Newspaper controlled by Pittsburgh Pirates owner runs anti-LGBTQ editorial

I'm so very tired of people saying shit about others - whether it's LGBT folk or people of color or people who aren't the same religion - and then claim we didn't understand correctly. I would expect a newspaper editor to have a pretty firm grasp of the English language and therefore be able to express himself clearly.

The Winchester Star, a daily newspaper in Virginia that claims to be pro-LGBTQ, published an editorial recently that both called into question the right of same-sex couples to marry and the very existence of transgender people.

The publication, part of the Ogden Newspapers chain, is controlled by the owner of the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team, Robert Nutting.

As first noted by the progressive blog Blue Virginia, the paper published an editorial on Wednesday slamming Gov. Ralph Northam (D-VA) for boycotting President Donald Trump’s recent appearance at the 400th anniversary commemoration of the Jamestown settlement.

“Gov. Northam?” the paper opined. “He made a speech earlier in the day, a few hours before Mr. Trump, speaking not of the tradition’s majesty, but of Virginia’s dubious 21st century achievements — i.e., homosexual marriage, elevation of the transgender lifestyle, etc. And then disgracefully departed, nowhere to be seen or heard when Mr. Trump spoke.”

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IL law will ensure students learn LGBT history

Does California have anything like this law? As far as I'm aware, it's a first of its kind.

A new law in Illinois will promote a more LGBTQ-inclusive history curricula in schools across the state. The measure goes into effect in July of next year.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) signed the legislation into law on Friday. The bill, which passed the House in March and the Senate in May, would amend the school code to ensure public schools “teach about the the roles and contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people” in U.S. and state history.

The measure provides for textbooks in public schools that include the “roles and contributions of all people protected under the Illinois Human Rights Act” and mandates that they be non-discriminatory toward those groups. Queer, trans, and nonbinary people are protected under state law.

Lawmakers who supported the bill say that LGBTQ-inclusive curricula will not only provide a more accurate telling of history but will work against transphobia and queerphobia and help LGBTQ students feel more welcome at school.

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Pro-LGBTQ companies bankroll anti-LGBTQ extremists in Congress

I hope Zero for Zeros is able to make some headway. It seems to be a bit hypocritical on the part of AT&T, and other companies as well, but we must hold corporations accountable. After all, they are people.;)

By almost all measures, AT&T has been a stalwart supporter of LGBTQ equality for a long time. It has protected workers from sexual orientation discrimination since 1975. It sponsors the Trevor Project to help LGBTQ youth in crisis. It received a perfect 100 score from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) in its annual equality index, ranking among the nation’s most inclusive places to work.

By any measure, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) is among the nation’s most anti-LGBTQ bigots. He defended bans on same-sex marriage as “sound public policy” and spearheaded the effort to block the elected government in Washington, D.C., from enacting marriage equality. He boasted of receiving a “True Blue Award” from the Family Research Council, a Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)-designated anti-LGBT hate group. He consistently earns a 0 score on HRC’s congressional scorecard, ranking among the lawmakers most virulently opposing equality.

Yet, AT&T’s corporate political action committee has given tens of thousands of dollars to Jordan’s campaigns since 2010, helping bankroll the re-elections of a man who HRC once inducted into its anti-equality “Hall of Shame” for “proactively [working] to undermine existing legal protections and promote anti-LGBT discrimination.” And AT&T’s PAC has given more than $400,000 to other firmly anti-LGBTQ members of Congress in recent years.

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Remembering the Compton Cafeteria Riot

Before Stonewall, there was a cafeteria.

In 1966, three years before the world-famous Stonewall riot in New York, a group of trans women in San Francisco stood up to police inside Gene Compton’s Cafeteria, an all-night restaurant in the Tenderloin neighborhood and popular queer gathering spot. A trans woman fed up with the harassment and abuse is said to have thrown a cup of coffee in an officer’s face, sparking a chaotic riot and unprecedented moment of trans resistance to police violence.

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Donald Trump struggles to explain transgender military ban

He's such an idiot. Facts and truth mean NOTHING to this man. He's never been honest at any point in his life. Why should he start now? He thinks he's the smartest man in the room when, in actuality, he's the most ignorant and uneducated man on the planet.

Asked about his 2017 decision to ban transgender troops from openly serving in the military, Trump claimed: “They take massive amounts of drugs, they have to. And you’re not allowed to take drugs, you know, in the military you’re not allowed to take any drugs, take an aspirin.

“They have to, after the operation, they have no choice, they have to. You would actually have to break rules and regulations in order to have that.”

Pressed on why he was enacting an anti-transgender policy while claiming to support LGBT+ rights, the president responded: “It is what it is. Look, also people were going in and then asking for the operation, and the operation is $250,000 dollars.

“The recovery period is long, and they have to take large amounts of drugs after that… and you can’t do that. I said, when it came time to make a decision on that, because of the drugs and the cost of the operation.”

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LGBT Pioneers Honored with NYC Monument

I'd like to believe in my heart that these two pioneers, two strong women, would be proud of the monument that will stand as a testament to their lives and work. It's sad that they are no longer with us; having died too young.

NEW YORK (AP) — Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson, two LGBT rights activists who took part in the 1969 Stonewall rebellion and founded an organization that helped homeless gay youths, will be honored with a public monument in New York City, officials announced Thursday.

The yet-to-be-commissioned monument is part of an initiative to increase the diversity of the statues and monuments in public places around New York City. It will be paid for out of $10 million allocated for new public artworks.

The monument will be installed in Greenwich Village a block away from the Stonewall Inn, where patrons resisted a police raid on June 28, 1969, and helped usher in a new, militant phase of the movement for gay rights.

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Russian Film Festival Powers On

It's so heart-warming to see people standing up in the face of violence and threats to bodily harm. Eleven years and no one has knocked them down!

Last week, the annual Side by Side (Bok o Bok in Russian) LGBT International Film Festival was held in Moscow. Amid screenings of films, gatherings within the community and providing a safe space for the LGBT community, the presence of anti-LGBT protestors and bomb threats tainted an otherwise peaceful event in the capital.

“The first festival in 2008 (in St. Petersburg) faced a lot of challenges, with pressure on the venues not to support [us], and emergency services closing down spaces,” organizer Manny de Guerre told The Moscow Times. “In some respect, we still face the same challenges today.”

In spite of these ongoing difficulties, the festival has powered through and has no intention of stopping. “Hundreds came to the event [in 2008] and it was clear that the festival was needed and in demand,” de Guerre said. “That is what kept us going.”

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