Police were called to a shooting at 11pm on January 6, where they found Martin with a fatal gunshot wound in a car in a ditch.
The paper did not mention Martin’s gender.
However, LGBT+ activists in Montogmery told Attitude that she was a trans woman.
Meta Ellis and Harvey McDaniel, who work for Montgomery Pride United, told the publication that they have been in touch with police about using Martin’s correct gender.
The actual number, however, could be higher as there is no official data collection on crimes against trans people, and trans murder victims have been known to be misgendered by local press.
Dana Martin was murdered on the 3900 block of Brewer Road, Montgomery. (Google Maps)
In November, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) released a report looking at the high levels of violence against America’s transgender community.
It found that 74 percent of identified transgender murder victims were misgendered (referred to using their birth gender) or deadnamed (referred to using their birth name) in initial police or media reports surrounding their deaths.
“Transgender people face devastating levels of discrimination and harassment in the workplace,” reads the report.
“These barriers are even higher for Black transgender people, who have double the unemployment rate of all transgender people, and four times that of the US general population.
“Transgender people face devastating levels of discrimination and harassment in the workplace.”
“With limited access to workplaces that are affirming and inclusive, transgender and gender-expansive people are put at greater risk for poverty, homelessness and involvement with criminalised work.
“Together, these factors put transgender people at an increased risk of violence and danger.”
Last year, the HRC Foundation and the Trans People of Color Coalition released a report documenting violence against trans gender people. It found that 2017 was the deadliest year on record for transgender people, particularly for trans women of colour.
A Canadian tech company has come under fire for allegedly providing filtering software censoring LGBTI content to anti-LGBTI governments.
LGBTI advocacy group All Out has teamed up with Mexican organization R3D, which defends human rights in the digital world, to shed a light on the issue.
The two have joined forces to urge Canadian company Netsweeper to stop providing LGBTI censorship filters to homophobic governments. Moreover, the LGBTI group wants to ensure that tech companies don’t use such technologies to violate human rights.
Activists started an online petition to put an end to this LGBTI-related content censorship. They addressed Perry J. Roach, Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Netsweeper Inc.
They also reached out to the Canadian government, which agreed to review their recommendations.
‘Helping countries like the UAE censor LGBTI content online, including life-saving information on HIV prevention, is a gross violation of international human rights guidelines,’ Senior Campaigns Manager at All Out Yuri Guaiana told Gay Star News.
‘We are glad the Canadian government agreed to review our recommendation that any additional financial support to Netsweeper will be made conditional on their commitment to human rights.’
Guaiana furthermore said that more than 27,000 people have signed the petition so far. They are asking Netsweeper to stop providing these filters censoring content identified as ‘Alternative Lifestyles’.
‘We’ll keep demanding that,’ Guaiana also added.
This is not the first time Netsweeper has faced criticism.
Last year, Citizen Lab, a security and human rights research group run out of the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto, published a report on the use of Netsweeper in 10 countries cited for systematic human rights problems. They analyzed activities in countries such as Afghanistan, Bahrain, India, Kuwait, Pakistan, Qatar, Somalia, Sudan, UAE, and Yemen.
‘Netsweeper’s services can easily be abused to help facilitate draconian controls on the public sphere by stifling access to information and freedom of expression,’ said Ronald Deibert, who runs Citizen Lab.
The report also explains how the technology provided by Netsweeper works.
The software blocks Google searches for LGBTI-related keywords and non-pornographic websites by mischaracterizing them as sexually explicit.
Husband and wife Jake and Hannah Graf are both trans | Photo: Paul Grace
18 December 2018 19:07 GMT
Six leading publications aimed at lesbian and bisexual women have issued a joint statement in support of trans people.
Representatives of DIVA, Curve, Autostraddle, LOTL, Tagg and Lez Spread The Word signed the statement.
They state, unequivocally, ‘That trans women are women and that trans people belong in our community.
‘We do not think supporting trans women erases our lesbian identities; rather we are enriched by trans friends and lovers, parents, children, colleagues and siblings.’
It said it was issuing the statement in the wake of anti-trans reporting across much of the media. There have also been a number of lesbians who have spoken out against trans rights.
Pride protest over trans rights
Last summer, lesbian protestors briefly halted the Pride in London march. Among their objections, the protestors claimed that some younger, butch lesbians were rushing to identify as trans men instead of embracing their lesbian identities.
They also objected to trans women with penises gaining access to female-only spaces such as changing rooms.
In the press, many media commented on the UK’s recent consultation on changing gender recognition laws. Even the left-wing Guardian was criticized for an editorial cautioning against changing the law.
‘We strongly condemn writers and editors who seek to foster division and hate within the LGBTQI community with trans misogynistic content, and who believe “lesbian” is an identity for them alone to define,’ says the statement.
‘We condemn male-owned media companies who profit from the traffic generated by these controversies.’
Trans rights advocates march at Glasgow Pride, 14 July 2018 | Photo: David Hudson
‘Concerned about the message these so-called lesbian publications are sending to trans women’
The statement continues:
‘We also strongly condemn the current narrative peddled by some feminists, painting trans people as bullies and aggressors – one which reinforces transphobia and which must be challenged so that feminism can move forward.
‘We are really concerned about the message these so-called lesbian publications are sending to trans women and to young lesbians – including trans lesbians – and we want to make in clear this is not in our name.
‘As the leading publications for queer women, we believe it is our responsibility to call out scaremongering conspiracy theories levelled at the trans community, and make it clear that DIVA, Curve, Autostraddle, LOTL, Tagg and Lez Spread The Word will always be safe spaces for the trans community.
‘Forty years ago, to be a lesbian was to be questioned and persecuted. Today things are better for cis lesbians but there are still places where to be a lesbian is impossible.
‘So it is for trans men and women, as well as non-binary people, many of whom identify as lesbian, bisexual, gay or queer. We know something of these struggles. And just as they and other allies have supported us, so we must support those among us who are trans, or risk ending up on the wrong side of history.
‘The sooner we stop focussing on what divides us and instead focus on our commonalities, the stronger we will be to confront the other injustices imposed on us.
‘We won’t be divided.’
Toxic ‘debates’ and tackling hurtful systems
Signing the statement are: Carrie Lyell (Editor, DIVA magazine); Linda Riley (Publisher, DIVA magazine); Riese Bernard (Co-founder and editor-in-chief, Autostraddle); Merryn Johns (Editor, Curve); Silke Bader (Publisher, Curve and LOTL); Eboné F. Bell (Editor-in-chief, Tagg Magazine); and Florence Gagnon (Founder and president, Lez Spread The Word).
Lyell told Gay Star News why she hoped to happen going forward.
‘I hope the LGBTQI community can move past these toxic “debates” about what it means to be a woman or to be a lesbian and to actually get down to tackling the structures and systems that really hurt us. We can’t do that if we aren’t united.’
She also spoke of the importance of speaking out.
‘We can’t achieve equality without visibility, and therefore it’s so important that trans people and their allies are louder than our detractors.’
Apple has removed a religious app from its online store which portrayed being gay as an ‘addiction’, ‘sickness’ and ‘sin’.
Religious group, Living Hope Ministries created and owns the LHM Men’s Network app . It was pulled after a gay-rights organization petitioned against it.
Truth Wins Out, which says it fights ‘anti-gay religious extremism,’ launched the petition last Thursday, US news site NBC reported.
The Living Hope Ministries is a nonprofit that says it serves ‘those who are seeking sexual and relational wholeness through a more intimate relationship with Jesus Christ.’
Living Hope Ministries’ executive director Ricky Chelette. Photo YouTube
Executive director Ricky Chelette told NBC that the group developed its app three years ago. He said the group is a ‘discipleship ministry’ and ‘very much like a church.’
We help people understand who they are in Christ,’ Chelette told NBC News on Sunday. ‘We only help those individuals who are seeking us.’
Truth Wins Out alleged that the app sought for LGBTI youth ‘to change from gay-to-straight through prayer and therapy
In 2014, Tim Cook became the first ceo of a Fortune 500 company to come out publicly
The petition had 356 supporters and Truth Wins Out thanked Apple and its ceo Tim Cook for removing the offending app.
‘We thank Apple for exemplifying corporate responsibility and taking swift action to remove a dangerous app that stigmatizes and demeans LGBT people,’ said Truth Wins Out executive director Wayne Besen.
‘Ex-gay programs are consumer fraud and cause significant harm to the people they purport to help.’
Truth Wins Out said it will seek to have the Living Hope Ministries app removed from other platforms, such as amazon.com, that still host it.
Some people think you can’t be gay and Christian. What better way to prove them wrong than with a list of LGBTI saints?
The Catholic Church doesn’t want you to read this. They’ve deliberately erased many gay saints from official lists.
And we have to admit it is difficult to find hard historical evidence about most saints. Many of the stories about them are little more than legends.
But if you start looking, there are lots of LGBTI saints and martyrs. Here are just a few of the most famous:
St Joan of Arc
The 1999 movie The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc.
Jeanne d’Arc is not just the most famous LGBTI saint but the most famous saint full-stop.
Joan was just a French peasant. But an angel appeared to her in a vision and told her God wanted her to lead the French fight against the English in the Hundred Years War.
She persuaded the French Prince Charles to let her lead his army, even though she had no military training. And, dressed as a male soldier, she achieved a momentous victory over the English at the city of Orléans in 1429.
Thanks to her, the prince was crowned King Charles VII. But Joan was then captured by the English.
They decided she was a heretic and a witch and burnt her at the stake. She was just 19.
Some refuse to accept Joan was LGBTI.
Was she a trans warrior or did she only cross-dress in male armor through necessity? Either way, she would be part of our gay, trans and gender-fluid family today.
Likewise, the same people who claim she was a virgin admit she liked to share her bed with other young women. And that sounds pretty lesbian to us.
St Sebastian
Gerrit van Honthorst’s depiction of Saint Sebastian.
St Sebastian is the original gay icon. This near-naked, young, muscled man – tied to a post and pierced with arrows – is one of the most famous images in fine art.
He was the commander of a company of archers in the imperial Roman bodyguard. And he was known to be ‘close’ to his male superiors. But he had a secret.
To rescue two other Christian soldiers, he ‘outed’ himself as Christian too. The Emperor Diocletian ordered that he should be shot to death by his fellow archers.
Strangely, that didn’t kill him. The pious St Irene saved him and treated his wounds. But Diocletian caught up with him. He ordered a second execution and Sebastian’s fellow soldiers beat him to death.
There’s no single reason why he became the unofficial gay patron saint. It’s a mix of his rumored sexuality, his ‘coming out’ story and his iconic homoerotic image penetrated with arrows. And homosexuality was once considered an illness while St Sebastian was known to save plague victims.
St Wilgefortis
Conchita (right) brought fresh attention to St Wilgefortis.
Legend says Wilgefortis was the daughter of a king in Portugal who took a vow of chastity.
When her father tried to force her into marriage with the king of Sicily she prayed for help. God saved her by giving her a beard and the Sicilian king refused to marry a bearded wife.
So she is a trans male saint.
Sadly, there is no happy ending. Her father got so angry he crucified her.
Her only reward is to become the patron saint of difficult marriages. After all, it’s a particularly difficult marriage that ends in crucifixion. In Spain she is called Librada because she helps women who want to be ‘liberated’ from difficult husbands.
The Catholic Church plays down St Wilgefortis. But after Conchita – another bearded lady – won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2014 for Austria, depictions of the saint gained short-lived cult status.
St Perpetua and St Felicity
George Hare’s 1890 painting Victory of Faith depicted Perpetua and Felicity in prison.
This North African lesbian couple are the patron saints of same-sex relationships.
Perpetua was 22-year-old noblewoman with a newborn baby. Felicity, who was pregnant, was her slave.
Roman soldiers arrested them in around 203AD because they were Christians. They comforted each other in prison and Perpetua wrote a jail diary, describing the visions she had while inside.
Felicity worried that she wouldn’t be martyred because Roman law forbade the execution of pregnant women. But she gave birth to her daughter in time.
The day came for games to celebrate the birthday of the Emperor Septimus Severus. As part of the entertainment, the pair were taken into the amphitheater in Carthage, North Africa, along with a group of male Christians.
Gladiators whipped them. Then boar, a bear, and a leopard were set on the men, and a wild cow on the women. That still wasn’t enough to kill them and they gave each other the kiss of peace before a swordsman finished them off.
Perpetua’s diary became the ‘Passion of St Perpetua, St Felicitas, and their Companions’. The story was so popular in North Africa that St Augustine ordered people not to treat it like it was part of the Bible.
St Paulinus
St Paulinus processed through the streets of Nola, near Naples, Italy.
If you’ve ever heard a bell ringing to call you to church, you’ve got the bisexual St Paulinus to thank. He invented that tradition.
He had previously been a married Roman senator. But after his wife died, he became bishop of Nola in Italy from 395AD to 431AD.
When the Vandals raided the region, a poor widow came to Paulinus asking him to help her son who the Vandals had carried off.
He had spent all his money paying ransoms for other captives. So he went to Africa to offer himself to the Vandals in return for the widow’s son. They agreed and made Paulinus a gardener. But when the Vandal king realized his son-in-law’s slave was the Bishop of Nola, he set him free.
What’s not well known is Paulinus also wrote love poems to his boyfriend, Ausonius. In one, he promised there love would last even after his death. And he added:
Thee shall I hold, in every fiber woven, Not with dumb lips, nor with averted face Shall I behold thee, in my mind embrace thee, Instant and present, thou, in every place.
He is still honored every year in Nola when his statue is paraded through the streets. American descendants of Italians from Nola also honor him in the same way in Brooklyn.
St Francis of Assisi
Mickey Rourke as St Francis of Assisi in the movie Francesco.
St Francis is one of the best-loved religious figures in history, famous for hugging lepers and showing compassion to animals.
What you probably don’t know is he encouraged the other Franciscan friars in his 13th century cloister to call him ‘mother’.
Even more surprisingly, he allowed a widow to enter the all-male friary, renaming her ‘Brother Jacoba’.
And it is likely he had at least one same-sex relationship while in his 20s. His partner’s identity is hidden by history but is thought to be Brother Elias of Cortona.
Thomas of Celano, who knew Francis personally and wrote a biography of him in 1230 just four years after his death, wrote:
‘Now there was a man in the city of Assisi whom Francis loved more than any other…
‘He would often take this friend off to secluded spots where they could discuss private matters and tell him that he had chanced upon a great and precious treasure. There was a cave near Assisi where the two friends often went to talk about this treasure.’
St Sergius and St Bacchus
The Passion of Saints Sergius and Bacchus by Elastic Theatre.
Homophobic Christians tell us that same-sex marriage is against their faith. Trouble is they don’t know their own history. Step forward Saints Sergius and Bacchus.
Sergius was a commander in the Roman army in the third century and Bacchus was his second in command.
They were referred to in the earliest records of their story as ‘erastai’, the Greek word for ‘lovers’. And it’s believed they committed themselves to each other in a Christian ceremony called ‘adelphopoiesis’ or ‘brother-making’ which was a kind of same-sex marriage.
But their faith got them in trouble while they were stationed in Syria in 303AD. As Christians, they refused to sacrifice to Jupiter, the Roman’s chief god.
Officials arrested them, dressed them in women’s clothing and paraded them through the street to humiliate them into submission. But they resisted, chanting they were dressed as brides of Christ.
So the Romans turned to torture. They separated them and beat them so severely that Bacchus died.
That wasn’t the end of the story. That night Sergius had a vision.
Bacchus appeared to him in his soldier’s armor and with the face of an angel. He urged Sergius not to give in, saying they would live together as lovers forever in heaven. It’s a unique martyrdom story, because martyrs are always promised they will be with God in heaven, not with their lover.
Over the coming days, Sergius was tortured and finally beheaded.
Christians honored them as saints right up until 1969, the same year as the Stonewall Riots. The Catholic Church stripped them from the official list of saints, perhaps to starve the emerging gay rights movement of their power.
St Aelred
The Name of The Rose movie depicted medieval monastic life.
The patron saint of friendship was erotically attracted to men, and celebrated male relationships, throughout his life.
Aelred was the abbot of a Cistercian abbey in North Yorkshire, England for 20 years until his death in 1167. He wrote about the link between friendship and spirituality, saying ‘God is friendship’.
Aelred advocated chastity. But his passion for male relationships is clear when he wrote: ‘It is no small consolation in this life to have someone who can unite with you in an intimate affection and the embrace of a holy love…’
In the same passage he describes this relationship with another man as one where ‘the sweetness of the Spirit flows between you, where you so join yourself and cleave to him that soul mingles with soul and two become one.’
St Galla and St Benedicta
Women in the Dark Ages faced few choices, as depicted in The Last Kingdom.
Galla had been married but was widowed after just one year. Not wanting another relationship with a man, she grew a beard to ward them off.
And she went even further. St Galla founded a convent in Rome in the sixth century and fellow nun Benedicta moved in with her there.
Then Galla fell seriously ill and St Peter appeared to her in a vision, telling her to prepare for death. She was devoted to God so liked the idea of going to heaven. But she was also devoted to Benedicta and didn’t want to leave her behind.
So she prayed to Peter that Benedicta would swiftly follow her to the afterlife.
Admittedly, by modern standards, praying for your partner’s death seems a bit wrong. But Peter agreed.
Galla died in 550AD of breast cancer and Benedicta’s death came 30 days later, just as St Peter had promised.
Historical note on gay saints
To historians, we would point out there are around 10,000 Catholic saints (though there is no definitive figure). By any impartial standard, some of them are bound to have been LGBTI.
To Catholics, we would say that you accept a saint’s sanctity on the basis of faith, not scientific proof. So why would you not accept their sexuality on the same basis?
Scientists have announced a potential major breakthrough in finding new HIV treatments.
French researchers have revealed they have successfully destroyed cells infected with HIV.
The scientists at Paris’ Institut Pasteur used metabolic activity inhibitors to eliminate ‘resevoir’ cells.
Antiretroviral drugs are unable to completely remove the virus.
Even when HIV is brought down to undetectable levels, a small amount of the virus is latent within certain cells.
The virus can also multiply if people stop taking their medication.
The virus remains in reservoirs, the CD4 lymphocyte immune cells, which are the main targets of HIV.
Eliminating these hidden reservoirs of virus has become a key target among scientists who wish to find a cure for HIV.
Theoretically, this French technique could perhaps eradicate HIV from the body altogether.
An Institut Pasteur spokesperson said: ‘The antiretroviral treatment used today is designed to block HIV infection but it is not able to eliminate the virus from the body.
‘The virus remains in reservoirs – the CD4 T lymphocyte immune cells, the main targets of HIV.’
HIV targets cells with high metabolic activity and ‘hijacks’ their energy in order to multiply.
The spokesperson also added: ‘Thanks to metabolic activity inhibitors, the researchers have managed to destroy these infected cells, or “reservoirs”, ex vivo.’
The next step in research will be assessing the potential of using this technique on living organisms.
Trump administration quietly shut down another study into a ‘cure’ for HIV in September.
The study implanted human fetal tissue into mice in its quest to find effective new treatment for HIV.
The human fetal tissue came from elective abortions. Although legal, anti-abortion groups oppose the research.
However, in late September, an email sent from a researcher at RML to the bioscience contractor that sourced the fetal tissue, said it would not be able to proceed.
In the email to Advanced Bioscience Resources in California, the researcher said: ‘[Department of Health and Human Services] has directed me to discontinue procuring fetal tissue from ABR, the only source for us. I think that they are the only provider of fetal tissue for scientists in the nation who don’t have direct access to aborted fetal tissue. This effectively stops all of our research to discover a cure for HIV.’
An LGBT charity calendar has reportedly been banned on Facebook for containing “sexual activity” despite it not containing any.
The calendar by The Naked Rugby Players, which aims to raise money for the testicular cancer charity Balls To Cancer and LGBT+ inclusive rugby, was banned from the social media platform for containing explicit content.
The calendar reportedly went against Facebook’s community standards on nudity and sexuality activity, which bans content containing nudity (showing genitals), sexual activity, sexually explicit language and female nipples (except in the context of breastfeeding, birth, health and protests).
However, the calendar contained none of the above.
According to The Gay UK, Facebook told the page’s owners that the post went against their community standards and banned the page from commenting or posting for 24 hours.
Facebook’s ban “disappointing”
The description on The Naked Rugby Players website reads: “We’ve photographed six inclusive rugby teams from across the UK, wearing nothing more than some sport socks and boots, to bring a little excitement to 2019 whilst at the same time raising money for each inclusive club involved and for the Balls To Cancer charity who promotes awareness of Testicular Cancer in men.”
It features the teams the Bristol Bisons, Liverpool Tritons, Glasgow Alphas, Brighton & Hove Sea Serpents, Northampton Outlaws and the Sheffield Vulcans.
The creative director behind the calendar, Jake Hook, told The Gay UK: “We take a huge amount of time on photo shoot days to ensure that everybody is comfortable and making absolutely 100 percent sure that nobody’s genitals are on show.
“In fact, it is in our agreement with the clubs that take part that we make sure that no one’s genitals will be invisible.
“Facebook’s ban is obviously disappointing,” he added.
“We are so proud of this calendar and the message that it gives. Be proud of your body, be proud of your sexuality and be comfortable in your own skin.”
An assistant principal bullied a trans boy and challenged him to prove his gender by using a urinal, according to a complaint filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
The student at Liberty High School in West Virginia was using a stall on November 27 when he was allegedly confronted by the senior staff member, Wave 3 News has reported.
“When he came out of the stall, the principal was essentially blocking him in so he could not leave.”
— ACLU West Virginia executive director Joseph Cohen
ACLU West Virginia executive director Joseph Cohen said: “He misgendered him, at one point challenged him to come out and use a urinal, essentially to prove that he was a boy.
“When he came out of the stall, the principal was standing in front of the exit, essentially blocking him in so he could not leave.”
The trans boy has reportedly returned to the school in Clarksburg, in the north of the state, but is suffering from anxiety and has experienced at least one panic attack since the bathroom incident.
The ACLU has sent a letter of complaint to the Harrison County Board of Education, in which it is also alleged that the trans boy was deliberately misgendered at school.
Cohen called on the school and the state to better address trans issues, saying: “More than 50 percent of male trans teens attempt suicide.
“This really is a life or death issue and it’s time that West Virginia schools take LGBTQ issues seriously.”
Superintendent Mark Manchin said that due process was needed, but added: “The preliminary information that I have received is perhaps, it does appear from what I’ve been able to confirm that our employee did not act in an appropriate manner, and was not sensitive to the needs of one of our students.”
Manchin continued: “Everybody has certain rights and also responsibilities, and we certainly take this very, very seriously to ensure all of our children are treated fairly and equitably.”
The assistant principal has not been disciplined by the high school, according to the ACLU.
Last month, a trans girl at Osseo Senior High School in Maple Grove, Minnesota, posted a horrifying video which appeared to show staff breaking into a women’s bathroom stall while she was using the toilet.
In the clip, the student is on the toilet with her trousers down while several adults attempt to force their way into the locked stall.
One person can be seen peering over the top of the stall, before a stick is used to unlatch the lock on the stall door, which swings wide open in full view of several male and female staff members.
The student tells viewers: “I’m using the bathroom right now and they just violated me. They’re some perverts.”
This week, Tumblr announced that it would ban all adult content from its platform and said any user who was hurt by the decision could simply migrate to another site. But creators and readers alike don’t believe there’s another website that fosters the same kind of sex-positive spaces that Tumblr has. It’s as though Tumblr CEO Jeff D’Onofrio has failed to understand his own platform, how unique these communities are to Tumblr, and how unlikely it is for them to survive beyond the shutdown.
“Sex wasn’t this separate, shameful thing. Tumblr allowed it to exist right next to every other facet of our messy, millennial experience,” says Vex Ashley, who runs the blog Vextape that’s inspired by her work as a cam model and making DIY porn. “We shared it, discussed it, debated it, and curated it.” Porn, she says, was as appropriate on Tumblr as song lyrics.
Tumblr is home to a myriad of sex-positive and body-positive blogs, in additional to indie porn blogs and curated archives that provide something not found on Pornhub, YouPorn, or any of the other mainstream adult portals. It’s also been relatively unique among social media sites for allowing nudity and sexually explicit content to be posted. Most sites, like Facebook and Instagram, prohibit nudity and regularly remove posts that are flagged. With Tumblr gone from the equation, creators and readers fear their hubs of sex-positive and body-positive content will vanish.
“There is a lot of value in being able to share images of and information about sexuality. This change will erase years of content from countless Tumblr users,” says the anonymous author behind Bijouworld, which curates photos of vintage gay porn, old magazine covers, and newspaper clippings. They believe that other blogs focused on the history of erotica will also suffer. “This was a good spot for us all to exchange and combine our info and knowledge, so I hope we can find a new way to do that.”
Bijou Classics, the gay adult company behind the blog, also posts regularly to Pornhub and maintains an extensive web presence across multiple platforms that allow adult content. But Tumblr, the blogger says, filled a void when the company wanted to explore the archival and historical aspects of gay porn.
“I do think Tumblr is unique … [it] was one of the few platforms that is broadly open to the public where we could share explicit photos in any sort of organized fashion.” The anonymous person behind the blog says that since 2011, Bijou Classics has “used our Tumblr presence to post images from our archives, written blogs, trivia, and more.” The purpose is to “keep information circulating about the history and evolution of erotica and gay culture.”
Many sexuality blog authors don’t see a way forward without Tumblr. That includes lawyer and journalist Maddie Holden, who runs Critique My Dick Pic, a blog that’s received attention from sites including The Hairpin, Jezebel, and The Daily Dot.
Holden takes a media that’s often considered a nuisance to receive and approaches it satirically as an art form, going in depth about the shadows and positioning of each photo. She ends her reviews with: “thank you for submitting to critique my dick pic” and a grade ranging from A to F. The latest lyrical review of a dick in the shower, posted on November 30th, reads, “your photo is certainly not coy but it avoids being dick-centric, and apart from minor flares of distraction — a green towel in the bottom-left corner and a blue razor in the windowsill — the background is uncluttered and effective.”
Critique My Dick Pic has been described by its followers as “hilarious and useful,” says Holden. She says a trans woman recently told her that the trans-inclusive nature of the blog factored into helping her decide to come out and transition.
The blog has been around since 2013, but Holden says she’s not sure if she’ll move to another platform after Tumblr hides her content from public view on December 17th. Holden tells The Verge, “I mean, it will be the end of the blog as far as I can tell. I receive a portion of my income from CDMP, which will end, and the site has been pretty beloved for years now, so it’s a shame for its followers.”
The operator of another quirky, body-positive blog, called Things My Dick Does, says he plans to keep his Tumblr open after the ban, but only to share safe-for-work posts to keep in touch with his readers.
Started by an anonymous man in 2015, the blog’s creator draws mustaches and smiley faces on his dick, often placing props around it in amusing situations. He tells The Verge, “I know it’s a silly dick blog, but I’ve gotten to know some pretty amazing people through here. (My girlfriend included!)” He says that as he continued to post pics of his dick sipping coffee, dressed as Batman, or just smiling cheerily, he received positive feedback and even had a woman reach out to him because they lived in the same city. She later became his girlfriend. “People say they’ve overcome some serious rough spots in their lives because of the laughs I brought them.”
The man says he can migrate to other platforms, but his presence on YouTube and Instagram is distinctly different. It’s covered up and less NSFW, obscuring the very quality of his blog that disarmed audiences — a charming, dressed-up dick that more resembled a cartoon than graphic porn. “It’s definitely a loss to the adult content creators out there,” the man behind Things My Dick Does says. “Seems like it’s getting more and more difficult to express yourself.”
There just isn’t anywhere else to go. Other than Tumblr, there aren’t many mainstream, well-acknowledged platforms that allow unique adult communities to grow. Facebook and Instagram both prohibit sexual content and nudity; Twitter allows it, but it’s not exactly known for its positive, supportive communities.
Ashley, who runs the curated, often DIY porn blog, explains that Tumblr was a livelihood and a home for people who didn’t necessarily conform to mainstream porn sites’ ideas of what is sexy. “As our lives move increasingly online, spaces that are safe for sex are becoming smaller and smaller,” she says, in words that are now published on Medium. “If we continue to push our depictions of sexuality into the shadows, we allow them to continue to be defined and co-opted by the status quo — whatever is on the first page of a porn tube site.”
It’s been revealed that the Trump administration quietly shut down a study into a ‘cure’ for HIV in September.
The study implanted human fetal tissue into mice in its quest to find effective new treatment for HIV.
The human fetal tissue came from elective abortions. Although legal, anti-abortion groups oppose the research.
According to a report in Science, the The Department of Health and Human Services forbid National Institute of Health (NIH) scientists from applying for any more fetal tissue to help with their studies.
This impacted on two NIH laboratories. One of them, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ (NIAID) Rocky Mountain Laboratories (RML) in Hamilton, Montana, was studying new treatments for HIV.
A spokesperson for NIH confirmed to Science that it had requested researchers, ‘pause procurements of fetal tissue,’ pending a review.
RML was carrying out a promising study into a treatment that could prevent HIV establishing latent reservoirs in the body.
Even when HIV is treated and brought down to undetectable levels, a small amount of the virus can remain hidden and latent within certain cells. The virus can multiply if people stop taking their medication.
Eliminating these hidden reservoirs of virus has become a key target amongst scientists who wish to find a cure for HIV.
However, in late September, an email sent from a researcher at RML to the bioscience contractor that sourced the fetal tissue, said it would not be able to proceed.
In the email to Advanced Bioscience Resources in California, the researcher said: ‘[Department of Health and Human Services] has directed me to discontinue procuring fetal tissue from ABR, the only source for us. I think that they are the only provider of fetal tissue for scientists in the nation who don’t have direct access to aborted fetal tissue. This effectively stops all of our research to discover a cure for HIV.’
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) did not respond to Science’s request for comment.
It follows news from last week that HHS appeared to be winding down a contract with the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) for fetal tissue research.
One agency collaborating on the RML research is the Gladstone Center for HIV Cure Research in San Francisco, California. Its director, Warner Greene, told Science, ‘We were all poised to go and then the bombshell was dropped. The decision completely knocked our collaboration off the rails. We were devastated.’
GSN has approached NIAID and the Department of Health and Human Services.
UPDATE: 11.12.18
A spokesperson for the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a statement to GSN the pause on fetal tissue use is to allow it conduct an audit over the procedures being followed.
‘In September, HHS issued a statement announcing an audit would be conducted of all acquisitions involving human fetal tissue to ensure conformity with procurement and human fetal tissue research laws and regulations.
‘In addition, HHS has initiated a comprehensive review of all research involving fetal tissue to ensure consistency with statutes and regulations governing such research, and to ensure the adequacy of procedures and oversight of this research in light of the serious considerations involved.’
