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Welcome!

API Equality-LA is a coalition of organizations and individuals working in the local Asian and Pacific Islander (API) community to build support for the right of same-sex couples to marry. From its founding in 2005, API Equality-LA has uniquely bridged the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community with the civil rights and other social justice communities, united by a common understanding of the parallels between past anti-miscegenation and current marriage equality struggles.

API Equality-LA is a partner with many other statewide and local coalitions, including API Equality and API Equality-San Francisco.

To learn more about API Equality-LA, click here.

Sisters Standing Up For Love

When:Saturday, April 10, 2010

Where: Monterey Hills Restaurant, 3700 Ramona Blvd., Monterey Park, CA, 91754 [View on Google Maps]

Contact: Brian Nguyen | contact@apiequalityla.org | (323) 860-7348

Click here for a link to this article.

API Equality-LA at SGV Lunar New Year Festival

As a part of our yearly Lunar New Year activities, API Equality LA participated in the San Gabriel Valley Lunar New Year Festival in Alhambra for a third year. Throughout the day, led by veteran volunteer Alan Chan who spent the whole day at the festival, a dozen volunteers talked to festival-goers about marriage equality and LGBT rights. With varying levels of Chinese-language ability and a willingness to "just do it!", volunteers gamely approached hundreds of people to engage in friendly conversations in English, Cantonese and Mandarin Chinese (even Spanish on occasion) about this issue and shared New Year well-wishes and chocolate-stuffed Year of the Tiger Red envelopes.

Among the crowd, we met a long-time couple happy to chat about their experiences and their passion about this issue, a program coordinator of a San Gabriel Valley High School Youth Summit eager to increase LGBT representation and visibility and many, many supporters eager to sign our support pledges. We were most excited to have two high school students who came and did outreach with us - for one of them, this was her second year out there with us! The times are quickly changing and these young, courageous volunteers were emblematic of that.

Special thanks go out to Mimi Saidane for her thorough efforts to recruit volunteers (even after the rain-out a week earlier) and to Andre Ting, who provided the Chinese newspaper article that was very well-received by monolingual Chinese-speaking community members Alhambra. And did we mention Alan Chan spent the whole day volunteering; he made sure everyone had nourishment, some training and the necessary materials throughout the day? Thank you, Alan, you set a new standard. Finally, a shout out and big props to all the other volunteers who joined us that day or helped make it happen: Glenn, Michael, Robin, Wilson, Linda, Kat, Steven, Ericson, Genevieve, Greg and William!

To join this fabulous team, join us at the Thai New Year Festival Outreach or come to the next Outreach and Recruitment Committee meeting the first Thursday of each month at 7p at KIWA. Next one's March 4 with a late cocktail hour! Contact us for more info!

Click here for a link to this article.

Chinese Lunar New Year, 2010

Thanks to all for participating in this year's parade! It was the most amazing one yet!

Lunar New Year

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API Equality-LA and AQWA at the Westminster Tet Parade

On Feb 13, AQWA marched with Vietnamese LGBT groups in the Tet parade in Little Saigon. This was a historic day since this was the first time an LGBT contingency participated in the annual new year’s parade. Read more here.

Click here for a link to this article.

Activist of the Month: Steven Truong

API Equality-LA's Activist of the Month: Steven Truong We're proud to present Steven as our February Activist of the Month!

What is one sound that characterizes you?
Crackle. He's the good-hearted, fun and smartest of the three Rice Krispies characters (Snap, Crackle, and Pop!). I also think he's the most handsome :P

Where are you right now?
Physically, I'm in my office. But my mind is on vacation on a white sandy beach with a bottomless pitcher of margarita.

What is one thing about you that surprises people?
I hate coffee. The smell of coffee nauseates me so much that I usually can't be in a coffee shop for more than a few minutes before I start feeling queezy. But I finally had my first cup of joe last year when I traveled to Seattle and decided it was time for me to give it a shot. That was also my last cup of coffee.

What committee are you involved with in API Equality?
I am involved with (in no particular order) the Outreach and Recruitment, Fundraising, and Media/Website committee. It was too difficult for me to choose just one!

How did you get involved?
I first learned of API Equality-LA when I heard Marshall Wong speak at a town hall meeting hosted by the LA LGBT Center.

Why is it important to continue this fight for marriage equality?
Discrimination should never be accepted--especially institutionalized discrimination. Same-sex relationships are just as real and beautiful as opposite-sex relationships and should be recognized as such. Marriage equality is one of many steps towards equal treatment for the LGBT community.

Hometown?
Monterey Park, CA

Occupation?
Paralegal

Heritage?
I'm a Monterey Park Dude, but grandparents are from Shantou in southern China.

Facebook or Twitter?
I love both websites for changing the way people stay connected and share information. But if I had to choose one, I would choose Twitter since it's a lot less incriminating than Facebook...

Coffee or tea?
Tea! I absolutely cannot stand coffee.

Click here for a link to this article.

Unite The Fight

For the latest in the Prop 8 Trials, click here:
http://unitethefight.blogspot.com

API Equality-LA and the 2010 Effort to Overturn Prop. 8

Recently, there have been some on-line accusations that there is a campaign underway to sabotage efforts to place a measure on the ballot in 2010 to repeal Prop 8. API Equality-LA wants to clarify our position, which has never changed.

Despite our disagreement on when we should try to overturn Prop 8, we are part of the same civil rights movement as the proponents of a 2010 initiative and we view them as our sisters and brothers in our common struggle for marriage equality. We respect the views of 2010 proponents and support their right to gather signatures for an initiative. We are not taking any action to interfere with or undermine this effort.

Click here for a link to this article.

API Equality-LA Reacts to Results in Maine and Washington Affecting Same Sex Couples

Voters supported Maine's Question 1, repealing marriage equality, but voters appear to approve Washington State's Referendum 71, affirming extended domestic partnership protections

Los Angeles - On Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009, voters in Maine repealed a law that allowed marriage between same-sex partners. Doreena Wong, co-chair of API Equality - LA stated, "We are deeply disappointed that the voters in Maine have chosen to reject the rights of same sex couples and have cast their vote for inequality over fairness."

However, Washington State provided a glimmer of hope for the gay marriage movement. Voters seemed to affirm the importance of extended domestic partnership protections, which closely resembles marriage. Reverend Dr. Jonipher Kwong, who heads the Faith committee of API Equality-LA, said, "We are happy that the voters in Washington stood up for gays and lesbians -- but domestic partnership is not marriage and we look forward to the day that Washington grants gays and lesbians full equality under the law."

Click here for a link to this article.

Congrats, Karin!

Congrats are in order to our own Karin Wang who received a Lambda Liberty Awards for her work with API Equality-LA. Below is her acceptance speech.

As a straight ally in the fight for marriage equality, I am often asked why I work on the issue of marriage equality and why I am still committed to this work after such a difficult ride.

It was not something that I planned, and--honestly--it was not even something that I chose. As a civil rights lawyer, I have learned that our battles often choose us. And five years ago, when hundreds of Chinese Americans protested gay marriage in Los Angeles, in the San Gabriel Valley which is the heart of the Asian American community, I was drawn into this particular battle.

The Chinese American protest was striking to me because 100 years ago, California had anti-miscegenation laws, banning marriage between different races.

At that time, Asian immigrants were the largest minority population in the state--brought here to work on the railroads and in the fields--so California, unlike other states, singled out Asian immigrants in its interracial marriage ban. At the same time, the U.S. government passed laws that made it impossible for Asian women to immigrate to the U.S., and even went as far as to strip U.S. citizenship from any American citizen who dared to marry an Asian immigrant.

For me, knowing this history of discrimination against Asian Americans, it was difficult to watch members of my own community advocate discrimination against gays and lesbians--especially when the arguments used against gay marriage are nearly identical, word for word, as the arguments used against marriage to Asians not that long ago.

But perhaps more important is why I am still committed to this work, five years later, with no clear end in sight.

For public interest lawyers the common theme running through much of what we work on is "how difficult is it to win"--the more difficult the issue, the more likely we are to work on it. On November 5th, after Prop 8 passed, I would have put marriage equality at the top of the list of "really, really hard issues to win."

But amazingly, the same election results that are so difficult to accept--because we really should have won--also offer a great lesson of hope and progress.

A few days after the election, the data researcher at the Asian Pacific American Legal Center showed me the exit poll data we had gathered from the November election. The Legal Center has polled voters in Southern California for more than 15 years, tracking Asian American voting trends. In 2000, we polled Asian American voters on Prop 22, the ballot measure that created a statutory--instead of constitutional--ban on marriage equality.

The results were so abysmal--Asian Americans were split roughly 70/30 in favor of Prop 22, significantly worse than the general voters who were split 60/40--that we promptly buried the data and hoped no one would remember that we asked that question.

Last year, California voters narrowed the gap between those that support and those that oppose marriage equality to 52-48, a significant shift in 8 years. That's pretty good, right?

Well, imagine our shock when we looked at our Prop 8 data and saw that Asian Americans voted 54/46 or nearly equal with all other voters--dramatically down from the 70/30 split in 2000. We quickly dug up our "forgotten" data to draw a comparison.

For the non-math majors, here's what happened: California voters narrowed the gap by 14 points in eight years--but Asian Americans narrowed the gap by 30 points in the same period of time.

It's hard to pinpoint all of the causes for the dramatic shift, but it's not a coincidence that during that 2000 to 2008 period, API Equality-LA, the Asian Pacific American Legal Center and dozens of Asian American community groups were engaged in a public education campaign to change hearts and minds in our community.

Every time I am disheartened by the setbacks on the road to equality--not just for LGBTs but in other social justice struggles, I look at the data and I think about the work over the past five years, and I realize that not only is change possible, but that together we can make change.

Click here for a link to this article.

Resource: Let California Ring

Let California Ring, a public education campaign on the freedom to marry for same-sex couples in California, is "reinvigorating." The LCR coalition numbers 50 organizations (including API Equality-LA) working toward marriage equality. Read more by clicking here.

Our Stories

Curtis & Jeff

I don�t feel protected in the sense that if something were to happen to Jeff, I would not be surprised if his parents cut me out in the sense of being able to see him at the hospital,� says Chin, whose own Chinese American family has been warm and accepting of the couple... First-generation Korean immigrants, Kim�s parents still struggle with their only son�s sexual orientation and acknowledging his relationship with another man.

[Read the full story]

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