Florida Agenda

LONDON, ENGLAND – The BBC has reported that the lifetime ban on blood donations by homosexual and bisexual men will be lifted in England, Scotland and Wales. Ministers have agreed to let men who have not had sex with another man in the past twelve months to donate starting in November. The restrictions were originally put in place in the 1980s to prevent the risk of HIV contamination. However, the latest medical evidence presented to a government panel argued the ban could no longer be justified.

Ministers in the three countries accepted the argument and said they would soon be relaxing the rules. Northern Ireland is expected to make a decision soon. The National Blood Service screens all donations for HIV and other infections. However, there is a “window period” after infection during which it is impossible to detect the virus.

NEW YORK, NY – The senate of students and faculty at Columbia University has voted to end their ban on allowing ROTC on the university’s campus. The ban was put into position during the Vietnam War as part of a peace movement and has been in place for over four decades. The lifting of the ban, which passed the senate 51 to 17, was in response to the military’s decision to drop their discriminatory “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

A federal appeals court refused to let same-sex marriages resume in California while it considers the constitutionality of a 2008 ballot measure that defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman.
The Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals had been asked last month to lift its suspension of an August, 2010, federal court ruling by Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker declaring the ballot measure unconstitutional, saying it discriminated on the basis of sexual orientation and gender.

Plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging Proposition 8 cited the Appeals Court’s decision to put the case on hold while the California Supreme Court decides matters regarding whether the sponsors of the initiative, a conservative religious coalition called Protect Marriage, have standing under state law to appeal the ruling.  While the state court is not scheduled to hear arguments on that issue until September, it might take months more to rule before the case can return to the federal court.

“It is decidedly unjust and unreasonable to expect California’s gay and lesbian couples to put their lives on hold and suffer daily discrimination as second-class citizens while their U.S. District Court victory comes to its final conclusion,” said Chad Griffin in a statement.  Griffin is the chairman of The American Foundation for Equal Rights, which represents the plaintiffs.