Search

ACTION AGAINST HATEFUL BROADCASTER The Australian Broadcasting Tribunal in Sydney recently found against the city's local radio. Radio 2GB and its broad­casters John Pearce on the grounds of "inciting or perpetu­ating hatred against, or gratu­itously vilifying a person or group on the basis of sexual preference." The Tribunal noted that it had 13 complaints about a pro­gramme of Pearce's aired by 2GB on 15th January last year. In it Pearce discussed the subject of "gay bathhouses" (saunas) with particular reference to the then pending planning applica­tion by a sauna called Roman Spa to open a venue in Sydney's Oxford Street. The telephone debate which en­sued included numerous verbal attacks on gay men both by Pearce and many of the callers, whose attitudes Pearce actively encouraged.

DANCING QUEENS Gay people are no longer wel­come in the Sao Paolo Munici­pal Ballet School, where the city Mayor, Janio Quadres, has stationed police outside the door to prevent dancers who 'look queer' from getting in. The directress of the school, Mariana Natal, called in the Mayor when she felt that gays were damaging the good name of her school, but didn't know how to tell them apart from the rest. This request fitted in nicely with the Mayor's 'cleaning up' of the city's institutions. As a result of the ensuing purge, 72 of the enrolled 80 male dancers are no longer tip-toeing through Ballet School. For the Mayor, not only does this pro­mote wholesome community values, it should also help him with his other professional ob­jective, cutting back the city deficit by reduced public spend­ing. With no gay ballet dancers, he'll have to close down the school and the local performing arts theatre.

GAY DOCTOR JAILED Dr. Ivan Toms, the gay South African anti-apartheid activist of long standing, has been imprisoned for refusing to serve in the South African Army. Dr. Toms is a founder member of the Cape Town based Lesbians and Gays Against Oppression, a non-racial gay organisation in South Africa. On March 3rd the doctor was sent to prison for 21 months after refusing to serve in the South African Defense Force. The military authorities have waged a viciously homophobic campaign against Dr. Toms since he made his stand against conscription. Although he is appealing the decision he has not been granted bail and it looks unlikely that his appeal will succeed. Messages of support would be gratefully accepted and should be sent c/o Nurse Pat Orpen, 28 Bell Road, Kenilworth, 7700 Cape Town, South Africa. More news in issue 3.

MEN OF ALL COLOURS Men of All Colours Together, New York (MACT, NY) moved last month into their own room at the Lesbian and Gay Commu­nity Services Centre, in New York city. MACT is an inter-racial gay support group and it formed a partnership with G-MAD (Gay Men of African Descent) to de­velop the room, tentatively called "The James Baldwin Room.” ALYSON PUBLICATIONS, the popular Boston publishing house, has decided to give one-third of all direct-mail income received during March to a num­ber of AIDS organisations. Sasha Alyson, the company President, has said that the money will go to the American Foundation for AIDS Research and the PWA (People with AIDS) Coalition. Alyson ex­plained that "we've been look­ing for more ways to help in the fight against AIDS and this seemed like a good one. I think it's great for businesses to do­nate a part of their sales to im­portant causes.

The sign on the front door of the cafe said 'NO GAYS'. No, this didn't happen in 1939 it was actually seen by a driver recently at a motorway cafe on the London M25.

PROTECTION CLAUSE FOR U.S. CITY Raleigh City Council in North Carolina passed an anti-discrim­ination ordinance - gay people included - on January 5th by a 7-1 vote, with only Mayor Av­ery Upchurch voting against the ordinance. The resulting ordinance pro­hibits discrimination against gay people in city employment, in contracts with the city, and in obtaining city funding, housing and services. It also bars firms that do business with the city from discriminating in employment based on sexual orientation. Raleigh is the hometown of Jesse Helms, regarded as the most anti-gay member of the U.S. Senate and the State of North Carolina still upholds sodomy laws on the Statute Books. There was virtually no opposi­tion to the new ordinance from city residents.

VISA CARD BOYCOTT Sasha Alyson, the President of Alyson Publications Inc., a Boston-based gay publishing firm, is continuing with his campaign urging gay people to stop using Visa credit cards be­ cause of the company's financial contributions to the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC). the USOC has drawn much criti­cism from gay activists for its successful lawsuit to keep the Gay Games (once called Gay Olympics) from using the name Gay Olympics, despite the fact that many other groups have used the word Olympics without being challenged. Alyson last year asked gay peo­ple to cut their Visa cards in half and send one half to the credit card company with a letter explaining their reason. The other half of the card was to be sent to Alyson's Campaign and by last January 700 cards had been received.