Quickies: 05/09/2012
By Good morning, friends! Please join me in extending a hearty “fuck you” to North Carolina. There are lots of news stories about that, but I’m not going to link them, because it is too damn early to start drinking.
Here’s a neat infographic comparing GLBT rights across the United States.
Stephen Fry is now officially my fourth honorary grandparent. (Don’t tell my actual grandparents.)
NY Senate is considering the Assembly’s Gender Non-Discrimination Act. New Yorkers, this might be a good time to write your state senators.
Here’s a petition on behalf of a senior at a Catholic high school in Iowa to be able to accept a scholarship for GLBT youth established in honor of Matthew Shepard.
Olympic-hopeful gymnast Josh Dixon came out this week in an interview with OutSports. Queerty has pictures, if you’re into that sort of thing.
Featured image of Mr. Stephen Fry.
Coincidentally, Colorado had a civil unions bill get killed at the same time as North Carolina had the ban passed. We had enough Republican votes to get it through commitee and pass it, but we were running up against the end of this year’s session (the session is short, so even though the bill was introduced on the first day, it was just getting to the House this week). Democrats were planning a filibuster-like move on the last day so that it would get put to a vote, but the Republican Speaker pre-emptively called a recess a few hours before the midnight and let the time run out, leaving the civil unions bill and 30 others on the agenda dead until next year.
It was pretty ridiculous. It’s just blatant, stereotypical manipulation of the political process to get one’s way without the hard work of actually giving any reasoning or attempting persuasion on the issue. Speaker didn’t want a vote on the bill, so he just sends everyone home.
Maybe next year we’ll have the Dems running the House and this won’t be a problem. They only need to gain one seat to have the majority. Also, now that we know we can pass this thing, maybe we won’t spend such a long time trying to line up votes next year. (And politicians might actually be attentive instead of watching polls and primaries the whole session).