Join Positive Images LGBTQIA+ Center and North Bay LGBTQI Families for a Social Saturday: Intergenerational Gathering on April 9th from 10am-1pm at Ragle Ranch Regional Park in Sebastopol! We will be gathering at the Gazebo, which we’ve reserved all day.
All LGBTQIA+ youth, families, adults, and elders are welcome at Social Saturdays, which are a recurring series of monthly events taking place throughout Sonoma County where we are seeking to bring together members of our community across generations, particularly gender expansive youth, teens, and adults.
At our April gathering we are excited to be offering two amazing activities: an all-ages hike and a music performance!
Hiking: For participants interested in nature and movement, Ciel Muir (he/him), a queer and trans California naturalist will lead an all-ages hike. A former environmental educator with Sonoma County Regional Parks, Ciel enjoys sharing his love of art and the outdoors with those around him. When not exploring the outdoors he enjoys spending time as a plant and cat dad while working on his own art. Our hike will start at approximately 11:00am.
Music: For participants interested in listening to a musical performance, RAD (she/her/ellx) is a local folk musician, who will play ukulele while singing originals and well-known favorites in English and Spanish! RAD will perform from 10:30am-12pm. @radfolkmusic
We will have $50 gift cards available at the picnic to families for whom financial barriers such as the cost of gas, a meal, or missed work would otherwise prevent them from attending. If you feel your family could benefit from this support, please fill out the form at the following link:
We at Positive Images and North Bay LGBTQI Families are still very aware of and concerned about the spread of COVID-19. If you are feeling sick in any way, please stay home and take care of yourself. Masks are strongly encouraged. We will have masks on hand for those who may need them. We will maintain social distancing from one another at all times.
We’re excited to see you then!
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Acompañe a Positive Images LGBTQIA + Center y North Bay LGBTQI Families para un sábado social: ¡Reunión intergeneracional el 9 de abril de 10 a. m. a 1 p. m. en Ragle Ranch Regional Park en Sebastopol! Nos reuniremos en el kiosko, que hemos reservado por todo el día.
Todos los jóvenes, familias, adultos y ancianos LGBTQIA + son bienvenidos en esta reunión, que es parte de una serie recurrente de eventos mensuales que se llevan a cabo en todo el condado de Sonoma, donde buscamos reunir a miembros de nuestra comunidad a través de generaciones, particularmente jóvenes, adolescentes y adultos con género expansivo.
En nuestra reunión de abril, estamos emocionados de ofrecer dos actividades increíbles: ¡una caminata para todas las edades y una actuación musical!
Caminata: Para los participantes interesados en la naturaleza y el movimiento, Ciel Muir (él), un naturalista queer y trans de California, dirigirá una caminata para todas las edades. Ciel, ex educador ambiental de los Parques Regionales del Condado de Sonoma, disfruta compartir su amor por el arte y el aire libre con quienes lo rodean. Cuando no está explorando al aire libre, disfruta pasar tiempo como padre de plantas y gato mientras trabaja en su propia arte. Nuestra caminata comenzará aproximadamente a las 11:00 a. m.
Música: Para los participantes interesados en escuchar una actuación musical, RAD (ella/ellx) es una música folclórica local, que tocará el ukelele mientras canta originales y conocidos favoritos en inglés y español. RAD actuará de 10:30 a. m. a 12 p. m. @radfolkmusic
Tendremos tarjetas de regalo de $ 50 disponibles en la reunión para las familias para quienes barreras financieras como el costo de la gasolina, una comida o el trabajo perdido les impedirían asistir. Si cree que su familia podría beneficiarse de este apoyo, complete el formulario en el siguiente enlace:
En Positive Images y North Bay LGBTQI Families todavía estamos muy conscientes y preocupados por la propagación del COVID-19. Si se siente mal de alguna manera, quédese en casa y cuídese. Se recomienda encarecidamente el uso de máscaras. Tendremos máscaras a mano para quienes las necesiten. Mantendremos el distanciamiento social entre nosotros en todo momento.
Waking up in a car parked on a muddy alleyway 30 minutes from the front lines of the Battle for Kharkiv was an inconceivable notion to me 3 days ago. Yet in the front seat of a beaten down Jeep Cherokee, I slept. Artillery blasts and other sounds of war created a cacophony of destruction throughout the night. However, in a world where a former US President is refusing to outright condemn the barbaric and terroristic actions unleashed by the tyrannical head of Russia against a steadfast ally, and an out transgender journalist is at the front lines of the major European land war in 2022, is anything truly inconceivable?
No.
More than six years ago, pre-transition, I embarked on an attempt to cover the “Syrian Refugee Crisis.” Beginning in Turkey, and then heading into the Balkans, I crossed Europe, ending my voyage on the shores of the English Channel by spending several days in Calais, France inside the sprawling migrant encampment known as “The Jungle.”
In total, I went overland across 11 countries following the stories of these displaced peoples from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, as well as several African nations, while also examining a European Union which was both unprepared and unwilling to fully integrate them into their societies. Ultimately, the book that came from it, Along the Tracks of Tears, was a woefully incomplete look into the lives of those whom I set out to report on, and this failure by me to dive fully into the deepest crevices of their torment is something that had haunted me ever since.
In 2015, I eagerly accepted the opportunity to go into Syria and speak directly with some of those fleeing from their home soil during the civil war there. Going so far as to cross the Bosphorus Strait and travel deep into the eastern part of Turkey, fear eventually swept over me. I caved to concerns of being kidnapped or killed and abruptly canceled my plans. Pangs of regret began to fill me from almost the moment of turning around, weighing heavily on my work.
Another aspect of that sojourn that gnawed at me was living as a male during my travels. At the time, pretending to be a guy wasn’t anything new. I’d lived as one for almost 40 years at that point, but guilt over the lie had begun to impede all of my undertakings, an impediment magnified by being given space among the majority Muslim male refugees who I presume would otherwise have shunned the true me. And so my publication, weighed down by those two burdens, fell far short of what it could have been.
Years passed.
An apartment building bombed in Kharkiv, Ukraine early overnight on March 16. Sarah Ashton-Cirillo
In the time since, much has happened to me personally and professionally. I published a novel, finally transitioned, and eventually became heavily involved in Nevada politics, the last area leading to the launch of a politics and news portal focused on the state.
Then in 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine and with that arose an opportunity to create a follow-up to my 2015-2016 coverage of the previous European refugee crisis – and this time attempt to do it right.
Beginning in Poland and then crossing into Ukraine, before eventually traversing the Ukrainian countryside, I arrived at the front, intent on learning about every aspect of what the victims of the invasion are enduring through photography, interviews, and personal observation. Along the way, I also realized the stories I uncovered, and the intertwined narratives which wove them together, were both much deeper and broader than I’d initially comprehended.
That first night we took cover in the darkness, camouflaged against a sky offering a canopy of infinite blackness because it was simply too dangerous to traverse the city streets after curfew. As soon as the light of morning peaked, we headed into the ravaged city, checkpoint after checkpoint lining the streets. While in many areas of Ukraine the blockaded streets are manned by volunteers from the Territorial Defense Forces, those asking for documents in Kharkiv are members of the professional, full-time, Ukrainian Armed Forces. Though we were stopped at an innumerable number of checkpoints on the more than 1,000 km drive through the nation’s heartland, the last search, the last flash of my credentials upon entering the city’s center, was truly the most poignant. It separated me from reading about war, and having listened to it, to witnessing it.
After being waved through into the downtown corridor, destruction enveloped me. Burnt out vehicles, blown out windows, decimated apartment buildings, and deep craters all pocked the landscape. Death too was present.
And yet residents of Kharkiv moved deftly around these reminders of war crimes and terrorism, lining up to get medicine, buy food, and withdraw money from banks, as life continued through 24 hours a day of enemy bombardment and Ukrainian counter-offensives.
The apartment I procured while at the frontlines promised to offer an expansive visage of the city. It didn’t disappoint, but as I quickly learned life at war changes hourly, and so I’ve spent a total of three hours in the accommodations since I arrived here.
Around 6 pm on my second evening, the group I’m embedded with decided to take cover for the evening in a restaurant, and the same on our third. Chairs, some blankets, a pillow, and contagious amounts of patriotic courage from my hosts have helped me find sleep during the explosive nights.
Operating as a hub of activity for various security services, the restaurant is now the location where I work, eat, sleep, and digest the toll that the Russian invasion has taken on the population of Ukraine and the global community as a whole.
Two weeks have gone by since I’ve arrived in Europe and 10 days since I entered a nation during the throes of war. In that short span, a realization settled in.
I’m not the same writer. I’m not the same photographer. I’m not the same person.
I came to Ukraine to cover a refugee crisis, I’m now reporting on a war.
A trans teenager was shot and killed by her own father in Georgia, United States, in what has been described as a “horrific tragedy”.
Kathryn “Katie” Newhouse, 19, was killed on 19 March, according to officers at Cherokee County Police who found both her and her father, Howard Newhouse, 57, dead in their home.
According to Pittsburgh Lesbian Correspondents, who wrote a blog post about Newhouse’s death, the teen was a “Minecraft and UberSpire enthusiast, an advocate for trans rights” and “had a bright smile”.
The blog post continued: “A native of Illinois, Kathryn was most recently living with her family in Canton, Georgia.
“Kathryn was a Minecraft and UberSpire enthusiast, an advocate for trans rights, had a bright smile, enjoyed changing up her hairstyles, and attentive to world events.”
“She enjoyed hiking and sightseeing. She was proud of her AAPI [Asian American and Pacific Islander] heritage; she was of Filipino heritage…
“Kathryn’s death is a horrific tragedy and she deserves to still be here with us.”
Newhouse’s brother Chris explained to CBS46 news that his sister was autistic and had lived with mental health issues.
“A tragic culmination of all of these different mental health issues that kind of compounded and led to such a, escalated to a situation that – it shouldn’t have happened, but it happened,” he said.
At least six other trans, non-binary and gender-conforming people have been violently killed in the US in 2022 so far, according to the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), which has been monitoring the wave of brutality since 2013.
It comes after last year’s record-breaking death tally of at least 57, many of them Black trans women. The record continues to climb even months after the year’s end, as more victims’ deaths are discovered by grassroots activists combing through local news reports and talking to relatives.
HRC said in a statement: “HRC works to shed light on this epidemic of violence in order to ensure victims’ lives are remembered with dignity, and to work to end the stigma that so many trans and gender non-conforming people face…
“While the details of these cases differ, it is clear that fatal violence disproportionately affects transgender women of colour – particularly Black transgender women – and that the intersections of racism, sexism, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia and unchecked access to guns conspire to deprive them of employment, housing, healthcare and other necessities.”
A gay teacher in Ohio, United States, has spoken out after being fired for giving Pride bracelets to students, saying: “There is room at the table for everyone”.
According to NBC15 News, Jay Bowman, who has worked as a teacher for 30 years, was wearing a rainbow-coloured Pride bracelet when several students asked about it.
Speaking in an interview, Bowman said: “If a kid has questions, if a kid wants honesty, I don’t think I should be forbidden from providing that.
“I don’t try to recruit anyone. The parents are responsible for the kids. The parents are the ones who need to teach their kids right and wrong.
“I think the reaction to my violation when compared to other instances in the school where certain things are tolerated was unfair.”
He added: “My catchphrase has become, ‘There is room at the table for everyone,’ and there is.”
The school district argued that Bowman broke school policies by discussing “political” and “personal” beliefs with students, as well as giving a student a Pride bracelet.
“Our board policies restrict staff from discussing with students certain subjects, including political, religious and personal beliefs,” the school district said in a statement.
“This past week, we received reports with specific concerns about possible violations of those policies by a substitute teacher in the district.
“As a result of his violation of board policies, the district decided his services as a substitute would no longer be utilised. While we recognise there are diverse points of view on this matter, this policy exists for the purpose of ensuring all students feel comfortable in the classroom.”
NBC15 News reported that some community members will ask the “school board to reconsider its policies” at a board meeting on 11 April.
The bill, which has faced fierce criticism not only from LGBT+ activists, but from US president Joe Biden, also mandates that school staff must out students to their potentially unsupportive families. The only exception is “if a reasonably prudent person would believe that disclosure would result in abuse, abandonment, or neglect”.
Now that it has been signed, the bill will come into effect on 1 July 2022.
Following the signing of the bill, Amit Paley, CEO of LGBT+ charity The Trevor Project, said in a statement: “LGBTQ youth in Florida deserve better. They deserve to see their history, their families, and themselves reflected in the classroom.
“While I am saddened to see this harmful bill signed into law, I am inspired by the outpouring of support for LGBTQ students we have seen from parents, teachers, celebrities, and their peers.
“Social support is vital for suicide prevention, and I want to remind LGBTQ youth in Florida and across the country that you are not alone.”
A group of determined New Jersey students defiantly staged a walkout in protest against a new policy that stops them from flying an LGBT+ Pride flag.
About 40 students, some wearing kaleidoscopic coloured items, in Passaic, New Jersey, took to the streets on Monday (28 March) for the right to fly the Pride flag, NJ.comreported.
The Passaic board of education recently enacted a policy that bans flag displays on school grounds with exceptions for the American flag, New Jersey state flag and school flags.
But students want to be able to raise the LGBT+ Pride flag. Several stood in front of the city’s three high schools and chanted “walk out” to encourage others to join in the protest against the new policy.
The brave students also called on school officials to allow them to “raise our flag”. The protest eventually moved from the schools to City Hall and then the board of education building.
Amari Gawthney led the group down to City Hall and declared “we’re not going to stop until we get what we want”.
“We put up the flag last year with no problem,” Gawthney said. “Then this new policy came from out of the blue, and they pushed it under the rug, actually.”
Last June, students in Passaic were allowed to raise the LGBT+ flag on school grounds for the first time to celebrate Pride Month. Flag displays were permitted until November when a group of community members questioned the school board on why the Pride flag was allowed to fly.
The board’s vice chairman L Daniel Rodriguez said it was easier to enact a blanket ban because it was “one of those issues [where] we want to make sure we were fair to everyone”, NJ.comreported.
Camila Perez, a freshman in Passaic, wore a rainbow flag as she spoke before trustees at a school board meeting last week. Perez argued the blanket ban is “unfair” and “discriminates” against the queer community.
“It bothers me, and it bothers the whole community,” Perez said.
The students at the protest called on the school board to rescind the policy and allow them to fly the LGBT+ flag in time for Pride Month, just two months from now.
Jaylie Barrett, a senior at Passaic PREP, argued the board “disrespected us as a community” and “won’t tell us why” they changed the policy.
Students across America have staged mass walkouts in protest of LGBT+ hate in the education system, discrimination against queer students and increasing restrictions on displays in support of the LGBT+ community.
Students across America are staging mass walkouts to protest LGBT+ hate in the education system, and schools are finding them harder and harder to ignore.
A short while later, hundreds of students in Texas marched out after a lesbian teacher was allegedly escorted off campus amid a row over stickers used by educators to show their classrooms were a ‘safe space’ for LGBT+ students.
Recently, the student organiser of massive school walkouts across Florida was suspended for distributing Pride flags during protests against the state’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill.
Jack Petocz, a junior at Flagler Palm Coast High School in Florida, said he was “proud of who I am” and proud of all those who are “protesting these regressive bills”.
He called on students to “let our politicians know that no matter how hard they try, they cannot suppress our identities or silence our voices”.
“Gen Z will not stand idly by as our rights are stripped from us,” Petocz said. “It is now up to you to decide which side of history you will be on, the side that empowers us or the side that seeks to erase us.”
A food distribution program run by an Iowa LGBTQ couple was almost sabotaged by a fake volunteer – but the community rallied to save the day.
Every month, Together We Achieve holds a food box giveaway event in which it passes out over 1000 boxes of food to those in need.
One person, however, decided to sign up for 10 volunteer slots with a “hateful email” that was reportedly intended to hurt the leaders of the organization. At the organization’s helm is couple Raymond Siddell and Matthew Salger.
Fortunately, volunteers stepped in and filled the slots.
“It’s just amazing when you put a call out like this or show the community that there’s a need and you’re doing something about it, there are so many members that will show up from the community to help out in any way that they can,” Siddell told KCRG.
Siddell and Salger founded Together We Achieve after they first began providing relief to Iowa families who were effected by a destructive 2020 weather event called a derecho.
After the derecho hit Iowa, Siddell started a Facebook group where people could seek and offer resources. That initiative grew into the Iowa Storm Derecho Resource Center, which offered both information and crucial supplies.
Siddell said he and Salger launched the center out of frustration for the lack of centralized location for people to get help.
“I like to give back,” Salger said at the time. “I’ve always tried to give back either through time, talent, whatever you have.”
And after the effects of the storm had died down, the couple didn’t want to stop giving back. So, Together We Achieve was born.
“Our biggest need that we saw in the community was those families that fall between the cracks,” Salger explained. “To see that relief on their face. We don’t ask any questions. They’re not going to get turned away. There’s no qualifiers. If you need help, you just come here.”
In addition to food distribution, the organization provides cold weather gear in winter. Its equipment program also offers residents fans and space heaters.
According to the Together We Achieve website, it has served over 10,000 individuals and over 3000 households, and has distributed over 700,000 pounds of food and served almost 6000 hot meals.
When FIFA convenes its 72nd Congress in Doha, Qatar, on March 31, 2022, in preparation for the World Cup, journalists, football associations, fans, and others should press both FIFA officials and Qatari authorities about human rights in the Gulf state, particularly the rights of migrant workers, women, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people.
Since 2010, human rights organizations, trade unions, and media have consistently documented the rampant human rights abuses in the country, especially against migrant workers, including widespread wage theft, high recruitment fees, unexplained deaths, and passport confiscation, among others. While Qatar has introduced several reforms with much fanfare, they came too late, have proven to be woefully inadequate, and are poorly enforced. Similarly, the authorities have made no serious reforms to the severe discrimination in law and practice against women and LGBT people.
Despite repeated warnings and concrete evidence of rights violations, FIFA has not used its leverage or authority to pressure Qatar to follow through on its reform promises. Instead, FIFA has covered up for Qatar’s slow progress and championed the authorities’ reform narrative built around worker welfare that clearly does not reflect the reality for migrant workers.
FIFA has also failed to effectively push back on other repressive laws on press freedom, LGBT rights, and women’s rights. Not only has FIFA been a dismal steward for protecting and promoting human rights in Qatar, failing to use its leverage to truly push for football as a “force for good,” but it has also failed to fulfill its own human rights obligations under the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (the Guiding Principles) that were adopted in 2016. As per the Guiding Principles, FIFA should step up and make reparations to the thousands of migrant workers or their families who experienced abuses, including unexplained deaths, to make the World Cup 2022 possible.
The FIFA decision to award Qatar with hosting the 2022 World Cup has been itself mired in controversy, starting with US Department of Justice allegations that FIFA officials were bribed to award Qatar the 2022 World Cup. FIFA made the decision despite the country’s poor human rights record and its massive infrastructure deficit, knowing it would rest on vulnerable migrant workers to build.
In March 2022, Human Rights Watch reported that workers at Bin Omran Trading and Contracting (BOTC), a prominent Qatari trading and construction firm, had not received their salaries for up to five months. BOTC’s projects include landscaping and underground utility works for Al Bayt Stadium, where the opening match will be held.
Indeed, Human Rights Watch research reveals that wage theft remains a systemic failure in Qatar with many employers getting away with it. Workers are still forced to pay exorbitant recruitment fees to secure jobs in Qatar, between US$700 and $2,600. This means they are already in debt before they arrive in Qatar, making them vulnerable to abuse and debt bondage.
Companies often withhold contractually guaranteed overtime payments and end-of-service benefits, and they regularly violate their contracts with migrant workers with impunity. In the worst cases, workers said, employers have simply stopped paying their wages, and the workers have often struggled to buy food.
Such abuses persist despite several reforms that Qatar has introduced since 2015 to improve wage protection for migrant workers. The government’s Wage Protection System (WPS), designed to ensure that workers receive their salaries through direct bank transfer by the seventh day of every month, allows the government to monitor wage payments and to impose sanctions on employers for noncompliance.
The Worker’s Support and Insurance Fund, which became fully operational in 2020, was established specifically to ensure that workers are paid wages they are owed when companies fail to pay or go out of business.
However, Human Rights Watch found that the Wage Protection System does little to protect wages and can be better described as a wage monitoring system with significant gaps in its oversight capacity. The authorities have yet to fully dismantle the causes for wage theft, which lie with the kafala (sponsorship) system; deceptive recruitment practices including high recruitment fees; and business practices including the so-called “pay when paid” clause, which allows the subcontractor to delay payments to workers until the subcontractor is paid and leaves migrant workers vulnerable to payment delays in supply chain hierarchies.
Had Qatar addressed the real causes of wage theft and had its announced reforms been well enforced, the WPS would have flagged companies like BOTC, which would have faced sanction, while workers would have been paid in a timely manner using the Workers Support and Insurance Fund. Instead, unpaid workers have been protesting collectively despite the risks, given that Qatar prohibits worker strikes.
One of the most prominent rights issues since Qatar was awarded the World Cup hosting rights in 2010 is the unexplained deaths of thousands of migrant workers.
Despite the global attention and consistent pressure on Qatari authorities for transparency, they have failed to publicize sufficient data on worker deaths. The numbers in the public discourse therefore vary widely. Qatari authorities say that the number of non-Qatari deaths between 2010 and 2019 is 15,021 for all ages, occupations, and causes. But because the data is neither disaggregated nor comprehensive, it is difficult to do any meaningful analysis on migrant worker deaths.
A Guardian investigation shows that between 2010 to 2020, there were over 6,751 deaths in Qatar of people from just five South Asian countries, which were neither categorized by occupation nor place of work. According to a recently commissioned report by the International Labour Organization (ILO), there were 50 work-related deaths in Qatar in 2020, and these have been disaggregated by key characteristics such as places of injury and death and the underlying cause where available.
Despite the widespread criticism, the authorities have dragged their feet in making comprehensive data on deaths of migrant workers publicly available. FIFA, too, has not used its leverage to push for more transparency around migrant deaths, but instead made erroneous remarks about them. According to media reports, FIFA President Gianni Infantino has even suggested that there have been just three work-related deaths in FIFA stadiums in Qatar, an incredible claim that is lower than even what Qatari authorities have announced.
According to the Guardian investigation, 69 percent of the deaths of migrant workers from India, Nepal, and Bangladesh between 2010 and 2020 were attributed to “natural causes.” A fifth of the 50 work-related deaths from 2020 were attributed to “unknown causes,” the ILO reported. According to Qatar’s Supreme Committee’s Workers’ Welfare progress reports, 18 of the 33 fatalities recorded between October 2015 and October 2019 attribute the cause of death to “natural causes,” “cardiac arrest,” or “acute respiratory failure,” terms that obscure the underlying cause of deaths, such as heat stress, and make it impossible to determine whether they may be related to working conditions.
When deaths are attributed to “natural causes” and categorized as non-work-related, Qatar’s labor law denies families compensation, leaving many of them destitute in the absence of their often-sole income provider. For a country with a highly advanced healthcare system, it is unfathomable that transparent data on worker deaths is not available and meaningful investigations of deaths have not been conducted but are simply attributed to “unknown” or “natural causes.” This does not prevent future deaths nor provide any consolation to the grieving families who are left in the dark.
Under the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, FIFA too has the responsibility to provide reparations for abuses it caused or contributed to. As an entity that has immense resources, it has no excuse not to fulfill its obligations. In 2014, for example, the qualifying rounds and final tournament brought FIFA US$4.6 billion, with profits amounting to over $2 billion.
National football associations, which can be tarnished by association with rights abuses, also have leverage over FIFA that they can and should use. No player would want to be a complacent participant in a tournament that has caused such immense loss of migrant workers’ lives and livelihoods. It is encouraging that many national associations have started speaking up on the issue and should continue to push for tangible commitments including reparations to those who were subject to wage theft and to families who lost loved ones. This would ensure that thousands of families of migrants who lost their lives in Qatar while making the games possible are not left with nothing.
Human Rights Watch has obtained a circular from Qatar’s Public Works Authorities requesting companies to reduce their migrant labor workforce from September 21, 2022 to January 18, 2023. As per the circular, “All Contractors shall prepare a strategic plan for workers’ leave which maximizes the reduction in the number of workers in the country during the period. It should not adversely impact the migrant worker’s well-being and established RPD [Roads Project Department] projects’ targets and objectives.” According to Migrant Rights, construction companies – primarily subcontractors – also shared that the directive has been communicated to them informally.
Migrant workers hired for jobs in Qatar do not have the luxury to take unpaid leave for extended periods. A large majority of workers, especially the recently hired ones, have outstanding loans associated with their illegally imposed recruitment fees that will continue to pile up during the months they are back home if they are not paid. The wages in Qatar are also how workers and their families make ends meet on a paycheck-to-paycheck basis without any savings or support system to draw from. Workers who face early dismissal or whose contracts will not be renewed should be allowed time to find another employer in the country. All such workers should be paid all their outstanding payments due, including for any untaken vacation time, wages, overtime pay, end-of-service payments, and any severance pay.
It is important for Qatari authorities and companies to clearly communicate to workers the details of the arrangement, with strong systems in place to ensure that companies do not take undue advantage of the situation to cheat workers.
Just as the construction phase of the World Cup has rested almost entirely on the backs of migrant workers, who comprise over 95 percent of the Qatari workforce, the delivery of the World Cup will also be almost entirely dependent on migrant workers. They will serve players, fans, and other visitors as waiters, hotel workers, shop staff, housekeepers, stadium workers, security guards, and drivers. Recent evidence has shown that hotel workers and security guards have continued to pay high recruitment fees. Every worker that a fan or a player comes across could, therefore, potentially be a victim of some form of abuse, such as paying exorbitantly for the jobs.
The Worker Welfare Standards from the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, Qatar’s 2022 FIFA World Cup organizer, were originally developed for the construction sector, but have been extended to the hospitality sector. Stakeholders have come together to develop a guidance tool for fair recruitment and employment for the hospitality sector in Qatar that hotels are expected to follow.
Proper due diligence by national football associations is key to ensuring that they do not contribute to or are associated with the abuses. However, it is also important for news media to be aware that they should not have a narrow focus when covering how migrant workers are treated. Just as some coverage has focused on stadium workers who comprised only 1.5 percent of the migrant workforce, media focus should not be limited to service workers in companies serving elite visitors like players and coaches. Conditions for workers serving elite visitors will undoubtedly be under disproportionately higher scrutiny and standards, but they will be a tiny proportion of the total service sector workforce that will directly or indirectly cater to the 1.2 millionvisitors expected to visit Qatar for the tournament.
Migrant workers in Qatar are part of the estimated 3 billion viewers of the World Cup who, in addition, also were indispensable in making the World Cup in Qatar possible. A good illustration of the popularity of the game among migrant workers in Qatar is captured in the documentary The Worker’s Cup.
Now that fans are flocking in from all over the world, migrant workers’ freedom of movement should be respected. They should not be restricted to parts of the country or in cramped labor camps or worse, sent back to their home countries, out of the sight of visitors who would otherwise be appalled if they got a glimpse of their living conditions.
Football is often called “the beautiful game,” which means there should be no discrimination among fans, whether they are low-paid workers who built and serviced the stadiums and infrastructure for the World Cup or visitors who bought the most expensive tickets and flew in from afar. Migrant workers and visitors should be allowed to mingle with each other. Visitors, including journalists wanting to report on the migrant worker situation, fans, and stakeholders like national football associations, sponsors, and rights organizations should not be restricted from visiting labor camps.
Qatari authorities require women to obtain permission from their male guardians to marry, study abroad on government scholarships, work in many government jobs, travel abroad until certain ages, and receive some forms of reproductive health care. Some hotels require women to have a male guardian or be married to book and stay in a hotel room. Some events, such as concerts where alcohol is served, even ban Qatari women from attending. Such policies are discriminatory and facilitate violence against women.
Qatar moreover, has no domestic violence law and women who attempt to flee abuse can be returned to abusive families, arrested, or sent to psychiatric hospitals. A lack of transparency over discriminatory rules makes it difficult for women to challenge them. Women in Qatar have appealed to the authorities to repeal such laws. However, repressive laws limiting freedom of expression and association, government intimidation, and online harassment prevent women from challenging such rules or punish them when they do. There are no independent women’s rights organizations.
The authorities have made no serious reforms to the severe discrimination in law and practice they impose against women, affecting Qatari women and the many foreign women who live in the country. The authorities should eliminate all discriminatory male guardianship rules and practices, pass anti-discrimination law to end discrimination in practice, and repeal laws and practices that limit women’s civic participation to demand their own rights.
Qatari authorities criminalize extramarital sex, which disproportionately affects women, who can be prosecuted if they report rape and because pregnancy serves as evidence of the so-called crime. The penalties for these offenses are some of the harshest in the region, with up to seven years in prison, and floggings if they are Muslim. Police often do not believe women who report violence. Women are also required to show a marriage certificate to access certain forms of sexual and reproductive healthcare.
At major sporting events like the World Cup, the risk of sexual violence increases greatly, not just for fans, but particularly for migrant women in low-paid sectors. A Mexican woman who was a Supreme Committee official reported a physical assault by a man to the police in Qatar in June 2021. Instead of getting protection and justice, she found herself accused of the so-called crime of extramarital sex because the man claimed to be in a relationship with her, which she denied. Even though she managed to leave the country, the authorities proceeded to prosecute her on this charge and she remains on trial. Qatar should repeal legal provisions criminalizing extramarital sex, including article 281 of the Penal Code. The authorities should ensure support for survivors of sexual violence including medical, legal, and psychosocial – mental health assistance, and including emergency contraception, sexual health checks, and post-exposure prophylaxis for HIV. The authorities should allow all women access to sexual and reproductive health care without requiring a marriage certificate and should ensure that police and prosecutors have gender-responsive training.
Qatar has assured prospective visitors that it will welcome lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) visitors and that fans will be free to fly the rainbow flag at the games. However, prospective visitors including LGBT fans have been deterred from attending the games, as shared by the English Football Association Manager, Gareth Southgate based on his discussion with English fans.
People who have experienced government repression have told Human Rights Watch that the Qatari government surveils and arrests LGBT people based on their online activity. The authorities also censor traditional media related to sexual orientation and gender identity, including people who show support for LGBT individuals. They have effectively excluded LGBT content from the public sphere.
Suggestions that Qatar should temporarily suspend domestic laws and state practices during the games would reinforce the idea that same-sex desire and gender variance are a peculiar preoccupation of outsiders. That leaves LGBT residents of Qatar struggling to navigate their sexuality and gender identity in a repressive environment that risks resuming in full after the World Cup.
As Qatar advances its surveillance capabilities, including inside football stadiums, the possibility of LGBT Qataris being persecuted for publicly supporting LGBT rights will remain long after the international fans leave. Physical and virtual spaces free from surveillance are vanishing in Qatar as its data protection law allows broad exemptions that undermine the right to privacy. Digital targeting is combined with laws that target people based on consensual sexual conduct outside of marriage.
Long-term legal reform should prioritize the realities of LGBT residents of Qatar, including by introducing legislation that protects against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, online and offline. The Qatari government should repeal article 285 and all other laws that criminalize consensual sexual relations outside of marriage.
Press freedom is curtailed in Qatar, which ranked 128 on the World Press Freedom list for 2021. Qatar also introduced an amendment to its penal code that imposes up to five years of prison for spreading rumors or false news with ill intent. It is not clear who determines what is a “rumor” or “fake news,” and what standards they will use in making such a determination.
In November 2021, two Norwegian journalists investigating migrant worker issues in Qatar were arrested and detained for 36 hours. Film showing evidence of the migrant worker situation in Qatar was destroyed. Separately, the same month, another Norwegian journalist was also held in solitary confinement for 24 hours. Such cases are common in Qatar, posing a credible threat to the narrative that the country is trying to build through its heavy public relations machinery.
Similarly, migrant workers who speak up about their realities and become important sources of information are also at great risk of immediate and arbitrary detention or deportation. Over the last year alone, Qatari authorities forcibly disappeared the Kenyan labor activist Malcolm Bidali before releasing him, and put Abdullah Ibhais, a Jordanian former employee of the Supreme Committee, on trial for bribery and misuse of funds, which some evidence suggests was in retaliation for his criticism of the poor conditions for migrant workers.
Qatar should have had every expectation of massive global media interest and coverage over the decade leading up to the World Cup and in the year of the tournament. It should not come as a surprise to Qatari authorities or FIFA that journalists who come to Qatar during the tournament will be interested in stories beyond the matches and who scores goals. They should be ensured that they will be safe and allowed to do their work with little interference. They should face no undue restrictions to report on social or economic issues should they wish to do so. Similarly, fans and other supporters should also not face any safety concerns for posting openly on social media platforms.
If Qatar and FIFA do indeed believe their own reform narrative, they should see the arrival of thousands of journalists and commentators from all over the world to the country as an important opportunity to bear witness to the positive transformation, not restrict their access or suppress their voices.
President Biden is a president who makes us proud. He clearly stepped up to the plate in difficult times. COVID, inflation, Ukraine are just a few of the volatile issues he is managing.
When it comes to international issues like Ukraine, the president represents the United States, not Democrats or Republicans. Yet today we are so divided there are Republicans willing to attack him trying to undermine our standing in the world. It was reported last week, “More than two dozen Senate Republicans demand Biden do more for Ukraine after voting against $13.6 billion for Ukraine.” One total jackass, Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.), has managed to infuriate even some of the most evil members of his own party when he “called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a ‘thug’ and the Ukrainian government ‘incredibly evil’.”
It is one thing to attack the president on domestic issues. But today we have a Republican Party hoping to see Biden fail without regard to the fact it would hurt the American people they have been elected to serve. Some individual Republicans have stepped up to the plate on one issue or another. Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) did so on the Jan. 6 committee. Yet most act like they are the dregs of society. Some so outrageous they manage to embarrass the party that has shown they are immune to being embarrassed, having stood by Trump. A new meme surfaced last week about Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) suggesting she represents what happens when ‘the ventriloquist dies and the dummy keeps talking.’
President Biden is showing how his years of experience in government, from the Senate to the VP’s office, are enabling him to effectively lead when working with NATO and our other allies. He has surrounded himself with some of the brightest, including National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken. He is wisely choosing to get advice from experts like Fiona Hill, among others, an expert on Russia and Putin. In 2013, Hill wrote a well-respected book, “Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin.” This week, Biden is in Brussels to meet with other NATO leaders for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine. He will solidify the work that has been done and reinforce the close working relationships he has reestablished with our allies after four years of Trump working to tear them apart.
One of the things I most respect about our president is his willingness to speak truthfully to the American people. To talk about some of what we will face at home including rising gas prices and continued inflation, as we support the people of Ukraine in their fight for their country and democracy. Biden has been attacked by those who think he is doing too much and those who think he is doing too little. That is the divide in our country we can lay at the feet of Donald Trump. Thankfully our allies, and the overwhelming member nations of the United Nations, are supporting what we are doing.
All this will play out as Americans go to the polls in November 2022. Whatever the situation is at home, and around the world, at that time we will see if a majority of the country is willing to support the president and elect Democrats up and down the ballot. We will see if they give the president a Democratic Congress so he can move forward more of his agenda for America. I believe when it comes down to it, they will. They will understand America has reclaimed its position as a leader in the world and we can move a domestic agenda forward that will benefit all. An agenda to bring children out of poverty and provide all with good jobs, quality healthcare, and a good education. Most Americans understand we must do something to fight climate change and ensure equal justice and opportunity for all.
I am an optimist and believe that optimism in the American people is not misplaced. Since I first stood on a street corner in New York City at the age of nine handing out flyers for Adlai Stevenson for president; to running a local storefront after school in 1960 supporting JFK for president; after being in winning and losing campaigns, that optimism remains. Somehow the American people find it in them to do the right thing even if it takes much longer than I want it to.
The Los Angeles Police Department said Wednesday that it is investigating an allegation that YouTube personality Denzel Dion attacked the social media personality Demi Martinez last week.
Martinez filed a police report accusing Dion of attacking her last Thursday after a party in the Hollywood Hills, according to Rosie Cervantes, a spokesperson for the LAPD.
Martinez, who goes by La Demi online and has over 300,000 Instagram followers, is a transgender woman known for posting about beauty, makeup and her transition. Early last Thursday, Martinez posted on Instagram that she had been the victim of a hate crime and an assault, naming Dion as the attacker.
Dion, a prominent LGBTQ YouTube creator who has more than 1 million subscribers and is known for his celebrity fashion critiques, has denied the allegations. On Sunday, Dion was one of 12 influencers whom Meta, Facebook’s parent company, invited to attend and create content at the Academy Awards.
Martinez first posted pictures to Instagram on Thursday appearing to show injuries she attributed to the assault, including bruising around her eyes and face, and cuts on her legs.
Hours later, Martinez posted screenshots of Dion’s Instagram account and identified him as her attacker, saying the two had gotten into an argument.
Dion denied the allegations in posts published on his social media accounts later Thursday, writing that he was “heartbroken and deeply saddened” by Martinez’s allegations. “I would never do the things I am being accused of,” Dion wrote. “I know La Demi and we have always been cordial.”
Dion went on to write that he assumes Martinez’s allegations are “the result of mistaken identity” and that he doesn’t understand why Martinez “constantly mentioned my height, build, and race.” Martinez didn’t back down, responding on Instagram that Dion — who is Black and well over 6-feet tall — has a “distinct look.” Previously, she referred to him as a tall African American man.
“It baffles me that people would call me racist or say I’m making this story up,” Martinez told NBC News. “I’m not dumb, I know who I had my altercation with.”
Martinez said she reported the incident to the LAPD’s Hollywood investigative division last Thursday, which was confirmed by the copy of the police report NBC News viewed. Dion didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Martinez said that she had encountered Dion at parties and social events before, but that she did not know his name or that he was an influencer with a large following.
Martinez said Dion referred to her using an anti-trans slur and threatened to beat her up. NBC News was not able to independently confirm the events that led up to the alleged assault.
“I said ‘Go ahead, do it,’” Martinez said. “Sure enough, he swung and knocked me out and I fell onto the steps and I remember grabbing the railing, trying to catch my balance, and it was just blow after blow to my head.”
Martinez said that she was the last member of her friend group at the party and was waiting for an Uber when the altercation began. According to the LAPD report that she provided to NBC News, Martinez said the incident happened around 3 a.m.
Some high-profile transgender creators, including Martinez’s friend and roommate Nikita Dragun, have posted in support of Martinez. They are both urging bystanders and witnesses to come forward. So far, none of the other party guests have posted publicly about Martinez’s allegations.
