ROLLING HILLS ESTATES, Calif. (AP) – Palos Verdes Peninsula High School’s new Gay-Straight Alliance has drawn much support this year, surprising officials who feared it would spark security issues for its members.

Students had tried to start the club in previous years, but school officials demurred. Then two students brought in a copy of California’s Safety and Violence Prevention Act of 2000, which requires secondary schools to allow students to form Gay-Straight Alliance groups, and officials changed their minds.

The group’s first adviser backed out, but the organization found a replacement, and more than 370 of the 3,000 students on campus joined. More than 100 attended the first meeting.

Bev Tang of the Gay-Straight Alliance Network said the group’s main goal is to make schools safer for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students by educating the community about sexual diversity.

“We’re not invisible, we’re a part of your community,” Tang said.

The club holds open meetings and fundraisers and plans to participate in the upcoming Peninsula holiday parade. It also hosts smaller, more serious discussion sessions, which are student-led but are conducted in the presence of a teacher.

Similar groups exist in Torrance, Manhattan Beach, Hawthorne and Los Angeles school districts.

Statewide, the number of groups has jumped from 40 to 400 in the past six years.

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. (AP) – Unhappy over anti-gay signs posted by its president, members of Cal State San Bernardino’s College Republicans want their leader to resign because of his anti-gay activities in the club’s name.

The club members were also angry that Ryan Sorba staged a boycott of the perspectives on gender class in the club’s name.

The signs claimed gay people live 20 years less than straight people, and children can be socialized into homosexuality. In a recent issue of the campus newspaper, The Coyote Chronicle, Sorba called the signs a recruiting tool for the club.

Members of the California State University, San Bernardino, club were upset.

“This is an act by the president, Ryan Sorba, on his own free will without getting approval,” said the club’s vice president, Scott Murphy. “We’re in the process of asking Mr. Sorba to step down.”

Sorba couldn’t be located for comment.

“I was rather upset and disturbed by it,” said Murphy, who noted the College Republicans founding president was gay.

Murphy called the university’s president’s office and the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Straight Alliance to apologize.

“I was very glad to hear that the College Republicans were not behind this,’ said Angela Asbell, the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender campus resource officer.

ST. LOUIS (AP) – Organizers of the United States’ first national gay and lesbian conference since the presidential election say resounding voter passage of same-sex marriage bans in 11 states has been hard to bear, leaving members devastated and fearful.

Matt Foreman of New York, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, likened the blow to a death, with soul searching in order.

“Our movement needs to regroup and buckle down,” said Sue Hyde of Cambridge, Mass., director of the “Creating Change” conference that concluded last week.

The presidential election saw 11 more states pass constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage. Missouri and five other states already had passed similar measures.

It’s tough when “the vast majority of citizens in your state not only do not understand you but take hostile steps to change the constitution to take away rights we never even had,” Foreman said. “There’s no way you can put lipstick on that pig.”

Still, organizers are taking the long view, knowing that gay people have moved beyond past discriminatory practices. They were purged from the U.S. military after World War II, blacklisted as subversives by Sen. Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s and subjected to police raids of their gathering places before fighting back in New York City during what became known as the Stonewall Riot of June 27, 1969.

On Nov. 2, 40 gay candidates were elected to local, state and federal offices, according to the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund, the nation’s largest gay and lesbian political action committee.

Foreman said the gay rights movement must not retreat from working for social and legal rights, though the battle is “extremely uphill.”

He and other organizers at the conference said they may not be able to change political leaders, and they see no point in talking to what they call “Anti-Gay Inc.” – to them, a right wing, anti-gay leadership whose mission is “to demonize us.”

“We have to engage our neighbors and co-workers in a deep conversation about our humanity, and the need to be able to take care of our families,” Hyde said.

Hyde said conference organizers believe the state measures passed by voters will be interpreted very broadly to prohibit recognition of same-sex relationships and families, and organizers anticipate the Bush administration will push for a U.S. constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

Organizers say they are deeply troubled that the lives and families of gay people were portrayed as a threat to society in the state campaigns for a same-sex marriage ban. Hyde fears that passage of the measures now means it’s possible for openly gay people in some communities to be physically hurt by those who fear or hate them.

Roey Thorpe, executive director of Basic Rights Oregon, shared a personal story that she believes illustrates the prejudice that a gay person cannot love as truly or as deeply as a heterosexual.

The Portland, Oregon, woman said an employee who was grieving over the death of her husband asked Thorpe, “Do your people feel sad when your person dies?”

“It tells it all,” Thorpe said. “I said, ‘You saw me as a little less human and for me to realize it breaks my heart.’”

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) – A jury has awarded $2.8 million to a former Essex County sheriff’s officer who said she suffered sexual harassment from other officers because she is a lesbian.

The Union County jury returned the verdict Nov. 15 for Karen Caggiano following a three-week trial.

Caggiano, 43, of Bridgewater, testified that she had to use the same bathroom and locker room as male officers in the late 1990s, and that pictures of naked women were posted on lockers.

She endured lewdness, including one sheriff’s officer who repeatedly exposed himself in front of her, according to her lawyers.

One of them, Neil Mullin, said the department issued a “whitewashed” internal affairs report that found no merit to her complaints. Caggiano’s superiors acted maliciously and intended to hurt her, Mullin told The Star-Ledger of Newark.

Sheriff Armando B. Fontoura had no immediate comment after the ruling on whether the department would appeal, a spokesperson said.

Rosemary Alito, who represented Essex County at the trial, maintained that the department had a thorough response to Caggiano’s complaints.

The trial was held in Union County instead of Essex County to avoid conflicts of interest.

NEW YORK (AP) – Good things come in small packages, and Viva Glam lipstick is a prime example.

Over the past 10 years, the lipstick by MAC Cosmetics has raised $40 million for the MAC AIDS Fund.

John Demsey, the chair of the fund and acting president of MAC, says the lipstick is a good, respectable beauty product on its own but the fact that 100 percent of the selling price – not only the proceeds – go to charity has made it “the lipstick heard around the world.”

“It brought incredible visibility to the HIV/AIDS issue in the cosmetics industry, and it’s an emotional connection for people who work for us to be a part of something that’s for the better good,” he says.

MAC was created 20 years ago by former makeup artists and it remains one of the most popular brands for fashion shows and photo shoots. The MAC AIDS Fund was born out of a sense of personal loss, explains Demsey, newly named as the global president of Estee Lauder Cos., because the fashion and beauty industries were disproportionately affected by the disease in its early years.

But, notes Lilia Garcia-Leyva, executive director of the fund, the face of AIDS has changed over the years. “It’s now a young woman’s face,” she says, noting the high HIV/AIDS rates found among women in Africa.

Viva Glam lipsticks are not part of an awareness or research campaign. The fund works with charities that provide daily essentials such as food, shelter and medicine, with a particular emphasis on children, Garcia-Leyva says.

Seasonal greeting cards created by youths affected by HIV/AIDS are another fundraising tool. The Kids Helping Kids cards on their own have raised more than $1 million.

MAC also created a beauty program three years ago called Good Spirits, which helps women undergoing HIV/AIDS treatments look their best. The company’s sales staff is trained to work with women in their own communities who are dealing with hollowing cheeks and shifting fat, particularly to the back of their necks, which are common side effects from their medicines, Garcia-Leyva explains.

“For many of these women, it’s the first time anyone has shown an interest in them personally, not just medically,” she says. “And for the first time, these women are trying to feel and look better.”

Viva Glam now has grown into a collection of five, and it’s the only product that MAC does ads for.

Demsey says Viva Glam V has raised $7.5 million since its launch in February.