10/21/22, Vol. 13 Issue 15

About the cover: Photo via Facebook

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Debra Tyler Horton, AARP Georgia State Director

With early voting now underway across the state of Georgia, we can officially declare that election season is here. Throughout the state, millions of voters will be casting ballots for any number of statewide and federal races, determining the future for us and our loved ones.

Here at AARP Georgia, we understand the magnitude of your vote. Our team has been working nonstop since the start of the year preparing for this election season.

“What are we preparing?” you may wonder. Well, I’m glad you asked. For 64 years, AARP has prided itself on

being a wise friend and fierce defender. That’s not just true for our older members, but for people of all ages. That’s why our team put together a comprehensive online Voter Guide with all the answers to where, when and how you can vote in this year’s elections. We have approached campaigns in the most visible races, asking them to give their candidates’ positions on several issues that are important to our membership. We have done — and will continue to do — outreach to voters everywhere from your local county fair to Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

The reason we go to all this trouble is simple: AARP believes that your vote is your voice. Two of the fastest growing voting blocs in the state of Georgia — and across

the country — are the 50-plus and LGBTQ voters. We have worked diligently to reach potential voters in both of these categories to arm them with voting information, especially important in light of recent changes to Georgia’s voting laws.

Hopefully you are already registered and have made plans this fall to vote. Still, you may have questions about voting hours or may not understand those new voting regulations.

AARP Georgia is here to help. Check out our comprehensive Voter Guide at www.aarp. org/GAVotes, or you can text GAVOTES to 22777 — though be aware that standard data and messaging rates may apply.

It’s true: your vote is your voice. And it’s time to vote. Now go make your voice heard!

PHOTO BY PEXELS.COM / COTTONBRO

Featuring work made over the past two decades, this exhibition is the first museum survey dedicated to Deana Lawson. Working primarily in photography, Lawson investigates and challenges conventional representations of Black identities and bodies. Her work evokes a range of photographic histories and styles, including family albums, studio portraiture, and staged tableaux; she also employs documentary pictures and appropriated images.

Deana Lawson is co-organized by ICA/Boston and MoMA PS1 and organized by Eva Respini, Deputy Director for Curatorial Affairs and Barbara Lee Chief Curator, ICA/Boston, and Peter Eleey, Curator-at-Large, UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing and Shanghai, with Anni Pullagura, Curatorial Assistant, ICA/Boston.

PREMIER EXHIBITION SERIES SPONSOR

PREMIER EXHIBITION SERIES SUPPORTERS ACT Foundation, Inc. Sarah and Jim Kennedy Louise Sams and Jerome Grilhot

BENEFACTOR EXHIBITION SERIES SUPPORTERS Robin and Hilton Howell

MAJOR SUPPORT PROVIDED BY

Deana Lawson (American, born 1979), Hair Advertisement 2005, pigment print, collection of the artist. Photo courtesy of the artist, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York, and David Kordansky, Los Angeles. © Deana Lawson.

Staff reports

Out On Film Announces Jury and Audience Awards

Out On Film, presented by Gilead and WABE, has announced the filmmaker awards for the recently concluded 35th edition of the Atlanta-based LGBTQIA+ film festival.

Gabriel Martin’s “Mars One” was a threetime winner, taking the jury awards for Best Narrative Feature, Best International Film, and Best Ensemble. Magnus Gertten’s “Nelly & Nadine” won the jury prize for Best Documentary, and P.J. Palmer’s “North” was another big winner, winning both the jury prize and the audience award for Best Drama Short Film.

Emmy Award-winner Colman Domingo, who stars in and produced “North Star,” also received the Out On Film Icon Award, while “New Moon,” written by Domingo and his husband Raul Domingo and directed by Jeff Le Bars and Jérémie Balais, won the Audience Award for Best Animated Short.

The top two Audience Awards went to Matt Carter’s “In From the Side” for Best Narrative Feature and Atlanta filmmaker Daresha Kyi’s “Mama Bears” for Best Documentary, while the jury award for Best Documentary went to Magnus Gertten for “Nelly & Nadine.”

Additional jury awards included Todd Flaherty of “Chrissy Judy” and Juan Felipe Zuleta of “Unidentified Objects,” who tied for Best Director and former Atlantan Travis Fine, whose film “Two Eyes” won Best Screenplay. Christopher Sandler’s “So Damn Easy Going” took home jury awards for Best First Film and Best Performance from that of Nikki Hanselblad.

Out On Film’s first screenplay competition yielded two prizes — Best Feature Screenplay for “Magpie,” written by Megan Mead, and Best Short Film Screenplay for “En Memoria,” penned by Roberto Fatal and Ali Meyers-Ohki.

This year’s Out On Film jury included actor/ writer Ava Davis  (The Ava Davis Show, The Duchess of Grant Park),  Emmy Award-

Out On Film Announces Jury and Audience Awards COURTESY IMAGE

winning director Frederick Taylor (Meet the Team Taking J-Setting from Underground Clubs to the Main Stage), Film Impact Georgia Executive Director Melissa Simpson, journalist Rich Eldredge (Atlanta Magazine, Eldredge ATL),  journalist Patrick Saunders (WABE),  Melbourne Queer Film Festival program director Spiro Economopoulos, Lesflicks founder Naomi Bennett and Nashville Film Festival Creators Conference Producer Paula Martinez.

Additional audience awards Hannah Barlow and Kane Senes’ “Sissy” as Best International Film, Ruby Fludzinski and Tiler Wilson’s “My Abortion Saved My Life,” cited as Best Local Short Film; Erich Rettstadts “Tank Fairy,” named as Best Comedy Short and Matt Nadel and Megan Plotka, whose “Cans” Can’t Stand won both the Audience Award and Jury Award for Best Documentary Short.

Find the full list of winners online at thegavoice.com.

Study Shows Nearly Half of LGBTQ-Owned Businesses Were Denied COVID-Relief Loans

Through the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic that shuttered many small businesses, the federal government provided relief loans throughout that period. The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans were available through May 31, 2021 through the U.S. Small Business Administration.

New data from the Center for LGBTQ Economic Advancement and Research (CLEAR) and Movement Advancement Project (MAP) shows LGBTQ-owned small businesses received COVID-19 relief funds at a far lower incidence than non-LGBTQ businesses. Yet LGBTQ-owned businesses applied at a higher rate, according to researchers.

Financial experts told USA Today that “poorer

economic conditions on average among LGBTQ-owned small businesses hurt them when it came time to apply for COVID-19 relief,” even though, as USA Today reported, Congress said it “targeted funding to the smallest and minority-owned businesses.”

A key element to this report is the fact that while PPP loan applications offered applicants the opportunity to highlight that they were woman-owned, minority-owned or veteran-owned, the SBA did not have a corresponding section for business owners to state that their businesses as LGBTQ-owned.

The data analyzed show LGBTQ businesses were equally likely to apply for loans or financing in general, but less likely to receive it. According to the report, “about 46 percent of LGBTQ-owned businesses reported that they had received none of the financing that they had applied for in the past year.” This is compared to only 35 percent of nonLGBTQ businesses that applied for funding.

The report states that discriminatory practices appeared embedded in the responses from lenders: “Notably, LGBTQowned businesses were more likely than nonLGBTQ businesses to explain their denial was due to lenders not approving financing for ‘businesses like theirs’ (33 percent vs. 24 percent), among other reasons.”

The data show that while LGBTQ businesses were more likely to apply for pandemic relief, they were less likely to receive it. The majority (57 percent) of LGBTQ-owned businesses applied for relief through the PPP, compared with 47 percent of non-LGBTQ businesses. A much higher rate of rejection was found for LGBTQ businesses: one in six LGBTQ businesses (17 percent) reported that they had received none of the funding that they had applied for in 2021, compared to only one in ten non-LGBTQ businesses (10 percent).

Theoretically LGBTQ small businesses should have received more funding, as those businesses “were more likely to also be women-owned and immigrant-owned, compared to non-LGBTQ businesses. More LGBTQ-owned firms were also majority-owned by women (34 percent of LGBTQ firms vs. 20 percent of non-LGBTQ firms) and majority-owned by immigrants (21 percent vs. 15 percent),” according to the data analyzed.

ABORTION RIGHTS ARE ON THE BALLOT

Katie Burkholder

You’ve heard it before. “This election is the most important of our lifetimes.” It’s a phrase that has been evoked seemingly every year since 2016. With the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court this summer, however, that phrase has never been truer. With abortion access now dictated on a state-by-state basis, who we elect this cycle will directly impact how accessible abortion and other reproductive health care are.

GUBERNATORIAL ELECTION

With Gov. Brian Kemp’s record on abortion, the impact of this race is clear. In 2019, he signed one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country, effectively outlawing the procedure after six weeks of pregnancy with exceptions for women facing serious hardship or death or in cases of rape or incest, so long as a police report was filed. With Roe v. Wade overturned, a federal appeals court panel allowed the law to go into effect this summer.

By contrast, Democrat Stacey Abrams’ campaign website states she would work as Governor to “repeal Brian Kemp’s extreme and dangerous ban on abortion after six weeks,” as well as “support safe pregnancies, [and] invest in maternal health care.” Like Kemp, Abrams comes from a Christian background, and she was “anti-abortion” until going to college. She told CNN, however, that she met a friend in college with similar faith values with whom she had conversations “about what reproductive care and abortion care really is … This is about a woman’s right to experience and determine her future.”

Abrams also has the support of Planned Parenthood, Amy Kennedy, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood Votes Georgia and the Vice President of External Affairs for Planned Parenthood Southeast Advocates (PPSEA), told Georgia Voice

“[If Abrams is elected,] I think you’ll see

much more proactive legislation to support access to abortion, contraceptives, and other forms of reproductive health care,” she said. “Knowing the redistricting and gerrymandering of our districts in Georgia, Republicans have made it really hard for Democrats to take control over either legislative body. She as Governor would have a tough fight ahead of her, but she could be the stop to all additional bans to sexual and reproductive health care, among other things, whether it’s access to contraception or decisions about who we marry. Stacey Abrams would still have a tough fight ahead of her as Governor, but she would be there to support the values we care about and support the people of Georgia.”

HERSCHEL WALKER

Outside the Governor’s race, the race for the Senate seat occupied by Democrat Rev. Raphael Warnock is of tantamount importance. Republican Herschel Walker is up against Warnock and, like Kemp, has extreme views on abortion — actually, even more so. Walker has expressed support

for a full federal abortion ban without any exceptions for rape, incest, or the health of the mother. However, he walked back this opinion during his debate with Warnock on October 14. Warnock, during that same debate, said that “God gave us a choice and I respect the right of women to make a decision” regarding abortion.

VOTING ACCESS AND OTHER RACES

Other races Kennedy said are of importance to Planned Parenthood are the races for Secretary of State and Attorney General.

“We’re also working hard on the Secretary of State race, knowing that that position really controls how we vote and puts restrictions on how we vote,” she said. “I think we’ll see this year the impact of recent legislation around voting rights and how it impacts turnout.

“We know moments after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade, Brian Kemp was there eager to enact his own six-week abortion ban and putting that into effect,” Kennedy continued. “He did that with the

help and support of the Attorney General.”

She also emphasized the importance of state legislator races, as well.

“We know that because of gerrymandering and a lack of a fair redistricting process in Georgia, our legislative districts aren’t drawn in a way that provides support to pro-choice legislators, unfortunately,” Kennedy said. “So, for us it’s important that were able to cut down any ability for a supermajority of anti-choice legislators and also that we support and amplify the work of pro-choice legislators when they’re elected and increase the numbers of them.”

THE WORST-CASE SCENARIO

Should this election not go in the direction toward reproductive freedom, Planned Parenthood will continue to provide the services it’s able to and fight for the reproductive rights of Georgians.

“Our doors remain open,” Kennedy said. “In Georgia especially, it has been an uphill fight since June. We’re providing services that we’re able to provide at this point. We’re also able to provide referrals for patients that are looking to get services elsewhere. We’re going to have to fight like hell … What 2018 and 2019 taught us is that our people show up and they mobilize and they fight like hell, and we’re going to have to do that again this time. We’re going to have to be more strongly funded, we’re going to have to have more bodies out there, we’re going to have to be talking to more people and really amplifying this work. We know anti-choice legislators are going to do everything they can to strip our rights away. We have to do everything we can to prevent that.”

Early voting is currently underway and ends November 4. Election day is on November 8. For more information on your polling place and other voting information, visit mvp.sos.ga.gov.

Protest of Supreme Court Ruling overturning Roe v Wade in favor of women’s right to choose on June 24, 2022 at the Atlanta Georgia State Capital. PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / NIR LEVY

GEORGIA’S ONLY QUEER STATE SENATOR IS URGING PEOPLE TO VOTE

Luke Gardner

State Senator Kim Jackson made history in January 2021 when she became the first openly LGBTQ state senator in Georgia. Now, she’s calling on queer people and allies to vote and get involved in the political process.

Jackson was the first out priest of color to be ordained in the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta and represents Stone Mountain, Clarkston, Tucker, and Lilburn.

“It’s really difficult to encapsulate what it means to make history,” Jackson told Georgia Voice. “I am always inspired and grateful for young queer youth who come up to me.”

This feeling of warmth is accompanied by the weight of representing the community, Jackson explained. The need for LGBTQ representation in state legislatures is growing as states across the country propose and pass anti-LGBTQ laws.

Jackson explained what it’s like working with Republican colleagues in the legislature.

“As an LGBTQ person, the interpersonal relationships have been great,” Jackson said. “Nobody has said anything to my face. While Republicans may not say anything to my face about my identity, they worked really hard to pass anti-trans legislation.”

She talked about the disappointment of watching colleagues she considers friends, people who she calls on in times of need, actively work to pass discrimination against her community. Jackson expressed that Governor Kemp himself spearheaded the law by telling Republican legislators on the last day of the session that they needed to prioritize banning trans student-athletes.

It was after this when Republicans tacked the anti-trans statement onto the critical race theory bill, HB 1084

In direct contrast, gubernatorial candidate

Stacey Abrams supports the rights of trans students to play on sports teams in alignment with their gender identity. As with most cases in modern U.S. politics, the Republican and Democrat candidates are split directly down the middle on LGBTQ issues.

In 2019, Abrams publicly condemned the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which would have legalized discrimination against LGBTQ people on the basis of religion.

Kemp said he would sign the bill into law, but he didn’t get the chance.

Governor Kemp has publicly condemned same-sex marriage and voted for a bill that would have banned it in Georgia when he was a state representative. Abrams has called

for gay marriage to be codified into law.

In a response to being endorsed by the Human Rights Campaign, Abrams released a statement saying her campaign aims to reduce hate crimes and provide mental health and healthcare resources for queer people. In September, Kemp spoke at a conference hosted by the Family Research Council, which is designated as an anti-LGBTQ hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. In 2019, Kemp rejected expanding Medicaid eligibility to cover working-class Georgians living with HIV.

Also in 2019, Kemp signed a bill into law banning abortion after six weeks with some exceptions. That law is now in effect in Georgia. The Abrams campaign released a plan for reproductive healthcare that includes repealing Kemp’s abortion ban and funding rural underserved communities that lack OBGYNs, among other things.

Republican-led Voter ID laws, like SB 202 that passed in Georgia last year, make it harder to vote from home using an absentee ballot. Jackson noted that this negatively impacts some trans people who prefer to vote from home because their government ID might not match their identity. Abrams is perhaps best known for her strong stance against voter suppression laws and slammed the law as “Jim Crow 2.0.”

This year’s Harvard Youth Study found that 51 percent of people under 30 think the Republican Party cares more about “the interests of the elite” than of the voters and that 39 percent felt the same way about the Democratic Party. A Gallup Poll from last year found that 65 percent of Democrats held positive views of Socialism, while only 52 percent held positive views of capitalism.

As U.S. politics rapidly change, several young voters will likely feel the Democratic Party isn’t progressive enough for them, a sentiment that seems to have become more mainstream since the 2016 election cycle.

“I have a lot of empathy for people that feel [the Democratic Party] isn’t progressive enough, but the alternative will cause great harm to our community,” Jackson said. “I want to be clear that the only party on the ballot that will protect and care for queer youth in Georgia is the Democratic Party. I’m urging our queer friends to show up and vote like your future depends on it, because it does.”

To compare Georgia candidates on LGBTQ issues, visit glaad.org/blog/ election-2022-georgia.

Early voting runs now through November 4 before Election Day on November 8. Find your polling location and other voting information at mvp.sos.ga.gov.

State Senator Kim Jackson PHOTO VIA FACEBOOK

ANTI-LGBTQ LEGISLATION IN GEORGIA:

STOPPING THE HATE

participation in public school sports.

according to Georgia Equality.

NATIONAL TREND

In its legislative sessions earlier this year and last, members of the Georgia General Assembly proposed several anti-LGBTQ bills and sneaked one into law.

House Bill 1084, Georgia’s “critical race theory” bill, passed in April this year and is aimed at controlling conversations about race in public schools and seemingly banning discussions of critical race theory in classrooms. Republicans included a last-minute change to the bill that created a committee to determine if trans student athletes should be able to participate in public school sports, according to Georgiarecorder.com.

Prior to sneaking the provision into the “critical race theory” bill at the last minute, several bills that were explicitly created to ban trans athletes failed to become law in Georgia.

In May of this year, trans student athletes were banned from participating in public school sports, meaning that if they choose to play, they are forced to play on the team that aligns with the sex they were assigned at birth. The ban was enacted by the Georgia High School Association, which oversees hundreds of athletic programs across the state.

2021 & 2022 BILLS

Over the past two years, four bills specifically attempted to control trans students’

All four bills died in committee, meaning they weren’t voted on and thus won’t become law. These bills included HB 276, HB 372, and SB 435, the “Save Girls Sports Act.”

Georgia’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, SB 613, died in committee earlier this year. The bill aimed to prohibit the discussion of LGBTQ identities in classrooms.

After the bill was announced, thousands of Georgians called their senators to complain about the bill, according to Georgia Equality, and high school students in DeKalb County participated in a national walkout protest over anti-LGBTQ legislation.

Another bill that died was the Vulnerable Child Protection Act, which aimed to strip genderaffirming health care from trans youth.

Unfortunately, a bill introduced by Democrats to prohibit the use of the gay and trans panic defenses also died in committee.

A year prior, the state did pass antidiscrimination legislation in the form of the 2020 “Georgia Enhanced Penalties for Hate Crimes Act.” The law prohibits discrimination on the basis of “actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender, mental disability, or physical disability,”

As long as anti-LGBTQ sentiment has existed, anti-LGBTQ laws have existed. While attempts to legally persecute LGBTQ people are not new, the past two years have seen a trend of Republican-led states across the country introducing extreme antiabortion and antiqueer legislation.

In March, NBC reported that a total of 238 anti-LGBTQ laws had been proposed so far in 2022 by U.S. state legislators. In contrast, 191 anti-LGBTQ bills were proposed in all of 2021 and 41 anti-LGBTQ bills were proposed in all of 2018.

This trend is exemplified by versions of the “Don’t Say Gay” and “Critical Race Theory” bills sweeping across conservative states.

Some bills use positive language in the title, like the “Save Girls Sports Act,” the “Vulnerable Child Protection Act,” and the “First Amendment Defense Act” of 2016. This wording, like the phrase “prolife,” positions these laws as virtuous on the surface, as though these laws are actually about defending children, the right to life, and the First Amendment.

Rhetoric describing queer people as predatory and dangerous to children and positioning conservatives as the protectors of children is being used by extreme right-wing figures like Marjorie Taylor Greene, who tweeted that it should be illegal for kids to go to drag shows

in June of this year. Greene also harassed drag queens reading to kids in a library in 2019.

PREPARING FOR WHAT’S TO COME

As social movements for the working class, queer people, and people of color continue to rise, so will the populist, reactionary politics used by figures like Trump and Greene. In countries like the U.S., Brazil, India, and Italy, increasingly right-wing views are becoming normalized. In the U.S., conservatives are doubling down on all their stances, especially the anti-LGBTQ ones.

Queer people and allies can work to combat antiLGBTQ legislation and ideologies in various ways: protesting, educating our friends and acquaintances, using social media campaigns, and calling on celebrities and corporations to boycott the state. These techniques worked in 2016 by pressuring Republican Governor Nathan Deal to veto the First Amendment Defense Act, which would have allowed businesses to discriminate against LGBTQ people using the basis of religious freedom.

Similar techniques also proved successful earlier this year by stopping Georgia’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which would have controlled and severely limited discussion of LGBTQ topics in public schools.

Other ways to combat anti-LGBTQ sentiment include direct action, creating a strong sense of community, civil disobedience, voting, advocating for representation, becoming involved in activism, and volunteering your time to various pro-LGBTQ organizations.

Luke Gardner

Marjorie Taylor Greene

PHOTO VIA WIKICOMMONS

THE LGBTQ VOTER’S GUIDE TO THE 2022 MIDTERM ELECTIONS

Cynthia Salinas-Cappellano

With the repeal of access to abortion this past summer, restriction of gender-affirming care and marriage equality, book bans and restrictions of queer-inclusive education, and the enactment of laws harmful to trans youth, queer Americans are progressively losing their civil liberties across the South. With early voting already underway and Election Day rapidly approaching, we’ve got everything you need to know before you hit the polls.

WHO’S ON THE BALLOT?

Georgia Equality and GLAAD released the abortion and queer equality records of federal and state candidates that voters can reference to research each candidate before voting. You can find these records on GLAAD’s website, glaad.org.

GOVERNOR

Stacey Abrams (D), former House Democratic Leader of the Georgia General Assembly, is running against incumbent Brian Kemp (R).

In 2015, Stacey Abrams co-sponsored Georgia’s Fair Employment Practices Act with queer Rep. Karla Drenner to prohibit discrimination against state employees on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Her website endorses expansion of Medicaid funding to support Georgians living with HIV/AIDS, implementation of a “Statewide Strategy with a Defined Timeline to Indefinitely Reduce the Spread of AIDS in Georgia,” and the repeal of Brian Kemp’s six-week abortion ban. Abrams plans to

expand health care funding to “support safe pregnancies, invest in maternal health care, fund rural hospitals and recruit and retain physicians statewide — especially in underserved areas and the 82 counties that have no OB-GYN.” Stacey Abrams is a definitive champion for queer Georgians.

SENATE

Incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock is running against Herschel Walker. Warnock supports the passage of the Equality Act, federal protections for trans women of color, and increased funding for HIV/AIDS prevention awareness and access to PrEP. During a Facebook Live with Georgia Equality, he was quoted as saying, “Whether it is by expanding Medicaid coverage in Georgia, passing the Equality Act, promoting better

data collection around hate crimes, or securing the sacred right to vote, there is still much work to be done to ensure that our country lives up to our ideals of equality.”

U.S. HOUSE

Veteran Marcus Flowers (D) is running against incumbent Marjorie Taylor Greene (R) in the 14th District in Northwest Georgia. Flowers supports access to abortion, environmental justice, education reform, and voting rights. Marcus recently tweeted, “Georgians must not forget how Marjorie Taylor Greene voted against codifying same-sex marriage and their right to contraception.”

ATTORNEY GENERAL

State Senator Jen Jordan (D) is running

against incumbent Chris Carr (R). Jordan pledged not to defend the state’s six-week abortion ban and to implement a voting rights division in the Attorney General’s office. Jordan also attended Atlanta’s recent Pride parade this October.

SECRETARY OF STATE

Bee Nguyen (D) is running against incumbent Brad Raffensperger (R). Nguyen opposes Raffensperger’s extreme position on the abortion ban and vows to protect all Georgians. In her words, “As a lawmaker, I’ve sponsored long overdue legislation to codify protections against workplace discrimination and harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity. At a time when our civil liberties are under threat, we need a Secretary of State that will stand up for basic human rights and fight for access to the ballot box for all eligible voters.”

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR

Charlie Bailey (D) is running against incumbent Geoff Duncan (R). Bailey’s family maintains a legal legacy of fighting for Georgians since the civil rights movement. Bailey opposes the politicization of trans children’s bodies: “My great uncle’s legacy has always inspired me to use the law for justice, not for discrimination. As Lt. Governor, that’s why I won’t stand for any ‘religious freedom’ laws in Georgia. Or allow our trans kids to be used as a political football. Or put up with anyone who tries to score political points by discriminating against members of the LGBTQ community.”

PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / JOAQUIN CORBALAN P

WHEN ARE WE VOTING?

Registration is over, but early voting began October 17 and the last day to order an absentee ballot application is October 28. In-person Saturday voting will occur at your county’s early polling locations on October 22 and 29. Sunday voting will occur on October 23 and 30. The last day to vote is the Election Day on November 8. Early voting locations, voter registration status, sample ballots, and more can be found on the Secretary of State’s website, mvp.sos.ga,gov/s.

WHAT’S AT STAKE: THE SENATE MAJORITY AND THE EQUALITY ACT

Although a majority of Americans support increased protection for queer Americans, some Supreme Court justices have hinted at a repeal of the Obergefell v. Hodges decision and queer Americans’ rights to privacy. Back in February, the House of Representatives passed the Equality Act, which is now awaiting action by the Senate. This bill is critical in the expansion of discrimination protections for LGBTQ Americans. If passed by a progressive Senate majority, the bill will prohibit discrimination based on “sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity in areas including public accommodations and facilities, education, federal funding, employment, housing, credit, and the jury system.” The bill would also expand public accommodations in restrooms, retail providers, health care providers, transportation services and gyms. Currently, LGBTQ Americans lack discrimination protections in 29 states, including a vast majority of the Southern states. If codified into law, this would be a historic win for LGBTQ civil liberties.

SPECIFIC MEASURES ON THE BALLOT

The Georgia General Assembly introduced two constitutional amendments requiring the confirmation of Georgia voters, as well as two measures to expand tax exemptions as required by the state constitution.

Amendment 1, Salaries of Public Officials

(including Assembly members): Suspension of

pay for certain public officials if they are suspended from office due to indictment for a felony. Note: the annual pay of some officials totals over $150,000.

VOTE YES to suspend pay for public officials who were indicted for felonies

VOTE NO to continue pay for public officials who were indicted for felonies

Amendment 2, Taxes: Authorize local governments to grant temporary tax relief to certain properties that were damaged or destroyed due to a disaster.

VOTE YES to support local governments’ allocation of temporary tax relief to certain properties that were damaged or destroyed.

VOTE NO to oppose local governments’ allocation of temporary tax relief to certain properties that were damaged or destroyed.

Referendum A, Taxes & Natural Resources: Exempts timber equipment owned by a timber producer from ad valorem property taxes. Note: this bill timely coincides with the City’s plans to deforest Atlanta to build a police compound.

VOTE YES to support tax exemption of timber.

VOTE NO to oppose tax exemption of timber. Referendum B, Taxes & Agriculture: Expands a property tax exemption to include merged

family farms and dairy products and eggs.

VOTE YES to support expanding tax exemptions for two or more family farms producing dairy products and eggs.

VOTE NO to oppose expanding tax exemptions for two or more family farms producing dairy products and eggs.

An additional measure was introduced this fall for the Extension of Hours for the Sale of Packaged Alcoholic Beverages on Sundays.

VOTE YES to authorize the City of Atlanta to permit and regulate Sunday sales of alcohol.

VOTE NO to oppose the City of Atlanta’s authority to regulate Sunday alcohol.

PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / LAZYLLAMA

THE BIDEN PARDON: MARIJUANA AND THE MIDTERM ELECTION

Adalei Stevens

On October 6, President Joe Biden pardoned the offense of simple marijuana possession for citizens and permanent residents of the U.S. Just short of federal decriminalization, as he promised in his campaign, Biden’s announcement has caught the attention of crucial voting demographics.

The White House announced the pardon just weeks before the midterm election cycle. Following the controversial student loan forgiveness plan Biden announced in August, this decision seems to be an attempt to revive the attention and support of Black, Latino, and young voters. The announcement does little to quell attacks from Republicanleaning platforms claiming Democrats are “soft on crime” amid rising crime rates.

Just weeks before the midterm elections, former President Obama is expected to visit Atlanta on October 28 for U.S. Senator Raphael Warnock, gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, and other Democratic Party nominees. The 2022 general election will be Georgia’s first election cycle under Senate Bill 202, passed following Trump’s 2020 election fraud allegations, which requires a driver’s license or valid ID number on absentee ballots instead of only a birth date and signature. The number of drop boxes for absentee ballots was restricted under the bill, and the period in which to request an absentee ballot was shortened.

According to Georgia Secretary of State officer Mike Hassinger, Georgia experienced the worst case of voter suppression, especially among Black voters, in 2020. Voters are encouraged to vote in person during early voting to avoid absentee ballots being thrown out due to the new guidelines.

Marijuana is not likely to make waves during Georgia’s midterm elections, despite the announcement of Biden’s pardon and. Issues like abortion and gun control have been prioritized in campaigns and debates this cycle, especially in Georgia.

Outside Georgia, five states will have recreational marijuana use on midterm ballots. Arkansas, Maryland, Missouri, North Dakota, and South Dakota will potentially join the other 16 states and Washington D.C. that have legalized recreational use. Due to Republican opposition, federal legislation in the Senate has not passed.

The president encouraged other state governors to issue similar pardons, which

would offer clemency to many individuals convicted of marijuana possession at the state level. The Los Angeles Times described the pardon as “offering categorical relief” to “a class of people deserving of relief.” Abrams also applauded Biden and stated she would do the same if elected.

The pardon will not remove charges from records. That can only be done by expunging individual cases. States most likely to sympathize with Biden’s plea have already taken steps toward expunging simple marijuana convictions in legalized states.

The Marshall Project reports that at least 6,500 people with prior convictions of simple marijuana possession and an

unknown number in Washington, D.C, may benefit from the pardon. The pardon does not extend to those found guilty of intent to distribute or apply to those with other felony charges on their records.

While Biden expressed the goal to reduce the disproportionate number of Black citizens arrested and convicted of marijuana charges, despite their rates of marijuana use being equal to white Americans, the pardon will do little to remedy this. According to Nina Patel, Southern Poverty Law Center’s Senior Policy Counsel for Decarceration and Criminal Legal System reform, the reor de-classification of marijuana would help to reduce the number of arrests and racial profiling, as well as the post-conviction poverty experienced by many.

Marijuana is considered a Schedule I drug under the Controlled Substances Act. This classification considers the drug not currently accepted for medical use with a high potential for abuse. Schedule I classifications include heroin, LSD, peyote, and MDMA (ecstasy).

In Georgia, possession of up to one ounce of marijuana is considered a misdemeanor, punishable by up to 12 months in prison and/or 12 months of community service, as well as a $1,000 fine. Possession of more than one ounce is a felony, punishable by one to 10 years in prison.

When convicted of a felony and upon release, individuals are required to indicate their felony status on job and housing applications. If declassified and expunged, simple marijuana offenses would no longer create barriers for people seeking housing and employment. Potentially 40,000 American lives could be freed, for a drug that two-thirds of the population believe should be legalized.

President Joe Biden BIDEN PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / MARLIN360; MARIJUANA PHOTO BY PEXELS.COM

THE ALLY ALL GEORGIANS DESERVE

Justin C. Smith

My uncle’s death from AIDS in 1989 was a defining moment in my life. I was too young when he died to fully comprehend the complexities of the disease that ended his life. However, as I grew older and learned more about my uncle, and as I came to embrace my own sexual identity, I wanted to understand why he died and what could be done to prevent others from acquiring HIV. This desire helped me to find purpose, fueled my nascent activist spirit, and shaped my educational and career trajectory. I earned my bachelor’s degree in Sociology and Community Health from Brown University, my Master of Public Health degree in Health Behavior from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and my Master of Science degree in Behavioral, Social, and Health Education Sciences from Emory University. I went on to work on addressing HIV in a variety of positions within public health institutions at the local, state, and federal levels. Each of these experiences equipped me with tools to contribute to the collective work to end the HIV epidemic in the United States.

My work in HIV is a way for me to honor my uncle’s memory and to honor my own commitment to serve and improve my community. As a Black gay man who grew up in Georgia, the state with the highest rate of new HIV diagnoses in the nation, I know that if we can end this epidemic, we can create a better Georgia. But to do that, we have to be united under strong leadership that puts Georgians first.

Now, many states are passing harmful legislation attacking the lives of LGBTQ people. Along with the reversal of Roe v. Wade, Supreme Court justices suggest that there may be further attacks on our freedom like the right to marry who you love. Honestly, it all feels pretty terrible right now. But I am still hopeful.

I am hopeful because, during a time that

feels so dark, my pride in having Reverend Warnock represent Georgians in the United States Senate is a point of light. As a Black gay man growing up in Georgia, I never imagined I would one day have an ally like Reverend Warnock as my senator, who is not only a Black man but also a pastor in a church that is such a storied part of Georgia’s Civil Rights legacy. He’s the champion for equality and steadfast ally in the United States Senate we need, especially during hard times like these.

Reverend Warnock has been a longtime HIV advocate. He has always listened to members of Georgia’s LGBTQ community, and when he was elected to the United States Senate, he brought our voices with him. With Reverend Warnock, we know we have a senator who fights for us, not against us. I take pride in having a senator who helped pass hate crimes

legislation and is a cosponsor of the Equality Act, which would protect members of the LGBTQ community from being denied housing, employment, medical care, or service just because of who we are.

As a person who has dedicated his life to protecting and improving the health of the public, when I see that my senator is fighting to lower prescription drug costs and expand access to Medicaid, I know these are policies that will not only lower costs but will also save lives.

I’m especially proud that he recently secured funding that will help Georgians living with HIV access health care and support services.

Georgians need a leader who will fight for all of us and reject hatred and division. This is not only a social goal, but is imperative for

the health and well-being of my community.

As a growing body of academic research exploring the connection between antiLGBTQ public policies and health outcomes has shown (including my own research on HIV), attacks on our community can lead to poor outcomes in both mental and physical health. It is vital that when we make our decision about who we think is the best person to represent Georgia in the United States Senate, we do so with the understanding that the person we choose will be in a position that will directly affect our well-being, both mentally and physically.

Reverend Warnock has shown us time and time again that he is a leader who fights for all Georgians in every community across the state. Reverend Warnock is a leader we can trust to fight for us, not against us. I’m proud to support Reverend Warnock, because with him in the Senate, I can say with pride that my senator is a fearless fighter who understands equal protection under the law cannot just be enjoyed by some Georgians — it must be for all Georgians.

Justin Smith is an Atlanta-based HIV and LGBTQ health scholar-advocate.

Reverend Raphael Warnock

PHOTO VIA FACEBOOK

“Reverend Warnock has shown us time and time again that he is a leader who fights for all Georgians in every community across the state. Reverend Warnock is a leader we can trust to fight for us, not against us.”

The Pink Triangle

Much has been written about the Pink Triangles, but the sufferings inflicted upon them only make sense if we think like a National Socialist (Nazi). Accordingly, here are a few facts.

First, the actual winner of the March 1932 German election for President was not Hitler, but the revered WWI figure, former field marshal Paul von Hindenburg.

However, Nazis had been furiously burrowing in and forcibly tossing out, and by the time the old and enfeebled von Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor on January 30, 1933, the Nazi grasp on power was already formidable.

When the German Reichstag building conveniently burned just weeks later, a gay Dutch communist was charged. The fire strategically paved the way to the Enabling Act, a March 23, 1933 decree that overturned all guarantees of personal and press freedom, essentially granting Hitler absolute power.

Unsurprisingly, the first thing Adolf did was enact revenge on all political opponents, who were sent to a new kind of massive prison, where the inmates were concentrated, terrorized, and overworked —often, to death.

Dachau was the template, but Nazis needed a way to readily tell the nature of an individual’s undesirability. A triangle sewn

onto clothing became that way.

Red triangles marked political prisoners, leftists of all stripes: Communists, Socialists, Social Democrats, Anarchists. You could be arrested, interrogated, maybe given a trial, serve your term, and upon release, taken into Schutzhaftbefehl (“protective custody”). Not protected, actually; this Nazi doubletalk means your release is a mirage. The red triangle also applied to Freemasons and gentiles who assisted Jews.

Green triangle = criminal. You’ve been found guilty of a serious crime and sentenced. But if local police think the courts were too lenient? When your term’s up, you could be taken into Schutzhaftbefehl.

Blue triangle = Émigrés. You actually left the Fatherland? This group also included Spaniards

who fought against Germany’s good friend Franco and, eventually, foreigners forced to labor in German-controlled territory.

Purple triangle = Jehovah’s Witnesses. You are a pacifist and recognize no temporal authority? Then you had no place in a state at war that owed all allegiance to a single deified man.

Black triangle = “Asocial.” You’re the misfit, the prostitute, the “work evader,” the lesbian. And, too, the Defectives: mentally ill or deficient and those with physical disabilities, alcoholics, etc.

Nazi eugenics, known as Rassenhygiene (racial hygiene), was a foundational tenet. It was devoted to propagating the idea of the Übermenschen, or the Supermen, the race of noble world conquerors, superior in every way to all Untermensch, or subhumans.

The Nazis naturally chose the “Defectives” as the first group marked for extermination. No mental or physical deformity could be permitted to pollute the “Master Race,” which accounted for their intense obsession with the pink triangle: gay men. How was

it possible for a physically and presumably mentally fit Aryan to suffer from the racedefiling sickness of homosexuality?

Before 1933, gay arrests were for Beischlafsähnlich, “intercourse-like acts.” But as Reichsführer Himmler’s “Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion” geared up, even “seductive glances” could cause arrest.

Could medical experiments help? Would castration change things? What about sewing goat gonads into the body or sending them to camp brothels and observing their performance? Himmler ordered: “Exterminate them, root and branch!”

If a military man get caught acting “queer,” he earned an instant bullet to the head. This included the Reichsführer’s own nephew.

How many men were killed in all? We can’t know. Estimates from various authoritative sources range from 5,000 (Rüdiger Lautmann) to 500,000 (Frank Rector).

Never again!

María Helena Dolan

Gay prisoners during the Holocaust were identified in concentraion camps by wearing a pink triangle.

PHOTO VIA THE LEGACY PROJECT

“Much has been written about the Pink Triangles, but the sufferings inflicted upon them only make sense if we think like a National Socialist (Nazi).”

MEETING YOUR IDOLS

Buck Jones

A fun dinner table conversation starter is to share with your friends your favorite in a particular category (my husband’s family actually has a name for this game, calling it, appropriately enough, “Categories”). It goes something like this: “What’s your favorite [fill in the blank]?” Nonchocolate dessert. 1980s television sitcom. Country music singer. You get the idea.

Incidentally, there is only one correct answer for the country music singer category: Dolly Parton. But I digress.

In the case of people, “Categories” can include not only the aforementioned country music singer (ahem), but also a politician, actor, or even writer. I’ve been fortunate to have met a couple of my idols in my life. My first brush with meeting relative greatness was in college. As a bit of backstory, I grew up as a conservative during the 1980s, which is not entirely surprising since I’m a white cisgender male from South Carolina. I became politically active as a youth and began volunteering for the nascent candidacy of Jack Kemp during his 1988 presidential campaign. His cheery optimism and conservative bona fides dovetailed perfectly with my own innocent notions of politics, so I enthusiastically offered to help in any way possible when the campaign turned its sights toward South Carolina heading into our “first in the South” primary.

I’ve written elsewhere about that experience, but in summary, I was not disappointed when I finally met Mr. Kemp. As his driver during his campaign visits to the state, I got a chance to see firsthand his charm, his intelligence, and his sense of humor. He always acted with respect and compassion for others, and while my politics have certainly moved away from Republican conservativism, my nostalgia for that campaign and era remains steadfastly positive.

This past summer, I had the opportunity to see another one of my idols, this time in the category of “writer/essayist.” For those of you unfamiliar with Fran Lebowitz, she is the quintessential New York City essayist and the subject of a recent Martin Scorsese docuseries from Netflix, “Pretend It’s a City.” Her fame began with writing movie reviews for Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine in the 1970s, focusing only on the worst films, which was a perfect pairing with her sardonic humor. Eventually, her collected essays were published as an anthology titled, “Metropolitan Life.” She then became a regular fixture on late night talk shows, such as David Letterman’s “Late Show,” and by the new millennium, this middle-aged curmudgeon was discovered by a new generation.

These days her schtick is to do various appearances at college campuses or civic theaters seated on a stage being interviewed, allowing her to opine about the topics du jour and reflect on the relative superiority of life in 1970s Manhattan. Needless to say,

it’s a great idea for a career — holding court by lobbing barbs and dispensing wisdom to ticket-holding fans — and I was delighted to find out that she was planning on coming to Paris for one of her “shows.” I quickly went online to buy a ticket for her appearance, only to discover that it was already sold out. Some quick research revealed that she was also going to be in Amsterdam, so I bought a ticket and booked a weekend visit to one of my favorite European getaways.

Her show in Amsterdam had some interesting moments; besides revealing that she had never been to this unique city of romance and canals, she also deftly handled one especially strange question from the audience Q&A about euthanasia. “First of all, I’m not ready to go. Not yet.” But her best quip of the evening was when the moderator asked her about American politics, and New York City politics in particular. Frannie spoke about recently departed NYC mayor De Blasio, of whom she said was surprisingly, unlike Trump, a truly unifying figure. “Everybody hated him. Democrats. Republicans. You name it.”

After the show, before an audience of over 2,000 fans, she made herself available to sign copies of her books. I had brought my dogeared copy of “The Fran Lebowitz Reader”

with me from home, and I stood in line with over a hundred other die-hard fans slowly making my way forward. To be honest, I was a bit nervous, recalling another one of my idols (category “comedian”), Dana Gould, whom I haven’t met yet, who stated that one should be prepared for disappointment when meeting one’s idols, because they are human just like you and me. I started reflecting how I might act if I were in Lebowitz’s custom cowboy boots, having just performed for a huge crowd, and then sitting for over an hour as a seemingly endless stream of strangers approached to meet me.

When it finally came to my turn, one of her handlers asked if I would like to have my moment filmed. “Yes!” I happily said as I gave him my phone. Fran smiled and took my book, asking me how I was doing. “I’m happy to tell you that I’m the midway point in the line,” I said teasingly. She stopped and looked up at me, “Really?” I smiled, and then we chatted for a too-brief moment about where I was originally from, coming from Paris, and how much I enjoyed her show.

Dana Gould’s admonition aside, I was not disappointed. When I left and was outside the Theater Carré, I stopped for a moment and turned to the dedication she had handwritten. “Your pal, Fran Lebowitz.”

Fran Lebowitz

PHOTO VIA FRANLEBOWITZ.COM

TREAT YOURSELF AT THE POLLS

Cliff Bostock

Well before I was old enough to vote — you had to be 21 then — I decided it was useless. Active in the antiwar and freespeech movements, proudly going balls-out reefer madness while naked and hunting ‘shrooms in a riverside cow pasture with my homophobic hippie friends, I wanted to crush the “establishment,” or at least live outside it.

I’d read Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” and subscribed to his observation that voting simply permits a majority to press its will on everyone else without regard to moral conscience. Better, he wrote, to live in the woods and, whenever necessary, publicly break laws that are purely oppressive.

I remained loyal to this mild anarchy throughout my 20s. When I began to emerge from the closet around 27, the importance of protest and the futility of voting seemed all the more obvious. Fucking literally became an act of gay civil disobedience. We had to fight psychiatry, religion, and the law — a fight that may soon resume as the Supreme Court continues its reinstatement of American puritanism while the Congress sits by shifting its eyes and biting its nails because, you know, all that cash.

It’s not that I don’t believe government can help now and then, but its boldest actions are usually stymied. When I finished undergrad and headed into rural Georgia to edit weekly newspapers for five years, the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act had brought significant challenges to the institutionalized and unapologetic segregation that was the norm there. In one town, the newly elected mayor owned a large slum. I’m talking countless shacks

without plumbing. The city council years earlier refused to include the slum in a broad annexation. So, it was basically a large peninsula of county land jutting into the city, thus without access to mandatory city services like plumbing. This also kept the Black residents within an overwhelmingly white voting district.

The feds stepped in to require redistricting. They did it. No problem. Then, when a popular Black man ran for the mayor’s job, the local politicos held a meeting in which they convinced one of the two white candidates to bow out in order to ensure a majority for the white slumlord. The Black candidate, for reasons he never disclosed, refused to acknowledge the white boys’ strategy. The point is that on the rare occasion the government acts in good conscience to confront a majoritarian evil, it usually gets sabotaged. Now we see the courts blatantly enabling a return to the cruelty that the apparent majority of voting Americans favor. As always, we are left supporting what purports to be the lesser of two evils, aka Democrats.

I began to think differently on the day Bill Clinton reneged on his support of LGBTQ military service in favor of the idiotic “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. I don’t understand why people want to join the military. I mean, retrospectively I did congratulate the Navy for kicking out my ex-partner for his voracious cock sucking, but, no, it wasn’t fair. Apart from the lunacy of blind love, I have no explanation for why gay people want to get married, but Bill Clinton’s signing of the Defense of Marriage Act was detestable. Meanwhile, his “welfare reform” eventually increased poverty in America. George Bush

turned Iraq into a cradle of infanticide and proposed a popular constitutional amendment to outlaw all but heterosexual marriage. Barack Obama, who promised to codify Roe v. Wade, decided not to bother, maybe because he was so busy chasing and arresting whistleblowers. I was whining, as I had for decades, that I was going to move to Canada to join my less privileged draftdodging friends from the ’60s.

Canada? I balked. What should I do? I sold out! I voted! It felt good — not because it did any good. It’s like flipping the switch to electrocute the nastier villain. It’s that video-game thing. Kill and kill and kill. You feel so good when the game is over. You know it means nothing, but catharsis is good. It’s therapeutic for a minute. It’s like masturbation fueled by Viagra’s promise of absolute, explosive power.

Do I sound cynical? Did you watch the Herschel Walker-Raphael Warnock debate? Walker, a graduate of the Trump School of

Talking Shit, blathered about Warnock’s love affair with Joe Biden and showed off a badge he claimed to be proof of his work as a policeman. Warnock got dodgy when it came to questions about defunding the police and Joe Biden’s candidacy in 2024. The media’s reporting on the debate was as intentionally withholding as it was during Donald Trump’s ascendancy, not daring to point out the literal stupidity and cruelty of Walker’s babbling, much less asking how it is we have come to a point of such inhumanity that we elect candidates like him. Yes, that’s right. The media actually do have an obligation to blatantly report lunacy to the lunatics who support them — especially when the lunatics comprise about half the voting public. I’m sure you’ve noticed that it is only comedians who do real reporting now.

So vote. Please vote. Treat yourself. It will feel good. You will be a big star, baby, in a drama of empowerment that allows all of us to forget that we live in the “civilized” world’s cruelest society.

PHOTO BY SHUTTERSTOCK.COM / ROMAN SAMBORSKYI

COMEDIAN

Joel Kim Booster

BRINGS NEW MATERIAL TO ATLANTA NEXT MONTH

After more than decade in the industry, Joel Kim Booster is becoming a name to know. In 2022 alone, the gay comedian has a Netflix special, Hulu movie, and is now coming to Atlanta to showcase brand new material at the Red Clay Comedy Festival.

The Red Clay Comedy Festival, happening November 10 through 13, takes over East Atlanta Village with comedy, specialty shows, live podcasts, after parties, and more. Booster will be performing on Sunday, November 13 at Variety Playhouse.

Those familiar with Booster are likely also familiar with “Psychosexual,” his comedy special exploring his experiences and observations as a gay Asian America that’s currently streaming on Netflix. While Booster said the two sets will share similarities, his new material marks a shift away from the identity-focused comedy of “Psychosexual.”

“I write in a pretty distinct voice that will be similar to what people saw in the Netflix special. But this is a whole new hour, it’s all new,” he told Georgia Voice. “[My comedy] is less identity-focused than it was in the special. If you see the evolution of my very first special on Comedy Central to my Netflix special to now, I just think I’ve hit all those beats. There are only so many times I can talk about what it’s like to be my identity… This is the first time in my career that I’ve been writing jokes as someone in a

relationship, so there’s plenty of stuff dealing with my relationship. A little bit dealing with my family — some of it is about grief and grieving, and that’s new territory for me as well.”

Or maybe you recognize Booster from “Fire Island,” the Hulu original rom com he wrote and stars in alongside other LGBTQ comedians and actors Bowen Yang, Margaret Cho, James Scully, Conrad Ricamora, Matt Rogers, and Tomas Matos. A far gayer spin on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice,” the hilarious and heartfelt story follows a group of friends who vacation on Fire Island and navigate classism, sex, and maybe even some romance.

“[Filming ‘Fire Island’] was one of the best experiences of my life artistically,” Booster said. “I got to make a movie with my best friends in one of my favorite places in the world. It was really exciting, and I’m really proud and happy with how it turned out.”

All in all, this year has been huge for Booster – but it took him more than a decade of work to achieve the success he has. He credits his success to dedication and persistence and says that the entertainment industry is hard on everyone, let alone gay Asian-American comedians like him.

“It’s hard to gauge if it was more difficult than anyone else’s experience in this industry, I can only speak to mine,” he said. “It wasn’t easy, I think it takes a lot of perseverance to make it in the entertainment industry no matter who you are.”

“For me specifically, I think it was about overcoming a lot of preconceived notions people have about who I am as a person because of those two identities [gay and Asian-American],” he continued. “It was about overcoming those predetermined expectations and really fighting back against those – and showing up! I’ve heard way more ‘nos’ than I’ve heard ‘yeses’ in my career, and if I had listened to those ‘nos,’ I never would’ve gotten up as many times as I did. It was just about waiting for the ‘yeses’ to come. It takes a long time. For me, it took almost a decade for things to really start to cook for me. It’s a waiting game, it’s about always showing up with your best work and putting in the work

to turn people on to what you’re doing.”

And show up he has. Booster says he’s excited to show off his new material, especially in Atlanta.

“I’ve only just started doing headlining shows again since my special came out, I only just now have the material to do it,” he said. “I’m excited to work on this material with audiences I love, especially audiences like Atlanta audiences. There’s no one quite like them.”

You can buy tickets to see Booster perform on November 13 at 9:30pm at Variety Playhouse at redclaycomedy.com.

Comedian Joel Kim Booster

PHOTO VIA FACEBOOK

Katie Burkholder

OUT FRONT KICKS ITS ‘BOOTS’ UP WITH NEW MUSICAL

Jim Farmer

As Out Front Theatre Company opens its new season, it does so with one of its most high-profile shows ever — the splashy musical, “Kinky Boots” — and the largest cast in its history. Twenty-five performers make up the ensemble, including actors Dustin Presley and Wendell Scott.

“Kinky Boots” debuted on Broadway in 2013 and won six Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Actor in a Musical for Billy Porter’s portrayal of Lola. It’s been a favorite, especially among the LGBTQ community, since its debut. The musical has a book by Harvey Fierstein and music and lyrics by Cyndi Lauper.

The musical is based on the 2005 film of the same name, with Charlie Price (Presley) inheriting a shoe factory when his father dies. The business is near bankruptcy and makes men’s shoes whose demand is drying up. With the help of an unlikely ally — cabaret performer and drag queen Lola (Scott) — Charlie starts generating a women’s boot that can be worn by a male-bodied person.

Charlie is a character who’s a little bit lost in his life, Presley told Georgia Voice

“He has not really found his purpose yet and is dealing with a lot of pressure in taking over the family business,” the actor said. “It’s going under, and in an effort to save the factory and provide jobs for all the people he’s known his entire life — well, necessity is the mother of invention. He has to come up with a new plan to save the factory. By meeting Lola by

happenstance, he gets the light bulb to make drag queen boots professionally and changes the game.”

Scott sees Lola as a fabulous drag queen who uses drag as an escape from reality.

“She loves everyone and accepts everyone, but she has some problems accepting herself,” Scott said. “When she meets Charlie, she understands how valuable she is just as herself.”

Both performers feel the show has several pertinent themes, one of which is the value of acceptance.

“Acceptance never dies, and that message never gets old,” Scott said. “I think it’s especially important for young actors of color — being this fabulous person right on stage doing these big numbers, but conveying that they can be exactly who they want onstage or off. Being that prime example for young people of color is profound for me.”

For Presley, “Kinky Boots” also deals with forgiveness — forgiving yourself and others when they hurt you or when they don’t do the best by you. For Charlie, specifically, there’s a learning curve because Lola is outside his comfort zone.

“We need to encourage more people to get comfortable and learn to enjoy people who aren’t the same as them and have the same views, because at the end of the day we are all human,” he said. “Sometimes it takes hurting and forgiving for that full-circle closure.

Scott, growing up gay, recalled that the first moment he came out, he was not accepted by his father, but his father eventually came to terms with it.

“I know a lot of people in the cast also resonate with stories like that and of Lola,” he said.

Nick Silvestri is the show’s music director and sound engineer. He calls “Kinky Boots” a classic pop rock-style musical where 90 percent of the songs are upbeat, with two or three heartfelt ballads.

“It’s a lot of fun to work on — and it’s a toetapper,” he said. “You’ll leave humming a song or two. As for being a queer musical, it’s one of the few shows where it’s not representative of a deeply traumatic queer experience. Of course, both main characters have to have conflict and character growth and something that pushes them, but it’s not a huge traumatic gay thing that other shows center themselves in. It allows more of the audience to connect.”

The show is directed by Paul Conroy, the company’s artistic director, who has led the troupe since its 2016 bow.

“Kinky Boots” runs now through November 5 at Out Front Theatre Company. Purchase tickets and learn more at outfronttheatre. com/event/kinky-boots.

Wendell Scott stars as Lola in Out Front Theatre’s “Kinky Boots.”

PUBLICITY PHOTO BY TYLER OGBURN PHOTOGRAPHY

HALLOWEEN EVENTS AT A GLANCE

Katie Burkholder

Boo! Halloween is just around the corner, which means there are a slew of events happening in Atlanta this week and next. Secure a costume (or two!) and get ready to haunt the town with your ghoulfriends.

THIS WEEKEND

Hot Mess Halloween Dance Pop Party

OCTOBER 21, 10PM

THE BASEMENT

Kick the celebration off early with this pop dance party in East Atlanta! Put together a hot mess of a costume for your chance to win questionable prizes: plastic goat trophies, unsharpened Halloween pencils, creepy witch fingers, and more! Enjoy music from pop princesses like Dua Lipa, Lady Gaga, Charli XCX, Kim Petras, and more. Tickets at basementatl.com.

Little Five Points Ghost Tour

OCTOBER 22-23 AND 27-30, 7PM

L5P COMMUNITY CENTER PARKING LOT Hear tales from the spooky side of Atlanta on the L5P Ghost Tour. Join clairvoyant tour guides on a mile-long, 1.5-hour trek through the neighborhood’s most historic and creepy landmarks. Encounter Lady Sintana from House of Ravenwood, 7Stages ghosts, Deacon Lunchbox, Gregory Davis, and more. Tickets at l5pbiz.com.

Little Five Points Halloween Festival and Parade

OCTOBER 22-23

L5P Head over to the Little Five Points neighborhood this weekend to enjoy a variety of Halloween festivities, like the Rainy Day Revival Old School Freak Show, the Bizarre Bazaar artist market, drag queen karaoke feature Alt3r, and

more! This year’s parade takes a new route on Moreland Ave, ending at Freedom Parkway, on Sunday at 2pm. Learn more at l5phalloween.com.

Shalloween with Crystal Methyd

OCTOBER 22, 9PM TO 3AM

MY SISTER’S ROOM

Get ready for Atlanta’s biggest Halloween drag show and costume contest! WUSSY presents their 7th annual Shalloween with guest ghoul Crystal Methyd from “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” along with performances from Brigitte Bidet, Deacon Slanders, EllaSaurus Rex, JayBella Banks, Mo’Dest Volgare, Mystery Meat, Saliva Godiva, and more! Tickets via Eventbrite.

NEXT WEEKEND

Atlanta Leather Pride: Meet and Greet and Cigar Social

OCTOBER 28, 8PM TO MIDNIGHT

THE EAGLE

Atlanta Leather Pride weekend kicks off the festivities at the Atlanta Eagle! Learn more at atlantaleatherpride.com.

Scary Mary’s Halloweenie Dress Up and Dance Party

OCTOBER 28, 10PM

MARY’S

Music from DJ Headmaster. $5 cover.

That’s So Fetch: Y2K Pop Dance Party –Halloween Edition

OCTOBER 28, 11PM

VENKMAN’S

Throw on your matching Britney and Justin denim fantasy, your Juicy Couture velour tracksuit, or your spookiest Ghostface getup for the Y2K-themed costume contest and dance the night away to Gewn Stefani, Lady Gaga, the Pussycat Dolls, Fergie, Shakira, and more. Tickets at venkmans.com.

EVENT SPOTLIGHT

ATLANTA LEATHER PRIDE CONTEST

OCTOBER 29, 11:30AM

BARKING LEATHER AND THE EAGLE

The official Atlanta Leather Pride contest begins at Barking Leather at with interviews at noon followed by the contest at The Eagle at 7:30pm. Judges and contestants will meet at 11:30am and 6:30pm respectively. An ASL interpreter will be on hand during the contest. Learn more at atlantaleatherpride.com. Shown above: Atlanta Pride Eagle 2019 winners. (Photo via Atlanta Leather Pride)

Halloween on the Roof

OCTOBER 29, 11AM TO MIDNIGHT

THE ROOF AT PONCE CITY MARKET

Enjoy all treats and no tricks during the kids’ Rooftop Trick or Treating from 11am to 4pm. Then, after 5pm, mystical fortune and magical cirque acts set the stage. Sip on Halloween cocktails, dare to try a Jell-O shot before you enter the costume contest for the $1,000 value grand prize.

Tickets at poncecityroof.com.

Creatures of the Night Ooky Dance Party and Monster Orgy

OCTOBER 29, 9PM

MARY’S

Celebrate Halloween at Mary’s with a costume contest, music from DJ Neon Horror, and only a $5 cover!

Atlanta Leather Pride: Victory Block Party and Halloween Extravaganza

OCTOBER 29, 10PM

THE EAGLE

Learn more at atlantaleatherpride.com.

Candela Halloween – Dia de los Muertos

OCTOBER 29, 10PM TO 3AM DISTRICT ATLANTA

Celebrate Halloween with a Latin twist this year! Candela is a Latin fusion event and Atlanta’s hottest monthly party. Enjoy music from DJ EU and DJ Eduardo Franco. Tickets at districtatlanta.com.

Atlanta Leather Pride: Tea Dance

OCTOBER 30, 3PM

THE EAGLE

Close out Atlanta Leather Pride weekend by dancing the day away at The Eagle’s new location. Learn more at atlantaleatherpride.com.

Goosebumps Atlanta

OCTOBER 30, 9PM TO 3AM DISTRICT ATLANTA

Don your best costume for a chance to win a prize for sexiest costume, most creative costume, or best couple/group costume! Come early and enjoy the open bar until 11:30pm with early bird tickets. Tickets via Eventbrite.

MY QUEER VOTE FOR A CONSERVATIVE

Ryan Lee

Older folks love to lament the supposed extinction of civics education and how ignorant that has made today’s youth, but then every couple of years we hold elections to prove that many adults can be as dumb as middle schoolers when it comes to government. We start by reducing every race, candidate, and policy to, “Our side good, their side bad,” and focus on politically irrelevant issues like whether a candidate for the commission that regulates utilities supports critical race theory, or if the state school superintendent is against abortion.

The aged — those who claim to have been blessed with in-depth instruction about American democracy and our constitutional order — are also overrepresented among those predicting or hoping for a second civil war. Either bygone civics lessons included insurrection in our system’s checks and balances, or, more likely, the closer someone gets to their personal end, the more they are convinced the entire country and world are deteriorating, too.

Part of being a model citizen in these bitterly polarized times is being a good team player, and voters of every age and affiliation have accepted that failing to vote straight-ticket will ensure a disastrous fate for themselves, their people and Earth itself. Which is why, as a gay liberal, I’m somewhat hesitant to admit the candidate I am most excited to vote for in November is a Republican.

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger holds views on any number of issues that I find objectionable, and a second statewide election victory might position the Republican for higher office where our differences become more consequential. However, when it comes to secretary-of-

stating, Raffensperger’s performance during his first term deserves rewarding.

I was initially impressed by Raffensperger during the summer of 2020 when he launched an aggressive marketing campaign informing Georgians about alternatives to in-person voting, and bluntly refuted the emerging conservative narrative that Democrats were planning a coup by mail. He maintained his administrative certitude a few months later when Trumpists claimed Georgia’s election results were fraudulent, and it is terrifying to imagine where our nation would be without Raffensperger’s integrity and resolve.

Several of my fellow progressives insist Raffensperger was simply doing his job and therefore warrants no acclaim, without acknowledging how many Republicans were willing to replace their official duties with Trump’s dirty work. It would have been so easy for Raffensperger to join them in the Big Lie, but he defended Georgia voters at great risk to his political future and his family’s safety.

He did his job well enough for me to believe he should be rehired, and frankly, I haven’t even checked to see who else is applying for the position. This vote might mark me as a tainted liberal, but I consider it a good-faith endorsement of democracy over civil warfare. We must end zero-sum politics — where any victory by one side signals the eradication of their opponents — if we are to retreat from the brink of national conflict.

In Georgia’s other two big races, I expect Governor Brian Kemp to defeat Democrat Stacey Abrams for reelection and am cautiously hopeful Sen. Raphael Warnock will be reelected over Republican Herschel Walker. The media will likely portray such a split outcome in chaotic terms, but it will at least indicate some Georgia voters do not universally consider the letters “D” and “R” to be synonyms for good and evil.