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Latin@ Citywide Panel To Focus On Latino Community & Response To Homophobic Hate Crimes

21 Oct 2010

Many of our NY area readers may have already heard of the brutal and violent crimes against three gay Bronx Latino men (two who were 17 years-old) who were allegedly sodomized and tortured by several youth and adults involved with a gang. Eight men have been arraigned for gang assault, sexual abuse and unlawful imprisonment and a total of eleven men have been arrested.

In response to these acts of violence Latin@ Citywide has invited me to sit on a panel to discuss ways we can respond to such acts of violence, homophobia, and misogyny among our community. This is not the first conversation to occur in the LGBTQI community in The Bronx since these attacks, but it may be the first one to be led and centered in the Latino community.

I’ll be sharing this opportunity with Rev. Carmen Hernanded, Founder / President of NYC LGBT Chamber of Commerce who I met earlier this year at the 2010 El Diario Mujeres Destacadas Awards ceremony as we were both recipients this year. Also in attendence wtill be Andrés Duque, Blabbeando Blogger and LGBT Activist, and Ephraim Cruz, Co- Founder of Bronx for Change.

I’m happy to have been invited to speak at this space, it represents an attempt to expand this conversation in ways that are often ignored. As many VL readers know, my ideas on gang involvement and affiliation as well as sexuality education and access for youth of Color, are not very popular; and I’ll be speaking from this space. Because there is no press or elected officials allowed I will be speaking as Bianca the sexologist, professor, educator and activist.

This event is open to the public and I do hope that if you are in NYC and are able to attend that you please do so. I’d love to meet some of our readers in 3-D and have this conversation and action plan moved in a way that is productive and inclusive! If you are interested in attending please RSVP via email by October 22, 2010 to: jcartagena@CSSNY.ORG

The original email invitation is below with full details. Read more…

On These Shoulders We Stand

3:50 pm By la Macha · California|GLBT · 2 Comments

19 Jul 2010

So far, I’ve only made it through the first two parts of this documentary–but it’s so good, I had to share. Usually, most of us in the LGBT/queer community know all about Stonewall and the organizing in the East. It’s more rare to really know anything at all about the organizing in the West, much less organizing that queer Latin@s and people of color did. This is fabulous. Espcially stay on the look out for Nancy Valverde!

On These Shoulders We Stand tells the stories of 11 older members of the Los Angeles lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community from the 1950s into the early 1980s. According to the filmmakers, the documentary, showing at film festivals around the country, “brings to light Los Angeles’ significant, yet hidden, role in U.S. gay history by interweaving first-person accounts with narration and seldom-seen archival materials.”

The producers want to spread the word that “not everything began with Stonewall.”

The 11 participants in the film, directed by Glenne McElhinney, are:

Dr. Maria Dolores Diaz: Activist in the Chicano and Feminist Rights Movement.
Nancy Valverde: A barber who was arrested and jailed many times.
Kevin Thomas: Los Angeles Times writer and film critic.
Dr. Marsha Epstein: Founding physician at the Herself Feminist Women’s Health Center.
Dale Reynolds: Hollywood actor, founder of Gay Actors Rap in Los Angeles.
Margo Strik: A graphic artist, active in Southern California Women for Understanding.
Miki Jackson: Friend of Morris Kight, early volunteer at the Gay Community Services Center.
Ivy Bottini: A founding member of the National Organization for Women.
Don Norman: Came out at a very early age in Los Angeles, Chemical Dependency Counselor.
Troy Perry: A Pentecostal Preacher, founded Metropolitan Community Church, in Los Angeles.
Mia Yamamoto: Attorney, Los Angeles Public Defenders Office.

ETA: Apparently there are only two clips! I thought that the whole documentary was online, I guess not! Anyway, the two clips are really good–they point to a really important time in our history and they highlight non-white folks, which I think is especially important. If white LGBT folks don’t know much about their history, non-whites know even less. So it’s good that they have multiple communities highlighted.

Remembering Amanda Gonzalez-Andujar : “She Wasn’t a Loner, She Wasn’t a Throwaway”

4:17 pm By Maegan la Mamita Mala · GLBT|Justice|Violence|Women · 4 Comments

28 Apr 2010

I did not know Amanda Gonzalez-Andujar in her life here, but after meeting and sharing space at a memorial and at a vigil this past Saturday with those who did know her, I felt the love, respect, and pride that her life was reflected back.

The memorial service was held at The Metropolitan Community Church in Midtown Manhattan, a Christian church who primarily ministers to the LGBT community nationwide. Organized by Amanda’s friend Elizabeth M. Rivera-Valentine, the memorial service and vigil were an answer to the transphobic portrayal that Gonzalez-Andujar received in the mainstream press after the 29 year old was found killed in her own apartment in Glendale, Queens. Rivera-Valentine, a health educator with Transcend in Boston, especially wanted to counter the notion that transgender members of our comunidades aren’t loved and don’t have families, actual and/or chosen that care about them and will fight for them. Rivera-Valentine shared how she met Amanda and how struck she was at seeing how supportive Amanda’s family was during her transition and how supportive her community was. Rivera-Valentine then shared a poem about how her own feminine spirit continued to beat the odds and the hate.
Read more…

FIRM Calls for Immigration Reform to Include ALL Families

2:14 pm By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Family|GLBT|Immigration|Justice · 5 Comments

8 Mar 2010

A few days after the #LGBTCIR summit, The Fair Immigration Reform Movement (FIRM), an organization inside the RI4A Coalition, stepped up publicly to ask that all families be included in Comprehensive Immigration Reform, including gay, lesbians, bisexual, and transgender families. Specifically, FIRM, a project of the Center for Community Change, came out in favor of including Uniting American Families Act (UAFA) language, language that was specifically excluded from Congressman’s Gutierrez’s CIR ASAP proposal.

Including UAFA language isn’t the only way to ensure that all familias are included in immigration reform but its one way and FIRM’s endorsement of this language should serve as a model to other organizations within the RI4A umbrella, especially as eyes focus on Senator Schumer and his CIR proposal and the March 21st march in D.C.

I really hope that all the organizations and that are demanding immigration reform follow FIRM’s lead and make inclusion part of their official mission. Justicia can’t leave anyone behind.

Read FIRM’s entire statement after the jump.

#LGBTCIR = Coalition Fail?

9:13 pm By Maegan la Mamita Mala · GLBT|Immigration|New York City · 24 Comments

28 Feb 2010

I spent Saturday afternoon at a briefing for LGBT bloggers, editors and reporters at the Desmond Tutu Center, organized by the LGBT Subcommittee of the Four Freedoms Fund. I should note that VivirLatino wasn’t originally invited to the event, but I attended upon hearing about it from Prerna Lal of DREAMActivist and Change.org. I went to the event having already paticipating in conversations about the intersections of the movements at the NOI Summit last summer and Netroots Nation. You all remember how well that went, right?

The LGBTCIR conversation wasn’t any different. First I should say that I missed the entire morning part of the session because I was mami’ing, working, and trying to get information on multiple families in Chile. I know that I missed a wonderful presentation from The Trail of DREAMs that inspired everyone. From Change.org:

The high point of the blogger summit was still the DREAM Act-eligible students who are walking the Trail of DREAMs from Florida to Washington, D.C. — a project of Florida Immigrant Rights Coalition, Students Working for Equal Rights, Presente, and DreamActivist. Two of the walkers who happen to be queer immigrants and in a relationship with each other — Juan Rodriguez (20) and Felipe Matos (23) — called in from Atlanta, Georgia, to discuss the ways in which the broken immigration system fails them.

Juan is documented while Felipe is undocumented. Their only legal recourse to stay together is either passage of the DREAM Act or the Uniting American Families Act, since immigration law will not recognize their partnership. Their bravery and willingness to not only speak out, but risk detention and their lives, by walking hundreds of miles through Klan-country was awe-inspiring.

Queer Ricans En San Juan, Puerto Rico!

11:48 am By BiancaLaureano · Uncategorized · 2 Comments

8 Feb 2010

Author and activist Dr. Larry La Fountain-Stokes will be in Puerto Rico discussing his amazing book Queer Ricans: Cultures and Sexualities In The Diaspora. Here’s what his website says about the upcoming events. Please attend, spread the word, and support if you can! Larry is an amazing writer and listening to him read his work is a treat!

Están todas y todos invitadas/os a dos eventos sobre Queer Ricans esta semana:

jueves, 11 de febrero: Presentación de Queer Ricans auspiciada por el Colectivo Literario Homoerótica, con presentación por Rubén Ríos Avila e intervenciones artísticas por el bailarín Norberto Gabriel y el artista y performero Freddie Mercado Velázquez, Nuyorican Café, Calle San Francisco #312 (entrando por el callejón), Viejo San Juan, 7:30 pm.

(Saldrá artículo sobre el libro en el periódico Primera Hora el jueves 11 de febrero.)

viernes, 12 de febrero: Conversatorio con Larry La Fountain-Stokes acerca de su libro Queer Ricans. Con: Carmen Luisa González, Agnes Lugo-Ortiz y Catherine Marsh. Auspicia el Programa de Estudios de la Mujer y Género. Donde: Seminario Federico de Onís de la Facultad de Humanidades, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Río Piedras, 10:00 am.

Call for submissions for 2010 Gay Latino Fiction Anthology

9:23 am By Maegan La Mala · Books|GLBT · 5 Comments

5 Jan 2010

Call for submissions for 2010 Gay Latino Fiction Anthology
Deadline: January 11, 2010

Lethe Press’ new imprint for LGBT writers of color, Tincture, has announced a call for a gay Latino fiction anthology.

The anthology is seeking unpublished fiction (short stories, novel excerpts, short-short stories and flash fiction) by queer Latino writers to take the pulse of contemporary gay Latino literature, stories, experiences and perspectives. It will present a who’s who of queer Latino men writing fiction today. Authors of selected stories will be modestly compensated.

The collection is slated for publication in September 2010 and the submissions are due by January 11, 2010.

A summary and full description of the brief are given below.

Guidelines
• Unpublished short story or novel excerpt of up to 7500 words (No multiple submissions in these categories)
• Unpublished Flash Fiction or short-short stories (up to 3 stories no more than 1000 words per story in these two categories only)
• Non-genre-specific
• Gay centric theme or LGBT characters
• Written primarily in English (Stories translated into English from Spanish are acceptable)
• Thought-provoking and original

Submission procedure
• Submission deadline is 11:59 p.m. EST on January 11, 2010.
• Please submit work to LatinoLethePress@gmail.com.
• Include a brief bio (no more than 200 words) of the author as a cover page. In the top left corner of the cover page, include: submission title, category, author’s name, address, phone, e-mail and (website, if available).
• Submissions should be sent as a Microsoft word or RTF document.
• Format: Single sided, dbl. spaced, 12 pt. font, 1 inch margins.
• Please submit unpublished, publication ready pieces only.
• All submissions will be reviewed by the editor.

Tincture is an imprint of Lethe Press and publishes work by LGBT writers of color.

First Legally Recognized Gay Marriage in Latin America

12:25 pm By Maegan La Mala · Argentina|GLBT · 1 Comment

29 Dec 2009

Yesterday Alex Freyre y José María Di Bello became the first gay couple to wed in a civil ceremony in Latin America (Ushuaia, Argentina to be specific).

Too sweet. Felicidades.

Via / El Diario La Prensa

Vigils for Justice y en Memoria de Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado

19 Nov 2009

georgestevenmercado1-233x300 There are a number of vigils that will be happening this coming weekend across the U.S. and in Puerto Rico demanding justice and in memory of Jorge Steven . I will be at the one in NYC this coming Sunday (local VL’ers hit me up if you want to come with or meet up).

As soon as more information comes in I will update this post. If you have information about a vigil in your community please leave a comment or email us at info@vivirlatino.com

Amherst
Monday November 23, 2009
6:30 pm
Food for Thought Books
106 North Pleasant Street
Bay Area
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
3:30 pm
Mac Arthur and Grand Ave. at Lake Merritt
CONTACT: Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Liz Latty
PHONE: (510) 282-5223
EMAIL: morethanavigil@gmail.com

Chicago
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
4-6 pm
Humboldt Park

Los Angeles
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
8pm-9:30 pm
West Hollywood Corner of Santa Monica and San Vicente

New York City
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
7-9 pm
Hudson Pier 45 at Christopher Street

Philadelphia
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
7 pm
Love Park 15th and Arch

Washington D.C.
Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
5-6:30pm
Dupont Circle, Washington D.C.
For more information contact Rayyan 410-530-6078.

People are also post vigil information from across the U.S on this facebook page.

Mexico City : Hate Crimes Laws Won’t Bring Back the Dead Pero It’s More than the U.S. Has

8:11 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · crime|GLBT|Justice|mexico|Violence · Comments Off

27 Aug 2009

mexic2 I have a pretty radical stance towards hate crimes legislation. I’m not the type of person who likes to push legislation as an answer to way communities are brutalized. Laws certainly won’t bring back the dead and a society with hate woven into the fabric of its narrative isn’t going to stop attacking people it sees as “imperfections” in that weave.

That being said, in Mexico City there have been at least 6 murders of gay men that have not been classified as hate crimes. Instead, authorities in the D.F. label the deaths as “crimes of passion”. From vecino Blabbeando:

LGBT advocates have already claimed that homophobia might be at play in the murders of six gay men during the last year, even if authorities have said otherwise. The latest, they say, occurred on August 15th, when 24 year old Victor Galán, who had moved to live in Mexico City a month earlier, was stabbed 12 times and found dead in his apartment. Advocates say that robbery was not a motive in the crime and that they suspect he was killed based on the fact that he was gay. Authorities, on the other hand, say that they have not ruled out a “crime of passion.”

VivirLatino