IN A FIRST, SRI LANKAN PRESIDENT ACKNOWLEDGES LGBT RIGHTS

In probably a first for a South Asian head of state, Sri Lankan President in a post on Twitter acknowledged the rights of LGBTQI Sri Lankans. Human rights activists said the President’s message was significant as Sri Lanka is one of the 69 countries in the world that has laws that criminalise consensual same-sex acts. […]

United Methodist conservatives detail breakaway plans over gay inclusion

Conservative leaders within the United Methodist Church unveiled plans Monday to form a new denomination, the Global Methodist Church, with a doctrine that does not recognize same-sex marriage. The move could hasten the long-expected breakup of the UMC over differing approaches to LGBTQ inclusion. For now, the UMC is the largest mainline Protestant church in […]

Nigerian church to anti-gay Americans: You’re not anti-gay enough

Henry C. Ndukuba, archbishop of the Anglican Church of Nigeria, has declared there’s “no such thing as a ‘gay Christian’ “. In a statement, Ndukuba criticized the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), which broke away from the Episcopal Church over its acceptance of gay clergy. Ndukuba cited a recent pastoral statement from ACNA that […]

In Colombian port town, LGBTQ community faces increasing threats

A main Afro-Colombian port city on Colombia’s western coast, Buenaventura has long been considered one of the most violent places in the country. It was here the “casas de pique” (Spanish for chop houses) operated, where armed groups would dismember victims and dispose of their bodies in the adjacent Pacific Ocean. In 2019, Buenaventura held […]

BIHAR GOVT TO PATNA HIGH COURT : WILL SET UP SPECIAL TRANS POLICE UNITS IN EACH DISTRICT

In an affidavit submitted to the Patna High Court, Bihar Government has said that it is committed to “respectful representation” of transgender people in public employment, and will set up a separate unit of Transgender Police Personnel called Special Unit (Transgender) at each district under the District SP, LiveLaw has reported. The affidavit states: “The […]

Different fight, ‘same goal’: How the Black freedom movement inspired early gay activists

On April 25, 1965, three teenagers refused to leave Dewey’s Restaurant in Philadelphia after employees repeatedly denied service to “homosexuals and persons wearing nonconformist clothing,” according to Drum magazine, which was created by the Janus Society, an early gay rights group. The teens were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, and Janus Society members protested […]

Malaysian man wins landmark challenge against Muslim gay sex ban

The Federal Court of Malaysia has ruled that the state of Selangor has no power to uphold a shariah law that declares it an offense to engage in same-sex intercourse. This decision came as a response to an applicant seeking to block Section 28 of Selangor’s Shariah criminal law. As Human Rights Watch reports, the […]

Different fight, ‘same goal’: How the Black freedom movement inspired early gay activists

On April 25, 1965, three teenagers refused to leave Dewey’s Restaurant in Philadelphia after employees repeatedly denied service to “homosexuals and persons wearing nonconformist clothing,” according to Drum magazine, which was created by the Janus Society, an early gay rights group. The teens were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, and Janus Society members protested […]

The inclusion of LGBT+ people in the census is long overdue’

The new national census will be conducted this year, and for the first time, it will include questions about LGBTQ+ identity. This is a great stride towards inclusivity of LGBTQ+ people in the UK, with the government able to collect reliable data about how many people identify as LGBTQ+ and what disadvantages they may face. […]

The Untold Story of Queer Foster Families

When Don Ward was a child, in Seattle, in the nineteen-sixties, his mother, each December, would hand him the Sears catalogue and ask him to pick Christmas gifts. By the time his parents filed for divorce, the catalogue had become a refuge, for Ward, from their shouting matches. Eventually, instead of looking at toys, he […]

Beach erupts in protest as armed police arrest gay couple ‘for kissing’

Two gay men were arrested after kissing on a public Mexico beach but were freed after fellow sunbathers charged after the police vehicle and demanded their release. In a video that has gone viral around the world, two men are seen in handcuffs being dragged into a vehicle by armed police. Quickly, a group of […]

Global Trends in LGBT Rights During the Covid-19 Pandemic

It’s impossible to evaluate what the year 2020 looked like from the perspective of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people’s rights without recognizing how Covid-19 put a spanner in the works and made for an especially tumultuous year, including for LGBT people. The Covid-19 pandemic exposed fault lines of inequality, leaving some more vulnerable than […]

Chechen Court Rules Police Abduction of Two Gay Refugees Is Legal

A court ruled this week that it was legal for Russian police to kidnap two gay men who escaped Chechnya after facing persecution under its anti-LGBTQ+ crackdown. Earlier this month, teen brothers Salekh Magamadov and Ismail Isayev were abducted from a safe house in the western Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod and returned to the […]

LGBTQ+: Wales’ first bilingual magazine launched in lockdown

What is believed to be Wales’ first national LGBTQ+ bilingual magazine has been launched. LGBTQymru will “celebrate, connect and support the communities of Wales – not just the LGBTQ+ community but Wales as a whole”, those behind it say. Founder and editor Bleddyn Harris has created the quarterly online magazine after launching the first Wales-wide […]

More young people identify as LGBTQ+ than ever before, poll finds

More young people are out than ever before, and most people who identify as LGBTQ+ are attracted to more than one gender, according to new data. A study released Wednesday by Gallup found that 5.6 percent of the U.S. population now identifies as LGBTQ+, up from 4.5 percent in 2017. Jeff Jones, a senior editor […]

The difficulties of being gay in Iran

Police in Iran enter a young man’s apartment looking for signs of “misconduct.” They rummage through his laundry and check his computer. The young man, who goes by the name of Sahand, stands accused of violating the laws of the Islamic Republic — a relative reported him to police after finding him in bed with […]

LGBT+ Americans inch closer to ‘freedom’ as House passes Equality Act

By a vote of 224 to 206, the House passed the landmark Equality Act, which amends the 1964 Civil Rights Act to include sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes in addition to race, religion, sex and national origin. The vote closely followed party lines, with only three Republican lawmakers supporting the bill. “Without […]

Malaysian man wins landmark challenge against Muslim gay sex ban

KUALA LUMPUR (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – A Malaysian man on Thursday won a landmark court challenge against an Islamic ban on sex “against the order of nature”, raising hopes for greater acceptance of gay rights in the mostly Muslim country. The Muslim man in his 30s – whose name has been withheld by his lawyer […]

South Korean Gay Couple Sues National Health Insurer

A South Korean gay couple sued the state health insurer over canceling coverage based on sexual orientation last week, an activist group told the Yonhap news agency. Couple So Seong-wook and Kim Yong-min filed a lawsuit against the National Health Insurance Service, the Korean Network for Partnership and Marriage Rights of LGBT told Yonhap. The […]

Outrage as Marjorie Taylor Greene displays transphobic sign in Congress

The Republican extremist Marjorie Taylor Greene attracted widespread condemnation – from transgender groups, Democrats and her own party – after she hung a transphobic sign outside her office in response to fellow congresswoman Marie Newman raising a transgender pride flag. The Georgia congresswoman put up the poster – which read “There are TWO genders: Male […]

American anti-trans activist invited to give Singaporeans a ‘better understanding’

An American doctor who believes transgenderism as a “myth” and has supported the forced “conversion” of homosexuals has been invited to lead a discussion of the issue Saturday in Singapore. After details of the Transgenderism: Science vs. Ideology webinar drew criticism over Quentin Van Meter’s documented history of homophobia, the event’s organizer, Focus On The […]

Transgender Arkansan killed in Pennsylvania

A 24-year-old transgender woman from Springdale was killed Thursday in Pennsylvania , according to the Pennsylvania State Police. Chyna Carrillo’s death is at least the seventh killing of a transgender person in the U.S. this year, though there are likely others that were unreported or misreported, according to the Human Rights Campaign. New Wilmington, Pa., […]

Poland Breaches EU Obligations Over LGBT, Women’s Rights

For 30 days, beginning January 17, European Union commissioners received daily Twitter notifications linking to personal stories of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Poles who have been harmed by the so-called “LGBT Ideology Free Zones” or anti-LGBT “Family Charters” in nearly 100 Polish regions, towns, and cities. The tweets were part of a campaign […]

Mexico’s top court to vote on gay marriage in Yucatan state

MEXICO CITY (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Mexico’s top court is due to vote Wednesday whether to order the state of Yucatan to legalize gay marriage, a move that would open the door to similar judgments elsewhere in the country. The Supreme Court in 2015 said that banning gay marriage was unconstitutional, but many states have […]

A record 5.6% of Americans identify as LGBT+, Gallup poll finds

NEW YORK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – A record 5.6% of Americans – or 18 million people – are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, a Gallup poll found on Wednesday, attributing a significant increase to greater social acceptance. The 2020 survey showed a 24% rise from the last poll in 2017, when 4.5% of adults identified […]

‘I’m still here’: Transgender troops begin new era of open military service

As the U.S. military adapts to evolving and increasingly complex global threats, highly-trained cyber warriors like Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Brock Stone are at the tip of the spear. “All the adversaries you hear about in the news are always out to get us. Not all those people speak English,” Stone said, “and that’s […]