Will LGBT Activists Derail Christine Quinn's Political Machine And Mayoral Campaign ?

Old Time, Cigar-Chomping Political Boss

The stop-and-frisk narrative from The Village Voice : "LGBT Purists to Christine Quinn: We'd Love a Gay Mayor. Just Not You."

... Gay men of color are just as affected by stop-and-frisk as anyone else, notes Fordham University political science professor Christina Greer. "Even though the face of the LGBT community in New York City is white men, that's not the makeup," she says. "If you're black and gay, stop-and-frisk may be a primary issue." Unlike her three Democratic rivals, Bill de Blasio, John Liu, and Bill Thompson, Quinn has refused to make a blanket condemnation of stop-and-frisk.

Then there's condom-carry, an issue particularly troubling to those fighting the ongoing AIDS epidemic. As the Voice has reported, the city vigorously supports and promotes condoms through the Department of Health, but allows police to arrest alleged prostitutes found to be carrying them. Transgender women complain that the NYPD targets them simply because of the way they're dressed. Quinn reportedly sent staffers to a key meeting on the issue instead of attending herself.

... On stop-and-frisk, Quinn doesn't have the luxury of simply disregarding city policy, Duane insists. "She has to work under the policies the mayor has set," he says, "or she'd have to resign." Quinn has instead advocated for changes in police training and for the appointment of an inspector general to monitor the NYPD. Such a diplomatic solution doesn't satisfy critics like Flores. "If Christine Quinn was the head of AVP today, she would be fighting [stop-and-frisk]," he says. Quinn did make one major concession last week when she agreed to allow a council vote on allowing victims of racial profiling to sue the NYPD—the first time she hasn't blocked a bill that she opposes.

On condom-carry, Quinn certainly doesn't equivocate. "Condoms being found on somebody and used against them should be changed," she says. "If I have the power to make direct changes, I will. We need to encourage safe sex. Whether for money or not, we cannot talk out of both sides of our mouths. ...

This article may be perhaps the first time when Speaker Quinn publicly addresses the issue that the NYPD are arresting LGBT New Yorkers for carrying condoms. But her talk is cheap, as activists have learned -- the hard way.

Let's see what Speaker Quinn actually does about the way the NYPD profiles, stops-and-frisks, targets, and falsely arrests LGBT New Yorkers ?

Let's let her actual record -- of what she delivers -- to be the final judgment of her political record.

Christine Quinn Interchangeable For Michael Bloomberg ; Condom Arrests Continue

Speaker Quinn Uses Bloomberg Events To Fluff Campaign, Turns Back On Bloomberg-NYPD Discrimination Against LGBT Community

Christine Quinn's mayoral campaign is increasingly seen as desperate, since her poll numbers are beginning to fall, now that more and more voters are tuning into her dismal political record -- and to her close relationship with the unpopular mayor, Michael Bloomberg.

• For the second time in a week, Mayor Michael Bloomberg has allowed Christine Quinn to take center stage at a big announcement by his administration. More and more, Speaker Quinn has come to be seen as interchangeable for Mayor Bloomberg during big policy announcements. “The mayor, without officially endorsing her, is helping her with his administration,” said George Arzt, a Democratic consultant. The strategy is a calculated risk: much of the criticism leveled at Ms. Quinn has been about her coziness with Mr. Bloomberg, particularly her support of the mayor’s successful effort to overturn the city’s term limits law and run for a third term. (Bloomberg Helping Quinn's Fledgling Mayoral Campaign With Media Events : NYTimes)
• Meanwhile, as Christine Quinn uses Bloomberg administration press conferences to help rescue her sinking mayoral campaign, the Bloomberg administration continues its attack on safe sex. Advocates say too many New Yorkers land in jail after cops confiscate condoms. Clara Sierra was falsely arrested her and charged with prostitution by police, after she was found carrying condoms. She served 10 days in Rikers. On this serious issue, which affects the LGBT community, Christine Quinn sides with Mayor Bloomberg, so that she won't jeopardise his backroom support for her mayoral campaign. Speaker Quinn puts her own political ambitions over the needs of the LGBT community. It hasn't been the first time, and it certainly won't be the last. (Transgenders Face Discrimination, False Arrests By NYPD : Metro)

Protest Against Christine Quinn at Jackson Heights Mayoral Forum

Several activists stood outside the Jewish Center in Jackson Heights tonight, to protest Christine Quinn's dismal record on LGBT equality, NYPD discrimination, and restrictions on the use of birth control.

Tonight's protest, which had been announced well in advance, was a success, activists said, because Christine Quinn cancelled her appearance at this forum.

Tonight's mayoral forum was sponsored by the New Visions Democratic Club, by the Lesbian Gay Democratic Club of Queens, and by City Councilmember Daniel Dromm.

Activists distributed over 300 flyers outside of tonight's mayoral forum. In their interaction with passers-by and with the attendees at tonight's mayoral form, activists often mentioned how Christine Quinn was primarily responsible for extending term limits to allow Mayor Michael Bloomberg to steal a third term, how Christine Quinn's use of slush funds creates a culture of corruption in City Hall, and how Christine Quinn has failed to hold the NYPD accountable for discriminating against innocent New Yorkers.

LGBT activists question why Christine Quinn, who is the highest elected openly LGBT politician in New York City politics, does not stand up to the NYPD. The NYPD have demonstrated a pattern of discriminating and falsely arresting innocent LGBT New Yorkers if they carry condoms. Police claim that if LGBT New Yorkers carry condoms, then the condoms are evidence that LGBT New Yorkers are engaged in prostitution.

Protest against @chriscquinn's inaction against NYPD condom criminalization today at 6:30 pm facebook.com/events/1650544… twitter.com/stopchrisquinn…

— Stop Christine Quinn (@stopchrisquinn) April 11, 2013

Activists displayed a banner, which portrayed a condom locked in a handcuff to represent how NYPD are trying to crack down on safe sex practices -- forcing us to return to backward Victorian times.

How can Christine Quinn support this kind of crackdown on the use of prophylactics, if the fact that prophylactics and birth control because legal in 1965 only after decades of attempts by Planned Parenthood to make it legal for people to use contraception.

But that's not all. The NYPD policy on stop-and-frisk also deliberately targets transgenders ; meanwhile, Christine Quinn does not hold the NYPD for discriminating against the LGBT community. The stop-and-frisk program discriminates, and, as a consequence, the City of New York ends up paying hundreds of millions in damages for violating the civil rights of innocent New Yorkers.

#NY’s Stop-and-Frisk #Election: In 2011 alone, #NYC paid out over $180 million in lawsuits against the #NYPDbit.ly/Zc7YX3

— BQ Brew (@BQBrew) April 11, 2013

Here is one of the flyers, which activists distributed tonight :

2013-04-11 Christine Quinn Stop and Frisk Condom Flyer

What a disgrace for the NYPD to menace the LGBT community like this. In an article in The New York Times last week-end, it was notable that no LGBT leader in this city was quoted here to denounce the institutional discrimination by the NYPD of LGBT New Yorkers. Most notable was the absence or silence by Christine Quinn, the highest elected LGBT official in New York City politics. She is somebody, who has a sensibility of what it means to be treated different because of her identity as a woman and as a lesbian. And yet she has said nothing about how the NYPD treats others in the LGBT community solely based on their identity. And in all the articles about how stop-and-frisk is used by the NYPD against communities of color and other minority groups, there has remained a radio silence about how a municipality can discriminate against people in public spaces based on sex, race, and other factors that are expressly prohibited by the Civil Rights Act. When were municipalities given the option of not enforcing the Civil Rights Act ? And how can the NYPD deliberately violate Griswold v. Connecticut, the landmark case that legalised the use of contraceptives in the United States ? When did carrying contraception or prophylactics become a criminal behaviour ? How can this be ?

NYPD Menace LGBT New Yorkers Based On Clothes : Arrests by the Fashion Police

"The elasticity that officers in New York and elsewhere have been given to police quality-of-life violations has had the unfortunate effect of leaving transgender women, especially, susceptible to the charge that they must be engaged in sex work."

The NYPD are arresting gays, lesbians, transgenders, and other gender non-conforming New Yorkers as part of their stop-and-frisk dragnet, and increasingly they are charging people, who do not conform to gender roles, with criminality. The charges are often suspicion of prostitution, and the police use and/or plant condoms as evidence of sex work, The New York Times has reported. See : Arrests By The Fashion Police

Christine Quinn is not quoted in this article. How odd is it for the city's highest ranking LGBT official to not be visible, to be outraged by this crisis ? Or is her absence intentional ?

What a disgrace for the NYPD to menace the LGBT community like this. In an article of such gravity, it is notable that no LGBT leader in this city is quoted here to denounce the institutional discrimination by the NYPD of LGBT New Yorkers. Most notable is the absence or silence by Christine Quinn, the highest elected LGBT official in New York City politics. She is somebody, who has a sensibility of what it means to be treated different because of her identity as a woman and as a lesbian. And yet she says nothing about how the NYPD treats others in the LGBT community solely based on their identity. And in all the articles about how stop-and-frisk is used by the NYPD against communities of color and other minority groups, there remains a radio silence about how can a municipality discriminate against people in public spaces based on sex, race, and other factors that are expressly prohibited by the Civil Rights Act. When were municipalities given the option of opting out of enforcing the Civil Rights Act ? And how can the NYPD deliberately violate Griswold v. Connecticut, the landmark case that legalised the use of contraceptives in the United States ? When did carrying contraception or prophylactics become a criminal behaviour ? How can this be ?

Christine Quinn, who is speaker of the New York City Council, each year approves the NYPD budget without defunding the unconstitutional stop-and-frisk policy, but Speaker Quinn has become silent about how the NYPD menace the LGBT community. Some observe that her actions enable the NYPD to continue to use stop-and-frisk against the LGBT community, because Speaker Quinn is seeking the endorsement of the police union in her campaign for mayor.

Related : Christine Quinn betrays the LGBT community

2013-04-01 Roots of Betrayal © 2013 by Louis Flores - Uncorrected Proof Not For Sale Chapter I Excerpt by Connaissable

Marriage Equality depends on SCOTUS ruling in Griswold v. Connecticut, which NYPD are trying to undermine

It is ironic that SCOTUS journalist Linda Greenhouse wrote her column about how marriage equality will, in part, depend on Griswold v. Connecticut, which, almost 50 years later, is being gutted by NYPD. New York City police profile and arrest LGBT New Yorkers if they carry condoms. And while the ruling in Griswold made it legal for people to use prophylactics, here in New York City you have cops arresting people for carrying condoms, because the police use condoms as evidence of criminality -- instead of respecting people's right to privacy under due process. How will marriage equality come about if NYPD are trying to undermine the integrity of the Griswold ruling ?

If marriage equality will, in part, depend on the ruling in Griswold, what are LGBT elected politicians doing to put a stop to the NYPD from gutting Griswold ?

Protest against NYPD Condom Arrests outside Democratic Mayoral Candidate Forum on LGBT Issues

Members of ACT UP and other affinity groups protested outside the Democratic Mayoral Candidate Forum on LGBT Issues on Wednesday, March 20. Activists were calling for passage of paid sick leave, the end of HIV criminalisation, and an end of NYPD arrests of LGBT New Yorkers for carrying condoms.

In this video, the blogger and artist Suzannah B. Troy and the activist and blogger Louis Flores addressed some of the many issues that activists have with the karmically-challenged mayoral campaign of New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

A controversial banner was prominently displayed at tonight's protest, depicting a condom that is handcuffed. One of tonight's activists said to the hundreds of people in the queue at the entrance to the mayoral forum, "If you get stopped-and-frisked, and you are carrying condoms, then you will be put in handcuffs," in reference to the NYPD's policy of profiling LGBT New Yorkers for arrest by using any condom possession as evidence of criminality.

Even though many mayoral candidates were set to appear at tonight's forum, Speaker Quinn's campaign leaned heavily on City Council staff, some activists said, because she had dozens of paid staff on-site to distribute stickers, hold up campaign signs to stack the queue in her favour.

The forum was held at Baruch College's Mason Hall, 17 Lexington Avenue at 23rd Street. The public was told to use the entrance on 23rd street, but there was a side entrance on Lexington Avenue, which Speaker Quinn used, so she could avoid protesters.

A few members from the Facebook group, Queers Against Christine Quinn : Protest against NYPD Condom Arrests outside Democratic Mayoral Candidate Forum on LGBT Issues, joined in tonight's protest.

Are NYPD violating the Griswold v. Connecticut Supreme Court ruling ?

Are NYPD violating Griswold v. Connecticut ?

Please sign our petition : Commish Kelly : Stop arresting people for carrying condoms !

Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965), is a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Constitution protected a right to privacy. The case involved a Connecticut law that prohibited the use of contraceptives. (Wikipedia) This case overturned the 1879, Victorian era law in Connecticut that banned the use of prophylactics by couples. Fast-forward to 2013, and we find the NYPD is arresting people for carrying prophylactics. What's going on here ?

Are Commish Kelly and NYPD trying to undo major advancements in civil liberties, women's rights, reproductive rights, and LGBT equality ? The critical Constituional right of due process, a woman's right to an abortion, and LGBT equality depend on the integrity of the Griswold case. What is motivating Commish Kelly and the NYPD to undermine Griswold ?

Are NYPD violating Griswold v. Connecticut ? christine-quinn-sold-out.blogspot.com/2013/03/Would-… Police arrest LGBT for carrying condoms. @glaad@nationalnow @nytimes

— Stop Christine Quinn (@stopchrisquinn) March 11, 2013

Discriminated Against and "Profiled" by NYPD, Transgenders in New York Fear Carrying Condoms. Would Heterosexual New Yorkers be Arrested for Carrying Birth Control ?

Please sign our petition : Commish Kelly : Stop arresting people for carrying condoms !

The NYPD profiles average law-abiding New Yorkers based on age, gender, race, religion, and sexual orientation. That's nothing new.

We already know that the NYPD targets transgenders for stop-and-frisks at more than double the rate of rest of the population in some neighborhood.

The harassment of innocent people carrying condoms has now reached absurd levels that some claim that the NYPD's discriminatory use of stop and frisk and arrests over the carrying of birth control may pose a risk to public health.

"Those who have been targeted by the police, or who know people who have, are so afraid of carrying condoms that they often don't," The Village Voice has reported.

"In a 2012 study by the Sex Workers Project and the PROS Network, a New York City coalition of sex workers, organizers, and service providers, close to half of the participants reported not carrying condoms at some point out of fear of police repercussions. Among participants who identified as either transgender female or another gender identity besides male or female, the rate was a staggering 75 percent," The Village Voice has reported.

"The New York City Department of Health has been giving away free condoms since 1971, and has made condom distribution a centerpiece of its public-health program over the past six years," added The Village Voice.

"The Department of Health is flooding the city with free condoms, and the police department is using those very condoms to make the quality-of-life arrests that are clogging the courts. It is difficult to avoid the impression that the NYPD is deliberately seeking to increase quality-of-life arrests—perhaps even meet quotas—with arrests that are blatantly at odds with the city’s own public-health policy," The Village Voice has reported.

New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn looks the other way, because she wants to stay in good standing with Police Commish Raymond Kelly. She puts political expediency over privacy and civil rights.

Related : SCOTUS justice Antonin Scalia suggests women have no right to contraception

Read more : Christine Quinn Betrays LGBT New Yorkers