Challenges to two sodomy
laws advance in courts ... Page 3
First board members
elected for March Page 11
The Carolinas’ Most Comprehensive Gay & Lesbian Newspaper
Published Every Two Weeks On Recycled Paper • Volume 13, Number 4 • July 11, 1998 • FREE
Another “Gang of Five” commissioner goes down in defeat
by Wanda Pico
Special to Q-Notes
CHARLOTTE—Mecklenburg County
Commissioner Hoyle Martin failed to obtain
enough signatures to run as an independent,
at-large candidate in Novembers county com
mission election. Martin, the only Democrat
considered a member of the “Gang of Five,”
fell well short of the 16,128 signatures he
needed to appear on the ballot as an indepen
dent candidate. By the June 26 deadline, the
Commissioner and his supporters had only
gathered slightly more than 14,000 signatures
— some of which were later disqualified be
cause the signers weren’t eligible county voters.
Martin’s District 2 constituency is predomi
nantly black and overwhelmingly Democratic.
He angered both demographics when he sided
with the board’s four Republicans in several
controversial votes last year.
Martin told the Charlotte Observer that he
thinks his role in the April 1, 1997 commis
sion meeting, when he voted with Republicans
to cut county arts funding because he objected
to a play that portrayed gay themes, led to his
failure to gather enough names. He was prob
ably also hurt by his vote
to restrict any agency re
ceiving county funding
from discussing homo
sexuality.
Martin said he doesn’t
regret his vote on any is
sue, but did note that he
was wrong to have once
commented that if he had
his way, “we’d shove these
[gay and lesbian] people
off the face of the earth.”
“In retrospect, that’s the
only thing I regret of all
that’s gone on,” he said.
“That was wrong, cruel,
and totally inhuman.
Last December, Martin
committed what many
saw as the ultimate party betrayal when he voted
to make Republican Tom Bush Commission
chairman and himself vice chairman — rather
than support Democrat
Parks Helms.
In response. Demo
crats fielded a candidate
to run against Martin.
The loss of party sup
port prompted him to
change his affiliation to
independent and mount
an at-large campaign.
Conservative Republi
cans were leading the ef
fort, but their support
eroded during county
budget talks. Commis
sioner Bill James, the
Republican budget’s au
thor, said Martin
pledged his support
prior to the vote, but
Commissioner Hoyle Martin
when the time came, instead helped the Demo
crats defeat the proposal. Martin said that the
proposed budget would cut too much from
social services and environmental protections.
Republicans accused Martin of being deceit
ful, leading his GOP foot soldiers to jump ship.
Some asked the Board of Elections to remove
their names from his petition, including the
other ousted Gang member George Higgins.
“Even under the best of circumstances, it
would have been difficult to get 16,000 signa
tures on a petition,” commissioner Parks Helms
said. “The unfortunate circumstances of recent
months have made it more difficult. Not all of
that was Hoyle’s doing.... Some of it was the
mean-spirited environment that we have been
operating in.”
Martin’s failed candidacy leaves seven at-
large candidates running for three seats. They
are: Democrats Helms and Becky Carney and
former commissioner Jim Richardson; Repub
licans Bush, Tom Vance and Steve Helms; and
Libertarian Chris Cole, who is openly gay. ▼
Student’s complaint triggers civil rights victoiy New GLBT PAC
by Joneil Adriano
Special to Q-Notes
FAYETTEVILLE, AR—In an important
step in combating harassment of lesbian and
gay students nationwide, the federal govern
ment reached agreement with the Fayetteville
-PaWtcrSchools in Arkansas on broad civil rights
protections in the schools.
The “Commitment to Resolve,” entered
into by the federal government and the school
system, remedies an administrative complaint
brought by Fayetteville student William
Wagner.
Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund
represented Wagner, now 17, and his parents,
in a sex discrimination complaint to the Office
of Civil Rights (OCR) of the US Dept, of Edu
cation. The complaint is the first filed under
Title IX on behalf of a harassed gay student.
OCR enforces compliance with Title IX, a
federal statute that prohibits sex discrimination,
including sexual harassment. In March of 1997,
OCR released new Title IX guidelines for
schools which, for the first time, made explicit
reference to “gay or lesbian students” as also
being covered by federal prohibitions against
sexual harassment.
“This is the first case in the nation under
the new Tide IX guidelines’ explicit coverage
of sexual harassment directed at gay students,”
said Lambda staff attorney David S. Buckel.
“School principals who question whether sexual
harassment of gay students is illegal will learn a
big lesson from this breakthrough. And now,
more lesbian and gay students may be able to
finish high school,” he said.
Under the agreement with the OCR, the
school district must overhaul its policies and
procedures and train faculty, staff and students
with written reports of progress to the federal
office until June 1999.
Throughout 1995 and 1996, several stu
dents harassed Wagner in grades eight to 10 at
his school; the harassment escalated to a gay
bashing by a gang that broke Wagner’s nose and
bruised a kidney. Criminal charges resulted in
probation for those students, but others at the
school continued to sexually harass Wagner.
After the school failed to address the on-going
harassment, Wagner and his parents filed their
OCR complaint in January 1997. The Wagners
subsequently pulled William out of school in
fear for his life.
Wagner’s mother Carolyn welcomed the
agreement. “My heart broke when my son was
so terribly abused, just for being himself A
mother’s dream for her children is that they be
happy and healthy, and this includes being safe
at school,” she said, adding, “This agreement
with Fayetteville Schools, hopefully, will safe
guard many parents’ dreams and protect their
kids.”
Carolyn Wagner and her husband Bill
worked closely with Parents and Friends of Les
bians and Gays (PFLAG), of which they are
members, to meet with federal officials on this
issue. After hearing of the resolution, PFLAG
Executive Director Kirsten Kingdon stated,
“We are relieved to hear that the US Depart
ment of Education is now making it clear to
schools that they have an obligation to protect
all of our children.” T
New book examines the rituals of gay weddings
by Mary Geraghty
Special to Q-Notes
IOWA CITY, lA—As activists and politi
cians debate the merits and drawbacks to same-
sex marriages, a University of Iowa professor
has taken a step back to look at the rituals in
volved in these ceremonies and what they rep
resent for the couples as well as for society as a
whole.
Ellen Lewin, an associate professor of
women’s studies and anthropology, interviewed
more than 50 gay
and lesbian
couples who had
held “commit
ment ceremonies”
as part of the an-
thropological
fieldwork for her
new book Recog- —————
nizing Ourselves: Ceremonies of Lesbian and Gay
Commitment (Columbia University Press,
1998).
Although she is publishing at a time when
same-sex marriage is a hot political topic, Lewin
said she came to the study “less out of my ac
tive concern with the implications of the
struggle to achieve legality for same-sex mar-
'7 found what seemed at first to
be curious combinations of
rebellious and conventional
impulses" — Ellen Lewin
riage than from a desire to fashion a cultural
understanding of lesbian and gay weddings as
powerful and complex ritual occasions.”
The book examines the rituals involved in
same-sex marriages and sets forth five central
themes related to the ceremonies: family, com
munity, authenticity, resistance and tradition.
Lewin found two distinct views on same-
sex marriage within the gay community. Some
couples see their marriage as a way for their
relationship to be recognized just as a hetero-
sexual relation
ship would be —
in essence, a way
for them to be
“just like every
body else.” On
the other hand,
some gay couples
think that by
publicly announcing their love for and com
mitment to one another in a ceremony, they
are advancing the more “radical” or “in your
face” aspects of gay culture.
However, Lewin said that while most
couples identify with only one of those two
viewpoints, most ceremonies she observed ex
hibited both “traditional” and “radical” quali
ties. “What people think they’re doing and what
they are actually doing are really very differ
ent,” she said.
Lewin said that her research did not iden
tify any “typical” or “exemplary” gay wedding,
but that the ceremonies have in common the
fact they are “grounded in a particular social,
political, and historical context in which gen
der is an embattled domain and inequality
based on sexual orientation has become visible
to a perhaps unprecedented degree.
“As such, these ceremonies draw on related
sources of meaning and stand together as co
herent reflections of what it means to be gay
and American on the eve of the millennium,”
Lewin said.
Lewin’s interest in the subject of gay and les
bian commitment ceremonies was sparked in
1992 when she and her partner held their own
ceremony. Her academic work on motherhood
among lesbians, which resulted in the 1993
book Lesbian Mothers: Accounts of Gender in
American Culture, seemed to be a natural lead-
in to studying same-sex marriages.
“In my study of lesbian mothers, I found
what seemed at first to be curious combina
tions of rebellious and conventional impulses,”
See BOOK on page 9
in the Triad
by Bob Conn
Special to Q-Notes
KERNERSVILLE, NC—The Triad Advo
cacy Network (TAN), a socio-political group
that addresses gay, lesbian, bisexual and
transgender issues in the Triad area ofNC, has
voted to establish TAN-PAC, the Triad Advo
cacy Network Political Action Committee.
TAN-PAC will concentrate on local elec
tions: boards of county commissioners, school
boards, city councils/boards of aldermen and
races for sheriff, initially focusing on Forsyth
and Guilford counties, but eventually making
recommendations throughout the Triad.
For five years, TAN has worked in advocacy,
voter registration and education and media re
lations in the Triad — and those efforts will
continue — but state elections laws preclude
the group from actually making election rec
ommendations or giving financial support to
worthy candidates. Political action committees,
however, can legally operate in both of those
areas.
TAN-PAC will serve as a local parallel to
NC Pride PAC, which focuses on candidates
and issues relating to the NC General Assem
bly, and the Human Rights Campaign, which
works on the federal level.
Unfortunately, neither the Human Rights
Campaign nor NC Pride PAC has the resources
to operate at the local level — where the GLBT
community’s fight with the Religious Right will
be won or lost. Conservative leaders have de
clared it their goal to take over every school
board and are succeeding. Some right-wing
candidates have already been elected in the Triad
and more are running.
Contributions are needed to counter the
effort. Because TAN is a political action com
mittee, contributions to the group are not tax
deductible and donors must be recorded by
name. Although anonymous donations are pro
hibited, only gifts of more than $100 during
an election cycle have to be reported to the state.
All lesser donations are exempt from this re
quirement.
The Religious Right’s number one advan
tage is money. With that money, they produce
mass mailings, voter education information,
advertisements and hire staff. They distribute
their literature in conservative churches and
directly fund candidates who support their
causes.
See PAC on page 9