All Things LGBTQ+ (4 Viewers)

[Farb]

Didn't really see a place for this so I thought I would start a thread about all things LGBTQ since this is a pretty hot topic in our culture right now

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/17/sup...y-that-refuses-to-work-with-lgbt-couples.html

• The Supreme Court on Thursday delivered a unanimous defeat to LGBT couples in a high-profile case over whether Philadelphia could refuse to contract with a Roman Catholic adoption agency that says its religious beliefs prevent it from working with same-sex foster parents.
• Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in an opinion for a majority of the court that Philadelphia violated the First Amendment by refusing to contract with Catholic Social Services once it learned that the organization would not certify same-sex couples for adoption.

I will admit, I was hopeful for this decision by the SCOTUS but I was surprised by the unanimous decision.

While I don't think there is anything wrong, per se, with same sex couples adopting and raising children (I actually think it is a good thing as it not an abortion) but I also did not want to see the state force a religious institution to bend to a societal norm.

 

[Optimus Prime]

Enthusiastically anti-trans internet users are flooding transphobic sports film Lady Ballers’ Rotten Tomatoes page with five-star audience reviews.

Lady Ballers was created by Daily Wire+, the right-wing publication Daily Wire’s production studio, exclusively for streaming on their platform. Written, directed by, and starring Daily Wire CEO Rob Boering, the so-called comedy stars Boering as Rob Gibson, a down-on-his-luck basketball coach who reunites his former high school championship team and enters them in women’s sporting events in hopes of finally winning some games.

Following its December 1 release, Lady Ballers currently has a 95% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes based on 2,500 ratings. Ratings, by the way, can be left by anyone.

“10/10 will watch again and show to my 3rd grade class,” one reviewer wrote.

“I’m so sick of virtue signaling movies, this was refreshing,” another said.

“People complaining about the politics: that’s a big part of the point of the movie,” a third reviewer added. “You couldn’t make Mrs. Doubtfire today. So the movie is self-aware — saying all the words you’re not allowed to say.”

That’s not to say that Lady Ballers didn’t receive its fair share of criticism from audience reviewers.

“The daily wire made a movie somehow worse than their political commentary,” one person wrote in a half-star review.

As a reviewer who gave the film one star put it: “If the Lumiere Brothers was shown this movie as an example of what their creations would eventually wrought upon the world, they would’ve burned all their research and then themselves.”

Lady Ballers’ Rotten Tomatoes page only features four reviews from critics. In a negative review for Decider, writer John Serba describes the film as “racist, sexist, transphobic, and antisemitic.”

“Perhaps [Boering and co] struggle with the idea of societal change; perhaps they believe in nothing whatsoever and are just lashing out at the stuff they don’t understand, don’t want to understand, and never will try to understand,” Serba writes.

During a recent episode of The Ben Shapiro Show, cast member and conservative commentator Ben Shapiro — whose previous credits include spending nearly 45 minutes throwing a tantrum over the Barbie movie’s existence — said that they originally intended to make as a documentary. But then they found out that (gasp!) a group of bigoted cis men in bad wigs can’t simply participate in women’s sports.

“As it turns out, most ladies’ leagues don’t allow any actual men, and [the actors] weren’t willing to go the full distance in terms of what it would require, the actual hormone treatments, to actually play in ladies’ leagues,” Shapiro admitted during an interview with Boering about the film...............

MSN

 

[bird]

Enthusiastically anti-trans internet users are flooding transphobic sports film Lady Ballers’ Rotten Tomatoes page with five-star audience reviews.

Lady Ballers was created by Daily Wire+, the right-wing publication Daily Wire’s production studio, exclusively for streaming on their platform. Written, directed by, and starring Daily Wire CEO Rob Boering, the so-called comedy stars Boering as Rob Gibson, a down-on-his-luck basketball coach who reunites his former high school championship team and enters them in women’s sporting events in hopes of finally winning some games.

Following its December 1 release, Lady Ballers currently has a 95% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes based on 2,500 ratings. Ratings, by the way, can be left by anyone.

“10/10 will watch again and show to my 3rd grade class,” one reviewer wrote.

“I’m so sick of virtue signaling movies, this was refreshing,” another said.

“People complaining about the politics: that’s a big part of the point of the movie,” a third reviewer added. “You couldn’t make Mrs. Doubtfire today. So the movie is self-aware — saying all the words you’re not allowed to say.”

That’s not to say that Lady Ballers didn’t receive its fair share of criticism from audience reviewers.

“The daily wire made a movie somehow worse than their political commentary,” one person wrote in a half-star review.

As a reviewer who gave the film one star put it: “If the Lumiere Brothers was shown this movie as an example of what their creations would eventually wrought upon the world, they would’ve burned all their research and then themselves.”

Lady Ballers’ Rotten Tomatoes page only features four reviews from critics. In a negative review for Decider, writer John Serba describes the film as “racist, sexist, transphobic, and antisemitic.”

“Perhaps [Boering and co] struggle with the idea of societal change; perhaps they believe in nothing whatsoever and are just lashing out at the stuff they don’t understand, don’t want to understand, and never will try to understand,” Serba writes.

During a recent episode of The Ben Shapiro Show, cast member and conservative commentator Ben Shapiro — whose previous credits include spending nearly 45 minutes throwing a tantrum over the Barbie movie’s existence — said that they originally intended to make as a documentary. But then they found out that (gasp!) a group of bigoted cis men in bad wigs can’t simply participate in women’s sports.

“As it turns out, most ladies’ leagues don’t allow any actual men, and [the actors] weren’t willing to go the full distance in terms of what it would require, the actual hormone treatments, to actually play in ladies’ leagues,” Shapiro admitted during an interview with Boering about the film...............

MSN

Stupidity is as universal as influenza and can be just as deadly.

Wtf is wrong with people?

 

[Optimus Prime]

In the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia two weeks ago, a group of adults running a public meeting created a blueprint for how to belittle, betray and dismiss kids.

“I’m honestly terrified,” one of the teens in Lynchburg admitted as she gathered the courage to address the school board that did this. The kids spoke in quavering voices, some wiping away tears at the Lynchburg City School Board meeting on Nov. 14 as they faced down the adults. Others deployed righteously incandescent teen rage.

The students of E.C. Glass High School were defending the $10,000 nonprofit grant they won — through research, hard work and a rigorous application process — to create a safe space for all kids in their school. The school board said it didn’t want to accept the grant. The kids are part of the Gender and Sexuality Alliance, and the organization that gave them the grant helps uplift those in the LGBTQ+ community who are struggling. You can guess which part of this triggered the adults.

The space they envisioned would have comfortable chairs, blankets and low light. It would be a place to go after a panic attack, bullying, or after being in yet another lockdown drill, imagining their own massacres and texting goodbye notes to their parents as my kid did just a few weeks ago in the America he has inherited.

Thanks to this new normal and the growing awareness among educators of mental health issues among kids, “chill” rooms or “calm down” spaces are becoming common in American schools. But this high school — in the hometown of Liberty University, Jerry Falwell’s evangelical indoctrination camp recently deemed unsafe by an Education Department investigation — didn’t have one.

The applicants made it clear the space wouldn’t be just for LGBTQ+ students. It would be for anyone who needs to “just breathe for a second,” said one of the students who confronted the adults Nov. 14.

“Their application was so earnest,” said Justin Tindall, a senior director with the It Gets Better Project, a nonprofit created after LGBTQ+ teen suicides in 2010. The group is known for its videos offering testimonies from adults, both famous and everyday, who endured bullying, hatred and self-doubt — and survived. One of the group’s programs, 50 States, 50 Grants, awards grants for student projects that remind struggling teens of the hope and promise that life will get better.

“Theirs was a simple one,” Tindall said, unlike the murals, field trips or conferences pitched in other places. “This was a proposal for a safe space for all students.”

Seems like some of the adults — terrified of such a notion — may need a safe space of their own.

Animated by a conservative movement linking parental fears and grievances to anything related to being LGBTQ+, they reach for their favorite buzzwords — “indoctrination” and “groomers.” They call drag queens dangerous while ignoring the fact that some of the most notorious predators are coaches and priests.

“Let me be very clear,” said Greg Barry, a grandparent and guardian of a student at the high school, when he spoke to the board and quoted scripture. “The LGBTQ agenda in schools is about indoctrination and grooming our children into an evil and wicked lifestyle,” he said, amid boos from the audience.

Comfy chairs and blankets aren’t dangerous. You know that, right, Greg?

“It definitely broke our spirits,” said Brittany Harris, 17, a junior and the co-president of the club, when she heard that the board didn’t want to accept the grant that students had worked on for weeks................

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/11/30/virginia-school-board-rejects-lgbtq-youth-grant/

 

[MT15]

 

[bird]

Right cause gays don’t have families.

Flocking idiots.

 

[Optimus Prime]

A nonbinary Florida teacher who was fired for using the gender-neutral honorific “Mx.” is accusing the state education department in a lawsuit of discrimination.

AV Schwandes taught science at the Florida Virtual School, an online public high school, until Oct. 24. Schwandes, who uses “they/them” pronouns, started using “Mx.” at the start of the school year in their email signature. They never actually had a conversation with students about the change, they said, adding that students just started using the new honorific once they updated their email signature.

Schwandes, who also goes by AV Vary, was fired when the school told them they had to change the honorific to comply with Florida’s Parental Rights in Education act, what critics have dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” law.

When the law was initially signed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis in March 2022, it prohibited “classroom instruction” on “sexual orientation or gender identity” in kindergarten through third grade “or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate.” The measure was then expanded in May to prohibit such classroom instruction from prekindergarten through eighth grade, restrict health education in sixth through 12th grade, and bar teachers and students from using pronouns and titles that don’t align with their birth sex.

In a lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, Schwandes and two other Florida teachers, both transgender women, allege that the part of the law that bars them from using pronouns and titles consistent with their gender identities discriminates against them on the basis of sex and violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.

“I lost my job, and maybe my career, because Florida lawmakers don’t want maturing young adults to know that I exist,” Schwandes said in a statement Wednesday. “As a high school teacher, I should not have to pretend to be someone I’m not simply because I don’t ascribe to someone else’s rigid ideas of gender. Tolerance is a two-way street. Just as I respect the faith-based beliefs of others, my civil rights need to be respected because I am an American, and I do exist.”

The Florida Department of Education and the Florida Virtual School did not immediately return requests for comment regarding the lawsuit.

Last month, in response to questions about Schwandes’ firing, the Florida Virtual School said in an emailed statement: “As a Florida public school, FLVS is obligated to follow Florida laws and regulations pertaining to public education. This includes laws … pertaining to the use of Personal Titles and Pronouns within Florida’s public school system.”.........

MSN

 

[Optimus Prime]

Thursday night, a Delaware County school board voted to ban LGBTQ+ Pride flags and other symbols promoting "activist causes" from the classroom.

The Big Walnut Local Schools Board passed it in a heated vote 3-2. This means there is a ban on "flags, banners, posters, electronic Insignia and other items" in classrooms or anywhere on school property that "promote activist causes, or otherwise deemed controversial."

United States, school mascots, and Ohio flags are permitted...........

MSN

 

[Optimus Prime]

At first glance, they could be letters to Santa Claus from any excited young child, hoping they have been good enough to earn a special gift. Meek is looking forward to hearing sleigh bells: “I think I have tried my best this year. I try to be positive,” they wrote. Alex, meanwhile, would love a bicycle and gift cards to bring some cheer to the end of an “extremely hard year”.

Look a little deeper, and all is not as it seems. The letters are genuine, but their authors are young people who are transgender or non-binary, writing not to the North Pole but to an alternative seasonal benefactor named Transanta, whose workshop exists in cyberspace.

Transanta is, unlike their world-famous namesake, more of an idea than an individual. A project from the anti-discrimination creative arts organization Allies in Arts, the website transanta.com pairs LGBTQ+ youth in need of help with anonymous donors willing to give it, by way of an Amazon gift registry.

Many of the requests are from young people experiencing hardship or trauma, some having been rejected by their families or communities. According to Transanta, they are seeking “basic needs such as gift cards for food, school supplies, gender affirming clothes, and mobility aids, as well as items just for the joy of the season like art supplies, cool accessories and toys for furry best friends”.

This is the fourth year that Allies in Arts has run the program, which it describes as a mutual aid social media campaign open to those up to the age of 24, and which by the end of last month had received almost 2,000 letters.

Transanta posts the correspondence, often accompanied by colorful artwork, on its website. They sit alongside a hyperlink to that person’s gift registry, allowing anybody to purchase items that will be delivered directly to the recipient in confidence.

“Through anonymous and safe gift-giving, trans and queer youth who are houseless, in foster care, or otherwise without vital support receive the gifts they want and the affirmation they need from people all over the world,” the group says.

“Anyone can be a Santa. Transness is so beautiful and we are celebrating our magic. By investing in trans care, you are investing in trans survival.”…….

Wishes come true for trans youth thanks to Transanta donors’ goodwill

A project from an anti-discrimination creative arts organization pairs LGBTQ+ youth in need of help with donors willing to give it

www.theguardian.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

When Travis Covitz arrived in Rochester, in upstate New York, in 2022, he moved into an apartment owned by gay landlords on a major thoroughfare where shop windows displayed LGBTQ+ safe-space stickers.

Covitz, a 23-year-old transgender man, ended up in Rochester somewhat by accident for a medical research job after graduating from Cornell University, a two-hour drive south in the progressive college town of Ithaca. “This is giving me similar vibes,” he thought upon his arrival in Rochester. He felt safe walking through the city dressed in drag, to the gay club where he eventually took a second job as a barback.

The culture of Rochester marked a noticeable contrast from his home state of Arizona, which has banned trans girls from school sports and tried to stop students from using pronouns and bathrooms that align with their gender identities.

In many ways, the environment for trans people in Arizona has become worse since Covitz graduated from high school there in 2018. And while he didn’t leave the state specifically for that reason, he’s grateful to be living in a place like Rochester.

He’s not alone. Community leaders and healthcare providers in Rochester say they’ve seen a significant influx of trans residents, many of whom are fleeing states that are hostile to their rights.

The entirety of New York is a self-declared sanctuary state for trans individuals, but the obvious destination of New York City is too expensive and overwhelming to be a realistic option for many of those looking to relocate.

“Something about that seems to be driving people to reach out to Rochester,” said Andrew Moran, president of the Rochester Rainbow Union, which maintains a “Lilac Library” and community space in the city.

To the outside eye, upstate New York is often seen as little more than a sea of reliably red counties – indeed, much of the state outside New York City voted for Donald Trump in 2020.

But floating in that sea is a handful of blue islands: the cities of Albany, Syracuse, Buffalo and Rochester. In all four places, the Democratic bent translates to inclusivity; Albany, Syracuse and Rochester (whose Pride celebration stretches into July, because “one month isn’t enough for us – we need two!”) earned perfect scores of 100 in Human Rights Campaign’s most recent municipal equality index, and Buffalo scored a 97.…..

Trans people are finding safe haven in an unexpected place: upstate New York

Rochester, Albany and other cities offer refuge from anti-trans laws in other states and ballooning costs in big cities

www.theguardian.com

 

[MT15]

This seems like a big deal:

 

[Optimus Prime]

Pope Francis authorizes blessings for same-sex couples | CNN

Pope Francis formally permitted Roman Catholic priests to bless same-sex couples on Monday, in a significant shift in Vatican doctrine.

www.cnn.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

AUSTIN (KXAN) — The Seattle Children’s Hospital filed a lawsuit in Travis County District Court on Dec. 7 against the Texas Office of the Attorney General (OAG), after that agency requested documents related to gender transition policies and any such care provided to Texas children.

However, hospital claims that the OAG lacks jurisdiction to demand such records from the hospital, and that Washington’s “Shield Law” protects it from requests made by states that “restrict or criminalize reproductive and gender-affirming care.”

“The Shield Law prohibits Washington-based entities such as Seattle Children’s from ‘[c]omply[ing] with subpoena, warrant, court order, or other civil or criminal legal process for records, information, facilities, or assistance related to protected health care services that are lawful in the state of Washington,'” the lawsuit stated.

KXAN reached out to the OAG multiple times prior to publication; however, the agency never replied to our requests..........

MSN

 

[SystemShock]

Pope Francis authorizes blessings for same-sex couples | CNN

Pope Francis formally permitted Roman Catholic priests to bless same-sex couples on Monday, in a significant shift in Vatican doctrine.

www.cnn.com

... but still going to hell.

The blessings may be carried out providing they are not part of regular Church rituals or liturgies, nor at the same time as a civil union, according to a Vatican document approved by the pope

So, basically, blessing a boat.

Poor Catholic church, trying so hard to catch up to the 20th century.

 

[MT15]

AUSTIN (KXAN) — The Seattle Children’s Hospital filed a lawsuit in Travis County District Court on Dec. 7 against the Texas Office of the Attorney General (OAG), after that agency requested documents related to gender transition policies and any such care provided to Texas children.

However, hospital claims that the OAG lacks jurisdiction to demand such records from the hospital, and that Washington’s “Shield Law” protects it from requests made by states that “restrict or criminalize reproductive and gender-affirming care.”

“The Shield Law prohibits Washington-based entities such as Seattle Children’s from ‘[c]omply[ing] with subpoena, warrant, court order, or other civil or criminal legal process for records, information, facilities, or assistance related to protected health care services that are lawful in the state of Washington,'” the lawsuit stated.

KXAN reached out to the OAG multiple times prior to publication; however, the agency never replied to our requests..........

MSN

This seems like it should be dismissed out of hand. What right does the TX AG have to any records from a hospital in WA?

 

[Optimus Prime]

As a gay man growing up in Russia, books were Vladimir Kosarevsky’s refuge, offering him a precious glimpse into lives that in some way echoed his own.

So when the Moscow librarian received orders late last year to destroy books referencing same-sex relationships – part of a sweeping attack on gay and transgender rights – Kosarevsky knew it was a line he wouldn’t cross.

“I realised that if I did it, I would never ever be able to forgive myself,” Kosarevsky told the Guardian from northern Spain, where he is claiming asylum. “It had always been important to me to see those heroes in books, because it represents you somehow. It makes you visible, even when the politics in Russia are determined to erase you.”

Kosarevsky, who at the time was the manager of Moscow’s Anna Akhmatova library, decided to ignore the orders. Instead, he began hiding books, loading them into boxes that he tucked away at the library.

Others, such as a signed copy of My White, a tale of two lesbians raising a child by the Russian author Xenia Burzhskaya, he stashed in the library safe. When pushed for proof that the books had been destroyed, he handed over falsified documents.

He went one step further, leaking the list of the more than 50 books he had been told to purge – from authors such as Haruki Murakami, Danielle Steel and Jean Genet – to independent media.

To hear the 39-year-old tell it, it was a rebellion that had been long in the making. As an openly gay man living in Moscow, he had constantly grappled with discrimination. But the situation spiralled after Russia invaded Ukraine and the country’s politicians seized on the promotion of “traditional values”, pushing through anti-LGBTQ+ legislation that cast Kosarevsky and others as scapegoats for the country’s woes. “Basically the masks came off,” he said.

He initially attempted to tune out of the political situation, burying himself in work at the library. After his brother died from cancer last summer, his focus shifted to supporting his sister-in-law and the couple’s five children.

That is, until the instructions to comply with the anti-LGBTQ+ law came trickling down from his superiors. “I had been discriminated against many times. Now I had to be the one who censors things? And destroys books? No, that’s fascism.”

He worried that the law – which rights groups say functionally outlaws any act or public mention of same-sex relationships – was a slippery slope. “They’re banning LGBTIQ literature today. What comes tomorrow – they take away our right to live?”………

‘No, that’s fascism’: the librarian who defied Russia’s purge of LGBTQ+ books

When Vladimir Kosarevsky was ordered to destroy gay novels, he raised the alarm instead – then went to Spain to rebuild his life

www.theguardian.com

 

[SystemShock]

A nonbinary Florida teacher who was fired for using the gender-neutral honorific “Mx.” is accusing the state education department in a lawsuit of discrimination.

AV Schwandes taught science at the Florida Virtual School, an online public high school, until Oct. 24. Schwandes, who uses “they/them” pronouns, started using “Mx.” at the start of the school year in their email signature.

Mexican AV Schwandes?

 

[Optimus Prime]

Somethng decent from Ted Cruz for a chenge
=================================

A Republican member of the House of Representatives spoke in support of a Ugandan law that provides the death penalty for those convicted of "aggravated homosexuality."

Salon reported on Wednesday that Rep. Tim Walberg, who's represented Michigan in Congress since 2011, made the speech in October in Uganda at a national prayer breakfast with the country's president in attendance.

In his speech, Walberg, a former pastor, railed against "the World Health Organization, or the United Nations, or sadly some in our administration in America" that have been outspoken against a new Ugandan law from May criminalizing homosexuality.

The law not only allows for 20-year sentences for "promoting homosexuality," but also stipulates death for "serial offenders."

The representative also spoke at length about his disdain for the idea of transgender people existing at all.

"I've been told all throughout COVID and everything else, 'Follow the science,'" Walberg said. "But when they come to understanding that there's male and female and God created it, that science and to lie to our children, to groom our children, to think that they can determine whatever they want… That's not science."

He added that "Your esteemed president, his excellence President Musevini, needs a nation that stands with him and says, 'though the rest of the world is pushing back on you, though there are other major countries that are trying to get into you and ultimately change you: Stand firm. Stand firm.'".

Though Walberg supports Uganda's anti-LGBT law, one notable member of Congress, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, spoke out against it online after it was enacted...........

MSN

A Republican House member spoke in support of a Ugandan law that doles out a death penalty for 'aggravated homosexuality'

Rep. Tim Walberg traveled to Uganda to voice his support for the country's law that sentences people to death for "aggravated homosexuality."

www.businessinsider.com

 

[Bigdaddysaints]

Ted Cruz is against criminalization and death penalty for LGBTQ people, he is more of a reeducation and gay camp kind of guy..