The day in Fresno, in pictures. All of them down below.
When we first got there, it looked like they were optimistic about the turnout. Maybe a little too optimistic.

It seemed like an awful lot of chairs for Fresno.

But then a few people started showing up.

The photographers showed up.
 
And more people.
 
And more.
 
And more.
 
And more.
 
They just kept coming.
 
And finally they'd filled the chairs, they filled the square, and they spilled over into the areas not really designed for people.
 
 They brought their signs.
 
Some of them wanted any lurking fundies to know they hadn't won the decisive victory they sought.
 
 There was a surprising - and gratifying - presence of all segments of our community, including many transgender men and women. At least one was one of the speakers, and I saw something happen that I haven't seen happen before. Every speaker talked about all of us. The one who didn't was corrected from the audience, when he neglected to mention bisexual and transgender people. I liked it. I liked what it said about the people who organized this event, and the people who showed up.

 There were people who felt the same way I did.

The speakers kept it short and to the point. One of the most powerful speeches (for me, anyway) came from 1Lt Choi. He talked about the struggle, past and future, and wanted us to decide what was worth fighting for. This will be a fight. This will be a lot of hard work. But it's worth it.

(more…)

crossposted on Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters
This is not an lgbt issue per se, but it can be seen as related to us in a way:
Dr. George Tiller, a Kansas doctor whose clinic received national attention for performing late-term abortions, was shot to death as he entered his Wichita church on Sunday.
“Members of the congregation who were inside the sanctuary at the time of the shooting were being kept inside the church by police,” the Wichita Eagle reported, “and those arriving were being ushered into the parking lot.”
Media reports said the suspected killer fled the scene in a blue Taurus. Police described him as a white male in his 50s or 60s.Tiller was not necessarily a favorite person of the religious right, especially the folks at One News Now. The news site ran a plethora of articles about Tiller; none of which were exactly unbiased:
George Tiller, a man many pro-lifers call “Tiller the baby killer,” received a standing ovation at the Feminist Majority Foundation's annual Women's Leadership Conference held recently at the NEA's headquarters in Washington, DC. During his talk, Tiller attempted to justify his work by showing the approving audience pictures of babies he had aborted who had fetal abnormalities. The Feminist Majority Foundation then announced it was launching a new campaign designed to keep Tiller's Wichita, Kansas, abortion mill open. - Tiller's appearance at NEA-hosted event draws pro-lifers' attention, March 26, 2008Calling it a tragic injustice for all law-abiding Kansans, a pro-life activist is dismayed that a grand jury in Wichita has failed to indict infamous abortionist George Tiller on criminal charges related to performing illegal late-term abortions. - Abortionist Tiller off the hook, May 7, 2008A Kansas jury has found notorious abortionist, George Tiller, not guilty on all counts. - Tiller found not guilty: Pro-life forces vow to continue fight, March 28, 2009
And the comments by its readers, no doubt instigated by these articles, were equally horrendous: 
Tiller should should be executed for these deaths. If the babies had been live births and full-term babies, he would have the death penalty. God knows how many he actually murdered in his career
 
Kansas people: you are not powerless to elect better government leaders and judges!! Do your job! I know there are Christians in Kansas-speak up! If you don't, God will continue to bring His wrath upon you. Do you think it is by shear coincidence that your state is going bankrupt?
Considering the abortion industry is all about the almighty dollar! I am really suprised the funeral directors & owners are not having a fit about all the revenue they are losing buy these abortionists, just throwing these bodies away with out a proper buriel(spel?). Can you believe all the revenue being wasted? Why doesn't Obama tax the heck out of abortions to balance the budget?
Would someone please explain to me how this man was acquitted and still has a license to practice medicine??? I am absolutely mortified!! I cannot believe that anyone/any judge, would/could let this man get away with these crimes. I know this man will pay for his crimes in eternity, but I will be praying for him to pay for his crimes here on earth as well.
Tiller needs to face the death penalty.
I live in Kansas. Thank God that someone is finally able to stick it to Tiller. Kline tried his best. Now that Gov. Sebelius will be off to Washington, she won't be able to protect Tiller to get his donations. Still, I don't understand how mass murder can be deemed a misdemeanor?
You see, this is the reason why I get spooked when One News Now publishes misleading articles and columns accusing President Obama of being a socialist or helps to sponsor those awful “tea parties” designed to demonize him.
This is why the hair on the back of my neck stands up when One News Now publishes article after article falsely saying that hate crimes legislation will lead to pastors getting arrested, or scaring their readers with the lies about gays “trying to indoctrinate” children.
This rhetoric will always sooner or later lead to something. It's like a car speeding towards a cliff.
I am not suggesting that One News Now actually told readers to murder Tiller, but in all honesty, the rhetoric emanating from the site contributed to a climate that made someone think that it was perfectly acceptable to gun down a man at his church.
When you create monsters, you also create those who want to kill the perceived monsters.
The site's rhetoric needs to be toned down. And there needs to be less of a bias from its articles. One News Now no doubt sees itself as representing the Christian point of view in America but how it is Christian to get people so worked up that they advocate violence as an ethical solution?
It's definitely something to think about.
Last, but certainly not least, my prayers go out to the Tiller family. And I hope that the authorities find whomever committed this awful crime.

(more…)

Someone was asking when we as a group were going to actually “stand up” for what we want. It would be a safe bet that the people behind this aren't hinking whether or not to kill. When they get done with pro-choice people guess who's next?
 
You and I.
http://www.ksn.com/news/local/story/Abortion-provider-Dr-George-Tiller-shot-and-killed/dkIPXoPgLkOiP0Fh-CuudA.cspx
This just shows the extent of what our counterparts on the other side of the gay rights battle will stoop to and don't you think otherwise. Its time to stop playing nice, get you ass off the fence and grab a club or a gun and made these creeps reap what they sow. 
 

(more…)

As the United States has grown older, it has expanded the right to vote to nearly every group of citizens, with one notable exception: former felons. Today, 48 states have their own laws that disenfranchise convicted felons at some point during incarceration, probation, or parole. This hodgepodge of policies has created confusion for former offenders and election officials alike, and has resulted in the loss of voting rights for about 5.3 million Americans. Voting rights experts have long advocated that these unfair laws–which have a disproportionate impact on low-income and minority communities that are overrepresented in the criminal justice system–should be abolished. It's an opinion apparently shared by President Obama's new nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court, Sonia Sotomayor, and there are encouraging signs that many states are moving towards restoring the rights of these millions of disenfranchised Americans.
In the 2006 Second Circuit Court case Hayden v. Pataki, plaintiffs brought a challenge under the Voting Rights Act against New York's felon disenfranchisement law. The plaintiffs argued that, in light of the history of discrimination, both in society and in the New York criminal justice system specifically, the state's disqualification of felons constituted disqualification based on race. This was rejected by court, as the majority reasoned that Congress did not intend the VRA to apply to state felon disenfranchisement laws.
Second Circuit Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor, however, saw it differently. She joined the main dissent–which found that the New York law amounted to a denial of the right to vote on account of race, and was therefore covered under the Voting Rights Act. Sotomayor also wrote a dissenting opinion of her own in which she found that the VRA “applies to all `voting qualifications,'” and - in her view - the state law “disqualifies a group of people from voting.”  
“These two propositions,” she concluded, “should constitute the entirety of our analysis.”  
Unfortunately, the majority of her colleagues did not undertake a similar analysis, and the result was a distorted interpretation of the Voting Rights Act that, in the words of the attorney Justin Leavitt of the Brennen Center  ”effectively amended the Voting Rights Act, giving the green light to racial discrimination.”
Restoration of voting rights for all former felons is still a ways off, but glimmers of hope do exist in legislative and judicial efforts of the recent past. Since 1997, 19 states have amended felon disenfranchisement policies, leading to the restoration of voting rights for at least 760,000 people, according to a 2008 Sentencing Project report.
In Washington State earlier this month, Governor Chris Gregoire signed felon voting rights bill, HB 1517, completing “a nine-year effort by…[Democratic Rep. Jeannie] Darneille to end a system that denied voting rights to former felons until all financial obligations ordered by the courts had been paid in full,” according to the May 6 Seattle Medium.
Under this bill, the voting rights of former felons are restored once they “are no longer incarcerated or in community custody,” a measure that could help as many as 167,000 former felons regain their rights. “Voting rights should never be based on the ability to pay,” said Darneille, who cited studies by Project Vote and other groups that “prove that recognizing the voting rights of ex-offenders reduces recidivism and improves successful outcomes in reintegrating former offenders into society.”
This year, 17 states have introduced bills to expand voting rights of former felons. Currently, only bills in MA, NJ, NY, OK, PA, TN, and TX are pending. Only one U.S. bill, HB 59 - which secures the federal voting rights of certain qualified ex-offenders who have served their sentences -  remains pending in the House Judiciary Committee.
However, substantial reform will require at least the passage of fair and consistent felon re-enfranchisement laws, and their proper interpretation by judges like Sonia Sotomayor.

(more…)

Last week I found myself caught up (yet again) in a Huffington Post thread that quickly devolved into a sick, sick blacks vs. gays thread. Usually, when that happens, I tend to leave the thread but this time I asked to questions that I will ask here:
Why is that many black people seem to think that white gay people have so much power? They really don't. At all.
Second Question, why is it that so many white gay people think that “the black community” has so much power? They really don't. At all.
I did get quite a few responses to this question, largely from black (presumably straight posters)
 

have you seen all of the media attention gay people get? For a group to be such a small % of the population they are on the news cycle constantly. Gay people and white women missing ….thats all you see on the news. Look Black people get zero stories except when they ALLEDGEDLY kidnap a white woman…….oh the shame
      ***********************************************
How many white folks who sit in the seats of power are gay? A lot more than most imagine, I'll bet.James Weldon Johnson stated over a century ago that whatever goes wrong in America will be blamed on Black people. It is just easy, you can call up every stereotype you know and then some, and it absolves white people from ever having to do anything for themselves.
They tried to blame 13% of the population for the economic crisis, and 6% of the electorate for the Prop 8 fiasco. As long as you fail to identify your enemies, you will continue to make this sort of error. And Black people's issues are generally beyond your ken. The one thing that might be learned from the struggles of the Black citizens is that the failure to identify friends and enemies will clearly affect the outcome of the struggles.
*********************************************************
 I will answer the first question. If you read this blog and others, they brag about how wealthy they're and how Obama will not get any money from them.
**********************************************************
And my personal favorite answer to this question:
Actually working together, they have much power.
********************************************************
Now I'm not saying that these answers to the first question represent the diversity of opinions in straight black communities but I have to say that this is not the first time I have heard these types of answers to this question.
Considering that mostly black people responded to this question when I posed it, I wanted to pose the two questions here as a way of continuing to foster the necessary dialogue between the 2 communities.

(more…)

I'm just sick of them rubbing it my face.  I don't “hate” them, I just don't want to see it.  They can do it in the privacy of their own home, but stop forcing it down my throat.
Familiar arguments against the LGBT community? Nope.  It's my reaction to the two different church groups that came to my door today to “save” my soul.
After resisting the urge to turn on my sprinklers or answer the door in the nude, I had to laugh at the hypocrisy of religious groups that want to convert the world to their viewpoint and shout their faith from the mountaintops (or from my porch), yet tell LGBTs to not live openly. While I am obviously not a big fan of organized religion, I respect others' rights to worship as they please.  Just please stop trying to get me to do it with you.  
And stop doing it so early in the morning on a weekend.
The problem I have is this burning need to convert everyone to their particular worldview.  It is a basic tenet of many faiths- go and spread the “good word” to save poor sinners like me.  Too many times these aren't just “personal beliefs” to live by in your private life, but a map of how everyone should act.
Yes, the same groups that say I am “flaunting my sexuality” by being openly gay or (gasp) wanting equal rights regularly come knocking on my door to shove their beliefs in my face.  And they somehow fail to see the hypocrisy in this.
My unwanted visitors today tried different tactics.  After realizing I was “a gay” (I'm mean, it's not hard to figure out when I come to the door holding my little dog in a rainbow shirt), one group tried to uncomfortably skirt the fact with code phrases like “oh, we're all sinners” and “God can heal anything”.   I managed to resist rolling my eyes as I closed the door.  It was a little early in the morning for subtle homophobia.
The other group was more overt in their condemnation.  The lead evangelist told me how I was living was a sin, to which I replied “What? When did being a homeowner become a sin? Or is it because I eat shellfish?  Did you catch me coveting my neighbor's possessions?”  
I can be a bit snarky in the morning.
The group seemed a bit aghast that I would make light of their very serious condemnation, saying “Hell is no laughing matter, son.”
I resisted the urge to get angry and started laughing instead.  It all just struck me as terribly funny that these people were invading my home, telling me how to live and that I was going to hell, and I was still in my pajamas.  
Yes, I was working at the terrible gay agenda by unloading the dishwasher.  
When they saw I was just smiling and shaking my head instead of falling to my knees to beg for forgiveness, they looked at me as if I was spewing green pea soup like in “The Exorcist.”  Still giggling, I politely told them I was happy with who I am and that they should leave, then closed the door.  I watched through the peephole as they stood looking at each other and shaking their heads.  Another sinner slipped through their fingers.  
For all the charges of gays trying to “recruit” others to their “lifestyle”, it's funny how the only people I see going door to door to get new members are the antigay religious forces.  
Now back to unloading my dishwasher and flaunting my gayness…

(more…)

(more…)

I won’t ask you to believe me. I don’t need you to. It took me a little over a hundred years, but I finally got over the need for validation from someone other than myself. I blame how long it took on the insecurities I had when I was human. I can remember them still, but now I tend to liken the emotions to a silent movie. I can remember myself going through the motions, but I can no longer actually feel what it was like to be insecure or to shy away from those I was unfamiliar with.
I always assumed that we got better at life as we lived it. I’m sure you’ve heard people say that if they knew then what they know now things would have been different. I can assure you that after seeing over 200 years come and go some of that statement is true and some of it isn’t. There are mistakes we make as humans and as vampires that happen over and over again. These mistakes almost always involve those of  the heart. If you’ll have me I’d like to tell you a few of my stories. I am a lesbian. I am a vampire. I have been in love with the same woman for over 200 years. If I knew then what I know now I would still do it over and over again.
This is my introduction. If you’ll have me.

Similar Posts:

The Urge to Merge
Reader Appreciation Day 2008
Marriage - Human Right, Not Heterosexual Privilege
Women scare me…

(more…)

The XTreme GPack Bullet is available from Sex Toys. I had my doubts about whether I’d enjoy using what is basically a bullet vibe after testing other more expensive vibrators, but this thing is awesome. AWESOME. This really goes to show you that cost does not always make something better or stronger. In fact, I’ve had less problems with this toy than I have had with some of the big fancy brands like Fun Factory, which are notorious for having wonky battery cases or random “dud” products that need replacing. For fans of the basic bullet vibe, this toy is going to be a nice upgrade. In fact, I’m going to be so bold as to say you should pass on all other bullet vibes and buy this. It’s got a jack, meaning that the bullet comes unplugged from the main unit and if you’ve got a toy like the Double Happiness Pleaser, you can interchange the bullets with this controller unit, although after some playing around with it, I don’t know why you’d want to. Half the fun of this toy is the curved shape of the bullet. And also, plugging this bullet into another controller is also not that exciting, because the settings are going to be all different, and the XTreme GPack Bullet has some really great settings! There are seven pulse settings, including one that is straight vibration with no pattern (solid ‘on’ vibe) and five speeds for each setting, giving you a total of 35 combinations.
It’s not waterproof, and you’ll want to avoid inserting this toy because tugging the cord to get it back out could damage the wiring and shorten the life of the toy. I have used this toy for (ahem) extended periods of time and not noticed any significant overheating of either the bullet or the battery unit. A lot of toys do heat up, and this one does not.
It’s an excellent value for the money. Put the 2 AA batteries in and it just works, multiple settings, and the bullet is curved to make it more useful in clitoral stimulation than your average bullet. It’s an attractive toy - I just love the purple and green, two of my favorite colors - and has a light up display to show speed and pulse settings. It’s as strong or stronger than your average $10 or $15 bullet vibe, and of a higher quality. I can’t say how long mine will last, as mine does not currently receive heavy use, but I can say that I know a friend of mine and fellow reviewer has owned this since January 2008 and uses it each time she masturbates, and it has not needed to be replaced. I am not kidding.
This isn’t as fancy a toy as many that I review, and I’ll admit that I waited a while to write the review because it wasn’t all bells and whistles. Lately, however, I find myself gravitating towards it. It’s just so easy. I’ll tuck it against my clit and sit back and read some erotica on my notebook computer, or lay in bed using it with the controller in comfortable reach on my stomach or beside me in bed (the cord is nice and long enough for this). I find that I don’t have to hold the bullet all the time, but can nestle it between my vulva and shift my hips and clench my thighs together to increase pressure and sensation, which leaves my hands free to do whatever else they need to, and also to change the settings.
Soon, I’m going to make up a list of toys that everyone with a vagina needs to own, and this one is most definitely making it on the list. Buy it. You will thank me later.
Similar Posts:

TLL Adult Review: Onye
TLL Adult Review: Laya Spot
TLL Adult Review: Liv
TLL Adult Review: Mia by LELO

(more…)

A

(more…)