Message-Id: <199409170812.BAA13812@netcom13.netcom.com>
Subject: MEXICAN CHIAPAS REBELS ADOPT PRO-GAY PLANKS
From: rwockner@netcom.com (Rex Wockner)
To: gaynet@queernet.org
Date: Sat, 17 Sep 1994 01:12:09 -0700 (PDT)

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Copyright (c) 1994 Rex Wockner. All rights reserved.
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     CHIAPAS GUERRILLAS ADOPT PRO-GAY PLATFORM AT CONVENTION

                       by Rex Wockner
                     rwockner@netcom.com 

        The Zapatista guerrillas who fought the Mexican government in 
January in southern Chiapas state incorporated a list of gay-rights 
demands into the official document that emerged from their National 
Democratic Convention held in August in the Chiapas jungle. And even more 
remarkable: the 7,000 delegates to the gathering accepted the gay planks 
without any controversy.
        Seventy leaders of Mexican gay groups met in Mexico City before 
the convention and prepared demands that included a national 
anti-discrimination law, improved education on homosexuality in schools, 
appointment of gays and lesbians to government positions, a government 
campaign against homophobia, and non-biased AIDS education.
        Sixteen gay and lesbian leaders then travelled to Chiapas and 
presented the demands to the convention.
        "Some convention delegates were surprised but there were no 
arguments against us during the assembly," said Tijuana gay leader 
Alejandro Garcia. 
        "It was a climate of equality and brotherhood. In a situation 
like that, when someone is homophobic, no one will support him.
         "The most important result," Garcia said, "is that our ideas 
were disseminated. Many people with very little knowledge of the gay 
movement now have heard a lot more about it."
        The convention's overall aims included proposing a new Mexican 
constitution, preparing demands of Mexico's new president (which turned 
out to be Ernesto Zedillo), and furthering the rebels' campaigns for 
improved basic services, human-rights reforms and a democratic political 
system.
        Many at the gathering were predicting a new wave of Zapatista 
violence if Zedillo's Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) stole the 
Aug. 21 election through vote fraud, as it has done many times since 
coming to power in the 1920s.
        But the election was generally reported to be Mexico's "cleanest" 
ever, with only scattered reports of corruption. Zedillo apparently 
legitimately got 49 percent of the vote, with two other major candidates 
splitting most of the rest.

                           == END ==