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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (June 15, 2001)
june 15. 2001 • Findlay clenches his fist and adds passionate ly: “Many closeted gay men come to our con certs, and we help give them the power to say they do not have to hide who they are. That is what’s at the heart of the chorus.” If Findlay isn’t singing, he is probably wear ing his cowboy boots and is surrounded by dancers. He joins the Rosetown Ramblers for country western and square dancing and works as their activities director. Findlay organizes the Halloween weekend Scares and Squares, an out-of-state hoedown that attracts about 150 gay and lesbian square dancers from throughout the country. He also dances with a more elite square dance group, Heads to the Center. Although Findlay’s social life is hopping, his personal life recently has undergone a revolu tion. The good news: He’s got a new honey in California. The bad news: He’s been downsized from his position as a marketing manager at Tektronix. Whatever his new job might be, Findlay proudly will express his rainbow colors. “When we hide who we are from a friend, from our co workers and even from the man on the street, we are living in shame. Pride is about singing out proud who we are.” —Peter Zuckerman RAJU GADHER ome of us have had to travel farther than others even to have the chance to cele brate Pride Weekend in Portland. Raju Gadher came to the United States from Kenya in desperation last August. He is a sec ond-generation Indian but was bom and raised in Kenya. Well-educated, he speaks six lan guages and several dialects, graduated from Cambridge University in England and is in a one-year master’s program at Lewis and Clark College. Gadher’s story of being gay in Kenya is fright ening. The president has called for the eradica tion of homosexuals, and being convicted of “homosexuality” is a criminal offense punishable by seven years in prison. To go to prison there “is like visiting hell," Gadher says. Prior to leaving Kenya he was under con stant family pressure to marry. Socially and cul turally, this is something firmly expected. Several times his parents tried to arrange marriages for him. Now 36, he says, “For an Indian man to still be single at that late age is very unusual.” About a year before Gadher left Kenya, he became the victim of a con artist. He fell for this man and assumed the same to be true in reverse. S Catholic school, when she read about civil rights pioneer Harriet Tubman. “She freed peo ple against great odds, and that was really attrac tive to me.” Hall went on to fight 1994’s Measure 13 while studying to become an American Sign Language interpreter at Western Oregon Uni versity. As a student senator, she encountered one of her first frightening foes: a College Republican. “He called me a pinko liberal—1 didn’t even know what a pinko liberal was back then—and a coward for not using my real name,” she says. “He didn’t even know me.” (For the record, Hall’s real name is Cheryl Meredith; she goes by CM not for anonymity but because of finger fatigue when signing for the Deaf.) Blackmail resulted—then things got worse. Newspaper reporters started following him, also demanding money and threatening to print stories. The Kenyan police began investigating and questioning him, and it became obvious it was time to leave. “I had reached the end of my tether.” Overcome by personal pressure and political oppression, Gadher knew he had no choice but to come to the United States, where besides get ting a degree, he hoped to experience the open ness and freedoms we enjoy as gay people. After he graduates from Lewis and Clark, he plans to move to England, where he also holds a pass port, and specialize in environmental activism. He says this will be his first Gay Pride cele bration anywhere. He’ll be marching in the parade with new friends he has made while here and celebrating a certain kind of freedom and relief—things we all might take for granted. —Richard Bray Hall, an alum of the Human Rights Cam paign Youth College for Campaign Training, tasted the agony of defeat as campaign manager during Salem Democrat Rick Stucky’s highly or CM Hall, April 30 is a date with per contentious House race in 1998. “I learned that sonal historical significance. Not only it takes money to run a campaign and that fund does it mark the day she came out to her raising is a key element of any campaign work conservative parents in 1995, it turned out to you be want to do.” Obviously, the lesson stuck with her. Last the day Ellen DeGeneres came out on national year, Hall raised an impressive $280,000 as television in 1997. Three years later, Hail found herself listening house party coordinator during the No on 9 to DeGeneres address thousands gathered for Campaign. the Millennium March in Washington, D.C. Afterward she immediately transitioned to Basic Rights Oregon, where as development The date? You guessed it. Fortunate coincidences are nothing new for director she also plans events, secures major this energetic activist, though. In 1999, during a donor gifts and writes grants. Some people stint as a bus driver for a political sideshow in might not be able to handle the constant bar Iowa, none other than Bonnie Raitt approached rage of anti-gay attacks from enemies such as the her to offer support—and free concert tickets. Oregon Citizens Alliance, but not Hall. Hall says her activist spirit came alive during “I’m idealistic and optimistic about our potential as a community,” the 28-year-old says. “1 think the majority of Oregonians are fair- minded, and that affirms my commitment to this civil rights movement.” —Jim Radosta i STEPHAN HERRERA tephan Herrera, 25, projects pride in just about every aspect of his life. An ener getic guy, he puts his heart, spirit and action where his mouth is. Herrera coordinates HIV outreach for the African American Health Coalition in Port land. In this capacity, he is also project ctxirdi- nator for Brother to Brother, which reaches out to gay black men, providing both technical and capacity-building assistance. Working through the organization’s board, he additionally handles outreach for men who have sex with men in the Portland area. S CM HALL F I Herrera says much work needs to be done with young gay black men in our community. Recent statistics verify his concern: New HIV infection rates are higher for young black men Continued on Page 34 ;|33
