Out in the Mountains

Celebrating Queer Free Your Mind...

Continued from page1 MIDDLEBURY -- During the actual

hour-long Queer Town Meeting,
Conference—goers had an opportunity to
come up to the microphone and speak
their minds. Here’s a sampler...

claim to ethical leadership. She also
suggested we View those in the closet as
“spies for the queer nation”. Harper
concluded that gay men, lesbians, queens
and cross dressers will “have the last laugh
on homophobia”.

- We are clearly in need of developing
an infrastructure. Until we have one
that is solidly in place, we’ll always be
flying by the seat of our pants and
relying on the efforts of a few very
dedicated people  Perhaps we can
start figuring out how to tap into the
ways we gather rather than imposing
structures  That’s what the Right has
done, and we need to figure out how
we can do it effectively and not think
that whenever someone uses the word
‘political’ that it’s bad.

Over 30 educational and planning
workshops were held throughout the day.
Workshop topics included Gay and
Lesbian History, Fighting the Right,
Racism, Bisexuality, Gay Men’s Health,
Coming Out, Intemalized Homophobia,
Wills and Legal Documents,
Homosexuality and Religion, and
Domestic Partner Benefits.

The town meeting portion of the day
provided an opportunity for participants to
discuss a variety of issues. Topics raised
during the forum included the inclusion of
bisexual and transgender Vemronters in
VCLGR’s name, the results of the recent
state and national elections,
“Chittenocentrism” - the belief that the
majority of g/l/b events occur in Chittenden
County, “Chittenophobia” — the irrational
fear of Chittenden County, use of the word
“queer” in the Conference’s title, and the
importance of developing Vennont’s g/l/b
infrastructure.

0 I realized as I looked at this name
‘Lesbian and Gay Rights’, it was
missing something. Or at least in my
opinion it’s missing something. There
are other people who should be a part
of our community — and that’s the
bisexual community  Are people
here interested? Is this Coalition
interested in expanding? You want
more numbers? You want more
people? Do you want to expand your
horizons and add bisexuality — the
people who belong here with us?

The ongoing success of the VCLGR ' Hike (the telm) ‘QUCCF T0WT1_
Conferences indicates a need for members Meeting’ bficallse W5 Very quick and
of Vennont’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, and e35_Y:_ and there’? 3 Sense of
transgender commumty to eeme together polrtrcalness to it. There’s'also a sense
as a group to network’ energize, learn, See of ‘yeah, damn it, we’re different!’ 
old friends, and make new ones. After this I don’t know Why We don,‘ h3V€ the
year’s Conference, Town Meeting Day in W0FdS ’biS€XUal’, ‘transgender’: and

Velmem will never be quite the Same ‘transsexual’ (in the name). I think
that’s one of the problems of this

whole thing. It’s like ‘How many
letters do you get to put on a banner?’
But it’s pretty poor  criteria to
define a movement.

Be sure to catch the rest of 0ITM’s
extensive coverage of the Conference in
this issue. V

- I would like to suggest we think of

sexual liberty as a concept. In the
libertarian tradition, you should be free
to do whatever you want with someone
else as long as they are consenting, and
we’re responsible, and it doesn’t hurt
them in any permanent way. So sexual
liberty is a concept I embrace and it
kind of gets all of us under one
umbrella.

Even though I’d love to see bisexual up
there (on the banner), I feel like this is
my community, this is my organization.
Regardless of the title, this is where I
belong. And I hope other bisexuals and
transgenders feel that way whether or
not they see themselves in the title
...Yes, this is a coalition and we have
differences  all sorts of people who
might not nonnally come together
except that we need to come together.

I’m just an eighteen year old boy who
is kind of lost in the system, I guess.
It’s definitely reassuring to see so
many people, so many faces out for
the same cause. I encourage all of you
to keep doing it because we are
definitely succeeding.

I want to encourage us as we get older,
and hopefully feel better about
ourselves, not to forget a group that
doesn’t have a voice yet  We need the
adults not to forget about the kids  I’m
on the Board of Outright Vennont (and)
we had a call last week from an eleven
year old girl who identifies as different
and is totally alone.

I’m a teacher at a high school and I
would like to encourage everyone here
to become involved with your local
town politics, your school board 
because one way in which the ‘other’
people move is to get on school boards,
to pass policies on books, on teachers,
on curriculum.

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