PRIDE FAIRDAY – Over 6,500 people attended this year’s Pride Fairday on Sunday February 28. Pride co-president Andrew Baietta told OUTinPerth that the event had been ‘a huge success with a lot of positive feedback coming through from the community’. According to Baeitta, this year’s event broke even and had provided the Pride Committee with some excellent ideas on how to make next year ‘even bigger and better’.
‘THAT’S SO GAY’ – A new campaign has been launched in America in an attempt to combat teen homophobia and especially the slur ‘That’s so gay’. Pop icon and Gen Y golden girl Hillary Duff appears alongside Wanda Sykes in TV commercials aimed at educating teens about stopping the use of offensive and homophobic language. A series of posters, which play on dictionary definitions of terms like ‘gay’, ‘faggot’ and ‘dyke’, have also been released as part of the Think B4 You Speak campaign. For more information or to view the ads see www.thinkb4youspeak.com.
MATTHEW SHEPARD REMEMBERED – This month marked the 10 year anniversary of Matthew Shepard’s death. In recognition his mother has posted a statement on the Matthew Shepard memorial site, www.matthewshepard.org, encouraging people to continue the fight to ‘erase hate’. Matthew Shepard died on October 12, 1998 from injuries sustained in a vicious homophobic attack.
WELLINGTON FOR OUTGAMES – The Gay and Lesbian International Sport Association (GLISA) has announced that Wellington, New Zealand is the Preferred Host City for the forthcoming 2nd Asia Pacific Outgames. The Wellington Outgames will take place from Saturday March 12 to Saturday March 19 in 2011.
GETUP PETITION – The web based lobby group, GetUp, are continuing their campaign for equal rights for same-sex couples by encouraging people to sign a petition which they will present to politicians in the Senate as they begin debating discriminatory federal laws this month. In 2007, GetUp a commissioned an influential nationwide poll in the lead up to the federal election which showed that over 70% of Australians believed same-sex couples should be have the same legal rights as other de facto couples. The new petition appears online at
