Washington Blade, Volume 54, Issue 05, February 03, 2023

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Comings & Goings

Swaruup takes role as executive director of DC Legal Aid

By PETER ROSENSTEIN

The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at: comingsandgoings@washblade.com

The Comings and Goings column also invites LGBTQ college students to share their successes with us. If you have been elected to a student government position, landed an exciting internship, or are graduating and beginning your career with a great job, let us know so we can share your success.

Congratulations to Vikram Swaruup on his new position as executive director of DC Legal Aid. Upon accepting the position Swaruup said, “Legal Aid is one of the most important institutions working to make sure all District residents are treated fairly in our legal system, and I could not be more grateful to the board for this tremendous honor. I’m excited to be joining a top-notch team that is on the front lines of fighting for District residents.”

Swaruup has been working in the Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia, as Chief

Deputy Attorney General. He served as second-highest ranking officer and thought partner to the attorney general in management of all legal work of the office, including the District’s affirmative, defensive, and appellate litigation, as well as legal advice provided to District agencies and the legislature. He began working there in the Civil Rights Section, as Assistant Attorney General. He litigated civil rights cases, including investigating pre-suit, drafting complaints, engaging in discovery and motions practice, and developing recommendations for amicus participation.

Prior to that he served in the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Appellate Section, Washington, D.C., as a senior attorney. Before going to the DOJ, he served as a law clerk for Judge Lucy H. Koh, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, San Jose, Calif. He was a summer associate with Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP, Oakland, Calif. He was a Holley Law Fellow with the the National LGBTQ Task Force in D.C., and a Pride Law Fund Fellow with the Transgender Law Center, San Francisco.

Vikram earned a bachelor’s of journalism, with high honors, University of Texas, Austin; and a Juris Doctor,

Bachelor’s Mill bar owner, D.C. philanthropist David Lewis dies at 65

By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com

David J. “Michael” Lewis, who owned and operated D.C.’s popular gay bar Bachelor’s Mill from 2006 to 2018 after taking early retirement from his longtime day job at the Library of Congress and while also playing an active role in working on projects to help disadvantaged youth in the U.S. and overseas, died on Dec. 6 at the age of 65.

Tom Baratta, one of his longtime friends from Florida, said the cause of death was a heart attack, which occurred while Lewis was visiting Havana, Cuba and preparing to distribute food and clothing for people in need.

Baratta said in recent years Lewis traveled between D.C. and his residence in Fort Lauderdale as well as to Cuba and the Dominican Republic, where Lewis provided support for charitable organizations that helped people in need.

“David was very helpful in support of events and programs in Ward 8,” said longtime D.C. LGBTQ rights and community activist Phil Pannell, who said he worked with Lewis on charitable programs in the 1980s.

Among other things, Pannell said Lewis helped provide toys for children and families and support for youth development programs, including serving as an instructor for youth in a high school equivalency or GED program through a nonprofit group affiliated with local churches called the Southeast Vicarious Clusters.

Others who knew Lewis, including longtime D.C. friend Thomas Gore, said Lewis was born and raised in D.C. and graduated from D.C.’s Anacostia High School. Around the time of his high school graduation, he began work at the Library of Congress. At that time, he also enrolled as a student at the University of the District of Columbia, Gore said. Around 1979 or 1980, Gore believes, Lewis graduated from UDC with a degree in gerontology.

Gore, Baratta and others who knew Lewis said they believe he continued working at the Library of Congress through the 1980s and possibly into the 1990s in a supervisory role before he took an early retirement to further pursue his philanthropic endeavors as well as his interest in opening a neighborhood bar.

In 2006, through a company called Backdoor, Inc., he purchased the Bachelor’s Mill, which had been operating as a gay bar with a mostly Black gay clientele since 1978 under the ownership of its founder, Beatrice ‘BB’ Gatch, who passed away in 2021 at the age of 81.

Pannell said Lewis later opened the Back Door Pub and Mike’s Place, two other bars he operated in the same building as the Bachelor’s Mill. Lewis preferred to go by the name Mike or Michael in running his businesses, people who knew him said.

Lewis was supportive of LGBTQ community causes and provided space at the Bachelor’s Mill and the oth -

University of California, School of Law, Berkeley, Calif. During his college years he participated in many activities including: California Law Review (Senior Articles Editor); Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice (Executive Editor); Faculty Appointments Committee (student co-chair); Queer Caucus (outreach chair); and South Asian Law Student Association.

er two bars for meetings and events by local LGBTQ organizations and activists, according to Pannell.

“I knew him for 20 years,” said Baratta, who lives in Boca Raton, Fla., which is near Fort Lauderdale where Lewis had a residence. Baratta said in the years he knew him, Lewis traveled “back and forth” from Fort Lauderdale to D.C. while also visiting Cuba and the Dominican Republic, where he worked on charitable projects. “He helped a lot of people who needed help,” Baratta said.

Gore said Lewis helped him start a youth employment program in 1985 that focused on youth in need in the city’s Wards 7 and 8.

“He taught job readiness classes,” Gore said. “David could think quick on his feet. He had an impact on a lot of lives in D.C.”

A memorial celebration of the life of David J. Michael Lewis is scheduled to take place Saturday, Feb. 4, at 1 p.m. at the Café 8, located at 424 8th St., S.E. in D.C. near where Lewis operated Bachelor’s Mill.

Friends say he supported charitable endeavors here and in Caribbean

VIKRAM SWARUUP

DAVID J. ‘MICHAEL’ LEWIS

Prosecutors drop multiple charges in D.C. gay murder case One count remains for defendant in 2019 stabbing death of Vongell Lugo

By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com

Without providing a reason, prosecutors with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia requested and received approval from a D.C. Superior Court judge on Jan. 23 to drop four of the five pending charges, including two counts of murder, against the man charged with the Jan. 6, 2019 murder of gay retail manager Vongell Lugo.

Court records show that Assistant U.S. Attorney Peter V. Roman asked Judge Marisa Demeo to dismiss four of the five charges handed down in an Aug. 20, 2019, grand jury indictment against former U.S. Navy Hospital Corpsman Collin J. Potter, who was 26 years old when D.C. police charged him with fatally stabbing Lugo at least 47 times.

A single charge of First Degree Murder While Armed remains pending.

An arrest affidavit filed in court states that the murder took place inside Lugo’s Northwest D.C. apartment shortly after the two men met, possibly for the first time, at the Black Whisky bar at 1410 14th St., N.W., and Lugo invited Potter to his apartment.

The arrest affidavit says police arrested Potter on the night of the murder after being called to the apartment building by a neighbor and after observing Potter fully nude standing over Lugo’s nude body that Potter minutes earlier dragged outside the apartment door. Potter has remained in jail since the time of his arrest on Jan. 6, 2019, while awaiting a trial that has repeatedly been

postponed. The trial is currently scheduled for April 18.

Court records show that in response to a motion filed by an assistant U.S. attorney on Jan. 18 of this year, Judge Dameo agreed to drop Counts 1 through 4 of the grand jury indictment. Those charges include Kidnapping While Armed, Felony Murder While Armed (Aggravating Circumstances), First Degree Sexual Assault While Armed, and Felony Murder While Armed (Aggravating Circumstances).

Roman’s motion, which the judge approved, called for leaving in place Count 5 of the indictment – First Degree Murder While Armed (Premeditated) (Aggravating Circumstances).

When contacted by the Washington Blade, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office declined to disclose the reason for the office’s decision to drop the four indictment counts.

“We cannot comment on matters not in the public record,” said spokesperson Patricia Hartman.

Prosecutors sometimes drop or lower charges against a defendant in cases like this in exchange for a plea bargain agreement in which the defendant agrees to plead guilty to a lower charge. Doing so avoids a trial, which prosecutors sometimes feel could result in a verdict of not guilty on all or some of the charges.

The public court records in the case pending against Potter do not show whether a plea bargain offer was

made prior to the dropping of the four charges. Potter’s defense attorney, Matthew Davis, has not responded to attempts by the Blade to reach him for comment on the case.

The next court hearing for the case, a Trial Readiness Hearing, is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 3. The Blade couldn’t immediately determine whether an explanation for why prosecutors chose to dismiss the four indictment counts would be disclosed at the Feb. 3 hearing.

Three juveniles arrested for armed robbery in Dupont Circle area Incidents took place near 17th and 18th street LGBTQ bars

By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com

D.C. police announced on Monday that detectives have arrested three juvenile males for allegedly engaging in four separate armed robbery related offenses on Sunday, Jan. 29, between 9:45 and 10:14 p.m.

Three of the incidents took place on streets in the Dupont Circle neighborhood, including areas where three LGBTQ bars are located.

In a Jan. 30 statement, police said the juveniles assaulted two of the four reported victims in the separate robbery related incidents, but no serious injury was reported.

“On Sunday, January 29, 2023, two 16-year-old juvenile males and a 15-year-old juvenile male, all of Northwest D.C., were arrested and charged with the above offenses,” the police statement says. It lists the offenses as Attempted Armed Robbery, Armed Robbery (Gun), Assault With a Dangerous Weapon (Gun), and Armed Robbery (Gun).

“The 15-year-old juvenile male was additionally charged with Carrying a Pistol Without a License, Possession of an Unregistered Firearm, Possession of Unregistered Ammunition, and Possession of a Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device,” according to the police statement.

“It’s very alarming because these are in the heart of Dupont and the gay core,” said Dupont Circle Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Jeff Rueckgauer.

Police reports for each of the incidents say that none

of them were classified as a hate crime.

The police statement says one of the incidents took place at about 9:50 p.m. on the 1900 block of T Street, N.W., when two suspects, with one brandishing a handgun, approached the victim and demanded the victim’s property. “The victim complied and then one of the suspects assaulted the victim,” the statement says, before the suspects fled the scene in a vehicle. The offense is listed as an Armed Robbery (Gun).

That incident took place a little over one block from the gay bar Larry’s Lounge, which is located at 18th and T St., N.W.

A second of the four incidents took place at approximately 9:54 p.m. in front of 1604 Q St., N.W. , according to a police incident report, when three of the juvenile suspects approached the victim, with one in possession of a handgun. The police incident report says the victim was able to escape from the suspects by entering the building where the incident occurred, the Claridge House Apartments, where the victim lives.

“No injuries were reported,” the separate police statement says. The statement lists the incident as an Assault with a Dangerous Weapon (Gun).

The third incident occurred in front of the nearby apartment building at 1700 Q St., N.W. at about 10:14 p.m. when the three suspects, one carrying a handgun, approached the victim. The police statement says the suspects assaulted the victim, took property from the

victim and then fled the scene in a vehicle. The offense is listed as Armed Robbery (Gun). The incident report says the victim lives in another part of Northwest D.C.

The 1600 and 1700 blocks of Q St., N.W are located within one or two blocks from several bars and restaurants with a large LGBTQ clientele.

The police statement says the fourth incident linked to the three arrested juveniles took place about 9:45 p.m. on Jan. 29 in the 2400 block of Connecticut Ave., N.W. on the Taft Bridge. “One of the suspects brandished a handgun and checked the victim for property,” the statement says. “The suspects then fled the scene without obtaining any property.” The incident is listed as an Attempted Armed Robbery.

One of the police incident reports says police were able to make the arrests after one or more police officers who responded to the locations where the incidents occurred observed the suspects entering a vehicle that was later found abandoned on a D.C. street. Based on descriptions of the suspects “a canvas of nearby Metro stations” resulted in the three suspects being stopped, the report says. Upon conducting a “protective pat-down” police found a handgun in the possession of one of the suspects, the report says.

The police statement and the incident reports do not disclose whether any of the victims were patrons of the many bars, restaurants, or other businesses in the area, including the nearby LGBTQ bars.

VONGELL LUGO was stabbed to death in 2019.

D.C. police data show 67 anti-LGBTQ hate crimes reported in 2022 Community continues to be hit with most bias incidents in city

By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com

Recently released hate crime data by the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department shows that similar to nearly every year since 2011, LGBTQ people in 2022 were victims of a hate crime in far greater numbers than the other categories of victims, such as ethnicity/national origin, race, religion, or disability.

The data show that 45 of the reported hate crimes in 2022 were based on the victim’s sexual orientation and 22 of the reported hate crimes were based on the victim’s gender identity or gender expression, bringing the total number of anti-LGBTQ hate crimes to 67.

By comparison, the 2022 data show that 30 reported hate crimes were based on the victim’s ethnicity or national origin, 20 were based on the victim’s race, and four on the victim’s religion. Three 2022 hate crimes were reported to be based on the victim’s status as a homeless person and just one reported hate crime was said to be based on the victim’s political affiliation.

The 67 reported anti-LGBTQ hate crimes reported in 2022 represent an increase over the 54 anti-LGBTQ hate crimes reported in 2021. The 2021 data show that 38 of the reported hate crimes were based on the victim’s sexual orientation and

16 were based on the victim’s gender identity or gender expression.

LGBTQ rights advocates, as well as law enforcement officials, have said they believe the reported number of hate crimes targeting LGBTQ people and other minorities are significantly less than the actual number of such cases because many go unreported.

“While the District strives to reduce crime for all residents of and visitors to the city, hate crimes can make a particular community feel vulnerable and more fearful,” a D.C. police statement accompanying the release of the hate crime data says. “This is unacceptable and is the reason everyone must work together not just to address allegations of hate crimes, but also to proactively educate the public about hate crimes,” the statement says.

Police and prosecutors have also pointed out that a hate crime is not legally classified as a crime in and of itself but instead as a hate or “bias” related designation to an underlying crime such as assault, threats of violence, destruction of property, and numerous other criminal offenses.

The Washington Blade couldn’t immediately obtain from

D.C. police additional 2022 data showing which underlying criminal acts were linked to the LGBTQ related hate crimes. The Blade has also requested data showing how many of the 67 reported anti-LGBTQ hate crimes in 2022 resulted in an arrest.

In past years, police data have shown that far fewer arrests are made compared to the number of reported hate crime cases. Past data has also shown that the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia prosecutes significantly fewer hate crimes cases than those sent to prosecutors after an arrest has been made.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office has said that it has dropped a hate crime designation for cases on grounds that there was insufficient evidence to prove a motive of hate if the case goes before a trial by jury. Spokespersons for the office have said that when a hate crime designation is dropped, they often continue to prosecute the person arrested for the underlying crime.

A chart showing hate crime data reported by DC police from 2011 through 2022, including all categories of hate crimes, can be accessed at the D.C. police website.

FBI reports ‘explosion’ of teen boys extorted after sending explicit photos, videos

Gay adults targeted on Grindr, other dating sites

By LOU CHIBBARO JR. | lchibbaro@washblade.com

Law enforcement officials led by the FBI and the U.S. Homeland Security Investigations division are reporting an alarming increase in incidents of mostly teenage boys being tricked into sending explicit photos and videos of themselves to online scammers who then attempt to extort money from the young victims.

Spokespersons for the FBI, the Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), which is an arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, where sextortion cases increased dramatically, have told the Washington Blade they so far are unaware of gay teenage boys being targeted for what authorities are calling financial sextortion.

“We have not seen that,” said Catherine Pollicicchio, a spokesperson for the FBI Field Office in Pittsburgh, when asked by the Blade if gay teens were being targeted. “But that doesn’t mean it is not happening. We may not know about it,” she said.

“Homeland Security Investigations has not observed any sextortion investigations that refer specifically to gay teenagers,” said Jason Koontz, a spokesperson for HSI Philadelphia offices.

A spokesperson for the FBI’s headquarters in Washington couldn’t immediately be reached to confirm whether FBI officials are aware of gay teenagers or gay young adults being targeted for sextortion in other parts of the country.

The D.C.-based LGBTQ youth advocacy group SMYAL is also unaware of any gay male teenagers in the D.C. area being targeted for sextortion, according SMYAL spokesperson Hancie Stokes.

But the popular app Grindr reports on its website that adult gay men using Grindr and other gay hookup apps have been targeted for sextortion in ways similar to how the straight teenage boys have been targeted.

The scammers are persuading the gay adult men to send who they believe is someone interested in a possible sexual hookup or a relationship nude or sexually explicit photos or videos of themselves. The scammer then uses the explicit images to blackmail the victim into sending large sums of money to prevent the scammer from releasing the photos or videos to the victim’s family, friends, or employer.

In a Scam Awareness Guide posted on its website, Grindr says that unlike potential straight targets for sextortion, some of the scammers have threatened to out gay men, including bisexual men married to women, by sending their sexually explicit photos or videos to a spouse or other family members.

In yet another means of carrying out sextortion scams, according to Grindr, some of the scammers have set up a fake profile as an underage person. After tricking the victim into sending explicit images the scammer threatens to report the victim to police for soliciting sex with a minor unless a ransom is paid.

The FBI’s national office in Washington issued a “public safety alert” about the increasing number of sextortion cases targeting teenage males in a Dec. 19 press release.

“Over the past year, law enforcement has received over 7,000 reports related to the online financial sextortion of minors, resulting in at least 3,000 victims, primarily boys, and more than a dozen suicides,” the FBI press statement says.

“The FBI has seen a horrific increase in reports of financial sextortion schemes targeting minor boys—and the fact is that the many victims who are afraid to come forward are not even included in those numbers,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray in the FBI statement. “The FBI is here for victims, but we also need parents and caregivers to work with us to prevent this crime before it happens and help children come forward if it does,” Wray said.

“Victims may feel like there is no way out – it is up to all of us to reassure them that they are not in trouble, there is hope, and they are not alone,” Wray said.

The FBI statement says sextortion schemes occur most often through sites where young people interact with each other such as social media, gaming sites, or video chat applications.

“On these platforms, online predators often use fake female accounts and target minor males between 14 and 17 years old, but the FBI has interviewed victims as young as 10 years old,” according to the statement. “Through deception, predators convince the young person to produce an explicit video or photo,” it says.

“Once predators acquire the images, they threaten to release the compromising material unless the victim sends money or gift cards,” the FBI statement continues. “In many cases,

however, predators release the images even if payments are made. The shame, fear, and confusion that victims feel when they are caught in this cycle often prevents them from asking for help or reporting the abuse,” the FBI statement says.

“A large percentage of these sextortion schemes originate outside of the United States and primarily in West African countries such as Nigeria and Ivory Coast,” according to the FBI statement.

Jane Clementi, co-founder and CEO of the Tyler Clementi Foundation, which advocates for programs to prevent bullying, including cyberbullying, targeting LGBTQ youth, said she and the Clementi Foundation, which is a nationwide group, were unaware of any specific gay youth or young adults being targeted for sextortion.

“The fact that this is on the rise is very disconcerting and means it needs to have more media coverage to inform youth and their parents about the harms and how to deal with the situation,” she told the Blade in an email. “My hope would be that we can prevent this situation from happening in the first place.”

Jane Clementi, her husband, and other family members founded the Clementi Foundation in 2010 a short time after their son Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old freshman student at New Jersey’s Rutgers University, took his own life after being victimized by cyber bullying.

Tyler’s suicide drew international attention when news surfaced that his college roommate secretly pointed his laptop computer camera at Tyler’s bed when he learned that Tyler had a date with another young man and the two planned to engage in intimacy in the dorm room. The roommate informed others that he would be broadcasting a live video of Tyler’s intimate interaction with his date over the internet and would be rebroadcasting it later, a development Tyler became humiliated and devastated over after he learned what had happened.

Jane Clementi said that type of cyberbullying and other forms of what she called revenge porn or nonconsensual porn, in which someone uses private images shared with them in confidence while in a relationship and then shares the photos or videos publicly after the relationship ends has been an issue of concern for many years.

State, local LGBTQ elected officials detail how they battle hate ‘Rainbow wave’ ready to make change

By CHRISTOPHER KANE

Just a few months ago, the midterm elections saw a “rainbow wave” with a record-breaking number of LGBTQ candidates elected to public office across the country.

After statehouses and city councils and other legislative bodies opened for new business, however, within weeks it became clear that Americans can expect to see a greater number of anti-LGBTQ bills and policies in 2023 than were introduced in any year in recent memory.

Five LGBTQ officials, both newly elected and reelected, recently connected with the Washington Blade to discuss their observations from the campaign trail and experiences in elected office. They shared reactions to the spate of harmful proposals that have been introduced so far and detailed plans for advancing pro-equality legislation while fighting against anti-LGBTQ policies this year and beyond.

New Hampshire State Rep. Gerri Cannon talked with the Blade earlier this month, and newly elected Trenton (N.J.) City Councilwoman Jennifer Williams responded to written questions last week. First-time officeholders Montana state Rep. Zooey Zephyr and Connecticut State Treasurer Erick Russell, along with returning Colorado Senate Majority Leader Dominick Moreno, each sat down with the Blade last month during the International LGBTQ Leaders Conference in D.C.

The conference was hosted by the LGBTQ Victory Institute, which administers programs and trainings for elected leaders whose campaigns are supported by the LGBTQ Victory Fund political action committee. Former Houston Mayor Annise Parker, who serves as president of the LGBTQ Victory Fund and Institute, also talked to the Blade earlier this month.

So diverse are the identities, backgrounds, experiences and political views of these officeholders that they shatter restrictive notions that LGBTQ candidates must fit into a certain mold or serve only in certain elected positions.

Zephyr, who became the first openly transgender person elected to the deep-red Montana Legislature, told the Blade she was nervous about the prospect of knocking on doors for the first time.

“There’s always that fear as a trans person that it only takes one scary moment,” she said. “But what I found was what I always knew: My community supported me and loved me.”

Many of Zephyr’s constituents, she said, “were excited to see me and to be talking to a trans woman about policy,” as well as LGBTQ issues. Many voters were eager to get into substantive discussions on topics as wonky as how policies concerning solar power might intersect with local unionization efforts, she said.

“What I saw in my community, and what I’ve seen, broadly, across Montana, is first and foremost kindness and community,” Zephyr said.

Russell, who with his election for Connecticut treasurer became the first gay Black man to serve in statewide office, said his constituents were “excited about the fact that they felt they were represented in a campaign” with many voters relating to Russell’s “humble beginnings.”

Voters were also heartened to see a younger candidate running, said Russell, who earned his bachelor’s degree in 2009 and graduated from law school at the University of Connecticut in 2012.

His identity aside, “at the end of the day, we were running a campaign that was built on substance,” he said. And “people want to know that they’re going to have advocates for their communities.”

Likewise, Cannon told the Blade, “I don’t use my status as being a trans person as a lever in most cases. I’m fighting for people in my community; I’m there to do the people’s business, and I just happen to be transgender.”

“I haven’t run into anyone that’s used my status as a trans

person during an election cycle,” said Cannon, who has served in the New Hampshire Legislature since 2018.

“When I ran for City Council here in Trenton,” Williams said by email, we “probably knocked on 3-4,000 doors and spoke with all kinds of people.” The questions she and her team received concerned crime, jobs, public utilities like water and roads, and Williams’ ability to work constructively with other councilmembers, she said.

Williams, who recently became Trenton, N.J.’s first LGBTQ city council member and the state’s first transgender elected official, said that voters did not ask about her gender identity or sexual orientation, nor did they bring up politically divisive topics like policies concerning the participation of trans athletes in school sports leagues or drag queen story hours.

Likewise, since her election to the city council, Williams’ Council colleagues who have been sworn in as well as her atlarge colleagues who won their runoff elections last Tuesday have been supportive — “very much so,” she told the Blade.

At the same time, Williams said she encountered some challenges because of her being a Republican. It “has been an issue with some people who are beyond my immediate circle or who haven’t gotten a chance to know me and support me,” she said.

“Some of my biggest supporters are very well-known local Democrats because they have seen the LGBTQ advocacy work and civic involvement that I have done in the past,” Williams said. “They also have very good ‘ears to the ground’ and trust me, people would tell them if I had come to canvass their neighborhood and if they spoke with me.’”

Williams expressed gratitude for the “endorsement and support” she received for her candidacy from the Victory Fund as well as for her progressive and Democrat supporters, because “they took a chance on believing in me and stuck with me even when they caught some hell for doing so.”

Parker told the Blade there is room for LGBTQ elected officials to make a positive impact even in the most challenging of circumstances.

“We are just as interested in seeing them be who they are and stand up and speak out in their legislatures — whether or not they can pass pro-equality legislation,” she said.

When passing pro-equality policy or batting away harmful policy is difficult, Zephyr said she expects to draw from some of the lessons she learned as an athlete: “if you put in the work, day in and day out, you will see the progress. If you trust that process and do the work, you’ll see the results.”

Most people have nuanced opinions on policy matters and are sincere in their convictions, including legislators who might not support pro-equality bills or the LGBTQ community, she said. “And I trust that if I go into those conversations, — I would even say most — of them” will engage in good faith. “To me, that’s how you change hearts and minds.”

Earlier this month, the Montana Free Press reported that during a sausage making party for Montana lawmakers, Zephyr was caught chatting amicably with Billings Republicans. She later told reporters that she enjoyed the chance to connect with her colleagues outside the Capitol building “to just hang out and talk to someone about where they grew up.”

There can often be more room for diversity, including ideological diversity, among candidates elected to state legislatures because these bodies are typically governed less by the strictures of calcified partisan politics that are difficult to overcome at the national level, Moreno told the Blade.

“It’s vastly more personal,” he said, which means “you do see a lot more cross-party collaboration” in the Legislature.

With his first election to public office in 2012, Moreno, who is gay, became one of the four LGBTQ members of the Col-

orado House of Representatives elected to serve that year, which was hailed by the Denver Post as “a historic first for gays.”

Zephyr and Moreno both discussed how hateful and vitriolic rhetoric informs the development and passage of harmful laws and policies — all factors that raise the likelihood of violence against LGBTQ and particularly trans people.

The painful reality of violence against the community was a top of mind for the officeholders as well as the organizers and attendees of the International LGBTQ Leaders Conference, which fell just a couple of weeks after a gunman killed five people and injured 25 in Club Q, a Colorado Springs, Colo., LGBTQ nightclub.

Moreno recalled that when he first joined the Colorado Legislature 10 years ago, as he and his colleagues were debating a bill concerning conversion therapy, “some Republican members associated being LGBTQ with being an alcoholic.”

“I took an opportunity to have a conversation with them to let them know how offensive that rhetoric is,” Moreno said. “What I think the Club Q tragedy will do is remind people to be more careful with their language, because I do think that the kind of very hateful rhetoric we’re seeing today has played a role in the instigation of violence against minority communities.”

There are some extreme state legislators in New Hampshire, Cannon said, noting last year’s proposal by Republicans to secede (in the language of the bill, New Hampshire “peaceably declares independence” from the U.S. “and proceeds as a sovereign state.”)

Asked whether these lawmakers are a “lost cause,” Cannon did not hesitate: “I would absolutely use that term,” she said, comparing them to committed anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists. “They really don’t care for LGBT people; they don’t want to learn.”

However, Cannon said, “I’ve talked to Republicans who are favorable who have gotten to know trans people in the Legislature.”

Russell stressed the importance of representation: “I think the important piece is electing folks to office who are committed to fighting for our values.”

For her part, Williams joins the City Council at an interesting juncture. Following a series of ugly incidents in which previous members displayed “anti-LGBTQ bigotry and anti-Semitism,” a few years ago, “our city was crying for new start and a new City Council that would welcome, respect and affirm everyone,” she said.

CONTINUES ON PAGE 14

State and local LGBTQ officials. (Photos courtesy of the LGBTQ Victory Institute)

Local LGBTQ officials detail their fight against hate

Williams added that while she hopes Trenton will never again face that kind of scandal — partly because it happened when the members were working remotely and in-person meetings tend to discourage officeholders from making hateful comments to each other — “I am confident that all six of my colleagues will have my back if anything happens.”

In the legislature, consistent with the approach she has employed in her prior work as an activist, Zephyr said she expects to focus her work on “making sure that we are taking action behind the scenes” to make sure each measure carrying a pro-equality message also carries a pro-equality impact.

For example, she said, passing a nondiscrimination ordinance is commendable, but when residents have cause to file a complaint, is there an accessible and effective means for them to do so?

Among the work Zephyr has done since she was seated has been the introduction of bills to ban the “gay and trans panic defense” and protect same-sex adoptive parents. She has also been a vocal critic of her Republican colleagues’ move to table Democrats’ proposal to allow police to temporarily take firearms from those deemed by a court as a danger to themselves or others.

The Club Q shooting provides for the opportunity for Colorado to build upon its already strong gun safety laws, such as by passing an assault weapons ban and achieving universal implementation of the state’s “red flag law,” Moreno told the Blade, adding that “we’re going to explore some of that in this next [now current] legislative session.”

Democratic state lawmakers in Colorado introduced an assault weapons earlier this month. With expanded Democratic majorities in both chambers of the state legislature serving with Democratic Gov. Jared Polis, who is gay, the state is in a position to pass more progressive legislation across the board, Moreno said.

In New Hampshire, Cannon has proposed a bill to make it easier for residents to change the sex listed on their birth records, having previously introduced the proposal to allow for people to change the sex listed on their driver’s licenses and state-issued IDs with the option to check a box for “nonbinary.” Republican Gov. Chris Sununu signed that bill into law and it went into effect in 2020.

Despite his support for that proposal, Cannon said Sununu pushed back against a previous version of her birth records bill because it had included an option to identify as nonbinary. She told the Blade she has reintroduced the measure this year without that provision, with the expectation that its success will provide for an opportunity to make it more inclusive in the future.

In her position on the school board, too, where until recently she served concurrently, Cannon focused her approach on working towards incremental change — voting, for instance, for a proposal that allows students to use restrooms and facilities that align with their gender identities even though it requires parental permission, therefore excluding trans students who are not out and supported at home.

“Getting that policy in place will open the door in the future” for a more inclusive policy, Cannon said.

Another bill introduced by Cannon, which was modeled after California’s, would make New Hampshire a sanctuary for LGBTQ families to escape prosecution in states that have criminalized parents for facilitating their children’s access to medically necessary and guideline directed medical treatments for gender dysphoria.

Parker noted that these types of bills were a major topic discussed by LGBTQ legislators when they convened for programs hosted by the Victory Institute.

Republicans, meanwhile, including Cannon’s GOP colleagues, are continuing to advance proposals to outlaw

healthcare for minors for the treatment of gender dysphoria.

“I’m speaking out against the [GOP’s] healthcare bill, flagging it as discriminatory and in violation of HIPPA rights,” Cannon said, referring to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, which prohibits the disclosure of sensitive health information without the patient or guardian’s consent or knowledge.

“You have to be able to use medical information to prosecute a family [for facilitating access to gender affirming healthcare],” Cannon said, adding constitutional issues might also be raised under the Fifth Amendment’s protection against self-incrimination.

Cannon is confident she will be able to convince enough of her Republican colleagues to table the bill so it never reaches a vote, adding that she expects Sununu would veto the proposal should it ever reach his desk.

Williams told the Blade that apart from bringing back Pride weekend celebrations that were on pause during the pandemic, Trenton does not have any LGBTQ-specific policy matters on the horizon.

“I think that is due to our being the capital of a very protective state that has strong LGBTQ protections written into law,” she said.

At the same time, she said, “my lived experience as a LGBTQ person informs me in many ways that correlate with the experiences of other marginalized groups,” Williams said.

“From issues ranging from youth homelessness to economics to law enforcement, LGBTQ people can bring much to government and its decision-making that can benefit everyone,” she said.

Likewise, Russell said, “being an advocate for LGBTQ rights and issues is going to be something that I will continue to do in my role” as treasurer. “But I think the there are opportunities for there to be overlap with a lot of different things.”

For instance, the attacks on LGBTQ rights come alongside efforts to abridge women’s reproductive freedoms. “One of the policies that I built through the campaign and worked with some legislators and nonprofits on was the creation of a safe harbor fund within the treasurer’s office,” Russell said.

“It would ultimately be a fund that we would put in place, and it would be used to help individuals traveling from anti-choice states who needed to access safe reproductive health care,” he said.

Other matters on Russell’s agenda will impact all residents in Connecticut, policies like “baby bonds, which was passed in our Legislature,” and will provide publicly funded trust accounts for every new child. Another priority is “expanding financial literacy programs so that we [will] have young folks who are coming out of school who know how to manage money,” he said.

Whatever their putative purpose might be, Cannon stressed that the impact of anti-LGBTQ legislation proposed by her colleagues is often a solution in search of a problem — a message that was echoed by Parker and Williams.

“In New Hampshire, the trans population is one-tenth of one percent,” she said. Nevertheless, “We have people trying to put forth legislation against the trans community when we’re such a small community of people.”

Likewise, regarding the debate over her proposal to allow residents to change the gender listed in their birth records, Cannon said, “the number of people born in the state who want to change their birth records is incredibly small,” while, “many of us who were born outside the state already had our information changed.”

Zephyr stressed the ways in which anti-LGBTQ bills are based on lies about LGBTQ people.

She pointed to a proposal in the Montana Legislature that would prohibit minors from attending drag shows, which

comes from the baseless smear propagated on the right that organizers of and participants in all-ages drag performances are sexually abusing or exploiting children.

Bills like these are “not a matter of logic or facts or information,” Parker told the Blade, but rather are intended as politically motivated attacks on the LGBTQ community. It’s “political theatre” cooked up by “right wing think tanks that circulate these bills to legislators around the country,” she said.

Russell noted how unpopular these policies are, broadly speaking. “Republicans are really using these campaigns to target trans kids, for instance, or to create these kinds of social wars around issues that the large majority of Americans believe that people should have the freedom and right to be who they are, and love who they love, and express themselves how they want to,” he said.

Williams sees both political opportunism and sincere bigotry motivating these anti-LGBTQ proposals: “There is definitely some hard-core prejudice behind some of these bills, but for many of these bills’ sponsors I believe they feel that they have put forth anti-LGBTQ legislation because they think they need to do so for their ‘conservative street cred’ and to raise money or gain a few percentage points in a primary.”

“There are definitely some Republican legislators who believe their legislation will solve problems that don’t exist,” Williams said. “I also learned that there are more moderate Republicans willing to push against such bad legislation, but they need support to help defend themselves when they get attacked for supporting LGBTQ people and in particular, trans kids.”

Parker has had first-hand experience dealing with anti-LGBTQ legislation when serving as mayor of Houston from 2010-2016, during which time, as an out lesbian, she was one of the first openly LGBTQ mayors of a major U.S. city.

In 2015, when voters repealed a broad nondiscrimination ordinance that included sexual orientation and gender identity, “it was about fear,” Parker said, stoked in large part by “the smear that trans women are sexual predators.”

She added that the effect of anti-LGBTQ bills can be both harmful and performative at the same time, pointing to efforts by conservative lawmakers to ban books that contain LGBTQ characters or themes.

“We [in the the LGBTQ community] have fought so hard to have affirming depictions of our lives in books and other media, so, to have books about LGBT lives removed from school libraries is really frustrating,” Parker said.

Particularly after the bills addressing “performative culture war stuff,” including book bans, are signed into law, she said, it often becomes clear that their proponents had failed to consider what that their implementation will look like in practice, perhaps in many cases because they did not expect the proposals to succeed in the first place.

From anti-LGBTQ laws to the onerous abortion restrictions that have been passed by many conservative states, GOP legislators are discovering the unintended and unforeseen consequences of poorly-construed policies and suffering the backlash from voters, Parker said. “It’s like the dog who chased the car.”

Montana state Rep. ZOOEY ZEPHYR (Photo courtesy of the Victory Institute)

Santos to step down from committee assignments

Republican Rep. George Santos (N.Y.) told House GOP colleagues on Tuesday that he will step down from his two committee assignments pending the resolution of investigations and possible law enforcement activity over his alleged financial crimes and violations of campaign finance laws.

Santos, who was appointed to the House Small Business and Science, Space and Technology Committees, neither of which are considered high profile, announced his recusal during a closed-door session following his meeting on Monday with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).

The news marks the first sign that the many scandals with which Santos has been enveloped since his arrival in Washington may have fractured his relationships with House Re-

publican leadership.

Last weekend, the Justice Department reportedly asked the Federal Election Commission to yield to the federal prosecutors probing Santos’ campaign finance activity, a likely signal that a criminal investigation is underway.

Santos is also the subject of a complaint filed to the House Ethics Committee as well as parallel investigations conducted by the Nassau County District Attorney’s Office and the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James.

The congressman has faced calls to resign, including from members of his own party, since it was revealed last month that he had fabricated virtually every part of his identity and biography.

CHRISTOPHER KANE

Ukrainian ambassador highlights support for LGBTQ rights

Ukrainian Ambassador to the U.S. Oksana Markarova on Jan. 26 spoke in support of LGBTQ and intersex rights during an event that highlighted her country’s LGBTQ servicemembers.

“(The) LGBTQ+ community is an inseparable community of us, whether it’s here or in Ukraine,” said Markarova. “The faster we can stop any discrimination, the faster we will win, not only in the battlefield in Ukraine, but we also will win globally.”

Markarova spoke during a photo exhibit at Ukraine House that showcased LGBTQ and intersex Ukrainian servicemembers.

QUA – LGBTQ Ukrainians in America, the Ukrainian Union of the LGBT Military and KyivPride organized the exhibit that features photographs from Alim Yakubov, a Crimean Tartar who moved to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, after Russia annexed the peninsula in 2014.

KyivPride Executive Director Lenny Emson, QUA – LGBTQ Ukrainians in America President Bogdan Globa and U.S. Agency for International Development Senior LGBTQI+ Coordinator Jay Gilliam are among those who spoke alongside Markarova.

Viktor Pylipenko, an openly gay Ukrainian servicemember who founded the Ukrainian Union of the LGBT Military, spoke via a video from the frontlines of Russia’s war against his country. A Russian missile attack forced him to end his

remarks and seek shelter.

“I want to thank all of them for their service to country,” said Markarova. “It’s unbelievable and (the) ultimate sacrifice to be there in harm’s way.”

Markarova also described Globa as “a leader for all Ukrainians here” and said she is “really thankful for all the activities that we do together, and everything that you do.” Globa

later told the Washington Blade that Markarova is the first Ukrainian ambassador to speak at an LGBTQ-specific event in the U.S.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2021 pledged Ukraine would continue to fight discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity after he met with President Joe Biden at the White House. Zelenskyy last summer said he supports a civil partnership law for same-sex couples. Russia on Feb. 24, 2022, launched its war against Ukraine.

Markarova praised Emson and Kyiv Pride and other Ukrainian LGBTQ and intersex rights groups that include Gender Z and Insight.

“Thank you for everything you do in Kyiv, and thank you for everything that you do in order to fight the discrimination that still is somewhere in Ukraine,” said Markarova, speaking directly to Emson. “Not everything is perfect yet, but you know, I think we are moving in the right direction. And we together will not only fight the external enemy, but also will see equality.”

“It’s a constant fight,” added Markarova. “It’s a fight that makes us better. It’s a fight that makes us freer, and it’s a fight that ultimately will give us the opportunity to live in the country where everyone again, regardless of their nationality, religion, color of their skin or sexuality, can live where they want to live.”

MICHAEL K. LAVERS

LGBTQ groups commemorate 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade

The U.S. Supreme Court on Jan. 22, 1973, issued its Roe v. Wade ruling that ensured the constitutional right to an abortion for all American citizens. The Supreme Court last June overruled the landmark decision.

Fifty years later, LGBTQ activists were among those who commemorated Roe, despite the fact the Supreme Court has overturned it.

Roe’s legal premise relied heavily upon the right to privacy that the 14th Amendment provided; however, legal experts argued that it was a vague interpretation of the amendment.

Vice President Kamala Harris last Sunday delivered remarks on Roe’s anniversary in Tallahassee, Fla., saying most “Americans relied on the rights that Roe protected.”

“The consequences of the Supreme Court’s ruling are not only limited to those who need reproductive care,” said Harris. “Other basic healthcare is at risk.”

The overruling of Roe put into question the security of other long-held precedents, such as Obergefell v. Hodges,

the 2015 case that legalized same-sex marriages, and Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 decision that legalized interracial marriages, because they rely on the same right to privacy that upheld Roe.

In that same speech, Harris announced President Joe Biden would issue a presidential memorandum to direct all government departments to ensure access to abortion pills at pharmacies.

“Members of our Cabinet and our administration are now directed, as of the president’s order, to identify barriers to access to prescription medication and to recommend actions to make sure that doctors can legally prescribe, that pharmacies can dispense, and that women can secure safe and effective medication,” Harris affirmed.

LGBTQ organizations and other human rights groups continue to work to protect reproductive rights.

Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson said she found it intolerable that “an extremist set of judges” had taken away an important right not only for women, but also

nonbinary people, trans men, and the entire LGBTQ+ community.

“Because we know that reproductive rights are LGBTQ+ rights, and that so many in our community rely on access to abortion care and other reproductive health services,” said Robinson in regard to Roe’s 50th anniversary. “The ripple effects of this decision will impact the most marginalized among us the most, and we cannot stand for that.”

“Overturning Roe v. Wade was the first time in history that the Supreme Court has taken away rights, and we know that they will not stop there,” added Robinson. “This is a dangerous turning point for our country, and we have to affirmatively defend against this assault.”

Equality Florida showed its support of Roe by standing alongside Harris during her Tallahassee speech with several other lawmakers and activists. It also denounced Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’s anti-abortion policies, as well as the Florida Legislature. ANDRÉS I. JOVÉ

Ukrainian Ambassador to the U.S. OKSANA MARKAROVA speaks at Ukraine House on Jan. 26. (Blade photo by Michael Key)

Rep. GEORGE SANTOS (R-N.Y.) (Screenshot via YouTube)

PETER ROSENSTEIN

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

Merriam-Webster dictionary gives various definitions for the word “queer” but also notes: “ The term is also prominent as a neutral term in academic contexts that deal with gender and sexuality. Current neutral and positive uses notwithstanding, the word’s long history of pejorative use continued into the current century, and some people still find the word offensive in any context.” I don’t find the term offensive in any context, but do find it offensive when those not members of the LGBTQ community use it to refer to places I go, or to the community I am a member of.

I recently wrote a letter to the Washington Post based on my reaction to the sub-headline of a column appearing on the front-page of their Style section. It read: “After a year of intensified anti-LGBTQ attacks across the country, queer bars, community centers and gay-owned businesses are rethinking how to best protect themselves.” I was offended by their use of the term ‘Queer’ when referring to our bars and indirectly to our community. The author of the column, Anne Branigin, used it to refer to two bars in Adams Morgan owned by a friend — Pitcher’s and A League of Her Own. I asked this friend if he refers to his bars that way and he said no.

My reaction to this word may be a generational thing. But even if that is the case, I would still ask why the Washington Post would feel comfortable, and find it necessary, to use it in a headline and column, not quoting someone in the community using it, when it still offends many of their readers. I would think the majority of their LGBTQ readers, and likely all readers, are of an age who will be offended.

When growing up there were many reasons I remained closeted. One was knowing if I came out I would be branded as a “faggot” or “queer.” At the time, those terms were used interchangeably. The word queer was directed in a negative way at any guy who was slightly different, maybe effeminate, even if they weren’t gay. It you were gay you certainly didn’t want anyone calling you that. It is a term still used today to insult members of the LGBTQ community by many who oppose any kind of equality, or acceptance, of the community. Today, with the increase in hate crimes against the LGBTQ community, it is being used and can be used, to prove a hate crime. I feel strongly the media, and those not members of the community, should not be adopting a word still used to slander the community. While it may seem cool or ‘woke’ to some, it is important to recognize to many it is still a very offensive word.

Hate crimes are rising against so many minorities along with the increase in anti-Semitism. The media should be careful not to use words offensive to members of the Asian community, or the African-American community. I understand younger members of the LGBTQ community are getting much more comfortable with the word queer and using it often. Recently I heard a young member of the disability community refer to himself and a friend as “gimps.” Having worked in that community for many years I was amazed at its usage. But again, they were using it with each other. No media outlet would or should ever consider using such words when reporting on or writing about those communities. The same would go for words a Jewish person might consider using with another Jewish person, within the community.

Following my initial visceral reaction to the headline, I began asking some of my friends in the LGBTQ community, and some straight friends, their thoughts on the word. It led to some interesting discussions. I also found some of my younger friends never realized it had been used to debase and attack the community.

Many of my older friends, and straight friends, had a similar reaction to it that I did. They had heard younger people using it and were as surprised as I was to find some young people in our community had no idea about its history. They were willing to accept young people might use it among themselves within the community but were also appalled the Washington Post thought it was OK to use it in describing something in the LGBTQ community as they still saw it as a derogatory term and one of hate.

To many, being referred to as ‘queer’ remains offensive Washington Post erred in using the term in a recent headline

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The price of freedom and criminalization of poverty

Right to be treated fairly by institutions that govern remains elusive

As we honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s legacy, it is important to recognize that civil rights battles continue in ways that are often unseen.  The right to be treated fairly and equitably by institutions that govern this country remains an elusive concept more than 50 years after his death.

One place where unseen injustice occurs every day in mass proportions is in our criminal legal system which irreparably harms millions, including those held in jail detention before trial.

People have been led to believe that those arrested on suspicion of a crime are innocent until proven guilty. But this is simply not true. Statistics make clear that the presumption of innocence is reserved for those with access to money.  There are approximately 400,000 people in this country who are being held in cages while awaiting trial every day.

In Los Angeles, home to the largest jail system on the planet, it is estimated that 46% of the 14,000 people held in jail are being detained pretrial, often for days and weeks, before receiving an attorney or seeing a judge.  That’s 6,440 people! And it’s been estimated that about 72% of those detained pretrial are there because they can’t afford bail. That’s 4,600 Angelenos unnecessarily, and unjustly separated from their children, their families and their lives.

While the separation from your community is awful enough, the extreme and life-threatening harms that people face while in jail  pretrial is also a crucial part of these less visible stories.

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BIPOC and LGBTQ+ people are disproportionately impacted by this systemic injustice. Over 85% of people in LA jails are BIPOC. LGBTQ+ people are twice as likely to be arrested relative to the rest of the population.  A survey of incarcerated LGBTQ+ people revealed that 74% of those interviewed were incarcerated simply because they couldn’t afford the price of freedom.

The battle against this egregious system of poverty punishment is not new, but it has once again come into the spotlight in LA, in part because of the unrelenting work of those most impacted and advocates.  We refuse to let our communities continue to suffer these harms. We continue to fi ght because we see how progress can be undermined when government actors disregard court rulings.

For instance, the California Supreme Court ruled that the state’s money bail system violates due process and equal protection in what is commonly referred to as the Humphrey decision. And while many may have expected to see movement towards a different and better reality for LA, 15 months later the LA Superior Court reinstated one of the most expensive bail schedules in the country. It did so in spite of the CA Supreme Court decision and without any evidence that secured bail improves public safety.

In fact, empirical literature has concluded just the opposite. So, we must acknowledge that even a decision by the state Supreme Court does not immediately turn the tide and can, in some cases, have little impact on what is practiced.

Angelenos must care about and commit to something different for anything to change. Supervisor Hilda Solis and former Supervisor Sheila Kuehl exemplifi ed this type of care and commitment in 2021 when they co-authored two motions — unanimously passed by the full Board — that support the Supreme Court decision, activating county resources to address the problem that cash bail and pretrial detention poses.

But even with this support, actual change for the people in pretrial detention remains unrealized. That’s why Civil Rights Corp and Public Justice’s Debtors’ Prison Project, with a coalition of concerned lawyers and faith leaders, fi led a class action lawsuit on Nov. 14, 2022 on behalf of six individuals jailed in LAPD and LASD stations and jails for fi ve days before seeing a lawyer or judge. They could not afford to pay preset money bail as required by LA County’s bail schedule, which assigns monetary amounts based on arrest charges before people are given any hearing in court.

In most cases, these charges were reduced or dropped once a prosecutor reviewed the case and the individuals were ordered released at their fi rst hearing. The case alleges that this bail schedule policy is illegal.

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“Our clients can’t afford to pay for housing, let alone the thousands of dollars police demand for their freedom. But they are not too dangerous to release: they would be set free right away if they could pay. They are jailed only because they do not have money. Through this case, they have decided to stand up to LA’s cruel and senseless system of cash-based jailing,” says Civil Rights Corps attorney Salil Dudani.

“Under LA County’s system, a person arrested for a less serious crime is locked up solely because she can’t pay, while another person arrested for a more serious crime is set free because he can afford bail. This is the defi nition of wealth discrimination, and it has no place in our society or our legal system,” says Debtors’ Prison Project Director Leslie Bailey.

The current problems with pretrial detention and the LA bail system validate Dr. King’s fears about the future. “Until we commit ourselves to ensuring that the underclass is given justice and opportunity, we will continue to perpetuate the anger and violence that tears the soul of this nation. I fear I am integrating my people into a burning house,” King said.

If we take this seriously, we must care for people in our communities who live in poverty and most importantly continue to put out the fi re before the house burns beyond repair.

To learn more about pretrial detention, the cash bail system and how to get involved in Los Angeles, visit The Bail Project or Justice LA.

Valentine’s gifts for the queers you love Elevated chocolates, top-shelf liquors, and more

Spread the love this Valentine’s Day with these festive, fun, and sometimes frisky gifts to fill all your special someone’s hearts with happiness and appreciation.

Love Script Pillows

PillowScript’s royal-hued love script pillows – in muted green, red, blue or gray – imbue your personal space with optimism, openness and a velvety softness smoother than Cupid’s bare bottom. $50, PillowScript.com

Tale as Old as Time

At once slim and sleek, the Vincero Kairos and Eros Petite mesh and leather-banded watches look stunning on a beauty or a beast. $99-$178, VinceroCollective.com

Fondue Feasts

You dip, she dips, they dip bite-size savories and sweets into BOSKA’s cheese and chocolate fondue sets equally suited for a sophisticated date night at home or as the centerpiece of a ’70s-inspired Galentine’s party. Better dust off the orgy lamp. $33-$44, USA.Boska.com

Covered in Love

Kisses and hugs and on-the-couch snugs are instantly cozier in Sunday Citizen’s XOXO throw or the Mamas Blanket x Calhoun & Co.’s pink-and-red girl-power blanket for wrapping up near-and-dear babes and broads. $170, SundayCitizen.co; $138, AustinMotelStore.com

Playboy Pleasure

You might assume that a synonymous-with-sex brand like Playboy would already have a leg (or two) up on the adult-toy industry, but its recently launched, first-foray Playboy Pleasure line couldn’t be rushed: The inaugural collection includes vibrators with heating, tapping, and thrusting functions; a spinning butt plug; multi-motor cock rings; toys with flickering tongues; solo strokers, and a first-of-its-kind flapper shaft for the G-spot. You’re gonna need a bigger tarp. $26-$200, LoversStores.com

Chinola x Vesta Chocolate

Skip the Stover’s and improve your chocolate-gifting game with limited-edition Chinola bonbon and ganache chocolates, the meltin-your-mouth collab between Dominican-sourced Chinola Passion Fruit Liqueur and Vesta

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Chocolate, co-founded by Chef Roger Rodriguez. $25$48, VestaChocolate.com

Lace Charms

Customize your kicks with splashes of sparkle when you outfit their laces with burnished beads and baubles – like Lace Charms’ Digital Pink Bundle, featuring gold stars and rosy bling-blings – fit for sneakerhead kweens and king-kings. $30-$75, LaceCharms.com

Happy Juice

You’ll get your lips kissed when you twirl a Sunkist on the stylish Verve Culture artisan citrus juicer (available in gold, rose gold, and black), your new go-to hand-operated appliance that gilds the lily of an already decadent holiday brunch in bed. $98-$150, VerveCulture.com

Power Flowers

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Gas You Up

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Big AND Beautiful Lizzo launched a thousand hips with her body-positive lyrics and lifestyle, and you can continue that self-satisfying trend with Le Chic Miami’s hand-painted, more-to-love basswood Venus hoop earrings, available in three everywoman skin tones. $27, LeChicMiami.store

All the Restaurants

Former New Yorker magazine editor turned self-taught artist John Donohue recognizes that most Americans’ first dates take place at restaurants (Starbucks is #1 while In-N-Out Burger clocks in at #2, according to a survey of Clover app users), which is why he’s made it his mission to commemorate the occasion with signed, limited-edition

prints of your fave romantic dining destinations, including Manhattan’s 12 Chairs Café and Abilene Bar, Jaleo in D.C., and London’s Noble Rot. $95, AllTheRestaurants. com

Bye-Bye Dry January

Build a more discerning home bar in 2023 with a curated selection of luxury liquors, including Empress 1908 and Jaisalmer gins, Rampur Double Cask and Bearface Triple Oak whiskies, Tequila Ocho Plata, and L’etoile du Nord vodka. Prices vary, Drizly. com; TotalWine.com

Jaisalmer

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.75 oz Cocchi Torino Vermouth

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One Love

Dateless for V-Day? Toast your single status – self-imposed independence should be celebrated (just ask Shakira) – with a bottle of Beau Joie Rosé Champagne and poppable Doughp cookie dough bites, in upbeat flavors like Cinnamood, Brownie Beast, Cookie Monsta, and Red Velvet Vixen. $135, TotalWine.com; $12-$16, Doughp. com

(Mikey Rox is an award-winning journalist and LGBTQ lifestyle expert whose work has been published in more than 100 outlets. Connect with Mikey on Instagram @ mikeyroxtravels)

CALENDAR |

Friday, February 03

Center Aging: Friday Tea Time will be at 2 p.m. on Zoom. This is a social hour for older LGBTQ adults. Guests can bring their beverage of choice. For more information, email adamheller@thedccenter.org.

GoGay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Social” at 7 p.m. at The Commentary. This event is ideal for making new friends, professional networking, idea-sharing, and community building. For more details, visit Eventbrite.

Saturday, February 04

Virtual Yoga Class with Jesse Z. will be at 12 p.m. online. This is a weekly class focusing on yoga, breath work, and meditation. Guests are encouraged to RSVP on the DC Center’s website, providing your name, email address, and zip code, along with any questions you may have. A link to the event will be sent at 6 p.m. the day before.

LGBTQ People of Color Support Group will be at 1 p.m. on Zoom and in person at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. This peer support group is an outlet for LGBTQ people of color to come together and talk about anything affecting them in a space the strives to be safe and judgement free. For more details, visit thedccenter. org/poc or facebook.com/centerpoc.

Sunday, February 05

GoGay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Coffee + Conversation” at 12 p.m. at As You Are. This event is for those looking to make more friends in the LGBTQ community and trying to meet some new faces after two years of the pandemic. This event is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.

Afrocode DC will be at 4 p.m. at Decades DC. This event is an experience of non-stop music, dancing, and good vibes. Tickets are $40 and can be purchased on Eventbrite.

Monday, February 06

Center Aging Monday Coffee and Conversation will be at 10 a.m. on Zoom. LGBT Older Adults — and friends — are invited to enjoy friendly conversations and to discuss any issues you might be dealing with. For more information, visit the Center Aging’s Facebook or Twitter.

Not Another Drag Show will be at 8 p.m. at Dupont Italian Kitchen. Logan Stone will host the show and there will be a rotating cast of local performers from the DMV. Tickets are free and can be accessed on Eventbrite.

Tuesday, February 07

“Beyonce: Baltimore Renaissance Happy Hour” will be at 5 p.m. at RYMKS Bar & Grille. There will be food, hookah and Beyoncé-inspired drinks. Admission is free and more information is available on Eventbrite.

By TINASHE CHINGARANDE

Wednesday, February 08

Job Club will be at 6 p.m. on Zoom. This is a weekly job support program to help job entrants and seekers, including the long-term unemployed, improve self-confidence, motivation, resilience and productivity for effective job searches and networking — allowing participants to move away from being merely “applicants” toward being “candidates.” For more information, email centercareers@thedccenter.org or visit www.thedccenter.org/ careers.

“Foxxy Moron Comedy Hour Open Mic” will be at 7 p.m. at Crazy Aunt Helen’s. This is a new comedy open mic hosted by Andy Waterworth and Bailey Vogt. Admission is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.

Thursday, February 09

The DC Center’s Fresh ProduceProgram will be held all day at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. People will be informed on Wednesday at 5 p.m. if they are picked to receive a produce box. No proof of residency or income is required. For more information, email supportdesk@thedccenter.org or call 202-682-2245.

“Wasted & Gay Thursdays” will be at 9 p.m. at Wasted Lounge. This event will be hosted by Nelly Nellz and there will be music by DJ RO. Tickets are $5 can be purchased on Eventbrite.

OUT & ABOUT

Rainbow History Project to interview Malebox! publisher

Rainbow History Project will host “Talking Gay History” to celebrate Black History Month by interviewing Ric Irick on Sunday, Feb. 12 at 12 p.m. on Zoom.

Irick is the creator and publisher of the magazine Malebox!: DC’s Largest Publication for Black Gay Men. Rainbow History Project will also dig into its recent donations of Black gay and lesbian publications to interview Irick To register for this event, visit Eventbrite.

Celebrate Mardi Gras in the DMV

Artomatic will host “Arty-Gras” on Friday, Feb. 27 at 8 p.m. at Whino in Arlington, Va.

This event is an art-centric mardi gras party in the DMV. There will be a masquerade parade and a costume contest party. Winners of the contest will be awarded cash prizes. The event will end with a dance party hosted by a DJ.

Admission is free, for any inquiries email info@artomatic.org.

Celebrate all things Bey at ‘Beyonce: Baltimore Renaissance Happy Hour’ on Tuesday.

Autistic poet’s work layered with ‘multiple levels of awareness’ Leslie McIntosh on coming out and learning he is neurodiverse

By KATHI WOLFE

(Editor’s Note: One in four people in America has a disability, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. 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, who played a heroic role in the Stonewall Uprising, 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, Assistant Secretary of Labor for Disability Employment Policy for the Obama administration, are only a few of the numerous queer and disabled people in the LGBTQ community. Yet, the stories of this vital segment of the queer community have rarely been told. In its series “Queer, Crip and Here,” the Blade will tell some of these long un-heard stories.)

Before he could even read, Leslie McIntosh knew he wanted to be a writer. “My Dad got me this little desk with a drawer in it,” McIntosh, 38, who is Black, male presenting, male attracted and autistic, said in a telephone interview. “I was learning the alphabet when I was two.” McIntosh, who was born in Newark, N.J. and grew up in Atlantic City, had a precocious ability to decode words. “I would scribble in this notebook until I learned how to write and form words,” he said.

This scribbling – this desire to be a writer – wasn’t just a childhood thing for McIntosh. The writing bug stuck to him. Today, McIntosh is a poet and “fictionist” whose work has received national recognition.

He has been awarded residencies and fellowships from Breadloaf, Callaloo, Millay Arts, The Watering Hole, Zoeglossia and other programs.

His poetry has appeared in “Beloit Poetry Journal,” “Foglifter,” “Obsidian,” the forthcoming anthology “In the Tempered Dark: Contemporary Poets Transcending Elegy” and other publications. He is an assistant poetry editor at Newfound.

McIntosh, who earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Montclair State University in 2006 and a Psy.D. from the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine in 2019, is also a psychologist with a private practice. He lives, he wrote in an email to the Blade, “on the stolen land of the Munsee Lenape, currently known as Hudson County, NJ, USA.”

This reporter read with McIntosh (and Avra Wing) last fall at the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival. McIntosh is a vibrant performer with a mesmerizing presence. (The reading was an event held by Zoeglossia, a fellowship program for disabled poets.)

In a wide-ranging conversation, McIntosh talked with the Blade about coming out, learning he was autistic, poetry and Bayard Rustin.

Growing up was complicated for McIntosh. “People would read — understand — that I was queer and on the [autism] spectrum,” he said, “before I even knew what that meant.”

There was a lot of repression in the early part of his life. “A lot of what you think about coming out didn’t happen to me,” McIntosh said.

McIntosh wasn’t diagnosed as autistic until five years ago. But, looking back, he reflected that he was different from neurotypical people.

“I would invent these alternative realities in my brain,” McIntosh said, “I would give these people sexual adventures and things like that.”

McIntosh would compartmentalize. “I wouldn’t attribute what was happening to me,” he said. “It was a lot of world building about what having a boyfriend would look like.”

College was a new start for McIntosh. There, his universe expanded. He met people, who he said, were “separate from the toxicity of high school.”

The characters in the alternative realities in his brain couldn’t keep up with the intensity and speed of the people he was interacting with in real life. “I had to experience things in real time,” McIntosh said, “It had to be me. That’s when my coming out began.”

Being queer in the early 2000s wasn’t easy for McIntosh. He didn’t feel quite at home in Southern New Jersey. “It’s hard being gay anywhere,” he said, “especially, where I come from.”

Even a college campus in the aughts wasn’t perfectly safe for a Black male. How do I frame myself? Who do I tell? When do I tell them, McIntosh wondered.

McIntosh went into psychology because he wanted to be of service. “Here’s a secret,” he said, “what’s helped me to be successful wasn’t the degrees I’ve earned.”

earning his Psy.D, the one Black faculty member in the program left it. “After that it was all white hetero cisgender people,” he said.

Thankfully, his family has always been supportive of him. “I’ve been out to them forever,” McIntosh said.

McIntosh got into poetry when he was preparing to go away to his first year of college. He became entranced by “Def Poetry Jam.” “I saw myself in it,” he said, “looking at that screen, I knew I was a part of it.”

Poetry makes his neurodivergence livable for McIntosh. “It gives me a place where it isn’t something I have to navigate around or over,” he said, “It gets center stage. Without poetry, it would be a burden.”

Every creative person has a quirk about them, he added.

“Leslie McIntosh’s poems mean a great deal to me because of the original and even visceral way they navigate the personal and the historical,” Sheila Black, a poet and Zoeglossia co-founder, emailed the Blade. “Making abundant use of historical fact and context but always shaping this toward a personal lyrical vision.”

“The world of Leslie’s poems is layered with multiple levels of awareness – the double and even triple consciousness of race, sexuality, disability,” Black added. “His poetry is always animated by an acute sense of human vulnerability and the longing for a better, brighter more just world.”

When he was just out of college, McIntosh learned about Bayard Rustin, the queer, Black civil rights icon. “His existence blew my mind and my heart,” he said. “Here is this unsung civil rights hero – a mentor of Martin Luther King, Jr. Virtually unknown because he was Black and openly gay in the 1950s.”

“What’s helped me clinically and humanly,” McIntosh said, “to relate as one person to another are things I learned outside [of his degrees].”

McIntosh can evaluate and diagnose his patients. “I can quote unquote treat them and bill insurance companies,” he said, “but that isn’t a lot of my practice.”

McIntosh works with patients to help them conceptualize their lives and what their needs are. “I feel like a lot of therapists being directive discourages patients from relying on their own wisdom,” he said.

McIntosh was going through his training in psychology when he began to think he might be autistic. He felt a bit shameful about this because of the way the behavior of autistic people is often pathologized.

“They treat the behavior of autistic people – such as stimming – as needing treatment,” McIntosh said, “they create a behavior plan to make them stop doing it.”

Being diagnosed as autistic was freeing for McIntosh. It gave him a feeling of control. “I can advocate for myself,” he said. “I can say I have this condition. This is unfair. We need to have a conversation.”

Race has always been at the intersection of his life as a Black, queer, autistic man, McIntosh said. While he was

McIntosh wanted to know how this could be. Being a poet, he imagined a story.

McIntosh wrote poems in the form of letters — “epistles” — from Bayard Rustin. For these poems, he created Imal, an imaginary character. “I didn’t want to be part of the story,” he said. “It was easier to imagine the story without me in it.”

Later, McIntosh thought leaving himself out of the story was due in part to his neurodivergence. “I was using Imal to create a version of myself that deserved to be loved,” he said, “and who cared back.”

“I had rooms of people fight for my coat, letters from Martin Luther King with my name on them,” McIntosh writes in the voice of Bayard Rustin in his poem “Epistle: The Verisimilitude of Ruin,” “But that didn’t matter — I wanted a forgotten alley or a dim phone booth … Make believe you haven’t drowned at the drag of a man’s thinly carpeted thigh, the gravity of the smell.”

McIntosh isn’t interested in reading the poems he might have written if he’d been neurotypical. He’s proud to be neurodiverse. “I like the poet that I am,” he said, “I don’t think any other iteration of myself could have written these poems.”

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Drag now a leading draw at Olney as ‘Kinky Boots’ debuts

In the last few years, Olney Theatre Center’s leafy, suburban campus has become a hotbed of drag activity and audiences are eating it up.

“We’re getting old straight couples who don’t come for theater, but they’ll come for this,” says Jason Loewith, Olney’s artistic director for a decade.

What began as part of Olney Outdoors, a COVID-inspired open air summer series, drag shows quickly exploded into a leading draw. In fact, Olney’s drag nights — initially suggested by director of curator programming Kevin McAllister — have sold better than all other outdoor offerings including cabaret and jazz, Loewith explains.

“Drag has brought us the most diverse audience for anything we’ve ever done: regular theatergoers and nontraditional theatergoers, queer and straight, old and young, and the very young for whom it would be illegal to watch a drag show in several states.”

With that in mind, Loewith is now directing Olney’s production of “Kinky Boots” (opening Feb. 10), the uplifting Tony Award-winning collaboration featuring Cyndi Lauper’s quirky, hard driving rock score and Harvey Fierstein’s familiarly sentimental book. Adapted from a small British film, it’s the story of Charlie Price, a young man trying to save his family’s failing shoe factory in depressed Northampton. A chance meeting with Lala, a London drag queen, unites the unlikely pair in an improbable business venture.

Though “Kinky Boots” has been on his radar for a few years, it wasn’t always. In the early years of his Olney tenure, Loewith, 54, wasn’t that into a drag centric show. It just wouldn’t have answered the “why this” and “why now” that theaters ask when building a season, he says. But things have changed, and he’s learned a few things about what his audience likes.

Now it’s the company’s first main stage show planned after the height of the pandemic. Still, Loewith was oddly nervous about directing. Despite having once dated a drag queen, he came to the project with little knowledge of the drag community so there was some anxiety involved, but that soon went away.

It seems Loewith, who married his husband in the backyard of their Bethesda home in the summer of 2021, has rather fallen in love with the show: “It’s elegantly put together yet very strong; there’s a delightful simplicity to it, resulting in a beautiful piece about acceptance and tolerance.

“It’s a great show about self-acceptance that touches on some universal themes like daddy issues. And with its message of opening your mind to free yourself, makes every day of the work a soul-affirming experience, especially in this moment of gender fluidity being under attack and perceived as something incredibly threatening.”

He’s also elated with the cast. Although they considered looking to New York to fill some of the parts, it wasn’t necessary. They’ve found a phenomenal group of DMV talent (19 members of the show’s 20-person cast are locals). “And as Lola and Charlie, Solomon Parker III and Vincent Kempsi, respectively, have claimed the triple threat roles,” he says. “They’re really born to play the parts.”

A hit on the Broadway boards, “Kinky Boots” promises a great experience on Olney’s comparatively intimate main stage too, he adds. Audiences get the big production numbers, the conveyer belt, and rock ballads, but here you get a much better sense of

Charlie and Lola’s intertwining journeys.

Replete with its own drag consultant Devon Vaow (who’s known to perform as Evon Michelle), the production is sponsoring related events including an opening night panel discussion on drag history; a Sip ‘n’ Face Paint (BYOM); a singles mixer that’s open to everyone; and Drag Queen Story Hour at nearby Olney Library (go to olneytheatre.org for details).

All in all, Olney’s “Kinky Boots” is poised to offer a lot. At a moment when there are legislators attempting to ban drag performances on college campuses, it’s a good opportunity to support the visibility of drag. And Loewith says to expect a good time. He likens the experience to seeing four drag shows wrapped into one fabulous Broadway musical.

‘Kinky Boots’

Feb. 10-March 19 | Olney Theatre Center

2001 Olney-Sandy Spring, Rd., Olney, Md. $42-$95 | Olneytheatre.org

‘A beautiful piece about acceptance and tolerance’

By PATRICK FOLLIARD

JASON LOEWITH is Olney Theatre Center’s artistic director.

Belgian Oscar contender strikes ‘Close’ to home

Exploring gender expectations we force upon our children

By JOHN PAUL KING

When queer Belgian director Lukas Dhont debuted his first feature film “Girl” at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, it made quite an impression. As winner of the Caméra d’Or prize for Best First Feature, as well as the Queer Palm Award and a Jury Award for Best Performance for its star Victor Polster, it was quickly acquired by Netflix and catapulted Dhont onto the international cinema scene. He was even named on the Forbes “Europe 30 Under 30” list of business and industry professionals to watch.

Not all the attention heaped on his movie was positive, however. The tale of a teen trans girl seeking a career as a ballet dancer, it raised sharp objections from some queer and trans commentators for what they perceived as a sensationalized approach to gender dysphoria and self-harm, not to mention for the casting of cisgender actor Polster in the leading role; though other queer and trans voices –including real-life trans ballerina Nora Monsecour, who inspired the story and consulted with Dhont and co-screenwriter Angelo Tijssens during the writing process – were quick to defend the movie, the controversy nevertheless created a blemish on its reputation, and that of its filmmaker, too.

Now, Dhont is back with his second full-length film, and while it certainly marks an escalation of his success, it’s not without its own detractors. “Close,” based on experiences from his own childhood and again co-written by Tijssens, also took Cannes by storm, winning the Grand Prix Award this time, and has gone on to accumulate accolades from other festivals and awards bodies around the world; yet its subject matter, perhaps inevitably, has opened the filmmaker up to another round of criticism from queer observers who are uncomfortable with the story he has chosen to tell – or at least with the way he has chosen to tell it.

It centers on two young teen boys, Léo (Eden Dambrine) and Rémi (Gustav De Waele), tightly bonded best friends who start their first year of secondary school after a summer spent

together in innocent but intimate companionship working on Léo’s parents’ farm. When new schoolmates begin to make comments about the closeness of their relationship, Léo begins to distance himself from Rémi, becoming involved with hockey and pursuing a camaraderie with the rougher, more athletic boys on his team instead; first confused, then devastated by his abandonment, the heartbroken Rémi is moved to a public schoolyard confrontation with his former friend, further driving a wedge between them and setting the stage for an unthinkable turn of events.

The film’s provocative title is partly a nod to psychologist Niobe Way’s book, “Deep Secrets: Boys’ Friendships and the Crisis of Connection,” which documents a study of intimacy among teenage boys – frequently using the term “close friendship” to describe their relationships – and was one of Dhont’s inspirations for making the film. More than that, however, it’s an important clue to what his movie is all about. Though the director revealed before making “Close” that it would be about a “queer character,” there is no suggestion, either explicit or implicit, that its two teen friends have a sexual relationship with each other, or even that such a thing has ever crossed their minds; they are simply two boys, comfortable with each other in that tender and trusting way that only boys at their age can be. Likewise, there’s no bullying, no aggressive or even “microaggressive” shaming; it’s only their schoolmates’ perceptions that introduce the suggestion this friendship might be something more – but that’s more than enough to sour the sweetness between them, forcing us to question why some ways of being “close” are only OK for boys until they start to become men.

More to the point, perhaps, it begs the question of how this kind of low-key homophobia, so culturally ingrained that it is perpetuated without a flicker of awareness, remains persistent in a community that should know better. We don’t see a lot of the adult world in “Close,” but what we do see leads us to an impression that most of the grown-ups around Léo and Rémi are intelligent, educated, compassionate, and sensitive; their parents are unconditionally loving, and more than welcoming of the close companionship between their respective offspring. Yet throughout the film, throughout the boys’ conflict and beyond, there is no adult figure in their lives who seems willing or able to broach the subject of sexuality, or to show by example that there’s nothing about being queer – or even being perceived as queer – to be ashamed of.

These things, of course, are part of the criticism that has been leveled at the movie. Without positive messaging to counter its bleak narrative, some have seen “Close” as perpetuating a bevy of toxic tropes. Though we try to avoid spoilers, it’s hard to discuss a movie like this without revealing that something tragic happens, and many have expressed disappointment that Dhont’s film “punishes” its gay characters – even if we’re never sure they’re really gay. Further, in the absence of any affirmation of queerness (or even non-traditional masculinity), some have been troubled by an assumed reinforcement of a homophobic status quo within its narrative.

I can’t – and won’t – argue with any of those points. “Close” is a challenging film in the same way as “Tár,” another controversial title among this year’s awards contenders, in the sense that it presents a problem and doesn’t offer a solution or tell you how to respond to it – yet unlike “Tár,” it encourages us to feel things for its characters, and the consequences here are much more tragic. That might be especially true for queer men, certainly of older generations but still among today’s youth, for whom the film may trigger traumatic memories that hit particularly close to home. That means, when it comes to deciding if you’re up to the substantial challenges of watching it, you’re on your own. (SPOILER ALERT: it’s rough going, emotionally speaking.)

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Still, “Close” is a beautiful film on a lot of levels. In the most literal sense, it’s visually stunning, framed with an almost tactile up-close intimacy and brimming with the preternatural light that glows through Frank van den Eeden’s delicate cinematography; in a larger sense, it strikes a resonant chord for anyone who has ever (is there anyone who hasn’t?) experienced the terrible pangs of losing a childhood friendship, an unforgettable hurt it captures with heart-rending authenticity. Though we want our coming-of-age stories to be uplifting, there are some kinds of pain that cannot be erased, and it’s to Dhont’s credit that he doesn’t try. He wants you to feel those feelings, and his movie is delicately crafted to make sure that you do, complete with the remarkable performances he elicits from his two underage stars.

That doesn’t make it easy to watch, of course, but for those who are willing to take it on, it offers plenty of food for thought; and if the observations it makes about the gender expectations we force upon our children make you uncomfortable, then it’s accomplished what it set out to do in the first place.

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EDEN DAMBRINE and GUSTAV DE WAELE in ‘Close.’

New bio illuminates Liz Taylor’s decades of support for queer community ‘Without

In the mid-1980s, actor Roddy McDowell threw a dinner in honor of Bette Davis’s birthday. Davis, a queer icon, thought it was “vulgar” when Elizabeth Taylor and actress Pia Zadora, tried on each other’s diamond rings. “Oh, get over it, Bette,” Taylor, an actress, philanthropist and queer icon, told Davis.

One Friday in 1998, Taylor learned that a friend of her assistant had died, alone, with no money for his burial, from AIDS. Taylor wanted her business manager to arrange for the man who had died to be buried. She was outraged when she learned that this couldn’t be done ASAP. “We will not fucking wait until Monday,” Taylor said, “We will do it right now.”

These are two of the entertaining, moving, and revealing stories told about Taylor in “Elizabeth Taylor: The Grit & Glamour of an Icon” by Kate Andersen Brower.

Many bios written about celebs have the shelf life of a quart of milk. Thankfully, this isn’t the case with Brower’s bio of Taylor. Taylor, who lived from 1932 to 2011, was, for most of her life, not only a celebrity – but a household name, a worldwide subject of admiration, titillation and gossip.

But Taylor was so much more than catnip for the paparazzi.

homosexuals there would be no culture’

By KATHI WOLFE

She was a feminist, an often underrated actress, businesswoman, senator’s wife, addict, mother, lover of animals, a proponent of gun control, an opponent of anti-Semitism, philanthropist and queer history hero.

Yet, despite the hype, glam and all that’s been written about Taylor, many aren’t aware of the multi-facets of her life.

In “Elizabeth Taylor,” Brower, a CNN contributor, who’s written “The Residence,” “First Women” and “Team of Five, “First in Line,” gives us an informative, lively bio of Taylor.

It is the first authorized biography of Taylor. Usually, this is the kiss of death for a biography. Few want their family members to be revealed as three-dimensional people with not only talent, but flaws.

Thankfully, Brower’s Taylor bio escapes the trap of hagiography. Brower began writing the biography after talking with former Sen. John Warner, who was married to Taylor from 1976 to 1982. (Warner died in 2021.)

Warner was one of Taylor’s seven husbands. He and Taylor remained friends after they divorced.

Warner connected Brower with Taylor’s family who wanted the story of Taylor to be told. Brower was given access to a trove of new source material: to Taylor’s archives – 7,358 letters, diary entries, articles, and personal notes and 10,271 photographs. Brower drew on unpublished interviews with Taylor, and extensively interviewed Taylor’s family and friends.

In her 79 years, Taylor did and lived so much, that telling the story of her life is like trying to put the Atlantic Ocean into one bottle of water. Yet, Brower makes Taylor come alive as an earthy, glam hero with flaws and struggles.

Taylor, who performed with Burton in Shakespeare’s “Tam-

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Saturday, Feb. 4 at 8 p.m.

Sunday, Feb. 5 at 2 p.m.

“A near-perfect example of fast-flowing musical drama”

(The New York Times)

CZECH NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

Steven Mercurio, conductor Robert McDuffie, violin

Sunday, Feb. 12 at 2 p.m.

A program of masterworks by Brahms and Beethoven

ing of the Shrew,” was as proficient at cursing as the Bard was at writing sonnets. “I love four-letter words,” Taylor said, “they’re so terribly descriptive.”

She was renowned for caring for friends and strangers. During Sept. 11, Taylor was in New York. She paid for a toothless woman, who was looking for a job, to get teeth, and comforted firefighters. A firefighter wondered if Taylor was really at his firehouse. “You bet your ass, I am,” Taylor said.

Taylor loved her children. Yet, her kids were often (due to her work) left with nannies or enrolled in boarding schools.

Due partly to life-long back pain sustained from an injury she sustained while filming “National Velvet” when she was a child, Taylor struggled with a life-long addiction to pills.

In “Elizabeth Taylor,” Brower illuminates Taylor’s decades of support and friendship with the queer community. Early in her career, she formed close friendships with queer actors Rock Hudson, Montgomery Clift and James Dean. “Without homosexuals there would be no culture,” Taylor said.

Decades later, it’s easy to forget how horrible things were during the AIDS crisis in the 1980s and 1990s. Brower vividly brings back the horror and the tireless work Taylor did for AIDS research. At a time when people wouldn’t use a telephone touched by someone with AIDS, Brower reports, Taylor would hug patients with AIDS in hospices. She jumped into bed to hold her friend Rock Hudson when he was dying from AIDS when no one would go near him, Brower writes.

“I’m resilient as all hell,” Taylor said.

There couldn’t be a better time for “Elizabeth Taylor” than today. In our era, when many would like to erase LGBTQ people, Taylor’s legacy is more important than ever.

DOUG VARONE AND DANCERS

Featuring the Mason Dance Company

Saturday, Feb. 18 at 8 p.m.

A vibrant program by this acclaimed choreographer

‘Elizabeth Taylor: The Grit & Glamour of an Icon’ By Kate Andersen Brower c.2022, Harper | $33 | 513 pages

DOUG VARONE AND DANCERS

How is the 2023 real estate market starting off? And what we can expect in the coming months

By JOSEPH HUDSON

One interesting statistic is that there was a 25% increase in weekly mortgage applications two weeks ago, according to a CNBC story I read recently. Yes, mortgage applications are down from an entire year ago, but they are starting to rebound, as the interest rates have started to soften a little bit over the past few months.

Another interesting statistic I heard is that in the last quarter of 2022, 42% of sellers were giving concessions to buyers at the closing table, a 10-year high, according to an article in Money magazine.

No one has that proverbial crystal ball, but it does seem like I have heard, anecdotally, from many agents that the buyers are starting to come back out into the market. They are realizing that there might be concessions they can get from the seller, they can do the home inspection, and maybe even ask for repairs or credits, and not feel like they must walk blindfolded into the housing market without some sense of confidence.

Sellers are also getting creative with attracting buyers. Some sellers are trying to find lenders that will help the potential buyer find a competitive interest rate or will offer to pay part of the buyer’s cost to buy down the rate for the first few years of the loan. Some sellers are hiring home inspectors, prior to listing their homes on the market, to do an inspection of their home and then doing the needed repairs before it even hits the market, which should provide a cleaner and smoother contract period for the buyer AND the seller.

During 2022, D.C. raised the HPAP (Home Purchase Assistance Program) amounts. Those who qualify to use the program for down payment assistance can get thousands of dollars more for their down payment, and the income limits were raised also, meaning more people qualify to use the program.

As we all know, a lot can change over a year, but Q1 2023 seems like it is starting off with a busier real estate market than the last quarter of 2022. Buyers seem to feel more confident to get back into the market, and many sellers are willing to work with all types of buyers to get their homes under contract, sold, and to move forward with their lives.

If you have any questions about these programs or thoughts about moving into the market in 2023, don’t hesitate to reach out.

The year is off to an encouraging start for the local housing market.

(Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

CHRISTINE ROLAND GARNER

(703) 587-4855

For additional photos & information: www.ChristineGarner.com

A timeless home filled with modern conveniences, coupled with the charm of yesteryear, Hunter Mews is one of Old Town Alexandria’s few single-family homes nestled on one of its oldest streets. A true rarity that is seen through two conventional lenses—the classic look and feel of Old Town from the exterior, yet young and new throughout the interior—this home awaits you as you pass through its gates. This gracious home built on land originally owned by John Hunter, one of Alexandria’s first Trustees, is an excellent example of recent architecture accurately blending with its historic neighbors. The site was first used by John Hunter and Thomas Fleming as a ship building yard from 1763 through the 1780’s and later for a carriage house. The site had no dwellings until 1889, when the land records note there were two dwellings. By 1987 only a small portion of one of these homes remained when construction on the present structure began. The present owners have renovated it with painstaking attention to detail.

Upon entering the home you will be welcomed by the entry foyer, which shows a custom leaded glass detailed front door, marble floor, English wool custom carpeting and dentil molding. You will immediately notice the open concept and meticulous attention to detail with the use of color and texture throughout. The main living room radiates from the natural light that shines through a full bank of windows across the room. A custom marble mantle sits at its center, across from a built-in wet bar. The gourmet kitchen has been renovated with brand-new appliances to include a Sub-Zero refrigerator/freezer, wine cooler, oversized deep sink, smart double oven, ice machine, under cabinet lighting, quartz countertops and center island. The light-filled breakfast/family room has a 20ft wall of floor to ceiling windows which look out to meticulous gardens with plush plantings. Additional features of the main level include a butler’s pantry adjacent to the kitchen with ample cabinets for storage and counter space, powder room, formal dining room with built in window seat, a study/home office as well as a library with floor to ceiling book cases and a hand painted 1800’s map of the world on the ceiling.

Whether it’s walking up the custom wainscot staircase or, taking the three-floor elevator with a working antique British phone, the second floor exudes both personality and elegance. The primary bedroom offers the perfect space to unwind, as it has a gas fireplace with black and gold select marble surround & custom cabinetry and wood, floor to ceiling wall of windows, vaulted ceilings with built-in speakers and cove lighting. Add extra privacy with remote-controlled Hunter Douglas Silhouettes. The primary bathroom has marble and solid brass fixtures, complete with a jacuzzi tub and spa shower. The upper level also includes four additional bedrooms that have been extensively renovated, each a warm study in color and

textures, two full baths, a laundry chute that connects to the laundry room on the lower level. A well appointed roof deck is accessible from 2 rooms and overlooks the private gardens.

A second beautifully crafted staircase takes you to the lower level that is an entertainer’s dream. A custom mahogany wet bar with wine rack storage for over 400 bottles is the centerpiece of the room, along with a gas fireplace with double arched brick hearth, and welled windows for natural light. Tucked around the corner, as you walk through a welled entrance and onto hickory wood flooring, sits an exquisite office with a full wall of custom-made cabinetry and double closets. This multi-purpose room is perfectly designed for a workout/craft room. The lower level also features a large bedroom suite with an abundance of closet space, a built-in day bed, and a full bathroom, an area that could serve as an additional guest bedroom or an au-pair suite. Dedicated laundry room with high efficiency appliances, deep cast iron sink, cabinetry for storage, laundry chute and folding area.

Step outside and you are transported into your very own sanctuary, giving you the luxury of entertaining and privacy. The backyard has a built-in gas grill with electronic ignition, a pond with interior light, three filters and a recirculating pump. Enjoy outdoor entertaining and al fresco dining! A nine-zone irrigation system—including the deck—landscape lighting and eight exterior lanterns placed throughout. Custom Adams caseworks surrounds the entire exterior, along with aluminum gutters, and a solid steel roof that has been factory finished and equipped with snow guards. The home also comes with state-of-the-art security features and an attached garage with additional storage and custom floor finish.

So come in, stay awhile, and fall in love as this gracious piece of charm, elegance and history welcomes you home.

PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY

LEGAL NOTICES

SUPERIOR COURT OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA PROBATE DIVISION

Case No. 2023ADM000022 Nashid S. M. Saadiq aka Nashid Saddiq Notice of Appointment, Notice to Creditors and Notice to Unknown Heirs

Minnie B. Saadiq, whose address is 1114 Trinidad Ave NE, Washington, DC 20002 was appointed Personal Representative of the estate of Nashid S. M. Saadiq aka Nashid Nashiq who died on December 8, 2022 with a Will and will serve without Court supervision. All unknown heirs and heirs whose whereabouts are unknown shall enter their appearance in this proceeding. Objections to such appointment (or to the probate of decedent’s Will) shall be filed with the Register of Wills, D.C., 515 5th Street, NW, Building A, 3rd Floor, Washington, DC 20001, on or before 8/3/2023. Claims against the decedent shall be presented to the undersigned with a copy to the Register of Wills or to the Register of Wills with a copy to the undersigned, on or before 8/3/23 or be forever barred. Persons believed to be heirs or legatees of the decedent who do not receive a copy of this notice by mail within 25 days of its publication shall so inform the Register of Wills, including name, address and relationship. Date of first publication: 2/3/2023

Nicole Stevens, Register of Wills, Clerk of the Probate Division

/s/Minnie B. Saadiq 1114 Trinidad Ave NE, Washington, DC 20002.202-706-1101

MASSAGE

ROSSLYN - RELAX & RECHARGE YOURSELF.

Massage in private studio located near Rosslyn, Fri-Mon, 12-8. www.mymassagebygary.com or text 301-704-1158.

EMAIL NOW TO PLACE YOUR AD classifieds@washblade.com

Hope to see you soon!

Thanks for reading the Blade!

CLEANING

FERNANDO’S CLEANING

Residential & Commercial Cleaning, Reasonable Rates, Free Estimates, Routine, 1-Time, Move-In/Move-Out

202-234-7050 / 202-486-6183

COUNSELING

COUNSELING FOR LGBTQ

People Individual/couple counseling with a volunteer peer counselor. GMCC, serving our community since 1973. 202-580-8661 gaymenscounseling.org.  No fees, donation requested.

EMPLOYMENT

ACADEMY OF HOPE

Adult Public Charter School REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS

Educational Specification & Consolidated Facilities Assessments

The Academy of Hope Adult Public Charter School located in Washington, DC requests proposals for Educational Specification & Consolidated Facilities Assessments. Proposals are due February 10, 2023. You can find the detailed request for proposal and submission information at: https://aohdc.org/ get-involved/jobs/

HANDYMAN

BRITISH REMODELING

LEGAL SERVICES

ADOPTION, DONOR, SURROGACY

legal services. Jennifer represents LGBTQ clients in DC, MD & VA interested in adoption or ART matters.

240-863- 2441,  JFairfax@Jenniferfairfax.com.

LIMOUSINES

KASPER’S LIVERY SERVICE

Since 1987. Gay & Veteran Owner/Operator. Lincoln Continental Sedan! Proper DC License & Livery Insured. www.KasperLivery.com. 202-554-2471

MOVERS

PROFESSIONAL MOVING & STORAGE

Let Our Movers Do The Heavy Lifting. Mention the Blade for 5% OFF of our regular rates. Call today 202.734.3080 www.aroundtownmovers.com

BODYWORK

THE MAGIC TOUCH

Swedish, Massage or Deep Tissue. Appts. Low Rates, 24/7, In-Calls. 202-486-6183

We’re making classifieds better for you, during this transition email the text of your ad to: classifieds@washblade.com and we will assist you!

Local licensed company with over 25 years of experience. Specializing in bathrooms, kitchens & all interior/exterior repairs. Drywall, paint, electrical & wallpaper. Trevor 703-303-8699