Peter's Place

I know I don't usually start off a blog post with a video (those who have been following my blog for a while know it's something I might end a post with, but not start one...) however, this is too important, and too moving, to not put up front. I'm not a vlogger . I just don't think I do well in video. But I do think I have a fairly decent command of the written word, and I've used that as my medium for quite some time. As someone who's been online in one form or another since the 1980s (that's before  the Internet was open to the public), I've used my powers of persuasive writing to advocate for a number of things—such as politics, the environment, and yes, for gay rights. “In my own unassuming way, I know I can make a difference. You can as well.” ~ Kinsey Millhone . Often, one of the questions posed to me, as a blogger, is, “Why do you blog?” I just finished reading T is for Trespass , the latest (as of this writing) released book in Sue Graft...

Today, 10 September 2009, is World Suicide Prevention Day . I am a suicide survivor. My first attempt was made when I was a teenager, because I couldn't come to terms with being gay and being Catholic. I just responded to someone on Facebook who inquired about this. Here's what I wrote: I was raised in a very conservative, very religious Catholic Democratic household, by my very religious, very conservative Democratic Grandparents . I didn't know that there were gay people growing up. Then I started going on-line, and I met my first gay person, my Unca Uni . He got me to realize that all the fantasies/what not I'd been having were b/c I was gay. I couldn't reconcile being Catholic with being gay. One night, whilst on the phone w/ a fellow young Republican from Yonkers, I came out to him. I was also taking sleeping pills. But having led an extremely sheltered life, I didn't know that you're supposed to take the whole bottle all at once, not one at a time (wh...

OK, I've been trying to do this for the past few weeks but things just haven't been in my favour. I'm hoping that today, they are. Actually, I started this tag a number of weeks ago in my #followfriday and #samesexsunday recommendation posts but I just never had the chance to explain it until now. As most of you know, I use Twitter, that wonderful micro-blogging service that where you send status updates in 140 characters (or less) in response to a very basic question: What are you doing? One of the greatest things about Twitter, and what I find most valuable about it, is the ability to connect with people around the world who you may otherwise never come into contact with. I hold daily conversations with folks from the Netherlands, Australia, Europe, Asia, and the Americas (North and South) that I've met -- solely through Twitter. I've formed great friendships, and met some truly wonderful folk. The way to interact with people on Twitter is by following them, or ...

[EDIT 29 June 2009] I've been thinking about this after finishing the blog post below, and there are a bunch of different ways I could have titled this other than "40 Years After Stonewall, Where Do We Stand?" Another title could be "Small Strides Made 85 Years Into the LGBT Civil Rights Movement" and yet another could be "We're still being killed millennia later, although it may no longer be legal in some jurisdictions." Still, another title could be "LGBT folk can't legally be killed in the USA, which is great progress, but what about places where Sharia is the rule of law?" So with that in mind, continue on to the article that I wrote yesterday and just remember that while it's against the law to murder a person of LGBT origin in the United States of America, that isn't necessarily the case around the world. [/EDIT] Forty years ago today, 28 June 1969, a firecracker was lit under the seats of gay (and when I say gay, I'...

Today is #samesexsunday on Twitter . In a nutshell, this is the day when Twitter users recommend other lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) users to follow. It was started by The Bilerico Project : "Same Sex Sunday is an idea hatched by me and Bil to build a stronger sense of LGBT community on Twitter. The concept is pretty simple. Its #followfriday gone gay, gay, gay." My list has grown a bit, so instead of tweeting it, I'm going to tweet this post, and then link to the people I recommend on here. I can also add comments about users here, as well, as that pesky 140-character limit won't get in the way. All of the following Twitter users are LGBT people I recommend because they're personable, knowledgeable, helpful, insightful, and good folk. Send them an @ (a directed message on Twitter) and you'll most likely get a response. Additionally, I've also tagged certain people with other twitter hashtags, to denote whether they're, say, a #wome...