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Kentuckiana Pride Crowd: 8,000
-- 3,000 More Than Last Year!
THE LETTER was the first local
media outlet to speak to Mike Shouse, Director of the Kentuckiana
Pride Festival, following this past weekend's tremendously
successful celebration. Shouse said that a conservative estimate of attendance at the
parade and Friday evening event on the Belvedere and at the main festival on Saturday (June 20) was at least
8,000 -- an increase of 3,000 over last year's festival attendance.
Over $5,200 was
raised from tips collected at the various drinking stations (an
increase of over $200 over last year). Again this year, all tips
will be donated
to the Louisville AIDS Walk.
Again this year, THE LETTER is
proud to have been a sponsor of the Kentuckiana Pride Festival. We
salute Mike Shouse and his all-volunteer committee for putting
together a record setting Pride celebration!
Pictures from three area Pride
events are currently featured in our
Community Photo Gallery. Click on the
camera below to view these great pictures!
Photos courtesy of Mike Buford
and Williams-Nichols Institute and are © 2009.
All Rights Reserved.
Gay Christian Speaker Discusses Outing
by Dave VanderPol, Executive Editor
 A gay Christian speaker who's
outing
was unceremoniously splattered across the Internet last year --
thanks to
gossip columnist Perez Hilton -- served as the opening speaker this
past Saturday (June 20) for the 2009 Kentuckiana Pride
Festival (KPF).
Azariah Southworth describes
his well-publicized outing, an event that quickly led to his losing his
job as a Christian television host, as “a whirlwind” kind of
experience.
We recently
asked Southworth about his public outing, his popular blog and about
how he survived a very anti-gay Christian upbringing.
Southworth currently resides near Fort Wayne, Indiana and travels
the country, speaking to college campuses, churches and community
events about the connections he believes there can be between
homosexuality and religion.
| DVP: What do
you think about the way Perez Hilton outed you? Do you
think it's ever OK for the media to forcibly out closted
celebrities? AZ:
When
I chose to come out, I wanted to make sure there were
fireworks because I knew I was going to lose my TV show.
So I am grateful that Perez publicized my story. I
received e-mails from people like 19-year-old Matt who
came out the same week I did. Matt told me his family
wasn't taking it well and he tried to commit suicide
twice already. He continued to say when he read my story
on Perez's website he felt hope and that everything was
going to be OK. If this was the only positive outcome of
Perez reporting my 'outing' then I happy he did it.
I don't think its OK to 'out'
celebrities. Everyone's journey is different. We 'come
out' at different times for different reasons and some
of us never do. It's dangerous to alter or interfere
with someone’s journey for your own profit.
DVP: Before you were outed did
you attempt to change of your sexual orientation through
any of the ex-gay ministries?
AZ: At age 13 my parents put me
in counseling with their pastor. For five years, once a
week, I went through pastoral counseling and multiple
exorcisms to become ex-gay. I did everything I was told
to do. I read the books of other ex-gays who “made it,”
I was reading my Bible daily, rebuking the lustful
thoughts, and spending a lot of time in prayer. However,
all this did was create a cycle of success and failure.
I was a success when I was what everyone else wanted me
to be. But I was a failure if I embraced who I am to any
degree.
If it's true that everything we
do as human’s stems out of fear or love then everything
I was doing and taught was out of fear. If you are
lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender you are not a
failure and you are not something to be “overcome”. When
I came out I was choosing not to live a life of fear
anymore. I now choose to love who I am and acknowledge
that I am worthy to be loved as I am.
DVP: You have a blog (azariahspeaks.blogspot.com)
that you keep updated regularly...Tell us about the HOLY
CRIMES feature on your blog.
AZ: The weekly posting titled,
"This Week In Holy Crimes" is something I get from
another blog. I chose to carry it on my blog because
LGBT people are often compared to pedophiles,
beastiality, among other outrageous and unfair
comparisons. Most of those accusations come from
religious "right-wing" leaders. I post it on my blog as
a reminder to people that the nearest pedophile and
money embezzler is as close to you as the local church
house and not your local gay bar. |
Southworth is but one of the
celebrities scheduled to be on hand for KPF that will take
place again this year on The Belvedere in downtown Louisville.
Popular musical group the Indigo Girls and singer Tiffany are among
the musical acts slated to appear. While gas prices (and the price
of almost everything else) has continued to rise over the past year,
once again this year admission to KPF is just $5.00. Talk about a
great value for your money!
Group Asks: Where You Going Now
That You Made It OUT Of The Closet?
 Sure, lots of GLBT folks have
“come out” of the closet, but many are unsure of “where to go” once
they are out. It seems this is a major reason for
“under-involvement” by many community members.
In order to help strengthen
our community, THE LETTER is currently in the process of organizing
OUTlet, a support and social group that will help folks learn about
the many resources available to them in throughout Kentuckiana and
give them a chance to meet lots of folks outside of their immediate
circle of friends. The group will be begin at various locations
starting soon at the 4th of July holiday.
For more information about OUTlet, write
outlet@theletteronline.com.
Advocacy Group Expresses Both Support &
Concern Regarding Recent Gay Policy Moves
The national office of
Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) has
applauded the decision by President Obama to sign a presidential
memorandum authorizing the extension of benefits to same-sex
partners of federal workers. However, the group urged the President
to honor his promise to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)
that prevents the Federal government from recognizing same-sex
unions.
"This change for federal employees is a great step in the right
direction," said Jody Huckaby, executive director of PFLAG.
"However, it is just a first step. We are committed to ensuring that
the President will stand by his campaign promise to work towards the
repeal of the so-called Defense of Marriage Act that is a barrier to
countless lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans. DOMA's very existence is the obstacle that prevents the federal
government from acknowledging legally-recognized unions."
"DOMA leaves our families and friends unprotected and unequal,
without access to more than 1,100 federal benefits. While PFLAG is
thrilled to see this Administration move equality forward for
federal employees, we will work to ensure that President Obama has
not forgotten his commitment to equality for all LGBT Americans."
Huckaby concluded.
PFLAG promotes the health and well-being of gay, lesbian, bisexual
and transgender persons, their families and friends through:
support, to cope with an adverse society; education, to enlighten an
ill-informed public; and advocacy, to end discrimination and to
secure equal civil rights. For more information visit
www.pflag.org.
University Library Acquires Gay Cable Network Archives
New York University’s Fales
Library, the university’s primary special collections repository,
has acquired the archives of the Gay Cable Network, one of the
largest and most important GLBT media collections in existence.
The Gay Cable Network (GCN), under the direction of Lou Maletta, the
gay media pioneer, began in 1982 and stopped production in 2001. The
first network in the nation to regularly provide information about
the burgeoning AIDS crisis, GCN eventually accumulated tens of
thousands of hours of original footage, ranging from a comment Dick
Cheney made on gay unions at the 1984 Republican convention when he
was a Wyoming congressman, to the first ACT-UP demonstrations. Other
footage includes the first Gay March on Washington, City Hall
meetings over the Gay Rights Bill, interviews with the first
executives of the Gay Men’s Health Crisis, the founding of the LGBT
Center on West 13th Street in Manhattan, and Gay Pride parades and
rallies.
The GCN collection acquired by Fales consists of more than 6,100
hours of footage. It was first brought to the attention of Fales
director Marvin J. Taylor by Allen Zwickler, NYU alumnus and
co-director of the Phil Zwickler Foundation, which helped defray the
cost of transferring the collection to Fales. According to Zwickler,
the GCN collection is one of the most important civil rights
archives of our time and was in danger of being lost. The Zwickler
Foundation is named after Allen’s brother, an artist who died of
AIDS in 1991.
“This is a major preservation challenge,” said Taylor of the
collection. “But it’s one we are ready to meet. NYU Libraries is a
leader in moving image preservation, and NYU has one of the most
important gender studies programs in the country. GCN had the most
significant media program for the queer community during the
beginning of the AIDS crisis, and we are committed to preserving
this history, so integrally related to New York City.” The GCN
Archives compliment Fales’ Downtown New York collection, which
documents the arts scenes from the 1970s to 1990s, a world that was
decimated by the AIDS epidemic.
“I cannot emphasize enough how valuable this acquisition is to me
and those of my students who work in contemporary U.S. sexuality
studies,” said Phillip Brian Harper, Erich Maria Professor of
Literature, professor of social and cultural analysis, and chair of
the Department of English at NYU. “The increasingly ephemeral
character of much of the public discourse in this arena makes it
very difficult for scholars in the field to construct manageable
working archives on which to focus their analyses, and the GCN
materials go a very long way toward addressing this problem.”
While NYU has made a commitment to preserving the collection, it
will take many years to reformat the tapes. Plans are underway to
seek outside funding sources to help preserve the collection.
ABSOLUT® SALUTES 40 YEARS OF PRIDE
WITH LIMITED-EDITION RAINBOW BOTTLE
 Even
though ABSOLUT® VODKA celebrates pride every day, the world’s most
iconic vodka is proud to pay special tribute to four decades of gay
pride with a limited-edition ABSOLUT Pride bottle that marks the
40th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. The special bottle package,
which features a hopeful rainbow design that has become an iconic
symbol of gay pride, honors the men and women who stepped out of the
bars and fought back on the streets of New York City’s West Village
during the summer of 1969.
“In An ABSOLUT World, everyone is encouraged to
be true to themselves,” said Jeffrey Moran, Vice President of
Multicultural Marketing, ABSOLUT Vodka. “That world is more
colorful, diverse and respectful. As people celebrate Pride this
year, we want them to be proud of who they are and let their true
colors shine.” Since
1981, ABSOLUT has been honoring pride and celebrating the
achievements of the GLBT community. Through community-specific
advertising, promotions and charitable contributions, ABSOLUT
continues to be synonymous with vodka at gay and lesbian bars and
living rooms from coast to coast. Now ABSOLUT becomes the first
spirits brand to offer an GLBT-specific bottle at retail stores.
"With its history of sponsorship of LGBT advocacy groups and LGBT
themed advertisements, ABSOLUT is one of our community's greatest
allies," said Neil Giuliano, President of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance
Against Defamation (GLAAD). "This year GLAAD celebrates the
twentieth anniversary of our partnership with ABSOLUT, which has
directly funded our media advocacy initiatives and enabled us to
change hearts and minds with stories about the lives of GLBT
people."
The limited-edition ABSOLUT Pride bottle, containing a 750ml bottle
of ABSOLUT, is available in select markets.
Support the vodka that supports PRIDE! The
Kentuckiana Pride Festival is excited to have ABSOLUT® VODKA as a
major sponsor for this year's celebration.
ABSOLUT PRIDE
COCKTAILS
|
Red - ABSOLUT Life
2 parts ABSOLUT Vanilia
1 part Cranberry Juice
Squeeze of Lime |
|
Orange - ABSOLUT Compassion
1 part ABSOLUT Mandrin
2 parts Orange Juice
Splash of cranberry |
|
Yellow - ABSOLUT Sunlight
2 parts ABSOLUT Citron
1 part St. Germaine
2 parts Lemon Lime Soda |
|
Green - ABSOLUT Nature
2 parts ABSOLUT Raspberri
Muddled with mint leaves, lime, sugar, fresh
raspberries and plenty of crushed ice --
Topped with 1 part soda |
|
Blue - ABSOLUT Serenity
1 part ABSOLUT Vodka
2 parts Curacao
Splash of lemon lime soda
Squeeze of lime |
|
Purple - ABSOLUT Spirit
2 parts ABSOLUT Pears
1 part Simple Syrup
Fresh blueberries & raspberries
Lime wedge |
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