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Gay rights are human rights. Amnesty is a group where they believe no matter what you like think or look like you should have human rights

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We all have the right to be treated equally. Governments have a moral and legal obligation to protect people from discrimination or violence based on who they are.

When governments fail to protect people, Amnesty International is there - helping ensure that all people can live in dignity, safety, and freedom.

The Problem

All over the world, including in the United States, people face discrimination, inequality, and violence based on who they are.

When people face these abuses, their ability to be safe, work, receive health care, get an education, start families, and pursue their goals in life are jeopardized.

Women experience violence and discrimination based on their sex and gender.

Sexual and reproductive rights are under increased threat in the U.S. and around the world.

LGBT people are harassed, discriminated against, and attacked because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Indigenous people have faced human rights abuses for generations, and today they continue to be denied justice in protecting their land and water, holding perpetrators of sexual assault accountable, and other areas.

Amnesty In Action

Changing lives and policies

Amnesty International conducts research, provides training, and advocates for reform to advance equality and safety. We've helped change federal laws on violence against women and Indigenous sexual assault survivors' access to care and justice, and we've helped repeal laws globally that criminalize abortion.

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Gender, Sexuality, & Identity - Amnesty International USA

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We all have the right to be treated equally. Governments have a moral and legal obligation to protect people from discrimination or violence based on who they are. When governments fail to protect people, Amnesty International is there - helping ensure that all people can live in dignity, safety, and freedom.

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America has come a long way for the LGBTQ community, even though we can take a stand fly the gay flag protest and be married doesn't mean its equal... people are still being discriminated against all over the world

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If someone told me 10 years ago the gay-rights movement would face a fight over baked goods, I would have laughed at them.

As someone who has fought for LGBT equality for the past dozen years, I have seen and heard some of the ugliest, most disgraceful acts of hatred committed against people simply because of who they are, or who they love.

I've heard firsthand accounts of people who have been beaten in the streets, fired from their jobs, turned away from emergency medical care, denied a legal relationship with their own child, refused the chance to say goodbye to their dying partner of 50 years. They've been made to feel low, shameful, and less than human-all because they liked girls instead of boys or boys instead of girls, or their gender identity didn't match the one they were assigned at birth.

We've come a long way since the days when being gay meant a life of complete and utter rejection and social isolation. We can wave rainbow flags and see ourselves represented on television. We can even get married in all 50 states.

We are increasingly seen as human beings with parents and babies and jobs and retirement savings and vacation plans and plaque-fighting toothpaste and all of the hopes and dreams and normalcies as everyone else.

Except we're not the same.

When we're denied services related to our weddings, we don't have full marriage recognition. Being told by the government clerk to go to the next town over to obtain our marriage licenses because she won't issue them to same-sex couples means we don't have full marriage equality. Being told by a public-serving business, including a wedding venue, a baker, or a florist, that they won't provide services for weddings of same-sex couples is another form of marriage discrimination, where same-sex couples continue to get singled out for discrimination.

If someone told me 10 years ago the gay-rights movement would be fighting over the right to get wedding cakes, I would have laughed because the right to marry seemed so far away. Now it is here. The cakes may sound trivial, but the freedom to marry is anything but. And that freedom isn't fully realized until we can obtain marriage licenses like everyone else. It isn't real until we can walk into any business that serves the public with confidence that we won't face the humiliation and stigma of being turned away simply because of who we are.

We need the law on our side. We need the public to understand that while there may be other bakeries that would be willing to serve, fear of discrimination shouldn't be one of the ingredients you have to consider when you choose your wedding cake. The psychological and societal damage that is done when you are denied service that everyone else is free to access-simply because of who you are-is significant. We've said time and again throughout history that we are not a country that condones hate and intolerance, especially against those groups that are marginalized. This no different.

The moments of societal rejection from clerks and businesses are part of the constellation of discrimination that continues to pervade our society. The baker who denies the gay couple their wedding cake. The florist who claims she can't provide flowers for a lesbian marriage. The doctor who turns away a baby with two moms. The emergency room nurse who refuses to treat a transgender person. They all boil down to the same equation: singling someone out because of who they are and denying them service that you would offer to everyone else. In other words, discrimination-pure and simple.

Of course, business owners, just like everyone else in America, have religious freedom; they are free to believe whatever they want, and act on those beliefs. The Constitution always has and always will protect that right. What they cannot do is impose those beliefs on others or use religion to break the law and harm others.

Core religious institutions, on the other hand, remain free to operate according to their religious beliefs. Priests or ministers do not have to marry same-sex couples, just as they don't have to marry previously divorced people if it violates the teachings of their faith. Churches do not have to host any religious marriages to which they object, including marriages of gay couples. The Constitution rightly protects their religious freedom.

But we are now seeing government officials and business owners asserting the right to refuse to follow the law based on their beliefs. That's not religious freedom, that's discrimination-and we should not accept it.

LGBT people are not yet treated the same under the law and in our everyday lives. Many of us are still fired from our jobs for being LGBT, and we lack express protections against such discrimination in nearly two-thirds of the states and at the federal level. Landlords still refuse to rent apartments to gay or transgender people, yet we have little recourse in many states. And a couple filled with elation that they can finally realize the same legal rights as their opposite-sex counterparts can walk into a bakery to order their wedding cake and be told, "We don't serve your kind here."

The fact remains that we're not there yet.

Until the laws catch up and protect us, and the fear dwindles into nothing more than a footnote in a history book, we'll have our work cut out for us.

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Gay Marriage Is Legal, but We're Still Not Equal

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If someone told me 10 years ago the gay-rights movement would face a fight over baked goods, I would have laughed at them. As someone who has fought for LGBT equality for the past dozen years, I have seen and heard some of the ugliest, most disgraceful acts of hatred committed against people simply because of who they are, or who they love.

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June 28, 1969 was a milestone for GLBTQ community gay patrons took a stand and rioted against discriminated police. which started the movement for Supreme Court to rule that states cannot ban same-sex marriage, giving gay and lesbian couples the same rights heterosexual couples have in spousal benefits and legal rights 44 years later in the same month.

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The law discriminates against gay marriage, a judge in mass denied a gay couple their right to be married

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BOSTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - A federal appeals court in Boston found on Thursday that a U.S. law defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman unconstitutionally denies federal benefits to lawfully married same-sex couples in a ruling that promises to push the issue of gay marriage to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The ruling on the 1996 law, the Defense of Marriage Act, marked a victory for gay rights groups and U.S. President Barack Obama, whose administration announced last year it considered the law unconstitutional and would no longer defend it.

In its 3-0 ruling, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit concluded that the law discriminates against gay couples. Eight of the 50 U.S. states permit gay marriage, including Massachusetts, which became the first in 2004, and Maryland, which became the most recent in March.

"Congress' denial of federal benefits to same-sex couples lawfully married in Massachusetts has not been adequately supported by any permissible federal interest," Judge Michael Boudin wrote for the three-judge panel.

The issue of gay marriage is an emotional and divisive one in the United States. Polls show U.S. public support of gay marriage rising.

Obama on May 9 said he believes same-sex couples should be allowed to marry, marking the first time a U.S. president publicly expressed support for gay marriage. Republican activists and conservative Christian leaders condemned Obama's stance.

Two of the three judges who made Thursday's ruling were appointed by Republican presidents and the third by a Democrat.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said the ruling "is in concert with the president's views" that the law is unconstitutional. Obama is seeking re-election on November 6.

Mitt Romney, who has clinched the Republican nomination to challenge Obama, opposes gay marriage, saying marriage should be limited to a union between one man and one woman.

Gay rights advocates hailed Thursday's ruling while conservatives opposed to same-sex marriage condemned it.

"For the first time, a federal appeals court has recognized that our Constitution will not tolerate a law that forces the federal government to deny lawfully married same-sex couples equal treatment. The writing is clearly on the wall for the demise of this unjust and indefensible law that hurts real families," said Joe Solmonese, president of the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign.

Plaintiffs, including seven married same-sex couples and three widowers, said the law, which prevents them from filing joint federal tax returns or collecting survivor benefits from the Social Security retirement program, denied them equal protections guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.

Bette Jo Green, one of the plaintiffs in the case, welcomed the decision. Green, 70, has been married to Jo Ann Whitehead, 70, since 2004.

"How thrilling it is for us to know that the court believes in protecting our right to Social Security benefits as with all the other married couples in the country," Green said.

"We're glad to know we fall into the same class as everyone else. We're no longer second-class citizens," added Jonathan Knight, 32, married to Marlin Nabors, 34, since 2006.

'DOUBLE STANDARD'

Mary Bonauto of the Massachusetts advocacy group Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, who served as the lead attorney for the 17 plaintiffs, said she expects this case now to go before the U.S. Supreme Court, the highest court in the country.

"We think this is a case that really could appeal to all members of the court because it is not only a double standard ... this law is also a real outlier because it inserts Congress into an area that states govern," Bonauto said.

The 1st Circuit panel recognized that many Americans believe marriage to be a union between a man and a woman. But the panel concluded that federalism permits diversity of governance based on local decisions, and that choice also applied to states' decisions to legalize same-sex marriage.

The panel said the ruling would not take effect until the Supreme Court has had an opportunity to review the law. The plaintiffs' right to receive tax and Social Security benefits will remain on hold pending any appeal.

The Supreme Court has never said that the U.S. Constitution requires states to permit same-sex marriages, the ruling noted. Therefore, the current case was limited to arguments "that do not presume or rest on a constitutional right to same-sex marriage," the panel said.

The ruling also did not address another provision of the law that says that one state does not have to recognize gay marriages performed in states that permit it. "Today's ruling just means that the federal government has to recognize states' marriages. If a married couple from Massachusetts wants to move to Texas, Texas doesn't have to recognize their marriage," said Paul Smith, a lawyer for the plaintiffs.

Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute, criticized the ruling as an attack on the traditional definition of marriage.

"For a Massachusetts-based court to just audaciously proclaim that the federal government is wrong and has to recognize a unique social experiment in Massachusetts for the purpose of providing benefits is bizarre and a violation of the principles of our federalist system," Mineau said.

Dale Schowengerdt, a lawyer for the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian advocacy group that has defended California's gay marriage ban in court, added, "Under this rationale, if just one state decided to accept polygamy, the federal government and perhaps other states would be forced to accept it, too."

In a companion case also on appeal, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley argued that Congress overstepped its authority and violated the 10th Amendment of the Constitution in passing the law because it undermined states' abilities to recognize marriage equality.

"It is unconstitutional for the federal government to create a system of first- and second-class marriages," Coakley said in a statement.

Lawyers for the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group of the U.S. House of Representatives (BLAG) had defended the 1996 law.

A federal judge in Massachusetts declared a key section of the law unconstitutional in 2010, and the appeals court agreed.

Among the plaintiffs is Dean Hara, the widower of Gerry Studds, a former U.S. congressman who died in 2006. Studds, the first openly gay member of Congress, and Hara were married one week after same-sex marriages became legal in Massachusetts. Hara was not eligible to receive the pension provided to surviving spouses of former members of Congress.

A California federal judge has found the law unconstitutional for denying federal benefits to same-sex couples. Another federal judge in San Francisco reached the same conclusion in a case currently on appeal before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

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judicial process / court cases / court decisions

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Court says marriage law discriminates against gay couples

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A federal appeals court in Boston found on Thursday that a U.S. law defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman unconstitutionally denies federal benefits to lawfully married same-sex couples in a ruling that promises to push the issue of gay marriage to the U.S. Supreme Court.

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"the Pentagon has updated its equal opportunity policy to bar discrimination based on sexual orientation, putting it in the same category as discrimination based on race, religion, color, age and sex." Now gays wont be discriminated against in the military or bars.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on Tuesday the Pentagon has updated its equal opportunity policy to bar discrimination based on sexual orientation, putting it in the same category as discrimination based on race, religion, color, age and sex.

The change in policy, announced by Carter at a gay and lesbian pride celebration, gives U.S. military troops a broader range of choices in pursuing complaints if they believe they have been discriminated against based on sexual orientation.

The change brought the rules into conformity with the 2011 decision to end the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, which allowed gays and lesbians to serve in the military only if they did not openly acknowledge their sexual orientation.

"The Department of Defense has made a lasting commitment to living the values we defend, to treating everyone equally, because we need to be a meritocracy," Carter said in announcing the decision.

"We have to focus relentlessly on our mission, which means the thing that matters most about a person is what they can contribute to national defense," he added. "This is a commitment we must continually renew."

Civilian employees of the Defense Department were already protected against discrimination based on sexual orientation under equal opportunity laws. But uniformed personnel were covered under separate rules affected by the department's long-time ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military.

That ban was lifted in 2011 and a Supreme Court ruling in 2013 provided some federal benefits to same-sex couples married in states where gay marriage is legal. The Pentagon has been working to bring its policies into line with the changes.

"With this policy revision, we are now ensuring that service members are afforded protection against discrimination in the Department's military equal opportunity program," said Navy Lieutenant Commander Nate Christensen, a Pentagon spokesman.

Christensen said the military equal opportunity program gives troops greater access to a broader range of options for resolving discrimination complaints and gives commanders access to equal opportunity advisers during the complaint process.

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Pentagon bars discrimination against gays, lesbians in uniform

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on Tuesday the Pentagon has updated its equal opportunity policy to bar discrimination based on sexual orientation, putting it in the same category as discrimination based on race, religion, color, age and sex. The change in policy, announced by Carter at a gay and lesbian pride celebration, gives U.S.

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in Ukraine LGBT's are being misplaced and kicked out of communities they set up shelters for misplaced people and started a bunch of new organizations.

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Lesbian Aleksandra Nemchinova shows off her trident tattoo, a symbol of Ukraine [Ian Bateson/Al Jazeera]

Kiev, Ukraine - On a chilly Kiev night Maxim, a 37-year-old gay man from the eastern city of Donetsk, waited for a cab to take him to the only shelter in the country for internally displaced LGBT people.

After Russia-backed separatists took over his hometown last summer he said life for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community became much more difficult. He held out another six months, deciding to flee only after his apartment block was shelled.

Maxim is one of the nearly one million people estimated by the UN to be displaced by the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

Easterners who flee west often face housing and employment discrimination and are blamed for the conflict.

LGBT individuals face double discrimination for hailing from the area and being LGBT.

Insight, a Ukrainian LGBT organisation, set up the shelter over the summer after receiving requests for help from people who wanted to leave eastern Ukraine and Crimea, but did not have the means to do so and faced difficulties in traditional shelters.

"First we had four people and once word got out we were up to our ears in applications," said the head of Insight, Olena Shevchenk o.

So far the shelter has housed 18 IDPs, providing each with up to three months of housing, in addition to food, medicine and legal services.

The shelter has faced considerable challenges, as displaced individuals, particularly LGBT, are undesirable tenants.

Insight's shelter coordinator Olga Olshanskaya explained that after a long search they eventually found an apartment, but paid an above-market rate calculated in dollars at a time when the Ukrainian currency has rapidly lost value.

It has also been a challenge to convince Western donor organisations that usually support LGBT civil society projects, to commit to financing a wartime shelter.
The 'irony of fate'
The shelter itself is located in a grey apartment block on the outskirts of the capital Kiev.

As Maxim's cab pulled up he said arriving at an apartment building so much like his own was like something out of the "Irony of Fate", a Soviet-era film in which a man wanders into a stranger's apartment in another city without realising it because of the identical styles and layouts.

After Maxim moved his things into the un-renovated building that would be housing eight people, he anxiously awaited his new roommates and explained why he left Donetsk.

"I don't see a future in the people's republics [Donetsk and Luhansk]. I don't support their views, I don't think Russia will save us or that Putin will save us, so the whole thing was completely foreign to me from the start," he told Al Jazeera.

After he decided to leave eastern Ukraine, Maxim first got his mother and grandmother on a bus out of town, sending them to Slovyansk, about 100km north of Donetsk.

He took only a few things with him, and worried that a new permit system announced by Ukrainian authorities would keep him from getting out.

According to Maxim - who like others interviewed for this article asked that their surnames not be published - gay social life in once-cosmopolitan Donetsk came to an abrupt halt over the summer as separatists tried to establish a new moral order.

Maxim described how the gay club Babylon, which he frequented, was raided by separatists, who beat up and extorted money from the people there. After the attack, the owner closed the club. Maxim said his gay friends were also preparing to leave.

Still, things are complicated.

"I have a friend in one of the battalions who is protecting the young republics," he said. "He is gay and he is there with the separatists. They can't imagine how he hit the clubs."

A railroad engineer, Maxim was trying to find a job with the Ukrainian railroad in Kiev.

Even if he gets a job, salaries remain low despite massive inflation, and discrimination against eastern Ukrainian residency stamps make employment and apartment offers evaporate.
A new identity
Another LGBT going through a job-search process while living in the shelter was Max, 36, a handsome and muscular person with tattoos of Chinese characters on his forearm which he says represent love, fortune and happiness. He fled to Kiev from a small town outside of Donetsk just before Christmas.

Max is transgender. He was born a woman but after hormone treatment his appearance is strikingly masculine.

Max began the complicated process of legally changing his gender in 2006, but the move was riddled with red tape and required full gender reassignment surgery before the application can be approved.

The situation had destroyed my nerves. There was no work, I had no money, stores were closed and there was no food.

Max, young transgender man

That situation has left Max with a passport that identifies him as a woman. No one believed it was his passport at a time when people regularly had their documents checked on the streets.

For months Max only left home at night to buy food before quickly returning home.

Leaving the Donbas region was not an option because passports were thoroughly checked by separatists and Ukrainian forces at the checkpoints.

Desperate, Max reached out to Insight's transgender coordinator Yuriy Frank who got in touch with contacts at the UN.

"The situation had destroyed my nerves. There was no work, I had no money, stores were closed and there was no food," said Max.

Four months later Max was able to get out by following a UN car across a checkpoint in a taxi he hired as artillery blasted nearby.

The UN had coordinated his leaving with separatist and Ukrainian officials.

Now Max is in Kiev adjusting to life in the big city, which continues to be challenging as he still only has a passport identifying him as a woman. That makes it hard to find work, which would provide the money needed for the surgery to legally change his gender.

"I like it [in Kiev], but my difficulties stayed, no work, no money," he said.
What now?
Aleksandra Nemchinova, 33, is all too familiar with what happens after fleeing to Kiev. She was part of the first wave of IDPs at the shelter and now rents a room with a friend for $110 a month.

"We try and earn money, but obviously money is constantly short and we don't have very basic things. There is nothing to eat, nothing to wear," she said.

The clothes Aleksandra wears are donated. She was wearing a red hooded sweatshirt covered in Egyptian motifs a few sizes too large.

Before she fled, Aleksandra was an activist and open about being a lesbian.

In Donetsk she worked for Yulia Tymoshenko's party Batkivshchyna for a time, but also participated in protests organised by the feminist group FEMEN, and at one point was arrested with them in Belarus.

In May and June she was active in the pro-Ukrainian movement in Donetsk.

Though a Russian speaker, she identifies closely with Ukraine and the Ukrainian language, inspired by one of her school teachers.

Over the summer, when expressing Ukrainian identity was quickly becoming a taboo in Donetsk, she felt the need to get a tattoo of one of Ukraine's national symbols, the trident, in the form of a falcon. She had to go to three tattoo parlours before someone agreed to do it.

In June things got more dangerous and she began receiving threatening phone calls.

Later, a friend reported seeing a picture of her at a separatist checkpoint labelling her a "Banderite lesbian", referring to right-wing Ukrainian nationalist leader Stepan Bandera.

Finally, armed separatists along with Donetsk police came to her apartment to seize her documents and arrest her. She said a neighbour returning early with a small child as she was arguing with them saved her.

The armed men said they would return later taking her documents. She decided it was time to go.

Now in Kiev, Aleksandra is thankful for the assistance the shelter gave her, but despite her pride in Ukraine she is hesitant to say life is better for the LGBT community since the Maidan Square protests.

She said for LGBT people it is a balancing act with right-wing homophobic groups such as Pravy Sektor on the one side and separatists on the other.

"They both beat gays on the street. We are between the two and have to balance, not to provoke aggression from one side or the other," Aleksandra said.
Follow Ian Bateson on Twitter: @ianbateson

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Ukraine's LGBT community: Trapped between warring sides

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Kiev, Ukraine - On a chilly Kiev night Maxim, a 37-year-old gay man from the eastern city of Donetsk, waited for a cab to take him to the only shelter in the country for internally displaced LGBT people. After Russia-backed separatists took over his hometown last summer he said life for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community became much more difficult.

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A family owned bake shop refused to make a cake that said "support gay rights". They appealed in court and the judge ruled that they were discriminating.

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A court ruling on an appeal by a bakery which was found to have "unlawfully discriminated" against a gay man, will be made public shortly.

Two years ago, the family-run firm refused to make a cake for gay rights activist Gareth Lee with the slogan "Support Gay Marriage".

The judge ruled the Christian owners of Ashers had discriminated against him. The family firm then appealed.

Daniel McArthur of Ashers said this was "never about the customer".

Speaking shortly before the result of the appeal was due to be made public on Monday, he said: "We have always said, and say again today, that whilst we are unwilling to endorse a view that goes against our conscience, we will continue to happily serve anyone who comes through our doors - whatever their background, lifestyle, or beliefs.

"This has never been about the customer. It has always been about a message promoting a cause that contradicts the clear teaching of the Bible on marriage. A message promoting a cause with which I and my family fundamentally disagree."

'Walking with dignity'

Mr McArthur said his family were hoping for a judgement which "protects people's freedom to remain faithful to their conscience".

Equality Commission chief Michael Wardlow, who was with Mr Lee outside the court, said he hoped the judgement would be "for common sense".

He commended Mr Lee for "walking through this with dignity".

"I hope the judgement today will be for common sense," he said.

In May 2015, a court in Belfast ruled that the bakery had discriminated against Mr Lee on the grounds of sexual orientation and religious or political beliefs.

At that time, District Judge Isobel Brownlie said she accepted that Ashers had "genuine and deeply held" religious views, but said the business was not above the law.

The family's appeal was heard in May, but the judgement was reserved.

Speaking at that stage, the Lord Chief Justice Sir Declan Morgan said the judgement would be given as soon as possible.

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A court ruling on an appeal by a bakery which was found to have "unlawfully discriminated" against a gay man, will be made public shortly. Two years ago, the family-run firm refused to make a cake for gay rights activist Gareth Lee with the slogan "Support Gay Marriage".

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Patrick Mizelle and Edwin Fisher, who have been together for 37 years, were planning to grow old in their home state of Georgia.

But visits to senior living communities left them worried that after decades of living openly, marching in pride parades and raising money for gay causes, they wouldn't feel as free in their later years. Fisher said the places all seemed very "churchy," and the couple worried about evangelical people leaving Bibles on their doorstep or not accepting their lifestyle.

"I thought, 'Have I come this far only to have to go back in the closet and pretend we are brothers?" said Mizelle. "We have always been out and we didn't want to be stuck in a place where we couldn't be."

"I thought, 'Have I come this far only to have to go back in the closet and pretend we are brothers?"

So three years ago, they moved across the country to Rose Villa, a hillside senior living complex just outside of Portland that actively reaches out to gay, lesbian and transgender seniors.

As openly gay and lesbian people age, they will increasingly rely on caregivers and move into assisted living communities and nursing homes. And while many rely on friends and partners, more are likely to be single and without adult children, according to research published by the National Institutes of Health.

But long-term care facilities frequently lack trained staff and policies to discourage discrimination, advocates and doctors said. That can lead to painful decisions for seniors about whether to hide their sexual orientation or face possible harassment by fellow elderly residents or caregivers with traditional views on sexuality and marriage.

"It is a very serious challenge for many LGBT older people," said Michael Adams, chief executive officer of SAGE, or Services and Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Elders. "[They] really fought to create a world where people could be out and proud. ... Now our LGBT pioneers are sharing residences with those who harbor the most bias against them."

There are an estimated 1.5 million gay, lesbian and bisexual people over 65 living in the U.S. currently, and that number is expected to double by 2030, according to the organization, which runs a national resource center on LGBTQ aging.

There are an estimated 1.5 million gay, lesbian and bisexual people over 65 living in the U.S. currently, and that number is expected to double by 2030.

Nationwide, advocacy groups are pushing to improve conditions and expand options for gay and lesbian seniors. Facilities for LGBTQ seniors have opened in Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco and elsewhere.

SAGE staff are also training providers at nursing homes and elsewhere to provide a more supportive environment for elderly gays and lesbians. That may mean asking different questions at intake, such as whether they have a partner rather than if they are married (even though they can get married, not all older couples have). Or it could be a matter of educating other residents and offering activities specific to the LGBTQ community like gay-friendly movies or lectures.

Mizelle, 64, and Fisher, 86, said they found the support they hoped for at Rose Villa, where they live in a ground-floor cottage near the community garden and spend their time socializing with other residents, both gay and straight. They both exercise in the on-site gym and pool. Fisher bakes for a farmer's market and Mizelle is participating in art classes. Fisher, who recently had a few small strokes, said they liked Rose Villa for another reason too: It provides in-home caregivers and has a nursing facility on site.

But many aging gays and lesbians - the generation that protested for gay rights at Stonewall, in state capitols and on the steps of the Supreme Court - may not be living in such welcoming environments. Only 20 percent of LGBTQ seniors in long-term care facilities said they were comfortable being open about their sexual orientation, according to a recent report by Justice in Aging, a national nonprofit legal advocacy organization.

This summer, Lambda Legal, a gay advocacy group, filed a lawsuit against the Glen Saint Andrew Living Community, a senior residential facility in Niles, Illinois, for failing to protect a disabled lesbian woman from harassment, discrimination and violence. The resident, 68-year-old Marsha Wetzel, moved into the complex in 2014 after her partner of 30 years had died of cancer. Soon after, residents called her names and even physically assaulted her, according to the lawsuit.

"I don't feel safe in my own home," Wetzel said in a phone interview. "I am scared constantly. ... What I am doing is about getting justice. I don't want other LGBT seniors to go through what I've gone through."

Karen Loewy, Wetzel's attorney at Lambda Legal, said senior living facilities are "totally ill-prepared" for this population of openly gay elders. She said she hopes the case will not only stop the discrimination against Wetzel but will start a national conversation.

"LGBT seniors have the right to age with dignity and free from discrimination, and we want senior living facilities to know ... that they have an obligation to protect it," Loewy said.

Spencer Maus, spokesman for Glen Saint Andrew, declined to comment specifically on the lawsuit but said in an email that the community "does not tolerate discrimination of any kind or under any circumstances."

Many elderly gay and lesbian people have difficulty finding housing at all, according to a 2010 report by several advocacy organizations in partnership with the federal American Society on Aging. Another report in 2014 by the Equal Rights Center, a national nonprofit civil rights organization, revealed that the application process was more difficult and housing more expensive for gay and lesbian seniors.

Recognizing the need for more affordable housing, the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Elder Housing organization opened Triangle Square Apartments in 2007. In the building, the first of its kind, residents can get health and social services through the Los Angeles LGBT Center. The wait for apartments with the biggest subsidies is about five years.

Residents display rainbow flags outside their doors throughout the building. On a recent morning, fliers about falls, mental health, movie nights and meningitis vaccines were posted on a bulletin board near the elevator.

Ed Dehay, 80, moved into one of the apartments when they first opened. His partner had recently passed away and he couldn't afford the rent on his old apartment by himself. "This was a godsend for me," said Dehay, a retired floral designer who has covered every wall of his apartment with framed art.

His neighbor, 74-year-old Lee Marquardt, said she came out after raising three children, and didn't want to spend her elder years hiding her true self as she had as a younger woman. Marquardt, a former truck driver who has high blood pressure and kidney disease, said she found a new family as soon as she moved into the apartment building two years ago.

"I was dishonest all the time before. Now I am who I am and I don't have to be quiet about it."

"I was dishonest all the time before," she said. "Now I am who I am and I don't have to be quiet about it."

Tanya Witt, resident services coordinator for the Los Angeles LGBT Center, said some of the Triangle Square residents are reluctant to have in-home caregivers - even in their current housing - because they worry they won't be gay-friendly. Others say they won't ever go into a nursing home, even if they have serious health needs.

In addition to facing common health problems as they age, gay and lesbian seniors also may be dealing with additional stressors, isolation or depression, said Alexia Torke, an associate professor of medicine at Indiana University.

"LGBT older adults have specific needs in their health care," she said. And caregivers "need to be aware."

Lesbian, gay and bisexual elders are at higher risk of mental health problems and disabilities and have higher rates of smoking and excessive alcohol consumption. They are also more likely to delay health care, according to a report by The Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law. In addition, older gay men are disproportionately affected by some chronic diseases, including hypertension, according to research out of UCLA.

Torke said LGBT seniors are not strangers to nursing homes. The difference now is that there is a growing recognition of the need to make the homes safe and welcoming for them, she said.

At Rose Villa, CEO Vassar Byrd said she began working nearly a decade ago to make the community more open to gays after a lesbian couple told her that another facility had suggested they would be more welcome if they posed as sisters. Today, several gay, lesbian and transgender people - individually and in couples - are living there, Byrd said. Her staff has undergone training to help them better care for that population, and Byrd said she has spoken to other senior care providers around the nation about the issue.

Bill Cunitz and Lee Nolet, who began dating in 1976, didn't come out as a couple until they moved to Rose Villa last year. Cunitz is an ordained minister and former head of a senior living community in Southern California. He said he didn't want to be known as the "gay CEO."

"After 40 years of being in the shadows ... we introduce each other as partner. Everyone here knows we're together."

Nolet, a retired nurse and county health official, said it's been "absolutely amazing" to find a place where they can be open- and where they know they will have accepting people who can take care of them if they get sick.

"After 40 years of being in the shadows ... we introduce each other as partner," Nolet said. "Everyone here knows we're together."

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LGBTQ seniors face discrimination in long-term care

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Patrick Mizelle and Edwin Fisher, who have been together for 37 years, were planning to grow old in their home state of Georgia. But visits to senior living communities left them worried that after decades of living openly, marching in pride parades and raising money for gay causes, they wouldn't feel as free in their later years.

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A whispering campaign is under way in Uganda's capital, Kampala, accusing Paul Semugoma, a doctor, of being a predatory homosexual, actively recruiting younger men into his "vice" with the help of foreign conspirators.

His home and business addresses have been published online and he has received a string of death threats.

"They are saying that I'm the 'gay tycoon', spreading the infectious disease of homosexuality in Uganda," he says with a bitter laugh. "It's such nonsense."

In reality, he is a respected doctor who has volunteered his time to help with HIV and safe sex education programmes and writes a weekly medical advice column for a popular newspaper.

But in the last month he has been publicly outed as a homosexual four times with government officials offering money to anyone willing to inform on his private life.

The doctor is living a lonely preview of the nightmare that life is about to become for the gay community in Uganda if new legislation is passed this month making homosexuality punishable with life imprisonment or even the death penalty.

Uganda's minister for ethics and integrity has said it will be every citizen's duty under the new laws to denounce friends, family or acquaintances they suspect of being gay.

Failure to report homosexuals to the authorities could see family and friends facing up to seven years in jail.

Veteran gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, who twice attempted a citizen's arrests of Mugabe and was beaten up for his efforts, believes homosexuals are being "scapegoated" by leaders keen to deflect attention from their own failures.

"The current wave of homophobic oppression appears to be a reaction to the growing visibility of lesbian, gay, bi and transgender Africans," he says.

Tatchell, whose organisation, Outrage!, is assisting the Malawian couple who go on trial on Friday, said the notion that homosexuality is "un-African" is "ignorant and delusional".

Church meetings this week in the capital and elsewhere in Uganda have been whipping up support for a public demonstration in favour of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill on 19 January ahead of its second reading in parliament.

Before that goes ahead, Steven Monjeza and Tiwonge Chimbalanga will have had to face a trial in Malawi on charges of consenting adult homosexuality.

The pair are being held without bail in Chichiri prison after they held a symbolic marriage ceremony which was reported in the local press.

The same-sex couple were arrested and three Malawian human rights activists who spoke up in their defence have been jailed also.

Authorities have since tried to force the young couple who had been living together for five months to undergo anal examinations to medically establish whether they had had sexual relations.

The apparent tide of anti-homosexuality may have peaked in Uganda and Malawi but the two countries are far from alone in Africa.

"Sodomy laws", legislation criminalising same-sex intercourse, are under consideration in new commonwealth member Rwanda and in neighbouring Burundi.

In Nigeria, a bill awaiting legislative action would impose criminal penalties for engaging in or performing same sex marriage ceremonies.

In Senegal, nine men, including a prominent HIV prevention worker, were sentenced to eight years in prison last year for "engaging in acts against the order of nature".

Their sentences were commuted to a fine and they were finally released three months later after an international outcry.

Monica Mbaru, the head of the Africa programme at International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, believes increased attention is revealing the full extent of institutional and popular homophobia.

"There is more focus than before so it might appear that things are getting worse. In reality, it was already there but it was kept silent, there was no media talk of homophobia."

The current anti-homosexual crackdown is drawing worldwide attention, but 38 out of 53 African countries had already criminalised consensual gay sex.

And in many cases, sodomy laws had remained on the books from the colonial era.

Mbaru, who has monitored the intensifying debate around gay rights throughout the continent, says one of the reasons for the sudden offensive in this culture war is opportunistic politicians who see the gay community as an easy target.

"There are those who are willing to use a component of society as a sacrificial lamb in order to cast themselves as society's saviour," she says.

It is 15 years since state-sponsored gay bashing found its most enduring voice, and the vituperative words of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe still echo across Africa.

In 1995 the theme for the annual Harare International Book Fair was "human rights and justice" and organisers had given a booth to Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ), a small, local organisation. When government officials discovered this, the organisers were forced to bar the group. Not content with that,

Mugabe decided to deal with the issue head on in his speech to open the fair. "If we accept homosexuality as a right as is being argued by the association of sodomists and sexual perverts," he told the assembled crowd.

"What moral fibre shall our society ever have to deny organised drug addicts, or even those given to bestiality, the rights they might claim."

While harassment of gays and lesbians had been routine in Zimbabwe prior to Mugabe's speech, homophobia was now official policy and about to get its own language and slogans. Speaking to reporters after the event he elaborated: "We don't believe they [gay men and lesbians] have any rights at all."

And most enduringly, the former Jesuit mission schoolboy justified his intolerance with the claim that homosexuality was "un-African", describing it as a disease "coming from so-called developed nations."

Taking their cue from the Zimbabwean leader, his counterparts, such as Namibia's Sam Nujoma and Uganda's Yoweri Museveni, started using the same language.

The anti-gay push in Uganda followed a three-day visit by a trio of controversial Americans whose teachings on homosexuals have been widely discredited in the US.

Tatchell, an Australian-born activist saves particular ire for the US evangelists who, he believes, are giving funding and succour to the chauvinists.

The evangelical Christians are: Caleb Lee Brundidge, who describes himself as a former gay man and offers "healing" sessions; Scott Lively, a missionary who writes on protecting children from gay recruiters; and Don Schmierer, who works with Exodus International, an anti-gay church group.

Participants at the Kampala talks describe hearing about the "hidden gay agenda" in which homosexual men convert boys by sodomising them and how gays can be made straight.

The appearance of the anti-homosexuality bill so soon after has been blamed on the evangelicals, especially as the bill's sponsor, David Bahati, claims to have friends in America's religious right.

However, others point out that evangelicals, who deny any role in the drive for legislation, were pushing on an open door in Uganda.

Erwin van der Borght, the director of Amnesty International's Africa Programme, says that unlike in the debate over the death penalty, this is not a matter of African leaders telling the public what they want to hear.

Whereas many African leaders would in private actually like to abolish the death penalty but bow to public opinion, he believes that their homophobia - and the conviction that homosexuality comes from outside the continent, is genuine.

"We really feel it's the politicians themselves who are pushing these harsher laws," he says, pointing to Rwanda where the President, Paul Kagame, appears to be driving new criminal statutes on to the books.

Mbaru, a Kenyan-born lesbian who lives in Cape Town, says that some of the blame for the failure to fight back against the "un-African" charge rests with the gay community.

The influx of international donor funding for HIV prevention has in many countries helped the gay and lesbian communities to find a voice and organise.

Too often, she says, this has given homosexual activism a foreign face.

"Who is the first voice to focus on these abuses?" she asks. "It's from outside." She says that there have been too few homegrown heroes, such as South African activist Zackie Achmat, with the result that the defence of gay rights "doesn't have an African face. We have to ask ourselves, how far do we want to go and what will we risk," she says.

The stakes can be horrifyingly high, especially in South Africa which despite its progressive constitution and equality under the law suffers from an epidemic of sexual violence.

Phumi Mtetwa knows better than most how painful the limits of supposed legal protection can be. Her friend Eudy Simelane, a midfielder with the national football team, Banyana Banyana, was repeatedly stabbed, gang-raped, mutilated and left to die in an open field in KwaThema township outside Johnannesburg in April 2008.

A well-known sport personality and the first openly gay woman in her township, the 31-year-old's murder was part of what Mtetwa says is a rise in the practice of "corrective rape".

"This country is going through a major social, economic and political crisis," says Mtetwa, who is also the director of South Africa's Lesbian and Gay Equality Project.

"We have got to ask ourselves where our constitution is in all of this? When we wrote this constitution, gay people, were supposed to be given the right to choose and live freely. But what we didn't do was transform society, or the conditions people lived in." The result is a constitution that is like a "rainbow ideal" out of touch with what is happening on the ground.

Even that fragile protection is a distant prospect for Dr Paul, as he is known for now to the readers of New Vision newspaper in Uganda.

Even before the latest tensions which have spilled over into the streets and left many people fearing for their lives, the gay community survived by "hiding", he says.

"That's why it's a big deal being outed. It's the biggest protection we have."

The only thing stopping the legalised hanging of gay men in Uganda is now the government, as the bill's backers have the votes if it goes to the floor in parliament.

For now, the doctor is ignoring the advice of friends and colleagues worried for his safety and staying put.

Despite the smears, his patients are still coming to his clinic. "I'm fighting so it doesn't become law. That's more important than my personal security. I'm not stupid, I know it's not as safe as it should be."

- THE INDEPENDENT

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Homosexuals being used as 'scapegoats' by flawed governments

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A whispering campaign is under way in Uganda's capital, Kampala, accusing Paul Semugoma, a doctor, of being a predatory homosexual, actively recruiting younger men into his "vice" with the help of foreign conspirators. His home and business addresses have been published online and he has received a string of death threats.

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Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual People

have been discriminated against for a while, Some people don't agree with it for many reasons. some may be because they dont think its morally right, religious purposes, or because some people are biased or judgemental.

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Supreme court passes a gay rights laws, but gays can still be legally discriminated against.

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Friday's Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage was a major victory for LGBT couples. But they can still legally be discriminated against in much of the country.

In most states their employers can fire them.

Their landlords can evict them.

They can also be denied service by hotels, restaurants and other businesses. They can even be denied credit and excluded from juries.

"Today's decision is historic, no doubt about it. But it does not end discrimination against many LGBT people," said Adam Talbot, spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBT rights group.

Related: Marriage equality: Not so fast

About 10% of 662 lesbian, gay and bisexual workers who were randomly surveyed said they have been fired within the last five years due to their sexual preference, according to Laura Durso, director of LGBT Progress campaign at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. And 26% of 6,450 transgender workers who participated in a non-random survey say they've been fired.

"In many states today it is legal for same sex couples to get married but to then be fired for getting married," she said.

Only 21 states have laws banning companies from discriminating against employees based on sexual preference. And two of those states still allow a transgender worker to be fired or denied a job.

Related: Same-sex marriage is legal. Here's what it means for couples

"If there has not been a wave of firings or evictions in those states, it's partly because people are staying in the closet in those parts of the country," said Stephen Clark, a professor at Albany Law School. "You can't do that if you get married. It's a public act that creates a public record. Even if you don't publish a notice in the paper or invite people, you are running a risk."

Advocates for gay rights say Friday's court decision makes it more necessary than ever to pass federal protections against LGBT discrimination. But such legislation remains stalled in Congress.

Related: Corporate America celebrates gay marriage decision

Many employers, especially large employers, have protections against discrimination for their workers. But without those company policies, or a labor contract, there is little legal recourse for an LGBT worker who has been fired or denied a job. In fact, an LGBT worker can still be fired by a company that's based in a state with non-discrimination laws, if that individual works in a state without those legal protections.

"Is discrimination as frequent as was racial discrimination in the Jim Crow era? I don't think so. But it's not difficult to find victims of LBGT discrimination today," said Sam Marcosson, law professor at the University of Louisville.

CNNMoney (New York) First published June 26, 2015: 2:39 PM ET

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How businesses can still discriminate against LGBT people

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In most states their employers can fire them. Their landlords can evict them. They can also be denied service by hotels, restaurants and other businesses. They can even be denied credit and excluded from juries. "Today's decision is historic, no doubt about it.

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CDC did some testing and research and saw that kids through 9th to 12th grade gay students have experience more sexual violence then heterosexual.

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The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) released its first study on the risks facing lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) high school students in the United States on Friday.

After surveying more than 15,000 students and analyzing data from various school districts across the country from 2015, the CDC found that LGB students in grades 9 through 12 experience sexual and physical violence at a much higher rate than their heterosexual peers.

"The majority of sexual minority students cope with the transition from childhood through adolescence to adulthood successfully and become healthy and productive adults," writes the CDC in the report. "However, this report documents that sexual minority students have a higher prevalence of many health-risk behaviors compared with nonsexual minority students."

The findings are troubling, but advocates see quantification of the problem as the first step toward developing solutions.

"This is the first time we can say that nationwide these are consistent challenges faced by lesbian, gay and bi-youth," David Bond of the Trevor Project, a national suicide-prevention organization focused on gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender youth, told the Associated Press.

Knowing such statistics can help families and schools recognize struggling teens and "foster resilience and safety for LGB youth," Abbe Land of the Trevor Project writes for the Advocate.

Some of the findings of the report include:

Some 18 percent of LGB students report being physically forced to have sex, compared to 5 percent of heterosexual students.

LGB students are five times more likely to report illegal drug use than heterosexual students.

A third of LGB students (34 percent) report being bullied at school and 28 percent report being bullied online. The same statistics for heterosexual students are 19 and 14 percent, respectively.

More than 1 in 4 LGB students report attempting suicide in the last 12 months, compared to 1 in 16 heterosexual students who reported attempting suicide recently.

Over 60 percent of LGB students and over 26 percent of heterosexual students report having felt sad and hopeless to the point where he or she stopped participating in routine activities.

Of the 15,600 students anonymously surveyed for the CDC's study, 2 percent identified as gay or lesbian, 6 percent identify as bisexual, and 3 percent said they were unsure of their sexual identity. Given these numbers, the CDC suggests that 321,000 high school students last year were gay or lesbian and 964,000 were bisexual.

Although the CDC's findings underscore deep challenges, LGBT Americans have seen unprecedented progress over the last few years, between the legalization of gay marriage nationwide, President Obama's designation of the Stonewall Inn as a national monument, and more.

"The progress for LGBT equality has been incredible, really," Carolyn Oakley, a senior legislative counsel for the HRC told the Monitor in December. "It is hard to overshadow how far the movement for equality has come in such a short period of time."

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CDC quantifies violence against LGB teens: Will awareness spur change?

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The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) released its first study on the risks facing lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) high school students in the United States on Friday.

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A baker in Colorado refuses to make a wedding cake for gay couples, because of his "christian faith" .

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In Colorado, a baker's decision to turn a gay couple away rather than make them a wedding cake has sparked a civil rights legal battle. In fact, as the number of states allowing same-sex marriages increases, so too has the number of business owners refusing to provide wedding services for religious reasons. Hari Sreenivasan reports.

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Why some wedding businesses say 'I don't' to gay couples

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In Colorado, a baker's decision to turn a gay couple away rather than make them a wedding cake has sparked a civil rights legal battle. In fact, as the number of states allowing same-sex marriages increases, so too has the number of business owners refusing to provide wedding services for religious reasons.

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Drug and food administration are trying to start new research on men who have had sex with another man who want to donate blood because they think gay men have a higher chance of carrying AIDS/HIVS. Gay right advocates thinks its discriminating

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Until recently, the ban was even stricter. In fact, it was permanent. The policy dates back to 1982, when a abby was infected with AIDS through a blood transfusion given at the University of California San Francisco hospital Shortly after, the FDA, which regulates the nation's blood supply, instituted a lifetime ban on blood donations from all men who admitted having sex with other men. Since then, advancements in testing technology have greatly improved.

Today, blood banks screen for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, with an acucracy rate of 99.99%, according to the FDA. Typically, all blood donations are screened for HIV twice. One test checks for the direct presence of HIV genetic material and the other looks for antibodies produced by the immune system to fight HIV. Today, the odds of getting an HIV infection through a blood transfusion are one in 1.5 million, less likely than being struck by lightning.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates there were more than 9,000 transfusion-related HIV transmissions between 1981 ad 1985. Then, as testing methods improved, the numbers dropped to the single digits per year. Since 2000, there have been only 4 confirmed cases in the U.S.

Still, as of 2014, 636,000 Americans had died from AIDS. 1.2 million people in the U.S. have the disease, according to the CDC.

Dr. Peter Marks is the director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research.

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Why so many gay and bisexual men can't donate blood in the U.S.

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is asking for new scientific research as it reevaluates a controversial policy banning men from donating blood if they admit to having had sex with another man in the past year. Gay rights advocates say the rules are not based in science, but on decades of stigma regarding gay men and AIDS.

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the article states that Republicans failed to protect the executive order issued by Obama to protect the rights to of LGBTQ community.

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WASHINGTON - Democrats shouted "Shame! Shame!," but seven Republicans switched their votes under pressure from House leaders Thursday and defeated a measure to protect gay rights.

"They literally snatched discrimination from the jaws of equality," Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney said.

The final vote was 213-212 after the chaos on the House floor. That was enough to defeat an amendment by Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, D-N.Y., aimed at upholding an executive order that bars discrimination against LGBT employees by federal contractors.
Maloney and other Democrats were incensed. "They literally snatched discrimination from the jaws of equality," Maloney said.

He said he had approached Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., as McCarthy worked on GOP colleagues to vote against the measure. McCarthy told Maloney to get back on his side of the aisle.

"I told him, 'What side am I supposed to stand on in support of equality?'" said Maloney, New York's first openly gay congressman. "It was disgraceful."

McCarthy rejected the assertion that Republicans unfairly held the vote open to prevail. "Was that a long time? So the answer is no," he said.

Maloney's amendment would have prohibited the use of taxpayer dollars to violate President Barack Obama's executive order barring discrimination.

He was trying to include it in a spending bill following passage late Wednesday of a defense policy bill that included a provision Democrats said would overturn the executive order. Republicans said the measure was simply a restatement of religious liberties from the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and they bristled at Democratic criticism.

"There are some people who are emotional ... that's beyond the pale. They can say whatever they want to but that's beyond the pale," said Rep. Bill Flores, R-Texas, asked about Democrats saying Republicans were a party of hate. "This country has a First Amendment that protects religious liberties, and that's all we were doing is protecting that."

House Speaker Paul Ryan, at a news conference immediately after the vote, denied knowledge about the vote-switching.

"This is federalism. The states should do this. The federal government shouldn't stick its nose in this business," said Ryan, R-Wis. GOP aides said adding the amendment would have jeopardized passage of the underlying spending bill for military construction and veterans, imperiling the House appropriations process just as it's beginning.

The vote for Maloney's amendment peaked at 217, beyond the majority needed for passage, before it began a sporadic decline. Members of the Republican leadership whose job is to round up needed votes were stalking the House aisles where GOP lawmakers seat, and they openly pleaded for support.

"Need two more votes," Rep. Steve Russell, R-Okla., said loudly as he prowled among Republicans.

Democrats were outraged, loudly chanting as their leader, Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California, yelled up from near the well of the House at her members, shouting at them to vote down the underlying bill.

In the end, 29 Republicans joined 183 Democrats backing the gay rights amendment, but it was not enough.

Democrats were quick to publicize the name of the Republican vote-switchers: Reps. Darrell Issa, Jeff Denham, David Valadao and Mimi Walters of California; Greg Walden of Oregon; Bruce Poliquin of Maine; and David Young of Iowa.

___

Associated Press writers Alan Fram and Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

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Amid shouts of 'shame,' House GOP defeats gay rights measure

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WASHINGTON - Democrats shouted "Shame! Shame!," but seven Republicans switched their votes under pressure from House leaders Thursday and defeated a measure to protect gay rights. "They literally snatched discrimination from the jaws of equality," Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney said. The final vote was 213-212 after the chaos on the House floor.

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"the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex."

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"intolerance toward those who hold different opinions from oneself."

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"A person or group that is made to bear blame for others."

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"any preconceived opinion or feeling, either favorable or unfavorable"