Oct. 20-26
1997
U.S.: Kevin Spacey attacks Esquire magazine as “dishonest and malicious” over its October cover story implying that he outed himself during the interview. Throughout the article, titled “Kevin Spacey Has a Secret,” writer Tom Junod teases about the actor’s “secret,” beginning and ending the story with rumors about Spacey’s sexuality. * The Philadelphia area Franconia Conference of The Mennonite Church vote to expel North America’s oldest Mennonite congregation, the Germantown Mennonite Church, for its acceptance of same-gender couples as members. * Club owner Fitzgerald Himmelsbach becomes the first official liaison to the city’s gay and lesbian community in Providence, RI. * The 7th AIDS Walk Atlanta raises $1.5 million. * Ellen DeGeneres threatens to quit her ABC-TV sitcom Ellen because of the “adult content, parental discretion” advisory the network slapped onto a recent episode. * Britain: Wilde, a new film biography of 19th century gay writer Oscar Wilde, opens in London. Wilde’s grandson Merlin Holland said he felt it focused too much on his grandfather’s gay sexual orientation.
1992
U.S.: Protesting the Vatican’s dictates against homosexuals, AIDS prevention and abortion, Sinead O’Connor tears up a photograph of Pope John Paul II on Saturday Night Live. The National Ethnic Coalition of Organizations responds by renting a steamroller, and crushing the Irish singer’s CDs and cassettes, outside the offices of her recording company in New York. * The ABC program 20/20 includes a segment on the “soon to be famous” community of lesbians living in Northampton, Mass. * In an interview with The Advocate, Jay Grimstead, director of the Coalition on Revival, a fundamentalist Christian group, says: “Homosexuality makes God vomit.” * Netherlands: According to a poll by the federal Social-Cultural Planning Bureau, 95 percent of Dutch citizens surveyed believe that “Gays must be allowed the freedom to live in their own way.”
1987
U.S.: The Washington Post amends its policy, and say they will, in some instances, list “longtime companions” of gay men and lesbians as survivors in obituaries. Within two weeks they refuse to name the lover of a man who dies of AIDS. * As the United Nations General Assembly holds its first debate on AIDS, more than 50 members of ACT UP are arrested, as they sit down on 5th Avenue to protest President Reagan’s lack of leadership in fighting the disease. * The House Judiciary Committee approve a bill that would require the U.S. Justice Dept. to collect statistics on ‘hate crimes’ based on several factors, including sexual orientation.
1982:
U.S.: A federal study of prisoners shows that effeminate gay men are four times more likely to be raped than other men. * Jose “Insane” Perez is arrested for fatally shooting Stanley E. Cox, and wounding Joseph Hall in an alley near the Loading Dock gay bar in Chicago. Perez tells police that he hates homosexuals because his two younger brothers are gay, and he also became angered by the fact that the bar was painted gray and black, the colors of his street gang. * Quote of the Week: Actress Shelley Winters on Phyllis Schlafly: “To even listen to her, you get sick! She makes me ill.”