/
2002
Cascade AIDS Project’s
Teen-to-Teen Program does
outreach to young folks 14 to
22 years old. Mercedes Herra-
da is one of the volunteers talking to hundreds of kids about the
dangers and prevention of AIDS. “Considering that over half
of the new HIV infections are in people under the age of 2 5 ,1
don’t think that youth are practicing safer sex than they were
10 years ago,” she tells Just Out. “But that does not mean that
all youth are having unsafe sex...I think that youth have a
tendency to think that we are invisible and that it won’t
happen to us.”
Folks are
“The Man with Two Faces,” reads
still figuring out
the cover of Just Out. “Lon Mabon
what to call the community, it there
thinks he’s too pro-gay. Bill Bradbury
-- such a thing. Annie Otis. Miss G av Pride
thinks he’s too anti-gay. Will the real
2 0 0 2 . wonders whv “G av ” fell off the Pride
Gordon Smith please stand up?” The
parade and whv her title of Miss G av Pride is
Human Rights Campaign endorses
now iust Miss Pride. 4‘Frannlv, 1 am disturbed
Smith for re-election, while Just Out
by this recent trend and am not convinced it
is a step in the right direction hut rather a step
endorses his Democratic opponent,
backward into the closer," she writes. Jess
Bill Bradbury. Meanwhile, Just Out
Bmneile writes about the diversity in G L B T —
readers give Smith a mixed review.
Horn hippies to moneymakers to youth and
“Smith is one of the appallingly tew
single moms. “You’ve got people who need to
politicians I know of who is genuine
lit in and the ones who fight not to have to ....
ly compassionate and caring about
There are those of us who put a lot of energy
controlling discrimination against
into making our community more inclusive for
everyone and those who resent having to add
gay men and lesbians,” writes Lee
the word ‘trans’ to the question,” writes
Coleman. But Christopher J. Arm-
Brunelle. “To me, community is more than
strong-Stevenson writes: “I think
having alternative sexuality in common. It’s
we’re being misled. His personal reli
about sharing a comm on Kind, having each
gious beliefs are stronger than any
other’s back and being accepted and appreciat
allegiance to our community.”
ed for who we really are. I haven’t found that
sense of community here yet, and I’m not sure
Lesbian cop Katie Potter
l ever will. For now, I guess 1 will have to take Portland
wants Portland to offer the same
for what it is: extremely diverse, fiercely opinionated, at
benefits
in retirement and death
times dysfunctional and definitely interesting.”
to domestic partners of police
and firefighters that it offers to
married couples. “It just kind of
slapped me in the face that my
family, which is so important to
me, has no support financially
should something happen,” she
tells Just Out. In February, the
city passes an ordinance that
does just that.
More than 100 trans activists
from Oregon, Washington,
Idaho, Nevada, California, Alas
ka and Canada attend the North
west G LBT Power Summit.
The Laramie Project plays in
Portland from May 25 to
June 30. A gay student, Matthew
Shepard, was bnitally killed in
1998, and this play focuses on
The 26th annual Gay Softball World Series comes to
the “environment in which he
Portland, bringing to town aKiut 2,300 queer softball players,
lived and died.”
friends and partners
< v
Helping people
buy homes, every day.
Just Out runs a cover story
on why some gay men are hav
ing sex without a condom, aka
harebacking. Among several
reasons is safe-sex fatigue. “You couldn’t have a more dangerous
behavior,” says Philip Knowlton of Cascade A ID S Project.
“Sex without condoms is great, but it’s hurting the communi
ty, and it’s going to screw us in the end."
Steam Portland, a gay bathhouse, opens in February and
C A P is there twice monthly doing outreach about safer sex.
Some view their presence as annoying, hut thap’s OK with
CAP. Its presence reminds people that anonymous sex in
public isn’t a “ffee-for-ail ganghang without mies. Or con
doms. Or consequences. ’
Measure 28. Funding tor medicine, no funding tor medicine.
The debate goes on. But in lanuarv some peopie receive notice that the state is
cutting off their HIV/AIDS medicine. ‘All hell broke loose, savs R. David Meador, one ot manv
low-income Oregonians who fell off the “we ll cover vou list.” As a result, A ID S Action Project
Northwest quickly forms to keep an eve on service providers. “Everyone was running tor cover,
asking where are we going to get our medications.'” comments Ooard member Eric Lindon. It used
to he “get tested, get treated." Now it s “get tested, get in line,“ reports Just Out.
2003
During Black Pride in
June. 75 people celebrate
the 10th anniversary of
Brother to Brother, a non
profit organization that
offers resources and services
to African Amencan gay
and bisexual men, includ
ing HIV/AIDS education.
The 2000 census put
Portland as having the
13th-highest number of
same-sex couples in the
nation. Two years later, a
national lesbian magazine
ranked Portland as the
fourth-best place for les
bians to live in the nation.
In 2003, The Portland
Oregon Visitors Associa
tion creates a program to
lure visitors to Gay Port
land. “We really see Port
land as a welcoming place
for G LBT travelers, and we
think it’s a perfect match,”
says cultural tourism direc
tor Barbara Steinfeld.
Basic Rights Oregon’s
Trans Advisory Group
heads to Salem, where it
gives legislators an intro
duction to transgender
basics. The class covers
items such as the differ
ence between gender
identity and sexual orien
tation, definitions of other
trans terms, plus personal
stories.
Ann Shepherd dies in January at age 84. She’s been the
community’s “mom” for more than 25 years. Ann and her
husband, Bill, along with Charles and Rita Knapp were
founders of the Portland chapter of Parents, Families and
Friends of Lesbians and Gays, better known as PFLAG.
She oughta be
in pictures—
and now she is,
when in 2003
legendary
drag diva
Darcelle X V
(proprietress
of the longest-
surviving drag
club in the
United States)
becomes
the subject of
her own
documentary,
S/He Shows:
D rag as Social
Action
In January, around 25,OCX) people in Portland protest the very real
possibility that the United States will invade Iraq. A tew months later,
we re at war, and Just Out interviews several activists. Bonnie Tinker ot
Love Makes a Family remembers that in 1991 during the G ulf War,
most gays and lesbians were preoccupied with Measure 9. “Queer
people were st) busy trying to just maintain survival rights ourselves,"
she tells Just Out. But now, there is more time. “Queer people are a
people who are defined by the way we love, and I think that it there
fore falls to us to take leadership in this peace movement.” JH
Pat Young is a Portland free-lance writer and gay and lesbian historian.
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