Jo Yurcaba

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Ivy League swimming champion becomes target of anti-trans rhetoric

A swimmer at the University of Pennsylvania is the latest target in the culture-war debate over whether transgender girls and women should be allowed to participate on female sports teams.  Lia Thomas, who came out as trans in 2019, set three school records and two national records at a meet this month.  Since then, Thomas has faced criticism and verbal attacks from anti-trans groups, conservative media and, reportedly, even two teammates. Some of the headlines about Thomas’ wins said she “smashed” the records and continued her “dominant” season alongside pre-transition photos of her and using her previous name and male […]

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Hormone therapy linked to lower suicide risk for trans youths, study finds

Gender-affirming hormone therapy is strongly linked to a lower risk of suicide and depression for transgender youths, according to the first large-scale study to examine the issue.  The research, published Tuesday in the Journal of Adolescent Health, was based on a sample of more than 9,000 transgender and nonbinary youths from the ages of 13 to 24 who provided data on hormone therapy as part of an online survey conducted last year by The Trevor Project, an LGBTQ youth suicide prevention and crisis intervention group. Young people receiving gender-affirming hormones reported a lower likelihood of experiencing recent depression and considering suicide […]

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Sexual assault, harassment, bullying: Trans students say they’re targeted at school

Willow Andring, a 14-year-old transgender high school freshman, said she faces regular harassment at her school, Armstrong Junior-Senior High School in Kittanning, about 45 minutes northeast of Pittsburgh.  A classmate yelled at her to get out of the girl’s restroom, and she’s been called both racist and homophobic slurs, she said.  In late October, that harassment escalated, and she was left with a concussion after another student attacked and beat her in an incident that was caught on camera and shared on social media. Willow said she was nervous to return to school after that. “I’ve been sort of just […]

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Acceptance significantly reduces suicide risk for intersex youths, report finds

LGBTQ youths who are also intersex — an umbrella term that describes those whose reproductive or sexual anatomy does not fit the typical definitions of “male” or “female” — have a higher risk of suicide when compared to LGBTQ youths who are not intersex, according to a new report. But researchers say there is hope, because the data also show that one thing can help significantly reduce the risk: acceptance. The Trevor Project, a national youth suicide prevention and crisis intervention group, released the research Friday in a report that explores the mental health and well-being of intersex LGBTQ youths. It found […]

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Transgender people in ‘survival mode’ as violence rises, anti-trans bills become law

Last Saturday, Que Bell led a vigil for Transgender Day of Remembrance, an annual observance to honor the memory of transgender homicide victims that began in 1999. Bell has led these vigils before. He is the executive director of the Knights and Orchids Society, a nonprofit group based in Selma, Alabama, that supports Black transgender, queer and gender-nonconforming people, and he has been an advocate for more than a decade. But this year will be different.  “​​This is literally the first time that I’ll have to write down my best friend’s name for a TDOR celebration,” Bell said, using the initialism for […]

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‘Hidden Mercy’ shines light on nuns, priests who responded to AIDS with compassion

In 1986, the Vatican released a letter condemning homosexuality with what The New York Times called a “pointed allusion to AIDS.”  A year later, nearly 48,000 Americans had died from the disease.  Even as the death toll rose, the Roman Catholic Church reinforced its stance and also opposed the gay and lesbian rights movement more generally, creating an ongoing tension. Despite this, some nuns and priests went against those teachings and worked behind the scenes to care for and sit at the bedsides of people dying from AIDS-related illnesses. A new book, “Hidden Mercy: AIDS, Catholics, and the Untold Stories of Compassion in […]

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After election, more than 1,000 LGBTQ officials will serve in the U.S.

Once last week’s victors are sworn in, the United States will have elected more than 1,000 concurrently serving LGBTQ officials for the first time in history, according to the political action committee LGBTQ Victory Fund.  At least 237 lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer candidates were on the ballot — an 18.5 percent increase since the last off-year election, in 2019, according to the Victory Fund. Races were still being called Tuesday afternoon, but in many states, LGBTQ candidates celebrated historic firsts. LGBTQ candidates celebrate historic election firsts across the country NOV. 4, 202102:37 Six out LGBTQ candidates won their races […]

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United States issues its 1st passport with ‘X’ gender marker

The United States has issued its first passport with an “X” gender marker, which denotes that someone is neither exclusively male nor female, the State Department said Wednesday. This marks a milestone for nonbinary and intersex Americans, who make up an estimated 1.2 million and 4 million Americans, respectively, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law, and interACT, an intersex advocacy group. An increasing number of intersex, nonbinary and gender-nonconforming people have come out in recent years, but most of them have been unable to obtain IDs that accurately reflect who they are due to a patchwork of state laws across the country. […]

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Texas agency removes webpages with resources for LGBTQ youths

Texas officials removed two webpages in late August that provided resources for LGBTQ youths — including a link to a suicide prevention hotline — a few hours after criticism from one of Gov. Greg Abbott’s Republican primary challengers. The candidate, Don Huffines, who owns a real estate development company in the Dallas area, wrote Aug. 31 on Twitter: “It’s offensive to see @GregAbbott_TX use our tax dollars to advocate for transgender ideology. This must end.”https://iframe.nbcnews.com/gi7itgd?app=1 He described a webpage on the Department of Family and Protective Services’ website titled “gender identity and sexual orientation.”  “They’re talking about helping ‘empower and […]

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‘Worst List’ names 180 colleges that are ‘unsafe’ for LGBTQ students

An LGBTQ nonprofit on Monday released its annual Worst Listnaming 180 colleges and universities as “the absolute worst, most unsafe campuses for LGBTQ youth.”  Campus Pride, which advocates for LGBTQ inclusivity and safety at U.S. colleges and universities, added 50 universities to the list since last year — the most extensive update since the list started in 2015, according to the organization. The list includes colleges and universities that have either received or applied for a religious exemption to Title IX, a federal law that protects students from discrimination in federally funded schools, or have a “demonstrated history of anti-LGBTQ policies, […]

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