Queer the minimum wage!
Economic justice is an LGBTQ issue.
I was a bit delayed sending this out tonight because I was monitoring Trump’s rally in Greenville, NC. And just when I thought things couldn’t get any more disgusting, I watched as a MAGA crowd chanted “Send her back!” about Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN). (Of course, earlier he’d also flippantly suggested that she’d been married to her brother.) It’s really sad to see just how hateful we’ve become.
Much of today’s round-up is international news, but make sure you also read Katelyn Burns’ piece over at Vox about the fight here in the U.S.: “The LGBTQ civil rights fight is far from over.” She rejects the premise of a few gay, white Republicans that the queer rights movement is over, detailing just how much is still at stake for so many other queer people.
Also, see that button there? Like right there? ^^^ I’d just like to drop a little reminder that if you’re reading this newsletter, it would mean a lot to me if you could share it with someone else or talk about it on social media. A lot of folks keep telling me that they like and value it, which is great, but if you could actually help other people find it, that’d be even better! (And thanks!)
Onto the news…
The minimum wage is an LGBTQ issue
One of the things that annoys me the most is when fiscal conservatives claim to be pro-LGBTQ but ignore how the economics they espouse negatively impact LGBTQ people too. There’s been a nationwide effort to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour, and a new study from the Williams Institute shows that doing so would increase the earnings of 1.45 million LGBT adults. Previous research has shown it would also help bring many same-sex couples out of poverty (in particular, female same-sex couples, which experience compounded discrimination).
Birds of a bigoted feather
I mentioned last week North Carolina congressional candidate Dan Bishop (R), who compared himself to Oskar Schindler when he was trying to help ensure anti-LGBTQ businesses could discriminate. Well guess who’s a big fan??
Hate crime in North Dakota
Gay North Dakotan William Lamb says he was attacked earlier this month outside a bar by a group that had been hurling anti-gay slurs at him and his husband all night. When he was outside smoking a cigarette, he got knocked out, and he woke up to a broken ankle, broken nose, and damage to his teeth. There have not been any charges yet, but even if there are, North Dakota law doesn’t offer LGBTQ hate crime protections.
Increasing pressure on Puerto Rico’s governor
Ricky Martin has joined those calling on Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló to resign in the wake of leaked documents showing him using sexist and homophobic language. He promised to join a march to the capital demanding Rosselló step down.
“They mocked our dead bodies, they mocked women,” he said. “They mocked the LGBTQ community, they mocked people with physical and mental disabilities, they mocked obesity! Enough already, enough already! It can’t be. It can’t be.”
Good news for India’s trans community
Indian lawmakers are considering a Transgender Rights Bill, but it has been particularly controversial because of proposed requirements that trans people be screened before they can be recognized. Those have since been dropped! While that bill is still pending, the Indian state of Bihar has also announced it will also help fund gender confirmation surgeries.
A conversion therapy conversion in Israel?
Israeli education minister Rabbi Rafi Peretz has apparently completely reversed course on conversion therapy. Whereas last week he said he supported the shame-based abuse and that he believed he even had successfully performed it on others, he’s now saying he’s “strongly opposed” to it. He added that it’s now his “unambiguous position” that “conversion therapy is illegitimate and severe.” It’s hard to tell if that’s what he actually believes or just what he needed to say to save his job.
Romanians use familiar marriage equality protest
Same-sex couples in Romania are borrowing a familiar tactic of applying for marriage licenses even though such marriages are prohibited. But whereas U.S. clerks often responded to such actions by politely declining, couples in Romania have been facing bigger backlashes. Several couples have now sued with the European Court of Human Rights for the right to marry.
A setback for Russian homophobia
That same European Court of Human Rights ruled this week that Russia had discriminated against several LGBTQ groups by refusing to register them as legal entities. Not only was the decision anti-LGBTQ discrimination, but it also violated the groups’ freedom of association. “The refusals to register the applicant organisations on the ground that they promoted LGBT rights cannot be said to be reasonably or objectively justified,” the court explained.
It’s the third such decision against Russia for violating LGBTQ people’s rights, but the country’s prejudice doesn’t appear to be going anywhere. Valentina Matvienko, a powerful senator from St. Petersburg, claimed this week that allowing same-sex couples to adopt “will simply lead to the extinction of humanity.” It’s unclear how that would even happen since same-sex couples wouldn’t naturally be having kids of their own anyway, but logic doesn’t seem relevant in this discourse.
Sodomy law Stockholme Syndrome
Many African cultures historically have a rich tradition of honoring and celebrating various sexual and gender minorities that we might now call the LGBTQ community. But when British colonists imported sodomy laws, many African nations wrote their past diversity out of their history and adopted the new bigotry as their norm.
That’s the case in Zambia, where President Edgar Lungu insisted this week that he will not impose “gay rights” on his country regardless of whether other nations withhold aid as a result. Sadly, he blamed it on cultural differences, even though those are cultural differences inherited from British colonial rule. he has previously said, “I will not compromise human nature because of money.”
Netflix slaps down Straight Pride
The white supremacists planning a Straight Pride next month in Boston have still been floating various “prospective sponsors.” Now comes an email screenshot from Netflix calling out their event as being about “hate” and threatening legal action if they don’t immediately take down their logo. They have in fact received a cease and desist letter, prompted them to call Netflix “a heterophobic company steeped in hatred and bigotry.”
A life change and a death drop
I’ll end the day with this high school graduation clip. This is what drag queens are doing to kids and I’m here for it:
Until next time, stay platinum!
(Wages due lesbians photo credit: Flickr/Peter O'Connor.)