Thirty-one-year-old Clayton Hubbird has been charged with first-degree reckless homicide and use of a dangerous weapon for killing Regina “Mya” Allen.
August 29 video footage from a BP gas station showed that Allen and Hubbird briefly talked inside the station before she stepped into the passenger’s seat of his black Chevy Tahoe SUV, police told FOX6. When the two arrived at Allen’s apartment complex, a witness told police that he saw them arguing in the vehicle before hearing a gunshot.
Allen reportedly stumbled out of the vehicle and exclaimed, “I’m shot!” before dialing 911 for emergency services. When police arrived, she told an officer that she had met the man who shot her at a gas station. She later died from her injuries, barely a month before her 36th birthday.
On August 30, police found the SUV parked in Wauwatosa, a city about seven miles east of Milwaukee. Investigators found ammunition and firearm magazines in Hubbird’s bedroom.
Police issued a warrant for Hubbird’s arrest on September 6.
Hubbird appeared in court on October 2, and cash bond was set at $250,000, according to FOX6.
Friends remembered Allen as full of laughter.
“I remember seeing her, and I was jut like, amazed by her, her beauty and the way that she carried herself,” said Ananna Sellers, a member of a Wisconsin Black trans leaders coalition called The Black Rose Initiative. “I really did have a soft spot in my heart for Mya.”
Sellers added, “Whenever something happens to a girl like us, it’s always got something to do with [being trans] to some capacity.”
Thirty-one trans people have been murdered so far this year, according to the Human Rights Campaign (HRC). A majority of the individuals murdered have been Black trans women. The number is likely an undercount seeing as some trans people are misgendered by their families, police, or media after death while others are never identified at all.
Yesterday Erika Hilton (she/her) in São Paulo and Duda Salabert (she/her) in Minas Gerais won their elections to the Brazilian Congress, making them the first trans people ever elected to Congress in the country’s history. Despite ongoing anti-LGBTQ hate perpetuated by the Bolsonaro administration, a record number of out LGBTQ people ran for Congress this year in Brazil – over 300 – including a record number of trans people. With yesterday’s results, LGBTQ representation in Brazil will double from 9 to 18 elected officials, 16 of whom are women.
Alhelí Partida, Director of Global Programs at LGBTQ Victory Institute, released the following statement about the election:
“Brazil’s LGBTQ community – and trans community in particular – has never had equitable representation in government. But with a record number of LGBTQ candidates running this year, it is clear that LGBTQ leaders are stepping up to make change from within the halls of power. Erika and Duda showed true courage in their campaigns for Congress, running during a time of increased homophobia and transphobia at the hands of President Bolsonaro and his followers. Their success is not just a sharp rebuke to these bigots, but a beacon of hope to Brazil’s vibrant LGBTQ community.
“While we hope their success is a sign of better days, Brazil remains an incredibly tough place to engage as an out leader – where homophobia, transphobia, death threats and worse are common. In 2018, we lost one of our own, Rio de Janeiro Councilwoman Marielle Franco, assassinated by anti-LGBTQ and anti-women attackers. While her loss continues to be devastating, she has become an icon and the fuel needed to inspire more courageous LGBTQ Brazilians to raise their voices.”
In preparation for the 2022 election cycle in Brazil, LGBTQ Victory Institute and #VoteLGBT held two trainings to support LGBTQ candidates. In total, there were 63 participants, 28 of whom ran for office this year – including three trans women who ran for Congress. #VoteLGBT, Victory Institute, Equal Rights in Action Fund and Google also released “The State of Brazilian LGBT+ Politics: Between Power and Obliteration” this year, the first analysis of LGBTQ politics and political power in Brazil.
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LGBTQ Victory Institute
LGBTQ Victory Institute’s Global Programs work to increase the political participation of LGBTQ people to advance equality across the globe. This work includes training LGBTQ leaders and aspiring candidates, implementing voter education and civic engagement initiatives, and conducting research on the climate of LGBTQ political participation.
When transgender activist Erin Reed first started transitioning, she found it difficult to locate gender-affirming health centers that provide informed consent around hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and its effects. So, as an adult, she conducted extensive research in trans-inclusive web forums and created a Google Map listing 786 trans-supportive clinics, LGBTQ community centers, and other services across the nation.
A transphobic website called “The Gender Mapping Project” (or “The Gender Mapper”) seemingly reposted Reed’s map — typos and all — in order to help anti-trans activists “name and shame doctors” that support trans clients. The website’s stated goal is to abolish the “gender industry.”
“We are dedicated to delivering the truth about what is happening to children and youth by documenting the hard numbers on how many gender clinics, how many surgical clinics, and recording evidence where necessary. We wish to hold those who are harming to account and we demand justice for the victims,” the website states.
The website — which repeats right-wing falsehoods about “experimental surgeries,” chemical castration, and using gender-affirming care to “abuse” children — was founded by Alix Aharon, a member of the Women’s Liberation Front, a group that opposes trans legal and civil rights.
When Reed became aware of the website allegedly using her map, she tweeted, “I am enraged. I made my informed consent HRT map specifically for people dealing with poverty or lack of access to be able to obtain hormones after a move, or obtain without going for a year of therapy they can’t afford. And this d**k is using it for hate.”
Reed filed a Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim and asked Google to remove the map. But the Gender Mapping Project continues to use it, Reed told The Daily Dot.
Aharon’s website map may have already helped anti-trans groups target gender-affirming care providers. Reed and other trans activists worry that others will use the map to intimidate, harass, or commit violence against care providers and their clients. This possibility seems entirely possible considering that death and bombing threats have targeted at least two gender-affirming hospitals so far.
Aharon’s website, Republican politicians, Fox News, as well as other activists and media figures have claimed that gender-affirming care is a form of “child abuse” even though every major U.S. medical association says such care improves the lives of trans people.
“Given the threats made against clinics and attacks on LGBTQ community centers, this poses an immediate risk to every place listed in this map,” trans advocate Alejandra Caraballo wrote on Twitter. “Anti-abortion activists use similar lists to coordinate bombings of clinics and murders of providers.”
In response to such criticism, Aharon disingenuously told Salon, “My map is subject to interpretation. I don’t express an opinion on the actual map, if someone thinks that child gender clinics are a wonderful thing then my map is simply a resource for treatment.”
She told The Daily Dot that she doesn’t “really have other political views” and doesn’t see how her map can be transphobic seeing as pro-trans advocates have posted similar maps.
While her website rails against gender-affirming care for children, its map contains listings for places offering “’adult advocacy, support & ancillary services’ including support groups, chest binders, and STD testing,” The Daily Dot noted.
The Gender Mapping Project’s Twitter and Facebook accounts have both been suspended. However, the site maintains a monetized YouTube account, meaning that Google and Aharon can both profit from it. Google told the aforementioned publication that it is investigating the YouTube channel and Google Map.
Google also said that anyone can create maps and also report ones that may violate the company’s policies. Meanwhile, Twitter users are sharing the map online, tagging high-profile anti-trans activists who could help direct violence toward gender-affirming caregivers, the aforementioned publication reported.
One Twitter user criticized Google’s inaction against Aharon, writing, “Seriously @google @googlemaps you are putting people in danger by not taking this down. Do something about it. #NoHate.”
When Jennifer Eller first began transitioning in 2011, she was an English teacher in Kenmoor Middle School in Maryland. That year, the students began calling her a pedophile. A human resources worker said that her therapist’s note about her transition was “garbage” before insisting that Eller present as male at the school. Another administrator told her not to wear skirts because it’d make others feel uncomfortable.
Eller transferred to Friendly High School, thinking things would get better. They got worse.
Students and parents repeatedly called her a tr***y and a pedophile and misgendered her. Students regularly called Eller “mister,” a “he/she,” an “it,” and “a guy in a dress.” They asked about her genitals. One threatened to rape her and make her “their girlfriend.” She reported the rape threat, but the school principal said he couldn’t do anything about it.
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One parent who accused Eller of “lying to everyone” about her gender came to school to yell at her. The parent had to be removed by school security.
Eller said she filed formal harassment and discrimination complaints with school officials. In response, school officials retaliated against her, she said. The school removed Eller from teaching an advanced English course, accusing her of being too friendly with students. Later, administrators and staff baselessly accused her of shouting at students and making them fear for their safety, Eller said.
She eventually resigned from teaching in 2017, citing a need to protect her own mental and physical health. She later filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EOCC). The EEOC determined that Eller’s claims had merit. She then filed a lawsuit against the Prince George’s County Public School district in 2018, stating that officials had done nothing to stop or address the transphobic abuse.
The school district recently settled with Eller for an undisclosed amount. The district also put into place policies and administrative procedures for handling future transphobia. These changes were part of the settlement agreement, The Washington Post reported.
The changes also include school staff resources that explain trans identity and related terms, pronoun use, policies about bathroom and locker room facilities, dress codes, athletic participation, and other related issues.
“If these policies had been in place when I started my process,” Eller told the Post, “I would have known what my protections were and what I can expect from folks. And that’s not to say everybody’s perfect or that everyone would follow it. But I think that it would have been different. I think it would have been a healthier environment for me.”
Eller currently works as part of the U.S. Navy’s Child & Youth Programs where she is treated with respect, her lawyers said. However, working there, she only earns a fraction of what she made as a teacher.
During the four months of the monkeypox outbreak, health care providers, researchers and an anxious public have scrambled to determine how the virus transmits, how to prevent it and how the infection plays out in the body.
Little attention has been paid to what comes after the infection clears.
Following recovery from this skin lesion–causing virus, people often find themselves waiting anxiously over the course of months to see whether monkeypox will leave them with permanent scarring. And in interviews with more than a dozen people who have had the virus and as many health care providers and researchers, NBC News learned that in some people, the lingering scars are not only physical but psychological. Troublingly, it’s also possible the virus could cause permanent damage to sensitive internal tissues and give rise to persistent pain or other onerous long-term symptoms.
“Just because you’re cleared and no longer contagious, it doesn’t mean you’re totally back to normal,” said Matt Ford, 30, a bicoastal actor who contracted the virus at the beginning of the summer and hopes that his scarring, including pockmarks on his face, will continue to dissipate. “It did a number on my body, especially in more sensitive areas.”
Unfortunately, people looking to doctors or health agencies for answers about what to expect post-pox are typically met with an information vacuum. This is the result of the notorious dearth of research conducted prior to the outbreak about a virus that until this spring largely only circulated in western and central Africa.
“I just want there to be more concrete information, but maybe that’s asking too much,” said Brad, 33, a New York City area resident who preferred to use only his first name to protect his medical privacy.
In an emailed statement, the New York City health commissioner, Dr. Ashwin Vasan, acknowledged this lack of health guidance, saying, “It’s still early in the outbreak and the kinds of long-term studies needed to understand these issues better have not been completed yet. We continue to learn from what people who’ve experienced infection and recovery are reporting.”
Since the unprecedented global outbreak was first detected by health authorities in mid-May, 65,415 cases have been diagnosed worldwide, 24,846 of them in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports. While the weekly case count both nationally and worldwide has declined in recent weeks, raising hopes that the outbreak might be brought under control, concerns remain that at least a fraction of those who have had the virus might suffer long-term impacts of the infection.
For gay men, who comprise the overwhelming share of global monkeypox cases and among whom the competitiveness to look good is famously Olympian, worry over sustaining noticeable scarring in the wake of the infection can be particularly taxing.
“Especially for people who already have body dysmorphia or are hypersensitive to how others see them, there is this hypervigilance” of such cosmetic effects, said Preston Wholly, managing clinical director of behavioral health services at the LGBTQ-focused nonprofit health care provider Harlem United in New York City.
The marks are also signals of an infection that because it largely transmits through sex between men, can be highly stigmatized.
“I think it’s important to be aware of the effect of stigma regarding the route of monkeypox transmission, at-risk groups and disfiguring skin lesions — all of which could contribute to psychological distress,” said Dr. James Badenoch, a physician at the Queen Mary University of Medicine in London and the co-lead author of a paper published Sept. 8 in eClinicalMedicine on neurological and psychiatric conditions linked to monkeypox.
Harun Tulunay, 35, was hospitalized with a particularly severe case of the virus in July. In addition to experiencing extreme proctitis, or inflammation of the rectal tissues, and an inability to swallow, he developed an atypically large purple-black lesion that covered his entire left nostril. The lesion has since healed but has left behind pockmarked scar tissue.
“I am very obsessed with the little scar on my nose and am using lots of creams, scared it won’t go away,” said Tulunay, who, like a substantial proportion of people who contract monkeypox, has HIV.
Harun Tulunay.Courtesy Harun Tulunay
Dr. Howa Yeung, an assistant professor of dermatology at the Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, said that while guidance on care for monkeypox lesions may be lacking, what is known about treating smallpox, which like monkeypox belongs to the orthopoxvirus family, can serve as a guide.
Yeung recommended the use of what are known as hydrocolloid dressings on lesions, which help keep them moist and promote healing while minimizing scarring. For thicker scars, silicone gel or patches may help improve their appearance, he said—especially if such treatment is started shortly after the scabs fall off. Later on, lasers and microneedling may further improve their appearance, although such interventions can be expensive.
The dermatologist noted that people with darker skin tones are likely at higher risk of monkeypox lesions leaving lasting dark marks, which he estimated could take three to 12 months to fade.
“Some scars will be permanent,” Yeung said.
He advised the use of skin-lightening agents, which a dermatologist can prescribe, as well as a high SPF sunscreen to keep the sun from further darkening the pigment.
Gerald Febles, 25, reported grappling with such marks, which, although they have been improving, still greatly bother him. Hoping they will recede over the coming months, he’s tried various scar-treatment creams, which don’t come cheap.
Gerald Febles points to a scar left from his monkeypox outbreak.Benjamin Ryan / NBC News
“I was very confident in my own skin before,” said Febles, who is an employee relations manager for the urgent care company MedRite. He said he now has “a lot more insecurity about my body in general. I’ve even gone to bars and some people have asked, ‘Oh, what’s that on your neck?’ So it’s something I’m reminded of whether or not it’s on my own terms.”
Febles was keen to assert that he sees no reason to be ashamed of having had monkeypox. But recalling that the infection caused him excruciating pain, he nevertheless characterized such questions from people as “a trauma trigger.”
The potential for lasting damage
Proctitis, experienced by 1 in 4 people with the virus in a Spanish study and 16% of U.S. cases about which the CDC has data, is one of the most devastating potential monkeypox symptoms. It can cause excruciating pain, in particular when defecating. What’s more, such symptoms might portend longer-term consequences of the infection.
During a July 14 Infectious Diseases Society of America call with reporters, Dr. Mary Foote, a medical epidemiologist at New York City’s health department, raised an early alarm that monkeypox lesions might cause permanent internal damage in some people. This, she said, could include the formation of scar tissue or strictures in the anorectal or urethral tissues, which could affect bodily functioning.
“It’s quite concerning,” Foote said of these potential outcomes, which she recently told NBC News might prompt the need for surgery or other interventions.
Dr. Boghuma Titanji, an infectious disease specialist at Emory University, reported seeing urethral damage or overall pain in the penis, including difficulty retracting the foreskin, due to scarring from monkeypox.
Dr. Boghuma Titanji.Courtesy Dr. Boghuma Titanji
“When we see these cases with urologic involvement, we consult urologists,” Titanji said, noting that “early urinary catheterization and other interventions may prevent complications down the line.”
Brian Rice, 43, reported suffering from a host of bothersome health problems, including the flu, since recovering from monkeypox in mid-August. Having endured penile pain, swelling and discharge during the infection, the attorney has since experienced pain in his pelvic area and the frequent need to urinate. These symptoms eventually resolved themselves, Rice said, following pelvic floor myofascial release treatments. But he’s also experienced a persistent rash in his pubic area that is only recently starting to clear up.
“Nobody knows whether these other symptoms I’m experiencing are related in any way to monkeypox,” said Rice, who is HIV positive and lives in Cliffside Park, New Jersey. “It could be stress and anxiety; it could just be triggering other things.”
Dr. Peter Shalit, who runs an LGBTQ-focused primary-care medical practice in Seattle, reported that one of his patients had a mild case of monkeypox in July, with only skin lesions. Then, in August, the man relapsed and suffered from worse disease symptoms, including proctitis. Three weeks after recovering the second time, his rectal symptoms returned once more, causing him severe pain. Shalit treated both the second and third waves with the antiviral TPOXX, which appeared effective at battling symptoms.
The eClinicalMedicine paper published this month reported that in rare cases people with monkeypox develop neurologic symptoms, including encephalitis, confusion or seizures.
“Encephalitis can cause long-term problems with disability, mood and memory problems,” said Dr. Jonathan Rogers, a psychiatrist at University College London and a co-lead author of the paper. He stressed, however, that he and his coauthors don’t have the necessary follow-up data to determine any extended effects of this condition among people who have recovered from monkeypox.
The CDC reported Sept. 13 the cases of two previously healthy men in their 30s who after contracting monkeypox developed encephalomyelitis, or inflammation of the brain and spinal cord. The men have recovered from the infection, but a month after the start of their neurologic symptoms, they each still require an assistive device to walk.
A difficult transition
Arriving during the Covid crisis denouement, the monkeypox outbreak has triggered pandemic-related anxieties that had only recently begun to abate, by sending people with the virus right back into isolation for the few weeks the infection takes to resolve. And as they grapple with recovering from such a stigmatized virus, many of those who spoke with NBC News said it has taken time for them to regain their confidence and calm within the outside world — be that interacting with colleagues, seeing friends and family, or getting back into dating and sexual intimacy.
These people report having a particularly difficult time disentangling the misery of monkeypox from the joys of sex.
“I just feel like I lost my mojo,” said Harun Tulunay, who, similar to Febles, finds men constantly striking up conversations with him about monkeypox, especially given how much media coverage his case received.
“They don’t seem much interested in dating me after,” he said, ruefully.
In the meantime, Tulunay, who is a training and volunteer coordinator at the HIV nonprofit Positively UK, is trying to get his semen tested to determine if he might still harbor the virus. Monkeypox has indeed been found in seminal fluid, and the World Health Organization has recommended that men wear condoms for 12 weeks following recovery from monkeypox out of concern, pending further research, that the virus might remain in semen and be transmissible for that long.
John Farrey, 32, said what he missed most while isolating with monkeypox was going out dancing with friends. So he thought he’d be jazzed to jump right back onto the dance floor once he recovered.
But, the Brooklyn tech worker said, “I felt very terrified of my own skin” during the immediate aftermath of his infection. Being around other people, he said, “still felt unsafe.”
“It really took me a long time to be comfortable having close contact again,” Farrey said.
For Brad, the New Yorker, having monkeypox was “totally traumatic,” sending him off-kilter emotionally. He’s been struggling to regain his equilibrium since then. A scar on his penis has made him self conscious and has caused him to worry that sexual partners will ask intrusive questions about it.
“Then it’s ‘bye-bye mood,’” Brad quipped of such a scenario.
“I’m still kind of afraid of sex, because my last sexual experience resulted in this, and it still carries so much weight,” he said of contracting monkeypox. “Sometimes it turns into this source of shame that I’ve never experienced before about sex.”
Then there’s the question of when the body is once again ready for the rigors of intercourse. Proctitis, said Dr. Chris Beyrer, director of the Duke University Global Health Institute, “is going have a very big impact on subsequent sexual functioning” for those who engage in receptive anal sex.
“I think the question is: ‘When have you sufficiently healed?’” Breyer said—which, he acknowledged, “is not a question that people have good answers for.”
The importance of support
Given the traumatic ripple effects that monkeypox can unleash, experts highlight the need to provide people who contract the virus with support that doesn’t end when the scabs clear up.
“The anguish experienced by many patients cannot be underestimated. It can be a truly horrible time,” Dr. Hans Kluge, regional director of WHO Europe, said at an Aug. 30 news conference about monkeypox. He called for buttressing “both the physical and mental health of patients during the entire course of the disease, and after. It remains of critical importance.”
Harlem United’s Preston Wholly said he works with his clients who have contracted the virus to cut through the harmful stigma tied to contracting monkeypox.
“We really want to process that it wasn’t their fault and work through the guilt and shame and kind of normalize it,” he said.
Jeffrey Galaise, 41, who said he has persistent nightmares about the infection —“I imagine myself having pox and pain,” he said — is among the many people who have contracted the virus and then established their own support networks. He founded a Zoom-based monkeypox support group for people with the virus he met mainly through social media. This outlet, he said, has been invaluable as he tries to move on.
“I need to get back to my normal life,” said Galaise, who works for a New York City governmental agency. “It has certainly been a transition. I certainly think I’m getting there.”
Brad, who has also found a supportive community of others who have had monkeypox through social media, said he yearns to have the lingering physical and emotional effects of monkeypox behind him.
“I would like there to be a day when I don’t worry about this anymore,” he said. “I just want to be done with it.”
Pope Francis reportedly encouraged an LGBTQ+ Catholic group to build a church “that excludes no one.”
According to L’Avvenire, the pope met with Italian LGBTQ+ Catholic group The Tent of Jonathon in a Wednesday (21 September) conference to discuss the organisation’s plan to build a hospitable church that would cater to LGBTQ+ people.
The group, which was founded in 2018, works with various religious organisations to provide “sanctuaries of welcome and support for LGBT people and for every person affected by discrimination.”
In an effort to convince Pope Francis, organisation members gave him a collection of letters from the parents of LGBTQ+ children who have faced “isolation and suspicious within the Christian community.”
Having urged religious parents to “never condemn your children” in a 26 January address, adding that parents should “not hide behind an attitude of condemnation,” the conferences appeared to convince him as he told the organisation to continue with the church’s construction.
Despite upholding traditional church teachings that claim homosexuality is “intrinsically disordered,” the pontiff has been surprisingly forthcoming about introducing LGBTQ+ members into Catholic proceedings.
In 2013, he famously said: “If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge?”
But there is still a long way to go for LGBTQ+ acceptance in the Vatican. During the same address, he condemned what was cryptically described as lobbying by the LGBTQ+ community.
“The problem is not having this orientation,” he claimed. “We must be brothers. The problem is lobbying by this orientation, or lobbies of greedy people, political lobbies, Masonic lobbies, so many lobbies. This is the worse problem.”
Pope Francis has also repeatedly shut down any hope of same-sex marriage in the Catholic Church, most recently in 2021 when he said he “doesn’t have the power to change sacraments.”
“I have spoken clearly about this, no? Marriage is a sacrament. Marriage is a sacrament. The church doesn’t have the power to change sacraments. It’s as our Lord established.”
Excommunications for LGBTQ+ positive paraphenalia is still incredibly common in local Catholic communities. In June, a middle school was kicked out of the Catholic fold after officials refused to remove Pride and Black Lives Matter flags from school grounds.
In a statement, Massachusetts bishop Robert J. McManus, who chose to excommunicate the Nativity School of Worcester, said: “I publicly stated in an open letter…that ‘these symbols (flags) embody specific agendas or ideologies (that) contradict Catholic social and moral teaching
“It is my contention that the ‘Gay Pride’ flag represents support of gay marriage and actively living a LGBTQ+ lifestyle.”
In response, school president Thomas McKenney said that the flags “represent the inclusion and respect of all people” and that they simply state “that all are welcome at Nativity and this value of inclusion is rooted in Catholic teaching.”
At the start of the new school year in New York, a trans, Jewish teacher at Brooklyn’s Magen David Yeshivah was outed by parents and forced by the school from her job.
Talia Avrahami, who holds a master’s degree in Jewish education from Yeshiva University, was hired shortly before the school year began.
Following parents’ night at the yeshiva, which serves a mostly Syrian Orthodox community, video of Avrahami introducing herself went viral on YouTube and WhatsApp, with accusations that Avrahami was masquerading as a woman. People dug up pictures from before she transitioned and shared them on social media platforms.
Two Orthodox outlets, in posts since removed, disparaged Avrahami’s hire as shocking and “insane.” She was doxed, with her home address published online. The family was forced from their Washington Heights apartment for fear of reprisal. Video of Avrahami leaving her building with her husband and child with bags packed on Friday was posted to an Orthodox YouTube channel.
That video was shot the same day Avrahami was forced to resign her position as a social studies teacher.
According to a spokesperson for Avrahami, the yeshiva told her she wasn’t a good fit for the school. Avrahami agreed to take her salary through January in exchange for signing a non-disclosure agreement, barring her from disparaging the school publicly.
Over the weekend, the yeshiva sent an email to parents addressing the vacancy: “Please be advised that beginning Monday, September 19th, your child will have a replacement teacher for Social Studies.”
“It’s sad to see that some people want to derail our lives,” Avrahami told The Times of Israel. “We’re questioning whether or not our entire lives are ruined or not. It’s tough.”
“They’re posting pictures of our family, they’re posting where we live, we’re getting death threats. They’ve somehow taken videos outside our home,” she said.
Despite the fact Avrahami signed a non-disclosure agreement with the school, she retains the right to make claims under civil rights employment law. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2020 that the protections of Title VII against discrimination applies to people who are LGBTQ.
Last week, Avrahami posted to Facebook seeking a “lawyer with expertise in defamation, contract law and human rights issues.”
Bisexual workers report lower rates of workplace discrimination than cisgender lesbians and gay men, a new study has found, but that may be because fewer cis bisexuals are out at work compared to cis lesbians and gay men.
The Williams Institute — a UCLA’s School of Law group that researches sexual orientation and gender identity issues — analyzed survey data collected in May 2021 from 935 LGBTQ adults in the workforce.
Its analysis found that 33.8 percent of gay and lesbian employees experienced at least one form of employment discrimination, namely, being fired or not hired due to their sexual orientation. Comparatively, 24.4 percent of bi employees reported experiencing the same.
The lower overall rates of discrimination may be due to the fact that fewer bisexuals are out at work. Only 19 percent of bi workers are out to all their co-workers, compared to 50 percent of gay and lesbian workers who are out to co-workers.
Only 19 percent of bi workers are out to their coworkers, compared to 50 percent of gay and lesbian workers. Similarly, only 36 percent of bi employees are out to their supervisors, compared to 74.6 percent of gay and lesbian employees.
Bi men and women were also more likely than gay and lesbian employees to report changing their workplace appearance to hide their sexual orientation. Approximately 26.4 percent of bi workers said they had done so, compared to 17.9 percent of gay and lesbian workers.
Interestingly, roughly 60 percent of gay, lesbian, and bi employees said they avoided social events and personal discussions to reduce the likelihood of discrimination and harassment. But when bi employees were out to their coworkers, they reported facing similar or higher rates of discrimination and harassment as out gay and lesbian workers.
The survey also found that gay and bi men typically faced higher rates of employment discrimination, verbal, and sexual harassment than lesbians and bisexual women.
For example, 57.7 percent of bi men experienced verbal harassment, compared to 26.8 percent of bisexual women. While 41.6 percent of gay men experienced verbal harassment, only 29.5 percent of lesbians experienced the same thing. Nearly 50 to 65 percent of all discrimination was religiously motivated, the respondents said.
Workplace sexual harassment was experienced by 34.8 percent of bi men, 33.6 percent of gay men, 29.2 percent of bi women, and 17.4 percent of lesbian women. While 58 percent of out bi men said they had left previous jobs due to workplace discrimination, only 27 percent of out bi women had left previous jobs for the same reason.
These findings came out just before Celebrate Bisexuality Day, an annual day for uplifting the bisexual community, individuals, and their shared history. Today is Celebrate Bisexuality Day.
A 2021 Gallup found that 57 percent of LGBTQ Americans identify as bisexual.
A recent study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has found that monkeypox disproportionately affects people with HIV and sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
The study looked at HIV and STI rates among 1,969 people with monkeypox in eight U.S. jurisdictions.
Of that sample, 38 percent of people with monkeypox had also contracted HIV in the last year. About 41 percent of people with monkeypox also had an STI in the preceding year. About 61 percent of the sample had contracted either an STI or HIV in the previous year.
Researchers said this correlation doesn’t necessarily mean that having HIV or an STI means you’re more likely to contract monkeypox.
In fact, the higher number may be due to a “self-referral bias,” meaning that people who visited a medical professional due to monkeypox symptoms may also already have established healthcare for HIV and STIs. Either that, or sexual health providers may be more likely to recognize and test for the monkeypox virus among men who’ve had HIV and STIs over the past year.
“Persons with monkeypox signs and symptoms who are not engaged in routine HIV or sexual health care, or who experience milder signs and symptoms, might be less likely to have their Monkeypox virus infection diagnosed,” researchers wrote.
HIV-positive people in the study sample were also twice as likely to be hospitalized due to monkeypox compared to HIV-negative people with monkeypox, WTTW reported.
This could mean that people with compromised immune systems — the kinds associated with advanced and under-treated forms of HIV — are more likely to exhibit severe monkeypox symptoms. Despite this, people with HIV aren’t more likely to exhibit worse monkeypox symptoms than HIV-negative people in the general population, according to Dr. Aniruddha Hazra, assistant professor of infectious disease and global health at UChicago Medicine.
The study also found HIV was more prevalent among Black and Latino people with monkeypox, with rates of 63 percent and 41 percent, respectively. These rates were higher than the 28 percent of white people and 22 percent of Asian people who have both HIV and monkeypox.
These racial disparities are particularly concerning considering that numerous studies have shown that Black and Latino men are less likely than white men to be vaccinated against monkeypox and to have access to HIV-related medical care.
In response to the study’s findings, the CDC recommended that medical professionals prioritize people with STIs and HIV for monkeypox vaccination. Additionally, the CDC recommended offering STI and HIV screenings for people who are evaluated for monkeypox.
This last week, White House health officials voiced their belief that “we’re going to get very close” to eradicating monkeypox. As of September 23, there were 24,846 total confirmed monkeypox cases in the United States, the CDC reported.
In just a few short years in politics, Evelyn Rios Stafford has managed to make an impression at the highest levels of government, and at the most local, too.
The first transgender person to hold elected office in Arkansas, Rios Stafford serves as Justice of the Peace for her small district in Fayetteville. In her role, she’s officiated dozens of weddings for constituents. “That’s one of the highlights of this gig as Justice of the Peace. It always gives me such a warm fuzzy feeling to do that for people,” she told LGBTQ Nation.
Now, Rios Stafford is running for reelection to the post without serious opposition, a vote of confidence even before the election that constituents view her time in office as effective.
Rios Stafford’s first political involvement was getting a local civil rights ordinance passed in the late 2010’s. In 2020, she ran for an open seat on the local Quorum Court, the equivalent of a board of supervisors, and won. She represents about 16,000 people in her district.
At 49, with a broad smile and the easy, thoughtful cadence of a Texas native, Rios Stafford says being trans wasn’t a focus of her first campaign. “You know, I made one post…about it on National Coming Out Day during the campaign. But that was about it.” It wasn’t until after she was elected that “some folks got wind of the fact that I was a first of something.”
But her victory would become pivotal in the fight over trans rights in the state.
In 2021, the Arkansas legislature passed HB1570, also known as the Save Adolescents from Experimentation or SAFE Act. Like similar legislation introduced in other red states, the bill would ban all gender-affirming care for minors, prohibit insurance from covering gender transition procedures, and criminalize those assisting minors in the process.
The bill was awaiting Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson’s signature when Rios Stafford was enlisted by an Arkansas legislator to help halt the bill’s march into law. From the “phone call to me to meeting the governor was probably, I’d say 24 hours.”
While Rios Stafford was trans, she hadn’t transitioned as a youth. “I knew that I needed to also make space for folks who had this experience and were directly impacted, because their voices are really the ones that have been left out of this whole thing,” she said. Rios Stafford brought 18 year-old Willow Breshears, who began transitioning at 16 with her family’s active support, to the ornate conference room table for her meeting with the governor.
“This was probably the first time that he had ever had a sit down, face-to-face discussion with a trans person before, or in this case two trans people. And, you know, he was kind of starting at zero in terms of knowledge.” A 15-minute appointment turned into half an hour and then 45 minutes. “He was just wanting to know more, basically.”
“I was on pins and needles walking out of that room, like, you know, almost on the verge of having a panic attack. I was replaying all of my answers in my head, like, did I say the right thing, did I screw this up completely?”
Not only did Hutchinson veto the bill, he wrote a Washington Post op-ed explaining why and also went on Tucker Carlson’s show to defend his decision. No matter, the Arkansas legislature overrode his veto, though the law remains tied up in court challenges.
Still, Rios Stafford was satisfied to hear “echoes of some of the things we talked about” in Hutchinson’s defense of the veto.
“‘Traditionally, Republicans have held themselves up as champions of limited government,’” Rios Stafford told the governor. “‘In what way, shape or form is this limited government? Because this is big government. This is government getting in between the families and their doctors.’”
Rios Stafford’s own gender awakening was pivotal to her work in her adopted home state. She majored in English at Rice University in Houston and was pursuing a career in journalism when she got a call from the ABC-TV affiliate in San Francisco asking her to come in for an interview. She got the job. She was young and bright and on the loose in Baghdad by the Bay.
“It was a great time to come there,” she recalled. “During the dot-com boom, the city was kind of going crazy, and it was a really fun time to be there in my 20s. And obviously San Francisco is a place where you can really explore your identity, as well.”
Born and raised in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas, she grew up attending Catholic school, where she encountered the first signs of her conflicted gender identity.
“In Catholic school, I had a boyfriend when I was 15. A couple of our friends knew about it, but it definitely wasn’t something that we were out about. I knew that I wasn’t straight, exactly,” she remembers thinking, “but I didn’t really have the language or knowledge to have an understanding of exactly in what way.”
In college, she figured it out. It was “literally, when I was, like, doing research in the college library, that I came across the idea of transgender. And it was this lightbulb moment of like, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s what’s been going on with me.’”
In San Francisco, she embraced her new reality. “Gradually, I became more and more out,” Rios Stafford recalled. “It was not a surprise for some people. It was a surprise for others.” While she was “bracing for the worst,” she was “really pleasantly surprised and so grateful for having such a positive experience.”
Evelyn Rios Stafford on her wedding day Provided
“Back then, this was sort of like, this was new territory,” she said. “I think I was the first employee at an ABC owned-and-operated station to transition on the job.” The following year, Rios Stafford picked up two Emmys for her producing. “I feel like it was all tied together.”
The total package arrived shortly after she transitioned, when Rios Stafford met her future husband, Bob Stafford, an artist and graphic designer, online. She was “smitten from the beginning.” The two shared mutual friends in the arts scene South of Market in San Francisco, and Southern roots, as well. Soon after, the couple moved east to Stafford’s hometown of Fayetteville. They were married in 2016.
According to Rios Stafford, performing weddings in her job as Justice of the Peace is optional. “Not all the JPs do it. I have a feeling that one or two of them might not be on there because if they were on the list, they might have to do a same-sex wedding, and it’s against their personal beliefs or something? But I was like, ‘Sign me up! I’ll do anybody.’”
