NOVEMBER 12, 1993

GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE 11

Lawsuit to be filed; Cincinnati boycott planned

Continued from Page 1

The Greater Cincinnati CVB has been in touch with Denver convention officials on how they have handled the boycott in their city, according to CVB spokesperson Beth Charlton.

Mark McNeil, coordinator for Equal Rights Not Special Rights, which favored the Cincinnati issue, said he doubted a-boycott would work in the city.

"We're really trying to bury the hatchet here," McNeil said. "The people of Cincinnati have spoken very clearly."

Backers of the boycott said it could be effective, even if it did not have an immediate financial effect, said Carol Lippman, spokeswoman for Gay and Lesbian March Activists-ACT UP. "In some ways, it's a symbolic way of saying: 'Enough is enough.'" she said.

Lippman's group led protests during the

1990 controversy over the Robert Mapplethorpe photography exhibit at the Contemporary Arts Center. Members also protested the treatment of Steven O'Banion, à gay man with AIDS who was arrested 22 years ago for jaywalking and alleged he was taunted, slapped and punched by jailers.

Boycott backers expect support nationally from gay-rights advocates.

Scott MacLarty, formerly of Cincinnati and now a member of ACT UP Washington, has secured help from the group and its AIDS Resource Center.

"We're basically using the space, our copy machine, all our press contacts to help spread the word," MacLarty said. "This is the kind of thing where the whole community needs to turn to the city of Cincinnati and say this is not acceptable."

Lee Caldwell, co-chair of Stonewall Cincinnati's media committee, said the group is opposed to a blanket boycott, but might

Assessing the aftermath

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certified, and we'll ask for an immediate injunction."

Greenwood said the American Civil Liberties Union and the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund would join in the suit. It would be filed as soon as the board of elections certified the results as official, probably within two weeks, he said..

Equality Cincinnati is also considering its next step. Says Nancy Minson, campaign manager for the group, "We're not really sure what to do next. We had a community forum last night [November 4] and we are exploring options. A boycott has been discussed. But we're also looking for more positive measures than boycotts. Maybe there will be some sort of selective boycott."

Because of the wide-ranging support from

throughout the community, Minson says there may be an effort at getting local businesses to display support by passing private employment protection. Area businesses may also be asked to make their support visible, perhaps with window stickers stating their support of all people. "We are still picking up the pieces," she said by phone November 5. "We will win in court. The degree by which we lost shows not just voter confusion, but that there is a lot of hate out there."

The vote in Cincinnati will encourage gay civil rights proponents to wage more effective campaigns in other cities, HRCF's King said.

"We know there are similar initiatives under way in nine states for 1994. Cincinnati has sent us a wake-up call, not just for gays and lesbians but all Americans who care about civil rights," King said.

Kent partner benefits

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care plan as saying, "that there is nothing special about marriage," and as devaluing marriage.

In response to Fox, Johnson said, "Nothing a gay or lesbian couple does devalues the status of marriage. Heterosexuals devalue the state of marriage by cheating on their spouse or getting a divorce. There is nothing a gay person can do that would devalue marriage.

Johnson believes the issues would not be difficult "if people think about them for a while; if they could disentangle or unconfound the issues of marriage and employee benefits."

"Of course," he adds, "people who are ruled or driven by emotions-rage, hate, fear-will always confuse these issues because they well up from their emotions and not from clear thought."

Johnson reiterates that he is not asking the university to allow him to get married. “I'm asking the university not to use marriage as the criterion on which eligibility for dependent status is determined. There are all sorts of other tests that can be used that will determine dependant status. You can point to any of these other tests that are used by municipalities, at other universities, in private businesses. All of these dependent status criteria I meet."

In light of the sexual orientation clause in the collective bargaining agreement, denying health benefits on the basis of sexual orientation may be viewed as discrimination. AAUP President Richard Klich has stressed that this case is a contract issue.

At the end of our interview Johnson read me the following passage from a commentary on gays and lesbians in academia by Rutgers Professor Catharine Stimpson that

was published in the Journal of the American Association of Higher Education: "Will lesbians and gays walk cheerfully down our streets, or will higher education act like Nazis in tweed jackets?"

Coming out of the KSU library the other day, I passed one of the university administrators who was wearing a tweed jacket and puffing benignly on a pipe. I wondered if this were one of the people who denied the request for a change in the policy on health benefits and who has refused to comment on the issues. Ironically, the president of the association from which the above citation comes is KSU President Carol Cartwright.

Note: Many of the facts and citations in this article come from two excellent articles by KSU student Scott Schonauer in the Daily Kent Stater. Also, interviews were held with Johnson and AAUP-Kent President Richard Klich.

Pro-gay vote off in Colorado

Denver-A group working to repeal Amendment 2 gave up a last-ditch petition drive set for October 30 because it didn't have enough volunteers.

People for a Stronger Colorado hoped to replace the amendment with statewide gayrights protections. But the group is thousands of petition signatures short of its goal to get a proposal on the 1994 ballot.

Petitions with 71,000 signatures were due at the secretary of state's office by November 5. The group had 50,000.

Daniel Brewer-Ward, who led the drive, said calling off the volunteer drive doesn't necessarily mean the end to his proposal.

favor an economic boycott targeted at specific businesses.

Columbus' Jerry Bunge, director of the Out Voice Project to Fight Ballot Initiatives, attended a post-election meeting in Cincinnati where the boycott issue was discussed.

He said one option-which he favorswould call for boycotting companies that do not have policies to protect the job rights of lesbians and gays. It would also call for boycotting companies whose owners contributed to the campaign to pass Issue 3, whether the company has a non-discrimination policy or not.

"This targets the real villains," Bunge said, adding that a boycott of the entire city hurts the gay community, too.

If a boycott is called for, Terry Schleder, founder of Boycott Colorado (organized after voters in that state passed anti-gay Amendment 2) has offered his support.

Schleder agrees that the national boycott of Colorado has resulted in $81 million worth of lost business, including at least $65 million from lost conventions.

Several groups already are considering canceling upcoming conventions in Cincinnati, according to reports in the Cincinnati Enquirer.

The Chicago-based American Library Association is looking at alternative sites for its mid-winter 1995 convention, which will draw 5,000 to 9,000 delegates.

The American Historical Association in Washington, D.C., has planned a January 1995 convention in Cincinnati. According to Jim Gardner, deputy executive director of the 14,000-member organization, the group is considering several options, including looking for an alternative site or coming to Cincinnati and staging some kind of protest.

The United Church of Christ was considering Cincinnati or Kansas City for a 1997 convention, but has said it will no longer

consider Cincinnati, according to Mike Wilson, president of the Greater Cincinnati CVB.

While the boycott issue is hashed out, attorneys for Equality Cincinnati, the group that campaigned against Issue 3, planned to file a lawsuit this week challenging the charter amendment on constitutional grounds.

Last month, the group made an unsuccessful attempt to have Issue 3 removed from the ballot on the basis that its proponents had misled petition signers to believe that the city's year-old human rights ordinance gave "special rights" to lesbians and gays.

In fact, the ordinance prohibited discrimination in employment, housing or public accommodations based on a person's "race, gender, age, color, religion, disability status, sexual orientation, marital status or ethnic, national or Appalachian regional origin."

Issue 3 removes the protection based on sexual orientation, and goes further by stating that the city cannot adopt any law that gives gays, lesbians or bisexuals "any claim of minority or protected status, quota preference or other preferential treatment."

Bunge said he believes Issue 3 passed because voters "didn't understand our message. They bought into the 'no special rights' rhetoric" of the right wing.

Another factor, he said, was that Issue 3 proponents capitalized on fears among the black community that the human rights ordinance enabled lesbians and gays to steal jobs from the black community, despite the fact that it did not call for job quotas or any affirmative action hiring program.

"They convinced people that equal opportunity is a pie, and there are only so many slices of it," Bunge said. "They drove a wedge between the African-American community and our community.”

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