Variety

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Carlos Santana makes polarizing anti-trans comments in viral concert clip

Carlos Santana is on the hot seat after a video of him on stage, making polarizing remarks about gender, quickly began circulating online. In the clip, the “Oye Como Va” singer is seen addressing the audience in between songs. Through the applause, Santana can be heard saying: “When God made you and me — before we came out of the womb, you know who you are and what you are. Later on, when you grow out of it, you see things, and you start believing that you could be something that sounds good, but you know it ain’t right. Because a woman […]

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‘Dear White People’ showrunner boycotts Netflix over ‘transphobic’ Dave Chappelle special

Jaclyn Moore has always considered Dave Chappelle one of her “comic heroes.” “His shadow is huge,” says Moore, who was a writer and showrunner on Netflix’s “Dear White People.” “He’s a brilliant goofy comedian, he’s brilliant as a political comedian. He has been brilliant for so so long, but I also don’t think because you’ve been brilliant means that you’re always brilliant.” Moore announced on Twitter and Instagram on Wednesday night that she would no longer work with Netflix after she watched Chappelle’s latest standup special, “The Closer,” which premiered on the streamer on Tuesday. In the special, Chappelle makes numerous jokes about trans […]

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Pete Buttigieg documentary ‘Mayor Pete’ to open LGBTQ Film Festival NewFest

The 33rd edition of the New York LGBTQ film festival NewFest will kick off with the East Coast premiere of “Mayor Pete,” the Amazon Studios documentary about Pete Buttigieg‘s run for president in 2020. Now Pres. Joe Biden’s Secretary of Transportation, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, had hoped to have been the youngest and first openly gay president of the United States. The 2021 hybrid edition of NewFest will take place Oct. 15-26 in New York City theaters and virtually on the festival’s on-demand platform. The lineup includes 130 films and episodic series from 31 countries. There are 30 narrative features, 14 docs […]

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J.K. Rowling Calls Gender Transitioning ‘a New Kind of Conversion Therapy’

– “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling is back in the spotlight after stating on Twitter that young people are being “shunted towards” hormones and surgery that may not be in their best interests, and comparing the measures to “conversion therapy.” “Many, myself included, believe we are watching a new kind of conversion therapy for young gay people, who are being set on a lifelong path of medicalization that may result in the loss of their fertility and/or full sexual function,” Rowling tweeted. Rowling was responding to a July 4 post by Twitter user @TrinerScot, who called out the author for […]

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‘Welcome to Chechnya’ Documents Horrifying Persecution of LGBTQ Chechens

Within two weeks of David France reading an article in The New Yorker about the persecution of LGBTQ people in Chechnya, he was on a plane headed to Moscow. It’s there that he first met the men and women who are featured in his new documentary “Welcome to Chechnya,” which premieres Tuesday on HBO. Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of the autonomous region of Russia, enacted a campaign in 2017 to find, imprison, torture and sometimes kill LGBTQ Chechens. Many who survived imprisonment have fled to Moscow, where they live in a safe house while seeking political asylum in other countries. […]

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Grindr to Remove Ethnicity Filter in Support of Black Lives Matter

Grindr said it will remove the racial and ethnic filter from its popular gay dating and social-networking app, citing user feedback and a commitment to the Black Lives Matter movement. “We will not be silent, and we will not be inactive,” the company said in posts on social media Monday. “We will continue to fight racism on Grindr, both through dialogue with our community and a zero-tolerance policy for racism and hate speech on our platform. As part of this commitment, and based on your feedback, we have decided to remove the ethnicity filter from our next release.” Grindr’s response […]

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LGBTQ-inclusive Entertainment Promotes Acceptance Study Finds

Movies, television shows and ads can help change attitudes about and erase prejudices towards the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer community. That’s the big takeaway from a new study conducted by advocacy group GLAAD and Procter & Gamble, the world’s largest advertiser. It found that 48 percent of non-LGBTQ people became more accepting of gay and lesbian people over the past few years because of their representation in media, significantly higher than reported for those who did not see LGBTQ people in the media. Seventy six percent said they were comfortable seeing LGBTQ characters in films like “Love, Simon” […]

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‘Welcome to Chechnya’ Documents Russian Region’s Anti-gay Purge

You can do anything with a face on screen these days, whether it’s shaving decades off with a digital scalpel or deepfaking it into unrecognizable oblivion. Usually this wizardry has the air of a stunt, a transformation pulled off merely because it’s possible. Never, however, have such effects proven as chillingly essential as they are in “Welcome to Chechnya,” a vital, pulse-quickening new documentary from journalist-turned-filmmaker David France that urgently lifts the lid on one of the most horrifying humanitarian crises of present times: the state-sanctioned purge of LGBTQ people in the eponymous southern Russian republic. Closely charting multiple missions to extract […]

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LGBTQ Video Creators Sue YouTube over Alleged Discrimination

A group of LGBTQ creators has sued YouTube and its parent company Google, alleging that the video platform was regularly restricting their abilities to make money with their videos based on their sexual orientation. The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in California Tuesday and first reported by The Washington Post Wednesday morning, seeks class-action status. YouTube did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday morning. “YouTube is engaged in discriminatory, anticompetitive, and unlawful conduct that harms a protected class of persons under California law,” the lawsuit alleges. It was filed on behalf of the creators of […]