Out on. the Town
Blumenthal launches gay club
page 36
Simply gorgeous
Gardens of the Carolinas
page 29
Appointment
Gay man named judge
page 9
Noted . Notable . Noteworthy . LGBT News & Views
SPECIAL-W/ilDENING & INTERIORS ISSUE
Volume 21 . Number 25 www.q-notes.com April 21.2007
Proudly walking the Walk for AIDS
Jordan and his whimsical flock have raised about
$3,700 for AIDS Walk Charlotte thus far.
HIV-positive nine-year-old tops
fundraising for upcoming AIDS
benefit
by David Stout . Q-Notes staff
Jordan Mitzel was born in the Spring of
1998. To say that he arrived with the deck
stacked against him is sort of like saying
Albert Einstein
was bright or
that Brad Pitt is
cute. It’s true, but
it doesn’t really
convey the pro
portion.
Jordan’s birth
mother was an
alcoholic, crack-
addicted, HIV-
infected prosti
tute. She was
apparently trav
eling the East
Coast on a ben
der when she went into labor in Charlotte.
Jordan was born drug addicted and suffering,
from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. He needed
assistance just to breathe.
According to a Johns Hopkins report, HIV
infects approximately one in four babies born
to HIV-positive women not receiving medical
treatment. Jordan was among the misfortu-
nate minority. However, a few days after his
birth something finally went his way.
His mother abandoned him at the hospital.
At five days old Jordan was placed in the
home of Beverly Mitzel and Sonja Austin.
After 11 months together the couple, at the
time 37 and 39 years old respectively, were
ready to start a family. They had already com
pleted the necessary steps for becoming foster
parents in Mecklenburg County. All they were
waiting for was a phone calf.
“I got the call from our foster care agency
at work,” remembers Mitzel, then a UNC-
Charlotte employee who now works for the
Regional AIDS Interfaith Network (RA.IN).
“We had requested an HIV-positive child'
and, I think, he was one of only two born in
the county that year. With the improved med
ications the rates were way down. They told us
he was three days old and we could have him
at five days, when he could be released from
the NieU (newborn intensive care unit).”
Caring for Jordan was a formidable task.
His viral load was in the millions so he was
immediately put on two liquid medications. At
six months he was switched to a powerful
multi-drug cocktail.
“Oh my god, it was awful,” Mitzel says.
“The liquid medicines were foul tasting. We
had to hold him down to give them to him.
The liquid form of Ritonovir tastes like pep
permint flavored lighter fluid and the consis
tency is almost like Vaseline. It would coat his
mouth and nothing cuts it; milk doesn’t cut it.
He’d have this
foam coming out
of his mouth and
then he’d vomit.
So, we’d have to
start over.”
Undaunted,
Mitzel and Austin
accepted a second
special needs child
when Jordan was
three. Two-year-
old Joseph was
born with a genet
ic condition that
prevented his
intestines from functioning properly. A per
manent colostomy was the only option to save
his life.
in 2003, four-year-old Alexis and her nine-
month-old half-sister Malaysia were wel-
AIDS
W IK
corned in.
Today, all four children are adopted. The
family’s unique circumstances and rich diver
sity, including the fact that Mitzel, Austin and
Jordan are white while Joseph, Alexis and
Malaysia are black, has forged a powerful and
intentional bond.
At the cusp of nine, Jordan’s life has settled
into a routine of elementary school, church
services at MCC Charlotte, spring and fall
league baseball, pets, video games, skate
boarding and a twice-daily dose of
seven piUs and ISccs of AZT. His
viral load is undetectable and he
is healthy.
“About she months ago he
finally asked me if he had HI\^’
Mitzel says. “It was shortly after
he went to the pediatric infectious
disease clinicTie visits every four
months. They check his T-cell
count, viral load,'make sure we’re
' compliant with the meds — that
sort of thing. He saw the posters
on the clinic walls. He just said,
‘DoIhaveHIVorA-I-D-S?’He
doesn’t say‘AIDS,’ he pronounces
the letters.”
see HIV on
Jordan wants everyone to know that “sometimes
people are scared of people with HIV and they don’t
have to be.’’
Religious right tries to derail hate crimes laws
Propaganda campaign
based on lies and half-truths
by Ralph G. Neas
WASHINGTON, D.C. —On
March 15, the body of Ryan Keith
Skipper, 25, was found bloodied
and abandoned on a roadside in
Wahneta, Fla. Police have charged
nvo men with first-degree murder
and announced that witness testi
mony makes clear that Skipper was
killed because he was gay. The sad
reality of brutal crimes motivated
by hatred is the impetus for bipar
tisan federal hate crimes legislation
recently introduced in Congress.
Currently federal legislators are
considering three bills that would
put an end to hate crimes, employ
ment discrimination and “Don’t
■ \
Legislation is urgently needed to
stamp out hate crimes against
LGBT Americans.
N.C. introduces non-discrimination legislation
page 18
Ask, Don’t Tell.”
The American
public has shown
that it wants
Congress to pass
hate crimes laws,
which are designed
to prevent and
punish violent acts
that target individ
uals from a partic
ular part of the
community for
intimidation and
physical harm. But
Religious Right
groups are so eager
to prevent any legal
recognition or pro
tection for gay and
lesbian Americans
that they are waging an aggressive
disinformation campaign against these legal
protections.
Their strategy? Create a distraction from
the reality of violent crimes by claiming that
such laws are really designed to criminalize
Christianity.
The campaign is, of course, dishonest to
the core. But it is part of a larger strategy that
has been politically and financially useful to
Religious Right leaders over the years. They
tell millions of Americans, week after week,
that gay rights advocates are out to silence
conservative Christians, criminalize the read
ing of the Bible, and force people to choose
between their faith and public service. It’s not
true. But it serves the radical right’s political
goals: it is easier to convince Americans to
support discrimination — even to oppose
laws designed to discourage violent hate
crimes — if you have first convinced them
see american on 6
LGBT Iraqi deaths continue to rise
page 20