Safe Schools Amendment Act

The Safe Schools Improvement Act (SSIA), a federal anti-bullying bill, is on the verge of introduction in the U.S. House and Senate. You can take action now to ensure it gets passed!

This bill will require schools and districts receiving federal funding to specifically prohibit bullying and harassment, including conduct based on a student's actual or perceived race, color, national origin, sex, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or religion - and based on association with anyone of those identities. If we all work together, we can make schools safer for students with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgeder, and queer parents - and ALL students!

Click here to take action now!

SAFE SCHOOLS IMPROVEMENT ACT
(Casey, Kirk)

Bullying and harassment of students is widespread and affects millions of students every year. The Safe Schools Improvement Act of 2011 (formerly S. 3739/H.R. 2262) is designed to help schools address this problem by ensuring that no child is afraid to go to school for fear of unchecked bullying and harassment.
What is the Safe Schools Improvement Act?

• Requires schools and districts receiving federal funding to specifically prohibit bullying and harassment, including conduct based on a student’s actual or perceived race, color, national origin, sex, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or religion.
• Ensures that schools and school districts focus on effective prevention programs in order to better prevent and respond to incidents of bullying and harassment both in school and online.
• Requires that states report data on incidents of bullying and harassment to the Department of Education

Why is this needed?

• A 2009 U.S. Department of Education study found that bullying and harassment affects nearly one in every three American students between the ages of 12 through 18.1 Another study estimates that 60,000 students in the U.S. do not attend school each day because they fear being bullied.
• Research shows that bullying and harassment have adverse long-term consequences, including decreased concentration at school, increased school absenteeism, damage to the victim’s self-esteem, and increased social anxiety.
• While we do have federal laws to provide support to promote school safety, there is nothing currently in place to comprehensively and expressly address issues of bullying or harassment.
• Awareness of the problem is growing. According to a recent poll, 85 percent of Americans strongly support or somewhat support a federal law to require schools to enforce specific rules to prevent bullying.2

What is the history of the Safe Schools Improvement Act?

• In the 111th Congress, S. 3739 had the support of seventeen bipartisan cosponsors in the Senate. Companion legislation in the House of Representatives, introduced by Representative Linda Sánchez (D-CA), was supported by 131 bipartisan cosponsors.
• When Congress last took up the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA, or No Child Left Behind), both the Senate and House Education Committees included the core principles of the Safe School Improvement Act in their draft bills.

Who supports the Safe Schools Improvement Act?
Numerous education, health, law enforcement and youth development organizations support SSIA, including the American Association of School Administrators, American Federation of Teachers, American School Health Association, Learning Disabilities Association of America, National Association of School Psychologists, National Down Syndrome Society, National Education Association, National Parent Teacher Association, American Association of University Women, Asian American Justice Center, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, COLAGE, Human Rights Campaign, Trevor Project, and National Council of La Raza.

Planned Parenthood, more than abortions but a queer issue

 Last week, the House of Representatives voted to bar federal funding for Planned Parenthood.  Want to learn more about what this means or wondering what you can do, click here for the Planned Parenthood Take Action website. Wondering how it's a queer issue? Check out shay's blog post here.
http://plannedparenthoodaction.org/positions/2011-congressional-attacks-womens-health-care-1024.htm

 For more info see: http://blog.nyacyouth.org/

Transgender Lobby Day Scheduled Mar. 13-15 in D.C.

Each year, transgender people, our families, friends and allies join us in Washington, DC, as we go to our members of Congress to share vital information with them about transgender people and our families. We will also have great opportunities to talk with policy makers in the Administration whose work directly impacts our lives. Please join us as we make strides to bring transgender equality to our nation's capital.
Make your plans now to join us on March 13-15, 2011 for an exciting conference and the opportunity to educate your member of Congress about vital issues for transgender people. Our goal is to make this our largest and most diverse Lobby Day to date. Will you help us?

Registration is now open for Lobby Day 2011. Go to Registration.

Local Action Team Trainings for Lobby Day for Equality 2011

Join us for a Local Action Team Training and get information about the EHEA and other legislative priorities for this year, learn what progress has been made in the past year with your legislator, and practice and prepare with others from your area in advance of meeting with your representative.

Northwest Ohio

Toledo
March 26th,  10:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.

Village Church - Register Here

Bowling Green

March 26th,  2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.
First Presbyterian Church -Register Here

Western Ohio - Dayton
April 16th, 10:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Cross Creek Community Church - Register Here

Eastern Ohio - Mt. Vernon 
May 7th, 10:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
The Social Room, 1st Congregational United Church of Christ - Register Here

Southeast Ohio - Athens 
May 7th, 2:00 p.m. - 4:00 pm. 
Athens Community Gateway for the Arts - Register Here

Northeast Ohio - Akron

May 8th, 12:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m.

Student Union Room 316 - Register Here  (Parking is not a problem) Cleveland, Canton, and Youngstown are being planned - time, date and place TBD

Central Ohio - Columbus

May 14th, 2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Stonewall Center on High - Register Here

Southwest Ohio - Cincinnati and Oxfod are being planned for the weekend of April 9-10.  Time and place TBD

Others are being considered as time and schedule allow.  Want a training in your area? Contact kim@equalityohio.org.

Clergy Call for Equality

This May 22-24, we encourage you to join HRC’s Religion and Faith Program and hundreds of fellow religious leaders from across the country to build the faithful movement for LGBT justice.  Now more than ever we need religious leaders like you to keep equality at the forefront of our nation’s conscience.  Sign up now for the 2011 Clergy Call for Justice and Equality in Washington, DC and  gather with colleagues from Ohio and beyond to organize, learn, worship and bring your witness for justice to Capitol Hill.  Learn more at www.hrc.org/clergycall.

Same-sex Parenting Case to Ohio Supreme Court

Updates: Case Number 2010 - 0276 (Re: Lucy Kathleen Mullen) - See oral arguments at Ohio Supreme Court - more.

Here is the case that is referred to in the testimony in Re: Lucy Kathleen Mullen.  Case Number 2001 - 0625 (Teri J. Bonfield and Shelly M. Zachritz) - See oral arguments at Ohio Supreme Court  - more.

Gill Foundation Matching Gift to Equality OHio

Gill Foundation invests $25,000 in Equality Ohio through matching gift - In November 2010, Equality Ohio was awarded a matching grant of $25,000 from the Gill Foundation.  For every new monthly donor to our Equality Council - the leadership giving group of Equality Ohio of $100 or more per month - the Gill Foundation will match the first $500 - more.

2011 CAUSE Conference Call for Proposals - April 1-3!

Save the Date Hosted by Equality Ohio at Columbus State Community College (CSCC) - tentative schedule includes an invitation to attend Fusion Friday at The Ohio State University on April 1, conference sessions Saturday and Sunday (ending at noon), and an optional group outing to Gallery Hop in Columbus's Short North Saturday night.

The planning committee is currently accepting proposals for workshops, caucuses, panels and presentations.  Please submit the following to info@equalityohio.org by Friday, March 12:

-Detailed description of the topic
-Information covered
-Goals or what attendees should get out of the session
-Required supplies (i.e. a computer, projector, etc.)
-Brief outline

Please limit presentations to 1 to 1.5 hours in length.

Register for the conference here.

Presented by the Hermes Foundation (Sustaining Sponsor)

McGregor & Antonio to Introduce EHEA in Ohio House

Representatives Ross McGregor (R - Springfield) and Nickie Antonio (D - Lakewood) to reintroduce EHEA in Ohio House - The Equal Housing and Employment Act (EHEA), which would prohibit discrimination in housing and employment on the basis of sexual orientation, is expected to be introduced in the House by Reps. Ross McGregor (R) and Nickie Antonio (D).  Equality Ohio met recently with Reps. McGregor and Antonio, and we will be working closely with them on navigating the bill through the current General Assembly.  Last year, EHEA was the first pro-equality bill to pass any chamber of the Ohio General Assembly, but it stalled in the State Senate.  We have established a base of support for EHEA in both the House and Senate, but it is extremely important for our community to mobilize in support of this bill to broaden its support.  Lobby Day on May 18th is an important opportunity for you to talk to your representatives about this and other pro-equality legislation, and we hope that you will join us then.  We also ask that you reach out to friends and family who live in areas where the current legislators are not supportive of EHEA so that they understand their constituents support it.  In the coming months, we will specifically identify those representatives who we believe are potential supporters and do targeted outreach in those communities.  Click here to read a recent article about EHEA. Source: Equality Ohio Newsletter

Happy Birthday Joan Crawford! Fundraiser

Not, perhaps, coincidentally, it's also the 107th anniversary of the invention of the wire coathanger. No joke. Speakers include BRAVO's Executive Director, Gloria McCauley and Equality Ohio's new Executive Director, Ed Mullen.
Noka Davers will perform two numbers as Joan Crawford and serving cake!

Stay after for a special screening of Mildred Pierce.

Admission is free. No RSVP necessary — just come enjoy the fellowship, networking and free appetizers!

Sponsored by KDB Easton, outlook media, Rainbow Cleaners, and the Angry Baker ... benefitting BRAVO.
Location: KDB at Easton (in the old Gameworks location in the Towne Center Building).

Time: Wednesday, March 9, 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

Feb February Raises Funds for Trevor Project

The Trevor Project is celebrating "Fab February" with gay social networking site Fab.com. For every new member to sign up, Fab will donate $1 the It Gets Better Project, The Trevor Project and GLSEN. Here are five easy ways you can help:

1.   Join Fab.com.  It's free to register and $1 will instantly be donated the second you join.    

 

2.     Click to Tweet about your donation.

3.     Tell your Facebook friends about your donation.

4.     Invite 5 Facebook friends to join fab.com to raise an additional $5.     

5.     Watch and share the fab.com team's It Gets Better video . The more people who watch it, the more money we can raise together!

"Fab is not only a social connector to gay-friendly people, places and activities anywhere in the world, but a safe place for members to share their personal struggles and concerns over gay issues," said Fab founder and CEO Jason Goldberg. "The outpouring of grief on the site when so many gay suicides were reported last year spurred us to want to contribute to strengthening the gay self-image, and that's how 'Fab February' was born."

Free Webinar on LGBTIQ Youth Homelessness

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual Youths Punished More Severely For Same Offense

A gay, lesbian or bisexual adolescent is punished more severely at school and by the criminal-justice system compared to heterosexual people of the same age for the same offenses, researchers from Yale University report in the medical journal Pediatrics. The authors say the disproportionate punishments cannot be explained by worse illegal activities or behaviors. They add that in order to achieve equality among heterosexual and non-heterosexual youth, it is important first to understand what causes these disparities in school expulsions, arrests, imprisonments, and then to address them.

Non-heterosexual young people are already at a higher risk of being bullied, abused within their families and succumbing to addiction, the researchers explain. Kathryn E. W. Himmelstein, BA, and Hannah Brückner, PhD set out to find out whether they were also victims of unfair criminal-justice and school sanctions.

They examined the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health which tracked a representative sample of young people in 1994-1995 from grades 7 to the end of 12. They also gathered information on a 2001-2002 follow-up.

Their definition of non-heterosexuality included people attracted to those of the same sex, same-sex romantic relationships, or LGB (lesbian, gay or bisexual) identification.

The investigators focused on six outcomes:

·                          Adult arrests

·                          Adult convictions

·                          Being stopped by the police

·                          Expulsion from school

·                          Juvenile arrests

·                          Juvenile convictions

They found that non-heterosexual individuals had a significantly and consistently higher risk of being punished. Teenagers who are attracted to people of the same sex were found to have a 41% higher risk of being expelled from school, and a 42% greater chance of being convicted for a crime as an adult, compared to heterosexual individuals.

Non-heterosexual teenagers have a 38% higher risk of being stopped by the police.

It was already widely known that children bully non-heterosexual children. This study reveals how adults treat non-heterosexual children.

The authors stress (again) that the higher risk of punishment is not reflected in a greater participation of illegal actions or behaviors by non-heterosexual teenagers.

The authors concluded:

"Non-heterosexual youth suffer disproportionate educational and criminal-justice punishments that are not explained by greater engagement in illegal or transgressive behaviors. Understanding and addressing these disparities might reduce school expulsions, arrests, and incarceration and their dire social and health consequences."

"Criminal-Justice and School Sanctions Against Nonheterosexual Youth: A National Longitudinal Study"
Kathryn E. W. Himmelstein, BA, Hannah Brückner, PhD
PEDIATRICS (doi:10.1542/peds.2009-2306)

Written by Christian Nordqvist
Copyright: Medical News Today
Not to be reproduced without permission of Medical News Today

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/210398.php

VICTORY

Illinois governor signs civil unions law

by Mike Andrew - SGN Staff Writer Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed his state's new civil unions bill into law on January 31. The law will take effect on June 1. 'Here we are in 2011 on the eve of Abraham Lincoln's 202nd birthday and I think this is very special,' Quinn said at the signing ceremony. 'We believe in civil rights and we believe in civil unions.' Quinn was joined by 20 Illinois political leaders and a standing-room-only crowd of nearly 1,000 supporters in a hall at the Chicago Cultural Center. Among those attending the signing were Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, Illinois Senate President John Cullerton, House Speaker Mike Madigan, Rep. Deborah Mell, Rep. Greg Harris, and Sen. Dave Koehler. The Chicago Gay Men's chorus performed at the ceremony. 'This legislation represents a giant step toward equality,' Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan said. 'If you enter a civil union, you can now visit your loved one in the hospital to make medical decisions and not be turned away. You can take time off to care for your partner and not lose your job.' According to the State Journal-Register newspaper, supporters of the new law worried that they might not be able to accommodate everyone who wanted to attend the signing ceremony. 'Our biggest problem right now is public response of people who want to be there to witness the ceremony. They feel this is part of history,' Rep. Greg Harris told reporters. The new law, titled the 'Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Union Act,' allows both same-sex and opposite-sex couples to enter into civil unions, giving them some of the same benefits automatically available to married couples, including the right to visit a sick partner in the hospital, disposition of a deceased partner's remains and the right to make decisions about a partner's medical care. According to Illinois LGBT activists, the new law provides more than 650 spousal benefits and protections. The law also allows religious institutions to define marriage as they choose. Illinois law will continue to define marriage as a one man-one woman relationship. Illinois joins 17 states, plus the District of Columbia, in recognizing some form of protection for committed same-sex couples - from limited partnership rights through civil unions to full marriage equality. Human rights activists greeted the new law with enthusiasm. 'Today marks a tremendous step towards equality for all families in Illinois,' said HRC President Joe Solmonese. 'HRC commends Governor Quinn for his commitment to ensuring civil unions became law. Congratulations to Rep. Greg Harris, lead sponsor of the bill, who fought for years to ensure civil unions would become a reality, and thank you to Equality Illinois and the ACLU of Illinois for their tireless efforts on behalf of the LGBT community.' 'This new law reflects the triumph of hope and fairness over distortion and division,' said Jill Metz, president of the ACLU of Illinois Board of Directors. 'Today marks yet another victory in the clear trend line of achieving fairness for families across the country,' said James Esseks, director of the ACLU Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Project. Lambda Legal announced a new program to help Illinois families protected by the new law to obtain the full range of benefits they are entitled to. 'We have had a surge of calls to our Legal Help Desk since November when the law passed the legislature,' said Camilla Taylor, senior staff attorney at the Midwest Regional Office of Lambda Legal in Chicago. 'By launching Civil Union Tracker with our partners at Equality Illinois, our goal is to provide a much-needed service to same-sex and different-sex couples in civil unions, and to their children. Many will have questions about what the law means. We also know from experience in other states with civil unions that many families will encounter difficulties in getting respect for their status as legally recognized families after the law goes into effect. Our goal is to help these families navigate Illinois' new legal landscape with as few challenges as possible.' Tell a friend:

ACLU And Lambda Legal In Court to Defend Transgender People's Rights

ACLU And Lambda Legal In Court MONDAY To Defend Transgender People's Right To Access Medical Treatment In Prison

ACLU And Lambda Legal In Court MONDAY To Defend Transgender People's Right To Access Medical Treatment In Prison CHICAGO - The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit will hear arguments Monday, February 7, in a case brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Wisconsin and Lambda Legal defending the right of transgender people to receive medical care while they are incarcerated. In 2005, the state of Wisconsin passed a law that barred prison doctors from providing transgender inmates hormone therapy or sex reassignment surgery while in state custody. Lambda Legal and the ACLU sued the state on behalf of transgender inmates, some of whom had been receiving hormone treatment for years in Wisconsin prisons. An injunction order was granted to continue hormone treatment until a ruling was made, and in April 2010 a federal district court finally struck down the so-called 'Inmate Sex Change Prevention Act.' More information on this case can be found on Lambda Legal's case page at: www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/cases/fields-v-smith.html or at the ACLU case profile page at: http://www.aclu.org/lgbt-rights_hiv-aids/sundstrom-v-frank-case-profile WHAT: Oral arguments in Fields v. Smith, a case defending the rights of transgender inmates to receive critical hormone therapy while incarcerated. WHO: John Knight, staff attorney with the ACLU Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Project, will be arguing the case. Larry Dupuis of the ACLU of Wisconsin will also be in attendance. WHEN: Monday, February 7, 2011 Order of arguments published at 9:00 a.m. CT WHERE: Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals 219 S. Dearborn Street Chicago, IL

Gays Targeted for Hate Crimes

SPLC’s Intelligence Report: Gays Targeted for Hate Crimes Far More Than Any Other Minority in America

Homosexuals are far more likely to be victims of a violent hate crime than any other minority group in the United States, according to a new analysis of federal hate crime statistics in the latest issue of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Report, released today.

The SPLC’s analysis of 14 years of hate crime data found that homosexuals, or those perceived to be gay, are more than twice as likely to be attacked in a violent hate crime as Jews or blacks; more than four times as likely as Muslims; and 14 times as likely as Latinos. The findings are based on FBI hate crime statistics from 1995 to 2008, the period for which there is complete data. The basic pattern also holds true in individual years.

Winter 2010 issue of the SPLC's Intelligence Report

The analysis is being released to coincide with the scheduled release of the FBI’s hate crime statistics for 2009.
These findings come as a wave of anti-gay attacks have washed across the country. In New York, for example, 10 suspects were arrested for brutally torturing three gay victims. And in Covington, Ky., a neighborhood was hit by a series of violent anti-gay attacks. Most dramatically, four teenagers committed suicide in September after being bullied, taunted or outed as homosexuals.

This analysis of hate crime data can be found in the Winter 2010 issue of the Intelligence Report, which also explores how the hard-core anti-gay movement in America is becoming more extreme in the face of gay rights advances.
“As Americans become more accepting of homosexuals, the most extreme elements of the anti-gay movement are digging in their heels and continuing to defame gays and lesbians with falsehoods that grow more incendiary by the day,” said Mark Potok, editor of the Intelligence Report. “The leaders of this movement may deny it, but it seems clear that their demonization of homosexuals plays a role in fomenting the violence, hatred and bullying we’re seeing.”

Goodbye, Mom and Dad. Hello, Parent One and Parent Two.

Parent One, Parent Two to replace references to

mother, father on passport forms

By Mary Beth Sheridan and Ed O'Keefe, Washington Post Staff Writers. Friday, January 7, 2011

The State Department has decided to make U.S. passport application forms "gender neutral" by removing references to mother and father, officials said, in favor of language that describes one's parentage somewhat less tenderly.

The change is "in recognition of different types of families," according to a statement issued just before Christmas that drew widespread attention Friday after a Fox News report.

The announcement of the change was buried at the end of a Dec. 22 news release, titled "Consular Report of Birth Abroad Certificate Improvements," that highlighted unrelated security changes.

The new policy is a win for gay rights groups, a vocal and financially generous Democratic voting bloc that has pushed for the change since Barack Obama began his presidential transition in late 2008. The decision follows last month's vote to end the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, which gay leaders consider one of their biggest victories in years.

Fred Sainz, vice president of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights advocacy group, called the news "a positive step forward for all American families. It was time that the federal government acknowledged the reality that hundreds of thousands of kids in this country are being raised by same-sex parents."

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, blasted it as reflecting the "topsy-turvy world of left-wing political correctness."

"This is clearly designed," he said in a statement, "to advance the causes of same-sex 'marriage' and homosexual parenting without statutory authority, and violates the spirit if not the letter of the Defense of Marriage Act," the federal law that defines marriage as between one man and one woman.

He called on Congress to take action.

It was not immediately clear whether a similar change would be made to all federal documents. But after Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced in 2009 that partners of gay American diplomats would be eligible for benefits accorded to spouses, the rest of the U.S. government followed suit.

In 2000, Clinton was the first wife of a president to march in a gay-pride parade, and as secretary of state she has advocated on behalf of gay rights. In a speech in June she said the United States "was elevating our rights dialogues with other governments and conducting public diplomacy to protect the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons."

Rosemary Macray of the State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs shrugged off complaints of political correctness and described the switch as an unremarkable bureaucratic tweak.

"Really, there have been so many changes in the last 10 or 15 years with reproductive technology and the like, and so this is why it is important for us to accurately reflect families in these applications," she said.

The DS-11 form is required of first-time passport applicants and children younger than 16. The change will go into effect Feb. 1 and will be part of an already-scheduled revision of passport forms, Macray said.

"It's not going to really involve any expense to taxpayers," she said.

sheridanm@washpost.com ed.okeefe@washingtonpost.com

4th Annual TransOhio Transgender & Ally Conference

4th Annual TransOhio Transgender & Ally Conference will be held the weekend of

August 5-7, 2011 in Columbus, Ohio!

Call for Presenters

Interested in submitting a proposal for a workshop, presentation, discussion or performance? For information, visit the Submission Page.

This year we are expanding our Conference this year to include:

Friday, August 5th: Provider’s Day

Explicitly for medical, legal, and social work professionals

Continuing Education Units (CEU)

More information coming soon.

Continuing Legal Education (CLE)

More information coming soon.

Interested in submitting a proposal for a class, seminar or workshop? For information, visit Submission Page.

Submit your proposal online! Submissions are due Friday March 18, 2011

Saturday, August 6: General Conference

Covering a broad range of interests throughout the community

Sunday, August 7: General Conference

Continuation of programs with a diversity of topics

Volunteers

As with any event, it takes people-power to make events such as the Conference happen. Volunteers will be

needed for Friday at the Provider’s Day and throughout the General Conference:

* Registration/Check-In

* Setup/Break-down

* Session proctors

* Information table

* Meet & Greet

* Saturday evening socials

* And more!

Interested in volunteering? Contact our Volunteer Coordinator, Sarah (sarah@transohio.org).

Sponsorship Opportunities

Do you work for a company or are you involved in an organization that you think might like to be a sponsor of this event? If so, visit our Sponsorship Opportunities page!

For more conference info, visit http://www.transohio.org/

Film Showing to Benefit TransOhio

They say that when someone comes out of the closet, they can't stop talking about it. Vancouver filmmaker Gwen Haworth not only talked she made a movie. Using archival family footage, interviews, phone messages, and hand-drawn animation, Haworth's documentary SHE'S A BOY I KNEW begins in 2000 with Steven Haworth's decision to come out to his family about his life-long female gender identity. The resulting auto-ethnography is not only an exploration into the filmmaker's process of transition from biological male to female, from Steven to Gwen, but also an emotionally charged account of the individual experiences, struggles, and stakes that her two sisters, mother, father, best friend and wife brought to Gwen's transition.

Under Haworth's sensitive eye, each stepping stone in the process of transitioning becomes an opportunity to explore her community's and our own underlying assumptions about gender and sexuality. When Steven starts to wear his wife Malgosia's clothing, she struggles with whether Steve "wants to be with me or to be me;" when Steven changes her name to Gwen, her father comments, that's "when I realized I lost my son;" Haworth's gender reassignment surgery, or vaginoplasty, forces her sister Kim to grapple with her own experiences in the medical establishment and raises questions about the implications of the medicalization of gender.

In these tender and difficult moments, SHE'S A BOY I KNEW forces us to question our own assumptions about the role that names, clothing, and anatomy play in our constructions of gender identity. As her transition progresses, Gwen is forced to reckon with the end of her marriage and the loss of her status as son and brother. But in doing so, she also discovers that while the nature of personal relationships may change, the love and support present within those relationships can remain just as powerful and sometimes even more so.

At turns painful, funny, and awkward, SHE'S A BOY I KNEW explores the frustrations, fears, questions, and hopes experienced by Gwen and her family as they struggle to understand and embrace her newly revealed identity.

Monday, February 21 · 8:00pm - 10:00pm

Gateway Film Center

1550 North High Street

Columbus, Ohio

$6—Benefits TransOhio

Peer Support for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Transgender (LGBT) Individuals

by Ronald E. Hellman, M.D., FAPA, Director,

LGBT Affirmative Program of South Beach Psychiatric Center

The LGBT Affirmative Program (LGBTAP) of South Beach Psychiatric Center was initiated in 1996 as one of several multicultural services provided by this large, public sector community mental health center in New York City. The program is based at the Heights–Hill Mental Health Service in downtown Brooklyn, one of seven outpatient clinics at South Beach, which serves a multi-ethnic, low socioeconomic population with serious, chronic mental illnesses.

Several years into the program, we observed that our sexual minority population, much like our general psychiatric population with significant disabilities, had great difficulty reintegrating within the larger LGBT community and the general community at large, despite the provision of LGBT–affirmative therapies. We came to believe that it was incumbent upon us to facilitate the creation of a socio-cultural component within a recovery model, in addition to the psychosocial and medical services already offered.

This resulted in the creation of an affiliated membership program, the Rainbow Heights Club (RHC). As members, individuals did not have to be enrolled at the clinic, and this allowed LGBT patients from all over the New York metropolitan area to attend. The larger numbers helped to approximate the diversity found within the city’s LGBT community. And, with the creation of an LGBT consumer advisory group, members came up with a name for the club and helped steer program development.

LGBT individuals with major mental illnesses can be reluctant to engage in psychiatric treatment and adhere to treatment regimens over time, because they are less likely to identify with mainstream settings. They are a minority in these settings, and are also subject to stigma in the LGBT community because of their mental illness and in psychiatric settings because of their sexual minority status. And, unlike other ethnic and racial minorities, their families typically do not share their sexual identity. Thus they can be particularly prone to a lack of affirmation and supports.

LGBT patients have to adapt to largely heterosexual, cisgendered (those comfortable in their gender of birth) mental health settings in virtually all areas of service delivery. Well-intentioned, “integrated” settings fall short when they do not provide safe, culturally relevant opportunities for the alienated LGBT patient. Culturally appropriate programming, fostered at all organizational levels, has the power to transform these patients into LGBT persons in recovery.

A crucial component of recovery for the LGBT consumer is peer support. LGBT peer support allows for a process of authentic identification with others like oneself. It promotes forms of socialization, role modeling, and individuation not otherwise available in the generic setting. Mainstream cultural settings often inadvertently rob the LGBT patient of their experience as a sexual minority person with a different, yet valid, worldview. LGBTAP and RHC were organized to facilitate peer support by bringing a “proto-community” of individuals together that had never previously connected.

Separation from the dominant heterosexual, cisgendered world and connection with sexual minority peers is a common step in the healthy psychological development of sexual minority individuals. Major mental illness can tear people away from that process, and mainstream psychiatric settings typically provide no substitute. LGBTAP and RHC created the conditions and opportunities for these individuals to connect with each other, thereby creating a unique cultural community in which pride, place, self-esteem, support, and hope could be nurtured, as the weight of mental illness became merely a shared part of that larger process.

As a unique, regional program, RHC has served almost 500 members. Collaborating with staff and peer specialists, members have made their needs and interests known, the result being an ever-evolving program of groups, support, skills training, and advocacy. An outcome study of this recovery model found that participants attributed significant improvement in adherence with treatment regimens, reduction in psychiatric symptoms, enhanced self-esteem, improved stress tolerance and hopefulness to the program, despite an average of 16 years of previous psychiatric treatment.¹ To appreciate the depth of this program, please visit http://www.rainbowheights.org.

¹ Hellman, R.E.; Huygen, C.; Klein, E.; Chew, M.; & Uttaro, T. (2010.) A study of members of a support and advocacy program for LGBT persons with major mental illness. Best Practices in Mental Health: An International Journal, 6(2), 13–26.

From "Recovery to Practice (RTP) Weekly Highlights" Volume 2, Issue 4, Feb. 4, 2011. To access the RTP Weekly Highlights and other RTP materials, please visit http://www.dsgonline.com/rtp/resources.html.

Bush's Daughter, in a Break, Endorses Gay Marriage

U.S.   | February 01, 2011 By MICHAEL BARBARO
As president, George W. Bush backed a constitutional amendment against same-sex marriage. Now one of his daughters, Barbara, has come out in favor of  it at: emailthis@m3.1ga2nytimes.com

Will she then repudiate her affirmation like Cindy McCain?

Goodbye, Mom and Dad. Hello, Parent One and Parent Two.

By Mary Beth Sheridan and Ed O'Keefe Washington Post Staff Writers

Parent One, Parent Two to replace references to mother, father on passport forms

Friday, January 7, 2011; 11:47 PM

The State Department has decided to make U.S. passport application forms "gender neutral" by removing references to mother and father, officials said, in favor of language that describes one's parentage somewhat less tenderly.

The change is "in recognition of different types of families," according to a statement issued just before Christmas that drew widespread attention Friday after a Fox News report.

The announcement of the change was buried at the end of a Dec. 22 news release, titled "Consular Report of Birth Abroad Certificate Improvements," that highlighted unrelated security changes.

The new policy is a win for gay rights groups, a vocal and financially generous Democratic voting bloc that has pushed for the change since Barack Obama began his presidential transition in late 2008. The decision follows last month's vote to end the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, which gay leaders consider one of their biggest victories in years.

Fred Sainz, vice president of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights advocacy group, called the news "a positive step forward for all American families. It was time that the federal government acknowledged the reality that hundreds of thousands of kids in this country are being raised by same-sex parents."

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, blasted it as reflecting the "topsy-turvy world of left-wing political correctness." "This is clearly designed," he said in a statement, "to advance the causes of same-sex 'marriage' and homosexual parenting without statutory authority, and violates the spirit if not the letter of the Defense of Marriage Act," the federal law that defines marriage as between one man and one woman.

He called on Congress to take action.

It was not immediately clear whether a similar change would be made to all federal documents. But after Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced in 2009 that partners of gay American diplomats would be eligible for benefits accorded to spouses, the rest of the U.S. government followed suit.

In 2000, Clinton was the first wife of a president to march in a gay-pride parade, and as secretary of state she has advocated on behalf of gay rights. In a speech in June she said the United States "was elevating our rights dialogues with other governments and conducting public diplomacy to protect the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons."

Rosemary Macray of the State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs shrugged off complaints of political correctness and described the switch as an unremarkable bureaucratic tweak. "Really, there have been so many changes in the last 10 or 15 years with reproductive technology and the like, and so this is

why it is important for us to accurately reflect families in these applications," she said.

The DS-11 form is required of first-time passport applicants and children younger than 16. The change will go into effect Feb. 1 and will be part of an already-scheduled revision of passport forms, Macray said.

"It's not going to really involve any expense to taxpayers," she said.

sheridanm@washpost.com ed.okeefe@washingtonpost.com