I'll remember this day

People around me were very nice when I was being treated for cancer in 2008. My friends came with me to the doctor, and to the infusion center when I had chemo. They asked what else I needed, and if I responded with 'nothing' (which was often), they believed me and didn't push.

Somehow I don't think Swedes would have been so effortlessly helpful.

So it's ironic that not until today has that basic generosity, thoughtfulness, and inclusion been official policy in the United States.

happy national coming out day

The Human Rights Campaign: The Coming Out Project helps LGBT, as well as straight-supportive people live openly and talk about their support for equality at home, at work and in their communities each and every day.

I just caught the end of an HBO documentary, OUTRAGE: Do Ask. Do Tell. From the synopsis:

An official selection of the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival, OUTRAGE investigates the hidden lives of some of the country's most powerful policymakers - from now-retired Idaho Senator Larry Craig, to former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevy - and examines how these and other politicians have inflicted damage on millions of Americans by opposing gay rights. Equally disturbing, the film explores the mainstream media's complicity in keeping those secrets, despite the growing efforts to "out" them by gay rights organizations and bloggers.

Through a combination of archival news footage and exclusive interviews with politicians and members of the media, OUTRAGE probes the psychology of a double lifestyle, the ethics of outing closeted politicians, and the double standards that the media upholds in its coverage of the sex lives of gay public figures. As Barney Frank, perhaps the best-known openly gay member of Congress explains, "There is a right to privacy, but not a right to hypocrisy. It is very important that the people who make the law be subject to the law."