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Standing With Arms Akimbo: Cultural Activism During the AIDS Crisis in 1980s San Francisco

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Thirty years ago, at the height of the AIDS crisis, the anonymous, San Francisco–based cultural activist collective Boy With Arms Akimbo/Girl With Arms Akimbo took a unique approach to AIDS activism. The group carried out street postering campaigns, media appropriation initiatives and other forms of visual intervention to promote queer pro-sex messages and respond to attacks by anti-sex reactionaries. Deploying posters, stickers and protest signs, Akimbo juxtaposed images of safe-sex acts with representations of political, religious and social leaders noted for their homophobia and AIDS-phobia. Isabelle Alfonsi, a French researcher and gallery owner, consulted the Boy With Arms Akimbo/Girl With Arms […]

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Two More UK Arenas Cancel Hate Preacher Franklin Graham’s Events

Two further venues have cancelled rallies by US hate preacher Franklin Graham, as a backlash grows to his planned UK tour. The Trump-supporting preacher, who is known for praising Vladimir Putin’s anti-gay laws and blaming gay people for a “moral 9/11”, is set to visit the UK at the start of Pride Month in June as part of an evangelist tour. Venues hosting the tour have faced complaints from LGBT+ activists – with a Liverpool conference venue dropping him on Monday. Following the pressure, two further venues have followed suit. Franklin Graham dropped by Sheffield and Glasgow venues Glasgow’s SEC Arena confirmed on Wednesday […]

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Wells Fargo Pulls Florida Voucher Donations over Anti-gay School Policies

Two of the largest banks in the U.S. say they will stop donating millions of dollars to Florida’s private school voucher program after a newspaper investigation found that some of the program’s beneficiaries discriminate against LGBTQ students. In a statement to NBC News and CNBC on Wednesday evening, Wells Fargo confirmed that it would no longer participate. “We have reviewed this matter carefully and have decided to no longer support Step Up for Students,” the San Francisco-based bank said of the voucher program. “All of us at Wells Fargo highly value diversity and inclusion, and we oppose discrimination of any kind.” […]

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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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Gays in Hungary Facing Increased Government Hostility, Rights Group Says

Hungary’s gay community is facing increased government “attacks” and fears that its hard-won rights, and an improvement in public acceptance of them, may be at risk, a rights group said. The European Union has long criticized Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s right-wing government over its record on the rule of law and civil liberties, including its attitude toward minorities, including LGBTQ people. The Hatter (“Background”) group said various legislative moves, a lack of police vigilance and sometimes hostile rhetoric from the ruling Fidesz party threatened to undo the progress seen since the fall of communism three decades ago. Related NBC OUT […]

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Bernie Sanders Endorsement by Podcast Host Sparks Backlash

Bernie Sanders’ embrace of an endorsement by Joe Rogan drew instant criticism from some corners of the transgender community because of the podcast host’s use of gay slurs and position on trans issues. Like many Twitter-centric controversies, the debate quickly blew up and then became circular, with Bernie foes jumping on the bandwagon—and other Democrats fuming that the uproar was another example of left-wing self-sabotage. It began when the Vermont senator’s campaign tweeted out a video clip Thursday of Rogan saying he will “probably vote for Bernie.” The endorsement of a wildly popular public figure—Rogan’s podcast is the second-most downloaded […]

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There Are 16 States in the US that Still Have Sodomy Laws

In 2020, there are 16 US states that still have sodomy laws against “perverted sexual practice” and “crimes against nature”. According to ACLU, laws against sodomy were originally designed to prohibit any sex that was not for procreation, and so included crimes like having sex outside of marriage and bestiality. But in the late 1960s, the laws began to be used to specifically target gay people, as an excuse for discrimination when gay rights progress was just starting to be made. Some states rewrote their sodomy laws so that they would only apply to gay people, others ruled in court that […]

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Who’s the ‘Q’ in LGBTQ? Study Shines Light on ‘Queer’ Identities

For some, “queer” is a loaded word — a negative epithet from a less accepting time that was hurled at anyone perceived to be gay. But for others, particularly younger LGBTQ people, it is a reclaimed term and a less restrictive self-identifier. While the word’s use — and its 21st century reclamation — has been mostly anecdotal up to this point, a new report from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law has put scientific data behind the population of queer-identified people in the United States. According to its findings, nearly 6 percent of sexual minorities identify as queer, while […]

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First Transitional Housing Project for Homeless Transgender Residents Opens in SF

Mayor London Breed joined transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) community leaders huddled outside of a building on Washington St. Thursday, spilling on to the cable car tracks to celebrate the ribbon-cutting of The City’s first transitional housing designated for homeless gender non-conforming adults. The project, a 13-unit apartment whose first tenant will be aspiring chef Jane Cordova, was spearheaded by the Our Trans Home SF coalition and its “mother,” Saint James Infirmary Executive Director Toni Newman. It is being funded by a $2.3 million allocation from The City that will not only fund the transitional housing program over a two-year […]

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Israel Kowtows to Russia’s Demands and Bans LGBT People from Adopting Russian Kids

Israel and Russia have signed a deal banning LGBT+ people from adopting Russian children, after a decade of negotiations. The agreement, signed on January 22, stipulates that same-sex couples cannot adopt children from Russia. Ze’ev Elkin, Jerusalem affairs minister, met with a senior Russian delegation Wednesday ahead of president Vladimir Putin’s scheduled Thusday visit to attend the Fifth World Holocaust Forum. The senior Russian delegation included Russia’s foreign minister, economics minister and education minister, according to the Jerusalem Post. Israel and Russia finalised two agreements at the meeting, one on same-sex adoption and the other regarding cooperation between the two countries’ foreign ministries. […]

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