Gay tourist wins suit

NEWS

telephone line where gay men can link

up with others throughout the USA and President sues

some overseas countries. Prior to their

account being cancelled, clients could

pay for the service with their credit cards.

SAN FRANCISCO: Discriminatory U.S. Diffidence

entry policies have been dealt a further blow by the awarding of a large settlement from the Immigration and Naturalisation Service. Jaime Chavez won the

$7500 settlement after filing a suit against the INS, Mexicana and Brantiff airlines, and Burns Security Services for false imprisonment during an attempted visit in 1980. He had been detained and stripsearched at San Francisco International Airport for "suspected homosexuality".

National Gay Rights Advocates, who represented Chavez, believes the settlement to be an important addition to the victory in the Carl Hill case last year when U.S. borders were officially opened to foreign homosexuals. That case removed homosexuality from the list of "mental illnesses" which disqualify visa applicants from entry.

NGRA Executive Director O'Leary noted that the effect of the settlement is "to put private corporations on notice that we will not tolerate this improper treatment of lesbian and gay tourists".

Texans struggling for law

disputed

WISCONSIN: After 12 months of operation not one prosecution has been launched under the first antidiscrimination law in the U.S. Although the Equal Rights Division has received 13 complaints on the activists are questioning the willingnew sexual orientation ground, local

ness of authorities to enforce the law.

In one case two men complained that they were thrown out of a bar for dancing together. The ERD turned over the matter to the District Attorney for prosecution, who in turn declined to press charges and said: "It's a bad case... and the resources of the DA's office are limited."

Wisconsin set a lead when Governor Lee Dreyfus signed into law the nations first, and to date only, gay rights bill in February 1982. The new governor, Anthony Earl, in response to Republican grumblings that "they don't like this thing", stated he would veto any attempts to repeal the new law.

Earl was lambasted for appointing DALLAS: The legal battles for the "queers" to his administration by the re-introduction of Texas antiRepublican candidate he defeated for office. The new governor has an openly sodomy laws are intensifying as gay press secretary and has established conservative forces try new ways a volunteer advisory council. of fighting back.

A Federal Circuit Judge recently removed the laws from the statute books because they violated the equal protection and right to privacy provisions of the U.S. Constitution. The decision, if upheld, could be used immediately to repeal similar laws in the other two States on the Fifth Circuit, Louisiana and Mississippi.

It all started when schoolteacher Don Baker filed a class action lawsuit against a local District Attorney-General. The nature of the suit was such that when it succeeded in August last year all DAs in Texas could appeal.

The then State Attorney-General announced his intention to make such an appeal but was elected Governor before he could get things going. His successor announced that the appeal was being dropped because there was "no point in trying to defend an unconstitutional law".

On March 11 the DA of Potter County in Amarillo announced his intention to take up the appeal, backed financially by an organisation called Dallas Doctors Against A.I.D.S. that believes the only way to halt Acquired Immune Defiency Syndrome is to outlaw gay sex. They are described by local activists as "homophobes with bigot bucks".

On the same day a bill was introduced in the State legislature to make several categories of "deviate sex" criminal of fences. The politically powerful Texan gay communities, particularly in Houston, are confident that they have the money and the muscle to roll back both initiatives. GCN Boston reports that enough senators are opposed to the Bill to block its passage.

AmEx Interruptus

SAN FRANCISCO: The American Express Company has pulled the plug on gay telephone sex by abruptly cancelling the merchant account of The Connector.

As a result The Connector, a gay telephone fantasy line and part of the growing telephone sex industry in America has filed a $10 million suit against AmEx to cover damages, costs and "other such relief as the court deems proper".

Bruce Stahely, district AmEx manager, after admitting that there had been no complaints or problems with The Connector's account said that working with "those people" would not be in the "best interests" of the company's "image".

The Connector is a computer operated

Despite problems with enforcement of the new law and the predictable conservative reaction, activists consider their hand has been strengthened and are moving once again to repeal the laws prohibiting sex between consenting males.

Like NSW, Wisconsin's anti-discrimination provisions in housing, employment, public accommodation and contractual matters are contradicted in spirit by its anti-sodomy laws. Attempts at repeal last year drew a blank.

NEW YORK: Sgt. Perry Watkins whose re-enlistment was ordered by the courts will be honored at the sixth annual Fund for Human Dignity awards dinner.

Watkins was drafted in 1967 dur-

ing the height of the Vietnam War. Despite marking a box on his medical history form that confirmed "homosexual tendencies", he was found qualified for service.

in 1979, the Army tried to revoke his security clearance and then to discharge him. Unsucessful at these attempts, the Army then tried to block his re-enlistment. In November 1982 a court order forced the Army to re-enlist Watkins.

Two months after his third reenlistment

The Fund for Human Dignity is the educational and fundraising affiliate of the National Gay Task Force. At their dinner on May 16 they will also be honoring singer and activist Holly Near, who will

be receiving the Award of Merit.

bank

LOUISVILLE: Kentucky's largest bank has been hit with a $2.25 million civil lawsuit by a branch manager who claims he has been deprived of his constitutional rights because he joined a gay organisation.

Samuel F. Dorr has charged that he was forced to resign from his job after he had accepted a leadership post with a Louisville gay religious group.

Dorr says he was given an ultimatum. when he informed bank executives of his new position as president of the local

Chapter of the Dignity/Integrity organis-

ation.

The executives demanded that Dorr take a lesser position in the bank, resign as president of Dignity/Integrity and avoid any public connection with the group.

Dorr claims that because of his religious convictions he had no option but to resign.

The lawsuit maintains that the bank and its executives deprived Dorr of his freedoms of religion, expression and association as well as his right to equal protection under the law as guaranteed by the US Constitution.

It charges that Dorr "has been permanently and irreparably damaged by the acts and conspiracies of the defendants," who "have acted with such malice as implies a spirit of deliberate indifference to their civil obligations."

...

Dorr also claims the ultimatum was issued because he is homosexual.

He is asking for $1.5 million damages for "lost wages, loss of future earnings, embarrassment, humiliation, frustration and emotional and mental suffering" and $750,000 in punitive damages.

Since the story of Dorr's forced resignation became public, many of the local community have withdrawn their accounts from the bank and returned their credit cards in an informal boycott which has been joined by parents of gays.

Blacks criticise dismissal

WASHINGTON, DC: Leaders of the local

NEWS BRIEFS

NILES

MICHIGAN: Fundamentalist

Christians

are putting pressure on public libraries in a town in the south-west of that State to restrict the availability of books dealing with homosexuality. The Reverend David. McQuade of Life Action Ministries asked for special classification for the titles after an exhaustive search of the card-catalogues.

The library concerned replied: "No group has the right to impose its own ideas of politics, morality or religion on other members of a democratic society. Freedom does not exist if it is given only to the accepted and inoffensive."

The town in question is called, by at coincidence of note to Australians, Niles.

UNNATURAL ATTIRE

NEW YORK: Pat Smith, the transvestite who was shot in the neck by an off-duty New York City Transit cop last February, is standing trial for "unnatural attire".

GCN Boston reports that the charges are not connected to the shooting incident and arise instead from an arrest made last June 22. Smith was with two male friends who were also in drag. Smith is in the transitional phase of a male-toattorney it is not unnatural for Smith female sex change and, according to her wear women's clothing. The judge requested more information on doctors' instructions to cross-dress. Smith's therapy program, which include

to has

VENEZUELANS FIGHT HARASSMENT

CARACAS: A new legal service has taken on the fight against police harassment after widespread raids on Venezuelan bars and clubs late last year. Complaints have been lodged with the Venezuelan Attorney-General and the International Secretariat of Amnesty International.

The raids were part of the "Plan Union", a widely criticised law-and-order campaign to supposedly control street crimes. The sworn affidavit that forms. the basis of the campaign notes:

"The true object of the operation was

measures being taken to protect tourists over the Christmas season using homosexual citizens as scapegoats

black gay community have issued an open to bolster official propoganda about letter criticising the National Gay Task Force's dismissal of the director of the NGTF Capitol office as being symbolic of the "insensitivity of the white gay power structure". Pastor of the Faith Temple, Dr James Tinney, added that "to force him out without recognising his contribution, and in the way they handled it, gives one the impression he has been dumped on."

NGTF's new national director, Virginia Apuzzo, was rumored to be unhappy with the Washington office when she took on the job late last year. Appointment of a new director was seen inevitable in the consolidation of allegiances for Apuzzo's position. With increasing talk of the NGTF being an irrelevant and out-of-touch organisation, there has been little surprise at the replacement of a black director by a white, in a predominantly black city.

Continued from page 5

second vote that attempted to get the matter reviewed. Goulden told Campaign that he was unhappy and disappointed that the matter had been decided without any consultation. He has since written to the Lord Mayor expressing his disappointment and belief that the existence of a large gay community within the precincts of the City Council has not been given proper recognition.

The application set out the history! and services provided by the service, as well as background material showing that single men and women live predominantly in inner-city areas, and that a third of the calls received by the phone counselling service are made from within five kilometres of the GPO.

The grant would have been used to extend the hours of the phone service, presently from six to ten in the evening, through the employment of a full-time

co-ordinator.

The legal service, La Asesoria y Consults Legal Sobre Derechos Ciudadanos, has demanded an end to the violation of democratic rights, the destruction of lists and files made by police, and a public investigation into the raids. They claim the operation violated four sections of the Venezuelan Constitution which guarantee personal liberty and security and freedom of movement and association, and which ban discrimination.

BRAZILIAN GROUP INCORPORATES

RIO DE JANEIRO: Brazilian activists are claiming a major breakthrough in the fight for public recognition and acceptance. Grupo Gay de Bahia (GGB) has been permitted to officially incorporate despite Brazilian laws prohibiting recognition of associations whose aims are "against public morals and mores" Two out of the seven Brazilian groups are already incorporated, but only on the basis of being "cultural associations" whose by-laws do not mention sexuality.

BLACK SHERIFFS

IN MUNICH

MUNICH: Strong controversy and a considerable amount of public criticism has resulted from a proposal by the CSU faction of the Munich Municipal Council.

The CSU wants the toilets on the lower level of the Stachus underground station a well-known and popular gay beat watched and controlled by a private security force.

The opposition considers this would be illegal and is just another attempt by the CSU to employ a private army known locally as "The Black Sheriffs".

1983 MAY CAMPAIGN 15