A newsreader has been ordered to pay $10,000 in compensation to a trans woman for liking Facebook comments that wrongly branded her “a male bully”.
The dispute began when Canberra radio broadcaster Beth Rep misgendered Bridget Clinch, Australia’s first transgender soldier, in a string of Facebook posts in March 2018. Clinch complained to the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Human Rights Commission, and mediation led to Rep writing an apology and paying Clinch AU$ 700.
However, the ACT said Rep then “added fuel to [the] conflict” by liking many of the offensive comments posted under the apology, including “Bridget Clinch is a male bully”, “I hate Bridget and I don’t even know who he is” and #istandwithbeth.
Rep argued that she didn’t write the comments and had ‘liked’ them to highlight their importance rather than show agreement, but the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal disagreed.
“The respondent could have deleted the comments made against the apology. They were rude, offensive and unacceptable,” said senior tribunal member Bryan Meagher, according to ABC. “Once she was aware of the comments and did not remove them, she is responsible for them.”
By leaving them on the post she had continued to incite hate, the ACT said, actively stirring the debate and encouraging more people to leave vilifying and victimising comments towards the trans woman.
“Even if the respondent was not minded to deactivate comments, there was no need to react to them,” Meagher said. “It was simply not necessary. To do so unnecessarily added fuel to a conflict that the apology was supposed to end.”
Rep was ordered to pay $10,000 to Clinch in compensation, to delete “all posts, statements, information, suggestions or implications” on the matter and to refrain from sharing similar posts in future.
It will likely be a tough blow to Rep, who described herself to the tribunal as a “radical feminist” who believes in resisting what she called “aggressive trans activism”.
LGBTQI History: A Sonoma County Timeline 1947-2000.Wednesdays 1:30-3pm. Online via Zoom. Next week, 9/16 our topic will be “Queering Space: SoCo LGBTQ Bars”. Please contact me to enroll in this FREE class and receivea Zoom invite: [email protected]
California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 145 on Friday evening, ending blatant discrimination against LGBTQ young people on California’s sex offender registry. Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) issued the following statement in response to the governor’s action:
“It’s appalling that in 2020, California continues to discriminate against LGBTQ people, by mandating that LGBTQ young people be placed on the sex offender registry in situations where straight people aren’t required to be placed on the registry. SB 145 simply ends that discrimination by treating LGBTQ young people the exact same way that straight young people have been treated since 1944. I am so grateful that Governor Newsom — one of the LGBTQ community’s strongest allies ever — once again has shown that he gets it and that he’s willing to support our community even when it’s hard. And the politics here are hard, with the massive Trump/QAnon/MAGA misinformation campaign against the legislation. The facts are clear: SB 145 simply ends anti-LGBTQ discrimination. Today, California took yet another step toward an equitable society.”
Equality California, which co-sponsored the bill with the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, released the following statement from Executive Director Rick Chavez Zbur:
“We are incredibly grateful to Governor Newsom for his unyielding commitment to LGBTQ+ civil rights and social justice. Dr. King said, ‘The time is always right to do what is right.’ Signing SB 145 was the right thing to do. It was the right thing to do for LGBTQ+ young people, it was the right thing to do to keep our communities safe and it was the right thing to do for California. If we want a California for all, then we need a justice system that treats all Californians fairly and equally — regardless of who they are, what they look like or whom they love. That goal is at the core of SB 145. Thanks to Governor Newsom and Senator Wiener, California is one step closer to living up to our shared values of fairness, equality and justice for all.”
Senate Bill 145 ends California’s anti-LGTBQ discriminatory treatment of specific sex acts regarding sex offender registry law. Under longstanding California law (since 1944), if an adult has voluntary penile-vaginal intercourse with a minor aged 14, 15, 16, or 17 and is up to 10 years older than the minor, the offense is not automatically registrable. Rather, a judge has discretion whether or not to place the defendant on the sex offender registry depending on the facts of the case. By contrast, if the act is oral sex, anal sex or sexual penetration, the court must place the defendant on the sex offender registry regardless of the facts of the crime and even in cases where the prosecutor and judge do not want to place the defendant on the registry. This distinction in the law is irrational and discriminatory towards LGBTQ young people. For example, if a 19-year-old and 17-year-old couple have voluntary oral sex, the 19-year-old must be placed on the registry. But if it’s vaginal sex, the judge has discretion to place the older party on the registry or to keep them off. SB 145 ends this irrational distinction by treating all voluntary sex the same way that the law currently treats penile-vaginal intercourse.
SB 145 is co-sponsored by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office and Equality California, and is supported by both law enforcement (California District Attorneys Association and California Police Chiefs Association), as well as civil rights advocates, including the the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the California Public Defenders Association, Children Now, the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CALCASA), Lambda Legal, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights.
###
Equality California is the nation’s largest statewide LGBTQ civil rights organization. We bring the voices of LGBTQ people and allies to institutions of power in California and across the United States, striving to create a world that is healthy, just, and fully equal for all LGBTQ people. We advance civil rights and social justice by inspiring, advocating and mobilizing through an inclusive movement that works tirelessly on behalf of those we serve. www.eqca.org
A New Jersey man was charged for detonating an explosive device at a lesbian-owned gym long considered by locals as a “safe haven” for LGBT+ people.
Dwayne A Vandergrift Jr, 35, was charged by federal authorities on September 4 for not only causing devastating damage to the Gloucester City gym, but for unlawful possession of two destructive devices and unlawful possession of a short-barrelled rifle, according to a press release from the US Attorney’s Office for New Jersey.
At around 4am on August 26, Vandergrift tacked the explosive device on the front door of GCity Crossfit Gym, according to surveillance footage.
Sprinting off, the resulting explosion shattered the glass and desolated the door.
An LGBT+ Pride flag decorating it on lithely hanging on the hinges, prompting the gym’s owners as well as the local community to suspect the incident was a hate crime.
LGBT+ gym allegedly bombed by man who searched how to produce makeshift explosives only days before the attack.
Owned by Jenai Gonzales and her wife Ann Panarello, the gym is a “known safe-haven in the area for LGBT+ youth” and many of its personal trainers and staffers are queer, athletic apparel Lifting Culture owner Steven Vitale wrote on his website.
As much as the gym’s owners suspect the attack was motivated by queerphobia, the Attorney’s Office does not specify a motive.
Federal and local law enforcement officers combed Vandergrift’s home on 28 August, finding inside bomb-making materials as well as several weapons, tactical vests, ammunition and around 85 marijuana plants.
Investigators tapped his home computer to find that he had in recent days searched for ways to jerry-rig explosives, including pipe and pressure cooker bombs. He was arrested later that day and is presently in custody.
Vandergrift faces a total prison term of at 20 years as well as a maximum fine of $250,000.
Though the attack left the local LGBT+ community shaken, Vitale wrote: “G-City Crossfit had, and will continue to have, a large gay Pride flag displayed prominently in their front door.”
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released the national Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance results for 2019. It’s clear from the national data that many LGBTQ young people continue to suffer higher health and suicide risks than their peers. This follows the same trends present in an HRC analysis of the 2015 and 2017 data — LGBTQ students are more likely to experience victimization, violence and suicidality. In many areas of the data, transgender students are facing more disparities in 2019 than they were in 2017.
The data show that 43% of transgender youth have been bullied on school property. 29% of transgender youth, 21% of gay and lesbian youth and 22% of bisexual youth have attempted suicide.
Since the YRBS began including data on sexual orientation in 2015 and gender identity in 2017, we’ve seen consistently that LGBTQ youth face greater health disparities than their cisgender straight peers. This data continues to make clear a truth that we’ve long known — that LGBTQ students are not getting the support, affirmation and safety they need and deserve. We must ensure that adults are doing everything possible to support LGBTQ youth, especially those who are living at the intersections of multiple marginalized identities. Complete and robust data collection for our entire community is vital to putting systems and structures in place to support LGBTQ students. The Human Rights Campaign Foundation will continue to provide resources for LGBTQ students and educators across the country and will work with our network of youth-serving professionals to be sure they have the resources and tools they need.
Ellen Kahn, HRC Senior Director, Programs and Partnerships
In 2019, many states collected gender identity data. Data for 14 of these states across more than 107,000 youth are included in publicly available files on the CDC’s website. Below are initial key findings from HRC’s original analysis of these 2019 data:
29% of transgender youth have been threatened or injured with a weapon on school property, compared to 7% of cisgender youth; transgender youth were more likely in 2019 to have been threatened or injured with a weapon on school property than reported in 2017
16% of gay and lesbian youth and 11% of bisexual youth have been threatened or injured with a weapon on school property, compared to 7% of straight youth
43% of transgender youth have been bullied on school property, compared to 18% of cisgender youth; transgender youth were more likely in 2019 to have been bullied on school property than reported in 2017
29% of gay or lesbian youth and 31% of bisexual youth have been bullied on school property, compared to 17% of straight youth
29% of transgender youth have attempted suicide, compared to 7% of cisgender youth
21% of gay and lesbian youth and 22% of bisexual youth have attempted suicide, compared to 7% of straight youth
These data underscore the need and urgency for youth-serving professionals to be well equipped to meet the needs of LGBTQ youth. The HRC Foundation has many resources for LGBTQ students and educators, including our Welcoming Schoolsprogram, resources for LGBTQ youth and resources specific to COVID-19. If you’d be interested in speaking with an HRC expert about this data, I’d be happy to help connect you. After all, youth-serving professionals who have attended the annual HRC Foundation’s Time to THRIVE conference are 64% more likely to say they are prepared to promote physical safety of LGBTQ youth than youth-serving professionals who haven’t attended Time to THRIVE.
President Donald Trump added 20 additional names to his shortlistof potential Supreme Court nominees Wednesday, and the list — which includes sitting judges and U.S. senators — immediately drew criticism from LGBTQ advocacy groups.
“This list is teeming with individuals who have alarming anti-LGBTQ and anti-civil rights records, which should be disqualifying for any judicial nominee, let alone a nominee for the Supreme Court,” Sharon McGowan, legal director for Lambda Legal, said in a statement, characterizing many of the potential nominees as “dangerous, ultraconservative ideologues.”
The Human Rights Campaign, the country’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group, called the 20 names a “wishlist” from conservative groups that have a “record of hostility towards progress, tolerance and equality.”
“If the past is prologue, he may once again nominate people who would deny legal protections for LGBTQ people, take away the health care provided by the Affordable Care Act, undermine the fundamental right to vote, erode core civil rights laws, and fail to value the lives, needs and Constitutional rights of the LGBTQ community,” the group’s president, Alphonso David, said in a statement.
When asked about assertions that the names on the shortlist are anti-LGBTQ, the White House broadly defended the president’s record on judicial appointments.
“President Trump has an unmatched record of appointing judges who believe in applying the Constitution as written, not legislating from the bench,” White House spokesperson Judd Deere told NBC News in an email. “Once again, the President is being transparent with the American people about the qualifications he considers paramount and who he would consider for a seat on the High Court to ensure this exceptional nation built on the rule of law continues for generations to come.”
Those qualifications, which were mentioned along with the president’s additional list of potential high court contenders, include a commitment to “protect life,” “protect religious liberty,” “protect the 2nd Amendment” and “protect our borders.”
Shortlist’s new names
McGowan said the sheer number of people on Trump’s running listof over 40 potential Supreme Court justices “whose records are replete with anti-LGBTQ bias is both staggering and terrifying.”
Among the newly added names is Noel Francisco, who served as U.S. solicitor general from 2017 until earlier this year. McGowan said the Trump-appointee drove an “anti-LGBTQ agenda” in that role which included submitting a Supreme Court brief asserting that gay workers are not protected by federal civil rights law.
Also on the list is Lawrence Van Dyke, who currently sits on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last year ahead of his 9th Circuit confirmation, Van Dyke broke down in tears when confronted with a scathing letter from the American Bar Association that deemed him “not qualified” and questioned his ability to treat LGBTQ litigants fairly. As solicitor general of Montana, a role he held from 2013 to 2014, Van Dyke argued against same-sex marriage in two cases and in favor of allowing photographers to deny wedding services to gay couples in another.
Another name causing “deep concerns” for LGBTQ advocacy groups, including Lambda Legal, is Allison Jones Rushing, who currently serves as a judge on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. One reason for the concern is the Trump-appointed judge’s ties to Alliance Defending Freedom, a legal nonprofit that the Southern Poverty Law Center has deemed a “hate group” for its espousal of beliefs such as the criminalization of homosexuality, legislation to restrict transgender people’s access to sex-segregated facilities and support of businesses to deny service to LGBTQ people.
A number of the newly added names to Trump’s shortlist — many of whom Trump previously appointed to lower courts — have already “lived up to the worst expectations” of LGBTQ advocates, according to McGowan.
“He even went so far as to say it was inappropriate to refer to a transgender person by their [preferred] pronouns,” McGowan said.
Prior to his 5th Circuit confirmation, Duncan was part of the legal team that represented Virginia’s Gloucester County School Board in its case against Gavin Grimm, a transgender high school student who was unable to use the restroom that aligned with his gender identity. And in 2014, he represented Louisiana in its bid to uphold the state’s ban on same-sex marriage.
Another 5th Circuit judge on the shortlist, James Ho, ruled against a transgender inmate seeking to undergo gender reassignment surgery in prison in December. McGowan called Ho “one of the most anti-LGBTQ judges on the court of appeals.”
Some of the most well-known additions to Trump’s shortlist include conservative Republican senators Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri, as well as former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement, who argued in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act before the Supreme Court in 2013 on behalf of Congressional Republicans.
‘Lasting damage to civil rights’
In less than four years in office, Trump has confirmed over 200 judges — two to the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, and 53 to appeals courts. By comparison, President Obama confirmed two Supreme Court justices and 55 appeals court judges during his entire eight years in office.
According to a 2019 report from Lambda Legal, eight of 12 appeals courts — which sit just below the Supreme Court in the judicial hierarchy —are now composed of more than 25 percent of Trump appointees.
Many of Trump’s appointments have provoked criticism from gay and civil rights advocates — a third of the more than 50 circuit court judges nominated by Trump since he took office have a “demonstrated history of anti-LGBTQ bias,” according to the report. This “threatens to do lasting damage to the civil rights of LGBT people,” the report states.
The next appointment to the high court could shape the future of LGBTQ rights for decades. In June, the Court delivered a landmark ruling for LGBTQ workers, finding that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act protects them against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. One of Trump’s high court appointees, Gorsuch, sided with the majority, while Kavanaugh voted against the broader interpretation of Title VII.
“The impact that another anti-LGBTQ nominee could have on the Supreme Court would be catastrophic,” McGowan said.
The court, currently divided 5-4 between conservatives and liberals, will hear a key gay rights case in the fall. In Fulton v. The City of Philadelphia, the court will decide whether faith-based child welfare organizations can reject same-sex couples and others whom they consider to be in violation of their religious beliefs.
A gay New York City councilman and U.S. congressional candidate is calling on an NYPD union leader to step down after a tweet sent from the union’s official Twitter account called the councilman “a first class whore.”
The now-deleted tweet is credited to Ed Mullins, president of the Sergeants Benevolent Association, a union representing approximately 13,000 active and retired police sergeants, and was directed at Ritchie Torres, a Bronx Democrat running for Congress in November.
“He we go America this is what a first class whore looks like RITCHIE TORRES,” said the tweet, typos untouched, which was originally posted on Sept. 4. “Passes laws to defund police, supports criminals, & now because he’s running for office he blames the police to protect what he voted for. Remember Little Ritchie? Meet LYING RITCHIE.”
That social media message is just part of an ongoing war of words between Torres — who has called the sergeants union “a bona fide hate group masquerading as a union” — and the union, which has accused Torres of supporting anti-police violence.
The deleted tweet included a video of Torres criticizing the NYPD for making fewer gun arrests and solving fewer gun-related cases as the number of summertime shootings doubled in 2020 compared to last year. In the video, Torres calls for an investigation into whether the NYPD initiated a “work slowdown” and, if so, to what extent the slowdown has “driven the growth of violence in New York City.”
“Calling a black NFL player a ‘wild animal.’ Calling a Latina Health Commissioner a ‘bitch.’ Calling an openly LGBTQ Afro-Latino a first-class whore.’ There is NOTHING benevolent about the bigotry of the @SBANYPD. Ed Mullins must resign,” Torres wrote.
Torres’ message referred to a tweet last September by the sergeants’ union calling a Black NFL player a “wild animal” for allegedly punching a police officer, and a tweet from earlier this year calling a female health official a “bitch” after she said she had told a police official, “I don’t give two rats’ asses about your cops” in response to a request for face masks (she since apologized for the remark).
On Tuesday, Mullins issued a response to the call for him to step down, saying that he’d “never resign” and that his comments about Torres “had nothing to do with his race, ethnicity or sexual orientation.”
The owner of the Baltimore Eagle, an LGBTQ leather-Levi bar that has been in business for 30 years, has raised strong objections to what he says was an Aug. 7 raid on his establishment by a dozen representatives of city regulatory agencies who claimed they were investigating a complaint that the Eagle was violating COVID-19 social distancing rules.
Eagle owner Ian Parrish told the Washington Blade the raid came shortly after he alerted officials with the Baltimore Board of Liquor License Commissioners that he learned that people associated with a competing LGBTQ establishment filed complaints against the Eagle with the liquor board and the city Health Department falsely claiming the Eagle was violating social distancing requirements.
He said his attempt to alert the liquor board and health department about the false complaints apparently did not reach the people who conducted the raid.
Parrish said one of the officials in charge of the agents that conducted the raid, all of whom wore “black body armor,” became angry when he asked to take their temperature as they arrived at the Eagle’s door. Parrish said taking people’s temperature “is part of our COVID-19 protocols for all people entering the premises.”
“’We’re the f[**]king liquor board,’ was their answer to my request,” Parrish said in an email to Maryland State Sen. Mary Washington (D-Baltimore), a copy of which he sent to the Blade. “Then, the horde of the agents in body armor walked through me. I was ping-ponged from side to side as each agent physically pushed me from left to right and back about ten feet as they forced their way past me,” he said in his email to Washington.
“Not only did those agents abuse their authority by assaulting me, they put our patrons at risk by willfully ignoring State of Maryland COVID protocols, and some of them weren’t even wearing masks!” Parrish said in his email message.
“The SWAT style show of force put upon us was grossly out of proportion for the circumstances, it frightened our patrons to the point of them leaving, and the worst part of it was that we were subjected to this gross abuse of authority for absolutely no valid reason,” said Parrish in the email.
Adam Abadir, a spokesperson for the Baltimore City Health Department, responded by email to a Blade inquiry about the concerns raised by Parrish that the Health Department was part of an unnecessary raid on the Baltimore Eagle.
Abadir characterized the visit to the Eagle by the various city agents as an “inspection” that was conducted by members of the Baltimore Social Club Task Force, which consists of several city agencies, including the Health Department, liquor board, and the police and fire departments. He said the inspection visit was prompted by complaints received from citizens that the Eagle was allegedly in violation of social distancing orders issued by Baltimore Mayor Barnard Jack Young to address the COVID pandemic.
Abadir said that at least one of the individuals that filed a complaint against the Eagle sent the Health Department a flier issued by the Eagle advertising a “foam party” scheduled to take place Aug. 7 and 8. The flier, a copy of which Abadir sent the Blade, states: “Throw on your harness and get naughty under piles of safe, antibacterial foam on our social distance patio. Thank you for respecting our COVID-19 guidelines.”
According to Abadir, the task force members determined through their inspection that the Eagle was in violation of a mayoral order issued on Aug. 7 just hours before the Eagle raid that banned indoor operations at bars and restaurants after 10 p.m. He said that during the inspection visit the Eagle’s management immediately complied with the order by moving all indoor patrons to the Eagle’s outdoor space and no penalty was imposed.
Abadir said that due to threats made against members of the Social Club Task Force during past inspection visits to other establishments, the task force members “unfortunately must wear bulletproof vests/flak jackets for their protection.” He said the “body armor,” as Parrish called it, is worn by task force members on all inspection visits and the inspection visit to the Eagle was handled the same as inspections for all other bars, restaurants and other establishments.
Matt Achhammer, a spokesperson for the Baltimore Board of Liquor License Commissioners, provided the liquor board’s explanation of the raid on the Eagle in a Sept. 2 email to Baltimore City Council member Ryan Dorsey. Dorsey asked the liquor board about the raid after being contacted by Parrish.
Achhammer said in his message to Dorsey that the inspection visit to the Eagle was prompted, among other things, by the Eagle’s flier advertising its foam party as well as two complaints about the Eagle from citizens who called the city’s 311 non-emergency services phone line to report the complaints.
“In this case please note that on August 7, though the location had major COVID violations, it was issued a warning,” Achhammer told Dorsey in his email. Achhammer acknowledged Parrish’s concern that multiple executive orders by the Baltimore mayor have created confusion among businesses required to put in place COVID related restrictions and policies.
Parrish said that he later learned that the mayor’s order banning indoor operations at restaurants and bars was issued at noon on Aug. 7, just hours before the raid took place at the Eagle. He said no one from the liquor board or health department contacted the Eagle to inform the club about the revised order.
“There is no reason why a call, a text, an email can’t be sent out to licensees to keep us informed so that nobody is causing an infraction unwittingly,” Parrish told the Blade. He said that at least one of the task force members participating in the Eagle raid acknowledged that the COVID related orders and rules have changed frequently over the past several months, making it difficult for businesses to keep abreast of the changes.
In his email message to State Sen. Mary Washington, a lesbian, a copy of which he sent to the Blade, Parrish said the Baltimore Eagle has a long record of operating as a responsible bar, restaurant, and retail shop.
“I mention this because in 30 years the Baltimore Eagle has never – not once – never been called before the Liquor Board for any wrongdoing,” Parrish states in his email to Washington. “We are a bar with a very long and verifiable history of community involvement and charitable giving, and we enjoy the formal written support of over 1,200 residential and commercial neighbors of all backgrounds and beliefs, the Charles North Community Association, and the support of 5,000-plus people who follow the Baltimore Eagle on social media,” he said.
Parrish told the Blade the agents participating in the raid never explained to him what the alleged multiple COVID violations were that Achhammer referred to in his email message to Councilmember Dorsey. Parrish said it was possible that Eagle patrons moved closer together than required for social distancing during the confusion that took place during the raid when the agents walked through all of the Eagle’s different rooms and spaces.
“Regarding the presence of foam, that has absolutely no bearing on social distancing or our other COVID-19 protocols,” Parrish said in a follow-up email to Councilmember Dorsey. “[T]he antibacterial soap-based foam has a deleterious effect on the COVID-19 virus, which is one of the reasons why we moved forward with it in the first place,” Parrish told Dorsey.
“So that certainly was not a reasonable impetus for the raid,” he continued. “What was actually relevant about the theme was that it was a threat to a competing venue’s performers to the point they openly discussed in the very same Facebook post their plan to file false complaints – which they did; and again, I personally made the authorities aware of this prior to the raid,” Parrish said in his email.
Parrish said he believes the people who filed what he says were false complaints against the Eagle were drag performers associated with a competing LGBTQ venue. But he declined to identify the competing venue.
“I think this story has a real chance of just touching off more negativity and a bigger problem,” he said. “I’m not trying to point fingers, even though these people really frightened our patrons and affected our business,” Parrish said. “But we’re talking to them since this whole incident. We started talking. We’re really not trying to go backwards and inflame anybody.”
Andrew Gillum, former rising star of the Democratic Party, said he “cried every day” after being found in a Florida hotel room with a gay escort.
A former Tallahassee mayor who ran for Florida governor in 2018, Gillum’s political career plummeted in March when he was found in a Miami Beach hotel room with a sex worker who had reportedly overdosed on crystal meth.Read More
Now, Gillum and his wife are set to appear on chat show Tamron Hall for his first interview since coming out of rehab, one that the eponymous host said is “one of the most difficult” in her 27-year career as a journalist.
“Everybody believes the absolute worst about that day,” Gillum reflected in the pre-recorded interview, due to air Monday (14 September). “At this stage, I don’t have anything else to conceal.
“I literally got broken down to my most bare place, to the place where I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to live, not because of what I had done, but because of everything that was being said about me.”
Andrew Gillum interview was ‘heartbreaking’ says Tamron Hall.
Tamron Hall said her interview with Andrew Gillum interview was “intense, and at moments it was heartbreaking, upsetting and it was disorienting”.
“I’m only there because they’ve agreed, but I still felt like I was prying,” Hall, 49, told PEOPLE magazine.
“They agreed to talk with me, but as a journalist, there’s moments where you wonder: How far are we really supposed to go?”
An outpouring of first responders hit the Mondrian South Beach hotel midnight on March 13, where officers found Gillum “inebriated” and vomiting in the bathroom, according to a police report.
Paramedics treated a man found struggling to breathe, who police suspected had overdosed on crystal meth. He was later identified as Travis Dyson, an escort through the website Rent Men.
Gillium, 41, checked into rehab for alcoholism and depression two days after the incident – a stunning and swift fall for the promising politician once considered a potential kingmaker in the race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee, so sought after was his endorsement.
One grins knowingly at a friend over the camera’s shoulder, caught up in the joy of the moment. Another strikes an imposing pose in a pink beard. A third fixes the camera with an inscrutable gaze, daring us to ask a forbidden question. These are three of the iconic photographs of drag queens taken by San Francisco photographer Roz Joseph (1926–2019) that will be on display from September 21, when the GLBT Historical Society unveils an online selection of images drawn from its 2015 exhibition “Reigning Queens: The Lost Photos of Roz Joseph.”
Joseph, who passed away in December of last year, moved to San Francisco in 1970. Her series of remarkable photographs documenting the city’s drag balls of the 1970s was rediscovered when she donated her work to the GLBT Historical Society in 2010. As we put the finishing touches on the online show, board members and drag performers Nick Large and Kyle Levinger share their reflections on the photographs.
Nick Large: Looking at these photographs, many of them depicting drag queens associated with San Francisco’s Imperial Court, causes me to reflect on how much drag has changed in the past 40 years and even in my own lifetime. When I first started doing drag, I had never heard of RuPaul’s Drag Race. There were no makeup tutorials on YouTube, and you could get your entire look locally. My first drag purchase at Forever 21 was a sleeveless fake-leather jacket, which at the time represented $30 of the total sum of $150 I had in my bank account. It’s easy to forget that in the grand scheme of things, the existence of Drag Race is a very recent phenomenon. The “lost” photographs of Roz Joseph are a reminder of earlier times. Joseph’s photos represent a moment when drag was more a form of expression than a competition. As the photographs document, San Francisco’s thriving drag community is decades old. Many people came together and formed their own families through the medium of drag, even though they were sometimes shunned by the larger LGBTQ community. I wonder what these queens of days gone by would think if they witnessed a drag performance today. What would they say we have gained, and lost? What advice and stories would they have for us? In the age of COVID-19 and online streaming shows, I wonder how we can replicate that feeling of family-building in a virtual world.
Kyle Levinger: In 2020, many members of the LGBTQ community are unaware of or uninterested in the Grand Ducal Court and Imperial Court here in San Francisco. Roz Joseph’s photographs transport us back to an era when the Courts were key in helping to shape the LGBTQ community. Drag queens were central in the fight for equality, and the Courts played a vital role in founding and supporting nonprofit organizations to fight AIDS, feed the hungry and meet many other community needs. The Ducal and Imperial Courts also served as families for people when their relatives turned their backs. Today, the Courts do not have the same appeal as they once did. As acceptance of the LGBTQ community continues to broaden and drag becomes an increasingly popular form of entertainment, they have had difficulty attracting and maintaining membership. How can the Ducal Court and Imperial Court adapt to remain relevant in the community?