting costs nothing,” a press release stated. “Delay gives individuals and their families the most options, including access to future medical advances once the patient can understand the risks and their own priorities. Senate Bill 201 would not have prohibited treatment or surgery when medically necessary; it simply prohibited medically unnecessary surgeries on babies that are purely elective and based on a desire to “normalize” a child’s genitals. Some of these surgeries include invasive procedures such as reducing a clitoris, creating a vagina, or removing healthy gonadal tissue. They can also lead to assigning a gender before an individual has the opportunity to express a gender for themselves.”
Comprising approximately 1-2 percent of all people, those born with both with variations in their sex characteristics, sometimes referred to as intersex traits, aren’t rare—they are just invisible. A subset of these variations are recognized at birth, while others may go unnoticed until later in life, if ever. Although a very small percentage of intersex infants may require immediate surgical intervention—for example some are born without the ability to pass urine—the vast majority are born with no health issues related to their genitals and are able to live rich, fulfilling lives without any modification.
“We’ve made significant strides in California to protect the right of sexual minorities to determine our lives and make decisions about our own bodies, but much work clearly remains to raise awareness and educate about this important civil rights issue, both in the Legislature and in the medical profession,” Wiener said. “Progressive California should not be denying individuals the basic human right to decide what happens to their own bodies, yet that is exactly what is happening as surgeons and parents assign genders to babies without any actual input from that child. SB 201 stands for a very basic and common-sense notion: That individuals should choose for themselves if and when to undergo life-altering and gender-assigning surgeries that aren’t medically necessary. Our broad coalition of intersex advocates, medical professionals, LGBT advocacy organizations, parents, civil rights organizations, and affected individuals look forward to the day when this basic human right is respected and protected by law, and we will continue to fight to make this vision a reality.”
Beginning in the mid-twentieth century, physicians began modifying the genitals of infants they considered atypical. These treatments and interventions have included infant vaginoplasties, clitoral reductions, and removal of gonadal tissues, and may result in extreme scarring, chronic pain, incontinence, loss of sexual sensation, post-traumatic stress disorder, and incorrect gender assignment. While a number of doctors continue to perform these irreversible procedures in infancy based on the theory that they will help intersex people feel more “normal,” no research definitively proves that claim, or the assumption that conformity is more important than autonomy over their bodies. All major groups led by affected adults condemn the practice when performed without the consent of the individual involved.
Three former Surgeons General, who were appointed by Presidents of both parties, oppose medically unnecessary genital surgery on intersex babies stating, “When an individual is born with atypical genitalia that pose no physical risk, treatment should focus not on surgical intervention but on psychosocial and educational support… [I]ntersex persons routinely face forced medical surgeries that are conducted at a young age without free or informed consent. These interventions jeopardize their physical integrity and ability to live free.”
“SB 201 has not only already raised tremendous intersex visibility in California and national media, it has given our entire community hope that compassionate and ethical care for children born with intersex traits is on the horizon,” said Kimberly Zieselman, Executive Director of interACT: Advocates for Intersex Youth, an intersex woman herself affected by the surgeries.
“At its core, SB 201 is about the State of California respecting each and every person’s autonomy over their own body and their own gender identity,” said Equality California Executive Director Rick Zbur. “California has led the way in protecting the civil rights of LGBTQ people over the last 20 years, and the fundamental principle underlying those protections has been respect for an individual’s own sexual orientation, gender identity and autonomy over their body. The bill’s delay today means that thousands more Californians will be subjected to medically unnecessary and often irreversible procedures aimed at ‘normalizing’ their bodies—without their consent and before they have any sense of their gender Identity.”
“We are proud that SB 201 has brought awareness of this marginalized population of children to the legislature. California already prohibits certain other practices with high risks of irreversible harm from taking place during childhood. SB 201 is in line with this approach and will help ensure that care is centered on the needs of patients themselves, not the ‘normalization’ of their bodies,” said Becca Cramer-Mowder, Legislative Coordinator and Advocate for the ACLU of California.
SB 201 builds on Senator Wiener’s Senate Concurrent Resolution 110, passed in 2018, which called on the medical community to delay performing medically unnecessary sex-assignment and genital “normalization” procedures until an individual can provide informed consent. The resolution was the first of its kind in the nation, and called on the medical community to create clear guidelines to protect this population of vulnerable children. Unfortunately, the California medical community failed to act, and it became clear that SB 201 was needed to drive this next step. The bill was opposed by the California Medical Association, the American Association of Clinical Urologists, the American Urological Association, the California Society of Plastic Surgeons, the California Urological Association, the Pediatric Endocrine Society, and the Societies for Pediatric Urology.
Living History DiscussionTwo-Spirit Voices: Still Here, Still Queer
Wednesday, May 17:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members For 20 years, Bay Area American Indian Two Spirits has been committed to activism and service for the Two-Spirit community. This program offers a look at the history and activism of the organization over the past two decades. Founding members of BAAITS, including Randy Burns, who also founded Gay American Indians in 1975, will engage in a dialog with current board members and community leaders. BAAITS is the subject of the ongoing exhibition “Two-Spirit Voices: Returning to the Circle” at the museum. Tickets are available online here.
Book LaunchCalifornia and the Stonewall Riots
Thursday, May 97:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members The 1969 Stonewall riots, when LGBTQ people fought back against police harassment at a New York bar, are often described as the starting point of the modern LGBTQ rights movement. In this presentation, San Francisco State University professor Marc Stein, who also serves as vice chair of the society’s board of directors, will discuss his new book The Stonewall Riots: A Documentary History(NYU Press, 2019),which situates Stonewall in a broader perspective. After reviewing pre-Stonewall LGBTQ protests in California, Stein will explore how news about the riots reached the West Coast, how Californians viewed the uprising and how Golden State residents responded. Tickets are available online here.
Exhibition OpeningThe Mayor of Folsom Street: Alan Selby’s Legacy
Thursday, May 167:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members An opening reception for our new exhibition, “The Mayor of Folsom Street: The Life and Legacy of Alan Selby,” which uses photographs, artifacts, fine art and digital displays to document the life of Alan Selby, also known as Mr. S, who opened the iconic leather and kink retail store Mr. S. Leather in San Francisco’s SoMa district in 1979. One of the city’s longest-lived and best-known queer retail establishments, Mr. S. Leather grew into a de facto community center as well as an international destination. Curated by Jordy Jones, Jeremy Prince and Gayle Rubin, and drawing on the Alan Selby Papers preserved in the society’s archives, this transdisciplinary exhibition situates Selby’s life within the context of a changing SoMa neighborhood, AIDS charities and the emergence of a distinct queer leather and kink culture. Light refreshments will be served. Tickets are available online here.
Walking TourThrill Spot: A Lost Queer History Walking Tour
Sunday, May 192:00–4:00 p.m.Meet in Jack Kerouac Alley (behind City Lights bookstore)261 Columbus Ave., San FranciscoFree The 1954 police raid on Tommy’s Place, a lesbian bar in San Francisco’s North Beach, is the stuff of legend. Lurid headlines describing the seduction of teenage girls in a “vice academy” were followed by sensational stories teeming with swaggering butches, police graft and political intrigue. Lambda Award–winning author and visual artist Katie Gilmartin leads this literary walking tour that explores the raid through performance, music and visits to key historical sites, including the infamous “happy hunting ground for adult debauchees.” The tour covers 10 blocks with two steep grades. Cosponsored by the GLBT Historical Society, this program is offered in collaboration with Openhouse and is made possibly by grants from the Queer Cultural Center and the Creative Work Fund. More information is available here.
Fighting BackUnions, Workers and Queers: An Enduring Alliance
Thursday, May 237:00–9:00 p.m.The GLBT Historical Society Museum4127 18th St., San Francisco$5.00 | Free for members The latest in our monthly “Fighting Back” series exploring contemporary queer issues in a historical context, this panel will discuss connections between organized labor and the LGBTQ community in the San Francisco Bay Area. Organized labor and LGBTQ activists have made common cause in San Francisco since the mid-1970s, when Harvey Milk helped create the coalition. Panelists will consider how workers, unions and members of the LGBTQ community have built a worldwide relationship based on shared struggles, similar goals and common values. Tickets are available online here.
PerformanceGay in the Great War: A Dramatized Reading
