Dan Savage on KRCL Tonight

[More Prop 8] Tonight from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m., KRCL-90.9's Troy Williams will host a conversation with Dan Savage*, editor of Seattle alternative newspaper The Stranger and a nationally syndicated sex advice columnist, on the station's public affairs program RadioActive.

Readers of City Weekly and Salt Blog might recognize the name. Savage was one of the first gay activists in the country to urge a total boycott of Utah (yeah, that's right. The whole state) the day after Californians passed Proposition 8 which bans same-sex marriage in their state. As is well-known by now, with the steady urging of the LDS hierarchy, members of the Mormon Church donated about $22 million to help pass the measure. Many of the biggest spenders live right here in Utah.

CW president John Saltas, who goes back years with Savage in the tight-knit community of altie papers, chose to drop Savage's sex column, which we had been running online. Saltas has explained his stand on the blanket boycott that Savage and others have been pushing, here and here.

I ran into Williams on a Main Street sidewalk earlier today. He promises the show will be lively. Williams, who is gay, told me he doesn't like the notion of a Utah boycott, nor does he support Saltas in his choice to drop Savage. "I want to heal the community," he told me, waving his arms in that big, expansive way of making a happy globe. Tune in, or better yet, call the show and be heard.

*That's Savage in the pix, though god knows how old that shot is. (Holly Mullen)

The Gay Vote

[Trends in Democracy] Let's see. On a chilly, rainy Sunday night, more than 600 people turn out at the Salt Lake City Main Library plaza for a candlelight vigil protesting California's Proposition 8. Of particular emphasis was the deep involvement of the LDS Church in the ballot measure to outlaw same-sex marriage in California.

Perhaps the reporter's estimate of turnout was a bit optimistic. What if it were only 400 protesters?

Hmmm.

I'd say any candidate in any party in Utah ought to start taking these numbers seriously. Ignore the issues that matter to gay and lesbian voters and their families at your peril. Even in Utah. (Holly Mullen)