Category: Bigotry
Floridians already feeling economic effect of DeSantis immigration law
Adults are failing LGBTQ+ youth at school and beyond. Here’s how we can step up
Photo: ShutterstockThink back to when you were a teenager. While this time in our lives can often be filled with new experiences and self-discovery, it can also be deeply challenging and sometimes even painful. Time stretches on forever. You don’t have the full slate of freedoms that most adults take for granted. You are stuck in a microcosm of the real world, spending a good part of your life in a classroom with other young people doing their best to fit in – and feeling like you’re failing in some way.
These challenges of adolescence are even more acute for LGBTQ+ youth, who face an uphill battle to find acceptance in a world that often condemns the beauty of diversity and in many cases seeks to deny their very existence. Even before COVID-19 sent us into seclusion for the better part of the last three years – with devastating mental health consequences for many – LGBTQ+ youth were experiencing higher rates of depression and other forms of mental illness due to higher rates of bullying, harassment, and family rejection.
While young queer activists across the country – including It Gets Better’s incredible Youth Voices – are heroically speaking out against these attacks on their rights, their health and their very identities, they can’t win this fight alone. Right now, adults are failing LGBTQ+ students, and we urgently need to take bold, decisive action to support and protect them.
The first thing we can do to support our queer and trans youth is simple: listen. With the advent of social media, the escalating “culture wars,” and the lingering aftermath of COVID, the problems young people face today are different from those faced by earlier generations. My interactions with LGBTQ+ youth have shown me how deeply they have thought about the challenges they face and what they need to resolve them. We need to resist the urge to default to our own experiences, to say “you’ll understand when you’re older.”
We also need to speak out forcefully against anti-LGBTQ+ education policies, whether they restrict discussion of LGBTQ+ identity altogether, ban the use of preferred pronouns, or attempt to forcibly out trans students to their families. No matter what grades or ages these policies target, their intended message is clear: if you are LGBTQ+, you are not welcome here. Ensuring that queer youth feel empowered to express their identity, safely and on their own timeline, will have a massive, sustained impact on their overall wellbeing.
But LGBTQ+ youth need more than just our attention and our supportive words; they need our resources too. Specifically in schools, there is an almost endless list of priorities in urgent need of funding that would make an enormous difference for the day-to-day well-being of LGBTQ+ students.
Through It Gets Better’s 50 States, 50 Grants, 5000 Voices program, we were so proud to recently announce grants of up to $10,000 each to more than 70 schools across the U.S. and Canada. They cover a range of projects to uplift and empower LGBTQ+ youth, including educator training, inclusive curriculum, community art projects, Pride celebrations, and the priorities of local Genders and Sexualities Alliances (aka GSAs). The philanthropic community stepping up to fund more projects like these at schools across the country would be one of the single most effective, tangible actions to support LGBTQ+ youth we could take.
While the adults in the room argue about the nuances of parental rights in education, the right to healthcare for trans youth, book bans and curriculum restrictions, young LGBTQ+ people everywhere are serving up a counter strike fueled by their passion to create a better world – a world that celebrates diversity and understands its value. Adults should be honored to have a seat at that table to watch and learn – and to catalyze the passion of young LGBTQ+ people who are ready to pick up the banner to concretize their right to exist.
Brian Wenke is the Executive Director of leading LGBTQ+ non profit, the It Gets Better Project, and has led the global storytelling effort to empower LGBTQ+ youth since 2016. He has spearheaded multi-national campaigns to connect and engage with LGBTQ+ youth where they live, work, and socialize – and has successfully leveraged corporate and institutional partnerships to expand the It Gets Better Project’s reach, which now spans four continents and six major languages.
Russia wants to ban all trans healthcare and gender recognition
This is what the right / republicans / Christian Nationalists desperately want for the US. Notice how the Russian laws went, first they claimed they needed to protect the kids so the laws started out chipping away at LGBTQ+ rights until they finally outlawed any public / social LGBTQ+ representation. They outlawed LGBTQ+ people. Now they are removing trans people, denying them treatments needed to be who they know they are. Simply erasing them in society, as they did the gays and pride rainbows. Notice this time they used the excuse of saving the families, the traditional nuclear family of one man, a subservient wife, and how many ever kids. Again this is the goal of the right here in the US, reverting the US society to the 1950s / the Leave It To Beaver fiction. Hugs
Russia set to ban all gender-affirming healthcare. (Getty Images)
Russia has given initial approval to a bill that would outlaw gender-affirming healthcare for trans people of all ages.
The proposed bill reportedly bans any “medical interventions aimed at changing the sex of a person”, as well as changing gender markers on official documents like passports.
Senior politician Pyotr Tolstoy, who sponsored the bill, claimed on Wednesday (14 June) it would “protect Russia with its cultural and family values and traditions and stop the infiltration of the Western anti-family ideology,” the Associated Press reported.
Lawmakers also reportedly claimed the proposed law would prevent anybody registered as male from changing their gender in official documents to avoid the military draft.
It will now go to Russia’s lower house of parliament, the State Duma, where it must receive three readings to be signed into law. The bill was approved unanimously in its first reading, The Times reported.
The Russian bill follows similar efforts elsewhere in the world, including in the US, where several states are attempting to ban or limit gender-affirming care for young people.
According to Equaldex, Russian trans people can currently receive a certificate recognising their gender from a medical commission.
Trans rights activist Maxim, who spoke to AP about the potential law, explained that the current situation in Russia with regards to gender-affirming care is “unique in a good way”. Unlike some other countries, gender-affirming care or surgeries are currently not required to change the gender on legal documents.
Under the new law, trans people who have already changed their gender marker on their official documents will reportedly be able to continue receiving gender-affirming care, however those who have not yet changed their official gender marker will be banned from doing so.
The proposed bill comes after Russia voted to expand its notorious LGBTQ+ “propaganda” bill to cover all ages in November 2022.
The law, which previously only applied to under-18s, prevents any promotion of LGBTQ+ identities or same-sex relationships in Russian media.
Igor Kochetkov of the Russian LGBT Network explained the expansion of the bill represented “part of a broader attack on anything the government deems ‘western and progressive’.”
YouTuber Gela Gogishvili, who was arrested and detained in April along with his partner Haoyang Xu for allegedly violating the “LGBTQ+ propaganda” law, warned that the law was “working” in order to silence LGBTQ+ people in Russia.
“What it means is that, if you are queer, you have to be silent, and the propaganda is working because this is what will happen to you,” he said.
“You either have to be silent if you want to stay in Russia or, if you want to express all of this, you have to get out of Russia.”
Trolling a school board that banned pride flags
Virginia Removes LGBTQ Youth Suicide Prevention Resources After Complaints By Ben Shapiro’s Daily Wire
Because the death of LGBTQ+ kids is better than them living openly as themselves in an accepting society according to the right wing mind set. Hugs
The Washington Post reports:
The administration of Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) quietly took down LGBTQ+ youth resources from a state website after a conservative media outlet questioned the links, records show, building on a pattern of removals derided by public health employees who say their work is being politicized.
Within hours of an inquiry from the Daily Wire, a dozen resources, including a live-chat online support group for teens, were removed from the state health department website at the direction of a Cabinet-level agency, according to emails obtained under the state’s open records law.
The presence of the materials — and their subsequent disappearance on May 31 — generated two headlines and a flurry of online reaction from conservative readers of the outlet, co-founded by right-wing commentator Ben Shapiro.
Read the full article.
Folks, I hope as an ally I’m not overstepping my bounds to post this classic.
They’re pro life for only fetuses. After that, good luck.
“Preborn you’re fine, preschool you’re fucked.” – George Carlin
They WANT dead kids. From mass shootings to removing suicide prevention to allowing pedophile clergy to outlawing loving same-sex family adoption. How much more obvious can it be????
This is what fascists mean when they way they want to “protect children”. They want to protect their fantasies in which more kids are dead.
Consider how fucked up you have to be to whine and complain that the government is promoting suicide prevention resources for a vulnerable minority.
At this point, I don’t care whether Ben Shapiro’s directly pushing for this. He consistently employs people who want us dead.
I have to stop this thread and post it as I am about 30 tabs behind. Due to making homemade ravioli with Ron.
Ron DeeeeeSantis must wake up every morning and think to himself, “what can I do today to further destroy the lives of the little people?” And then he sets out to do it.
The problem is that they view our pride as their shame. They don’t understand that it’s not about them. They don’t have to feel anything, just acknowledge that we are fellow creatures and move on.
Dr. HAAAAAAA TomKitten196020 days ago
I was walking hand in hand with hubby, a person turned and said to me. “You have no shame”
My reply “Well thank you a very unexpected complement.”
Rocco Gibraltar AtticusP18 hours ago
Hey white trash rednecks. Guess what? We don’t need a rally or a fucking hat. We vote for true honor and respect of our country. Go put your confederate flag on the back of your tacky ass pickup truck, while you hurl empty cans of manly beer at electric cars.
Told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing.
Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homo OTOH..a day ago
Not new, but it seemed appropriate today
Uncle Mark: HoHo-smoking homo claya day ago
IDK, I rather enjoyed seeing that paltry Trump rally in Bumblefuck, SC…especially the booing of Ms Lindsey. (Imagine being boo’d by the citizens of the very county you were born, raised & lived in. Must be how Trump felt in NYC.)
No, Brian, no. Nobody wants to “steal” your independence: they want to share in your rights. You’re treating those rights as though they belonged exclusively to white, straight, male people, to be granted to others as you see fit. No. The rights to “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” among other rights, belong to all of us.
A man you don’t even know sticks his pecker in another man you don’t even know. Tell me, Brian, exactly how is this stealing YOUR independence? The gay agenda is to live a normal life like everyone else
Kurtis Rader thatotherjean14 hours ago
Brian is objecting to the fact he no longer has the “independence” to stone gay people to death without repercussions as his religion demands. To misquote George Orwell: Some rights are more equal than others.
TennesseeEscapee BensNewLogin21 hours ago
From his perspective, the Constitution was given to us by god. What a twisted psyche he must have.
Shy Guy TennesseeEscapee17 hours ago
They literally do believe that. There’s a line of cringeful paintings of how they think of it:
That was great. One thing I wish he had also asked when the guy said drag is inherently sexual is “Oh, does that turn you on?”
amandagirl15701 Paddycakes20019 hours ago
True story. There was a guy in the gay bar years ago, who said he was totally straight, but got off on drag queens. But he’s totally straight and it wasn’t gay at all. That’s how their minds work.
There’s a real, concerted effort by the Republicans and the anti-liberal left to use RFK Jr. And Cornel West to spoil the 2024 election and help Trump win another term.
Raging Bee AyJayDee221 hours ago
Yup, just like they used Ralph W. “Lenin Lite” Nader and Jill Stein.
bearLvrFL AyJayDee219 hours ago
I ran into someone on the left who tried the “why the hating on RFK Jr?” on one of my social media pages. I responded, “Because of the belief in numerous conspiracy theories and ads that appear to have been made in Russian troll farms. No other reason, tho!” 😉
and that the contributions came from a “right down the middle” mix of Republicans and Democrats.
That statement is as credible as his views on vaccines.
He is not a democrat. He is being supported by the far right. This is their new thing–sham candidates, many of whom run as a democrat and if they win, they change their party affiliation to republican. This sure stinks of election fraud to me. I hope he gets so humiliated that he slinks away back into whatever cave he’s been hiding in and is never seen or heard from again.
His travel records, previously under scrutiny by the media, are now secret, thanks to a new legal exemption — one of a record number created in 2023 by the Republican-led Legislature and approved by the governor. DeSantis also has fought to conceal information about some of the most significant events during his tenure, including withholding Covid infection data and blocking release of records about the controversial relocation of dozens of migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, legal filings show.
Fitting, that he and Trump — two of the scummiest human beings on Planet Earth today — are the de facto leaders of today’s Republican Party.
A perfect fit — they with it.
Ross another_steve20 hours ago
are the de facto leaders of today’s Republican Party
Only because Hitler isn’t available.
I just listened to episode 2 of Rachel Maddow’s latest podcast, Deja News.
Great analysis of how the current dictator of FL is dredging up the hate & fear of others, just as the John’s Report did in the 50s & 60s.
Yeah, Desantis has been making a mockery of Florida’s so-called “sunshine laws”.
I read through the decision. It’s bonkers. It’s all just regurgitating conspiracy theories and complaining about the decisions of Twitter and Facebook that *every* other court who has looked at this nonsense has held to be private action, not government action, and thus not violating the 1st Amendment at all. And it gripes about things done when Trump was still president. One of the plaintiffs is Jim Hoft of the Gateway Pundit, a/k/a the dumbest man on the Internet, and the judge complains about a Twitter suspension before Biden became president. And, of course, it claims the story about “Hunter’s laptop” was suppressed even though it was the biggest story in the country — and happened when Trump was president.
This is really nutty stuff. Not surprising, I guess. This is the same judge who credulously quoted anti-vax nonsense and granted an injunction against HHS’s requirement that healthcare workers get one of the vaccines. The Supreme Court undid that and held that “mandate” was perfectly constitutional. This judge can’t learn his lesson and control himself. Given the current composition of the 5th Circuit, though, we shouldn’t be surprised if it stays in place for a while.
They don’t know their flag. They don’t know the law. They don’t know the Constitution. They don’t know their history. They don’t know their Buybull. This is today’s anti-woke Republicans.
The_Wretched Ken Elmquist2 days ago
It’s not just ‘don’t know’, they actively misinform their alt-reality.
As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen (Muslims); and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan (Mohammedan) nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.
Treaty Of Tripoli, Article 11, 1796… passed unanimously in the US Senate by many of the actual ‘founders’.
As a forriner I find it super weird how much the Founding Fathers are respected and ‘claimed’. It’s like a religion to some Americans.
They were just people, and more importantly, people of their time. Slave owners, white, educated (read: rich). People who wanted to do their best for their country but they were full of flaws like the rest of us.
Who gives a fuck what someone said several hundreds years ago? Oh, right: Bible humpers.
Tuxedocat PJ2 days ago edited
Obligs
It’s really feeling like the late 1930s around here these days… Didn’t we mostly all used to agree that NAZIS ARE FUCKING EVIL?
They’re not going to “tolerate” what the actual fuck??? The LGBTQ community has been TOLERATING the hate and bullshit discrimination from the right and conservatives for DECADES… Get off your fucking high horse and go do something actually worthwhile, better yet just go crawl in corner and die!
Houndentenor BartmanLA2 days ago
This is why there is no middle on the issue lgbt rights. We want equal rights; they want us to disappear. At the very least they want us all back in the closet afraid that we will be fired, ostracized or even killed if we come out. There is no middle ground between the two.
“We’re not gonna tolerate this rainbow pride stuff anymore.”
You’re gonna need to find a way to manage your emotions. We’re not going away
J.Martindale Cackalaquiano2 days ago edited
Who made this Nazi asshole God? I don’t give a fuck what the prick tolerates. He has way too high an opinion about his shitty, bigoted opinions.
Big shots on the right, even the supposedly educated “conservative thought leaders,” always sound so incredibly ignorant when they talk about LGBTQ+ America. They always seem to talk about us like we’re citizens of a different country (the way most of them think Puerto Ricans are citizens of a different country). Are they just pandering to the rank-n-file, or are they really so genuinely clueless? Honestly, part of me would prefer Machiavellian pandering to braindead ignorance.
Sister_Bertrille Teslaac2 days ago
Here you go. An oldie but goodie.
Former Arkansas Governor and Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee has called LGBTQ rights the “biggest threat” to religious morality in America.
In an interview with The Christian Post, Huckabee…decried acceptance of LGBTQ people and blamed the “Christian Church” for not doing enough to combat LGBTQ equality.
You Again? Sister_Bertrille2 days ago
Don’t forget this creepiness:
Florida Atlantic University Halts Search For President Over Questionnaire Asking If Applicants Are “Queer”
Don’t say gay bills started out to protect little kids from gender identification or sexual orientation that might confuse them, you know little kids up to grade three or around 8 years old. Then they raised the age to grade 8 or 14 because again they wanted to protect the children from something that would confuse them, but by that age I doubt that may kids were confused by those topics. Then to protect the children they expand the entire ban on those topics in all public schools in all grades, I guess because young adults would be confused about gender identity and sexual orientation? Now they have banned what can be taught in higher education and they are demanding to know the sexual orientation of potential hire. The real goal is now and always has been to remove any representation of LGBTQ+ especially gay and trans people. They want to wipe gay and trans people out of society. These are real Christian nationalist racist bigots, true believers, and they will keep going until they are removed from any position of authority. Hugs
The South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports:
Just days before the three finalists for Florida Atlantic University’s next president were set to speak at public forums, the search has been stopped in its tracks.
State University System of Florida Chancellor Ray Rodrigues sent a letter to Brad Levine, chairman of both the FAU Board of Trustees and the Presidential Search Committee, citing “anomalies that have been alleged in the Florida Atlantic University presidential search.” The letter, dated Friday, was posted on social media Friday evening.
The letter said Rodrigues’ office “received concerning information,” including that search committee members conducted a straw poll to rank their six preferred candidates out of a list of nearly 60 and that one candidate said a questionnaire asked if his sexual orientation is “queer” and that another survey asked whether his gender is “male, female or other” and what pronouns he uses.
Florida Politics reports:
Rodrigues said such questions appear to violate U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission regulations forbidding questions about job applicants’ sex, sexual orientation or gender.
According to the letter, consulting firm AGB Search did not inform members of the FAU search committee that such questions would appear on the questionnaire. Rodrigues said that raises further questions about whether information was being withheld from university officials.
“Those rankings were submitted confidentially and directly to the search firm,” Rodrigues wrote. A new Florida law keeps finalists for college and university president searches confidential until a list of finalists is publicly announced.
Desantis had recommended viciously anti-LGBTQ state Sen. Randy Fine for the job, but Fine did not make the list of finalists. That, you can be sure, will play into this story as it unfolds. As you can see below, some apparently believe that the questionnaire issue is being used as excuse to ultimately give the job to Fine. FAU, based in Boca Raton with multiple satellite campuses on the southeast coast, has an enrollment of 30,000.
How TYT has SHIFTED FOCUS and is Creating CONTENT useful for The Right (Feat. @olurinatti!)
Trans TYT Employee Quits, Condemns Cenk Uygur & Ana Kasparian’s Anti-Trans Rhetoric
I have become more worried about the TYT network. Anna was given more authority over the show and the hosts, and she has since them abused that authority. She talks over every other host, belittles them, and acts toward Cenk like she is a host on Fox who is the one talking to a token not hard right person. Anna acts like the over top authority that shall not be questioned, and by her own admission has moved very right wing in her thinking. She demands the limelight on every show. She interrupts him constantly yet refuses to let him interrupt her, she rails against his opinions unless it is him attacking democrats.
Cenk got really bitter and admitted he burned his bridges in the Democratic Party after he ran for congress and lost badly. He was someone who never held any public office yet felt entitled to the office due to his show to gain entry to the federal House of Representatives. So now he attacks Joe Biden / the Democratic Party at every turn no matter how trivial the reason just because he is constantly pushing for someone to primary Biden, which is not going to happen. All Cenk is doing with these constant angry attacks is to provide the republicans with stuff they can use to attack Biden in the General election. The show has changed a lot over the last year and I have canceled my membership.
TYT was once was a news program that cut through the bias driven media of opinion corporate networks. Now the shows they host have become inflammatory opinion driven episodes that could be shown on Fox News or delivered by their hosts. Sad but Anna had a change in thinking just 6 months ago because of a traumatic incident, and Cenk got bitter that he couldn’t just move into congress. Between them they changed their show from news to opinions. They have gone from saying remove emotion to see the misinformation to screaming emotionally about the misinformation they spew. This is one of a dozen videos from former workers and guest hosts who have recently been turned on by Cenk and Anna. Hugs
Scottie's Playtime 