Meidas Contributor Francis Maxwell reflects on a speech given by radical right Supreme Court Justice Alito during a Federalist Society event in the wake of the recent attacks against the LGBTQ community.
Special Counsel Jack Smith filed a letter brief on Thanksgiving calling out Trump’s lawyers for providing false and erroneous information to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals following Tuesday’s oral argument. MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas breaks it all down.
The US is developing it’s own version of the Taliban who are trying to enforce dress codes and moral standards of their own on the rest of the population via threats of violence and death. In the US it is called the maga republican right wing. Hugs
An Afghan woman and a girl walk in a street in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 9, 2022. REUTERS/Ali Khara
Taliban’s treatment of women may be crime against humanity: UN experts
An Afghan woman and a girl walk in a street in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 9, 2022. REUTERS/Ali Khara
GENEVA, Nov 25 (Reuters) – The Taliban’s treatment of Afghan women and girls, including their exclusion from parks and gyms as well as schools and universities, may amount to a crime against humanity, a group of U.N. experts said on Friday.
The assessment by the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan Richard Bennett and nine other U.N. experts says the treatment of women and girls may amount to “gender persecution” under the Rome Statute to which Afghanistan is a party.
Responding to the assessment, Taliban Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Abdul Qahar Balkhi said: “The current collective punishment of innocent Afghans by the U.N. sanctions regime all in the name of women rights and equality amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
The U.N. experts said in a statement that women’s confinement to their homes was “tantamount to imprisonment”, adding that it was likely to lead to increased levels of domestic violence and mental health problems. The experts cited the arrest this month of female activist Zarifa Yaqobi and four male colleagues.
They remain in detention, the experts said.
The Taliban took over from a Western-backed government in August 2021. They say they respect women’s rights in accordance with their interpretation of Islamic law.
Western governments have said the Taliban needs to reverse its course on women’s rights, including their U-turn on signals they would open girls’ high schools, for any path towards formal recognition of the Taliban government.
Separately, a spokesperson for the U.N. human rights office called for the Taliban authorities to immediately halt the use of public floggings in Afghanistan.
Ravina Shamdasani said the office had documented numerous such incidents this month, including a woman and a man lashed 39 times each for spending time alone together outside of marriage.
Balkhi said the Taliban administration considered the statement by the United Nations and others by Western officials were “an insult towards Islam and violation of international principals.”
This is governing by threats of violence. Remind you of any other time that people just being / existing? People just wanting equality and civil rights? Yes you get the cookie, it was the same way black people and their supporters were treated in the early 1960s during the civil rights era. We seem to still be in an era of fighting for civil rights. This is the American republican Taliban, trying to enforce a dress code with weapons, threats, and violence. No one has a right to cause another to fear for their life for dressing differently. Yet the republicans feel entitled to do so, to enforce their regressive religious moral views on everyone else. Hugs
In an exclusive interview, Bob the Drag Queen talks about the dangers they faced filming the new season.
Bob the Drag Queen, Shangela, and Eureka O’Hara Photo: Greg Endries/HBO
From the very start, the project of HBO’s documentary series We’re Here has been to show small town communities the human side of drag. The series follows RuPaul’s Drag Race alums Bob the Drag Queen, Eureka O’Hara, and Shangela as they crisscross the nation nurturing and mentoring everyday people as they dip their toes into the world of drag performance for the very first time. Their interactions are often heartbreaking and inspiring, illuminating the struggles of queer people living in small towns and the discrimination they face.
In an exclusive interview with LGBTQ Nation, Bob and Executive producers Stephen Warren and Johnnie Ingram talk about the outright hostility they felt filming the new season.
As everyone involved is quick to note, each show season has presented unique challenges. Filming on Season 1 was cut short in 2020 due to the pandemic, while in Season 2, the cast and crew, like so many others in the entertainment industry, had to navigate new safety precautions to prevent the spread of COVID-19. And in both seasons, the production frequently faced anti-LGBTQ pushback and occasional outright hostility from the communities in which they filmed.
But Season 3 was different. Shortly after production started this spring, reports of protests at drag shows and all-ages Pride events proliferated in the media. Seemingly overnight, drag queens became a favorite punching bag for Republican politicians, right-wing commentators, and anti-LGBTQ extremists.
“I wish I could say that I’m shocked to see it happening. But I’m not shocked,” Bob told LGBTQ Nation. “Economics doesn’t trickle down, but bullsh*t does. And when people at the top are spewing hatred and horrible, horrible rhetoric…why would you be shocked that it trickles down to every part of our community?”
Executive producer Stephen Warren, who co-created the series with executive producer Johnnie Ingram, recalled the resistance the cast and crew faced filming the pilot episode two years ago during the 2020 presidential campaign. “There was a truck with a Trump flag and people screaming at us as they walked by. And that threw us,” Warren remembered. “That is nothing—nothing—compared to what we started to feel [this season].”
In town after town, the show faced hostility from people who seemed newly emboldened by the hateful rhetoric proliferating online from Twitter accounts like Libs of TikTok and Republican politicians looking to score cheap political points at the expense of the LGBTQ community. In Utah, police received what ultimately turned out to be a bogus threat of a mass shooting at the drag show they put on for every episode.
“The protests were way more intense,” Warren says. “The protests were not just behind our backs. This year there was a huge difference.”
“We experienced full-on macro aggressions,” says Bob. “There were towns where the city council tried to have us run out of town completely—to shut our entire show down. There were towns where people threatened us with gun violence just for existing. And then we had towns where there was just no opposition at all. Because we travel far and wide.”
“This season we had to have additional security, not just at the regular drag event. We had to have security guards dressed in regular clothes always near our production.” Ingram explains. “In Granbury, Texas, there were threats to our drag show, so we had to beef up our security for that particular drag event.”
Filming what would become the Season 3 premiere in Granbury was especially difficult for everyone involved. “I’ve said, if I never go back to Granbury, Texas, it’ll be too soon,” Bob says. “That place was wild. It was the first time I was like, These people really hate us. They do not want us here. I would have left if it was up to me.”
Eureka O’Hara and Shangela confront an anti-LGBTQ protester in Granbury, Texas. Greg Endries/HBO
Warren says that a week before the show arrived in Texas, a local ultra-right-wing podcast began ginning up hostility, spreading a rumor that the queens would be participating in Granbury’s Fourth of July parade—something that was never in the works. “We get to the town and already many of the people that we met were hostile. Because they thought we were trying to pollute them,” Warren recalls.
Producers were forced to relocate a planned drag story hour event at a local queer-friendly coffee shop after people called, threatening to forcibly remove the children who were planning to attend with their mothers. “Not their children,” Warren notes. “They were going to forcibly remove them, and they were potentially armed.”
“People are more vocal now than ever because they feel vindicated to be able to be vocal. People feel supported in their negative opinions, and there’s a lot of fear being thrown around about children,” says Eureka. “Which, again, has constantly tormented the queer community. And it’s heartbreaking that at the root of everything, people forget that we have families too. We have hearts too. We don’t want to hurt children. Some of us have raised children. Me and Shangela specifically, we are huge influences in our brothers and sisters’ children’s lives. Our nieces and nephews, if it wasn’t for us doing what we do, may not be as supported as they are, may not have a chance for success. I’m a queer person, and if it wasn’t for what I get to do, how I make money, I wouldn’t be able to help them thrive.”
For Ingram and Warren, seeing drag queens become the targets of dehumanizing rhetoric has been devastating. But, they say, the current political climate reinforces their show’s importance.
“We created this show to show this human connection between people that wouldn’t normally connect,” Ingram explains. “We’re saying in this season that drag is love. It’s a warm hug. We have an uphill battle on our hands showing what that love is. But we stand up and squash the hate with love—the love from our community, the love from these drag performers, the love we put into the wardrobe, the celebration, the people that celebrate onstage their own personal journeys for the first time. Standing up to the hate with love fearlessly and fiercely is all we can continue to do. That is the only way forward.”
“This season is so important,” Warren insists. “It’s by far and away the most important season we’ve done, because everyone’s always asking ‘What can I do?’ And it’s not until you feel the connection with somebody that I think you can make substantive change.”
“People share these memes on social media, but when you really sit with a human and you listen to their story and you watch them shine, that is what we really need to do,” Ingram adds. “From our whole experience, there’s a lot more people that are on the right side of history than there are these loud obnoxious people. We definitely outnumber the hate.”
Matt Walsh, alone in his car, argues the differences between consensual and non-consensual sex, as well as discussing the alleged sexual assault of children carried out by former Catholic Church Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. Thanks to the @The Serf Times for digging this up.
Louisiana Rep. Mike Johnson wants to make Florida’s hateful “Don’t Say Gay” policy federal law. He has introduced a bill to make discussing sexuality or gender in elementary classrooms illegal. They do this in the name of not sexualizing children, but in reality, is designed to make LGBTQ+ kids stay in the closet.
Newly declassified intelligence has confirmed that Donald Trump tweeted out a classified photo from a spy satellite while he was serving as President. The intelligence community at the time of the tweet was absolutely floored that the President would do this, as it risked exposing our capabilities and operations. Farron Cousins explains what this new information means.
But the right wing media and the maga crowd are horrified over Hillary’s emails. The right loves to claim that trump never mishandled security or confidential information, but we know he was so loss with it he told the Russian ambassador and spy chief about highly classified spys / information shortly after becomeing president. Hugs
This is what the right wing / republicans in office want to do here. They are already doing it in schools by banning any positive mention of the LGBTQI+ while they continue to spew lies and misinformation. They are already doing this by trying to ban drag queens or making them a sexual orientated business. Hugs
Russian parliament passes law banning ‘LGBT propaganda’ among adults
People take part in the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) community rally “VIII St.Petersburg Pride” in St. Petersburg, Russia August 12, 2017. REUTERS/Anton Vaganov/File Photo
MOSCOW, Nov 24 (Reuters) – Russia’s parliament approved on Thursday a bill that widens a prohibition of “LGBT propaganda” and restricts the “demonstration” of LGBT behaviour, making any expression of an LGBT lifestyle almost impossible.
Under the new law, which still needs the approval of the upper house of parliament and President Vladimir Putin, any action or information that is considered an attempt to promote homosexuality – whether in public, online, or in films, books or advertising – could incur a heavy fine.
Previously, the law had outlawed only promotion of LGBT lifestyles aimed at children. The new bill also bans the “demonstration” of LGBT behaviour to children.
Lawmakers say they are defending traditional values of the “Russian world” against a liberal West they say is determined to destroy them – an argument also increasingly being used by officials as one of the justifications for Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine.
Authorities have already used the existing law to stop gay pride marches and detain gay rights activists. Rights groups say the new law is intended to drive so-called “non-traditional” LGBT lifestyles practised by lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender people out of public life altogether.
‘HYBRID WARFARE’
“LGBT today is an element of hybrid warfare and in this hybrid warfare we must protect our values, our society and our children,” Alexander Khinstein, one of the bill’s architects, said last month.
Legal experts said the vagueness of the bill’s language gives room for law enforcers to interpret them as broadly as they wish, leaving members of the LGBT community in a state of even greater uncertainty.
Kseniya Mikhailova of the LGBT support group Vykhod (“Coming Out”) said adults-only gay bars or clubs would probably still be allowed to function, although perhaps not to advertise, but that same-sex kissing in public might be taken as an infraction.
And she said same-sex couples would begin to fear that their children might be taken from them on the grounds that they were having an LGBT lifestyle demonstrated to them.
The law stipulates fines of up to 400,000 roubles ($6,600) for individuals and up to 5 million roubles ($82,100) for legal entities. Foreigners could face 15 days of arrest and subsequent expulsion.
Mikhailova said the original ban nine years ago on LGBT “propaganda” towards minors had triggered a wave of attacks on the LGBT community, and that it could now expect a “tsunami” because the amendment in effect “says the state is not against violence towards LGBT people”.
Political scientist Ekaterina Schulmann said the law aimed to prohibit anything that showed LGBT relations or inclinations to be “socially acceptable” or “equal to so-called traditional family relations or sexual relations”.
“People – authors, publishers, just people – will think twice before even mentioning anything related to LGBT,” she said in an interview from Cologne, Germany.
Schulmann said the bill was also a “huge win” for the communications regulator, Roskomnadzor, which had already “assumed the powers of a political police” and now had the authority and responsibility to monitor all kinds of information in search of LGBT propaganda.
The video-sharing app TikTok was fined 3 million roubles last month for promoting “videos with LGBT themes”, while Russia’s media regulator asked publishing houses to look at withdrawing all books containing “LGBT propaganda” from sale.
Notice Russia is not attacking military targets. This is terrorism, it is targeting civilians and infrastructure needed to survive to get what they cannot achieve fighting the Ukraine army. They want to make the people so scared and desperate that they will just give in and give Russia what it wants. This is about a bully making the victim suffer. My gods how can the world just let this continue when we can stop it. Think of what it is like in the US snow belt when the power goes out? This is what is going to happen in Ukraine all over the country. Think about when there is no running water. That is what is happening in Ukraine due to Russia. Russia is losing the war, so they want to make the Ukrainian people so miserable and frightened that they will negotiate giving Russia parts of their country. We have the tech to stop this, we have the tools. We need to move in and stop these missiles. But even more we have tied Ukraine’s hands, we have given weapons and support only as long as they don’t attack inside Russia. Yet Russia can attack inside Ukraine. So Ukraine cannot fight back, cannot make Russia suffer as Russia is doing to Ukraine. It means that while Russia gets to do anything it wants to hurt Ukrainians we are preventing Ukraine from hurting Russia back. Damn one sided if you ask me. Hugs
Russia launched 70 missiles at Ukraine in its latest “large-scale attack on crucial infrastructure facilities,” the Ukrainian Armed Forces said on Telegram. Fifty-one of the 70 missiles were intercepted, as well as five attack drones, the military’s statement read.
Bob the Drag Queen, Shangela, and Eureka O’Hara Photo: Greg Endries/HBO
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