Ah,yeah!That's it!!!

Travel to Athens in crisis and support the 6th Outview:
Athens International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival.

We are asking all of you to ask for your support for the 6th Athens International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival.

Due to the economic and social crisis in Greece, tolerance towards difference has been minimized and racism is on the rise. Gay rights among political agendas are at the bottom even for LGBT politicians. It’s so important for us that this year as many of you as possible attend our festival, to participate as viewers or exhibit your art or organise a workshop or represent an organization or make any sort of statement.

It is terribly important to show that an economic crisis doesn’t mean that human rights should be ignored. This is why we are making this call to you to attend our festival and give a strong international LGBT presence and show Greece and the world that we won’t be silenced.

If you plan on visiting Greece use this festival as an excuse to finally make it over and along with your other plans include attendance at the festival.

Our Festival this year will take place at Cervantes Institute who fully support us. It’s going to last 10 days, from 3 – 13 May and it’s right next to Sydagma square in the center of Athens, just 10 min from the Acropolis.

Even in crisis we know how to party and we still offer openhandedly our great traditional hospitality. We promise you a great time with a lot of tsipouro, ouzo and many films. We have collaborated with a travel agency and we have made some really cheap tour packages that you can see below or you can search by yourselves online and find something much cheaper!

Please contact us at this email info@outview.gr for requests and please don’t forget that any of you that can, in one way or another, participate actively in Outview. Send us info of what and how you want to participate.

Looking forward to your response

OUTVIEW FILM FESTIVAL SPECIAL PACKAGE

•3 nights in hotel 100m from festival, http://www.panhotel.gr
•3day film pass
•Guided tour of acropolis museum,

Single room €175
Double room/sharing €125
Triple room/sharing €120

Prices per person in Euros (€), upon request and availability.

Outview Film Festival Team

Πηγή:www.lesbian.gr

European Parliament calls on Nigeria to reverse anti-gay laws.

Following violence and economic concerns in the African state, the European Parliament has adopted a resolution on Nigeria which condemns in part the current legal threats to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender citizens.
Nigeria’s Same Gender Marriage Prohibition Bill was proposed in 2011, and has since been amended by the Nigerian Senate to punish those in a same-sex union with 14 years’ imprisonment, and anyone ‘aiding or abetting’ such unions with 10 years in prison.
The Parliament said in addition to locals, tourists and aid workers in a same-sex marriage or civil partnership are at risk of arrest and prosecution, those working in embassies but without diplomatic protection will also be subject to prosecution.
The European Parliament is calling “on the Nigerian Parliament to reject the ‘Same Gender Marriage Prohibition Bill’ which, if passed, would put LGBT people – both Nigerian nationals and foreigners – at serious risk of violence and arrest”.
It also “calls for the abolition of current legislation criminalising homosexuality, in some cases making it punishable by stoning”.
The law currently punishes gay acts with 14 years’ imprisonment or death by stoning in some regions.
Michael Cashman MEP, Co-president of the European Parliament’s Intergroup on LGBT Rights, said: “Nigeria is already among the world’s top oppressors of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Why such a law now? Nigeria needs to follow the example of countries like Rwanda, Kenya or South Africa, which prove African nations don’t need to persecute the vulnerable in order to strive.”
Ulrike Lunacek MEP, Co-president of the LGBT Intergroup, said: ”Our Nigerian sisters and brothers have the European Parliament’s full solidarity in these difficult times. No group has ever called for same-sex marriage in Nigeria; our fellow lawmakers should stop obsessing about citizens’ private lives, and start tackling the dire socio-economic situation in Nigeria.”
In December, activists delivered a copy of a 60,000-strong global petition addressed to the Nigerian President Goodluck Johnson, urging him not to sign in the law if it is passed by the House of Representatives.

Πηγή:www.pinknews.co.uk

30 gays arrested in Dubai says unconfirmed reports.

An United Arab Emirates LGBT group claims that more than 30 men have been arrested by government forces for being gay. The United Arab Emirates Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender group has received reports that 30 people who are believed may be gay were arrested in private ‘after’ party last at 5am, last Friday (9 March) in the Shangri La Hotel, Dubai.
It was said the party was ambushed and all present were taken for questioning. Some of the men are reported to be from prominent Emirati families.
It is unclear at this point if the men are still in detention or have been freed, nor if any charges have been brought against them. Neither UAE LGBT nor Gay Middle East have not been able to verify the details and hotel staff were cagey when questioned about the incident by us.
The United Arab Emirates has strict federal laws regarding homosexuality and each emirate has their own specific laws. While the Emirate of Dubai has technically severe laws they are usually not strictly enforced.
‘It was a private party in a private hired space where people were behaving and not even engaging in any public display of affection, so I can’t imagine why they got arrested,’ said Adilah, a lesbian member of UAE LGBT told GME.
‘The CID [police] don’t just bust private parties, either someone ratted the party out or some hotels guests or staff complained about the noise in the middle of the night, I am just shocked that this happened!’ she protested.
‘We waited a few days,’ she continued, ‘to see if it would get a note in the press. It didn’t as the authorities knew it would create uproar. We only knew that they were kept in detention for a few days, but have no idea if they are still locked up.
‘Plus some of the boys are from prominent Emirati families, so something may have been arranged with the police and the press to silence this story, its very difficult to find out accurate details.’
‘My heart goes out to the boys, who must be feeling humiliated and in terror have sat or even still sitting in a cell. No one deserves to be incarcerated for being who they are, especially when it doesn’t hurt anyone around them.
‘This was a private party, one amongst hundreds if not thousands taking place in the UAE on a Friday night. The boys risk huge consequences and discriminations in their future careers if their names get out, not to mention the lives of some of them are at risk if their families are conservatives, as it may lead to so called “honour killings”.’
Abdulla the chair of UAE LGBT told GME: ‘As an activist This is disheartening, the government’s actions towards our community are horrid and deplorable especially at a time where the public has expressed willingness to engage in a debate about the issues our community faces, just for being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender!’
UAE LGBT is appealing for information, if anyone has any details please to be send an email via the GME editorial to editor@gaymiddleeast.com.

Πηγή:www.pinknews.co.uk

Protection pre-conception, should gay parents consider it?

The Court of Appeal has handed down a decision today in a case brought by lesbian parents seeking to marginalise the relationship between their son and his natural father.
The focus of the parents’ argument was that they wanted to bring up the child in a two parent family. In contemplation of that they sought to reach an agreement with a close male friend. They entered into an agreement – pre conception – whereby he would act as a donor but would then have no further role in the child’s life. Whilst understandable from the parents’ point of view it would have been extremely difficult for a court to uphold this agreement if it were not in the best interests of the child.
The question on everyone’s lips now is whether same sex couples should enter into pre conception agreements such as this and if so should or would those agreements be upheld by courts in the future?
The question arises as a result of changing attitudes towards same sex couples and their legal rights. It would be easy to say on the one hand that following on from the recent highly publicised prenuptial agreement case (Radmacher) such agreements should be given considerable weight. After all the decision in Radmacher was based, at least in part, on the courts taking the view that adults should be able to regulate their own affairs provided there is no undue influence.
However we must recall that in the case of pre nuptial agreements these usually deal with finances rather than the level of contact parents should have with their children following on from divorce. Indeed it is difficult to see a court upholding an agreement which, for example, states that if a married couple later separate the father will see his child for two hours each week. Inevitably the court would take into consideration the welfare checklist as set out in the Children Act.
The overriding principle of the Children act is that the court must do what is in the best interests of the child. That test must be undertaken at the time the matter comes before the court. It seems highly unlikely, in my view, that the courts, despite their efforts to ensure they are keeping up with social change, would feel able to uphold an agreement made in relation to a child several years ago.
The other point of difference in relation to pre nuptial agreements is of the course the need for some level of equality of bargaining power. The courts will consider whether each party had independent legal advice before entering into the agreement or at the very least whether they had the opportunity of doing so and whether if they did not they were disadvantaged in their ability to deal with the agreement. Is it possible to measure the levels of bargaining power when one is dealing with such an emotional topic as a parent/child relationship?
Whilst therefore it is easy to say that such pre conception agreements should be upheld is it right that greater weight should be attached to an agreement made pre conception to an agreement made post conception by a heterosexual couple or indeed a lesbian couple? It is difficult to see why different criteria should attach. Does it really make a difference to the child’s best interests whether he or she was born at the time the agreement was entered into? The salient facts are of course that the donor is a natural parent. As a natural parent the child has a right to know him and to maintain a father child relationship in all but the very most extreme cases. Should this really be any different because a donor decided pre conception that he would never have any contact with his child, especially when the donor is a close family friend and is therefore coming into contact with that child on a regular basis.
In summary it is difficult to see how a pre conception agreement such as the one in this case could have been upheld. If such agreements are to be upheld then they must surely only be upheld when the parties have each had independent advice or at the very least having a high level of understanding of what they are entering into. It is this which causes difficulty. If each party has capacity or is commercially aware there is equality of bargaining power when discussing financial issues. I think the difficulty comes in how we assess equality of bargaining power in relation to a donor who has not yet seen or bonded with his unborn child but may later go on to do so.
Whilst it may seem fair at first blush to hold a donor to a pre conception agreement the consequence would inevitably lead to agreements being made by heterosexual couples and couples looking to regulate the position post conception. It is this which renders such agreements difficult. That said this case is perhaps unusual in that the couple in the case decided today sought to reach an agreement with a man with whom they maintained a friendship. It was inevitable he was going to come into contact with this child.
One has to query whether this situation would arise in other than those fewest of cases if the donor never later came into contact with the child. Would he be making an application and more importantly would it be in the child’s best interests for him to have contact – he may by then be in an established environment where knowledge of his natural father may seek to de stabilise the situation. Once can certainly see that in that scenario it would be far easier to uphold the agreement. It has been acted upon to the extent there has been no bonding.
It seems that from a practical point of view if a same sex couple seek to ensure a donor does not later seek contact the donor should never be a close friend, should not come into contact with the child at all and if there is an agreement at least then there is an argument to say that the disruption to the children would be so great that it would not be in his or her best interests.
An agreement in those circumstances would serve to show that intention existed from the beginning and having been acted upon to date it would now be detrimental to the child to resile from it. Having an agreement is not of itself sufficient: it is the choice of donor and the action taken after the birth of the children which are likely to determine what would happen if the donor made a later application for contact.
Amanda Melton is a Partner and Head of the Family Group, at Matthew Arnold & Baldwin LLP.

Πηγή:www.pinknews.co.uk

Denmark: Equal marriage law to take effect in June.

Denmark’s prime minister has announced that equal marriage laws will come into effect in the European country on 15 June this year.
At a press conference, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, who took office in October last year, announced that gays would be allowed to marry in time for the summer, the Copenhagen Post reports.
She said: “We have looked at two laws that will provide the gay and lesbian community the opportunity to get married in the church and at city hall.
“The administration and I firmly believe that this is a natural step to take in a modern society like Denmark.
“The law will go into effect on June 15, so already this summer we’ll see the first gays and lesbians getting married in Danish churches.”
Denmark was the first country in the world to legalise same-sex unions, in 1989, and acts of homosexuality were decriminalised in 1933.
The law will not compel priests to marry gays.
Ms Thorning-Schmidt said: “It will be up to each priest whether he or she will perform gay marriages, but the government gives all members of the church the right to get married in church, whether they want to marry a person of the opposite or same sex.”
Denmark will join European countries including Iceland, Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and Portugal in allowing gays equal access to marriage.

Πηγή:www.pinknews.co.uk

No Pride in Eastern Europe.

We interview Australian filmmaker Logan Mucha about his gay rights in Eastern Europe documentary, showing at the Melbourne Queer Film Festival tomorrow.

 

The ‘dire’ plight of gay activists in Belarus, where there is no protection of LGBT rights at all, is the subject of a documentary, East Bloc Love, showing at the Melbourne Queer Film Festival tomorrow.
Gay Star News speaks to Australian filmmaker Logan Mucha about why he decided gay rights in Eastern Europe should be the focus of his first feature film, what happened when activists tried to hold a Pride march in Belarus and how the KGB are trying, unconvincingly, to infiltrate gay rights groups.
Where did you get the idea for East Bloc Love?
East Bloc Love was my first feature documentary. I started filming it when I was 23. I was overseas for eight months filming then it took me about four or five months fulltime to edit.
Two years before I made the film I traveled through Eastern Europe on holiday with my boyfriend. And we were just interested to see that the whole gay scene there was so underground. Even to go to a gay bar you had to walk down an alleyway and knock on a door and a security guard would come and take you in. I found that really fascinating, especially coming from Australia.
I decided to take a year off from studying and just go over there and start exploring why gay people were so invisible in Eastern Europe.
What did you find out?
There are so many different reasons depending on what country you’re in. It still seems like a hangover from the Soviet occupation, or some of the countries are so extremely Catholic or very right wing orthodox and just the mind set over there. Everyone was still so conservative and because they were such relatively poor countries compared to Western Europe the idea of talking about gay rights was just so low on the radar, compared to talking about economic stability or any of these other things.
What countries did you go to?
We went to six countries and five ended up being in the film. It mostly focuses on Belarus. That’s where the main story sets off from. Then we go to Poland, Romania, Latvia and Estonia.
What's life like for gay people in those countries?
All the countries apart from Belarus are part of the EU. And by being accepted into the European Union, they had to set protocols in terms of gay rights, but how much they are actually enforced is an entirely different story.
In Belarus, which is kind of like a subsidiary to Russia, homosexual ‘propaganda’ is illegal, these people have no rights, it’s impossible to form organisations, it’s illegal to have any marches or protest for gay rights.
Belarus is just literally the most depressing place I’ve been to in terms of gay rights. They have no support. The European Union can’t touch them. It’s just a really dire situation that they’re in at the moment.
Who did you meet in Belarus?
The main story starts in Belarus where we met an activist called Sergey Yenin, at the time he was only 20. He was one of the main organisers of Gay Belarus, which was an illegal gay activist group who worked out of a small apartment on the outskirts of the city. The got some grants from some organisations in the Netherlands, but they were illegal in their country.
The whole film revolved around them trying to put on their first gay pride in Belarus, which was absolutely horrible the way it turned out. They put in a lot of applications for a march and the local authorities kept denying them permission for stupid reasons, like the march was too near a metro station, or this that and the other. They kept providing alternate routes of where it was going to go but they kept getting turned down.
In the end they held their Pride march anyway with about 25 activists. Including some who’d come down from the Gay Russia organisation in Moscow. And the march lasted about five minutes before the police came and arrested everyone.
Are the activists lives in danger in Belarus? Did you ever feel frightened when you were making the film?
I was the most fearful I’ve ever been in my life. We literally spent two and a half/three weeks with this organisation. It was scary because the KGB still exists in Belarus. They haven’t even changed their name. It turned out that one person who came into the organisation while we were there filming was there from the KGB, monitoring them. It sounds like something from an old James Bond spy novel but this guy infiltrated the organisation and passed on the details, which is how their Pride march got stopped so quickly.
It was really weird because this guy came along saying he wanted to do music for the festival week. We kept thinking, ‘why is this guy trying to do music when there’s not really an event that requires music?’ He didn’t talk much and everyone had their scepticism about him. The good thing is that a lot of conversations were held without him there. A lot of people clicked on to the fact he might not be exactly who he said he was. He had a girlfriend as well. It was very strange for someone just to jump on board and want to be supportive. His motives were very unclear.
The other thing is that a lot of people inside the organisation have been approached by the KGB and asked to be recruited to get information for them.
Everyone’s extremely fearful. You can’t go out on the street and say you’re gay. There’s only one gay club in the city and it’s on the outskirts and you have to know where to go. It’s impossible to be open there. The police, wider society just don’t accept it and don’t understand it.
Will your film be shown in the countries you filmed in?
It was May 2009 in May when I filmed the march in Belarus, and last year I went back for their Pride week. They rented out a conference room there, with security and they never announced it publicly, but they had what they call a festival. They had a conference and then played my movie. It was really exciting for all the people in the film to watch themselves. It was a really weird surreal moment when everyone couldn’t believe that they were subjects of this feature documentary.
It screened at a film festival in northern UK [Rainbow Film Festival, Shropshire] and they paid for Sergey to go out and speak at the film festival, and he’d never been to Western Europe before so it was really exciting. And now the film’s being screened at Amnesty International Film Festival next month in The Netherlands are they’re flying him out again for that. It’s really exciting to know that somebody from Belarus is actually going to speak to people at the screening. So that’s been a really positive outcome from the film.
The whole point of the film is to give some media attention to this subject, because the media in Belarus don’t give them any exposure. So I like fact that now somebody from the organisation is able to go over and talk at these festival and give them an inside account. That exactly what I aimed to do but never thought was going to happen.
What's your next project?
There’s a few on the go. Last year I went over to Moscow for Moscow Pride and started work on a documentary about Nikolai Alekseev who’s the head of Gay Russia. I started working on his biography but it’s a very slow process because so much as happened since with the anti-propaganda bill that’s been passed St Petersburg and other places. So there’s so much more story to cover which I haven’t been able to do yet.
I’m also working on a new feature documentary which is all these short stories from around the world which connect into one narrative, which is actually going to be called The Last Gay Thing I Ever Do. I promised it will be the last gay activist documentary I make for a while. After three documentaries I feel it might be time to explore some other issues, but I’m still very passionate about it.
I’ll hopefully go out next year and pitch to local broadcasters for funding and be able to go out and make my own documentaries, with funding for the first time!

Πηγή:www.gaystarnews.com

St Petersburg governor signs ‘gay propaganda’ bill into law.

St Petersburg’s governor has signed into law a bill making it an offence to ‘promote’ gay or transgender personal identities with commentators fearing how badly it will ‘encourage hate’ towards the city’s gay, bi and trans people.
The city now punished the promotion of such identities with a fine of 5,000 roubles, £107 or up to 50,000 roubles, £1,070 for holders of public posts. The fines are increased tenfold again for legal entities.
St Petersburg is one of four Russian cities to have introduced a law banning the promotion of gay and trans identities among minors.
Andre Banks, co-founder and executive director for AllOut.org said: “By validating a new regime of censorship and intolerance, Governor Poltavchenko has diminished the reputation of his city with the stroke of a pen.
“100,000 people have promised not to visit the “new” St. Petersburg after this law goes into effect. Travel companies are considering revising their scheduled trips to the city. St. Petersburg’s sister cities have even begun to put pressure on the Governor to reject this law.
“Together, we have sent a very clear message to Poltavchenko and leaders around the world: there will be a high price to pay for advancing the cause of bigotry and intolerance. AllOut.org continues to stand with our partners in Russia and will work through diplomatic channels, creative online campaigns and offline events to ensure that this law is repealed and that others like it never see the light of day.”
350,000 people have watched an AllOut.org video telling the governor St Petersburg will suffer as a result of the law.
Polina Savchenko, general manager for ComingOut, a St. Petersburg-based LGBT organization said: “Authorities project ‘traditional values’ and clerical rhetoric onto politics, and prioritize ‘interests of majority’ over the value of human individuality. We realize that today, fascist-like rhetoric in Russia is becoming basis for legislative activity.
“In fact, this law has little to do with protecting minors. Today, neither homosexual people, nor human rights defenders, nor lawyers can answer the question of how this law is going to be applied in practice, due to its vague nature and non-legal terminology.”
She said: “To talk about existence of homosexuality, to publicly denounce homophobic violence, to develop sense of self-awareness and dignity in homosexual people, to promote tolerance – all of these acts can fall under the ‘propaganda’ law. This law will serve directly to further isolate and marginalize the gay community and encourage hate towards a social group.
“We are convinced that no authority can deprive people of their right to dignity, to respect of private and family life, to freedom of expression and to protection from discrimination and violence. We are offended and outraged by this act by city authorities and will continue fighting for the rights of LGBT citizens until the barbaric law is repealed.”
The British Foreign Office had said it hoped the governor would reconsider the law.
The Kaleidoscope Trust was told by the British Foreign Office: “We, along with EU colleagues, have already expressed concern to the St Petersburg legislature and the Russian MFA, that this legislation is incompatible with Council of Europe guidelines on preventing discrimination against LGBT people.”
The European Parliament adopted a resolution in February on the Russian presidential elections, later won by Vladimir Putin, denouncing the regional laws which ban ‘gay propaganda’ around minors.

Πηγή:www.pinknews.co.uk