Tina Madison White – Voices of North Carolina
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FDA Launches Campaign to Prevent Tobacco Use Among Young LGBT People
FDA Launches Campaign to Prevent Tobacco Use Among Young LGBT People
The FDA hopes to reach young LGBT folks with an antismoking campaign that uses videos of drag queens and YouTubers.
www.advocate.com/health/2016/5/02/fda-launches-campaign-prevent-tobacco-use-among-young-lgbt-people
John Kasich Can’t Figure Out Where Gay People Come From
John Kasich Can’t Figure Out Where Gay People Come From
You really have to hand it to John Kasich — this delusional creep is still running for president, despite finishing in last place in just about every available race. We’re not just talking about losing, here. It’s as if he set out to run a marathon, disappeared for a decade, then re-emerged with a long beard to finally crawl across the finish line … backwards.
It’s probably not helping that he’s making disastrous appearances like his recent Q&A at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, where an audience member asked him a bunch of questions on LGBT topics. Are we born gay, the man wanted to know, and Kasich answered:
“You know, sir, probably. I mean, I don’t, I don’t know how it all works, Okay? I mean, look. Are they? You know, probability they are. Okay?” Well, great, thanks for clearing that up. You clearly have a firm grasp on the situation, John.
For what it’s worth, he also seemed resistant to bathroom-bans for trans people, saying, “I think we should just try to, like, take a chill pill, relax, and try to get along with one another a little bit better instead of trying to write some law to solve a problem that doesn’t frankly exist in big enough numbers to justify more lawmaking.”
He makes a good point — there are no cases of predators using trans access to bathroom as an excuse to molest anyone. There are, on the other hand, plenty of cases of Republican politicians committing sex crimes, so maybe we ought to ban them.
Kasich is still dragging his feet through the dark ages, and recently opposed marriage equality and adoption for same-sex couples. He’s also referred to the “gay lifestyle” and said that openly gay soldiers should be thrown out of the military. And then he says that he’s attended a wedding for a gay couple, as if that entitles him to some kind of tolerance trophy. Good grief. John Kasich can’t even bigot properly.
feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/gTWxObQjCgE/john-kasich-cant-figure-gay-people-come-20160502
Did The Dixie Chicks Just End the Debate About How Country Beyoncé’s ‘Daddy Lessons’ Really Is? – WATCH
Did The Dixie Chicks Just End the Debate About How Country Beyoncé’s ‘Daddy Lessons’ Really Is? – WATCH
Over the weekend, The Dixie Chicks performed a pared down cover of Beyoncé’s “Daddy Lessons”, a move that perfectly illustrates the cross-genre influences at work in Bey’s new album, Lemonade.
While the song has a strong country sound, some have debated just how “country” the tune really is. A debate that has not been entirely free of racial undertones.
In a post called “What’s So Country About Beyoncé?”, CMT’s Alison Bonaguro sniffed, “It doesn’t sound like a country song to me, she didn’t cut it at a studio in Tennessee, and it certainly wasn’t written by a group of Nashville songwriters.” The Beyhive promptly took Bonaguro to task, tweeting pictures of Beyoncé in cowboy hats and pointing out the veiled racism in her boundary policing. As the Texas Observer’s Andrea Grimes wrote on Twitter, the subtext of Bonaguro’s post is that Beyoncé “is trying to appropriate country, a genre stolen from Black folks by white folks.”
Does the Dixie Chicks’ all-acoustic version of “Daddy Lessons” end the debate?
Listen as the Chicks Dixie take on the foot-stomper, below.
You can watch Beyoncé performing “Daddy Lessons” in Miami recently, below.
The post Did The Dixie Chicks Just End the Debate About How Country Beyoncé’s ‘Daddy Lessons’ Really Is? – WATCH appeared first on Towleroad.
HRC Staff Speaks Out About HIV Epidemic Among Black Gay and Bisexual Men
HRC Staff Speaks Out About HIV Epidemic Among Black Gay and Bisexual Men
In a poignant article in The Advocate about “The Perfect Storm Facing Black Men on HIV,” HRC HIV & AIDS Project Manger Marvell L. Terry II spoke to some of the reasons Black gay and bisexual men, particularly those living in the South, continue to bear the brunt of new HIV transmissions.
“There is very little culturally competent health care for us and very poor access to healthcare in Memphis,” Terry says in The Advocate. “There is still much racism. Add to that the layer of being a black gay man in a Southern city where you have the headquarters of the Church of God in Christ, which is the largest Pentecostal denomination.”
Terry, a native of Memphis, Tennessee was first diagnosed with HIV eight years ago. Determined to improve the lives of Black LGBT people around him, Terry founded The Red Door Foundation (TRDF), which provides technical assistance, capacity-building services and community support. TRDF is also the driving force behind the Saving Ourselves Symposium, a national conference focused on empowering and encouraging Black LGBT people in the South.
HRC is committed to working with organizations such as the Young Black Gay Men’s Leadership Initiative, The Red Door Foundation and others to shine a spotlight on the needs of Black gay and bisexual men and to turn the tide against HIV through partnership and collaboration
Read the article in full here and to learn more about HRC’s work on HIV & AIDS, click here.
Kathryn Hahn Receives the Ally For Equality Award
Kathryn Hahn Receives the Ally For Equality Award
Gay Man Attacked While Walking Dog
Gay Man Attacked While Walking Dog
Another gay man has been attacked in Dallas’s heavily gay Oak Lawn area, which has seen about a dozen such crimes since last fall.
www.advocate.com/crime/2016/5/02/gay-man-attacked-while-walking-dog
Trans Target Employee Speaks Out About Workplace Transphobia
Trans Target Employee Speaks Out About Workplace Transphobia
Although Target is trying to be a safe space for its transgender customers, their trans employees may have it a bit rougher.
Transgender Target employee Maxwell Jamison works in Phoenix, and he’s written a now-viral Facebook post about transphobic behavior he’s observed in the wake of Target’s public pro-trans stance:
Over the past week since Target announced their inclusive restroom policy following the North Carolina bathroom bill, I’ve had to endure multiple conversations regarding what rights trans people deserve. These comments coming from the guests at my store, my fellow coworkers, and even a few of my supervisors.
I have been told that trans people ought to use “the bathroom that matches their junk,” that a “man in a dress” is going to sexually assault everyone’s daughters, our store has been threatened and cursed out by guests, and the amount of rampant transphobia that’s taken place in store and online this past week has been nauseating.
So, here I am, in the men’s restroom at Target, a trans man, standing up for my trans siblings out there who’ve had to listen and read the same bullshit I’ve been experiencing. Know that for every negative thought some bigot has had about us, there are other gender-dismantling folks out there standing up for our right to use whatever restroom we please, in Target, in restaurants, in shopping malls, wherever.
There’s more where that came from, though Max says he’s received an overwhelming amount of support for speaking out about the issue.
Transphobic and insensitive language from customers is one thing, but if he’s hearing it from coworkers and supervisors, he may want to take it up with management…or an attorney.
ACLU Demands Calif. High School Allow Lesbian Couple to Run for Prom King, Queen
ACLU Demands Calif. High School Allow Lesbian Couple to Run for Prom King, Queen
Last week, we told you how a high school in Redding, California, was refusing to allow a lesbian couple to be nominated as prom king and queen.
Jim Bartow (right), the principal of Foothill High School, stated that allowing two girls to serve as prom king and queen would amount to gender discrimination in violation of federal law.
But Haley Lack (above) and her girlfriend fought back, and now they’re getting some help from the ACLU of Northern California, which is demanding that the school change its policy.
In a letter to Bartow dated Monday, ACLU senior staff attorney Elizabeth Gill wrote:
Students have a recognized free expression right to bring same-sex dates to the prom, and that right extends to running for prom king and queen. As a federal court in Mississippi found more than five year ago, “this expression and communication of her viewpoint [bringing a same- sex date to prom] is the type of speech that falls squarely within the purview of the First Amendment.”1 The expression courts have found inherent in bringing a same-sex date to the prom—the expression of a sexual orientation, the statement of equality for same-sex couples, and the challenge to traditional gender roles—is no less true of a student and her female prom date seeking the titles of prom king and queen. If anything, it would only amplify all these messages for the same-sex couple to seek and potentially win prom king and queen.
It is also plainly illegal under applicable law—the U.S. Constitution, the California Constitution, and the California Education Code—to discriminate against students based on sexual orientation.2 The nomination form for prom king and queen allows students to nominate couples, and it is our understanding that different-sex couples are often nominated for and elected prom king and queen. To prohibit same-sex couples from engaging in an activity regularly allowed different-sex couples is discrimination based on sexual orientation.
The prom, where students will vote on king and queen, is set for Saturday, and Gill is demanding a response from Bartow by Tuesday.
Stay tuned.
The post ACLU Demands Calif. High School Allow Lesbian Couple to Run for Prom King, Queen appeared first on Towleroad.
Congressional Republicans Attach North Carolina-Style Discrimination To Defense Budget
Congressional Republicans Attach North Carolina-Style Discrimination To Defense Budget
Once again, the defense bill is being used to restrict LGBT rights.
The post Congressional Republicans Attach North Carolina-Style Discrimination To Defense Budget appeared first on ThinkProgress.
thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2016/05/02/3774488/defense-bill-anti-lgbt-amendment/
