Gay Bar Bans Bachelorette Parties

I was so glad to see Mr. David Cooley owner of The Abbey in Los Angeles publicly come out and take a stand against Bachelorette parties in his gay bar on CNN today.

"We love our straight girlfriends," the bar’s owner, David Cooley, said in a statement released Thursday. "But it's also a slap in the face to my customers and my life that we can't have that same celebration.

“It was just kind of, enough is enough,” The Abbey spokesman Brian Rosman told the Daily News.

I posted about this last month asking women to please call ahead to the bar they were thinking of going to and see if it was O.K. with the management before traipsing in with all their giggling girlfriends in tow to oogle the dancers and other men at the bar.

If you do not realize that a big debate is going on in this Country about marriage equality than you have been living under a rock. 

I am sad to say I am living in a State that proposed Proposition 8, Thankfully it has been overturned and it is working its way to the Supreme Court where I know eventually, if not ever so slowly, what is right and fair will win out.

Six states - New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Iowa - allow gay marriage, as does Washington, D.C. In addition, about 18,000 same-sex couples married in California during the summer of legalization in 2008, and their unions are valid regardless of the outcome of the Prop 8 case.

As a straight women who has always had the right to marry I am embarrassed, irked, annoyed and sometimes disgusted by the insensitivity we have to the LGBT community.  That is why I felt the need to post an Open Apology at the very top of this blog.

Gals, the gay community and gay bars have shown you respect by not discriminating against you and allowing you access to their bars and clubs.  And lets face it, they probably have better entertainment and dance floors than most of the straight clubs.  However it is time to show them the same respect and UNTIL they have the same right to marry as you do please stop rubbing your rights in their face and take your Bachelorette party somewhere else so we do not force these clubs to ban us.







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WINNER HOP AGAINST HOMOPHOBIA

I am sorry this took a couple days to post but that nasty thing called "work" kept interferring with what I consider the most important thing, the Hop.

I am happy to announce
K-Lee Klein of Chaos In The Moonlight blog is the

winner of $100.00 being donated in her name to PFLAG which stands for Parents Family & Friends of Lesbians and Gays a very worthy cause that welcomes even straight folks like myself. :-)
I tried to get to the over 280 some blogs who entered WOW!  Unfortunately even with staying up late each evening I was not able to get to all of them however I will be continuing to visit your blogs if you all do not mind!

Thank you once again for letting me, a person who does not even write fiction, to participate in such a worthwhile event that is very important to me.
Shadow Sterling

Hop Against Homophobia

Welcome to the Hop Against Homophobia. 

An extremely important cause that is dear to me and I appreciate being included today.

Please click on the EVENTS PAGE for details.

International Day Against Homophobia and Straight People

So straight person what are you going to do on May 17^th, named International Day Against Homophobia?


“Oh that is a day for gay people not me”………............WRONG!

The LGBT community has been assaulted by homophobia for years and most of it comes directly from the straight community. I know there are those “who protest too loudly” against same sex relationships who are probably struggling with their own sexuality but the vast majority comes from us, the straight community.

This is a day that “we” the straight community need to do more than just pay lip service to our views of equality for all.  It is a day to get out of your comfort zone and do something positive for your LGBT community.

There are still places in the U.S. and around the world where you can be denied housing, lose your job, be beaten, jailed and even put to death for being gay.  You know this is true!

The LGBT community have worked hard enough, they are tired and they need your help!

 WHAT CAN YOU DO?

1. Reach out to someone you know is gay or being bullied and say you are sorry.

2. Join Straight For Equality and read what they have been so kind to write for us.

3. Post something positive on your blog, Twitter, FB page. This is not a day to give any time to those who are seeking negative attention.

4. Send a letter and/or donation to a local LGBT outreach organization. It takes so little to turn someone’s day around.

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?
I am going to spend the day apologizing.

If just one person hears me or reads this and believes it to be sincere and from my heart then I feel I may have taken a tiny step in the right direction.

AN OPEN APOLOGY
I am straight and I am sorry for taking for granted all the entitlement and privileges I receive in this world that you do not.

I am sorry for the cruel things I said to you in school.
I am sorry my thoughtlessness embarrassed you in front of others.
I am sorry for not extending my hand in friendship when I could have.
I am sorry for the tasteless jokes I said at the office.
I am sorry I made your work environment tough to go to each day.
I am sorry for the thoughtless comments you overheard me say to others.
I am sorry if your family did not support you when you came out or even rejected you.
I am sorry that you have to always be careful what you say around me.
I am sorry that I made you feel less of a man or woman.
I am sorry this is too little and too late in coming.
I am sorry.


I was wrong and you did not deserve any of it.

With great respect,

Shadow Sterling
　



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(If you know of someone who is hurting and you think this apology might help, please feel free to pass it on)

Acknowledgments
1.  http://www.towleroad.com/2012/05/clintonbullying.html
2.  http://www.towleroad.com/2012/05/gay-iowa-hs-student-acted-as-anonymous-twitter-angel-for-fellow-bullied-teens.html
3.  http://dan14lev.deviantart.com/journal/Homophobic-ToMyUnbornChild-tweets-turned-into-PSA-294126272
4.  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120406234458.htm
5.  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/homophobic-maybe-youre-gay.html?_r=2&emc=tnt&tntemail1=y
6.  http://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/public/NCAA/Resources/Latest+News/2012/April/Athlete+Ally+-+Hudson+Taylor+tackles+homophobia
7.  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/08/sports/hockey/08avery.html?ref=sports
8.  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/14/sports/two-straight-athletes-combat-homophobia.html?pagewanted=all
9.  https://twitter.com/#!/homophobes
10. http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2011/05/163529.htm
11. http://www.adl.org/hate-patrol/homophobia.asp
12. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/assault/etc/quiz.html
13. http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/sexual_prejudice.html
14. http://www.endhomophobia.org/homophobia.htm
15. http://www.fangsforthefantasy.com/2012/04/international-day-againt-homophobia-and.html


 

Gay Adult Stars - The Human Side

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Studio I Write For

So how did a straight gal from Southern California in the U.S. end up writing for a gay European adult studio? Well in all honesty I basically insulted them.

My business background is in marketing and I absently fired off a comment on one of their blogs saying I didn’t like they way they were “marketing” their models and insinuated their practices were nefarious at best. Because no one ever reads the emails on an adult site blog let alone posts them. There is just some poor guy sitting in front of a computer at 1:00am scrolling through hundreds of “spam” just deleting it right?

So I felt better for having gotten that off my chest, knowing it would never see the light of day and went on with life.

Then a couple days later BAM! I get an email from this European studio.

Now I quickly start trying to remember, what did I say in my email? Did I say anything libelous that could get me sued? Oh my God how much is this going to cost me, they are a big studio for heaven’s sake. Can I change my address or move out of the State before they actually track me down? How much does a plane ticket to Argentina costs these days?

All these thoughts are racing through my brain at warp speed but I decided to just bite the bullet and open the email.

Oh no!

It was way worse than I thought. Not only had the studio contacted me about my post to their blog it was from the owner of said studio.

Great, now you are in deep, deep dog doody girl.  You had better get out the suitcase and start packing before a couple of big burly guys with foreign accents show up at your door asking you to “take a ride“ with them.

Then I started to read the email and realized he actually wanted to “discuss” my comments and my concerns. Of course I am no fool, well except for the stupid post I made, but I am thinking he just wants me to stick my foot farther into my mouth so he has more ammunition to sue me with right?

So we started to correspond and I actually found him to be a very articulate, intelligent and compassionate individual. I do not know why I thought someone in the adult industry would not have these qualities, I guess I thought he would be, oh never mind what I thought, I just didn’t think he would be……..nice.

And then things got really weird.

He said he found my style of writing “interesting”. I thought, interesting like mental or interesting like interesting. Apparently he thought interesting like interesting and asked me if I would consider a gig writing for his studio blogs and helping with some of their model blogs.

 What????

So I fired back another email and let him know I had never done any writing like that before and there was no way, no how, I would write hardcore. And the couple of raunchy sentences that pass for writing on the bulk of adult studio so-called blogs was NOT what I would be interested in doing.

I figured that was that and I could go back to my good old boring, quiet, non-interesting, thank you very much, life.
　
　


So you are still here aren’t you?

Well you know things did not end there and now here I am a straight girl writing for a gay studio and I still keep turning around looking for the porn writing police to take my keyboard away for me.

I figured my new “career” would be over as soon as they took a look at my writing and the new way I wanted to market their studio.

But again that didn’t happen and in the words of Sally Fields, “they like me, they really like me” were starting to sink in. Or at least that is what they are telling me right now.

But I am still scared. Can I really do this? I don’t want to hurt anyone with my writing and I certainly do not want to hurt the gay models who work so hard to produce the videos. I want to bring some dignity, respect, pride and some humor into their lives and I do not know if I am up to the challenge. I wish I was gay so I could do a better job for them.

So these insecurities cause me to lay awake at night, chewing on my lower lip, counting the patterns on my curtains and causing me to drink coffee in the morning for the first time in years to counteract my lack of nightly repose.

To assuage some of my fear and anxiety I went in search of any groups, conventions, clubs, chats, two crickets getting together, whatever, that fit my new job specifications-----US straight girl writing for European adult gay studio.

So far I have not found any. The closest I have come are the beautiful M/M erotic romance writers who are a delightful group but it is still fiction writing that they do and they are way more talented than I am.

With no one to mentor or to talk to or even exchange an occasional email with I have resorted to you little blog.

I need to get these anxious feelings out of my head so I can stop counting the patterns in my curtains at night and STOP drinking the damn coffee!

I have not mentioned the name of the studio here little blog because my relationship with them is still so new and frankly tenuous.

And I have no illusions here. If they do not see an improvement with the new way I have presented the writing and marketing of their studio and models it will be “adios little straight girl”. “We will go back to our old way of doing things“.

So I am going to have to use you as my confidant for now little blog.  I just hope I do not make too many mistakes as I learn my way around the adult entertainment business and also look for more understanding in the divide that still exists between the straight and gay worlds.


To be continued……………..I hope.

More Letters In My Alphabet Soup

Some of you may be asking "Whats up with all the new letters I have seen?"

What do all the letters mean?

Most of us are familiar with the initials LGBT the acronym for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender.

I have also seen the following additions
LGBTQ - Q- Questioning
LGBTQI - I - Intersex
LGBTQIA - A - Asexual
And I have seen others that I could not find definitions for.

I have also seen it written GLBT but for the purposes of this blog I will use the LGBT initials used by organizations like GLAAD, PFLAG, The Advocate and many others.


This in no way means I do not acknowledge all the added ones, so please do not think I do not include you all here.