Equally Speaking
The following is a transcript of HRC’s morning news webcast "Equally Speaking." To view the current videos visit the main Equally Speaking page.
Good morning and thanks for tuning in to Equally Speaking, your morning dose of GLBT news from the Human Rights Campaign for Tuesday, May 13th. I’m Sultan Shakir.
And I’m Tommy Lodge. First up, a new HRC Foundation initiative.
The HRC Foundation and the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association will release the Healthcare Equality Index today. The HEI is a first-of-its-kind survey rating the nation’s hospitals on a set of baseline standards of patient care for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans. To learn more, visit http://www.hrc.org/hei.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel reports on HRC’s first Camp Equality, held in Fort Lauderdale this weekend. The more than 50 participants in Camp Equality were trained in political tactics to make them effective campaign volunteers. HRC will hold 12 more camps in cities around the country. To learn more, visit http://www.hrc.org/campequality.
A gay couple married in Canada has filed suit against the Swedish government for refusing to recognize the marriage. Lars Gardfeldt and Lars Arnell say that the Swedish income tax authority regards them as having only a civil union, while recognizing the foreign marriages of opposite-sex couples. In January, a public opinion poll found that 70 percent of the Swedish electorate supports the principal of same-sex marriage.
A bronze bust of the first openly gay man to hold a prominent elected office in the United States is going up in the San Francisco City Hall, more than 28 years after he was assassinated. The statue to Harvey Milk will be unveiled on May 22, on what would have been his 78th birthday. Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977 and shot to death a year later.
Few GLBT Americans understand their basic rights, according to an analysis released last week. A poll by Hunter College asked whether same-sex marriages were legal in the respondent’s state, if the U.S. Constitution bans same-sex marriage, whether gays can serve openly in the U.S. military and if there’s a federal law barring the firing of workers based on their sexual orientation. Only 38 percent of poll respondents answered all four questions correctly.
Cuba President Raul Castro's daughter, Mariela, is organizing the nation’s second anti-homophobia festival this week. The festival’s goal is to boost public awareness of the country's long-marginalized GLBT community. Unlike the first, this festival has the approval of Cuba’s Communist Party. Mariela Castro has headed the National Center for Sexual Education for 14 years.
That’s the news from us today. Thanks for tuning in to Equally Speaking.
Thanks for watching, and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow.