Page 6
GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE November, 1989
Letters
Continued from Page 3
books. We even rediscovered Winnie the Pooh and fell asleep before Pooh could wriggle out of Rabbit's hole.
We decided to create a home together and shared our first Thanksgiving dinner with family and friends. When we decided to move to San Francisco, our extended family stood with us and prayed for our safe journey. Our dreams were beginning to come true...
The Domestic Partners debate that is currently raging in San Francisco touches my life deeply. Opponents seem certain that gay or heterosexual couples who live together outside of marriage are immoral. The belief is that by registering as domestic partners, my lover and I will virtually destroy the "traditional family.” When pressed for an explanation as to how this phenomenon will occur, there is no response.
We are not trying to redefine the traditional family. The family has already redefined itself. The family has already broadened its boundaries so that it is more inclusive than exclusive. When the traditional family could no longer fulfill all of the emotional, spiritual and economic needs of its members, the nontraditional family reached out with love and support, and said "we are here."
Individuals must not continue to look outside of themselves for someone to blame for changes in the family. It is not the gay community. It is not the feminists.
nurturing family units. And when you have a society of loved and nurtured human beings, you have a society that is strong and productive and creative. You have a society that is truly "familiar."
When Sydney and I register our already-existing relationship at City Hall, nothing will be taken away from the traditional family. No money is going to come out of the
pockets of taxpayers (of which, by the way, we are two) to pay for our registration. And no city benefits will be bestowed upon us at the signing of our Domestic Partnership.
What will happen is that we will stand and face those who fear us, and we will say, "We are loving and we are devoted. We are nurturing and we are strong. We support all families, whether they are like ours or different from ours. And we are here to stay."
Please take a long look at who is part of your family. All of our lives will be enriched if we only embrace one another . . . if we let go of narrow ideas... and if we give "families” the room to grow and become truly fulfilling to its members.
Cindy Bologna
Bologna was a plaintiff in a lawsuit to have the domestic partners issue removed from San Francisco's November 7 ballot, which would have allowed the ordinance to go into effect.
It is not the Communists. Changes in the Jail annex
family have occurred out of necessitychanges that will help build, not destroy, society.
I see the American family expanding its comprehension of who is already part of that family. People who may or may not be related by blood or traditional marriage have already formed loving and
To the Editor:
On November 7, Cuyahoga County voters will decide on a law enforcements and public safety issue. Issues 3 proposes to expand the existing County Jail to accommodate at least 480 more
prisoners without an increase in taxes. It is low budget campaign with a high impact message.
As you know jails are a sad necessity in our community. We cannot enforce our laws with the ability to confine those who break the law and thus maintain the safety of our County. In Cuyahoga County our jail is full to overflowing. A person arrested for a violent crime can beat the policeman back to the neighborhood because there is no room at the jail.
The County Commissioners have placed the $62 million bond issue on the November 1989 ballot to build a County Jail Annex. It will initially accommodate at least 480 prisoners (50 percent increase). The County is under court order to expand or restrict admission. Fortunately this bond issue can be paid off with no increase in taxes, by extending the .27 mills per year now devoted to paying off original Justice Center bonds authorized in 1970. Issue 3 authorizes a 0.29 bond retirement levy. Passage of this bond issue is an absolute necessity for us to have a safe County.
Seth Taft Chairman
Citizens for a Safe County.
Not funny
The following is a copy of a letter sent to Jack Calvey, manager of the Pick-n-Pay supermarket on Coventry Road. The letter was written on September 6, 1989. Dear Mr. Calvey:
At your suggestion, I am writing to clarify our conversation of this after-
noon.
Today, Wednesday, as I shopped in the dairy area of your store around 2:30 p.m. these remarks were made by one of
Phone fantasy leads to arrest
In what appears to be a sadomasochistic phone-sex fantasy gone awry, the FBI arrested two Virginia men August 14 for allegedly conspiring to kidnap, rape, and murder an indeterminate boy for a pornographic video. More than 100 FBI agents from around the U.S. participated in the six-month investigation during which police infiltrated and tapped a national gay computer bulletin board called chaos.
In custody are Dean Ashley Lambey, 34, of Richmond, Va. who was a clerk at Engineering Research Associates, and real estate agent Daniel T. Depew, 28, of Alexandria, Va, a Washington suburb. They are being held without bail pending indictment and are undergoing psychiatric testing at the federal penitentiary at Butner, North Carolina.
The investigation began in February when Lambey began communicating over chaos with a San Jose, California, police undercover agent who was posing on the bulletin board as a gay man attracted to boys. Lambey discussed his own interest in boys with several undercover agents and eventually introduced them over the bulletin board to Depew. Lambey allegedly mentioned communications he had with Depew about producing a snuff film.
According to U.S. Attorney Henry Hudson, who chaired former Attorney General Edward Meese's pornography
commission and is prosecuting this case, the two men proposed to purchase or kidnap a boy, hold him captive for two weeks, film him having sex with them, and then strangle him. Afterwards, Hudson alleges, they planned to wash the boy's body with muriatic acid "to remove incriminating forensic evidence,” and stash it in a marsh in Maryland.
Police say that Lambey claimed to know a man in Florida who would sell a boy for $12,000, and refund $5000 if he were returned alive.
But despite the fact that police met with the two men at the Dulles Marriot hotel in July, supposedly to "finalize plans," they admit that Lambey and Depew never offered any money, and never intended to harm a specific boy.
"There was no particular person targeted for the kidnapping," FBI special agent Will Garrett told the Guide to the Gay Northeast.
Nor do police claim that the alleged Florida child-seller exists.
That police are trying to pump an S/M sex fantasy into reality is "certainly one of the things we're exploring," says William Linda, Lambey's attorney. “Just being a pedophile or just being a Republican-just classifying yourself like that is not against the law," he told the Guide. "Sharing (a fantasy) and taking steps to bring it to completion are two different things. I think pretty much
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everything they did was within the law." A New York attorney familiar with government sex entrapment schemes said that the prosecution's evidence so far appears weak.
"I suspect the reality quotient of this is extremely low," says Robert Rhodes, a gay legal activist. "The defendants do not seem to have taken the actions which would have lifted this scheme out of the realm of fantasy and definitely placed it
your adult employees to two other (younger) employees who were stocking halfway down the aisle opposite the meat cases: "Oh, I see the two gay boys are working together!" Following their laughter, he said, “I'm surprised you're not holding hands.”
Not only am I offended at the tone and attitude in his statements, but I find it hard to believe that these "jokes" could be made so casually and openly in his workplace. The work setting for your employees is a public space for the patrons of your store.
There were only a few other shoppers in this section of the store at the time of this exchange, so perhaps he believed that his attempt at humor was not overheard. However, even if no one had been within earshot, I consider these statements against gay men and women to be derogatory and unacceptable. If this gentlemen has a need to make homophobic slurs, I would ask him to do so in the privacy of your employee break room on his off-time, not mine.
Many residents of the Coventry neighborhood, including myself, have wished to see this Pick-n-Pay remain rather than move to the new Severance location. However, if the attitude and behavior I witnessed this afternoon is condoned by the management, I, for one, will be happy to see Pick-n-Pay leave.
Mark A. Lynch
The Chronicle encourages everyone to write and express their opinion about the paper or life in general. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity. We will print your name unless you specifically ask us
not to.
Address letters to the Chronicle, P.O. Box 5426, Cleveland, Ohio, 44101.
into the realm of a real project they were planning to undertake," he told the Guide.
"In fact, it seems that at this point it's a pure thought crime for which Dennis Cooper (the gay author of Closer, a novel about sadomasochistic pederasty) could equally well be prosecuted," Rhodes says.
Reprinted with permission from the Guide to the Gay Northeast.
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