AFA Refuses Donation With Milk Stamp

The Wire reports:

How much do anti-gay groups hate the new Harvey Milk stamps from the U.S. Postal Service? One organization refused to even open a mailed donation to their cause using one such stamp as postage. Staying true to their announcement that they would boycott all mail with the Milk stamps, the American Family Association told The Wire that the organization had mailed back our attempted $5 donation to their anti-gay group unopened. Speaking to The Wire, AFA's Director of Issues Analysis Bryan Fischer said that the very existence of the Harvey Milk stamp was akin to "honoring Jeffrey Dahmer on a postage stamp designed to honor the culinary arts." That's because Fischer and the AFA, citing a line from a biography of Milk, believe that Milk was a sexual predator. "He is not somebody that should ever be honored on a postage stamp," Fischer said.

Maybe the Wire shouldn't have announced the attempt two weeks ago? Focus On The Family and the Family Research Council both processed Milk-stamped donations sent by the Wire.

AFA: Don't Open Mail With Milk Stamp

"Unfortunately, the deed is done. The United States Postal Service honored a child predator at the whim of a drag queen. Furthermore, the radical homosexual lobby will undoubtedly encourage businesses to use these stamps - all in the name of inclusiveness, political correctness and diversity. This is not diversity; this is perversity. What you can do: 1. Refuse to accept the Harvey Milk stamp if offered by your local post office. Instead, ask for a stamp of the United States flag. 2. Refuse to accept mail at your home or business if it is postmarked with the Harvey Milk stamp. Simply write 'Return to Sender" on the envelope and tell your postman you won't accept it." - From a super-sadz message by the American Family Association.

TODAY: White House To Unveil Harvey Milk Stamp In Live Webcast Ceremony

Via White House press release:

This Thursday, May 22nd, the White House Office of Public Engagement, the United States Postal Service and the Harvey Milk Foundation will host a first-day-of-issue dedication ceremony for the Harvey Milk Forever Stamp at the White House. The event will feature remarks by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senator Tammy Baldwin, Representative John Lewis, Deputy Postmaster General Ronald A. Stroman, and other distinguished guests including the Co-Founders of the Harvey Milk Foundation, Stuart Milk and Anne Kronenberg.

The ceremony will be live-streamed here at 3PM. I'll push this post back to the top of the blog a few minutes before things get going.

UPDATE: The ceremony is about to begin.

UPDATE II: The unveiling is done. Among those on stage in the photo below: Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Shultz, Rep. John Lewis, Sen. Tammy Baldwin, Rep. Mark Pocan, Stuart Milk (Harvey's nephew).

NEW YORK CITY: Harvey Milk Musical Set For Local Debut At Lincoln Center

Theatermania reports:

Tony winner Kristin Chenoweth (Wicked) will star alongside composer/lyricist Andrew Lippa (Big Fish) in the New York premiere of Lippa's choral work I Am Harvey Milk on October 6 at Avery Fisher Hall, producers Bruce Cohen, Robb Nanus, Jessica Leventhal, Bruce Robert Harris, and Jack W. Batman have announced. Lippa, the songwriter behind the musicals Big Fish and The Wild Party, will play the title role, with Chenoweth as the soprano soloist. The production will feature the Orchestra of St. Luke's and introduce the 12-member All Star Broadway Men's Chorus. Directed by Noah Himmelstein, the creative team for I Am Harvey Milk includes Joel Fram (musical director, conductor), Michele Lynch (choreographer), Andrew Lazarow (projection design), and Scott Lehrer (sound design).

Tickets for the one-night show at Lincoln Center are available here.  I Am Harvey Milk had its world debut last summer in a concert by the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus.

(Tipped by JMG reader Peter)

Haters Have The Harvey Milk Sadz

"Harvey Milk was a very dishonorable man -- a sexual anarchist who hated sexual boundaries, a homosexual predator of teens and boyish-looking young men, and a brazen attacker of moral standards and parental rights. The intolerant homosexual-bisexual-transsexual movement is guilty of trampling religious freedom, free speech, private property rights, parental rights and the innocence of children, If you believe in protecting children from bad role models, don't buy the Harvey Milk stamp. Harvey Milk's 'LGBT' agenda has been an extremely negative influence on religious freedom, which it crushes, and the health and well-being of children, whom it sexually targets,. Indeed, a moral disaster -- the unnatural, unhealthy, tyrannical homosexual-bisexual-transsexual agenda -- is being honored by the U.S. Postal Service, which is pushing negative outcomes on children through this harmful sexual movement." - Save California crackpot Randy Thomasson, renewing his annual call for parents to keep their kids out of school on next month's Harvey Milk Day. (Via Good As You)

USPS Begins Milk Stamp Pre-Orders

Via press release from the White House:

The U.S. Postal Service officially revealed the Harvey Milk Forever Stamp today. The stamp’s official first-day-of-issue ceremony will take place May 22 at the White House. The public is invited to attend the May 28 Harvey Milk Forever Stamp special dedication ceremony in San Francisco. Details on the time and location will be forthcoming. Customers may order the Harvey Milk stamp now for delivery following the May 22 stamp issuance. The stamp image is based on a circa 1977 black and white photograph of Milk in front of his Castro Street Camera store in San Francisco taken by Daniel Nicoletta of Grants Pass, OR. Antonio Alcalá of Alexandria, VA, was art director for the stamp.

Pre-order your stamps here.

Matt Barber Has The Stamp Sadz

"This is a man who was known for a perverse sexual appetite for teenage, runaway, drug-addicted boys and the fact that this Obama administration and the postal service would choose to ignore that and go with the propaganda and the hype that this guy was some kind of hero and a pro-LGBT martyr – it just boggles the mind. That [Harvey Milk] would get his own stamp and that this other homosexual activist would get a stamp honoring a lifestyle that has led to the AIDS epidemic, that has led to the spread of syphilis and STDs and a decline in our culture's morality, just speaks to how far we have fallen as a nation." - Hate group leader Matt Barber, speaking to OneNewsNow. The "other homosexual artist" Barber refers to is Tom Of Finland, who will be honored this fall by Finland's postal service.

Harvey Milk Stamp To Be Dedicated At White House Ceremony On May 22nd

Via press release from the White House Office of Communications:

The official first-day-of-issue dedication ceremony for the Harvey Milk Forever Stamp will take place at the White House May 22. Harvey Milk was a visionary leader who became one of the first openly gay elected officials in the U.S. when he won a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977. Milk’s achievements gave hope and confidence to the LGBT community in the United States and elsewhere at a time when the community was encountering widespread hostility and discrimination. Milk believed that government should represent all citizens, ensuring equality and providing needed services. His remarkable career was tragically cut short nearly a year after he took office, when he and San Francisco Mayor George Moscone were assassinated. In 2009, he was posthumously awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama. May 22 is Harvey Milk Day in California. The stamp image will be previewed at a later date and a public dedication ceremony will take place in San Francisco May 28.

I predicts some super-sadz over this! I especially love that as a "forever" stamp, the text reads "Harvey Milk Forever USA."

UPDATE: The Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund reacts.

“Harvey Milk urged LGBT people to seek public office because he understood the power of elected officials to create change. Since his high-profile election in San Francisco, thousands of LGBT people around the world have responded to his call to serve their own communities by seeking elected and appointed office, and indeed that is helping to change our world. We applaud President Obama and his administration for opening the White House to this historic occasion, and we are especially grateful to the Harvey Milk Foundation and everyone who worked to make this possible. We hope the issuance of the Harvey Milk stamp will inspire a new generation of young LGBT leaders to choose careers in public service and continue his important work.”

UPDATE II: From the Task Force.

"Harvey Milk was an extraordinary activist whose courage, tenacity, and legacy is alive today in everything we do to advance real freedom and justice for all LGBT people and their families. His life has been an inspiration to me, personally. For his service and sacrifice, it is entirely fitting that a forever stamp be dedicated to him and all that he stood for. This tribute would not have been possible without our partners: the Harvey Milk Foundation, the International Imperial Court System and Victory Fund Institute."

REPORT: Harvey Milk Stamp Revealed

I'm not finding confirmation elsewhere, but yesterday a philatelist site declared that this is the Harvey Milk stamp which will makes its debut next month.

A black-and-white photograph of Harvey Milk (1930-78) will be used for the central design of the forthcoming United States commemorative forever stamp honoring the San Francisco political figure and gay rights activist. The stamp will be issued on Harvey Milk Day, May 22, in a location or locations yet to be determined. Both Washington, D.C., and San Francisco are potential first-day cities. U.S. Postal Service officials announced the stamp subject in October 2013 but have not formally revealed the image. The stamp design includes the pride flag colors as six different color squares stacked vertically in the upper left corner. The stamp is likely to be issued in a pane of 20.

If this indeed is the official version, it's a great improvement over the stamp that the same site showed us last year.

USPS To Announce Harvey Milk Stamp

From the Facebook page of the Harvey Milk Foundation:

Breaking! It is official! The USPS will confirm this week that my uncle, Harvey Milk will be commemorated on a 2014 US postage stamp. Another first! My deep gratitude to everyone that supported this effort! More details including the image to come via USPS soon! "Hope Will Never Be Silent" and will be on millions of letters soon!

Get ready for some super-sadz!

REPORT: Harvey Milk Stamp Approved?

Citing a leaked document, the Bay Area Reporter says that the USPS may issue a commemorative Harvey Milk stamp next year.

Linn's Stamp News, a weekly publication that covers the mail service, is reporting in its May 27 issue that Milk was among the special stamps chosen for next year by the Citizens Stamp Advisory Committee during its closed door meetings earlier this year. An anonymous source sent Linn's a copy of the panel's January 31 and February 1 meeting minutes where 2014 stamps were debated and chosen. It included a notation that the minutes regarding the Milk stamp, along with a number of other choices, had been approved at an April 13 meeting.

The BAR notes that "there is no certainty" that the Milk stamp has made the cut.  According to the office of the Postmaster General, the final list of next year's commemorative stamps will be issued in August or September. (Tipped by JMG reader Homer)

Harvey Milk Day - Hope

Video by Sean Chapin.

"What came to be called 'The Hope Speech' was initially conceived as a stump address, wherein Milk attempted to embolden a strong GLBTQ nationalism within the Castro, while also appealing for an alliance with other disenfranchised groups and straight folks," wrote Jason Edward Black and Charles E. Morris III in their anthology An Archive of Hope: Harvey Milk's Speeches and Writings (University of California Press, 2013). Milk would revise the speech and recite it several more times at various appearances, according to the introduction written by Black and Morris to the version they included in their book. It was a defiant speech about gay self-acceptance that included Milk's call for LGBT people to come out of the closet and inspire others to do so. For as Milk said, particularly of LGBT youth, "And you have to give them hope. Hope for a better world. Hope for a better tomorrow. Hope for a place to go if the pressures at home are too great. Hope that all will be alright."

CA Hate Group Calls On Parents To Keep Kids Home On Harvey Milk Day

Save California has launched a radio and web campaign urging parents to keep their kids out of school during Harvey Milk Day observations.  In 2009 then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the bill designating May 22nd as a "special day of recognition" in California.  Save California has called for keeping kids out of school every year since then, but this year's marks their first radio campaign on the issue. Listen to the spot here.  The group has also produced flyers for parents to hand out. Note how they've inserted the word "gay" into the title of the day in the excerpt below.

The Sacramento Bee reports on the ads:

An anti-gay rights group has purchased hourly radio spots to urge parents to keep their children home from school on Harvey Milk Day, which honors the gay rights pioneer.  Randy Thomasson, president of the SaveCalifornia.com, said the group bought more than 100 time slots for a radio ad in Los Angeles and Sacramento. It urges parents to "protect your children from Harvey Milk indoctrination," by keeping them home from school on Wednesday. "This is harmful to children," Thomasson said. "This is not academic, it's brainwashing."

RELATED: In 2011 Save California head Randy Thomasson claimed that Harvey Milk Day would  "unleash a tsunami of perversity" that would include "mock gay weddings" at public schools. In 2010 Thomasson claimed that Harvey Milk Day would include "cross-dressing contests" and that Milk endorsed pedophilia. In 2009 Thomasson claimed that Harvey Milk Day would mean that California had passed Massachusetts in the "sexual indoctrination of children." Below is the YouTube clip that Save California posted last year.

Harvey Milk Terminal, Not Airport

The bid to renamed San Francisco International for Harvey Milk has apparently ended in a compromise agreement to name one of the airport's terminals for the slain gay rights icon.

Under a deal aimed at avoiding a ballot fight and a load of potential political embarrassment, Supervisor David Campos has settled for putting Milk’s name on a yet-to-be-determined terminal. The compromise comes after weeks of negotiations between Campos — chief backer of rechristening SFO in Milk’s honor — and the mayor’s office and some fellow supervisors who weren’t too hot on the idea. Campos initially suggested he would be open to naming the international terminal after the slain supervisor. But some supervisors thought that should be reserved for Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the former mayor who was instrumental in its building.

SFO has three domestic terminals.

Imagine A World Without Hate

The Anti-Defamation League imagines a world that still has Harvey Milk, Anne Frank, Martin Luther King, and Matthew Shepard in it.

Other Names Floated For SFO

Yesterday we learned about a proposal to rename San Francisco International for Harvey Milk.  The Bay Area Reporter notes that some folks have other ideas.

While many LGBT leaders and community members, unsurprisingly, have expressed support, others have floated the names of a variety of people as alternative choices. The suggestions include the late lesbian astronaut Sally Ride, the late gay black civil rights leader Bayard Rustin, lesbian pioneers Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon, murdered transgender teenager Gwen Araujo, or the late disco star Sylvester.

Backers of any number of the city's political leaders, such as former Mayor Willie Brown, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein , would likely love to rename SFO on their behalf and could work to squash the Milk naming proposal. It also remains to be seen if the Milk idea will fly with the city's Asian community, whose voting bloc is significant and increasingly a force citywide. SFO bills itself as "the gateway to the Pacific," and the names of several Chinese leaders have already been put forward as naming choices.

Those in favor of renaming SFO on behalf of Milk acknowledge the proposal will likely encounter strong head winds against it. "I am supportive of the idea, but people need to understand this isn't necessarily a slam dunk," said Cleve Jones , who was an aide and close confidante of Milk. "Powerful forces, I suspect, will attempt to derail this."

Ladies and gentleman, we are about to begin our descent to Sylvester International Airport. Please turn off your electronics and prepare to feel mighty real.

SAN FRANCISCO: Voters May Consider Renaming Airport For Harvey Milk

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering a ballot measure which would rename the airport for slain LGBT rights icon Harvey Milk.

A charter amendment sponsored by Supervisor David Campos would put the question of creating Harvey Milk-San Francisco International Airport on San Francisco’s November ballot. If five of Campos’ colleagues agree to submit the proposed name change to voters and the amendment goes through in the fall, the city would become home to the world’s first airport honoring an openly gay person, said Milk’s nephew, Stuart Milk. Milk, who runs an international gay rights foundation in his uncle’s memory, said that adding an airport to the list of public venues named for Harvey Milk would mark a milestone since flights to and from San Francisco International serve 68 countries where homosexuality is illegal.

The wingnuts are gonna love this one. (Image via Harvey Milk Foundation)

SF Chorus: A Tribute To Harvey Milk

Yesterday was the 34th anniversary of Harvey Milk's assassination. JMG reader Sean Chapin writes with a description of the clip below:

The video follows an original chorus member (Robert Rufo) who was at the chorus' first-ever public appearance, which was at the candlelight vigil on the steps of City Hall the night when Harvey Milk was assassinated. Robert Rufo remembers what it was like that night, and how the chorus has been living the legacy of Harvey Milk since then over the last 34 years. The video shows Robert Rufo and the SF Gay Men's Chorus singing at the 34th anniversary memorial service and marching with candles to the Castro. Speakers at the memorial service last night included Supervisor Scott Weiner, Harvey Milk's campaign manager Anne Kronenberg, Mayor Ed Lee, former Mayor Willie Brown, George Moscone's son Jonathan Moscone, California State Assemblymember Tom Ammiano, Supervisor David Campos and Harvey Milk's nephew Stuart Milk. The song/recording in the video is "Thou Lord Our Refuge", which the chorus sung that night at City Hall when Harvey Milk left us in 1978, as re-arranged by chorus member Edwin Morales and performed earlier this year in 2012. The chorus in June 2013 will be premiering a landmark concert called Harvey Milk 2013, Living The Legacy.

Photo Of The Day

JMG reader Aaron Heier writes: "It's happening. The street sign is up & ready for the unveiling just outside of the San Diego LGBT Community Center today at 5PM. It's the first Harvey Milk Street ever."

It's Harvey Milk Day

Image source.