Fridae

Phuket gay festival postponed to Apr 7-10
Organisers of the annual Phuket Gay Festival scheduled to take place in February have announced that the festival would be postponed to Apr 7-10, citing respect for the dead and Thai traditions as the main reasons. The December 26 tsunami which hit the southern Thai resort town of Phuket claimed some 5,200 lives in the country and more than 150,000 in Sri Lanka, India and Indonesia.

While the main gay area of Phuket which is located several streets from the beach front was spared from the tsunami, Fridae understands that the gay owned and operated Club One Seven B&B Phuket were badly damaged. The 14-room Patong Bay beachfront Bed & Breakfast, which is affiliated with Club One Seven in Singapore, is currently closed for repairs. One of its employees who is believed to be a Malaysian national was killed. Kenya's Sea Hag Restaurant which was also damaged plans to reopen in February.

The festival organisers have urged tourists not to cancel their holidays to the area as cleanup operations are underway. A festival press release dated January 7 said " the best thing that people who care about Phuket and Patong could do, is continue to come here, don't change your plans."

"The general feelings of the Gay Festival Organisers, supported by the many participating business owners, was that respect for the consequences of the tsunami was far and away the most important issue, and allowing the Patong area residents to have some time to recover both emotionally and physically from the disaster."

"We have rescheduled the 2005 event to April, the week just before Songkran, the Thai New Years Holiday, and plan to totally create the festival event as a time of renewal and remembrance." The website (www.phuketgaypridefestival.com) said.

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New Bangkok non-profit group to focus on welfare of male sex workers
Swing, a new non-profit organisation in Bangkok aims to focus its efforts specifically on male sex workers. The organisation is the first to do so after its director Surang Janyam and eight colleagues founded the group last September. Surang is a 17-year veteran who spent her entire professional career at Empower, a local organisation that deals primarily with the welfare of Thailand's female sex workers.

Funded by Family Health International, the Swing office located on the top floor of a building in the heart of Bangkok's infamous Patpong district offers English classes, Internet access and a place to nap, to shower, and soon, exercise equipment and medical assistance.

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US Supreme Court won't hear Florida gay adoption appeal
The US Supreme Court on Jan 10 declined to hear an appeal brought by four gay foster parents who claimed that Florida's law keeps thousands of orphaned and abandoned children from finding homes. "We win some," said Florida Governor Jeb Bush, brother of President George Bush, who says children should grow up in a traditional family headed by a father and a mother. He said the gay adoption ban was "the appropriate law."

While conservative groups cheered the decision, gay rights groups expressed disappointment and concern that the Supreme Court's refusal to rule on Florida adoption ban could result in more statewide bans. In a statement, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) quoted Chris Zawisza, an attorney on behalf of Floridas Children First which is representing the children involved in the case, who said that the ban flies in the face of the positions of every major child welfare organisation, many of which have come out publicly against this law. Florida currently has no restriction on gay people serving as foster parents although they are prohibited from adopting them.

Six states specifically allow adoptions by gays - California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Vermont - as well as the District of Columbia. Three states of Florida, Mississippi, and Utah have restrictions while the rest have no formal law.

In the meantime, a second wave of states considering constitutional amendments to bar same-sex marriage has begun. The proposals typically define marriage being between one man and one woman and would prevent the state from granting civil unions. The Kansas Senate will hear a proposed constitutional ban on gay marriage by this week while Republicans in Tennessee have vowed to bring in an amendment this session. Lawmakers in South Dakota, Arizona, Virginia and Alabama are at various stages of considering their own amendments. On Nov 2 last year, 11 states - Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Utah and Arkansas - passed amendments that define marriage as the union between a man and a woman.

Additional information about Florida's adoption ban is available at www.lethimstay.com.

Pope: Fighting gay marriage top priority in 2005
While acknowledging natural disasters including the December 26 Indian Ocean tsunami that left 150,000 died and million homes and "barbarous terrorism which caused bloodshed in Iraq and other countries," Pope John Paul II put lobbying against gay marriage at the top of the Vatican's agenda for 2005.

In a Jan 10 speech addressing the 174 ambassadors who make up the diplomatic corps accredited to the Vatican, the ailing 84-year-old's speech, which was mostly read by an aide also denounced other "challenges of life," including abortion, cloning, assisted procreation and embryonic stem cell use.

"Today the family is often threatened by social and cultural pressures that tend to undermine its stability; but in some countries the family is also threatened by legislation which - at times directly - challenge its natural structure, which is and must necessarily be that of a union between a man and a woman founded on marriage." Family, he said, "must never be undermined by laws based on a narrow and unnatural vision of man."

The pope also spoke of malnutrition and hunger suffered by millions of people, freedom of religion and the war in Iraq without directly mentioning the US.

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