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Gay Peoples Chronicle

NATIONAL NEWS..

Kuropan leaves NGLTF

Rosemary Kuropat, appointed the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force's co-director for finance and administration last August, resigned her position April 4.

In her 5-page letter of resignation, Kuropat criticized Jeff Levi, the co-director of governmental and political affairs. Blaming Levi for the NGLTF's concentration on AIDS while charging that it failed to address other gay issues, she said this undercut her efforts to obtain greater financial support for the organization. Kuropat also criticized Levi for "showing a lack of respect for financial management and development.

Levi and NGLTF board member Urvashi Vaid told the

Washington Blade that the organization is not limiting its lobbying to AIDS, but that it had do devote much of its resources to AIDS issues.

Apparently trying to cut off speculation that the resignation might indicate a split along gender lines, Vaid, a lesbian, told the Blade "The repercussions caused by AIDS have been so great that we're seeing the civil rights of Lesbians as well as Gay men jeopardized."

With all parties in apparent agreement that the system of co-chairs has not worked, Levi will now be the organization's only head. Its operations will be moved entirely to Washington, D.C.

Reagan Fumbles

In a March 23 interview with the New York Times, president Reagan clearly validated his judgement on at least one point, that he is unfamiliar with the contents of the New York City gay rights bill.

He first said, "Well, know that this is a very touchy question, and I

one

who believes in the rights of the individual-individual freedom--and I do have to question sometimes whether individual rights are being defended in this particular field, freedom of the individual, or whether they are demanding an acceptance of their particular lifestyle that others of us don't demand."

When reporters told him that the bill did not cover issues of lifestyle, he changed his statement to, "I don't want them discrimina-

ted against simply on that basis as to housing and jobs and so forth. I, on the other hand, don't want to give them privileges beyond what the rest of us have."

After this rather vague endoresement of the bill's actual provisions, Reagan ended with a stirring defense of children: "But what I'm saying, is that how would we feel if a teacher, male or female, a heterosexual, insisted on the right in the classroom to discuss their sexual preferences and why and whether they believed in complete promiscuity or not, we would be quite offended and think that our children should not be exposed to that.

Well, lots of heterosexists have trouble keeping issues clear. But then they aren't president.

Robin Changes Sex

Back in the 1950s when Eisenhower was president and psychiatrists had sold the American public on the belief that they were experts on everything, one of them named Werthan rocked the country with a book blaming comic strips for just about everything from juvenile delinquency to nuclear warfare. He called it The Seduction of the Innocents.

Among his other charges, Wertham cast doubt on Batman's sexual orientation, claiming that his relationship with Robin was like "a wish-dream of two homosexuals living together."

Wertham really had a fixation about the nuclear family. He also accused Wonderwoman of being a lesbian, simply because she was unmarried and lacked a steady

boyfriend. We don't know whether he speculated that Nancy was really the illegitimate daughter of Fritzi Ritz or whether he even knew that the mother of the Katzenjammer Kids was living in sin with the Captain.

To quiet rumors, Batman and Robin quickly acquired female companions. But the rumors didn't go away. the latest version of Batman, Robin is said to have become a female, which would make him the first transsexual in American comics.

Yes, we know that in 1924 Harold Gray started a comic strip about a little orphan boy, and that Joseph Patterson told him, "Put a dress on the kid and call him Annie," but this indicates only that Little Orphan Annie is a transvestite.

May 1986

BY: Casmir Kuczynski

Will Georgia Lose?

Gay leaders, including NGLTF chairman Jeff Levi, seem cautiously optimistic about the U.S. Supreme Court's reception of arguments in Hardwick v Bowers. The case involves the constitutionality of Georgia's sodomy law.

Michael Hardwick, gay man in Atlanta, was arrested in his bedroom while engaging in sex with another man. Although the charges against him were dropped, he challenged the Georgia law as a violation of the U.S. Constitution's right to privacy. The Georgia Attorney General appealed the case to

the Supreme Court.

Optimism rests partly on Laurence Tribe's argument on behalf of Hardwick, seen as excellent, and concentrating on the privacy issue. The argument for Georgia, presented by attorney Michael Hobbs, was regarded as weak, concentrating on moral rather than legal issues.

Observors were also encouraged by the absence of hostile questions directed at Tribe, and by Hobbs' weak performance. Asked by Justice Stevens why Georgia had its dropped case against Hardwick, Hobbs could not

answer.

More Fun with Phones

Still

rattling the tin cup, fundamentalist homophobe Jerry Falwell charges that a national conspiracy by militant homosexuals to call his Old Time Gospel Hour's toll-free number has cost him almost one million dollars. Not only that: they also ordered 50,000 sets of Bibles and Christian materials which he assumes they burned.

Besides pleading that his followers send him money to compensate for these losses, and comparing his crucifiction to that of poor Anita Bryant (who also accused us of burning the Holy Bible--

and in public, yet), Jerry is closing down the tollfree number.

But all is not lost. The Gay Community News writes, Although the Old Time Gospel Hour no longer has a toll-free number, the gay and lesbian community čạn still reach out to Jerry in his hour of need. The Liberty Federation (formerly the Moral Majority) and Liberty Baptist College, both Falwell groups, can be reached without cost to the caller. The first can be reached at 1-800-826-1234, while the second can be reached at 1800-522-6225."

Gays Win in W. Hollywood

In its second municipal election, West Hollywood reelected the three incumbents standing for office. John Heilman, who is gay, and Helen Albert, who is not, won handily as Coalition for Economic Survival candidates. Gay candidate Steven Schulte, who spent the larg-

est amount on nis campaign, was narrowly re-elected. Although Schulte may have been hurt by a flyer that included a nude photograph of him taken when he was a model most observors held he lost votes because of his endorsement by the West Hollywood business community.

The Dynamic Duo Before Robin's Operation