Los Angeles Blade, Volume 07, Issue 34, August 25, 2023

Lake Arrowhead shop owner shot to death over Pride Flag

C , Calif - San ernardino County Sheri s deputies responding to a shooting call in the unincorporated ake rrowhead area on riday, ugust , , at around p m disco ered the owner of a clothing outi ue su ering from gunshot wounds outside of the store

he ictim, identi ed as -year-old aura nn Carleton, the owner of the ag Pi clothing at ook Creek oad, in Cedar len was pronounced deceased at the scene y emergency medical personnel

spokesperson for the San ernardino County Sheri s o ce said that during the response to the initial scene on ook Creek oad, deputies recei ed updates from Sheri s ispatch indicating the suspect, who has not een identi ed, fled on foot, and was seen on orrey oad, east of ighway

eputies located the suspect near orrey oad and ause ancho oad, armed with a handgun hen deputies attempted to engage the suspect, he refused to drop his weapon and a use of lethal force encounter occurred and the suspect was pronounced deceased o deputies were in ured during the incident

he Sheri s Speciali ed n estigations i ision omicide etail also responded and assumed the in estigation

hrough further in estigation, detecti es learned the suspect made se eral disparaging remarks a out a rainow flag that stood outside the store efore shooting Car-

leton

ccording to a source familiar, the suspect who arri ed at Carleton s store erratically remo ed a pride flag hanging as a decoration outside the shop Carleton confronted the unidenti ed man who remo ed the flag he male shot her multiple times efore fleeing

Carleton, who is married, also owns the ag Pi clothing outi ue in Studio City ccording to friends she was a strong ally of the community and elo ed in the Cedar len area She is sur i ed y her hus and of years and their children

eryone deser es to li e free of hate and discrimination and practice their constitutional right of freedom of speech auri was a remarka le mem er of the community and send my deepest condolences to her family in this time of grief, San ernardino County Super isor awn owe said in a statement also la eling the shooting a senseless act of hate and iolence

California o ernor a in ewsom on witter said his is a solutely horri c shop owner has een shot and killed y a man after he critici ed the pride flag hanging outside her usiness auri lea es ehind her hus and and children his disgusting hate has no place in C ccording to the Sheri s epartment spokesperson the in estigation is ongoing, and no further details are eing released

nyone with information regarding this incident is urged to contact the San ernardino County Sheri s o-

micide etail at - -

Callers wishing to remain anonymous should contact the e- ip otline at - - -C ( ) or got to www wetip com.

Suspect in murder of store owner over Pride flag identified

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. - San Bernardino County

Sheri Shannon icus held a press conference onday to rief the pu lic on the updates to the in estigation into the murder of elo ed Cedar len shop owner aura nn Carleton last riday

e ening

he suspect was identi ed as local resident, -yearold ra is keguchi, who had shot and killed Carleton after she confronted him in front of her store o er his remo al of an Pride lag he two e changed words and after yelling homopho ic epithets he shot her then fled on foot e was followed y se eral witnesses who reported his location to sheri s dispatchers

Sheri icus told reporters that deputies from the win Peaks su station confronted keguchi near orrey oad and ause ancho oad east of ighway , a out a mile from the homicide scene at the ag Pi clothing outi ue at ook Creek oad in Cedar len

s deputies attempted to engage the suspect, he refused to drop his weapon and opened re on them, striking multiple s uad cars he Sheri said the deputies returned re striking keguchi who died at the scene icus noted that none of his personnel were hurt or in ured

he Sheri noted that the handgun found on keguchi was elie ed to e the same weapon used to murder Carleton adding that semiautomatic pistol was not registered to him, and he did not ha e a license to carry a concealed weapon

icus also said during onday s media rie ng that keguchi s family had reported him missing the day pre ious to the shooting

San ernardino County Sheri s in estigators said that

keguchi fre uently posted hate- lled content on social media ews media outlets including the lade were a le to locate (formerly known as witter) and accounts matching his name

is social media posts were lled with Christian ationalist hate- lled themes and retweets often targeting the community oth accounts were still acti e onday e ening Paci c ime

Sheri icus said that the in estigation is acti ely ongoing and that the San ernardino County istrict ttorney s o ce will in estigate the shooting of keguchi, as is standard practice with all lethal force encounters in ol ing law enforcement agencies

nyone with information regarding this incident is urged to contact the omicide etail at - -

Callers wishing to remain anonymous should contact the e- ip otline at - - -C ( ) or got to www wetip com

BRODY LEVESQUE

Lake Arrowhead shop owner Lauri Carleton, was shot to death outside of her business after a dispute over an LGBTQ Pride flag turned deadly. (Screenshot NBC News)

TRAVIS IKEGUCHI

A community in pain remembers Laura Ann Carleton

By SIMHA HADDAD

CEDAR GLEN, Calif. - The news of the shooting death of a beloved local merchant this past weekend spread at a speed that would match a seasonal California wild re in this mountain community above Lake Arrowhead.

Now that community and its LGBTQ + community are in mourning and deep pain.

urdered o er a Pride flag, aurie nn Carleton, , is remembered by her husband of 28 years, nine children, family, friends, and fans worldwide, but most especially by the tightknit community where she owned a clothing outi ue called Mag.Pi.

lifelong ally of the community, she proudly flew the instantly recogni a le rain ow pride flag in front of her store

Vandals in the what locals have said is an increasingly homophobic community near Lake Arrowhead tore down her flag repeatedly ach time, she put up a igger one She epressed fear to close friends that one day these constant vandali ations would escalate to an in-person altercation

Then, on August 18th, Carleton’s fears came true when a -year-old male tried to andali e Carleton s flag yet again She got into a heated er al argument with the armed man who hurled homophobic remarks at her. He then pulled out a concealed handgun shooting and murdering her.

Prior to the murder, the suspect, Travis Ikeguchi, posted several homophobic images on social media including a burning pride flag

his disgusting hate has no place in C , tweeted California o ernor a in ewsom, shortly after Carleton s death he destruction of pride flags has een under re iew in seeral states as a hate crime

et s e clear, said representati es for uality California, auri Carleton was a ictim of the hate- lled calls to action made y politicians and e tremists that continue to push false narratives and misinformation about the LGBTQ+ community. Her unwavering commitment to standing for the dignity and respect of LGBTQ+ people is a testament to her kindness and humanity and will always be remembered.

“More than 350 anti-LGBTQ+ incidents occurred from June 2022 to April 2023, accompanied by the introduction of more than 500 anti-LGBTQ+ pieces of legislation introduced across the country in 2023 alone. This hate does not happen in a vacuum — it is all part of a backlash to the advances made by the LGBTQ+ community. We must continue to stand against this rising tide of hatred.”

Before opening her clothing stores, Carleton studied at the rt Center for School and esign hile there, she uilt a reputation for being kind-hearted and creative. Eventually, she oined the sta of enneth Cole Productions in and worked for the company for more than 15 years, becoming an e ecuti e, according to the company s we site

Cole posted a statement on social media con rming Carleton had been a friend and a long-time associate of his company. He called her killing “an unnecessary and tragic death.”

The Lake Arrowhead LGBTQ group called Carleton a “remarka le gure , whose “unwavering support” for the com-

munity and “dedication to creating a safe and inclusive space within her shop touched the lives of many.”

“Today was a very sad day for Lake Arrowhead and for the LGBTQ community. Our friend and supporter Lauri Carleton... was murdered defending her lg t Pride flags in front of her store in Cedar Glen, California,” the group wrote in a statement. “Lauri did not identify as LGBTQ+ but spent her time helping ad ocating for e eryone in the community She will e truly missed.”

Matthew Clevenger, a co-founder of the organization, recalled that “new folks moving into town -- new couples, new LGBTQ families -- were concerned about moving up here. We hear stories about them driving y her store and seeing the flags and feeling so welcome.

“They immediately felt the acceptance and were no longer afraid to be up here,” Clevenger told C and other media outlets. “And Lauri did that for them.”

The suddenness of the heinous crime seemed to leave many family members and friends in disbelief at their loss. A family photo of Carleton has been circulating the internet that em odies her lo e of nature and e ortless style n it, Carlton wears her long, wa y hair down under a sun hat She has on turtle shell sunglasses and a denim button-down top under a sand-colored acket

e are all de astated for her hus and ort, said lm director Paul Feig, a close friend of Carleton’s, “and her family and the LGBTQ+ community, for whom Lauri was such a true ally.” Her alleged murderer was later shot and killed by the San ernardino police and so no longer poses a threat to the community. But this intolerance has to end. Anyone using hateful language against the LGBTQ+ community has to realize their words matter and that their words can inspire violence against innocent, loving people. Let’s all keep moving forward with tolerance and love. Let’s not let Lauri’s tragic death be in vain.”

Other friends lamented that they had just seen Carleton alive and well and were making plans to take a trip to the lake together

ctress ridget erett -- of the dramedy Someody Somewhere -- also mourned Carleton in a post on nstagram, saying it was not the rst encounter Carleton faced o er displaying the pride flag

n the past, when someone took down her flag or andalized it, she’d put up another one,” Everett said in her post, which was accompanied by a photo of Carleton. “The last

time I saw Lauri was, oddly enough, at Lake Arrowhead Pride both in the parade and then at a party. All that anti-LGBTQ rhetoric has a price. And now, Lauri’s husband Bort, her daughters, friends and community are devastated. And for what?”

The local Mountain Provisions Cooperative wrote a moving tribute on Instagram:

“In loving memory of our dear friend, mom to many, ally, organizer, entrepreneur, founding member and soul of our co-op Lauri Carleton.

Lauri was a pillar in our community, an immovable force in her values for e uality, lo e, and ustice f you knew Lauri you know she loved hard, laughed often, and nurtured and protected those she cared a out She was a force, she lo ed to crack jokes and wanted to live as joyful of a life as possible. We will continue to stand for the values she so selflessly stood for er death will not be in vain.

Lauri and her husband Bort were pi otal in organi ing our ree Store which provided free food and supplies for 4 months after the blizzard. Lauri put her whole heart into keeping it going as long as we could. Pay an act of kindness forward in her honor. Our community needs as much as love as we can get right now.

ly your flags in honor of auri lo e will pre ail Please respect the privacy and be respectful of family and friends grieving this horri c loss

Sending lo e to our entire community, especially our ueer community Stay safe friends

“I admire her, and I’m so proud of her, and I know she passed standing up for something she believed in,” said Ari Carleton, one of her daughters.

She was so fearless and any negati e reaction she ust powered through, ri added he flags ha e een torn down efore y di erent indi iduals, and she always went and ordered an e en larger flag in response uring his onday press rie ng, San ernardino County Sheri Shannon icus spoke a out the national attention this case has received:

“This particular victim has had an impact really across the nited States, said the Sheri e e een reached out y the ice president of the nited States ur ictim certainly had a major impact on the community and people that she’s come across with during her lifetime.”

The family has asked for time to hold a vigil for Carleton. The vigil will be announced when the family deems it appropriate to do so and will be open to the public.

lifelong ally of the community, she proudly flew the instantly recogni a le rain ow pride flag- and was killed for it

LAURIE CARLETON (Family photo shared on social media)

yoming on t Say Gay could have Chilling ect in classrooms

CHEYENNE, Wyo. - When Grady Hutcherson, now president of the Wyoming Education Association, was a second grade teacher in Goshen County, a student he called “Frank” brought a doll to class every day.

That boy, Hutcherson said, played with female students — and his doll — every day.

“I didn’t care that he brought that doll,” said Hutcherson, who spoke at a Joint Education Committee meeting in Cheyenne Tuesday. “I cared about his safety, and him not being bullied by other people. That was my concern.”

However, proposed legislation under consideration by the Joint Education Committee would have a “chilling effect” on Hutcherson’s ability to protect that child, he said. f passed in , the draft legislation considered Tuesday called “Parental rights in education-1” would prohibit “classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity.” The draft legislation also contains parental noti cation re uirements and complaint procedure processes.

was not introduced in the House.

“I would just suggest that it depends on, is it age appropriate? What are you going to explain to the kids and Frank about the doll? Is it just that Frank likes this doll and that’s OK?” Biteman said. “That is not a problem.”

Biteman said the bill addresses a much deeper issue delving “into gender identity politics.”

“This bill is aimed at stopping discussion happening in kindergarten through third grade,” Biteman said. “These kids can t even wrap their heads around what the heck you are talking about. It prevents some teacher, who is a very big time activist, say, from going on a diatribe for 10 minutes about whatever issue they want to talk about using that as an opening.”

ccording to a memo to the oint ducation Committee from Tania Hytrek, operations administrator for the state’ s egislati e Ser ice ce ( S ), there are “several constitutional concerns with the proposed legislation.”

ytrek clari ed that the S does not take a policy stance, ut that it is her o ce ’s job to “advise on potential future issues n its memo, the S identi ed potential constitutional concerns related to protected speech under the First Amendment, among others.

“There is some precedent that, in the event that you are chilling the environment that students are being educated in, or chilling the environment that teachers are educating, that that is a violation of the students ’ First Amendment rights,” Hytrek said. “There are lots of cases that discuss that you don’t shed your First Amendment rights as soon as you enter a school building, whether you are a teacher or a student.”

A ‘Don’t Say Gay’ law in Wyoming?

arcie indred, a woman who identi ed herself as a mother and founding member of Wyoming Family Alliance for Freedom, said the bill is a carbon copy of Florida’ s “Don’t Say Gay” law. She spoke against the bill, and during around three hours of public comment, supporters and opponents of the legislation addressed the committee.

kid comes up to me and they ask me about this situation, would I be allowed to tell the truth? Would I have to say ‘No’ and lie r would e forced to deflect

McKenzie said he already refers to his husband as his “spouse” in his classroom because he considers it best practice to separate his personal life from his students. When asked, he acknowledged that his colleagues don’t always do the same, and use the terms “husband” and “wife.”

Nathan Winters, president of the Wyoming Family Alliance, said “the thousands of families that we represent are for this bill.” The Wyoming Family Alliance, according to its website, is a political advocacy partner of Focus on the Family.

Mary Schmidt, a member of the Natrona County School District Board of Trustees, spoke in favor of the bill, saying that her school district was already considering similar rules. Further, she said she has several issues with the constitutional First Amendment concerns outlined in the memo.

“[The memo] gives the example of chilling students, school personnel and others from disclosing their sexual orientation or gender identity, ” Schmidt said. “Why would a teacher or personnel be talking to a child of this age about their sexual orientation? That right there is uestiona le eha ior

While opponents of the bill say that it “ classi es ” people, it actually protects them, she continued.

“Based on this bill, I don’t understand if I would be able … to provide instruction to my entire class that it is OK for Frank to play with dolls, or females, or not,” Hutcherson, who taught for 24 years, said. “I am asking all of you to answer the uestion Would I be able to have that discussion with my class about Frank and the doll?’”

Sen. Bo Biteman (R-Ranchester) brought the bill to the committee, saying it mirrors legislation that passed the Senate last session. That previous bill failed because it

yan c en ie, who identi ed himself as a yoming teacher, spoke against the legislation, saying it takes options away from teachers, parents and educators. It also “ es a pro lem that isn ’t broken,” he said.

“If a kid comes up to me and he is being bullied because his two dads are gay, for the reading of this bill, I would not be allowed to convene a classroom meeting to solve this problem,” McKenzie said.

McKenzie, who said he is married to a man in the U.S. Air Force, went on to describe a situation that happened to him in May.

“I had a parent out me to one of my kids,” he said. “If a

“The person who spoke about the story of the little boy with the doll. Was he classifying that boy into a transgendered or a homosexual? No, you can’t do that,” Schmidt said. “You have to just say, ‘You can t bully him because he has a doll.’ This law is stating that you can’t imply the child is any classi cation ou ust ha e to treat them as they are, at the developmental level they are at.” he committee oted to split the ill into two parts One regarding classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity, and the other on parental noti cation as referenced in the ill te t he committee oted that a new ill draft regarding parental noti cation will move forward to the November Joint Education Committee meeting.

Rep. Karlee Provenza (D-Laramie) made a motion not to carry the bill text regarding sexual orientation or gender identity to the next meeting. That motion failed in a 7-6 vote.

The committee voted 6-6 not to sponsor the balance of the bill regarding sexual orientation and gender identity ccording to committee co-chair Sen Charles Scott ( -Casper), the ill may come ack as legislation put forward by an individual legislator, in which case, Scott said he would support it.

“[The memo] gives the example of chilling students, school personnel and others from disclosing their sexual orientation or gender identity”

By CARRIE HADERLIE

Senator BO BITEMAN ( anchester) speaks on an. , in the Senate Chamber. Biteman brought forward discussion on the draft legislation called Parental rights in education , which he said he supports. (Photo by ichael Smith)

Virginia’s Gov. Youngkin embraces softer ‘parental rights’ message

RICHMOND - Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin has a lot at stake with the potential for his party to win control over both chambers of the state’s General Assemly in o em er and the growing chorus high pro le P donors urging him to run for president.

Appearing before a crowd of Republican voters last month in Salem, Va., alongside state Sen. David Suetterlein ( - oanoke), the go ernor was flanked y a huge sign that read, “Parents Matter,” a message that Youngkin’s 2021 gu ernatorial campaign had used to re up conser ati e Virginians concerned about education policies, including LGBTQ matters.

However, the Washington Post notes that while “parental rights” arguments were previously focused on opposition to pro-LGBTQ policies, pandemic mask mandates, and the teaching of critical race theory in Virginia schools, “this year’s edition is decidedly more middle-of-the-road.”

During campaign events for GOP state legislature candidates in battleground districts across the state, Youngkin has been “treading carefully around the red meat occasionally served up by his audiences,” steering “comments back toward the catchall idea of parents being involved in their kids’ lives,” the Post reports.

For instance, during last month’s event with Suetterlein, a member of the audience said her daughter had been “brainwashed” on social media into believing it possible for someone to be both gay and a Christian, which Youngkin addressed by urging parents to “be engaged” in their kids’ lives and educate them on the dangers of social media.

At the same time, Youngkin’s tenure as governor has seen a flurry of anti- policies, especially targeting

youth, schools and the transgender community, which, unlike his “parents’ rights” rhetoric, has not abated or become less extreme.

Last month, the governor reportedly took down a page on the Virginia Department of Health’s website that offered two links for LGBTQ youth to access resources after the right-wing news outlet The Daily Wire inquired about it.

to adopt policies that would require transgender students to use facilities and participate in activities corresponding with their sex assigned at birth.”

When running for governor in 2021, Youngkin appeared on Fox News to defend a teacher who was suspended for refusing to use a student’s preferred pronouns, vowing to “stand up for teachers and parents against these kinds of cancel culture initiatives.”

HRC and Equality Virginia in March counted more than two dozen anti-LGBTQ bills that were introduced by Youngkin’s GOP allies in the legislature during this session, all of which were ultimately defeated as Democrats have retained control of the upper chamber.

These included:

measure to an gender a rming care for transgender youth, which also sought to erode anti-discrimination protections for health insurers and permit the companies to opt out of co ering gender a rming care for adults,

A policy requiring schools to “out” students by informing parents when their child has disclosed experiences of gender dysphoria or asked any employee of their school to participate in their social transitioning, such as by using preferred names or pronouns, and requiring parental consent “prior to the implementation at such school of any plan concerning any gender incongruence”,

Last year, the Human Rights Campaign wrote, “Youngkin unveiled a new directive restricting the rights of transgender students in schools, ordering all 133 school districts

A requirement for students to obtain a court order to change a student’s name on any school record, and egislation re uiring parental consent and noti cation when their child participates in any Gender-Sexuality Alliance or Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) club at school.

CHRISTOPHER KANE

Florida Community College student group forced to change name

TALLAHASSEE - A newly enacted law signed by Governor Ron DeSantis is forcing a student group at Tallahassee Community College to change its name or face loss of state and federal funding. DeSantis signed Senate Bill 266 into law on ay and it took e ect last month

Tyler Soto, a student at TCC, a member of The Black ale chie ers student group told Florida Public Radio/ NPR outlet WUSF the group is working out possible new names, such as “Male Achievers” or “Scholar Male Achievers.”

“We’re going to have to change the name of our organization or they’re going to defund it because it has ‘Black’ in front of it,” Soto said.

A new law prohibits student-led organizations that “advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion” and other social and political causes from receiving state or federal funding. While those organizations aren’t banned outright, they may only receive funding from student-activity fees under the new law.

Soto, who’s also a member of TCC’s Student Government Association, says changes like these only encourage him to get more involved in the political process.

“It has made me want to step up and be the change.”

NBC News in Miami reported this new law threatens ac-

tivities historically led by Black fraternities and sororities, which have advocated for equality and the advancement of people of color in the United States. Black student organizations are largely funded by students, but colleges and universities sometimes provide them with space and food for campus acti ities, according to BET, and the law may a ect that

In remarks at the time the bill was signed, referring to

diversity and inclusion polices, the governor said: ‘‘This has basically been used as a veneer to impose an ideological agenda and that is wrong. In fact, if you look at the way this has actually been implemented across the country, DEI is better viewed as standing for discrimination, exclusion and indoctrination, and that has no place in our public institutions.”

Other members of the Black Male Achievers have also called out the law, as well as others restricting how race and African American history are taught in K-12 schools and colleges.

“I don’t think we should have to change our name because obviously it’s for the Black community, so I’m not a fan,” Denzel Wiggins, a member of the Black Male Achievers, told WUSF

Black Male Achievers was founded with the aim of empowering and educating minority men, according to the allahassee Community College website.

The organization provides mentoring and academic advising, as well as academic and professional skill development through workshop events and guest speakers. The goal is to help students graduate and enter the workforce. Members are also eligible to apply for scholarships.

BRODY LEVESQUE

Virginia Gov. GLENN YOUNGKIN appearing before a crowd of Republican voters last month in Salem, Va. (Screenshot/ABC 13 WSET-Roanoke)

Tallahassee Community College’s Learning Commons building. (Photo Credit: Tallahassee Community College)

Political mapmakers urged to take LGBTQ+ community into account

edistricting and updated political maps are at the heart of merican democracy

ery years, the S Census ureau tells lawmakers the demographics of their constituents, and likely, how they ll ote awmakers then redraw districts, in many cases, along partisan lines to gi e ad antage to a speci c party his process, called gerrymandering, is at the heart of state legislatures across the country, and poses a signicant challenge to rights in many states

Gerrymandering has been at the heart of multiple court challenges since the election s of uly, 74 cases have een led challenging district maps in states as racially discriminatory or partisan gerrymanders.

While the conversation around gerrymandering often focuses on race or political a liation, the community is often left out, despite ha ing massive voting power. he community has utili ed its oting power for a long time, and famously elected ar ey ilk, the S ’s rst openly gay person to hold pu lic o ce, to the San rancisco oard of Super isors in Since then, the num er of openly- politicians is growing, with a record num er e pected to run in

edistricting played a powerful role in ilk’s election. Despite the population making up one fth of San Francisco’s oters at the time, the city s at-large electoral system — where council members were elected by the whole city put neigh orhoods at a disad antage

ilk and other acti ists led the ght to change the city’s electoral system to district contests, and in , ilk won his seat on the council.

he ictory und launched a rst-of-its-kind campaign to lo y for redistricting that considers populations in map-drawing. The “ e elong ogether campaign, launched following the election, has two

main focuses ncourage organi ations to lo y to keep areas intact and to gather data showing where communities are located within legislati e districts.

“ e worked on asically how to identify large groupings of people, and then ad ocate to the decision makers who are doing a lot to say, ‘ ey, this is a community of interest, and you need to make sure that they stick together, ictory und ice President of Political Programs Sean Meloy said.

Communities of interest are communities of people that are grouped by a common factor — often race and class — that’s taken into account when redistricting happens people aren’t classi ed as a community of interest in many states due to sexual orientation not being part of the census

“A lot of other demographics are accounted for in the census, eloy said “ he Census ureau did a pulse surey recently that asked a out people nd that s a great step in a great direction because every community and demographic has uni ue ulnera ilities, uni ue issues that government should understand so that they can help address them because they’re all people that they’re supposed to e working on ehalf of

he ousehold Pulse Sur ey was launched in and tracks a wide ariety of household data including, ut not limited to, employment, housing security and access to health care he sur ey also tracks se ual orientation and gender identity ccording to the Census ureau’s website, the sur ey tracks how “emergent issues are impacting households across the country from a social and economic perspecti e

eloy said that this data collected y the ureau allows for groups like the ictory und to draw maps of “centrali ed areas where there are same se married couples s-

ing the maps, groups can lo y mapmakers to not “draw a line right through these communities, di iding up their voting power.

ri ona, California, Colorado, ichigan and ontana are all states where maps are drawn by nonpartisan commissions as opposed to lawmakers drawing the maps and are the top targets of outreach going into the election cycle

“ hey ha e fairer districts, and a lot of those states ha e districts that actually do respect people as communities of interest, and so you know, we had more led legislators elected in California and in ri ona and in Colorado, eloy said

ther areas, such as ew ork, ort auderdale, tlanta and oise, daho, could all see an increase in pu lic o cials if oters were taken into account in redistricting, according to ictory und

“ e know that once we elect some people, there is a domino e ect that people feel they can come out, they can e in o ce, it reaks that arrier, eloy said “And we’ e seen that in a lot of other places o er the last years, ut we still ha e a lot of places that we need to continue reaking down those little arriers

ISABELLE KRAVIS

Civil rights probe targets Vanderbilt as trans patients sue hospital

NASHVILLE -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center is cooperating with an investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Serice s ce of Ci il ights, a spokesperson for the hospital con rmed on Thursday.

News of the probe comes just weeks after transgender patients sued VUMC for failing to redact personally identifying information from their health records when they were shared with the o ce of Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti late last year

When the hospital disclosed its compliance with the records reuest, which according to the s o ce was made in con-

nection with its investigation into the hospital s illing practices, transgender patients and their families raised alarm over how their information might be used.

The patients’ complaint argues these concerns are ampli ed following the passage of bans on gender a rming health care for minors, along with other e orts y the state s epu lican o cials to restrict the rights of trans Tennesseans.

“Our clients are encouraged that the federal go ernment is looking into what happened here, an attorney for the plainti s told he ennesseean.

spokesperson for S did not immediately respond

to a request for comment about whether its civil rights in estigation is linked to ander ilt s disclosure of health records to Skrmetti s o ce

n uly, Skrmetti oined a group of conser ati e attorneys general who are resisting a federal rule that would establish parameters limiting the collection of records of patients who ha e sought a ortions or gender a rming care out-of-state because of restrictions on these services in the places where they live.

he mo e renewed skepticism o er the o ce s claim that its demand for Vanderbilt to turn over health records for hundreds of patients was made in connection with a run of the mill pro e into potential illing fraud he C spokesperson declined to share details eyond a rming the hospital s compliance with S s in estigation spokesperson for the s o ce did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

CHRISTOPHER KANE

Missoula Pride participants in Missoula, Mont., in 2022. Montana is among the states that LGBTQ activists are targeting in 2024. (Photo courtesy of Lo Hunter Photography)

Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee.

(Photo Credit: Vanderbilt University Medical Center/Facebook)

Trevor Pro ect responds to reports of sta dissension, union busting

S - he re or Pro ect, a non-pro t that works to end suicide among youth, responded to a recent ashington lade report alleging widespread sta dissension, union usting, and other challenges, acknowledging it needs to impro e the working en ironment for its crisis counselors, ut disputing many of the other allegations made y nearly a do en current and former senior employees

he lade story, pu lished on ug , further alleges long wait times for distressed callers and some former sta ers said the organi ation grew too uickly, resulting in a drop in ser ice uality

lot of us were oking that it was the most corporati ed nonpro t that anyone has e er worked for, said a former mid-le el employee who spoke on condition of anonymity t was ery money dri en, ery growth, growth, growth

ut a former re or o cial responded, saying that the growth ena led re or to help more youth in crisis and that signi cant changes were made to impro e ser ice re or declined to make senior leadership a aila le for inter iews for the ug story nor would sources speak with attri ution for this story

Speci cally, a re or spokesperson said the organi ation made the following changes

• Shifting Clinical Operations’ focus to prioritize quality, sustainability, and impact instead of growth;

• Transforming the sta ng model across lifeline and digital crisis services to address overnight understa ng, inaccurate workforce planning, and unrealistic goals;

• ncreasing pay and wellness benefits for Clinical perations sta .

he changes ha e resulted in a decrease in a andonment rates across ser ices, the spokesperson said, noting the organi ation has the highest le el of accreditation

from the merican ssociation of Suicidology

Sta concerns led to the riends of re or nited union to egin organi ing in early loria iddleton, president of the Communications orkers of merica ocal , under which riends of re or is organi ed, said re or opposed the union hile union organi ers were in talks with re or, the organi ation egan laying o workers he union condemned that, calling it union usting, and said that re or intentionally ga e the union ery little time to respond

he re or spokesperson disputes this, saying the union didn t form until

e oluntarily recogni ed the union in appro imately si weeks, the spokesperson said e communicated to sta immediately to acknowledge the recognition re uest and said that we respect employees right to unioni e when re or recogni ed the union, we communicated to sta again that we were pleased to share that information

Crisis counselor ae aplan told the lade she was red y re or for reacting with emo is during an all-sta meeting, another accusation that re or disputes he re or spokesperson said aplan was a contractor at nsight lo al, not a sta mem er, therefore, nsight lo al informed ae of the separation

o ody s role was reduced, nor would e, for using oogle eet reactions or emo is, the re or source said re or s C and co-founder Peggy a ski is a straight, white cisgender woman and sources told the lade that

the C-suite is almost entirely white and cisgender think there needs to e a permanent C who is , said Preston itchum, who ser ed as a director of ad ocacy and go ernment a airs at re or efore he uit in e ruary nd in my opinion, one who is a person of color, or at least someone who acti ely understands intersectional framework and how to ha e these culturally important clinical con ersations of competence and responsi ility to speci c communities ut re or claims it pri es diersity among its e ecuti e team and that the team is composed of e perienced leaders, including eight women (seven who are cisgender, one who is transgender) four men (three who are cisgender, one who is transgender) in addition, se en are P C dditionally, in the last few years, re or has created the organi ation s rst a nity groups lack re or, rans re or, P re or, atin re or, and isa ility re or, the source noted re or also takes issue with allegations that it had la policies go erning sta spending ne source told the lade, there were no policies around spending, while another insisted that the organi ation did not e en ha e a per diem policy in place for employee tra el

ike any organi ation, we ha e policies and appro al processes around e penses such as tra el, meals, usiness spending, etc , as well as annual udgeting, the reor source said, adding that the per diem policy is spelled out in an employee hand ook

LA BLADE STAFF

Woman charged: Threatens Federal judge, LGBTQ people and others

HOUSTON - A Texas woman has been charged with threatening to kill S istrict udge anya S Chutkan, who is overseeing one of the cases against former President onald rump, along with S ep Sheila ackson ee ( - e as), emocrats in C and people ederal prosecutors with the S epartment of omeland Security s ederal Protecti e Ser ice led a criminal complaint on ug in the S istrict Court for the Southern istrict of e as accusing -year-old igail o Shry of relaying the threats in a oicemail to Churkan s cham ers in the S istrict Court for the istrict of Colum ia on ug

ccording to the ling, Shry egan her message y addressing the udge who, along with ee, is lack with racist language, including the n-word, efore owing to kill anyone who went after rump, including a direct threat to kill the congresswoman, emocrats in C and all people in the community f rump doesn t get elected in , she said, we are coming to kill you, so tread lightly, itch

Chutkan was assigned to the case prosecuting rump for his e orts to o erturn the presidential election n riday, granting a re uest from the prosecutor in the case, Special Counsel ack Smith, she issued a protecti e order against the former president warning him against making inflammatory statements a out the case he more a party makes inflammatory statements a out this case which could taint the ury pool or intimidate potential witnesses, the greater the urgency will e that we proceed to trial to ensure a ury pool from which we can select an impartial ury, Chutkan said

n estigators who traced Shry s oicemail to her cell phone say she denied ha ing any plans to tra el to C or ouston to carry out the threats ut warned that if ee comes to l in, then we need to worry

n ednesday, S agistrate udge Sam Sheldon denied ail for Shry on the grounds that she had een charged se eral times for similar conduct o er the past year, ordering that she e detained for days

CHRISTOPHER KANE

The Trevor Pro ect sta marching in New ork City Pride . (Photo Credit The Trevor Pro ect Facebook)

ABIGAIL JO SHRY of Alvin, Texas ( ugshot .S. arshal s Service via arris County, Te as Sheri s epartment)

Argentina activists raise alarm over far-right primary victory

a ier ilei won ug primary, candidates also ad anced

By MICHAEL K. LAVERS

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — The results of Argentina’s primary elections on Aug. 13 have exposed a political landscape that com ines signi cant ad ances in and intersex rights with the worrying expansion of the far-right in that country. In an election in which only a few openly queer candidates managed to advance to the general elections on ct , the and interse community is watching closely the rise of conservative tendencies that could impact their rights.

The results had an unexpected protagonist: Ultra-right wing candidate Javier Milei won the most votes.

With almost 7 million votes — about 30.1 percent of the total cast the li ertarian economist leader of a i ertad Avanza capitalized upon Argentines’ discontent with leftist President Alberto Fernández’s government.

Former Security Minister Patricia Bullrich, who was part of right wing President Mauricio Macri’s government, and her ogether for Change coalition nished second with 28.3 percent of the votes. Peronism, represented by Finance Minister Sergio Massa and his “Unión por la Patría” ruling coalition, obtained 27.2 percent, which is its worst result since 2011.

for making history in rgentina t was a triumph to e the rst rans candidate for president of Argentina,” said Ibañez. “This marks a historical fact here in the country.”

For her, “the triumph of the ultra-right here in Argentina I attribute it to the fact that more and more people are buying the discourse of the right and in this case the ultra-right won, which in this case would be Milei with his discourse of anti-politics, anti-caste and it worries that this type of characters ha e won in rgentina

“We will be vigilant and attentive so that they do not take away the rights we have won,” she said.

a e added it is a threat to the community ecause Milei said that there is no need for the ministry of gender and women in his campaign. And he is against people, so if the same result is con rmed in cto er, it will e a ery di cult country for all sectors, not only for the community

Esteban Paulón, a well-known activist, in a historic milestone won enough votes in his race to become a congressman to advance to the general elections.

Argentina is an expression, distorted, of punishment vote to the current national government of the Front of All, with a still very fresh memory of what was Mauricio Macri’s government.”

“We must be clear about two things: That the electorate as a whole does not fully and consciously share the program of political-economic subordination to the United States and the cut to basic rights such as health, education and work; and on the other hand, that an electoral victory is not a blank check so that it can implement the whole of its liberal program as we saw in Jujuy winning Morales with a 54 percent of the votes and then having a popular rebellion that was an example of how to face the adjustment,” stressed D’Ambrosio.

Finally, they indicated that “it must be emphasized that this is not an ideological ote, ut one identi ed with anger towards the political caste and the great economic problems of the country, without ever talking about the role played by businessmen and that caste of which he is a part.”

Far right’s rise a challenge for LGBTQ+ rights

The primary election has highlighted the rise of far-right tendencies in Argentina, which has raised concerns within the and interse community ith parties and candidates seeking to curtail and interse rights and speaking out against sexual diversity, many activists fear the gains they have made in recent years could be at risk.

Among the group that supports Milei there are recognized anti-rights militants, deniers of the dictatorship and climate change, and anti- rights, which they ha e characteri ed as pri ileged, said Paul n

Milei’s running mate, Congresswoman Victoria Villarruel, during the campaign spoke against marriage rights for same-sex couples, saying a union between people of the same sex was already “guaranteed with the civil union.” Milei himself also spoke against sexual and gender diversity.

LGBTQ+ candidates

eina a e ecame the rst ransgender woman presidential candidate in Argentina’s history. She won enough otes to stay in the race

Ibañez told the Washington Blade she feels like a winner

“We obtained 62,000 votes throughout my province and we need to increase to a little more than double that to manage to ght for the seat on ct , Paul n told the Blade.

The candidate for the province of Santa Fe in northeastern Argentina explained “we are going to intensify the campaign in the big cities, the tours in the towns and communes of Santa Fe and seek the support of those who, in spite of the national panorama, want to count on a voice that will defend the rights of all in Congress.”

On the other hand, Santiaga D’Ambrosio, a nonbinary candidate of the Popular eft ront, e plained to the lade that they believe “the electoral triumph of the ultra-right in

The candidate added “in this sense Milei’s electoral rise implies a concrete risk for queer people, both because of the possibility of regression in terms of rights, Milei’s vice presidential candidate has proposed to repeal equal marriage and sanction a di erent ci il union for ueer couples At the same time she is a militant against comprehensive sex education and the alleged gender ideology.” and interse acti ists are in an e ort to mo ilize voters and raise awareness about the importance of maintaining and strengthening the gains made in equal rights and acceptance of diversity. The general election is shaping up to be an opportunity for Argentine citizens to take a clear position on the political and social direction the country will take in the coming years.

la ia assen io, president of the ederation of Argentina, the most important queer organization in that country, told the Blade that “it is a very worrying result for the right wing in Argentina.”

“The truth is that both the equal marriage law, the gender identity law, as well as many advances that Argentina had, may be at risk with the advances of these candidates if they are actually elected,” lamented Massenzio.

JAVIER MILEI (Screen capture via YouTube)

SANTIAGA D’AMBROSIO says the rise of the ultra-right in Argentina is a threat to social progress. (Courtesy photo)

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PETER ROSENSTEIN

Three House jokers introduce bill to end D.C. Home Rule Congress should instead focus on gun reform

I had to laugh when I read three members of Congress (complete fools) introduced a bill to end Home Rule in D.C. Obviously, they felt comfortable telling 700,000 people they couldn’t run their own government. A government that for years has been better run than Congress. The bill has zero chance of becoming law ut represents another epu lican show of o ensi e arrogance

From 1995 to 2001 there was a federally mandated Control Board overseeing D.C. Since 1997, with the Control Board, and then for more than two decades since it was ended, D.C. has had a balanced budget. When was the last time congress balanced its budget? D.C. today has a budget of about $20 billion, with 36,000 employees, and a triple-A bond rating. Congress is seeing the federal government’s bond ratings going down.

The introducers of the bill clearly have no desire to serve the constituents who elected them, or those in D.C., being much more interested in interfering in other people’s lives; whether it is the people of D.C., the community, or women id these clowns who introduced the ill other to gure out what Congress would have to do if it actually took away Home Rule? Of course not, that would have taken some time, and some brains, which they clearly don’t have. There is nothing in the bill dealing with the aftermath were it ever to pass, but then I guess they always knew it couldn’t.

The bill was proposed by this trio of House Republicans, they said, as a solution to help D.C. reduce crime hey gured repealing the C ome ule ct would do that, letting Congress gure it out he trio was led by freshman Rep. Andrew Ogles (R-Tenn.). Home Rule is the 1973 law that gave D.C. its elected mayor and City Council. There is an added absurdity of having the bill introduced by Ogles who represents the ash ille area of ennessee ennessee s crime rate of per , is the fourth highest in the country. And it might come as a surprise to Ogles, clearly not a very bright representative, that Tennessee often ranks within the top 10 most dangerous states in the U.S., and Nashville is the fourth most dangerous city in ennessee So, would suggest he might spend more time trying to gure out how to take care of his own constituents, those who made a mistake by electing him, before he tries to tell others how to live, or solve, their problems. I don’t know much about the other two clowns who co-sponsored his bill, but one, Byron Donalds is a Republican from Florida, enough said, and the other is Matthew M. Rosendale (R-Mont.). I guess the people of Montana don’t need him to do anything for them so he had nothing else to do.

I agree the District of Columbia, like other major cities, has a crime problem, much of it related to the explosion of guns in the nation. But then the idea Republicans in Congress would do anything to help in this area is idiotic hey would rather do anything they can to keep the guns flowing so in no way would their controlling things make D.C. residents safer.

or the good of the nation, we need to get guns o our streets and the only way to do that is y passing strong gun-control legislation. Don’t hold your breath for Congress to do that. Without even knowing I would bet these three who introduced this bill never met a gun they didn’t like. They are part of the group of epu licans who whene er there is a shooting in their own istrict o er only thoughts and prayers, ut no real help. They do the same whenever there is a mass shooting anywhere in the country, and “according to the un iolence rchi e, there ha e een more than mass shootings in so far, which is de ned as an incident in which four or more ictims are shot or killed

ll this ill does is once again remind the decent, intelligent people of the nation, and am still con dent they are in the majority, that the only way to move our nation forward is to defeat every Republican. As long as the Republican Party is in the grip of Donald Trump and his cult, they will not change, so we need to defeat them all.

is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist. He writes regularly for the Blade.

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I’m a war correspondent, reporting on endless anti-LGBTQ violence

LOS ANGELES - My favorite quote is from former South African President Nelson Mandela’s 1994 autobiography, “Long Walk to Freedom,” in which President Mandela wrote: “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”

These days more-so than ever before, that thought is so true and applicable to the great battles being waged by American conservatives against other Americans. It is an unceasing war where innocents, children mainly, lose their lives and in many cases their souls to the hatred espoused by the right.

I’ve gone from being a political journalist to being a war correspondent reporting on the casualties of this war as good people, decent people, are killed or die by suicide because they have lost all hope.

This past Friday night, a beloved member of a small tightknit community in the San Bernardino Mountains adjacent to Lake Arrowhead lost her life to the hate that has consumed the cultural and political landscape of the United States.

Laura Ann Carleton was murdered by a 27-year-old man, who had been exposed to a steady diet of homophobic and transphobic hatred, lies, and propaganda that culminated in his anger taking the life of Carleton, a mother of nine children in a blended family, a loving wife of nearly three decades, and a beloved business owner who was an integral part of the community of Cedar Lake.

His hatred of the LGBTQ+ community was documented y Sheri s in estigators and ournalists re iewing his social media history and posts.

The reason Carleton was cut down you ask? Because she was an important and steadfast ally of the LGBTQ+ community who proudly displayed her commitment to this esieged minority community y flying the sym ol of its spirit, a Pride flag, pu licly, outside at her place of usiness

She was murdered for flying a Pride lag- let that sink in for a moment.

Canadian writer, journalist, novelist and anthologist ichael owe reflecting on this heinous crime wrote in a Facebook Post on August 21st:

“Quick exercise: take the phrase, “these are good, decent people who simply take issue with the LGBTQIA lifestyle,” and substitute literally any other minority group for “LGBTQIA.” What happens then? When you do that, are they still “good decent people?” Maybe ask Ms. Carleton’s annihilated husband and her now-motherless children

“As for me, I’m tired of the “thoughts and prayers” sop, and I’m tired of bigoted straight people’s primitive religious super-

stitions—pardon me, “religious freedoms”—taking precedence over the safety and freedom of queer people and their allies. And I’m especially bone-tired of the people who hate us being accorded the “good, decent people” designation in “debates” about our humanity, just because, apparently, in the general consensus, “alphabet people” still don’t really rate “

To reiterate and add some terms: an entity (an individual or group or organization) acts as a stochastic terrorist by demonizing a target entity which motivates a third group, the terrorist entity, to carry out a terrorist act against the target. This terrorist scenario is stochastic because with the public demonization of a target, a terrorist act against the target is not certain but is made more likely. It is also stochastic because the identity of the terrorist and the timing and means of the attack cannot be predicted.

et s pin the tail on these ackasses ess than fty miles from Cedar Glen is Chino, California whose school board just passed a policy to require ‘Outing’ trans kids to parents or guardians under the guise of ‘parental rights.’ Never you mind that in most cases those children are not Out to their parents for a damn good reason. The term that best applies here is non-a rming homes

And how did this school board arrive at its decision? A radical right president elected with an anti-LGBTQ+ agenda fed by the lies and propaganda of groups like Florida-based ‘Moms for Liberty.’

Plus, the Chino school board meetings were heavily attended by such “luminaries” as the Proud Boys, a nationalistic white supremacist group which also hates on the LGBTQ+ community. Terms like “groomer,” “paedophiles,” and other such rubbish tossed around during the meetings and in fact by a couple of the speakers- most hiding behind “family moral values” and ‘parent rights.’

ight a match and start a re

I’m in complete agreement with my journalist colleague and likely more so than bone-tired as I have literally like many in the LGBTQ+ movement and community been on the front lines waging this warfare against a segment of society who actually don’t possess a shred of humanity.

Recently, the war has been focused on “parental rights,” directed at the LGBTQ+ community, most especially transgender and queer youth, in a campaign of terrorism designed to erase trans youth from existence. The right wants to forci ly inflict pain and su ering all in the name of their rights as parents to raise their children but the consideration for other people’s children be damned.

These campaigns are at a local level, school boards, state legislati e odies, all in what argua ly is clearly de ned as stochastic terrorism et me uickly trot out the de nition of that term for those unaware:

“Stochastic terrorism is the public demonization of a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable but whose specifcs cannot be predicted. “

Translation: Lone wolf attacks such as the murder of Laura Ann Carleton, fomented by the hate, lies, and propaganda from anti-LGBTQ+ hate groups.

I am NOT claiming that the shooter in the murder of Ms. Carleton is directly related to the actions in Chino, and in fact currently three other Southern California school districts as well. But, what I am saying is that all of this hatred, ampli ed y far-right media, social media, and hate groups has caused stochastic terrorist acts against the LGBTQ+ community to become the norm versus the exception.

Which leaves me to ply my profession as a journalist these days as a combat correspondent, grieving at the losses. Laura Ann Carleton the most recent casualty along with LGBTQ+ kids who have lost hope and died by suicide as they cannot see any victory, normalcy, just being accepted as human beings.

“People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite,” Mandela wrote.

These days, teaching people that Love is Love- will reuire greater e ort and frankly stronger measures to protect the LGBTQ+ community, its allies, and its kids.

Elections matter folks and most assuredly so do words.

People must learn to hate, & if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart…

(Brody Levesque/Los Angeles Blade graphic)

BRODY LEVESQUE is a veteran journalist and the Editor-in-Chief of the Los Angeles Blade.

Mark S. King on new book and surviving HIV and meth y

a ulous isease writer chronicles e periences with humor, honesty

By TIM MURPHY

HIV/AIDS writer Mark S. King, a GLAAD- and National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association award-winning author of the popular log y a ulous isease has published a new book out Sept. 1 that’s a compendium of the blog’s best pieces, as well as pieces he wrote well before the blog, back in the 1990s. Pre-order y a ulous isease Chronicles of a Gay Survivor” at marksking. com/marks-new-book. He’s appearing at the S Conference on S on Sept in C

Diagnosed with HIV in 1985, Mark has taken a lifetime of ups and downs and turned them into a, well, fabulous collection of pithy, witty, often brutally honest and self-critical short essays on everything from how we gay men are so good at shaming and judging one another for all sorts of things to his gay brother’s tale of helping his lover, who was dying of AIDS, end his own life with a Seconal cocktail to what it was like starting his own gay erotic phone line in the 1980s to how he’s morphed into a total top who wants sex only a fraction as often as when he was young. The essays range from quite raw and painful to utterly hilarious. King has that perfect Oscar Wilde/Paul Lynde way with a uip got he Clap so many times that started calling it The Applause.” Or, marveling at how little sexual energy he has currently, at 62, compared to his youth, that these days, “10 minutes is a triumph of passion and stamina.”

I like Mark’s writing because he doesn’t shy away from examining aspects of himself that many of us gay men would rather look away from is anity, narcissism and need for attention. Things he’s done in the past that have hurt people, including family members and lovers. Even what he sees as his own manipulativeness in seducing a 30-year-old man when he was 15 — this in an age when we would almost unanimously agree that all the responsibility for a statutory-rape situation lies with the legal adult, not the child.

TIM MURPHY ark, thanks for talking to me So, you and your husband Michael, a federal healthcare worker, live in Atlanta, yes?

MARK S. KING: As we speak, I’m surrounded by boxes because we’re moving in a few days from an apartment in Midtown to a home in North Decatur. Michael’s currently holed up in his home o ce and he doesn t come out until after e

MURPHY hat s a typical day like for you

KING y cat enry wakes me up around a m , ut fortunately ichael feeds him reakfast and starts the co ee, so I can sleep longer. I stumble out around 7 a.m., have my

co ee and look at my emails r sometimes, if I’m writing something, if the solution I’ve been looking for occurs to me around a.m., I’m at the keyboard making it work e en efore ha e co ee f I’m in the zone like that, I can forget to have breakfast. But then I have my go-to daily conversations with usually two out of three people my rother, ick, who s gay and lives in Shreveport, La., with he ody com writer Charles Sanchez, and with my friend Lynn. Then I go to the gym to work on any part of my body that is visible in a tank top. As long as my chest is igger than my stomach, m ne I play racquetball, so that takes care of the legs. Things like calves, you either have them or you don’t. I know I should be doing yoga and stretching and working on what they call your core, whatever that is. At some point as I age it’s going to be more important to be able to bend over and pick things up, not lift a large weight above my head.

MURPHY o you do steroids

KING ha e don t any more estosterone is not steroids.

MURPHY h, know hy no more steroids

KING ge, and the fact that they can damage your li er and kidneys. It’s also true that taking testosterone has made my prostate the size of a grapefruit, but I haven’t stopped that.

MURPHY hen you rst went on testosterone, did you notice changes in your mood, libido and strength?

KING es, all those things take it ecause it works e een on it for years when m not working out, deflate like a balloon. I feel like the Grindr hookup that doesn’t look like his pictures

MURPHY hat do you do the rest of the day and night KING Play with my cats and write a little it sound like a man of leisure, and kind of am fter ichael nishes work, we cook dinner. I’m a much better cook than I was when I met him.

MURPHY ark, you grew up ouisiana KING y dad was an ir orce o cer so we li ed all o er the place, ut when he retired when was in fth grade m the youngest of six—we moved to Louisiana.

MURPHY hen did you start writing KING wrote silly little stories when was a kid, and then

when I went to work for an AIDS agency in 1986, [the now defunct] L.A. Shanti, it was growing so fast that I became the media guy, the one writing the newsletter and press releases. But it’s only been in the last 20 years that I’ve really been able to identify as a writer. The turning point was when I started writing y a ulous isease consistently Prior to that, d write columns for rontiers and then send them to di erent gay papers around the country who would print them.

Of all the editors I ever worked with, Bonnie Goldman, who founded the S site he ody, challenged me the most. “Why are you saying it this way?” she’d ask. She told me that the more warts, faults and doubts I revealed, the more I’d draw people in. She really worked for me and asked me to write a log for he ody

t was after onnie left he ody that started y a ulous isease d actually started it as a we site to promote my rst book, “A Place Like This,” and my web designer told me to blog on that page to keep it fresh and ring people to it or a long time, I had to keep telling myself, “If you continue to build it, they will come.” Now, in a good month, I’ll get 100,000 hits. I’ll also share my content with Plus, Po it doesn t matter

MURPHY ne thing like a out your writing is that you are ruthlessly honest. What’s been one good and one bad outcome of that?

KING Certainly felt good a out writing a out addiction I wrote a piece about a relapse I had when I was still dealing with its fallout hat felt good ecause su er, as many of us do, with imposter syndrome. I’d think, “If they only saw behind the curtain, that I struggle with drug addiction and have ruined relationships and have all sorts of wreckage in my wake, then they wouldn’t like me anymore.” So to have been able to write that piece only days after coming to—some might say it’s dangerous to write about such a thing so soon, ut my writing is my therapy, my way of sorting out my own feelings. So I wrote it and then pressed the button.

MURPHY n your ook, you ha e se eral pieces written about a decade ago or more about how we gay men tend to shame one another—how HIV-negative men shame positive men by using phrases like “drug- and disease-free” or “clean” and “you be, too,” or how older HIV survivors shame younger gay men for having tons of sex without condoms now that PrEP is available. Do you think in the years since you published those pieces, we’ve become a less shaming community overall?

KING ou re right, wrote a lot of that when social media and hook-up apps were inflaming arious stigmas ay men are remarkably good at shaming our own—we’ve been shamed so much that we’ve developed claws of our own. I haven’t been on hook-up apps the last ten years, so I can only go by conversations I have, which make me think that stigma is alleviating a little bit. But these things are generational. We were raised for decades in mortal fear of sex, which is a really powerful emotion that doesn t ust go away with a scienti c breakthrough like U=U [undetectable = untransmittable, the now-proven fact that people with HIV on meds with undetectable viral load cannot transmit HIV sexually] or PrEP.

(Continues at thecaftanchronicles.substack.com)

‘Every Body’ casts overdue spotlight on intersex lives

Three activists move past childhood dominated by shame

By JOHN PAUL KING

Even within the larger LGBTQIA+ community, intersex people remain something of a mystery for most of us. That’s not meant to start a guilt trip; it’s an observation hinting at the power of the stigma that has kept intersex stories buried in the dusty cabinets of medical research halls even as the other segments of the queer population have been given increased representation – and with it, the chance to express their truth – in the public sphere. Guided by unquestioned assumptions about “natural” e pressions of gender, the scienti c and medical estalishment has long shrouded the facts around intersex people, often even from the parents of intersex children, as they made autocratic decisions about medical procedures to “correct” what they perceived as nature’s “mistake.” How can someone share their truth with the world if it’s always been kept a secret from them, too?

by a choice to disregard medical advice about keeping the reality of their bodies a secret. Now leaders and advocates in a global movement for greater understanding of the intersex community, they share the narratives of the lives that have gotten them there – both the ones that were forced upon them and their families from their birth, and the ones they have written for themselves.

o en within these pro les is a historical tale a out the astly influential yet little-remem ered r ohn Money, a sex researcher whose views on gender became central to institutionalizing a 1950s-era sensibility into accepted medical thought around intersex people; more speci cally, it relates a stranger-than- ction case of medical abuse under Money’s care, featuring exclusive archival footage from NBC News archives, and exposing the fallacies behind medical protocols that continue to linger, unchecked, years after being resoundingly debunked.

It’s through this wide-view look at the context in which intersex people have historically been framed by doctors and psychiatrists that the lm pro okes the most igorous emotional response from audiences, perhaps; the real life-story of a id eimer, su ect of the e periment that would eventually discredit Money’s work, is a heartreaking one, and the footage of the lm s three su ects watching the harrowing interviews the deeply damaged Reimer gave when his story was made public provides some of the movie’s most viscerally moving moments.

Indeed, Cohen’s original concept for the movie was a straightforward exploration of the Reimer case, but after connecting online with eigel, and through them, with allo and all, she changed direction Struck y their commitment to the cause of greater understanding and etter medical care for interse people, she egan lming their activism and their day-to-day lives. As she says in her press notes, hat had started as an archi al documentary ecame a lm ery much set in the present

spawned all those notorious “Change My Mind” memes – on his own platform by challenging their simplistic conceptions about the biology of gender, reminding us of how formidable we can be when we speak from a truth gained through lived experience.

As laid out in “Every Body,” “RBG” director Julie Cohen s documentary pro le of three prominently isi le intersex individuals (now streaming on Peacock after a theatrical release earlier this summer), the answer to that question is that they can only do it by forging a new truth, based in their own experience and independent from the expectations of others.

he lm s three su ects actor screenwriter i er allo (they them), political consultant licia oth eigel (she they), and Ph student Sean Saifa all (he him) have each moved beyond a childhood dominated by shame and secrecy into a thriving adulthood lived as their authentic selves – something only made possible

It’s a shift in approach that focuses the movie on transcendence over trauma. Through the inspirational sagas of its three central gures, ery ody resoundingly emphasizes the empowerment that comes with taking control of one’s own narrative, and the freedom and forgiveness that can blossom in a more fully self-actualized life than the one they were encouraged or even coerced to accept in their younger years atching allo s tender reminiscences with their mother, or hearing all s empathetic acceptance of his now-deceased parents’ choices for him in the face of what they knew or were told, is a welcome contrast to the often strident dialogue we are growing ever more accustomed to encountering around such matters in the public conversation; at the same time, there’s a deeply satisfying thrill that comes in seeing eigel stymie a e as egislature or shut down a isi ly shaken Ste en Crowder the contro ersial conservative comedian and pundit whose signature schtick

It’s scenes like these that overcome the dark weight of a less-enlightened past to help the documentary move into the more hopeful light of today’s active struggle for something better. Having claimed, at last, the autonomy over their own body that was denied them as children, these three are ready to stand and ght for a future in which others like them will never have to face what they and countless intersex people throughout history have had to e perience hen ery ody mo es, nally, into the here and now, it drops us into a community made up of individuals who have found each other in spite of the secrecy, whose willingness to share their truth with each other and with their allies has changed the way a generation of intersex individuals learn to think of themselves. It takes us to a rally designed to bring an end to the age of secretive surgeries performed without consent on individuals too young to decide for themselves, channeling the lessons learned and experience gained from the queer and trans rights movements that came before them to work for a cultural shift toward greater acceptance, inclusion, and understanding. It leaves us feeling assured that the oft-horri c mistreatment and forced conformity of past decades might nally e replaced y the kind of compassionate and informed guidance that everyone deserves when it comes to decisions impacting the very core of their identity. Carefully-structured but organically-flowing, and infused with a sense of purpose that avoids the performative grandstanding of culture warfare to nd the oy that lies ehind the most genuinely persuasive movements for change, Cohen’s documentary makes its statement by leaving us on an “up” note. Unfortunately, like most such documentaries coming into the world now, as virulent antagonism against all segments of the queer community grows ever more ominous, the optimistic tone that may have seemed appropriate at its inception can’t help but feel a bit out of step hat s not a flaw in the lm, ut a gauge of a time that feels a little more precarious than most of us are comfortable with, and when our culture’s long-standing o session with an either or inary construct of gender made painfully o ious y the lm s opening montage of elaborate “gender reveal” party stunts – looks more and more like an immovable wedge.

Still, current moods notwithstanding, the ght must go on, and “Every Body” is the kind of movie that can inspire even the most weary warriors to push forward against the tide of closed-minded bigotry that seems so bent on engul ng our nation

For that reason alone, it comes with our highest recommendation.

Intersex activists SEAN SAIFA WALL, ALICE ROTH WEIGEL, and RIVER GALLO

Meet ‘one of the most powerful disabled people on the planet’

Eddie Ndopu a wizard of advocacy and glam

By KATHI WOLFE

(Editor’s Note: One in four people in America has a disability, according to CDC. Queer and disabled people have long been a vital part of the LGBTQ community. Take two of the many queer history icons who were disabled: Michelangelo is believed to have been autistic. Marsha P. Johnson had physical and psychiatric disabilities. Today, Deaf-Blind fantasy writer Elsa Sjunneson, actor and bilateral amputee Eric Graise and Kathy Martinez, a blind, Latinx lesbian, who was Assistant Secretary of Labor for Disability Employment Policy for the Obama administration are just a few of the people who identify as queer and disabled. Yet, the stories of this vital segment of the queer community have rarely been told. It its series “Queer, Crip and Here,” the Blade is telling some of these long un-heard stories.)

Everything comes full circle: back to Britney Spears for Eddie Ndopu, 32, a queer, Black, disabled man who is a wizard with advocacy and glam.

“I knew I was queer early on,” Ndopu whose memoir “Sipping Dom Perignon Through a Straw: Reimagining Success as a Disabled Achiever“ (Legacy Lit) is just out, told the Blade recently in an extended interview, “though I didn’t have the language for it.”

dopu, whose mother fled from South frica ecause of apartheid, was born in Namibia. At age nine, he and his family moved to Cape Town, South Africa. He was raised by his mother, a single mom.

When he was two, he was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy. He was expected to die from this degenerative disa ility y the time he turned e

Decades later, Ndopu knows what it means to live with declining strength, and the knowledge, that while we’ll all die, he’ll likely die sooner than most of us.

At the same time,through his queerness, disability, and imagination, Ndopu said, he embodies what it’s like to live a fabulous life.

It began when he was a child watching and listening to Spears ritney was the rst pop star encountered as a young boy,” Ndopu said. “She was iconic in so many ways. I adored her! I watched her dance.”

His mother gave him an album by Spears. “It was my thing,” dopu said, he rst thing owned Spears seemed unstoppable to Ndopu. It triggered something in him. “It made me want to be on the global stage,” he said.

Years later, Ndopu empathized with Spears when she fought to be released from the conservatorship she was under from 2008 to 2021.

“Disabled fans, especially, were with Britney in her battle to be free,” Ndopu said, “because often, disabled people, particularly intellectually disabled people, have been denied agency. Have been denied their autonomy.”

We owe Spears an apology, Ndopu said. “It’s analogous to what disabled people go through,” he added, “we’re owed an apology for all the ways in which we’ve been made to endure so much [through ableism].” (This reporter is queer and disabled.)

Since childhood, Ndopu has loved beauty, fashion and glam y rst dream was to e a designer, he said, sketched in art classes in school.”

Ndopu daydreamed about living in the United States –about being based in New York City. He watched the soap opera “The Bold and the Beautiful.” “I didn’t watch for the stories about the characters,” Ndopu said, “I watched for the fashion! It gave me glimpses into a world where I wanted to be.”

But as his disability progressed, Ndopu lost strength in his hands. He could no longer draw. “I had to dream a new dream,” he said, “I knew I wanted to do something extraordinary. I imagined an escape.”

One day, he looked through a magazine and saw a story about a school, the African Leadership Academy, that was going to train young people in Africa to be future leaders. He applied to the school.

“They rejected me. Because they didn’t know what to do with me,” Ndopu said, “I wrote to them and got in.”

“I don’t know if I’d do that today,” but I did then,” he added, “that was my saving grace.”

oing there was dopu s rst ig reak hen he was only in his teens, Ndopu was speaking about disability justice.

After graduating from the Leadership Academy, Ndopu graduated with a bachelor’s degree in interdisciplinary studies from Carleton University in Canada in 2014. In 2017, Ndopu was the rst frican student with a degenerati e disa ility to graduate with a master’s in public policy from the Blavatnik School of Government, Oxford University. Based at Somerville College, Ndopu received a full scholarship from Oxford.

Today, Ndopu, known for his fab oversized, bejeweled sunglasses, is an award-winning global humanitarian and social justice advocate. Time magazine has called him “one of the most powerful disabled people on the planet.”

dopu, ful lling his childhood daydream, now, li es in ew York City.

He is on the board of the United Nations Foundation, a group founded by Ted Turner to support the work of the UN. He works for the UN as a global advocate for sustainable development on issues from climate change to hunger.

Ndopu likes to identify as queer because, he believes, the word “queer” embodies all of his identities – from race to disability to sexuality to being fabulous. “I love to identify as queer,” he said.

In college, Ndopu was infatuated with a guy on the basket all team e was heart roken when his a ections were unrequited. “That was the moment when I fully embraced my ueerness, dopu said, came out with my rst heart reak There was no sitting with it. I went from zero to 100!”

Ndopu became one of the directors at Carleton’s gender and sexuality resource center. He studied queer theory.

There’s a critical contradiction for queer, disabled people, Ndopu believes. At its best, queerness (and the queer community) celebrates the full spectrum of bodies, sexuality and gender from nonbinary to pansexual to two-spirit. “The body is at the center for queer folks,” he said, “that’s something to celebrate.”

On the other side of the coin, though, the queer community doesn’t want to accept, “doesn’t want to have a conversation about bodies that aren’t the socialized idea of the body,” Ndopu said.

That often boils down to ableism toward queer, disabled bodies, Ndopu said. If you’re queer and disabled, you go

through “the tension between acceptance and desire,” Ndopu said.

There are many “inspirational” memoirs by disabled people – tales of “overcoming” disability – of overpowering insurmountable odds.

Thankfully, Ndopu’s memoir doesn t t this bill at all. “Sipping Dom Perignon Through a Straw” is searing and intimate. Ndopu describes his family: what it was like to grow up with an absent father, how oppressed his mother was by apartheid and how loving and caring she was of him. But much of the memoir is focused on his year at Oxford.

For most people, queer, non-queer, disabled or nondisabled, being at Oxford would have been like being in a fairy tale. Like living the fantasy of your life.

For Ndopu, it was a crowning achievement. He had friends, studied what he wanted to study at a renowned university, and, even became student body president of his program.

Yet, from the get-go, his time at Oxford was riddled with ableism. The physical inaccessibility of the buildings was bad enough. But, Ndopu needs help 24/7 with activities of daily life from getting dressed to going to the bathroom. Finding and paying for caregivers at Oxford was a nightmare for him.

“A sharp, illuminating debut memoir,” Publishers Weekly, said of Ndopu’s book, “...Ndopu shines a light on ableism both conscious and unconscious.”

His experience at Oxford made Ndopu realize that being successful wouldn’t protect him from disability-based prejudice and discrimination. Being brilliant wouldn’t guarantee that you’d have a caregiver to help you pee. He came to believe exceptionalism is used against disabled people (and other marginalized groups).

“The idea that we have to be resilient – that if we have enough grit we’ll overcome all obstacles is used to oppress disabled people,” he said.

You might think that, given his shortened life expectancy and experience of ableism, homophobia, and racism, Ndopu would give up hope. But you’d be wrong.

“I’m going to go out like a fucking meteor!” queer and disabled icon Audre Lorde says in the epigraph to Ndopu’s memoir.

“I deliberately chose this quote from Lorde’s Cancer Journals,” Ndopu said, “I hope I’ll die in as close to a transcendent experience as possible.”

No matter what, Ndopu will be fabulous. “It’s not a frivolous thing,” Ndopu said, “being fabulous makes me, visible.”

For too long, queer and disabled people have been invisible, he added.