John Russell

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Taliban arrests & beats two queer women in Afghanistan. They might get death by stoning.

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LGBTQ+ activists Maeve Alcina Pieescu and Maryam Ravish were arrested by the Taliban last month while trying to flee Afghanistan. According to the U.K.-based human rights non-profit the Peter Tatchell Foundation, the two women face possible torture and execution. “They are expected to be tortured to reveal the names of other LGBTs and sentenced to a long jail term or possibly executed,” said Nemat Sadat, CEO of Afghan LGBT+ network Roshaniya, which is working with the foundation to press for the two women’s release. In a March 31 press release, the Peter Tatchell Foundation said that 19-year-old Ravish and 23-year-old Pieescu, […]

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US Citizenship and Immigration Services implements “cruel & unnecessary” anti-trans policy

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This week, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that it will only recognize “two biological sexes.” In a Wednesday, April 2, press release, the agency said that it was “updating the USCIS Policy Manual to clarify that it only recognizes two biological sexes, male and female.” The release cited President Donald Trump’s January 20, “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”  The president’s anti-trans order similarly declared that the U.S. government will only recognize two sexes, male and female, and falsely characterized so-called “efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex” as fundamental attacks on women […]

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Cops burst into women’s restroom to remove butch lesbian, accusing her of being a man

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A cisgender woman in Arizona is speaking out after she says she was harassed by cops in the women’s restroom of a Tucson Walmart late last month. Kalaya Morton, 19, of Phoenix, says she and her ex-girlfriend were using adjacent stalls in the store’s women’s restroom when two male sheriff’s deputies entered. “They were flashing lights on our feet and saying, ‘You have to get out of here. You have to come out. We need to talk to you,’” Morton told Advocate. Morton, who identifies as a stud — queer slang for a Black masculine-presenting lesbian — says she believes a store employee […]

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Trans landmark added to National Register of Historic Places despite Trump’s anti-trans attacks

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A San Francisco address that was once the site of a pre-Stonewall transgender uprising has been added to the National Register of Historic Places, the official list of historic sites, buildings, and objects in the United States. The National Park Service added the building at 101-102 Taylor St. in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood to its official list of historic U.S. places worthy of preservation on January 27, without any public statement or press release, The Bay Area Reporter first reported. The address was the location of Compton’s Cafeteria in the 1960s. One night in August 1966, a riot broke out at the 24-hour […]

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The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor said that anti-LGBTQ+ oppression in the country is part of the Taliban’s systematic gender oppression

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The International Criminal Court’s (ICC) chief prosecutor has filed applications for arrest warrants for two senior Taliban officials, charging them with gender persecution, including of LGBTQ+ Afghans. In a January 23 statement, ICC Prosecutor Karim A. A. Khan said that after an investigation of alleged crimes committed against Afghan civilians, his office has determined that there are “reasonable grounds to believe that the Supreme Leader of the Taliban, Haibatullah Akhunzada, and the Chief Justice of the ‘Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,’ Abdul Hakim Haqqani, bear criminal responsibility for the crime against humanity of persecution on gender grounds, under article 7(1)(h) of […]

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People living with HIV in Gaza are running out of medication

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Isreal’s war on Gaza has made finding medication nearly impossible for people trying to survive in the region, and Palestinians living with HIV have been hit particularly hard. According to The Intercept, aid groups like Glia say that HIV medication has specifically been blocked from entering Gaza, though Isreal’s agency for the Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories denies the allegation. “Israel neither blocks nor limits the entry of medications, including those for HIV, which can be brought in without quantitative restrictions,” the agency told the outlet. But Dr. Tarek Loubani, a Palestinian Canadian emergency physician with Glia told The Intercept that Israel has […]

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Trans inmates are being forced to cut their hair short & undergo breast exam’s in Florida

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The ACLU of Florida is suing the state’s Department of Corrections over a new anti-transgender policy that will restrict trans prisoners’ access to gender-affirming medical care as well as their ability to express their gender identity. According to a report from The Marshall Project and the Tampa Bay Times, a federal judge in Tallahassee held a preliminary hearing in the case on December 9. The ACLU of Florida has asked the judge to block enforcement of the policy, calling it an unconstitutional ban on gender-affirming care. A ruling is expected in the weeks ahead. Under the new policy, Florida prisons will […]

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Experts detail what LGBTQ+ healthcare may look like under Donald Trump’s new administration

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With President-elect Donald Trump just under two months away from taking office and a slew of troubling cabinet appointments making headlines — including anti-vax crank Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Health & Human Services (HHS) Secretary — LGBTQ+ Americans are understandably concerned about what a second Trump administration will mean for our rights and healthcare. In a recent interview with the Washington Blade, Human Rights Campaign (HRC) director of HIV and health equity Torrian Baskerville acknowledged the fears many LGBTQ+ people, particularly those who are Black, trans, and/or living with HIV, are experiencing around healthcare in light of both Trump’s rhetoric […]

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Four men are the latest victims of Nigeria’s anti-LGBTQ+ mob violence

Four men became the latest victims of anti-LGBTQ+ mob “justice” in the African country of Nigeria earlier this month, after they were accused of engaging in consensual same-sex sexual activity. As the Los Angeles Blade reports, the four young men were paraded down a street and run out of Edo State capital Benin City on November 17 wearing only their boxer shorts. The angry mob threatened to kill them if they ever returned. Nigerian LGBTQ+ activist Samson Mikel told the Blade that queer people have become scapegoats in Benin City, which he described as “backward” and a hotbed of “scammers and other crimes.” “The […]

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Tulsi Gabbard’s ties to anti-LGBTQ+ “cult” draw scrutiny after National Intelligence pick

Since being named President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for Director of National Intelligence, former Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard is facing new scrutiny for her ties to an alleged cult. As The Daily Beast notes, Gabbard became the first practicing Hindu member of Congress when she was elected to represent Hawaii’s 2nd district in 2013. But she is also reportedly connected to a fringe off-shoot of the Hare Krishna movement known as the Science of Identity Foundation. As The New Yorkernoted in a 2017 profile, Gabbard’s parents “joined the circle of disciples” surrounding the group’s founder, Chris Butler, when the family moved to Hawaii in […]

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