LGBT Health Starts to Count

While people cheer over marriage equality finally arriving in New York, I have watched a much quieter victory unfold.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services rolled out plans last week for adding LGBT data measures to the leading federal health survey. This huge milestone for our communities is a moment to be celebrated. And although HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced her commitment to collect LGBT data, those of us who were advocates for years knew how long it could take for the federal government to go from promise to reality, so we were waiting for a little more than good intentions. And we got all that and more.

Secretary Sebelius and the Office of Minority Health have a plan.

Their time line includes not only adding the tested LGB question to health surveys but also developing and adding much needed gender identity questions. The section of health care reform that requires better race and ethnicity data collection also allowed HHS to suggest new populations to measure. So HHS has now committed to developing a full standard for the routine measurement of LGBT data over the next few years. Again, this may seem small and unimportant to many, but as someone with more than a few pocket protectors in my drawer, for whom the label “data geek” isn’t foreign, I know this is a moment I’ll talk about well into my retirement.

Think what it would be like if you opened your dictionary and couldn’t find the words lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. What if the only place those words even existed was in some online urban slang dictionary? The truth is that when it comes to federal and state funding, priorities and resources are all driven by the “dictionary” of what data agencies can cite. Without those data, they don’t say our name, don’t include us as prioritized populations in funding announcements, don’t allow us to have the same vocabulary to prove why we need to be included in grants. We just don’t exist.

Hate crimes against us wouldn’t get counted, and we wouldn’t even know how many service members were released under “don’t ask, don’t tell,” how many same-sex couples might want to marry, how many of us are parents, and myriad other information about LGBT people.

Now one of the largest agencies in the federal government has announced that it is introducing the words lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender into the dictionary. It is doing it publicly, with millions of dollars of internal resources being spent to make sure it is done with every possible scientific validation. The research it does to find the best way to ask the questions is work that can be replicated by every other agency and should be quickly. Someday soon, we will be on the U.S. Census as well.

A friend emailed me, wishing me “Happy Data Day! I presume it’s already a national holiday, right?” Yes, I think this moment really is our holiday, because many things can come and go in this world, but data are forever.

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Taiwan's Gays Welcome Lady Gaga!

Gay fans and others turned out in force Sunday for Lady Gaga’s first concert in Taiwan, a free promotional event held in the city of Taichung.

Gay fans and others turned out in force Sunday for Lady Gaga’s first concert in Taiwan, a free promotional event held in the city of Taichung.

The pop star performed for an hour, singing nine songs — five more than scheduled, according toFocus Taiwan. There were 6,000 fans in the Fulfillment Amphitheater for the event, while another 30,000 watched the concert via two large TV screens set up outside the venue.

The Taipei Times reports that an LGBT contingent planned to hold up signs during the concert expressing gratitude for Gaga’s support. Slogans included “Born This Way, Born This Gay” and “Gaga Loves Gays, Gays Love Gaga.”

One member of the group put together a costume that won a “creative outfit” contest organized by Mercedes-Benz in conjunction with the concert. The man, identified only as Chris, “covered himself with black feathers and a cage to symbolize the discrimination and repression that gay people suffer, but that rather than be cowed by such attitudes, gay people are determined to fight for their rights,” the Times reports. He got 10,000 votes on the Internet to win the contest, and he hoped to meet Lady Gaga.

No word on if he did so, but the concert left “tens of thousands of fans in ecstasy,” Focus Taiwan reports. “Her ‘little monsters’ were surprised by the singer's improvisation of the lyrics and spontaneous interaction with them, such as singing ‘Taiwan you and I’ or stopping in the middle of a sentence to let fans finish singing the rest,” the news site notes.

Sunday was declared Lady Gaga Day in Taichung; the city welcomed her with a ceremony(pictured) featuring Mayor Jason Hu and a performance by children in traditional costume. She is scheduled to give a press conference in the capital city of Taipei Monday.

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SMH!!! Lesbian Military couple commits fraud, marries others

Military officials are charging three California-based Marine corporals with fraud and larceny for entering in a pair of sham marriages to collect housing funding, officials said.

The military alleges that a lesbian couple – one a Marine, the other a civilian – decided to live together off base and wanted to collect the $1,200 housing benefit granted to married Marines.

The female Marine found a male Marine willing to get married, allowing them to collect the housing benefit, and the civilian woman also eventually married a Marine and collected funds, 1st Lt. Maureen Dooley, a spokeswoman at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego, said Saturday.

The female Marine, Cpl. Ashley Vice, told San Diego’s KGTV-TV that she and her partner, Jaime Murphy, were forced to enter sham marriages because the military doesn’t provide allowances for unmarried couples and they couldn’t afford to live off base without the extra money. She and her partner only wanted to “be a family,” Vice said.

“It doesn’t matter what their sexual preferences are, if they’re violating the law and making fraudulent use of government money, they will be held accountable,” Dooley said.

The corporals, assigned to the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing at Camp Pendleton, now face fraud and larceny charges, but more could come later, and the three could have to pay back $75,000 to the military.

The military does not have jurisdiction over the civilian woman, Dooley said, and it was not clear if she would face charges.

Even after the military officially drops its ban against openly gay or lesbian members, same-sex couples, even if married, would still not be eligible because of a federal law defining marriage as between a man and a woman.

Vice told the station she and the other corporals, Jeremiah Griffin and Joseph Garner, could face at least a year in the brig at Miramar, since none of them can afford to pay the government back.

In addition to jail time, Vice said she will likely be demoted in rank from corporal to private.

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Trial to begin in slaying of gay middle school student Larry King!!

Brandon McInerney, left, was 14 when he shot gay classmate Larry King. Now 17, he's about to stand trial on first-degree murder and hate-crime charges.

Brandon McInerney, who was 14 when he shot King in an Oxnard classroom, faces 1st degree murder and hate-crime charges. The defense will argue for voluntary manslaughter, saying he was young, immature and provoked.

When he was just 14, Brandon McInerney walked into an Oxnard classroom, took his seat, pulled a .22-caliber handgun out of his backpack and shot the student sitting in front of him. Then he tossed the weapon to the floor and walked out.

The victim, Lawrence King, was an openly gay student who McInerney reportedly thought had a crush on him.

This week McInerney, looking more like an adult at the age of 17, will be tried in a high-profile murder case that rallied the gay community and triggered calls for greater protections of young homosexuals on school campuses.

Prosecutor Maeve Fox says she will outline a straightforward case in opening arguments set to begin Tuesday in a Chatsworth courtroom. The Oxnard teenager carefully planned and carried out the Feb. 12, 2008, execution of his eighth-grade classmate, she said. He brought a gun to school, positioned himself directly behind King during a morning computer class and fired twice into the back of the 15-year-old's head.

McInerney then dropped the gun and walked out the door in front of two dozen horrified classmates and a teacher, Fox says.

Prosecutors have added a hate-crime allegation, arguing that McInerney's actions were spurred in part by a hatred of gays, in line with his alleged neo-Nazi sympathies. If convicted, he faces 53 years to life.

McInerney is being tried in adult court under the provisions of Proposition 21, which allows prosecutors to bring murder charges against juveniles as young as 14 for certain serious crimes.

McInerney's lawyers, Scott Wippert and Robyn Bramson, say their client doesn't deny the killing. But they argue it was voluntary manslaughter because the adolescent was provoked by King's repeated sexual advances.

Fellow students say the two had clashed for days over King's expressing his attraction to McInerney. King, who was living in a children's shelter because of problems at home, had recently gone to school wearing eye makeup and women's accessories.

McInerney was humiliated by King's advances, his attorneys said. He came from a violent home and decided to end his misery in a way that made sense to him — with a gun. He shot King "in the heat of passion caused by the intense emotional state between these two boys at school," Bramson said last week outside the courthouse, where jury selection was underway.

A voluntary manslaughter conviction would prevent a life sentence, Wippert said, making McInerney eligible for release before he's 40. Even a finding of second-degree murder would virtually assure that he wouldn't be eligible for parole until he was in his 70s, his lawyers said.

The defense will stress McInerney's age at the time of the crime, and may summon a psychologist to talk about the maturity and critical-thinking abilities of a 14-year-old. In essence, they will argue that McInerney didn't have the maturity to deal with King's schoolyard taunts.

"Age will explain his behavior and his response," Wippert said. "How a 14-year-old reacts is different than how an older person would react."

The defense could face a challenge in portraying McInerney as a naive youth. At the time of the shooting, he looked young and sweet-faced. In court recently, the defendant was a tall, lanky young man dressed in crisp Oxford shirts and khaki pants.

Wippert said he's not worried that jurors won't be able to see the confused young boy of three years ago.

"Part of the job of the jury is to understand that this happened when they were in middle school," Wippert said.

Pretrial court proceedings have delayed the case as McInerney changed lawyers and defense attorneys petitioned to remove the Ventura County prosecutors and a judge from the case, claiming they were biased. Those motions were denied.

The defense sought a change of venue and the case was first transferred to Santa Barbara County before settling in the Chatsworth courthouse in Los Angeles County. A defense request to unseal King's juvenile records was denied by a California appeals court.

The killing triggered an emotional outpouring that included candlelight vigils across the country and a day of silence in April organized by the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, a New York-based group dedicated to preventing harassment of young gays and lesbians on school campuses.

Students at the school, E.O. Green Junior High, organized a peace march attended by hundreds in the days after the shooting. Several states have passed laws specifically outlawing bullying of homosexuals at school, and California strengthened its own anti-bullying laws.

Still, bullying of gays remains a problem. After a spate of suicides by homosexual youths last fall, including that of 13-year-old Seth Walsh of Tehachapi, activists, celebrities and others postedYouTube videos with the It Gets Better Project to inspire hope in struggling youths.

Eliza Byard, the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network's executive director, said progress is being made in communities and schools that proactively address issues of bias. The network will be closely monitoring the McInerney case, she said.

"It's a coda to an unbelievably tragic situation," she said. "This is a case where at least two young lives were destroyed."

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