Will and Harper (2024) - 5 of 5 Diamond Earrings
This has been on our list to watch since it came out. We finally got to it, and it was even better than I hoped it would be. What a touching look at friendship and stark look at being transgender.
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In & Out (1997) - 3 out of 5 Teacher of the Year Awards
I saw this movie back when it first came out with my dad and sister. He didn't, I don't think, do much research and we went because it was a comedy starring Kevin Klein and Joan Cusack. Little did he know what it was.
It's a cute movie and though it definitely feels dated in its portrayal and handling of homosexuality in a small midwest town, it still made me laugh a number of times.
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LGBT Conservatives (w/ Contrapoints)
I enjoyed this entire conversation, but I did get curious and want to look up what percentage of LGBTQ+ people are what political leaning. This was the top result I came across:
Nearly nine million LGBT adults are registered and eligible to vote in the 2020 general election.1 Half of registered LGBT voters (50%) are Democrats, 15% are Republicans, 22% are Independents, and 13% said they identify with another party or did not know with which party they most identify.2 LGBT voters are racially diverse, nearly half (47%) are under age 35, and one-third have at least a college education.
2019 Study about the 2020 LGBT Vote by the Williams Institute
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"Rainbow Reload" is an LGBTQ+ gun group
I've come to have strong feelings on gun control which amount to "get rid of them all" - but this was an interesting read about one of the gun groups growing on the left.
In March 2023, former Fox News host Tucker Carlson did a segment on Democrats and gun control. At the top of the show, he called out Rainbow Reload, an LGBTQ+ gun group in New Hampshire. "Rainbow Reload. They're packing heat," he said. "You can't have guns, but faithful servants of the Democratic Party can."
After being spotlighted on national television, Rainbow Reload's social media got hacked and members received death threats. But instead of scaring people away, the attention prompted more supporters to join and new Rainbow Reload chapters sprouted in Tennessee and Vermont.
Gun owners are an anomaly within the LGBTQ+ community. According to research from UCLA and the Pew Research Center, gun owners in the U.S. are more likely to be straight and Republican, rather than queer and Democratic. While there is no specific data on how many gun owners in the U.S. identify as LGBTQ+, queer gun rights groups across the country are noticing that more LGBTQ+ people are becoming interested in gun ownership, and they are turning to their own community to learn.
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Supreme Court rules in favor of anti-same sex marriage web designer
I know many aren't surprised by the ruling, and I'm not either.
The dispute was one of several to land before the justices in the wake of its 2015 landmark decision establishing the right to same-sex marriage that raised the question of whether a business owner can refuse service to LGBTQ customers because of their religious beliefs.
In 2018, the high court sided with a Colorado baker who was sued after he refused to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding, but did not address whether a business can deny services to LGBTQ people. Instead, the Supreme Court said the state's Civil Rights Commission was hostile to baker Jack Phillips' religious beliefs in violation of the First Amendment.
In the years after, the Supreme Court declined to clarify whether states could force religious business owners to create messages that violate their conscience. But the court's rightward shift, solidified by former President Donald Trump's appointment of three justices, raised concerns that the Supreme Court would erode LGBTQ rights by allowing businesses to deny services to LGBTQ customers.
For full transparency, I edited the above to correct a typo from the news article. It originally said, "LGBTQ peple" which I feel confident is meant to be "LGBTQ people."
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"10 Facts About the History of LGBTQ Pride Month"
Not just a listicle, some great segments and content in this.
2. The Stonewall riots were not America's first LGBTQ uprising.
In May 1959, a group of LGBTQ individuals who were fed up with being mistreated by the police fought back at Cooper Do-Nuts in Los Angeles. According to Out, the group, which was led by several transgender women, “pelted officers with donuts, coffee, and paper plates until they were forced to retreat and return with larger numbers.” It is believed to be the first documented LGBTQ uprising in U.S. history.
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"'Genocidal': Transgender people begin to flee states with anti-LGBTQ laws"
As a transgender kid in a conservative region, Susan said Elsa could feel the growing tensions concerning people like her – she told her parents to "just let them hurt me," instead of moving out of state.
"It just kind of reveals how much damage all this causes to trans people, to their families, to people that support them, to people that haven't even figured out who they are yet," said Brian.
Elsa's family has since moved to Washington and said LGBTQ acceptance in the community has been like day-and-night between the two states, Susan said.
Manny Santiago, the executive director of the Washington State LGBTQ Commission, said it's a bittersweet feeling to know that the state has become a safe space for families with LGBTQ members, while others implement restrictions.
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"FDA relaxes blood donation guidelines for gay and bisexual men"
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said Thursday it had officially eliminated restrictions that had previously prohibited many blood donations by gay and bisexual men — a longstanding policy that critics say is discriminatory.
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"Scotland passes law making legal gender change easier"
Am glad to hear about this change for Scotland, but what really caught my attention is that the article also included right at the top that eight countries in Europe do not have any way for a person to legally change their gender. I shouldn't be terribly surprised, but I was.
Scotland's Parliament passed a hotly debated law on Thursday that makes it easier for transgender people to legally change their legal gender, amid similar moves in some countries in Europe and the passage of anti-trans laws in the United States.
But eight European countries — Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Hungary, Monaco, North Macedonia and San Marino — do not offer a path to change one's legal gender. More than two dozen countries in Europe also mandate that a transgender person divorce their spouse before they can certify a gender change or already ban same-sex marriages, according to ILGA-Europe.
Despite the ban, Finland is one of twelve European countries that still mandates sterilization, and the only Scandinavian country to do so.
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