GMHC Its a Chop

Monday, February 18, 2013

Boycot the Latex Ball 2013




The House Ball Historic & Cultural Institute’s second; GMHC, It’s a Chop; protest by council members and supporters was held on Friday February 15th, at the LGBT Center in New York City. The organization, Men of all Colors Together, honored Gay Men’s Health Crisis (GMHC) and executive director Marjorie Hill, who was in attendance and saw us protesting outside the center. We contacted Men of all Colors Together in advance to let them know that we plan a peaceful demonstration. We educated Men of all Colors Together before hand why we are protesting GMHC and we invited them to support our cause.

Louis, a LGBT activist, friend and supporter, produced a great video about the protest with Ballroom Hall of Famer Kevin Omni and Muhammad Omni, who were speaking on behalf of the House Ball community. They are sharing with us why the community should boycott the 2013 Latex Ball at Roseland and why GMHC should gracefully fade out its artistic programs from the House Ball community. We are suggesting that GMHC goes back to their roots of HIV/AIDS prevention and education.

Please click on the link to watch the video by Louis and learn what Kevin and Muhammad have to say about GMHC and our concerns. http://youtu.be/DOH2UFdz7H4

Our next GMHC protest will be held on Thursday March 21st at Cipriani on 42 street across from Grand Central in NYC at 6:30pm, where GMHC is holding a large fundraiser. This event is an opportunity for us to reach many GMHC supporters and to educate the community at large about our concerns with the Latex Project program by the GMHC agency. Please save the date and come out and support us at Cipriani, because we need a strong presence to make an impact.

Please join our third protest on the 21st of March and let your voices to be heard. The blog link below has more information about WHY to boycott the 2013 Latex Ball http://gmhcitsachop.blogspot.com/2012...

Our second protest was very successful in bringing more attention to our concerns to the community at large. We had an opportunity to talk to people about our concerns and we learned from the community more about GMHC and how they are wasting money on focus groups for the AIDS Walk, which raised over 6 million dollars in 2012, but they don’t have any money for a metro card for their clients attending the CAP meeting, which is a meeting by GMHC clients to give feedback to GMHC about their programs.

In addition to the protest at Cipriani, members from the Council are also going to be handing out flyers at the LGBT Business Expo on March 9th and 10th at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City. Our member Rob De Anthony, founder of the Our Youth organization offered his support and is providing us with table space and flyer distribution at the Expo.

Can You Afford Not To Support.
Please share our concerns with your friends and the community.

Council Chairs
Kevin Omni and Wolfgang Busch
Serving our community for 30 years.