Annise Parker becomes first openly lesbian mayor of major American city

Excellent news out of Houston:

In a close run-off race of historic proportions, Houston voters chose City Controller Annise Parker as Houston's next mayor. Parker defeated attorney Gene Locke Saturday with about 53 percent of the vote (with 99.86 percent of the precincts in). When sworn in in early January, she will become the first lesbian to hold the office of mayor of a major American city and only the second woman. Kathy Whitmire held the office from 1982-1991.

She is also the first openly lesbian mayor of Houston, TX and the first openly lesbian mayor of a major American city.

Of course Parker didn't run as "the lesbian candidate," but her victory is a milestone which should be celebrated by all.

And it's definitely something to remember whenever the fight for marriage equality doesn't go our way.

It's not all doom and despair, folks.

Know your lgbt history - The Ricki Lake Show

Editor's Note - I am taking a very short break from the "Jennings County Wars." However the following links are for those looking for recent information about the newest smears against Kevin Jennings: 

AIM Apologizes For Jennings Falsehoods -- Then Tries To Smear Him Again 

Morrissey Should Have Been Silent On Jennings And Just Been Thought A Fool

Though some may disagree with my assessment, the Ricki Lake Show did a lot of good for lgbt visibility.

When the talk show, hosted by actress Ricki Lake, first appeared in 1993, it was a bit different from the powerhouse shows like Oprah and Donahue in the fact that it was very youth-oriented, particularly when it came to focusing on the lgbt community.

When lgbt issues were generally discussed in a talk show setting, the narrative seemed to always be making gays and lesbians look like pitiful creatures begging for society's "tolerance."

The Ricki Lake Show did deal with topics about how ignorance of gays and lesbians can affect families, such as the following:



The show also had topics that dealt with the lgbt community as we are and not some sad prototypes needing to appeal to an idea of normalcy or caged creatures looking for  "tolerance."

The Ricki Lake Show  presented the lgbt life as it was, with warts and all but with an appreciation of our culture:



Past Know Your LGBT History posts: 

Know your lgbt history - Which Way Is Up

Know your lgbt history - Gays in Primetime Soaps

Know your lgbt history - Boys Beware

Know your lgbt history - The Boondocks

Know your lgbt history - Mannequin

Know your lgbt history - The Warriors

Know Your LGBT History - New York Undercover

Know Your LGBT History - Low Down Dirty Shame

Know Your LGBT History - Fortune and Men's Eyes

Know your lgbt history - California Suite

Know your lgbt history - Taxi (Elaine's Strange Triangle)

Know your lgbt history - Come Back Charleston Blue

Know your lgbt history - James Bond goes gay

Know your lgbt history - Windows

Know your lgbt history - To Wong Foo and Priscilla

Know your lgbt history - Blazing Saddles

Know your lgbt history - Sanford and Son

Know your lgbt history - In Living Color

Know your lgbt history - Cleopatra Jones and her lesbian drug lords

Know your lgbt history - Norman, Is That You?

Know your lgbt history - The 'Exotic' Adrian Street

Know your lgbt history - The Choirboys

Know your lgbt history - Eddie Murphy

Know your lgbt history - The Killing of Sister George

Know your lgbt history - Hanna-Barbera cartoons pushes the 'gay agenda

'Know your lgbt history - Cruising

Know your lgbt history - Foxy Brown and Cleopatra Jones

Know your lgbt history - I Got Da Hook Up

Know your lgbt history - Fright Night

Know your lgbt history - Flowers of Evil

The Jeffersons and the transgender community 

Ugandan bill defended and criticized, attacks against Jennings flopping?, and other Friday midday news briefs

Ugandan MP Defends “Kill Gays” Bill - Paul Cameron's lies are global.

TWO Praises Pastor Rick Warren for Speaking Out Against Anti-Gay Uganda Bill - So he finally did it. Real men of God don't wait for outcry to publicly attack injustice. They are usually the ones leading the outcry.

Another Californian, another Speaker milestone - The news ain't all bad today.

The Jennings smear = the latest right-wing "scandal" to flop in the mainstream - The attacks on Jennings seem to be flopping. No one should be blamed for it. Reasonable people generally don't like sticking their hands in a hot mess of lies.

Nearly half of New Jersey Catholics support gay marriage - How is that for a shocker?

Bouncers bop gay dancer: cops - What kind of mess is this?

Latest smear against Kevin Jennings revists familiar lie - 'Little Black Book'

Gateway Pundit continues to tell its Mass Resistance fueled lies on Obama appointee Kevin Jennings.

This time the site is claiming that Jennings and the organization he founded to help lgbt children, GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network), passed out a guide encouraging children to have sex with strangers in public parks.

It's the latest in the plethora of lies pushed against Jennings.

Let's look at the list of lies before hitting on the new one:

Gateway Pundit falsely claimed that Jennings and GLSEN were encouraging students to read explicit books. This was a serious misrepresentation of the facts.

The site brought up the Fistgate lie irregardless of the fact that this story had been refuted

It propagated a lie that Jennings had led the way to the passing out of "fisting kits" to children. The kits had nothing to do with "fisting" and they were created by Planned Parenthood.

Gateway Pundit made the false claim that Jennings and GLSEN passed out an explicit sex guide "Little Black Book"  to students at a conference in 2005. This was another falsehood. Fenway Community Health officials said they accidentally left about 10 copies of the ''Little Black Book" on an informational table they rented at the conference. Furthermore, no students actually got copies of the book.

That last lie is important to remember because the new lie Gateway Pundit is pushing is linked to it.

You see, the guide that Gateway Pundit is claiming that Jennings and GLSEN distributed to children encouraging them to have public sex with strangers is "Little Black Book:"

Right-wing site removes post calling Kevin Jennings a pedophile

Post also falsely claimed that there were videos of Jennings teaching children sex acts.

Today comes the news that some on the right have thrown a slur at Kevin Jennings which may have scared even them.

From Media Matters comes the news that the right-wing group Accuracy in Media (pardon me for laughing) has thrown a very ugly slur at Jennings. So ugly in fact that the site backtracked like a dancer doing the moonwalk:

In attacking the media for allegedly insufficient coverage of Obama administration official Kevin Jennings, a blogger for Accuracy in Media, which purports to "set the record straight on important issues that have received slanted coverage" -- and which has a record of antagonism toward gays -- smeared Jennings as a "pedophile" and falsely claimed that "[v]ideos have surfaced of Jennings teaching 14-year-old boys the dangerous sexual practice of 'fisting,' and discussing with them the particulars of oral sex." In fact, Jennings did not conduct that seminar and, in fact, reportedly criticized it when he became aware of its content.

From a December 10 AIM blog post by Allie Duzett, "an intern at the American Journalism Center, a training program run by Accuracy in Media and Accuracy in Academia":

I get nasty facebook message about Kevin Jennings and other Thursday midday news briefs

Hey Alvin McEwen, where's your chipmunks? or is it gerbels? I can't remember which small furry kicking and screaming and scratching little rodent you freaks prefer!! I'm sure Kevin jennings has some pre-adult advice on this topic as well.

I got that message on Facebook. Since my coverage of the Jennings situation this week, it's the third ugly message I've gotten. I don't know what's worse; being called a rat, a pedophile (and I'm being nice because the person couldn't spell the word correctly), or this one.

It's almost comical except for the fact that it reveals the mindset behind some of the people targeted by the anti-Kevin Jennings that has flowed out this week from the right:

While they lie about Kevin Jennings, Michelle Malkin attacks GLSEN's funders

When fisting and oral sex are the same: The latest smear against Kevin Jennings

Right-wing plan against Kevin Jennings: Tell a lie, let it get refuted, wait a while, repeat lie again

Since they can't refute the lies, they stoop to personal attacks.

No one really should be surprised. After all, look at the folks who are leading them by the nose.

Now on to other more vital news subjects:

This Uganda thing is getting scary. Like wake up in night sweats, fearful for your life scary. - It was just a matter of time before some knucklehead religious right member in America voiced open support of the Ugandan anti-gay bill.

GLAAD Responds to Recording Academy Statement on Buju Banton's Grammy Nomination - With the recent mess going on in Uganda and with Kevin Jennings, I failed to give this story adequate coverage. Luckily other folks are nailing it down rather awesomely.

Anti-Gay Rhetoric Rises in Race for Houston Mayor - Why oh why should we be surprised?

Tila Tequila Claims She's Engaged! - Frivilous I know but cut me some slack. It has been a week from hell! WORK IT GIRL!

Time magazine covers Ugandan anti-gay bill, calls attention to Rick Warren's cowardice

Time magazine has now reported on the Ugandan anti-gay bill and there are so many good things in this article, including the fact that it puts the blame for the bill on the shoulders of members of the United States religious right:

The bill has an American genesis of sorts, inspired to a large extent by the visits of U.S. evangelicals who are involved with a movement that promotes Christianity's role in getting homosexuals to become "ex-gays" through prayer and faith. Ugandan supporters of the bill appear to be particularly impressed by the ideas of Scott Lively, a California conservative preacher who has written a book, The Pink Swastika, about what he calls the links between Nazism and a gay agenda for world domination, which, by itself, would have raised the anti-colonial sensitivities of Ugandan society. Says the Rev. Kapya Kaoma, an Episcopalian priest from Zambia who authored a recent report on anti-gay politics in Uganda, Nigeria and Kenya: "The U.S. culture wars have been exported to Africa."

The article goes on to report the new developments about the bill - that the death penalty portion has been dropped.

You will forgive me of course for not shouting off of the rooftops on that one. I would be much happier if the entire bill was dropped.

The article calls attention to Rick Warren's inaction regarding this bill:

 . . . the popular preacher released a statement to Newsweek saying, "It is not my personal calling as a pastor in America to comment or interfere in the political process of other nations." That position irks the Rev. Kaoma, who is an Anglican pastor with the Archdiocese of Boston. Warren, he says, has immense influence among Uganda's political élite, counting many parliamentarians, including the country's First Lady Janet Museveni (who is reportedly close to Ssempa), among his friends. "He eats with them, he knows what goes on, they respect him," said Kaoma in a conference call. At the very least, Warren could get his purpose-driven nation to reflect on the purpose of this severe piece of legislation.