[RD] LGBTQ news
- Thread starter bernie14
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Meh. I think it might be more bearable in English, because intuitively I don't see why not to have a comma before a vowel. In Greek it is the other way around, since the word for "and" starts with a "k", so most people don't use a comma before that.
But you still can, it isn't identified as erroneous. Imo I would have a comma if I wanted to specify there are reasons to pause (in literary writing), but in business epistolography or news articles I don't really see the point.
There you have it, the case in English, the case in Greek, and a general indifference.
If you've ever worked in a big Corp, you'll realise how ridiculously far the most minute detail can become 'important'
I've had presentations sent back for change, when the border had the wrong 'shade of blue' and the page number wasn't the appropriate size.
I've had presentations sent back for change, when the border had the wrong 'shade of blue' and the page number wasn't the appropriate size.
Well I'll know who to blame next time! 
Broken_Erika
Play with me.
Scores of anti-trans candidates running in Ontario school board elections
With support from several conservative groups, some candidates are vowing to end inclusive sex education
In school board elections across Ontario this Monday, dozens of candidates are running on promises to roll back protections for transgender students, part of a concerted effort by conservative lobby groups to undo policies aimed at addressing systemic discrimination.The normally sleepy contests for trustee positions have been highly charged this year with faith-based groups, political parties and self-styled "anti-woke" organizations involved to an unprecedented degree, including providing endorsements, mobilizing volunteers and providing candidates' training from U.S. political operatives.
It's not limited to Ontario. In British Columbia's school board elections last week, nearly 30 candidates ran under the banner of ParentsVoice BC, a group opposed to inclusive sex education.
The Canadian Anti-Hate Network, a non-profit that monitors extremism, recently posted that two candidates in Manitoba's school board elections later this month who have expressed anti-LGBTQ views.
Advocates for the trans community are concerned these local campaigns will contribute to an already-deteriorating social climate, which many say has worsened amid a wave of anti-trans legislation in the U.S.
"The data that we have in Canada shows that hate crimes against our communities are continuing to rise," said Lyra Evans, a school board trustee in Ottawa who is transgender.
"And so I think this is of great concern to everybody who wants their kids, their trans or cisgender kids, to grow up in safe schools."
For weeks, some candidates in Ottawa, Waterloo, Hamilton, among other places in Ontario, have been using transphobic rhetoric in public, portraying gender-inclusive sex education as an attempt to indoctrinate their children.
An investigation by CBC News found that at least 20 candidates for trustee positions in Ontario had either used discriminatory terms in interviews, aligned themselves with transphobic lobby groups or used their social media accounts to amplify transphobic content.
Opposed to teaching gender inclusivity
For example, Mark Paralovos, a trustee candidate in Guelph, Ont., has repeatedly taken to social media to deny the existence of trans and non-binary genders."There are men. There are women. That's it," he tweeted earlier this month.
Terry Rekar, running for a trustee position in Peterborough, Ont., boasts of leading a chapter of Action4Canada, a conspiracy-minded far-right group that also denies the existence of gender minorities and describes gender-affirming surgery as "child abuse."
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In an interview with a local podcast, Rekar said she is concerned about the "pornography books" in school libraries.
Neither Paralovos or Rekar responded to requests for comment.
In an interview with CBC News, Paula Dametto-Giovannozzi, a trustee candidate running in Caledon, Ont., for the local Catholic board, repeated a debunked transphobic conspiracy theory that maintains teachers are placing cat litter in classrooms for students who identify as cats.
Some of the most contentious races in this election cycle are in Ottawa, where a number of candidates are running on platforms that make explicit their opposition to teaching anti-racism and gender inclusivity in public and Catholic schools.
One candidate, Chanel Pfahl, a former school teacher, faced criticism recently when she published on social media the confidential details of online support group meetings for visible minority and LGBTQ students at schools she hopes to oversee.
"I'm actually trying to protect kids from a toxic ideology," Pfahl said in a tweet explaining her actions. "Can't say the same for whoever is trying to have secret meet ups with lesbian kindergarteners."
The Ottawa-Carleton District School Board said the information Pfahl shared online put its students at risk.
Another candidate, Shannon Boschy, said Ontario's sex-education curriculum was partly to blame for the rise in transgender and non-binary identifying students.
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He also compared non-binary genders to a disorder.
On Wednesday, a number of LGBTQ advocacy groups in Ottawa released a statement, saying: "We condemn in the strongest terms possible the transphobic rhetoric being used by Ottawa school board trustee candidates."
The statement named eight candidates, including Boschy and Pfahl.
Groups backing surge of 'anti-woke' candidates
In several school districts across Ontario, groups of closely allied trustee candidates are running on the shared belief that public and Catholic schools are trying to push radical left-wing ideologies on their students.Many of these platforms borrow the term "woke," which is used pejoratively by conservative politicians in the U.S. to describe efforts to combat systemic racism and encourage acceptance of gender diversity.
In Ontario, scores of websites and social media accounts have sprouted up in recent weeks to identify candidates running on "anti-woke" platforms.
A candidate in the Kawartha Lakes area, Peter Wallace, set up an organization called Blueprint for Canada to assist other candidates in the province who are opposed to gender-inclusive sex education.
Wallace said in an email he hoped his platform would discourage children from seeking gender-affirming care. "Then it will be worth putting up with the 'transphobic' accusations," he said.
Behind the surge of candidates running on near-identical platforms are several highly organized conservative advocacy groups.
Liberty Coalition Canada, a Christian group formed last year, announced this summer it had partnered with the Leadership Institute, a well-funded think-tank based in Virginia that is known for training conservative politicians.
A social media post from early August invited municipal and school board candidates running in Ontario, Manitoba and British Columbia to take part in a training session put on with the Leadership Institute.
Dametto-Giovannozzi said she and some 60 other aspiring candidates took part in the session, which was held in Mississauga, Ont., in August. Derek Sloan, the leader of the socially conservative Ontario Party, was a speaker. Republican strategists participated via Zoom.
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Parents as First Educators, a lobby group opposed to the various reforms in Ontario aimed at making sex education more inclusive, delivered a series of webinars of its own for school board candidates. It also endorsed several candidates but declined to share that list with CBC News.
On its Facebook page, Parents as First Educators has applauded anti-trans legislation in Virginia and Florida.
The largest conservative group involved in the elections, though, is the Campaign Life Coalition, best known for supporting anti-abortion politicians at all levels of government.
Jack Fonseca, the organization's head of political operations, said they increased their involvement in school board elections recently amid concerns that "anti-God atheists" were taking over the education system in Ontario and elsewhere.
The organization's website lists trustee candidates it finds "supportable" — that is, candidates it believes will oppose gender-inclusive sex education. It's also playing an active role trying to get them elected.
"We're mobilizing our database of supporters to get out the vote; to volunteer; to help install lawn signs, help door knock, help distribute literature. We're encouraging them to donate to the candidates," Fonseca said.
Making schools safe for trans students
Though many of the trustee candidates running on anti-woke platforms are vocal on social media about what they oppose, few outside the Ottawa area were willing to discuss their platforms.CBC News contacted nearly a dozen candidates in the rest of the province to better understand what policies they intended to implement or repeal. None agreed to be interviewed for broadcast, nor were they willing to elaborate via email.
One candidate, Jeannette Lee, who is running on an anti-woke platform in Hanover, Ont., said when reached by phone that she didn't feel "confident" talking about her platform.
Despite many of these candidates promising to end "political indoctrination" in schools, provincial legislation — including the Ontario Human Rights Code — limits the ability of trustees to alter school curriculum.
However, school boards have access to millions of dollars in discretionary spending and also set privacy policies.
Boschy, the trustee candidate in Ottawa, said he wanted to repeal a policy that gives students final say about whether parents are informed if they identify as a different gender at school.
His opposition is based, in part, on how his own child transitioned genders. Boschy said the school didn't inform him and that contributed to a rift with his child. "I lost my relationship with my child," he said.
But for trans advocates, such privacy policies are vital for keeping gender and sexual minority students safe.
Transgender students are best placed to determine how and when they come out, said Fae Johnstone, a trans advocate who runs a consulting firm based in Ottawa that specializes in gender justice.
Privacy policies help reduce the risk of bullying, child abuse and homelessness, she said.
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Libraries in Canada hit by wave of hate, threats, as right-wing groups protest all-age drag events - Transgender youth 5 times more likely to attempt suicide, study finds
LGBTQ students already feel less safe at school compared to their classmates, according to a survey of 4,000 students in Canada conducted between 2019 and 2020 for Egale, one of the country's leading LGBTQ groups.
The same survey found 57 per cent of trans respondents were the target of bullying.
A study published earlier this year in the Canadian Medical Association Journal found transgender youth are five times more likely to think about suicide, and 7.6 times more likely to attempt it.
The election of trustees comfortable using transphobic rhetoric would only make this situation worse, said Jaime Sadgrove, of the Canadian Centre for Gender and Sexual Diversity, one the groups behind the statement released on Wednesday.
"Safety is the baseline. If you don't feel safe, if you don't feel comfortable, how are you supposed to be able to learn?"
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ontario-school-board-trustee-investigation-1.6622705
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Broken_Erika
Play with me.
Push to restrict talk of LGBTQ issues in Russia will leave community 'even more unprotected'
Russian lawmakers seek to expand pre-existing 'propaganda' law to all ages
A push by Russian lawmakers to more firmly restrict the public discussion of LGBTQ lives and issues will further isolate a community that faces ongoing peril, advocates say.A draft bill discussed in Russia's State Duma this past week aims to build on prior legislation — enacted nearly a decade ago and decried in the West — that banned "promotion of non-traditional sexual relations" to minors.
Supporting lawmakers, engaged in this effort for months, want to extend that ban to Russians of all ages.
"We propose to extend the ban for LGBT propaganda regardless of age, not just for children as it is today," Alexander Khinshtein, a Russian lawmaker and proponent of the bill, said this week.
The move to tighten anti-LGBTQ measures is occurring at a time when Russia is engaged in a high-profile war with Ukraine — and both experts and advocates see Moscow working to spell out very clearly who it sees as opponents.
Miron Rozanov, a spokesperson for the NC SOS Crisis Group, said the Russian government is trying to convince its people that "Ukraine, Western countries and LGBTIQ+ people are enemies."
Maria Popova, an associate professor of political science at Montreal's McGill University, said at the same time, Moscow is signalling the wide gulf between itself and the values of the West, while showing little regard for the people caught in the middle.
"The West has LGBT rights, so Russia has to reject them," Popova said in an email.
'No rights in Russia'
Dilya Gafurova, head of the Russian LGBTQ rights organization Sphere, said the community "has no rights in Russia at the moment" and that the legislation being considered by lawmakers would make things even worse."This will make them even more unprotected and even more invisible," she told CBC News via email.
It would also limit the ability of groups like Sphere to support the community, Gafurova said.
Rozanov said the proposed legislation "legitimizes violence against LGBTQ people and effectively prohibits coverage of the work of human rights organizations that help them."
His group helps people in that community who live in the North Caucasus region — people who he says are especially endangered by the proposed extension of the propaganda ban.
"It is extremely difficult to achieve justice for people who have experienced violence because of their identity or orientation," Rozanov said in an email.
"Law enforcement agencies do not investigate allegations of torture, 'honour killings,' detentions, 'conversion' practices. The new law will exacerbate the problem: Now it is the complainants themselves who can be held liable, and not the [perpetrators]."
Ongoing oppression
Advocates, including Gafurova and Rozanov, see a long-running thread in Russian politics that casts the LGBTQ community as being Western-influenced and on the wrong side of Russian values — as the Kremlin defines them for political purposes."Being LGBT+, 'non traditionality' is something that was weaponized continuously by the Russian regime to justify defending itself from 'Western influence,' as if being queer is something that can be influenced onto someone or flown in from abroad," Gafurova said.
Rozanov said the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin "has turned to homophobic rhetoric at every opportunity" since introducing its initial ban on propaganda nearly a decade ago.
Gafurova points to remarks Putin made last month, where he referred to children and gender identity, as an indication of the state's views.
"LGBT+ people are not regarded as people [in Russia]," Gafurova said, adding that some lawmakers "sincerely believe us to be the result of 'propaganda' or [that] we're a means to an end, a justification for certain political actions."
Military not known 'for acceptance'
In recent weeks, Putin ordered a mobilization of hundreds of thousands of Russian men to join the fighting in Ukraine, which was invaded by Russia in February. That move has spurred thousands to flee the country.But some are forced to serve — and that would surely include some members of the LGBTQ community.
Sphere's Gafurova said that "the Russian military isn't exactly known for acceptance toward queer people," and she suspects many will have left the country for the same reasons their fellow compatriots have.
"They simply don't want to serve and be a part of this unjustifiable and bloody war," she said.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/russia-anti-lgbt-legislation-1.6625009
sophie
Break My Heart
*cough* the us and uk *cough cough*
Which state (or city) would you say is the best for lgbtq+ people?
Cloud_Strife
Deity
None of them
sophie
Break My Heart
As cloud said: no place is “safe.” Some places are more remote and isolated, and so are more dangerous, while others have large concentrated queer populations that can lean on each other for support, protection, and solidarity, which helps insulate us from harm to some extent. But for instance trans women are kidnapped, murdered, raped, and sex trafficked regularly, even in “safer” cities like Chicago, San Francisco, or here in Seattle.
Any place that has police is not safe for queer people, is really what it comes down to. And that’s everywhere.
Any place that has police is not safe for queer people, is really what it comes down to. And that’s everywhere.
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Is there a graphic or map showing the proliferation of such incidents nationally?
sophie
Break My Heart
It’s also very hard to get a complete sense of how often it happens because, as a group, queer people have learned by experience not to trust the police and so frequently do not involve police in such matters or report their occurrence.
Thanks!
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