[OutVoice] A Kenyan lesbian fights for visibility + a Thai trans-woman celebrates her culture + global LGBT news

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"THIS WAY OUT: the international lesbian & gay radio magazine
Program #1,088 - distributed 2/2/09
(hosted by Greg Gordon and produced with Lucia Chappelle)
A Kenyan activist fights for visibility;
Trans-women get their own space in Thailand;
A lesbian takes the helm of Iceland's melting government, Colombia's top court commands couples equality, a US court denies masks for Prop 8 donors, Lebanese Army soldiers beat a gay male couple, Maryland's LGBT rights group threatens state security? and more global LGBT news

- In "NewsWrap": Iceland's Social Affair Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir is poised to become the world's first openly lesbian prime minister...  Colombia's Constitutional Court extends more marriage-like rights to same-gender couples, while a U.S. federal court rejects the request by California's Prop 8 backers that names of their donors be kept secret... Helem's queer human rights award is soured by Lebanese Army soldiers, Egyptian cops crow about their latest "gay crackdown," Maryland cops call the state LGBT rights group a "security threat"... and more LGBT news from around the world  (written by GREG GORDON, and reported this week by CHRIS WILSON and PAM MARSHALL).

- The principal of a school in northern THAILAND late last year determined that between 10 and 20 percent of his students identified as transgender… so, in addition to bathrooms for boys and girls, he established a third – its doors are half blue and half pi
nk.  For some insights into trans-life in that southeast Asian country, Radio Netherlands human rights reporter JONATHAN GROUBERT talked with activist SUTTIRAT SIMSIRIWONG (with transmittal thanks to RN's ERIC BEAUCHEMIN).

 -  Discrimination, exclusion, hate crimes, drug abuse, suicide.  It's a depressing outlook for most of KENYA's closeted LGBT community. They're intimidated by the law in that east African country that makes homosexuality a crime, punishable by up to 14 years in prison.  But some people believe all that can change.  PAULINE KIMANI is a 23-year-old equal rights activist, and one of Kenya's few "out" lesbians.  This Way Out's ARUSHA TOPAZZINI met Kimani and some of her family and friends in Nairobi [find the Gay and Lesbian Coalition of Kenya online at www.galck.org; check out the music of French freelance reporter-singer/songwriter Arusha Topazzini at www.reverbnation.com/arusha].
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