Errors-To: owner-ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu Reply-To: ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu Sender: ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu From: ecto@ns1.rutgers.edu To: ecto-request@ns1.rutgers.edu Bcc: ecto-digest-outbound@ns1.rutgers.edu Subject: ecto #360 ecto, Number 360 Thursday, 5 November 1992 Today's Topics: *-----------------* I heard... Perhaps we really are waking up psychowelders in buffalo YAY!! DepthGauge Maybe we aren't waking up From Chooseday to Wednesday Pointe uv Information Mitch and Dan Quayle??!! ======================================================================== From: shark@cs.ucla.edu (Jeanne B. Schreiter) Subject: I heard... Date: Tue, 3 Nov 92 10:36:35 PST I heard something about Tori being on Arsenio Hall sometime this week. Anyone heard anything/seen anything about it? -- ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 3 Nov 92 21:36:45 PST From: stevev@greylady.uoregon.edu (Steve VanDevender) Subject: Perhaps we really are waking up Bush is losing big. Oregon's Measure 9 (which would have amended the state constitution to discriminate against homosexuals) is losing pretty decisively, currently about 60% "no" to 40% "yes". How's it going in Colorado, Doug? So for the most part, this election is turning out a lot better than I thought it would. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 03 Nov 92 19:35:33 EST From: kurious erenj Subject: psychowelders in buffalo unfortunately, this event already happened. forgot the exact date, but it certainly was a few weekends ago - the monday after that show they did in akron, oh was the exact day i believe. is that the 24th of october? (woj looks at a calendar) nope, that was the 26th - that sounds right as i'm sure it was the monday after the last time i visited meredith. look for another eastern united states tour in the spring of next year. woj ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 4 Nov 92 2:12:39 EST From: WretchAwry Subject: YAY!! We just got home from a victory party. Geez, I'm so tired, I got up at 5:45am to go vote and haven't been home since. I just had to get on for a minute before I go to bed to say... **********!!!!!!!!!!YAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!********* And...HOORAY for the people of Oregon!! And, because it's important to me...HOORAY for the people of Missouri!! (new pro-choice gov) What a night! Good night! Vickie (from Chicago "home of Carol Moseley Braun" Illinois) ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 04 Nov 92 04:17:40 -800 From: jonathan@unixg.ubc.ca (Jonathan Schachter) Subject: DepthGauge Dear Johnson & Segal, Bravo and thank you from Vancouver, Canada. My IIsi would have driven me mad with its slow performance had you not allowed me to toggle 1 bit on the fly! Will purchase Happy Rhodes CD as soon as can put $15.00 in the same place! Yours gratefully, Jonathan G. Schachter ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 4 Nov 92 08:24:32 MST From: dbx@olympic.atmos.colostate.edu (Doug Burks) Subject: Maybe we aren't waking up Greetings, Steve wrote: Oregon's Measure 9 (which would have amended the state constitution to discriminate against homosexuals) is losing pretty decisively, currently about 60% "no" to 40% "yes". How's it going in Colorado, Doug? Unfortunately, Amendment 2 passed with 53% of the vote, though don't go automatically bashing Coloradans, who are a very tolerant bunch. We even voted for a Democratic president for the first time since 1964. The story is more complex than that. First, the amendment was very reasonably written, basically denying homosexuals any special status under the law, granting them the same status as anyone else. It had none of the standard gay bashing tirades or even code words in it. Second, there were actually two separate campaigns for 2. The more prominent one was run by Colorado for Family Values, which had all of the standard gay bashing lines and invented a few of their own. However, even they ran some fair and effective ads pointing out that gays as a group are better off economically than average person, and that nothing can distinguish gay and straight people, so how can they be discriminated against? The Equal Protection Committee ran an even more effective campaign, behind the slogan "Equal Rights, Not Special Rights". Third, the No On 2 campaign was completely incompetent, relying on scare tactics. They claimed all sorts of nonsense, even that Amendment 2 would lead to depriving homosexuals the right to vote. Yet probably the worst thing they did, though, was to sue TV stations to keep them from airing ads by Colorado for Family Values supporting the amendment, (because of their sexual content, of all things). That pissed off a lot of people sympathetic to dthe cause, generating a lot of favorable and free publicity for the Yes On 2 campaigns. (In a side note, Colorado saw a lot of battles over TV ads, and in all of them, it was the left trying to suppress the right, which embarrasses me to no end. Why does the Politically Correct movement try to suppress free speech so much?) In short, the campaign was obviously run by Boulder activists, who have a foaming at the mouth self- righteousness that will turn off practically all but the True Believers. In my opinion, their most effective campaign weapon would be to present reasonable looking and sounding gay people who were actually discriminated against. The campaign showed nothing about that. So in the end, the result wasn't unexpected. I knew quite a few people who I know are liberal and tolerant who supported the amendment. Even Larimer County, a liberal college-dominated county, didn't defeat the amendment soundly. Given the way the campaigns were run, I really can't blame anyone who supported the amendment. By the way, the other election news in Colorado was equally bad. :( Doug Burks _O_ dbx@olympic.atmos.colostate.edu |< She really is!! ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 4 Nov 92 09:54:50 MST From: dbx@olympic.atmos.colostate.edu (Doug Burks) Subject: Re: Maybe we aren't waking up Greetings, [Gee! What bad form following up your own post! :) ] I wrote: Even Larimer County, a liberal college-dominated county, didn't defeat the amendment soundly. [...] Oops! I double-checked the latest election results. Larimer County _passed_ Amendment 2. Amendment Two was only defeated in the counties of Boulder and Denver. While the victory was narrow, the support for Amendment Two was amazingly broad-based. Doug Burks _O_ dbx@olympic.atmos.colostate.edu |< She really is!! ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 4 Nov 92 10:30:12 PST From: stevev@greylady.uoregon.edu (Steve VanDevender) Subject: Maybe we aren't waking up Doug Burks writes: > Unfortunately, Amendment 2 passed with 53% of the vote, though don't go > automatically bashing Coloradans, who are a very tolerant bunch. We > even voted for a Democratic president for the first time since 1964. The > story is more complex than that. As an Oregonian who survived the battle over Ballot Measure 9, I certainly wouldn't start bashing Coloradans. Here, though, there were many reported acts of vandalism and intimidation, which makes me wonder whether enough Oregonians are really very tolerant. > First, the amendment was very reasonably written, basically denying > homosexuals any special status under the law, granting them the same > status as anyone else. It had none of the standard gay bashing tirades > or even code words in it. This could be the future tactic of the OCA (Oregon Citizens Alliance) here. Last night they were already saying they'd draft a new measure for the 1994 general election. Measure 9 was much more strongly worded, listing "homosexuality, bestiality, sadism, and masochism", and preventing the state government and any of its employees from speaking of any of those in a positive way. > Second, there were actually two separate campaigns for 2. The more > prominent one was run by Colorado for Family Values, which had all of > the standard gay bashing lines and invented a few of their own. However, > even they ran some fair and effective ads pointing out that gays as a > group are better off economically than average person, and that nothing > can distinguish gay and straight people, so how can they be discriminated > against? The Equal Protection Committee ran an even more effective > campaign, behind the slogan "Equal Rights, Not Special Rights". The OCA didn't quite have so many periods of lucidity. Although OCA officials started to backpedal a bit and say that they didn't want to see state government employees be fired for being gay, or to ban large quantities of books and art, in general most of their ads and official statements were strident, manipulative, and all too often played up negative stereotypes of homosexuality. Similar statistics about the economic status of gays and lesbians came up here, although I really wondered about the way that they were used. I really got the impression that the people quoting those statistics were trying to say, "They make more than we do so we need to hold them back." > Third, the No On 2 campaign was completely incompetent, relying on scare > tactics. They claimed all sorts of nonsense, even that Amendment 2 would > lead to depriving homosexuals the right to vote. Yet probably the worst > thing they did, though, was to sue TV stations to keep them from airing > ads by Colorado for Family Values supporting the amendment, (because of > their sexual content, of all things). That pissed off a lot of people > sympathetic to dthe cause, generating a lot of favorable and free publicity > for the Yes On 2 campaigns. (In a side note, Colorado saw a lot of battles > over TV ads, and in all of them, it was the left trying to suppress the > right, which embarrasses me to no end. Why does the Politically Correct > movement try to suppress free speech so much?) In short, the campaign was > obviously run by Boulder activists, who have a foaming at the mouth self- > righteousness that will turn off practically all but the True Believers. > In my opinion, their most effective campaign weapon would be to present > reasonable looking and sounding gay people who were actually discriminated > against. The campaign showed nothing about that. The No on 9 campaign was clearly more effective. Although they did make generous assumptions about the possible effects of Measure 9, they ran some very intelligent TV ads, especially compared to the ones run by the OCA. Although the OCA kept using the "No special rights" slogan, Measure 9 and all of their official statements basically said that because they believed homosexuality was wrong, state law should actively discourage it, a significant step beyond "no special rights". I suspect that Colorado's Amendment 2 would have also passed in Oregon. Is this topic of enough interest to ectophiles to make it worth continued discusstion here? ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 4 Nov 92 10:59:45 -0800 From: Michael G Peskura Subject: Maybe we aren't waking up Steve VanDevender asks: > Is this topic of enough interest to ectophiles to make it worth > continued discussion here? The memory of the Republican convention, a manifestation of one of the strongest political forces in the US of A, should have inspired all of us to reflect on what life in this country is becoming. Steve, these things should be discussed on -ecto- and everywhere thinking people have a voice...! ======================================================================== Subject: Re: Maybe we aren't waking up Date: Wed, 04 Nov 92 23:51:27 -0500 From: jeffy@syrinx.umd.edu Doug sez: >First, the amendment was very reasonably written, basically denying >homosexuals any special status under the law, granting them the same >status as anyone else. It had none of the standard gay bashing tirades >or even code words in it. Think about this, though. I don't know a single homosexual (and trust me, I know plenty...;-) who want special status under the law. We're not looking for special rights. We want *equal* rights. What's scary to me about Colorado's 2 is that is makes it impossible for *any* sort of region (city, county, public universities) to have non-discrimination clauses. No chance for a city to pass a domestic- partnership law (since it's impossible for two people of the same sex to get married anywhere in the US; a DP bill isn't a great solution, but a lot of people feel it's better than nothing) The amendment specifically states that no gay man, lesbian, or bisexual shall have the ability to 'claim discrimination.' All you have to do is look at a list of hate crime statistics to get an idea of the discrimination out there. But don't expect to look at a list of Colorado hate crimes against gay men, lesbians, and bisexual--since there's no way to claim discrimination, there's no way to compile statistics on occurrences. While I'm glad the Oregon didn't pass Measure 9, and Portland did not over turn it's gay rights bill, I think it's terrible that Article 2 passed and that Tampa passed their [similar] bill. So it goes. Jeff ======================================================================== Date: 4 November 1992 14:44:39 CST From: Subject: From Chooseday to Wednesday Toward the end of the film _Fiddler on the Roof_ there is a bit of business in which one of the emigrating villagers says to another, "I'm going to New York, America." The second villager replies, "I'm going to Chicago, America," where- upon the first exclaims, "We'll be neighbors." I am reminded of all this by the coincidence that according to the State Board of Elections list of general election candidates, Carol Moseley Braun--now the first black woman elected to the U.S. Senate--lives on the same street as I do, albeit nearly a mile and a half away. Now she's moving to Washington, and we'll no longer be neighbors-- as if we ever were in the first place :-). It's sort of in the same vein as my having lived next door to Norman Maclean, the author/protagonist of _A River Runs Through It_ (not a history of the Loop tunnel flood), during my early childhood. I never had any contact with him, my parents presumably did, though that presumably was not an absolute prerequisite for my mother being able to pass this datum on to me. By coincidence, as I write this NPR is about to interview Harvard economist Robert Reich, Clinton's classmate in the Rhodes Scholar program on "What Happens When An Old Friend Becomes President?" It is interesting how people other than liberal Democrats (or their overseas equivalents) don't seem to gravitate to this mailing list, judging from the lack of expressions of disaffection over our collective propensity for Bush- bashing. Aside from the favorable public policy implications of the change in administrations, it somehow sticks out in my mind that the dog person (which I once was) is giving way to the cat person (which I am now). By an interes- ting coincidence, one of the newest members of the resident company of outside hangers-on is a dead ringer for Socks. By an accident of scheduling, I found myself going straight from the polls to the dentist, whose deep drilling still has me feeling tenderness in one spot of my mandible. I also went to the dentist on the day of the primary, in which Braun scored the upset. I cannot remember whether I went to the dentist on election day in 1982, when she was re-elected to a safe seat in the state legis lature (I voted for her that time, too). One can only hope that these things are causally independent, and that the fate of this rising political star is in no way a function of my dental health (_vel non_) over time :-). Richard Nixon's first election occurred during my senior year in high school. I cannot remember whether it was the next day, or a couple of days later, that someone I ran into in the corridor mused that the dull, dreary day that it then was fit in with the election results. This morning started out cold, overcast, even a little bit snowy, lending me some assurance that such correlations were indeed spurious. Later, I looked up from my lunch to find the sun had come out, though it was still reasonably cold. Such is what comes of overreliance on _a posteriori_ indicators. The final idea that came to me for musical accompaniment for the campaign may be of purely local interest, but at least it uses Happy's music. The winning candidate for state's attorney, O'Malley, found it necessary to work at pre- venting voter confusion of him with this opponent, O'Connor. What better background music for this dilemma than "Oh The Drears?" (Or should it more properly be "O' The Drears?" :-) ) Today's issue of McPaper (a/k/a USA Today) carries a feature on the country singer Suzy Boguss, in which she observes that the growth curve up to her current success had its beginnings when she developed "little pockets of listeners" and did her own "promoting, booking and poster-plastering" on the live performance circuit. As one of Happy's little pockets of listeners, let's hope it's a precedent for greater things to come. Doug says: >By the way, the other election news in Colorado was equally bad. :( Not entirely sure what's meant by that. Aside from the nadir of the referendum that McPaper cryptically labeled "Discrimination Protection," the principal outcomes were the defeat of the education voucher referendum, new restrictions on black bear hunting, Ben Campbell's election to the Senate, and of course Clinton's accretion of the state's electoral votes. Van Devender says (in re the so-called "Discrimination Protection" (qv): > Is this topic of enough interest to ectophiles to make it worth > continued discussion here? I had been planning to write that it should be. Then Peskura's post came in, saying it far more elequently than I could have. I second Mike's thoughts enthusiastically. Mitch ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 5 Nov 92 08:18:23 MST From: dbx@olympic.atmos.colostate.edu (Doug Burks) Subject: Re: Maybe we aren't waking up Greetings, Mitch wrote: >By the way, the other election news in Colorado was equally bad. :( Not entirely sure what's meant by that. Aside from the nadir of the referendum that McPaper cryptically labeled "Discrimination Protection," ... Actually, that's probably about as good a two-word description as I've heard. The basic result of the amendment is that anyone who specifically discriminates against gays in Colorado is now protected. Only a violation of a gay's human rights could be prosecuted. ... the principal outcomes were the defeat of the education voucher referendum, new restrictions on black bear hunting, Ben Campbell's election to the Senate, and of course Clinton's accretion of the state's electoral votes. All true, and I actually voted on the winning side of all of these (which stunned me). However, the list would be a bit different from a Coloradan. We banned all tax increases which aren't approved by popular vote, along with some very restrictive definition of tax increase. A much needed tax increase for education was overwhelmingly defeated. Colorado has effectively killed any hopes for quality public education or effective state or local government. Add in the Republicans winning Ben Nighthorse Campbell's seat, (upping their edge in Colorado to 4-2) and a complete non-entity named Wayne Allard remaining my Congressman, and I can only echo St Rep Ruth Wright's comment, "I can't believe we fixed the federal government and trashed Colorado". By the way, to brighten the day a bit, every candidate who took a strong anti-abortion stand in Colorado was soundly defeated. None of the races were close. Jeff wrote: What's scary to me about Colorado's 2 is that is makes it impossible for *any* sort of region (city, county, public universities) to have non-discrimination clauses. Actually, there's a lot of hope here. Colorado's constitution has a "home rule" provision, allowing cities to make their own laws. The City and County of Denver (which was one of three cities whose gay rights ordinances were overturned by Amendment 2) is suing in the Colorado Supreme Court under that provision. Keep your fingers crossed! But don't expect to look at a list of Colorado hate crimes against gay men, lesbians, and bisexual--since there's no way to claim discrimination, there's no way to compile statistics on occurrences. You are over-stating things a bit here, Jeff. The amendment prevents discrimination claims from being taken to court. The claims could (and should) still be made and statistics compiled both by governmental and private organizations. The amendment creates a climate that makes it harder to do, but the climate was not much better before its passage anyway. Think about this, though. I don't know a single homosexual (and trust me, I know plenty...;-) who want special status under the law. We're not looking for special rights. We want *equal* rights. I'm going to put my radical raconteur hat on here and probably get Jeff and a few others mad. Whatever the intention, the enshrinement of a law specifically protecting a single group becomes de facto special rights. If not, why have so many people claimed to be Hispanic in San Francisco that they've had to create a commission to decide who really is? There have been court cases where the prime argument is whether the victim was really black. If I ever tried to claim discrimination, I would be laughed out of any court, even if it were completely true. On top of that, there are other groups who also have very serious problems in this society with discrimination who have no hope for such special status, such as the overweight, smokers, people with certain diseases or personal habits, certain professions, left-handers, etc., etc. Instead of pushing for special cases, why not push for a charter of _human_ rights to ban discrimination for _any_ reason. In my opinion, the problem in this society is not a lack of laws, but a lack of tolerance for people who are different. No law is going to change that, usually ending up pissing off the groups who don't fall under a protected class, creating only more intolerance, not less. We must continually attack intolerance of all types, determining the quality of people from who they are, not what group nature happened to put them in. I know, it's all dreamy pie-in-the-sky stuff, but, as I said a couple of days ago, I'm a bit radical and extreme on this issue. Mitch wrote: It is interesting how people other than liberal Democrats (or their overseas equivalents) don't seem to gravitate to this mailing list, judging from the lack of expressions of disaffection over our collective propensity for Bush-bashing. [I guess this is my week to get things off my chest. :) ] That doesn't mean that they aren't here. Anyone who reads this list for any length of time will quickly see which way the wind is blowing. A conservative person will have to decide whether all of the Happy and music talk is worth put up with the attacks on his political beliefs. I suspect they usually don't, and I worry about how many proto-Happy fans we've lost this way. Personally, I would have a lot of sympathy for them, as one of my personal beliefs gets trashed occasionally in this group. No, I'm not a conservative, but I am Christian. Unfortunately, stereotyped Christian-bashing is an occasional recreational sport in my social circle, which includes Ecto, and I just put up with it. I just want to let you know that just because no one is complaining about it, it doesn't mean they aren't here. By the way, I'm not advocating stopping any of the non-Happy threads. Heck, that's what makes Ecto what it is. I just want people to be aware of this, keeping a little eye open for how their comments may be perceived by an Ectophile who disagrees with their opinion. That is what tolerance is all about. Doug Burks _O_ dbx@olympic.atmos.colostate.edu |< She really is!! ======================================================================== Date: 5 November 1992 10:54:13 CST From: Subject: Pointe uv Information >From what I've read of Colorado Proposition 2, in these pages and elsewhere, one thing remains ambiguous to me: does it only kibosh bans on discrimination based on homo/bisexuality, or does it extend to bans on discrimination based on sexual orientation more globally? If the former, it might be possible to argue that a statute that bans discrimination on the basis of orientation, _qua_ orientation--and remains silent as to particular varieties of sexual preference --is unaffected, since it does not entrench the rights of some orientation grou ps and not others. If the latter, on the other hand, Prop 2 may appear to be airtight--unless one wants to try out a 14th Amendment theory challenging it. All this is an object lesson in the dysfunction of getting your information fro m _USA Today_, a rag I only read in the aftermath of national elections, when the pack rat mindset re the latest info takes over. It never mentioned the more lugubrious results that came out of Colorado. If it's any consolation, we in Illinois also failed to pass an amendment which would have put the state explicitly on the hook for a majority of the cost of public election, while passing one that guaranteed a variety of rights to crime victims which had already been guaranteed by statute--in effect giving vent to some of the more vengeance-oriented sentiments that sometimes float around the criminal justice system. To add insult to injury, the Republicans gained control of the state senate, whose new leader tends to be venomously anti-urban. Politic- al misery loves company, eh wot? :-) Mitch -------------------------- "That's the people...try and lick that." --James Gleason at the end of _Meet John Doe_ ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 5 Nov 92 12:55:40 EST From: Laura Clifford Subject: Mitch and Dan Quayle??!! Mitch - I just had to laugh when you said: >By an accident of scheduling, I found myself going straight from the polls to >the dentist, whose deep drilling still has me feeling tenderness in one spot >of my mandible. I also went to the dentist on the day of the primary, in which >Braun scored the upset. I cannot remember whether I went to the dentist on >election day in 1982, when she was re-elected to a safe seat in the state legis >lature (I voted for her that time, too). One can only hope that these things >are causally independent, and that the fate of this rising political star is in >no way a function of my dental health (_vel non_) over time :-). When Dan Quayle was asked what he was doing Tuesday, he said he was going to the dentist 'for good luck' as that's where he had been the day he won his first election! Laura ======================================================================== The ecto archives are on hardees.rutgers.edu in ~ftp/pub/hr. There is an INDEX file explaining what is where. Feel free to send me things you'd like to have added. -- jessica (jessica@ns1.rutgers.edu)