The Buck and Mike Blog

Today is the first day that same-sex couples in Washington, DC, begin picking up marriage licenses. Undoubtedly, some of the first in line will be couples who have been together for 20, 30, or 40 years or more. Some have raised children and have grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Many have worked openly as civil servants for years, getting your social security checks out on time, inspecting your food, manufacturing coins and currency, and testing drugs to make sure they are safe and effective. Some work in the Environmental Protection Agency, helping safeguard our environment. Others work for the Smithsonian Institution, helping safeguard the treasures of our national heritage. Some install cable TV, put out fires, police the streets, manage stores, preach on Sundays, build houses, and fix cars. There will be college students, plumbers, doctors, bus drivers, teachers, artists, cabinet makers, computer programmers, architects, flight attendants, attorneys, and writers. There will be employees of the Red Cross, the World Bank, Amnesty International, the Pentagon, and international embassies.

We know Washington people in all these categories, and some will be waiting in line today. This is a great demonstration of joy, optimism, and love in a city that is often the scene of cynicism. I’m very happy for all of you. If we were not already married, we would be lining up with you.

Read the CNN.com article.

Attention runners!

The 46th Annual DeCelle Memorial Lake Tahoe Relay will take place on June 12.

The most scenic run in all of America, the route runs completely around Lake Tahoe. Seven-member teams run the seven legs, each 8-12 miles long, for a total of 72 miles, through both California and Nevada. It is a favorite race for many teams, who return year after year. If you want to participate, you have better register early. There are a limited number of slots and last year some teams had to be turned away because they didn’t register early enough.

This is the 46th annual race! The race’s founder, Robert E. DeCelle Sr., devoted his life to promoting distance running, serving as an official, certifying courses, and lobbying for more events. His advocacy was instrumental in gaining support for women to compete in distance running events. He passed away in 1997, two weeks after the 33rd annual relay.

The race is named after Robert DeCelle, Sr’s son, Captain Robert DeCelle, Jr. “Bobby” as his family called him, an avid high school runner. Drafted into the Army in 1966, he flew a helicopter during the Vietnam War. In February 1971 his helicopter was hit and he suffered severe injuries, yet he managed to pilot it away from the battle and thus saved the lives of his crew. He died from his injuries about a week later on February 21, 1971. He was heavily decorated by the Army and a base in Vietnam was named for him. At that time, the Lake Tahoe Relay was renamed in his honor.

This not-for-profit relay event is staffed each year by dozens of volunteers, most of them friends and extended DeCelle family members. All profit from entry fees goes to local high school running programs, a fitting tribute to both Robert Sr. and Bobby. The race is managed and coordinated by April DeCelle Carter, who is Robert Sr.’s daughter, Bobby’s sister, and—as you might expect—an avid runner herself.

For more information, go to the race’s web site, http://www.laketahoerelay.com, or send me an e-mail message and I’ll snail mail you a flyer with registration information.

Okay, I admit it. We have a family connection. My charming and talented daughter Olivia married Scott Carter, April’s son and Robert Sr.’s grandson. Mike and I will be doing our part during the race, directing traffic, cheering runners, and playing with the West’s most charming grandkids as much as possible.

DeCelle Memorial Lake Tahoe Relay, Lake Tahoe, Robert E. DeCelle Sr, distance running, distance running, Captain Robert DeCelle, Jr., Lake Tahoe Relay, relay, April DeCelle Carter

A fascinating article in today’s New York Times shows the importance of words. Apparently, to Americans being gay or lesbian is not as bad as being homosexual. This is no surprize to gay people, who deal with the language of intolerant or uneducated (or both) people every day.

But sometimes the hurt of language cuts even deeper. The leaders of my own church, the Mormons, for example, insists that there are no homosexuals, only people who “suffer from same-sex attraction,” SSA. No, wait, they have changed the words again. Seemingly unable to use the word “sex” they now say we suffer from “same-gender attraction.” Words matter.

But I digress. The New York Times article:

New Poll Shows Support for Repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’

By DALIA SUSSMAN
As the Obama administration proposes repealing the policy known as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” a new New York Times/CBS News poll finds that a majority of the public support allowing openly gay men and women to serve in the military.

There’s less support, however, for allowing homosexuals to serve openly.

Confused?

The results highlight the importance of wording on the issue. In a test, half of the poll’s respondents were asked their opinion on permitting “gay men and lesbians” to serve, and the other half were asked about permitting “homosexuals” to serve.

The wording of the question proved to make a difference. Seven in 10 respondents said they favor allowing “gay men and lesbians” to serve in the military, including nearly 6 in 10 who said they should be allowed to serve openly. But support was somewhat lower among those who were asked about allowing “homosexuals” to serve, with 59 percent in favor, including 44 percent who support allowing them to serve openly.
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New York Times

No Name-Calling Week was inspired by a young adult novel entitled “The Misfits” by popular author, James Howe. The book tells the story of four best friends trying to survive the seventh grade in the face of all too frequent taunts based on their weight, height, intelligence, and sexual orientation/gender expression. Motivated by the inequities they see around them, the “Gang of Five” (as they are known) creates a new political party during student council elections and run on a platform aimed at wiping out name-calling of all kinds. Though they lose the election, they win the support of the school’s principal for their cause and their idea for a “No Name-Calling Day” at school.

Motivated by this simple, yet powerful, idea, the No Name-Calling Week Coalition, created by GLSEN and Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing, and consisting of over 40 national partner organizations, organized an actual No Name-Calling Week in schools across the nation during the week of March 1-5, 2004. This year, No Name-Calling Week will take place the week of January 25-29, 2010. The project seeks to focus national attention on the problem of name-calling in schools, and to provide students and educators with the tools and inspiration to launch an on-going dialogue about ways to eliminate name-calling in their communities.

The Misfits, James Howe, GLSEN, Simon & Schuster, No Name-Calling Week

There are still Americans who believe our current climate changes are just part of the nature order of things, an that we should just learn to live with it. They deny the reality of global warming, as there are deniers of evolution, the Holocaust, and the death of Elvis. Americans are especially good at denying their addictions, especially to the fossil fuels that are the major causes of damage to our home.

The United States has traditionally blocked worldwide acceptance of strong environmental protections as “not in our national interest;” in other words “we don’t want to change our selfish way of life.” Island nations that are sinking below the rising oceans or being ravaged annually by storms don’t have such luxury. Perhaps it’s time to put aside our belief in our superiority and invincibility and begin to think globally.

I’m hoping the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference, which ends this week, results in some sweeping changes that will allow my grandchildren to see a world at least as nice as the one I have grown up in. At the current rate of decline, theirs will be a very different, more depressing, place.

global warming, Copenhagen Climate Change Conference

Today we celebrate Human Rights Day, the anniversary of the 1948 signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This is possibly the most important individual document ever created by the UN and ratified by member countries. It recognizes the humanity of us all and grants basic rights and protections to all people around the world. The first few words of this powerful document—“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights”—seem basic, but the concept is still not accepted around much of the world.

There is no better example of the importance of the struggle for basic human rights today than Uganda. A bill before the country’s legislature would make homosexual sex a death-penalty offense. Just being gay could get you a life sentence. If you know someone who is gay and don’t report them within 24 hours, you can get three years in prison. Yes, including family members. As a side effect, we can anticipate an exponential rise in AIDS in a country that until now has had the best prevention program in Africa. “Moral” extremism will kill the country, as it has in so many others.

Read about the Uganda situation in this CNN article.

Amnesty International, the human rights organization I worked with for years, is sponsoring a special Global Write-a-Thon today. Please give a moment of your time to help.

Human Rights Day, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, AIDS, Uganda, Amnesty International

Although today is World AIDS Day, we should remember all year those who we have lost and the ongoing effort to find a cure. Consider what you can do in your community to further the cause. Some important links:

• AIDS.gov: US Federal Government Effort and Resources
• World AIDS Campaign
• World AIDS Day: National AIDS Trust
• Be the Generation: AIDS Vaccine Research

If you live in Maine, you should feel ashamed today.

Maine

I have written about the need to bring struggling lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Mormons back into the fold, as a demonstration of unconditional love and acceptance. It is a cause I believe in very strongly, as it is a cause of incredible family pain that does not seem to have its equal in non-Mormon families. (See Keep Them and Love Them.)

I have also written about the Foundation for Reconciliation and their laudable activities (see A Move Toward Reconciliation, Bring them In From the Plains and the Home at Last benefit concert). Wednesday, Nov. 4, the anniversary of the passage of Proposition 8 in California with tens of millions of dollars of help from individual Mormons and Mormon companies, all at the request of their ecclesiastical leaders, is another Foundation activity.

The Great LGBT Handcart Rescue begins at 1:00 pm at the This is the Place Monument. From there, the group will trek by handcart, as did so many of our pioneer ancestors, to a 3:30 pm gathering at City Creek Park, at the northeast corner of North Temple and State streets. At 4:00 p.m., the group will deliver a package with signatures from a petition asking for reconciliation with LGBT members to LDS Church Headquarters.

This is an important event in the continuing story of LGBT equality in Utah and in the LDS Church. I encourage all who can spare some time to join in the Wednesday afternoon trek—or at least a part of it—and join the gathering at 3:30. Because so few of us can travel to Utah for the event, we count on those of you who are fair-minded and care about your family members to stand up for them and participate.

And thank you, Foundation for Reconciliation, for your continuing hard work on our behalf.

From Despair to Hope

I’m a proud descendent of Mormon pioneers, who traveled from Scandanavia and the British Isles, crossed the American Wilderness, and settled in Utah — all because they wanted to have lives free of persecution, to live honestly and proudly about who they were and what they stood for. I hope that the tradition has worked its way down through the generations to keep us all proud of who we are and mindful of the importance of standing up for who you are.

A famous Mormon story tells of Brigham Young learning of a group of these pioneers stranded in snow, with no provisions, and only part-way along their journey west. Standing at the pulpit of the Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake City for a conference, he gave orders to people to leave the conference and prepare wagons and immediately travel to these people to “Bring them in from the Plains.” When the rescuers arrived, the survivors told of how their spirits turned from despair to hope.
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Concert Proceeds Benefit the Volunteers of America, Utah’s Homeless Youth Resource Center.

Next Monday, September 21, there is an incredible benefit concert in Salt Lake City. The lineup of performers is amazing and the cause is an important one.

Home at Last is presented by the Foundation for Reconciliation, a group whose ultimate goal is to foster better understanding between the LDS Church heterosexual majority and Church members who fall within the category of sexual minorities: gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender.

The choice of organization to benefit from the proceeds is not accidental. Gay and lesbian Utah teens are thrown out of their homes and/or commit suicide at alarming rates for such a family-oriented state. Suicide is the leading cause of death for Utah males ages 15 to 19, who die at a rate nearly double the national average. Suicide is the leading cause of death for teen boys in Utah. That shameful fact, in and of itself, should be a wake-up call. But apparently the call of statistics falls on deaf ears when it comes to Utah parents whose children come out to them. Volunteers of America is too often left to pick up the pieces of damaged youth who took their families’ unconditional love for granted and suddenly find themselves out on the streets. So the joint effort between the homeless youth resource center and the Foundation for Reconciliation is appropriate and wise.

The all-star performers include:

Get details and purchase tickets online at http://pdbookstore.com/tickets.html. Besides being a worthy cause, I promise this will be a concert you will never forget.

Carol Lynn Pearson, Barlow Bradford, Leraine Horstmanshoff, Michael Chipman, Bill Green, Emily Pearson, Shane Jackman, Peter & Mary Danzig, Leopard in the Temple

Ben & Jerry’s Renames Legendary Flavor to Celebrate Freedom to Marry

BURLINGTON, Vt. - (BUSINESS WIRE) - Ben & Jerry’s, known for its euphoric ice cream flavors and dedication to social justice, celebrates the beginning of the freedom to marry for gay and lesbian couples in Vermont with the symbolic renaming of its well-known ice cream flavor “Chubby Hubby” to “Hubby Hubby.” In partnership with Freedom to Marry, Ben & Jerry’s aims to raise awareness of the importance of marriage equality and, to show its support, will serve “Hubby Hubby” sundaes in Vermont Scoop Shops throughout the month of September.

Ben & Jerry’s has a long history of commitment to social justice, including gay rights. Its partnership with Freedom to Marry, a national leader in the movement for marriage equality, aims to raise awareness of the importance of marriage equality and to encourage other states to follow the blazing trails of Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, and Maine. Freedom to Marry promotes the national conversation about why marriage equality matters and brings together partner organizations into a larger whole - a shared civil rights campaign.
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Ben & Jerry’s, Freedom to Marry