All Things LGBTQ+ (3 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]

Fifteen years after my sunscreen-filled days of sleep-away camp, I arrived at Camp Indigo Point in June with the hope that I could immerse myself in queer and trans joy — an opportunity for which my 13-year-old self could have only dreamed.


I went on to spend the week with 120 LGBTQ+ kids and 50 LGBTQ+ counselors and staff from 30 states, braving the sweltering humidity in rural Southern Illinois.

Upon arriving, I was struck by yurts decorated with pride flags and a morning bugle call preceded by music from Chappell Roan. Soon enough, I observed a camp with a beautifully liberated freedom of expression.


Camp Indigo Point was founded three years ago by Shira Berkowitz, Dan Grabel and Daniel Bogard. They each brought unique strengths to the table to create a safe haven for queer and trans youth in the Midwest.

They also each spent formative years attending sleep-away camps where they made lifelong friends and grew with others their own age. They all share a lifetime of love for camp and building rituals away from one’s immediate home environment — and wanted to create that same experience in a safe haven for LGBTQ+ youth.

The mission hits especially close to home for transgender co-founder Berkowitz. In their day job as a senior director of public policy in the Missouri legislature, they lobby against anti-LGBTQ+ laws.

Bogard, a rabbi based in St. Louis, fondly recalls his decades of involvement with Jewish sleep-away camps. He and his wife Karen wanted to give their transgender son the kinds of memories and values Bogard had during his own childhood.

“We immediately understood that we were going to save lives, that we were just going to run a regular camp and there were going to be kids who would stay alive because of it,” Bogard said……..

https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/2024/09/05/camp-indigo-point/

 

[Optimus Prime]

GLOUCESTER, Mass. (AP) — A transgender teenager from Massachusetts is recovering after allegedly being punched, kicked and stomped upon by other high schoolers at a party.

Sixteen-year-old Jayden Tkaczyk said he was at an outdoor party Friday night in Gloucester when as many as a dozen teenagers attacked him and called him homophobic slurs. They chased Tkaczyk into the woods, where police found him. He said he was taken to a local hospital and treated for his injuries, including a broken bone under his right eye and scratches and bruises on his body.

“I was scared, but I thought to myself that if I escape and I get out, that things will eventually get better,” Tkaczyk told The Associated Press. “As I was getting hit, it was terrifying. I thought I was going to die, but I tried to keep a positive mindset.”

Tkaczyk’s mother, Jasmine, said she was terrified when she got the call that her son was in the hospital.……

A transgender teen in Massachusetts says other high schoolers beat him at a party

A transgender teenager from Massachusetts is recovering after he was allegedly beaten by other high schoolers at a party.

apnews.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

Last month, news outlets reported that Visit Florida, an agency funded by state taxpayers and members of the tourism industry, removed its “LGBTQ Travel” section from its website. The move aligns with and comes on the heels of several policy changes that directly target the LGBTQ community in Florida, notably the passage and then expansion of a law that has become known as “Don’t Say Gay” and a bill that banned transgender minors and restricted transgender adults from receiving gender-affirming care.

When asked about the change on the Visit Florida website, Florida’s Republican Governor Ron DeSantis said he was made aware of it after the fact, but celebrated its push away from identity politics. He noted, “We’re not going to be segregating people by these different characteristics… that’s just now how we’re operating.”

In portraying this issue as one of identity politics that’s wrought social division, DeSantis and other conservatives willfully ignore how this is a matter of protected civil rights and freedoms—ones that reveal who is welcomed and who is not in Florida. It also betrays the fact that LGBTQ tourism remains big business for Florida, and indeed, has been central to the success of this booming industry for decades.

Prior to the Civil War when Florida joined the Confederacy, roughly 44% of the state’s sparse population consisted of enslaved people. The state even had a higher population of alligators than it did of people at the time. And so, in the aftermath of the war, Florida boosters launched campaigns to attract more wealthy white people to the state..............

For years, Miami and Havana battled it out over which city would be the most accommodating playground for tourists. In the process, an early form of LGBTQ tourism emerged. Miami officials informally adopted a policy of seasonal policing and enforcement of its laws—often looking the other way and, at times, even encouraging queer performances, acts, and entertainment for tourists and residents alike.

It worked. By the 1930s, Miami had a thriving and visible queer culture wherein people who today would likely identify as LGBTQ often found work, made intimate connections, and built community. During these years, or before air conditioning became a mainstay of Florida life, the area’s tourist season stretched from about October to mid-March. During those months, Miami law enforcement generally allowed the public visibility of LGBTQ people. They did so because it was part of the appeal for tourists; many travelers lamented when nightspots that featured drag performers, for example, were shut down.

And to appease moralists who wanted Miami to remain a “model city” without such entertainment, local authorities regularly conducted what one newspaper called “Miami’s seasonal ‘face washing’” from mid-March to the start of the tourist season. That included raids on vice dens and queer nightspots.

Until at least about the mid-1940s, this more permissive culture created a more tolerant climate, at least seasonally, for LGBTQ people, especially those who were white. Officials knew then that LGBTQ tourism was a central part of the city’s culture and that curbing it would hurt their pocketbooks.

By the late 1940s and ‘50s, or as gay identities and communities became more formalized and visible, the state launched new campaigns against LGBTQ people—ones with striking parallels to what Florida is seeing today. Last year, major organizations including the Human Rights Campaign, Equality Florida, the NAACP, and the Florida Immigrant Coalition, issued travel or relocation advisory warnings on Florida. The NAACP maintained that Florida’s current laws are “openly hostile towards African Americans, people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals.”

Today, several areas throughout Florida—including Key West, Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Wilton Manors, Tampa, and Orlando, among several others—bring in billions of dollars every year to the state in promoting LGBTQ tourism. In the Orlando area alone, estimates from last year show that LGBTQ tourism brought in roughly four million visitors and more than $3.1 billion in spending................

LGBTQ Tourism Helped Put Florida on the Map

The recent removal of the "LGBTQ Travel" section of the Visit Florida website ignores history.

time.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

Restrictive voter identification laws in some states could make it more difficult for transgender Americans to cast ballots in November’s general election, according to a report released Tuesday by the Williams Institute.

Upward of 210,000 voting-eligible transgender adults are likely to face barriers to voting this fall because they lack identity documents that match their gender and live in states with strict voter ID laws that conduct their elections primarily in person, according to the report, including an estimated 91,300 who could face disenfranchisement in states with rigid photo ID requirements.

Thirty-six states require or request that voters show some form of identification at the polls, such as a valid driver’s license, state-issued identification card or military ID. In nine states — Kansas, Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Mississippi and Georgia — voter ID laws require voters to present photo identification to cast their votes.

Voters in those states without acceptable identification must vote on a provisional ballot, used to record a vote when there are questions about a voter’s eligibility. In some instances, state law may require voters to submit a photo ID after Election Day for the provisional ballot to count, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

According to Tuesday’s Williams Institute report, voters in 27 states will face new restrictions for the 2024 general election that were not present for the 2020 general election.

Nearly 173,000 transgender adults live in states with the strictest voter identification laws, according to the report, accounting for roughly a fifth of transgender Americans eligible to vote in the 2024 elections. An estimated 276,500 trans adults lack identity documents that correctly reflect their chosen name or gender identity, though not all of them live in states with voter ID laws.

“Voter ID laws can create a unique barrier to voting for a substantial number of transgender people, which is particularly impactful in elections decided by a small number of votes,” said Jody L. Herman, a senior public policy scholar at the Williams Institute and the report’s co-author.

Three of the seven battleground states that are likely to determine the presidential election — Wisconsin, North Carolina and Georgia — have restrictive voter ID laws, impacting the ability of roughly 135,500 transgender adults to vote, according to a 2022 Williams Institute estimate............

https://thehill.com/homenews/lgbtq/4871761-transgender-voters-voter-id-laws/

 

[Optimus Prime]

One morning in February, 16-year-old Levi Hormuth took off school, his parents called out of work, and the three began a five and a half hour drive.

The purpose of the 350-mile trip from their home in St Charles county, Missouri, to Chicago, Illinois, was a routine doctor’s appointment.

Levi, a transgender boy, now 17 and in his final year of high school, had been a patient at the Washington University (WashU) Transgender Center since he was 13.

The center, a short drive from home, had helped Levi in his transition, providing counseling and eventually hormone treatments at age 15.

The testosterone had profoundly positive impacts, Levi and his parents said, helping him overcome significant mental distress stemming from his gender dysphoria.

But in June 2023, Missouri’s Republican governor enacted a bill banning gender-affirming healthcare for youth under 18. The law had an exception for youth like Levi who were already accessing the care, but WashU, fearing legal liability, stopped prescribing medications to all trans youth.

The best alternative for Levi and his family was to cross state lines.

“The fact that I have to drive five hours both ways for treatment just shows our government in Missouri doesn’t care about things that are actually important,” Levi said one afternoon, sitting on his backyard deck with his parents in St Charles, a county that is more conservative than neighboring St Louis.

“We have potholes galore that should be fixed, we have horrible crime rates. It’s enraging that they’re not focusing on what matters and listening to our voices.”

The stakes of the presidential election are enormous for people like Levi and the broader LGBTQ+ community.

Donald Trump has promised aggressive attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, with a focus on trans youth, who have been a central target of the GOP’s culture war.

The former president’s proposed “plan to protect children from left-wing gender insanity” includes ordering federal agencies to end all programs that “promote … gender transition at any age”; revoking funding from hospitals that provide gender-affirming care to youth and subjecting them to US justice department investigations; punishing schools that affirm trans youth; and pushing a federal law stating the government doesn’t legally recognize trans people.

Trump has also pledged to rescind federal LGBTQ+ nondiscrimination policies, which could mean a loss of protections in housing, healthcare, employment, education and a range of federal programs.

He has promised new credentialing for teachers to “promote positive education about the nuclear family, the roles of mothers and fathers”. The Republican platform calls for advancing a “culture that values the sanctity of marriage”

Project 2025, the rightwing manifesto authored by Trump allies, is even more explicit, saying Biden-Harris pro-LGBTQ+ policies should be replaced by ones supporting the “formation of stable, married, nuclear families” and “heterosexual, intact marriage”.

It says adoption agencies, healthcare workers and businesses should be able to reject LGBTQ+ people, and faith-based government contractors should be allowed to deny services to people who don’t fit “biblically based” definitions of marriage.

Some legal scholars have warned that marriage equality, already endangered at the supreme court, could be further threatened under Trump,particularly if he gets the opportunity to appoint additional justices.….

If Trump wins the election, he could launch a ‘catastrophic’ rollback of LGBTQ+ rights

Republican state lawmakers are already targeting trans people with discriminatory policies. A second-term Trump is likely to use the US government to launch a ‘catastrophic’ rollback of LGBTQ+ rights

www.theguardian.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

Same-sex couples in Thailand can get married when equality law takes effect in January

Thailand’s landmark marriage equality bill has been officially written into law, allowing same-sex couples to legally wed.

apnews.com