[Massachusetts legalizes same-sex marriage; Red Sox win first World Series in 86 years.]
I'm reading When the Drama Club is not Enough: Lessons from the Safe Schools Program for Gay and Lesbian Students while the dryer goes.
From the Introduction:[...] January 1989, when the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released its Report of the Secretary's Task Force on Youth Suicide. The report stated that 30 percent of youth suicides are committed by gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth. [...]
Not long after this report was published, the gay and lesbian community in Massachusetts found itself in unusual election-year circumstances. The two gubernatorial candidates, Republican William Weld and Democrat John Silber, were in a close contest. Vying for the gay vote, Weld promised he would, if elected, address the problem of youth suicide and support pending legislation to establish a commission to study the needs of gay and lesbian youth. If the legislature did not pass the bill, he further promised that he would establish a commission by executive order. Silber, who had been a vocal opponent of gay and lesbian rights, was silent on this issue. True to his word, after he was elected, Governor Weld created the Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth and swore in the appointed members, charging them with finding ways to reduce the high rate of suicide among gay and lesbian youth and to prevent the violence perpetrated against them.
That election was in 1990, when I was seven years old, and he served for six years. I have vague memories of the Weld-Kerry debates six years later (when I was in seventh grade), but I couldn't actually tell you why I liked William Weld. But I did. Probably the only politician I will ever like -- and given my detail-oriented critique mode nowadays, even that probably wouldn't survive if I went back and actually paid attention now.
From the Introduction:[...] January 1989, when the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released its Report of the Secretary's Task Force on Youth Suicide. The report stated that 30 percent of youth suicides are committed by gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth. [...]
Not long after this report was published, the gay and lesbian community in Massachusetts found itself in unusual election-year circumstances. The two gubernatorial candidates, Republican William Weld and Democrat John Silber, were in a close contest. Vying for the gay vote, Weld promised he would, if elected, address the problem of youth suicide and support pending legislation to establish a commission to study the needs of gay and lesbian youth. If the legislature did not pass the bill, he further promised that he would establish a commission by executive order. Silber, who had been a vocal opponent of gay and lesbian rights, was silent on this issue. True to his word, after he was elected, Governor Weld created the Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth and swore in the appointed members, charging them with finding ways to reduce the high rate of suicide among gay and lesbian youth and to prevent the violence perpetrated against them.
That election was in 1990, when I was seven years old, and he served for six years. I have vague memories of the Weld-Kerry debates six years later (when I was in seventh grade), but I couldn't actually tell you why I liked William Weld. But I did. Probably the only politician I will ever like -- and given my detail-oriented critique mode nowadays, even that probably wouldn't survive if I went back and actually paid attention now.