letters

Marijuana & Governor
Dean «

Thank you for running “Medical
Marijuana Key Issue for AIDS
Patients,” which gave readers a solid
overview of the issue.

By the time this letter is
published, we may know if Gov.
Howard Dean has made good on his
threat to kill H.645, Vermont’s med-
ical marijuana bill. As I write this in
mid-April, reports from the state-
house consistently indicate that Dean
has been twisting arms in the Senate,
in hopes of keeping themeasure from
ever reaching his desk. If the bill
dies, Dean’s fingerprints will be on
the corpse. ‘ I '
When I came to work at the
Marijuana Policy Project last year —
after a dozen years in GLBT and
AIDS journalism — I knew of Dean
primarily as a hero in the civil unions
battle, and was shocked to discover
he opposed protecting seriously ill I
people who use medical marijuana.
I’ve been even more shocked by the
inaccurate statements he has made to
both local and national media about
the bill — claiming, for example, that
it authorizes possession of three
pounds of marijuana. That’s nonsense
and the governor knows it.

It’s also nonsense to claim,
as Gov. Dean has done, that medical
marijuana legislation is inappropriate
unless marijuana goes through the
FDA’s drug approval process.
Hundreds of herbal remedies are sold
and used every day without being
licensed as drugs by the FDA. The
FDA even allows individuals to
import unapproved medications from
abroad — drugs that are often vastly
more toxic and dangerous than mari-
juana— for personal use. Surely as a
medical doctor Gov. Dean knows
this.

Dean has been making the
rounds of national GLBT political
events in apparent preparation for a
presidential run. Along the way he
has been implored by GLBT and
HIV/AIDS organizations, publica-
tions and elected officials to support
medical marijuana legislation. We
must ask ourselves: Is someone who
is willing to put PWAs in jail for
using a medicine that relieves their
pain and nausea really our friend?
Can we trust someone whose expla-
nations of his position are so consis-
tently inaccurate and misleading?

Sincerely,

Bruce Mirken

Director of Communications
Marijuana Policy Project

P.S.: Readers interested in following
marijuana policy issues can find a

- trove of infonnation on our web site,

www.mpp.org.
Warm Fuzzies

The April issue of OITM is a real
knockout! Great coverage of new
community ideas, initiatives, a whole
theme section on gardening, with a
new editor who writes well, plus
beautiful new layouts — what else can
one ask?!

More of the same, please!

I wish you all great success in keep-

ing up, and improving as you already
have, a Vermont GLBT tradition that
has never read better or looked better.

Cheers,
Joe Ryan
East Middlebury

Congratulations on a great issue! I
was so energized by once again hav-
ing the paper be meaningful to me.

Thanks for the gardening articles and
the reminder‘ of community. I am a
lesbian of the Stonewall era and I
housemate with a young lesbian. I
mention that because I see my per-
spective lightening up, being more
optimistic by her “less burdened”
one. I think this newspaper is a won-
derful platform for that. We can share
each other’s perspectives and experi-
ences. Up until recently, it seemed
dominated by the men and by sub-
jects that meant little to me. I was
thrilled with April’s issue and am so
glad you are the editor.

Many thanks,
Judith Ruskin

I want to say “ditto” to readers’
response to the back page of the
March issue. Man (womyn), that was
enough to scare anyone. ‘

Mostly I want to embrace
Buan Bear as the new editor, and say
thank you, thank you, thank you for
profiling some of our local beautiful
wimmin doing their thing.

We’re very lucky to have
Euan, and I hope we can all support
her throughout her tenure. You go
girl. '

Mary Wallman
Williston

And, Not So Warm 

If I were a middle-aged, professional,
tie-wearing yuppie, bent on making
the straight world view me as just
like them, I would read Out  the
Mountains. Unfortunately, I fit into
the other (probably more numerous)
crowd of GLBT individuals who find
the picture of Miss Yolanda on the
back cover of your rag refreshing. If
the so-called elite of Vermont’s gay

> continued on page 6

50-ish gay man

mentioned the case
to me in a phone con-
versation. A fundamen-
talist Christian pastor
and religious school
principal had been
'ndicted for molesting

oys he had met

about gays and lesbians.
Well, yes, in
ome kind of “aha —
otcha” way. It can be
0 tempting to gloat
when those who con-
emn members of the
gbtq community as
immoral" are caught
being way less than per-
ect. In some perverse
way, it’s sort of satisfying
when they get caught in
behavior that in their
gnorance and homo-
phobia they attribute to
members of our commu-
nity. '

But I decided»
not to pursue the story in
any formal way. The rea-
son for that decision has
to do with how unattrac-
tive gloating is and,
more seriously, with the
toll in human lives and
potential for the victims
of the alleged molester.
The minister pledhot
guilty at his arraignment,
even though the police
filed an affidavit saying
the man had confessed.
But regardless of the
legal outcome, at least
three — and perhaps
more — boys have
reported being molested.

They’ll have to
deal with that reality for
the rest of their lives.
They were incredibly
brave to buck not only
society's messages
about males never
admitting being victims,
but also the community’s
perception of the man
they've ‘accused. As a‘
result of their experi-
ences, their faith may be

destroye . ey I
never get back the
chance to choose their
own first sexual partner.
They will have to sort
out whether being
molested means they
are gay or whether they
are somehow to blame.
It may take them years
to feel at ease with
physical intimacy, to
trust men. They may act
out theiranger at being
sexually used against
male authority figures or
even against men they
think are gay, making
the same erroneous
assumption that many
supposedly educated
commentators make
about priestly child
abusers.
This is not an

“aha" story. It’s reason to
mourn.

In Search of 
‘m searching for writers
and photographers,
especially for news and
feature stories that have

an impact on our com-
munities. Columnists
we’ve got — everybody’s ;
got a personal opinion.
But if you can ask good
questions, take accurate
notes of who said what,
do research on the Web, ‘
write clearly, and meet
deadlines, then you're
the people I want to talk
to. Everything you read
that's not by me in this
or any future issue of
OITM is written by
someone who is donat-
ing his or her time and
energy. l’m grateful for
the folks who wrote this
issue — and l’d love to
see a few more. Contact
editor@mountainpride- _
media.org to volunteer.

Almost Perfect?

’d like to think so. At

least, no one men-
tioned any major errors
beyond a few typos
(Kitsch-en, not Kitch—en; ,9
gardener, not gardner, ,
along with a few others).

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