"Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Is Still Alive at MCRD (tags)
Anyone who thinks anti-Queer discrimination in the military is a thing of the past needs to read this article! Zenger's Newsmagazine associate editor Leo E. Laurence was fired from his stint as a volunteer at the San Diego Marine Corps Recruit Depot (MCRD) for bringing his roommate to an on-base event.
A Challenge to All Supporters of Medical Marijuana (tags)
Advocates of medical marijuana need to act NOW! Send e-mails to the White House and the Department of Justice to demand that President Obama and Attorney General Holder stop the concerted campaign to use federal enforcement agents to put medical marijuana dispensaries out of business, and return to Obama's campaign promise not to use federal law against medical marijuana in states where it is legal.
Queer Liberation Started in San Francisco, Not Stonewall (tags)
The legend says America's — and the world's — Queer liberation movement began with the riot at the Stonewall Inn bar in New York City in June 1969. But three months before, militant Queer activists in San Francisco had launched the Committee for Homosexual Freedom (CHF) and mounted the first-ever picket against a private employer for discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation. Leo Laurence and Pat Brown, two veterans of that movement, brought their story to Activist San Diego June 16.
It Didn't All Start at Stonewall! Meet Two Pioneers of Queer Liberation Jan. 15 (tags)
Three months before the Stonewall Inn riots in New York city in June 1969 which are commonly — but wrongly — thought to be the start of the Gay liberation movement, a group of Gay activists in San Francisco started the nation’s first Gay Liberation Front. Two of those activists, Leo E. Laurence and Pat Brown, now live in San Diego and will be speaking Monday, January 15, 7 p.m. at the Joyce Beers Community Center in Hillcrest in an event sponsored by Activist San Diego.
In this pioneering article from the December 1968 issue of Vector, an early Queer publication, Zenger's Newsmagazine associate editor Leo E. Laurence, J.D. tells his coming-out story and advises other Queer people on how to come out. Four months after this article was published, Leo co-founded the Gay Liberation Front in San Francisco and led the first demonstration against a private employer for anti-Queer discrimination in U.S. history in March 1969, three months BEFORE Stonewall.
Chaos in San Diego's Medical Marijuana Community (tags)
A report on conflicts within San Diego's medical marijuana community between the grass-roots Americans for Safe Access (ASA) and the dispensaries' trade group, Patients' Care Association (PCA) — and conflicts within the PCA between locals and an out-of-town organizer they accuse of trying to take over.
A Few Minutes with the Real Andy Rooney (tags)
Zenger's Newsmagazine associate editor Leo E. Laurence recalls his meeting with the late Andy Rooney, longtime commentator for the CBS news show "60 Minutes." They encountered each other at the 1996 Republican Convention in San Diego and Rooney personally apologized for his infamous on-air homophobic slur six years earlier.
Obama’s Justice Department Declares War on Medical Pot (tags)
The federal government recently escalated its war against medical marijuana. In San Diego and other southern California counties, instead of targeting medical marijuana dispensaries themselves, they are threatening the dispensaries' landlords with having their properties seized if they continue to rent to the dispensaries. They are also threatening publications like "Kush" and "Nug" aimed at the market for medical marijuana. This is yet another about-face for the Obama administration from its former assurances that they would leave medical marijuana dispensaries alone if they complied with state law.
Immigrants Are Undocumented, Not "Illegal" (tags)
The following resolution, principally authored by Zenger?s associate editor Leo E. Laurence, was unanimously approved by the Committee on Diversity of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) August 18 and will be presented to the SPJ at its national convention in New Orleans September 25-27.
Queer-Oriented Obelisk Store Shut Down by Hellish Fire (tags)
Obelisk Bookstore, a major Queer-oriented business on University Avenue in Hillcrest, burned on Wednesday, July 6. Three other businesses in the building were burned out, as were 15 apartments on the second and third floors. Miraculously, none of the residents were injured because none of them were home at the time. Leo E. Laurence, J.D., associate editor of Zenger's Newsmagazine and a former volunteer firefighter in Tijuana, got photos of firefighters containing the blaze (they weren't able to save the Obelisk building but WERE miraculously able to keep the fire from spreading to the rest of the block), the true extent of the damage (visible only from the alley behind the building) and the condition of Obelisk's stock after the fire.
Hemp Music Festival in Balboa Park (tags)
While music festivals supporting medical marijuana are common in southern California, it was rare when longtime cannabis (marijuana) activist James Dean Stacy produced an event focused on hemp in Balboa Park on July 9. ?Hemp is the cousin of cannabis that has no THC in it,? explained Stacy.
Teen Producers' Project Makes Pro-Immigrant Videos (tags)
In addition to running the popular San Diego Latino Film Festival, the Media Arts Center in North Park also sponsors the Teen Producers? Project, which trains teenage filmmakers to make professional-quality videos. This year?s productions were a series of hard-hitting documentaries on the rights of immigrants that progressive Congressmember Bob Filner offered to take to Washington, D.C. and show to his colleagues.
Yet Another Gay/Queer ?History? Book Perpetuates Old Myths (tags)
Yet another so-called ?Gay history? book, Michael Bronski?s ?A Queer History of the United States,? recycles the tired New York-centric myth that the Queer Liberation movement sprung full-blown from the Stonewall Inn riots in New York City. Leo E. Laurence, who was present at the REAL creation of Queer liberation in San Francisco in March 1969, three months BEFORE Stonewall, comments on Bronski?s book and offers Lambda Literary Award finalist Gale Whittington?s ?Beyond Normal? as an accurate source for the real birth of Gay Lib.
FilmOut Taps the Magic of Movies for Gays (tags)
There?s a film festival for virtually every racial, ethnic, religious, cultural and lifestyle community, and Queers are no exception. In San Diego, FilmOut runs monthly screenings at the Birch North Park Theatre as well as an annual festival in August featuring Queer-themed movies from around the world.
Activist San Diego Screens Medical Cannabis Film (tags)
A new film, ?Medical Cannabis and Its Impact on Human Health,? exposes the lies about the medical use of marijuana that led the San Diego City Council to enact a virtual ban on medical marijuana dispensaries in the city. Director James Schmachtenberger, who works at a local dispensary, appeared with the film Saturday, April 30 at a showing sponsored by Activist San Diego. The film is a bit dry, and even Schmachtenberger describes it as not especially entertaining, but it lays out the facts about marijuana's medical uses and makes the case for allowing the substance to be used to treat disease and preserve health.
Zenger’s vs. Fox on “Undocumented” vs. “Illegal” Immigrants (tags)
Does it look to you like he’s wearing a dress? That’s just one of the loonier accusations leveled against Zenger’s Newsmagazine associate editor Leo E. Laurence, J.D., shown being made up for one of his two recent appearances on Fox News. He was invited on “Fox and Friends” and “The O’Reilly Factor” to discuss his campaign to get the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) to recommend that immigrants in the U.S. without official papers be referred to as “undocumented” rather than “illegal.” What he got was a firestorm of bigoted, prejudiced and frequently ad hominem attacks from members of Fox’s core Right-wing audience; “idiot” was actually one of the less mean things he was called in the hundreds of e-mails that flooded in to his accounts after the shows.
A Different Kind of Tea: Some Tea Partiers May Support Pot Legalization (tags)
Proposition 19, which would legalize and tax marijuana in California, may have some unexpected supporters in the conservative tea party movement, reports Leo E. Laurence, associate editor of Zenger’s magazine and a former deputy sheriff who's campaigning for the measure as a member of the group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (L.E.A.P.).
Openly Gay Democrat Runs for San Diego County Supervisor, Bucks GOP Trend (tags)
Openly Gay Democrat Stephen Whitburn is challenging 16-year incumbent Republican Ron Roberts for the San Diego County Board of Supervisors. In what's expected to be a “Republican year,” Whitburn is hoping voter disgust with ALL incumbents will boost his campaign. He's already won the endorsement of the San Diego Firefighters' Union — who backed Roberts in all his previous campaigns — largely because the all-Republican Board, out of partisan distaste for the Obama administration, turned down federal stimulus money that could have upgraded the county's ability to deal with San Diego's endemic wildfires.
Marijuana Initiative Could Generate $1.4 Billion (tags)
Proposition 19, the initiative on the November 2 ballot to decriminalize possession of marijuana in California, could bring $1.4 billion or more annually to California's parched coffers — but in advocating for the measure as part of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (L.E.A.P.), Zenger's Newsmagazine associate editor Leo E. Laurence has found some politicians and law enforcement personnel eagerly embracing the idea, while others figuratively and sometimes literally run away from any hint of endorsing the measure.
Gay Liberation DIDN’T Begin at Stonewall!!! (tags)
The commercial interests who have taken over the Queer rights movement have a vested interest in promoting the myth that it all started with the riots at the Stonewall Inn bar in New York City in June 1969. But a group of activists who were present at the REAL foundation of Gay Liberation in San Francisco in early 1969 are coming together in an organization called "Project History" to set the record straight. Leo Laurence, Gale Whittington and Pat Brown are active in a project that will, among other things, reclaim the Queer movement's radical history and its alignments with the Black Panther Party and other militant Left groups of the time.
Proposition 8 Rallies Energize Queer Community (tags)
Rejecting the "safe" namby-pamby campaign against Proposition 8 that kept Queer people in the closet and lost anyway, young Gay activists are mobilizing on the Internet and holding mass rallies and marches to offer militant resistance to the anti-marriage initiative. Leo E. Laurence, who started the first Gay-liberation group in San Francisco in January 1969 (five months before Stonewall), finds these new activists reminiscent of himself and his colleagues in the late 1960's and early 1970's.
Progressive San Diego Council Candidate Takes On Developer (tags)
Progressive San Diego City Council candidate Stephen Whitburn held a press conference September 7 to protest a new development proposal for the Hillcrest area that would erect two high-rise towers in a small-scale, intimate neighborhood, adding to traffic congestion and destroying the community's atmosphere. Developer Bruce Lightenberger, also interviewed, said he couldn't care less; he claims that as long as it meets existing zoning, he has an absolute right to build his project and neither the city nor the community can stop him.
Handicapped Senior Citizen Bicycles Cross-Country … on Oxygen (tags)
Mark Junge of Cheyenne has white hair, but on August 12 he appeared as fit as a teenager in San Diego’s Embarcadero Park behind the Convention Center with his specially equipped $6,000 bicycle. Junge had just completed a 650-mile ride from San Francisco to the Tijuana border, clocking nearly 7,200 miles on four, long-distance trips in four years despite needing oxygen, which he gets from a specially built piece of equipment.
San Diego Community Leader Accused of Breaking Law (tags)
Popular San Diego community activist Leo Wilson is being accused of practicing law without a license, involving a heated controversy over the balloting on by-laws revisions for the Hillcrest Business Association (HBA).