‘Milk’ screenwriter barred from college
Advocate. com reports Academy Award-winning “Milk” screenwriter Dustin Lance Black has been barred from a discussion at Hope College in Holland, Mich., because administrators believe his advocacy is divisive.
Black was invited to participate in the sexuality panel and to address a screenwriting class at the private Christian liberal-arts college.
But college officials pulled the plug on the roundtable.
Hope College Dean of Students Richard Frost said that, from past experience, strongly opinionated speakers usually don’t further academic discussions about LGBT issues.
“We are willing to do these things, but for the college to do this, we have to be sure it’s educational,” said Frost.
Director quits Scientology over Prop. 8
CNN.com reports director Paul Haggis has severed his ties with the Church of Scientology over the organization’s alleged stance against gay marriage.
Haggis wrote a letter addressed to Tommy Davis, the head of Scientology’s Celebrity Centre. In it, Haggis stated he was disappointed by the church’s tacit denial of gay rights in the debate over California’s gay-marriage ban.
Haggis, 56, who won an Oscar in 2005 for co-writing “Crash,” said he was quitting the church after 35 years.
“I could not, in good conscience, be a member of an organization where gay-bashing was tolerated,” Haggis wrote.
Davis said Haggis’ complaints were based on misunderstandings and strenuously disagreed that the Church of Scientology is in any way antigay.
Marriage supporters lead in funding
365gay.com reports supporters of Maine’s same-sex-marriage law continue to collect far more campaign contributions than their opponents in a referendum that’s being watched nationally.
NO on 1/Protect Maine Equality reported to the state that it has raised $4 million in its effort to keep Maine’s same-sex-marriage law on the books. That compares to the $2.5 million raised by Stand for Marriage Maine, which forced the people’s veto vote through a petition drive.
— Larry Nichols