For anyone reading this blog who wasn't seen the groundbreaking documentary film "Paris Is Burning" stop reading it and go rent it. I don't want to say too much about it because I really want folks to watch it, but it documents the ball scene in the 80's that gay black men participated in. There was a mini ball at the conference (inspired by the very balls documented in the film) that unfortunately was poorly advertised and most of us missed. Susan, Samuel, Eva and I went out to dinner and we asked Chico to join us. He came late because he had been participating in the ball. When he got there we were talking about it and Eva had no idea what we were discussing so we explained it to her.
Susan and Samuel have done an amazing job of making sure the rest of us were okay during the conference and we dubbed them The Mother and The Father of The House Of Tobacco. Samuel said, if they were doing a documentary on this conference we would be the House of Tobacco. Ladies, Gentlemen, Trannies and everyone else, I give you the House of Tobacco.
Samuel Lurie, Eva Poole, Chillton “Chico” Brown, Susan Hollinshead, Jordon Johnson, Muriel “Blue” Lynn Jones, and LaShana “Shän” Lewis and Logan Druckman.
I can assure you this is only the first you'll be hearing of us.
Monday, March 19, 2007
one last meeting
On Sunday Morning Marta who works for the national LGBT tobacco control network and my fellow scholarship recipients and I met up for one last meeting. We first went around and shared what each of us has taken away from this experience. Then we discussed the LGBT tobacco summit coming up in October of this year and how we are all hoping to attend. It was so nice to have one more group activity that wasn’t a workshop because this was a group of really great folks.
Overall it felt like people were able to learn lots of new things to take back home with them. Blue and Shan made a great point about subgroups within the LGBTQ population who often get overlooked (ie Bears) which is something for all of us to think about. Eva talked about how there is really no queer community to speak of and that she plans to return home and try to start one.
I’m hopeful that we will all see each other again in October, and we plan to stay in contact via email before then. I’m so glad that I was able to meet so many interesting and great fellow activists from all over the country with fresh ideas and abundant enthusiasm. We gave kudos to Marta who will be heading to
Thursday, March 15, 2007
"We don't smoke that ****, we just sell it."
This afternoon's workshop was put on by the Pride Institute in partnership with the Tobacco-free Lavender Communities Project of Minnesota. The Pride Institute is an in and outpatient facility that works with people to overcome addictions. Through his work there Pablo McCabe has found a strong correlation between smoking and other substance use in the LGBTQ community. In addition he noted the large number of people in recovery who choose to smoke. A workshop participant who outed himself as a 12-stepper said that outside of any 12 step meeting you will find a large portion of the members smoking.
Antonio Cardona who works for the Tobacco-free Lavender Communities Project emphasized the importance of viewing smoking as a social justice issue, not just a health issue. Commercial tobacco has longstanding history of being racist, homophobic and misogynistic. He cited that the Colonial Americans were the first ones to see tobacco as something to be used to gain profit. Colonists are the ones responsible for the large outbreak of commercial tobacco which required a large workforce. The large workforce needed was one of the contributions to slavery, later replaced by cotton. In the mid-20th century commercial tobacco used many derogatory images of women in their advertisements. Women were portrayed as promiscuous or as servants for men. Later women were targeted by cigarette companies encouraging them to use smoking as a way to lose weight. Now that the big tobacco reports have been uncovered, we have found that the tobacco industry heavily targets the LGBTQ communities with advertising and marketing.
When asked why none of the tobacco company executives smoked one of them responded in a now famous statement saying "We don't smoke that S**t, we just sell it. We reserve that right for the poor, the black, the young and the stupid." Again, I mention the viewpoint that this is not just a health issue but a social justice issue. Tobacco executives freely admit targeting minority populations including the less educated, lower income, people of color, youth and the LGBTQ community.
In Minnesota according to a Blue Cross Blue Shield study 18% of adults smoke. The study done by Rainbow Health found that 46% of LGBTQ Minnesotans smoked. It doesn't need to be said but there is a huge disparity here. Furthermore, Antonio said that the 46% number was a composite and explained that sub-populations had varying rates. 70% of Lesbians smoked, gay men were close to 40% and Bisexuals were around 25%.
The 12-stepper in the workshop said that quitting cigarettes was harder than quitting drugs and alcohol. He said that he "went through worse hell quitting cigarettes than any other time in his life." Another participant raised a very good point that I had never thought of. She said that if you are trying to quit using heroin you don't walk down the street seeing people doing heroin and being bombarded by advertisements for it. Tobacco has permeated nearly every aspect of our society. Physically and psychologically tobacco (nicotine) has been labeled as difficult to quit as heroin and similar in terms of how challenging the process is for recovering users.
Pablo ended by explaining the 4 reasons why LGBTQ people smoke in such disparate rates that they have identified. 1) Stress 2) Smoking as a social tool 3)Due to targeted marketing and promotions and 4) Smoking because of the association between alcohol and other addictions.
Perhaps mobilizing people around the social justice aspect in addition to the health risks will help us reach the smokers who feel that they don't need to quit now. If queer smokers realize the ways in which they are being targeted and taken advantage of, maybe they will be more likely to want to quit. Like the bumper stickers say: If you aren't outraged then you aren't paying attention...
Antonio Cardona who works for the Tobacco-free Lavender Communities Project emphasized the importance of viewing smoking as a social justice issue, not just a health issue. Commercial tobacco has longstanding history of being racist, homophobic and misogynistic. He cited that the Colonial Americans were the first ones to see tobacco as something to be used to gain profit. Colonists are the ones responsible for the large outbreak of commercial tobacco which required a large workforce. The large workforce needed was one of the contributions to slavery, later replaced by cotton. In the mid-20th century commercial tobacco used many derogatory images of women in their advertisements. Women were portrayed as promiscuous or as servants for men. Later women were targeted by cigarette companies encouraging them to use smoking as a way to lose weight. Now that the big tobacco reports have been uncovered, we have found that the tobacco industry heavily targets the LGBTQ communities with advertising and marketing.
When asked why none of the tobacco company executives smoked one of them responded in a now famous statement saying "We don't smoke that S**t, we just sell it. We reserve that right for the poor, the black, the young and the stupid." Again, I mention the viewpoint that this is not just a health issue but a social justice issue. Tobacco executives freely admit targeting minority populations including the less educated, lower income, people of color, youth and the LGBTQ community.
In Minnesota according to a Blue Cross Blue Shield study 18% of adults smoke. The study done by Rainbow Health found that 46% of LGBTQ Minnesotans smoked. It doesn't need to be said but there is a huge disparity here. Furthermore, Antonio said that the 46% number was a composite and explained that sub-populations had varying rates. 70% of Lesbians smoked, gay men were close to 40% and Bisexuals were around 25%.
The 12-stepper in the workshop said that quitting cigarettes was harder than quitting drugs and alcohol. He said that he "went through worse hell quitting cigarettes than any other time in his life." Another participant raised a very good point that I had never thought of. She said that if you are trying to quit using heroin you don't walk down the street seeing people doing heroin and being bombarded by advertisements for it. Tobacco has permeated nearly every aspect of our society. Physically and psychologically tobacco (nicotine) has been labeled as difficult to quit as heroin and similar in terms of how challenging the process is for recovering users.
Pablo ended by explaining the 4 reasons why LGBTQ people smoke in such disparate rates that they have identified. 1) Stress 2) Smoking as a social tool 3)Due to targeted marketing and promotions and 4) Smoking because of the association between alcohol and other addictions.
Perhaps mobilizing people around the social justice aspect in addition to the health risks will help us reach the smokers who feel that they don't need to quit now. If queer smokers realize the ways in which they are being targeted and taken advantage of, maybe they will be more likely to want to quit. Like the bumper stickers say: If you aren't outraged then you aren't paying attention...
"How They Get Us To Screw Ourselves..."
Today I attended the workshop entitled "How the Tobacco Industry Targets Queer America." The first presenter was Ted Guggenheim, the Project Coordinator of the California LGBT Tobacco Education Partnership. He had a really informative slideshow with two videos. He started by showing specific examples of advertising campaigns that target the LGBT community and then showed the counter-tobacco advertising campaigns his organization came up with. My favorite was an ad that looked similar to a Marlboro type of ad featuring two cowboys and a pack of cigarettes with the tag line "I wish I knew how to quit you." Everyone knows the LGBTQ community appreciates clever humor.
Additionally, Ted's organization found politicians who accepted campaign contributions from tobacco companies and offered counter-tobacco campaign contributions. The organization also managed to get four politician's to sign agreements pledging not to accept money from the tobacco industry.
Finally Ted treated us to the video "How They Get Us to Screw Ourselves" about the tobacco industry and the LGBTQI community. The video emphasized the following cycle which continues to repeat itself...1)The tobacco industry gives money to conservative politicians. 2)The politicians support anti-gay agendas 3)Tobacco companies run ads targeting the LGBTQ community and showing that they "support" us. 4)We buy the tobacco products. 5) The money we spend goes back to the tobacco companies and turns into donations for conservative politicians etc...
I'd encourage people to check out this website http://www.ciggybuttz.com for more information, resources and neat products.
Additionally, Ted's organization found politicians who accepted campaign contributions from tobacco companies and offered counter-tobacco campaign contributions. The organization also managed to get four politician's to sign agreements pledging not to accept money from the tobacco industry.
Finally Ted treated us to the video "How They Get Us to Screw Ourselves" about the tobacco industry and the LGBTQI community. The video emphasized the following cycle which continues to repeat itself...1)The tobacco industry gives money to conservative politicians. 2)The politicians support anti-gay agendas 3)Tobacco companies run ads targeting the LGBTQ community and showing that they "support" us. 4)We buy the tobacco products. 5) The money we spend goes back to the tobacco companies and turns into donations for conservative politicians etc...
I'd encourage people to check out this website http://www.ciggybuttz.com for more information, resources and neat products.
Friday, March 9, 2007
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
