Black LGBT Contingent in 26th Annual Kingdom Day Parade

MadProfessah and Wonder Man were part of a contingent of nearly 100 Black LGBT Angelenos participating in the 26th Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Kingdom Day Parade in South Los Angeles for the 3rd consecutive year, primarily organized and sponsored by the Barbara Jordan/Bayard Rustin Coalition, in collaboration with Here To Stay Coalition, Los Angeles Black Pride and Black Lesbians United.

The contingent has grown every year, and this time we received media attention from the local public radio station, KPCC 89.3 FM.

Thousands of people lined Martin Luther King Boulevard in South Los Angeles to pay tribute to the fallen civil rights leader.

It's the 26th annual Kingdom Day Parade – and the first parade for Long Beach resident Chante Craig. Craig walked as part of a group declaring themselves "black, gay and here to stay."

She says Dr. King's words are inspiring to gay blacks seeking tolerance and love.

"Unfortunately, though we live in California, it's a very liberal state but we still have some very conservative views – especially in the black community with churches being such a stronghold in the community. It tends to allow homophobia to spread across the community – and so this is one of our ways to come out and bring some positive exposure to the community and show them what other things we're doing as well."

L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, county and state leaders and marching bands from South L.A. high schools took part in the event. A party continues at the parade route's end in Leimert Park.

2011 Fusion LGBT People of Color Film Festival March 3-4

One of the highlights of being an openly gay person of color living in Los Angeles is having access to the Fusion LGBT People of Color film festival. I missed most of last year's edition, but attended and reviewed the 2009 and 2007 editions.

I'm not sure I'll be in town this year, currently I'm planning a trip to South Africa for March 2011 but my dates are relatively flexible.

MOVIE REVIEW: Waiting for 'Superman'

Finally saw the acclaimed documentary Waiting for 'Superman'. It was showing at my favorite second-run theater, the Regency Academy 6 in Pasadena ($2 for a matinee, $3 other times). As an educator myself and someone interested in reforming mathematics education (especially 8th grade algebra) I had heard that this was a must-see film, and I was not disappointed.

Waiting for 'Superman' is the film which provoked the greatest emotional impact on me this year. It made me cry with despair and it made me gasp and groan with shock and disappointment. In the year of films with $100 million visual effects budgets, the most suspenseful moment I experienced in a movie theater in 2010 was waiting for a lottery ball to drop and reveal whether a student had been selected by random drawing for a slot in a public charter school!

The movie follows the educational hopes of five multicultural children, Daisy (a Latina 5th grader in East Los Angeles), Francisco (a Latino 1st grader in The Bronx), Anthony (a Black 5th grader in Washington, DC), Bianca (a Black kindergartener in New York City, NY) and Emily (a white 8th grader in Redwood City, CA). Each of these kids has engaged parents(or caregiver)  who have inculcated a love of education in their charges. However, the school uses an array of facts and figures to demonstrate that in order to improve their chances in life they will need to get a superior education, and in order to do that they will need to change what  schools they are going to. However, the decision of what school a child gets to attend in America depends on a number of things, and the primary thesis of the film is that the most important factor in the decision is luck. Either luck in being born to parents who have the resources to send you to private school, or the resources to buy a house in  a school district with good public schools. If you are not lucky to have been born to rich parents then you need the luck of the draw to win the lottery for admission to a public charter school that is committed to insuring that all their students have a good education and a better future.

The director, David Guggenheim, is already an Oscar winner for An Inconvenient Truth, and decided to tackle the issues of education reform when he realized that he was driving by numerous public schools on the way to dropping his kids off at at their private school.

Some would question the director's motives and are upset by the depiction of teachers' unions (American Federation of Teachers and National Education Association) as the primary impediment to meaningful education reform and the lionization of controversial Washington, D.C. superintendent Michelle Rhee and charter schools KIPP and Harlem Children's Zone. But I think people who dismiss the film for these reasons are missing the point; what Guggenheim's movie is trying to point out is that the American education system is  "about the adults" instead of being "for the children." And until that prioritization is corrected (and hopefully reversed) education is not just "other people's problem" it is all of our concern.

Title: Waiting for 'Superman'
Running Time: 1 hour, 42 minutes.
MPAA Rating: PG for some thematic material, mild language and incidental smoking.
Release Date: Friday, September 24, 2010.
Seen: Tuesday, December 28, 2010.

Plot: A+.
Acting: N/A.
Visuals: A-.
Impact: A+.

Overall Grade: A/A+ (4.11/4.00).

International LGBT Radio Program In Dire Financial Need

This Way Out is an international LGBT radio newsmagazine which has been in continuous production since 1988(!). In fact, while in college yours truly co-founded an LGBT radio show called "Homo Radio" on WRPI 91.5FM in 1992 which used the weekly 30-minute This Way Out program as the core around which an entire community-based radio program was based.

I also serve on the Overnight Productions board of directors, the 501(c)(3) entity which produces This Way Out.

Recently, This Way Out producer (and founder) Greg Gordon put out this dire fundraising appeal:

We're often asked, "How many listeners do you have?" For several reasons, typical radio ratings services just don’t help us answer that question. 

We do know that at least 200 local broadcast outlets across the U.S., Canada, Australia, Europe and New Zealand now air our program every week, in addition to global short wave station RFPI. We’re also heard through satellite distribution to cable outlets and homes across the Asia-Pacific and Africa-Middle East regions, and hundreds download our podcasts each week.

•     “Just wanted to pass on my deepest thanks and gratitude for your show. I love the international coverage, the humor, the music -- I love it all!”
-H.C.
New York City

•    "Thank God I found you! Thanks very much for your wonderful programmes."
-Sampson
Owerri, Nigeria

Messages like these tell us something about the depth of our impact. One of the ways we can measure the breadth of our reach is by the support we receive during our holiday season/year-end fund-raising campaign. It's the generosity of our listener-sponsors at this time of year in particular that has literally meant the difference between life and death several times during our more than 22 years on the air. We need your help now to keep this one-of-kind internationally distributed nonprofit weekly public/community radio show going.

•     “I'm not gay, but have gay friends; I'll tell them about this program. Keep up the good work.”
-K.L.
State College, Pennsylvania

•    “I was amazed to listen today to This Way Out and liked it very much."
-E.A.
Holguin, Cuba

"This Way Out" doesn't operate out of a state-of-the-art studio. We don’t have an office or a large paid staff. Our overhead is low, but we still need to raise $5,000 for our production and distribution costs through April 2011, when we hope to receive an annual grant from a longtime supportive foundation.

Each and every contribution, no matter how large or small, will make a difference! One of the easiest ways you can support "This Way Out" is to sign up for automatic monthly donations, at whatever level you can afford, from $10 to $100.

We could stay healthy until that grant arrives with:

  > 34 "Angels" donating $25 per month for the next six months.
  > 17 "Major Angels" donating $50 per month for the next six months, or ...
  > 9 "Supreme Angels" donating $100 per month for the next six months, or ...

You can easily choose your preferred DONOR LEVEL in the "Is Anybody Out There?" text at:

http://www.thiswayout.org

Of course your automatic contributions at any level or your one-time donation before year's end will certainly make you a special kind of Holiday Angel in our eyes as well!  Find the one-time "DONATE" button in the text at:

http://www.thiswayout.org

You can also postal-mail a check to us at P.O. Box 38327, Los Angeles, CA 90038. And if you’re in the U.S., your contribution (online or postal-mailed) is tax-deductible as a charitable donation to the extent allowed by law. We acknowledge every donation with a "thank you" email or letter.

(In case you're wondering why we don't ask for listener donations to our program during the program, it's because U.S. federal regulations governing public/community radio forbid it.)

•    "I hear your program on headphones behind my closed bedroom door so that no one will know I'm listening."
- Email from an anonymous teen

Several heart-breaking suicides of teens who were gay, or who were perceived to be gay, have been in the headlines lately. Much of our programming reminds LGBTQ young people that life really does get better! (By the way, the links to several youth support groups are posted on our website.)

We know from the mail we get that we do what can sometimes be genuinely life-saving work. "This Way Out" is often the only supportive voice LGBTQ young people hear. Please help us continue to share that voice with those teens, and with others around the world struggling to break out of their closets in a safe and supported way.

•     “I'm a 44 y.o. married male just confronting my homosexuality. I can't tell you what a morale boost your program is for me. I look forward to it every week. It's better than church.”
-Neal
Los Angeles, California

A core group of volunteer journalists and feature producers make our informative, entertaining and educational weekly programs possible. Will you volunteer now to help bring "This Way Out" to all the listeners who need us? Please don’t assume that enough other people will support our efforts -- we can’t go on without you, too!

Thank you! We wish you and yours the happiest of holiday seasons, and a healthy, productive, and pleasure-filled New Year.

P.S. - Read our informative blog at http://www.twopodcast.blogspot.com/

Become our Facebook fan at http://www.facebook.com/ThisWayOutRadio 

And follow Associate Producer Lucia Chappelle's
timely tweets at http://twitter.com/TWOradio

Please give generously to support this worthy LGBT program.

CA-AG: Cooley Concedes! Kamala Harris Wins!

The next Attorney General of California (will be a Black/multiracial woman)

As MadProfessah has been saying for awhile, Kamala Harris will be the next Attorney General of California, after all. Her opponent Steve Cooley finally officially conceded the race today as it became more and more apparent that Harris' current lead in the excruciatingly close race was insurmountable.

The latest tally has Harris with 4,376,509 votes (or 46.0%) versus 4,324,924 votes (or 45.5%) for Cooley, a lead of 51,585 votes out of 9.5 million votes cast for Attorney General (there were 4 minor party candidates). Note, starting in November 2010 general election ballots in California will only ever have two candidates (with no write-in provision), thanks to the ill-conceived Proposition 14 which passed in June 2010. That, along with "non-partisan, "citizen-driven" re-districting should make 2012 a wild and crazy year for electoral politics, even in the deep blue state of California.

It should also be noted that Cooley received some 300,000 votes more than his party's ill-fated standard bearer, failed gubernatorial candidate ("such a lovely ring to it, dontcha think?" Meg Whitman and 150,000 votes more than that (rhymes with "witch") failed U.S. Senate candidate Carly Fiorina.


It also means that the Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General all explicitly support marriage equality and oppose defending Proposition 8 in court. since they believe it is unconstitutional. In fact,  I would wager every single statewide elected official in California supports marriage equality at this point (since they are all Democrats!) 

CA-AG: Harris Has Insurmountable Lead of 43,050!

Kamala Harris now leads Steve Cooley by 43,050 votes (4,291,854 or 46.0% to 4,248,804 or 45.5%). According to the Secretary of State's office (pdf) there are are now 629,634 unprocessed ballots, with 361,588 provisional ballots and 228,854 vote-by-mail ballots. Los Angeles County has the most number of outstanding ballots, left to be counted 93,590 (73,928 of which are provisional). 82% of provisional ballots are usually counted. The thing to note is that Harris won on election day (when provisional ballots are turned in by approximate 3 percentage points and she lost vote-by-mail ballots by 8 percentage points. Of the ballots left to count, Cooley should be expected to have a net gain of 10K-20K votes at most.
(He wins VBM ballots netting approximately 20K votes but loses provisional ballots by 8K votes.)

Basically, we are where we were on election night when Harris had a slim lead but today there are far less votes to be counted, dramatically reducing Cooley's chances of retaking the lead. I'm still slightly worried that the percentage of votes left to be counted consists of less than 20% from Los Angeles County, but Harris won other relatively large counties by good margins as well. Also, there are some indications that the unprocessed ballot number is too high, making things even tougher for Cooley.

It is mathematically possible for Cooley to win but the probabilities are in the 1-2% range (he would have to win the outstanding ballots at net rates of 7-8% which the rest of the sample simply does not reflect). Los Angeles County Council President Eric Garcetti (and former Occidental College professor) called the race for Harris yesterday and urged media outlets to do the math to show how slim the possibility of Cooley winning actually is. Garcetti actually estimates that there are far LESS uncounted votes than in the unprocessed ballot status page since some of the counties have not updated their numbers in over two weeks and the total vote count is approaching 9.6 million. We'll probably hit 10 million votes cast statewide by the time everything is counted and certified next month.

SD-28: Ted Lieu Announces Run For Oropeza's Seat

Assemblymember Ted Lieu has announced his plans to run for the late Jenny Oropeza's State Senate seat in the 28th District. Sadly, Oropeza died on October 22, but was re-elected posthumously in the statewide general election on Tuesday November 1st.

Lieu currently represents the 53rd Assembly district, but will lose his seat on December 6th when Betsy Butler is sworn in to represent the South Bay-area district because Lieu decided to run for Attorney General this Spring since he was forced to leave the Assembly due to term limits. He lost in the Democratic primary in June 2010 to Kamala Harris, who is still in a too-close-to-call race with Republican Steve Cooley to be California's next Attorney General.

Another person who lost in the June 2010 Democratic primary, this time in the Lieutenant Governor's race (to Gavin Newsom) was Janice Hahn, who announced today that she would not run in the special election and endorsed Lieu. Another perso who may announce  a bid for the seat is Warren Furutani who represents the 55th Assembly district which covers part of the 24th Senate District. Furutani was able to win the 55th Assembly district when Laura Richardson gave it up to run against Oropeza in an August 2007 special election when Congresswoman Janice Millender-McDonald's 37th Congressional district opened up due to her untimely death. Richardson won that race and now represents CA-37.

Of course all these district lines will become open seats in the next election in 2012 when the lines are redrawn, thanks to Proposition 11 and Proposition 20 by an independent "citizen's" redistricting commission with data from the 2010 Census.

NO JUSTICE! Oscar Grant Killer Cop Gets 2-Year Sentence

Wow! Johannes Mehserle, the Oakland public transit officer who shot and killed Oscar Grant III on January 1st, 2009 has been sentenced to two measly years for the unarmed fatal shooting of a Black man by a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge. Mehserle had previously been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter this summer but could have received a maximum of 14 years with a gun enhancement.

Judge Robert Perry threw out the sentence enhancement due to the commission of  a crime using a gun by calling the incident "an accidental shooting" AND gave Mehserle credit for time served so far, so that the killer cop could be released in 219 days.

The Los Angeles Times reports:

After the sentencing was announced, Grant's mother, Wanda Johnson, emerged from the courtroom muttering, "Nothing, he got nothing!" The family declined to talk to reporters.

About 50 Grant supporters lined up in front of the courthouse chanting, "Mehserle is guilty, guilty. The whole damn system is guilty, guilty."

In downtown Oakland, where a memorial was being set up for his grandson, Oscar Grant Sr., 65, said, “It’s a bad decision. No time can bring [Oscar] back. But [Mehserle] should have served some time. Otherwise, they’re telling the public, though he went to trial, a policeman can shoot someone and go free. These guys have a license to kill.”

But the elder Grant discouraged violent protests.

We'll see! This is really a sickening situation, especially since the original incident where Mehserle shot and killed Grant in the back while he was lying face down on the ground was captured on video!

Celebrity Friday: Dean Hamer

MadProfessah, with scientist Dean Hamer

Last weekend I attended the Out To Innovate conference as a panelist and moderator; it was held at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles on October 10th. Organized by NOGLSTP, the national organization for gay and lesbian scientists and technical professionals, the conference is the LGBT's community response to President Obama's Educate to Innovate initiative.

Dean Hamer, the author of the famous Science article "A linkage between DNA markers on the X chromosome and male sexual orientation" which demonstrates that sexual orientation has a genetic component, gave the keynote speech at the Out to Innovate conference during lunch.

Afterwards, he graciously agreed to take a picture with me.

30-Year-old Black Caltech Prof Wins MacArthur "Genius" Grant

John Dabiri is a 30-year-old tenured associate professor of aeronautical engineering and bioengineering at the California Institute of Technology who was named a 2010 MacArthur Fellowship winner today: $100,000 per year for 5 years.

Other notable winners of this year's MacArthur grants include David Simon, the creator of the television shows The Wire and Treme; Annette Gordon-Reed (now) of Harvard Law School and author of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemmings: An American Controversy; Amir Abo-Shaeer, a high school teacher who founded the Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy.

Los Angeles Scorching Hot (Record 113°!) Today

The Other Half sent me this picture from inside his car reading the external temperature outside at aruond 1:30pm PDT today. 117 degrees!

The official temperature in downtown Los Angeles was 113 degrees, the hottest ever since records began in 1877. That's a full seven degrees hotter than the previous record for September 27th set in 1963.

The National Weather Service it has only ever been over 100 degrees 3 other times in downtown Los Angeles.

Eye Candy: Mark Hawthorne

Mark Hawthorne is a 22-year-old model from Los Angeles who was brought to my attention by Mechadude. Check out more of his pics here and here.

Is Koo Koo Roo Dying?

One of my favorite chains of "fast food" in Los Angeles is Koo Koo Roo chicken. I was surprised recently to find out that there are basically only three franchises of the store remaining in Los Angeles: West Hollywood, Larchmont Village and Santa Monica. Pasadena and downtown Los Angeles have closed recently. I remember there used to be one in the Miracle Mile area of Wilshire Boulevard also.

Apparently the parent company of the grilled chicken joint was bought by Luby's this summer after the parent company Magic Brands (which also owns Fuddruckers burgers) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in April.

Koo Koo Roo has a prominent location in the "gay ghetto" in West Hollywood, but it seems like the gay boys have changed their allegiances to Tender Greens (which also only has 3 locations in Southern California).

Have you eaten at any of these chains? What do you think of them?

Celebrity Friday: Mitrice Richardson

The sad, mysterious story of Mitrice Richardson has come to an end with the revelation that skeletal remains found in a Malibu Canyon belong to the 25-year-old Black lesbian student and beauty queen who disappeared 11 months ago.

Richardson was arrested at Geoffrey's restaurant in Malibu after acting bizarrely and saying she was unable to pay her $89 dinner tab. She was released from custody shortly after midnight without her car — which had been impounded — or a cellphone or purse. Investigators believe she was spotted three times in the canyon area in daylight hours that morning. After that, she was never heard from again.

The remains — which include a skull — were found about two and a half miles from the last credible sighting of her on Sept. 17. The discovery casts an ominous shadow over the case of the missing woman.

[...]

The release of the Cal State Fullerton graduate into an area near a rugged canyon that she was not familiar with prompted widespread criticism of the Sheriff's Department. Her mother and father filed lawsuits accusing the Sheriff's Department of negligence in releasing her without transportation or conducting a mental health exam.

Geoffrey's staff told sheriff's personnel that Richardson was acting crazily at the restaurant. And police investigators said later that an examination of her diaries and text messages revealed she was probably suffering from a severe bipolar disorder and may not have slept for five days before her arrest.

Rod 2.0 posted this local ABC television coverage of the Mitrice Richardson story and decried "A young life lost over $89."

MOVIE REVIEW: The Kids Are All Right

Decided to go see The Kids Are All Right starring Annette Bening and Juliane Moore as a lesbian couple on our 2nd wedding anniversary at the shiny, new L.A. Live Regal 14 Theaters in downtown Los Angeles. Mark Ruffalo stars as the sperm donor (I prefer the term sperm dad or "spad," being one myself) which resulted in the couples two kids, played by Mia Wasikowska (last seen in Timothy Burton's Alice in Wonderland) and Josh Hutcherson (who has starred in Journey to the Center of the Earth, Zathura, Bridge to Teribithia).

The film was written (with Stuart Blumberg) and directed by Lisa Cholodenko, a lesbian mom herself.

The Kids Are All Right is a heart-wrenchingly real depiction of American family life, especially from an LGBT perspective. It is also laugh-out-loud, gasping-for-air funny. However, as I told my husband on the way out, "There's an awful lot of heterosexual sex in that movie for a lesbian comedy!" He pointed out that there's a fair amount of depiction of gay sexuality as well, with multiple kisses and affection between Jules(played by Julianne) and Nic (played by Annette), not to mention the entire "gay man porn" subplot.

The basic premise is that the two kids, Joni (played by Wasikowska) and Laser (played by Hutcherson) become curious about their father and make contact with him. Since Joni is 18, she has to make the call to the sperm bank, at the request of her rambunctious 15-year-old brother. But it is another member of the family who ends up making a significant connection with Ruffalo's Paul, who is played with excessive charm.

As a matter of fact, all the acting is superb, with Annette and Bening leading the pack. Annette's Nic is fragile, funny and domineering, but fiercely loves her family. Julianne's Jules is spacey, beautiful and (often inadvertently) hysterically funny. This film should get them both back into the Oscar nominations discussion, and may even win one or both of these beautifully aging actresses (Annette, 51; Julianne, 49) that little gold statuette they have been denied for years.

The writing is astonishing. All of the characters are flawed, but also appealing in some way. Just like in real life. Although some critics have taken issue with the degree of accuracy or fidelity in the depiction of lesbian sexuality as well as the non-depiction of people of color in a positive light,

overall I would argue this is a must-see film for most regular film goers.

(On a side note, it was pretty surreal to watch the final scenes of the movie and yell out "Hey, that's Occidental College!" Joni goes off to college, and the place she picks just happens to be the place at which I teach and work. Go figure. It's silly, but that familiar aspect, as well as the distinctive shots of Los Angeles gave the film an especially high emotional resonance with me.)

Running Time: 1 hour, 46 minutes. MPAA Rating: Rated R for strong sexual content, nudity, language and some teen drug and alcohol use.

Plot: A-.
Acting: A+.
Visuals: A.
Impact: A.

Overall Grade: A (4.0/4.0).

Sam Querrey Repeats As Champion in LA

ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images

American Sam Querrey became the first person since Andre Agassi in 2001 to defend his title in Los Angeles by defeating the top seed, World #4 Andy Murray 5-7 7-6(2) 6-3 on Sunday.

MadProfessah had been invited to visit the tournament earlier in the week for a USTA Diversity event and saw Querey and James Blake lose a desultory doubles match to the excessively handsome (and eventual semifinalist) Feliciano Lopez and Jarko Tipsarevic.

FOOD REVIEW: Juicy's Restaurant (Los Angeles, CA)

Juicy's brown stew chicken and beef short ribs.

Readers of this blog will be aware of my longtime quest for the best Caribbean food in Los Angeles (for background, see here and here). During my quest a friend of mine took me to Juicy's Natural Restaurant near Washington and Arlington just North of the 10 freeway. I hadn't even heard of the place, so I was happy to try it out. Next door they have a West Indian grocery store for products that you may be missing from the islands.

Unfortunately, I was not very impressed with the food at Juicy's. One of my favorite aspects of West Indian food is the peas and rice, and Juicy's was simply overcooked to the point of being bland. The brown stew chicken should be intriguingly spicy (piquant, not picante) but theirs was not really distinctive in any way. See my review of Joan & Sisters for some good brown-stew chicken and rice and peas. Although that place does not qualify as a West Indian restaurant; they are a Belizean restaurant and an excellent one at that.

I'm actually not sure if Juicy's roti or not (one criteria for my quest for an excellent Caribbean/West Indian restaurant is that it should sell roti; another criteria would be having the drink sorrel on the menu).

If you are really craving some good Caribbean food I would recommend heading out to Leimert Park to check out Ackee Bamboo or stopping by the Beverly Center and experiencing Kassava.

Name: Juicy's Restaurant
Location: 3426 W Washington Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90018.
Contact: (none).

AMBIANCE: B.
SERVICE: B+.
VALUE: A-.
FOOD: B-.

OVERALL: B.

Q*POC LA Meeting Wed 7/28

Oscar Grant Trial At Jury Deliberation Stage

A Los Angeles area jury with no African American members will decide the fate of a white former BART police officer who shot and killed Oscar Grant on January 1, 2009.

The Los Angeles Times reports:

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Robert J. Perry rejected a defense argument that jurors should be allowed to consider only second-degree murder in the case against Johannes Mehserle. But Perry also ruled that prosecutors could not argue for a first-degree murder conviction.

Mehserle, 28, shot in the back and killed Oscar J. Grant III as the victim lay on a Bay Area Rapid Transit station platform on New Year’s Day 2009. Prosecutors have argued that the shooting was intentional. The officer told jurors that he mistakenly drew his firearm instead of his electric Taser weapon as he struggled to handcuff Grant, 22.

While second-degree murder carries a maximum sentence of 15 years to life in prison, voluntary manslaughter carries up to 11 years and involuntary manslaughter up to four years in prison. If convicted, Mehserle could receive considerably more years behind bars under an enhancement that alleges he used a firearm.

WATCH: The Black Gay Male Pledge

Happy Black LGBT Pride in Los Angeles!