Leonard Link

Richard Hickox RIP - Attention Should Be Paid

I was shocked to read Richard Hickox's obituary in the New York Times the other day.  Hickox died suddenly and prematurely.  He was an orchestra conductor of great talent and repertorial curiosity, whose work is an important backbone of my music collection, mainly because I shared his special love for English concert music.

That very love and speciality may have stood in the way of his attaining a greater international reputation and a major podium to call his own.  He did lots of conducting with the major London orchestras, but always as a guest or in an assistant position below the top rank.  He also conducted many of the English regional orchestras, with whom he made most of his recordings for a variety of labels, but most importantly for Chandos, with whom he explored many neglected byways of English orchestral, choral and operatic music.  He also had a significant career conducting in Australia, and was one of those conductors who spent more time in airplanes than was good for his health.

Sadly, I never had the opportunity to see him conduct a concert or opera live, and will now never have that chance.  But I will continue to treasure his recordings, and to remember the important contribution that he made to reviving much that was worthwhile from a neglected repertory.  Among the most treasured recordings are those of the music of Ralph Vaughan Williams.  He conducted a series of the symphonies for Chandos, including a much-honored recording of VW's Symphony No. 2 ("A London Symphony") in the original version that was played at the premiere and later much cut and revised before assuming its final published version.  Hickox's excavation job was magnificent, revealing interesting early VW that would otherwise have been lost to us.  He also made noteworthy recordings of Britten operas, and a treasured set of his early recordings for EMI included one of the best of my favorite brief VW piece, the prelude from his film music for "49th Parallel," an otherwise forgetable wartime British flick.  (I know the movie is forgetable because I have a VHS tape of it, and one viewing was enough.) 

So, farewell to Richard Hickox, with thanks for many happy hours of listening and regret for all the byways that he will never have the opportunity to explore.

NY Appellate Division Rules on Transsexual Name-Change Petition

Rejecting a trial judge’s objection that a gendered name-change would cause "confusion," a unanimous panel of the New York Appellate Division, 3^rd Department, ruled on November 26 in _Matter of Earl William Golden III_, No. 504992, that the trial court should have ordered the name change, but should include in its order a statement that the name change could not be used as proof of a change of sex. Franklin Romeo of the Sylvia Rivera Law Project represented Golden on the appeal.

According to an article about the case published in the _New York Law Journal_ on November 28, Supreme Court Justice Jeffrey A. Tait of Broome County received the petition for a name change from Golden, seeking a legal change of name to Elizabeth Whitney Golden, on the ground that the petitioner, who is married to a woman, now identifies as female. Golden’s wife did not object to the name change. Golden presented no evidence of any surgical alteration of sex.

Justice Tait asserted that the change from a traditionally male to a traditionally female name was "fraught with confusion," and dismissed the petition.

Justice Anthony V. Cardona, writing for the appellate panel, noted that under New York’s common law, anybody can assume a new name so long as this is not being done to commit fraud or deception, without going through any legal proceeding, but a state statute authorizes the Supreme Court to grant name change petitions in order to make such a change "speedy, definite, and a matter of record." Having a court order expedites the process of getting other documents, such as driver’s license, social security card, other forms of identification, and passports issued in the new name.

Cardona pointed out that courts have routinely granted non-fraudulent name-change requests unless there is some sort of "reasonable objection" to the selected name. Since a name change will always engender a certain amount of confusion, wrote Cardona, potential confusion is not a ground for refusing to grant the petition, so long as all technical requirements of the law are met. Evidently, the appellate panel felt that the lack of evidence of sex-reassignment surgery was not an impediment, as the issue was not discussed by the court.

Getting a name change is an important step for a transsexual seeking to assert his or her gender identity, for psychological and legal reasons, and the refusal of judges to grant such name changes freely has remained a significant impediment, even in New York where there is a well-established legal tradition of freely granting name-change petitions. Volunteer lawyers in New York staff a special legal clinic under the auspices of the LGBT Community Services Center to provide assistance to transsexuals seeking legal name change orders.

Not Enough Brahms Piano Trios? Try Hans Gal!

I love the trios for violin, cello and piano by Brahms.  Few can top him in this genre.  But there are not enough of them, only three!!!!   Why couldn't he have written more?  As a stop-gap for those suffering fraom Brahms trio deficit syndrome, I recommend the early piano trios by Hans Gal (1890-1987).  Although his life barely overlapped with last few years of Brahms, Gal grew up in the late romantic Brahms tradition and his trios, despite being written in the first half of the twentieth century, would be welcome listening for any Brahms lover.  I've discovered a marvelous recording by three young musicians, made late in 2004 in Vienna and released on the Japanese Camerata label.  OK, it is strange to find this very Viennese romantic music being recorded in Vienna by young Viennese musicians taken down by Japanese technicians and released on a Japanese label, but that is our international world of classical recording.  Doris Adam (piano) and her sister Karin Adam (violin) are joined by Christoph Stradner, first cellist of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, for wonderful recordings of Gal's Op. 18 and Op. 49b, as well as "Variations on a Popular Viennese Tune" for piano trio, Op. 9.  Forty-eight minutes of romantic bliss.

Baz Luhrmann's "Australia"

After a terrific Thanksgiving feast courtesy of my sister-in-law Carol and brother Dave, it's off to the flickers with Mom and half a dozen family to see the new film "Australia," directed by Baz Luhrmann and starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman.   This is a big, colorful, romantic drama of the Australian outback from 1939-1942.  I believe it is fiction, although it culminates in a historical event, the Japanese bombing of the northern Australia port city of Darwin.

I've enjoyed Luhrmann's musicals and wondered how he would be directing an Australian version of a "western," a big chunk of which is devoted to a cattle drive (shades of "Red River" and scores of other American films).  Well, he does it quite admirably.  Although I found the "back-story" segment provided over the first 10-15 minutes had a cartoonish character, somewhat similar to Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge, once things got under way in the Australian outback it took on the dimensions of a realistic -- if highly romanticized -- traditional western.  Kidman and Jackman are terrific, but young Jamie Guplill steals the show as the tiny dynamo, half-Caucasian, half-Aborigine, who attaches himself to Kidman and Jackman and steals everybody's heart with his big serious eyes and infectious smile.  What a charmer!

Luhrmann knows music, and he has had his musicians raid the classics for memorable moments.  Towards the beginning I heard what sounded like "Fratres" by Arvo Part (and if it was just a rip-off of same, it was very convincing).  Harold Arlen's "Over the Rainbow" from "The Wizard of Oz" is a leitmotiv, and a bit of a pun, of course, considering the setting.  J.S. Bach's chorale prelude "Sheep May Safely Graze" is a major source for much of the score, and at the ending the Nimrod variation from Elgar's Enigma Variations puts in a showing.  There may be others that I've forgotten at this point.

Despite its great length (over 2-1/2 hours) I found this engrossing and never tired of it.  The supporting cast, mainly Australian talent, has many unfamiliar faces but not a weak performance among them.  One of my nephews commented at the end that the saccharine content was high, but I responded that I thought it was real sugar....   He also commented that such a big budget film should have been better on the details, pointing out that the airplanes in the Japanese attack were inauthentic and the bombs they were dropping were ludicrous - looked more like torpedoes than bombs.  That apart, though, I found much of the period effect convincing, and whatever technical faults there were did not distract me from enjoying the story.  Also, the wide-screen, full-colored panoramic shots of Australia were stunning in their natural beauty.   This film should be a shot in the arm for tourism to Oz....

Quantum of Solace

A James Bond film in these latter days is mainly an excuse to string together exotic chase sequences littered with explosions, crashing glass, smoke clouds, and wrecked motor vehicles.  This newest entry in the series does all this with elan.  Daniel Craig remains the unflappable bond, and everybody else does their shtick with style.  The old musical themes are back on the soundtrack, providing reassuring continuity.  The plot is ridiculous, but serves its purpose for stringing out the chases.  Everything is filmed with great beauty, the classy hotels in which Bond prefers to lodge are breathtaking, and he has a chance to romance two statuesque, spirited women.  What more could any Bond addict ask for?  Wit and literacy??  Don't be greedy....

Noise - A New Australian Film

The Cinematique of Daytona Beach has been presenting a new independent Australian film, "Noise," by writer-director Matthew Saville.  The film was premiered at Sundance Film Festival, and received a good review in the Hollywood Reporter, but I thought it was a bit of a mess.  The problem may be due in part to the circumstances of viewing: the Cinematique has a rather weak projection system, and every film I've seen there has seemed to me to be underlit, this one being no exception.  Also, the actors mainly had rather broad Australian accents, hard to understand, and they tended to mumble or rattle of dialogue quickly, making comprehension difficult.  There was little in the way of traditional exposition, things just happening without much explanation, and little in the way of exposing the motivation of the characters.  In other words, I found this only intermittently interesting, rather slow moving in the way of many first-time indy films, and in the end I was unsure what it accomplished.

9th Circuit Orders New Asylum Hearing for Gay Iranian Man

A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9^th Circuit, finding that an Immigration Judge had violated the due process rights of a gay Iranian man who had applied for asylum, ordered a new hearing before a different Immigration Judge in Hassani v. Mukasey, 2008 WL 4989149 (Nov. 13, 2008) (not published in F.3d). The court’s memorandum opinion is not attributed to any particular member of the panel.

According to the decision, "Hassani argues that he was arrested, interrogated, detained, and tortured in Iran on account of his homosexuality. Although he concedes that his arrests were in accordance with Islamic law for his public association with women and his possession of alcohol, he maintains that those grounds were merely pretext. Hassani argues that the true motivation of the Iranian police was to take him into custody in order to force him to confess his homosexuality and name his male partners. Under Islamic law, such a confession could have led to the death penalty."

Hassani sought to have an expert, a professor specializing in Islamic studies, testify in support of case, but the Immigration Judge (IJ) refused to hear the expert, stating that she had already decided based on Hassani’s testimony and response to her questions that he was not credible. According to t he court’s summary, "before Hassani's expert witness had a chance to testify, the IJ determined that Hassani was not a credible witness. This determination was based, in part, on the IJ's speculation as to how a gay man would behave in Iran, as well as assumptions about how sharia, Islamic customary law, treats homosexuality. For example, the IJ asked Hassani why he would have violated the law by being in the company of women when he was already afraid for his life. Hassani explained that this crime was less serious than homosexuality, would not have put his life at risk, and was committed to disguise his homosexuality. The expert likely would have been able to shed light on Islamic law's treatment of these various crimes, perhaps explaining Hassani's behavior. The IJ also stated in her decision that Hassani's account of the Iranian government's actions against him made no sense because if the police had wanted to kill him for being gay, they would have done so long ago. The expert could have explained under what circumstances Islamic law permits execution for homosexuality or sodomy. These are only two examples, but the record is peppered with the IJ's expressions of doubt where expert testimony might have bolstered Hassani's claims.<170>

The court, noting its prior decisions on point, observed that asylum applicants are entitled to due process of law, which includes the right to present expert testimony to corroborate and bolster their contentions as to why they are entitled to asylum in the United States. For the IJ to have made a credibility determination without hearing Hassani’s proffered expert was to deny him the most fundamental procedural right, thus invalidating the IJ’s decision, which had been affirmed in the usual pro forma manner by the Board of Immigration Appeals.

Hassani had also filed a motion for reconsideration by the BIA, arguing that since he had converted from Islam to Christianity since arriving in the United States, circumstances had changed making it even more imperative that he not be deported to Iran, where such conversions are subject to the death penalty under traditional Islamic law. The court decided that because it was remanding his case for plenary reconsideration, the BIA motion was moot.

The court took the step of suggesting that in light of the IJ’s original inappropriate credibility determination, the matter should be assigned to a new IJ.

Twilight - The Movie

I am not familiar with the books on which this story is based, so I can't judge from the perspective of a pleased or disappointed reader.  As a movie experience, I found this to be quite entertaining.  Catherine Hardwicke directs a superb cast headlined by Kristen Stewart as Bella Swan, our heroine from whose perspective the story is told, and Robert Pattinson, the strikingly modern vampire Edward Cullen.  As vampire movies go, this is among the best, imaginatively set out and enacted.  Indeed, Pattinson casts an eerie spell as the "young" Edward, frozen in time for almost a century as an 18-year-old.  The wonderful touch was the wall of mortarboards in his home - he's matriculated through the senior year of high school repeatedly over the past century - is that everybody's dream, or everybody's nightmare?  The special effects are well handled, and the supporting roles all superbly well done, especially Billy Burke as the long-suffering dad of Bella.  This was No. 1 in the U.S. in ticket sales this past weekend, and surely deserves the honor....  And I hope the ending means we are set up for a sequel.

The Florida Adoption Opinion from Miami-Dade

Here's the draft I've submitted to Gay City News for this week's issue:

For the second time in just a few months, a Florida trial judge has ruled that the state’s statutory ban against adoption of children by "a homosexual" is unconstitutional. Ruling on November 25 on an adoption petition by Frank Martin Gill, a North Miami man, to adopt half-brothers John and James, age 8 and 4, for whom he has served as a foster parent together with his partner for the past four years, Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Cindy S. Lederman held that the statutory ban violates the equal protection requirement of the Florida constitution and directly contradicts the state’s articulated policy of seeking "permanent placements" for children. In the Matter of the Adoption of John Doe and James Doe, [Case No. Redacted] (Fla. 11^th Dist. Cir. Ct., Nov. 25, 2008).

The ACLU of Florida and the ACLU LGBT Rights Project represent Gill, including litigation team members Robert Rosenwald, James Esseks, Leslie Cooper, and Shelby Day. The children were represented by volunteer attorneys from Hilarie Bass and Ricardo Gonzalez from Greenberg Traurig and Charles Auslander.

This Miami ruling followed an August 29 ruling from Key West by Circuit Judge David J. Audlin, Jr., who also rejected the statutory ban and approved an adoption by a gay petitioner. For reasons that remain obscure, the state took no action to appeal that ruling, but a news report on the Miami-Herald website shortly after the decision was released indicated that the state planned to appeal Judge Lederman’s decision.

The appeal has everything to do with politics and nothing to do with the merits of the case, since the appeal announcement came immediately upon the release of Judge Lederman’s 53-page opinion, when attorneys for the state could not possibly have had time to carefully read and analyze the ruling. "We respect the court's decision," said Assistant Attorney General Valerie Martin to the Miami-Herald. "Based upon the wishes of our client, the Department of Children & Families, we will file an appeal." In other words, nothing the court could say would sway the Department from its political mission to defend the statutory ban. Thus, the state agency charged with protecting the best interest of children exhibits its lack of concern with those best interests.

Judge Lederman’s opinion carefully describes the situation confronted by young John and James when they were first placed with Gill and his partner. John, then four, was virtually mute, totally devoted to looking after his infant half-brother and totally unable to trust any adult after the neglectful care he had experienced. Both children had medical problems for which medicines had been prescribed but not administered by their neglectful parents, from whom they had been taken by the state. Judge Lederman describes how both boys flourished under the loving, firm guidance of Gill and his partner. The men decided that only Gill would petition to adopt, assuming that attempting a joint adoption in the face of Florida’s statute would be doubly difficult.

The trial presented Judge Lederman with numerous experts, some testifying live and some by affidavit. The state’s case seemed to be based on arguing virtually every stereotype about the lives and partnerships of gay people, attempting to convince the court that gays are depressive, suicidal, pedophiles, addicts, prone to short life spans and a succession of short relationships, all of which would present adverse conditions for raising children. Of course, to find an "expert" to present such testimony, they have to scrape the bottom of the barrel and come up with people whose credentials end up being more theological than anything else, relying on spurious studies inspired by "faith" rather than facts.

The state’s primary expert was Dr. George Rekers, identified as a Clinical Psychologist and Behavioral Scientist from Miami, without academic affiliation, who is an ordained Baptist Minister. Rekers based his testimony heavily on the discredited publications of the notorious Dr. Paul Cameron and others of his ilk. At one point, the judge characterized his testimony as "contrary to science and decades of research in child development," and she concluded that "Dr. Rekers’ testimony was far from a neutral and unbiased recitation of the relevant scientific evidence. Dr. Rekers’ beliefs are motivated by his strong ideological and theological convictions that are not consistent with the science. Based on his testimony and demeanor at trial, the court can not consider his testimony to be credible nor worthy of forming the basis of public policy."

The state’s other expert, a Kansas State University associate professor named Walter Schumm, fared little better, and actually helped to make the petitioner’s case, testifying that a categorical ban on gays adopting children, as maintained in Florida, was not warranted by the facts, and that adoption decisions should be made on a case by case basis.

By contrast, Gill’s attorneys presented several experts holding distinguished academic positions and relying on peer reviewed scientific publications, as well as experts with long experience administering governmental child welfare programs, all of whom agreed that gay people are capable of making fine parents who can raise physically and mentally healthy children. Judge Lederman’s factual findings completely refuted the state’s experts, concluding that "it is clear that sexual orientation is not a predictor of a person’s ability to parent. Sexual orientation no more leads to psychiatric disorders, alcohol and substance abuse, relationship instability, a lower life expectancy or sexual disorders than race, gender, socioeconomic class or any other demographic characteristic."

She pointed out that there is now a consensus among professionals in the fields of psychology and child development, based on long-term studies involving thousands of children, that parental sexual orientation is not relevant to a person’s qualifications to be a good parent. "As a result" she wrote, "based on the robust nature of the evidence available in the field, this Court is satisfied that the issue is so far beyond dispute that it would be irrational to hold otherwise; the best interests of children are not preserved by prohibiting homosexual adoption."

From this conclusion, Judge Lederman proceeded logically to the conclusion that a state policy disqualifying prospective adoptive parents based on their sexual orientation was irrational and thus violated the constitutional guarantee of equal protection to both children and prospective adoptive parents.

"A law such as the blanket ban on adoptions by homosexuals infringes on the foster child’s right to be free from undue restraint and to be expeditiously placed in an adoptive home that serves the child’s best permanency interests," she wrote. "Indeed, a law that subverts judicial process and imposes on the court the burden of taking action harmful to the child should be immediately suspect because the injury it imposes contradicts the legislative purpose and constitutional basis of the child’s having been taken into custody by the State in the first place."

"The Department argues [that the adoption ban] is rationally related to Florida’s interest by protecting children from the undesirable realities of the homosexual lifestyle. However, as thoroughly summarized in the Findings of Fact section of this Final Judgment, the foregoing is, frankly, false," the judge asserted.

The judge specifically rejected all the justifications argued by the state, including the assertion that the state’s responsibility for the "morality" of children justified the ban, which was clearly contradicted by the state’s willingness to put children into a quasi-permanent foster relationship with gay people.

"The Department’s position is that homosexuality is immoral," Judge Lederman commented. "Yet, homosexuals may be lawful foster parents in Florida and care for our most fragile children who have been abused, neglected and abandoned. As such, the exclusion forbidding homosexuals to adopt children does not further the public morality interest it seeks to combat.... The contradiction between the adoption and foster care statutes defeats the public morality argument and is thus not rationally related to serving a governmental interest.

"

The judge concluded that the statutory ban "violates the Petitioner and the Children’s equal protection rights guaranteed by Article I, Section 2 of the Florida Constitution without satisfying a rational basis. Moreover, the statutory exclusion defeats a child’s right to permanency as provided by federal and state law pursuant to the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997." She declared that the adoption of John and James would be effective immediately, as both the Guardian ad litem and the state workers who had processed this case were agreed that Gill was well qualified to be a parent, the only obstacle to adoption being the now-discredited statute.

Will Florida Officials Flunk the Intelligence Test and Persist in Defending Their Gay Adoption Ban?

Florida state officials have been handed a basic intelligence test by Circuit Court Judge Cindy S. Lederman in Miami-Dade County, who ruled this morning that the state's statutory ban on "homosexuals" adopting children is unconstitutional and in basic conflict with the state's own statutorily articulated goal of achieving permanent placements for children who are wards of the state, preferably through adoption.

The intelligence test:  A challenge to Governor Crist, who is supposedly an educated and intelligent man.  Read Judge Lederman's opinion.  Carefully consider her factual findings.  Carefully consider the disgraceful case put on by the state in seeking to justify its continued status as the only state in the country that expressly bans gay people from adopting children - a case mired in theologically-inspired misrepresentations about the lives of those gay people who seek to parent children.  Carefully consider the grave obligation of the state for the welfare of children who lack legal parents and need permanent placements, taking into account the number of such children who must be placed each year and the difficulties of finding suitable placements, especially for older children.  And take into account the detailed description by Judge Lederman of the potential adoptive parent in this case, and the marvelous effect of parenting by him and his partner of these two youngsters over the past four years. 

In other words, Governor Crist, do the intelligent thing in response to this opinion.  Appealing it is the dumb thing to do in terms of public policy.  Taking it as a directive and advocating that the legislature repeal the current ban and not oppose this adoption is the intelligent response. 

This opinion comes hard on the heels of another decided in Key West just a few months ago.  The two opinions agree with each other that the state's policy is riddled with internal contradictions and is thus IRRATIONAL, which means it is a facial violation of the 14th Amendment.

Judge Lederman premised her constitutional ruling on equal protection, but could just as well have done so on due process grounds.  Due to the peculiar way that the adoption statute defines "homosexual" in terms of conduct rather than status, there is a clear conflict with the US Supreme Court's decision in Lawrence v. Texas (2003) that the conduct at issue is constitutionally protected and that its use to impose any disqualification upon individuals defined according to that conduct should invoke heightened scrutiny, as two federal circuit courts have held over recent months in challenges to the irrational US military policy on service by gay people.  And, this policy that Judge Lederman found to be irrational can not possibly survive heightened scrutiny -- unless it runs into an appellate court that is oblivious to the facts (as, unfortunately, Florida appellate courts are wont to be on this subject).

It's time to end this farce of placing kids with gay foster parents but then refusing to let the parents adopt when a parental relationship has become fully established and its clear that the placement is working well for the kids.  It is also stupid for the state to do this when the alternative of allowing adoption is both in the best interest of the children and is financially beneficial for the state, which ends it financial obligations for the children when they are adopted.