#PinkNews

[frameacloud]

Maria Morava (March 31, 2023). "Most anti-trans adults don’t actually know a trans person in real life, new study reveals." PinkNews. https://www.thepinknews.com/2023/03/31/trans-day-visibility-report-just-like-us/

tl;dr: Some of the things that a large study by the UK charity Just Like Us found: most adults who don't support transgender people don't know any. Meanwhile, "personally knowing a trans person doubles the likelihood of trans allyship." Lesbians have the greatest tendency to do so of all LGBTQ people. Nearly all lesbians know and are supportive of transgender people.

[queerliblib]

“This year has seen countless attempted book bans across the US, and many banned titles come from authors dealing with LGBTQ+ themes, with activists explaining that pushes to ban books is “harmful to students from historically marginalised backgrounds”.  One project, the Queer Liberation Library (QLL), is now aiming to combat this, launching in October with an entirely online catalogue that can be accessed anywhere in the country – even in states enacting bans on certain titles."

-How this online library is fighting back against US book bans, by Emily Chudy, PinkNews

[coochiequeens]

Two men who had a baby through exploiting a woman want to talk about equality in parenting.

When Paul Morgan-Bentley and his husband welcomed their son, Solly, they were struck by how little is expected of men when it comes to raising kids.

Solly was born in 2020, just as lockdown began, via a surrogate. So far, Paul and Robin’s parenting journey has been beautiful and life-affirming, without any of the homophobia they feared they might encounter. 

But it’s also been an incredible lesson on how gendered society remains.

“Lots of people were lovely or didn’t bat an eyelid which was lovely, but what we did find repeatedly just how little was expected of men at all when it comes to being a parent – being a fully engaged parent with primary responsibility,” Paul tells PinkNews.

Paul, who is head of investigations at The Times, wants parenthood to be equalised, and believes that can only be achieved by doing away with gender norms and encouraging all parents to pull their weight equally.

“In a non-traditional family, you just get the job done and you can feel really liberated from expectations,” he says.

“Lots of women face years and years of cultural expectation about what it means to be a woman and how that means you should be caring. 

“We write it on the slogans of young girls’ t-shirts that are sold in supermarkets – it’s all about caring and nurturing and boys are ‘cheeky little monkeys’ and are not expected to be nurturing. It’s nonsense.” 

Before and since becoming fathers, Paul and his husband were surprised by just how gendered things still are.

“To our faces we haven’t faced much direct hostility – often it’s embarrassment,” he continues.

“In the IVF clinic, even going through that process, all the paperwork is mum and dad – we had to cross off mum all the time. 

“We’re not massively sensitive about it but society has changed in lots of ways and actually what we found is that often the institutions haven’t kept up.

“Often with hospital births, most hospitals in the UK kick dads out – or any partner out – and you can only come back in visiting hours. What message does that send to the mother?

“It’s all geared towards a heterosexual couple and there’s this idea that there is a mother who will be looking after the baby.” 

Those attitudes also extend into the way parental leave and childcare work.

“If you look at how childcare is organised in the UK, you have some help – very little help, actually – financially from the state during that first year of parental leave, and then nothing for most families until your child is three. 

“Either the government doesn’t believe one or two year olds exist, or there is still fundamentally this subconscious belief that a wife is at home looking after the baby.” 

These realisations inspired Paul to write The Equal Parent. Released in March, the book interrogates societal attitudes towards parenting and looks in-depth at the mistakes we’re making when it comes to raising children.

Paul believes it’s time society moved into the 21st century and accepted that parenthood doesn’t look the same as it did in the 1960s.

“We should be playing to our strengths and communicating as parents and couples in relationships and working out what’s best for everyone – not just doing things because it feels like the normal thing to do because of our gender,” he adds.

[evangelineartemiasamos]

Fascists wanting to "protect families" by stabbing families in the back

[archivlibrarianist]

Gaines is creating a big stink about this article, too. So you definitely shouldn't read it.

[invertedaquariumperson]

love this image of the what to buy section of the pinknews site.

like. what a bizzare collection of artists to think are like, specifically gay people artists. here's my guess of how each of these happened:

aespa: people saw that KPOP has a big deep passionate fanbase full of young people and assumed it was a gay thing, & picked the first artist that came up alphabetically ATEEZ: picked the second artist that came up alphabetically Billy Joel: "oh yeah, that one artist from the seventies whos been out for almost fifty years and wrote I'm still standing & Rocket Man. Billy Joel i think it was" Coldplay: listened to Coldplay and simply decided that it HAD to be gay music

[churchhouseconf]

Celebrate Diversity at the PinkNews Awards

Join the vibrant celebration of inclusion and equality at the PinkNews Awards! Hosted at the elegant Church House, this prestigious event honors trailblazers championing LGBTQ+ rights. Experience a night of inspiration, recognition, and unforgettable moments. Be part of a movement making a difference! Visit Church House for details.

[pandabara]

Sounds about like Chaiya Raichik

Moms for Liberty organiser exposed as convicted sex offender

[settlercolonialismisbad]

As a trans person, I actually don't feel like the way that Rufus Wainright framed his support in this interview was helpful or supportive.

[coochiequeens]

“We think there will be some threats in that way, but we are working with the police… we’ll have dozens of people there to keep it a safe situation, we’ll have first aid and field support to offer any kind of support.“ Yes that’s something truly oppressed people say. 🙄

Students at Oxford university will stage a protest on the same day as “gender-critical” Kathleen Stock’s address to the Oxford Union this month. 

Various student groups announced the Oxford Trans+ Pride event on Sunday (7 May) in an effort to counteract the contentious pundit’s planned speech on 30 May.

Controversy arose last month after the union announced that former University of Sussex philosophy lecturer Stock, who has argued that self-ID “threatens a secure understanding of the concept ‘lesbian’,” had agreed to speak.

The Oxford University LGBTQ+ Society condemned the union’s decision to give Stock a platform in April, saying that she “has been campaigning against trans rights, labelling them as dangerous to women”.

The society’s president, Amiad Haran Diman, told PinkNews that the collective effort by society organisers is not just about protesting against Stock’s views, but also about celebrating the trans people of Oxford.

“Our motivation is not to attack the union or attack Kathleen Stock, because we think they love the attention. The reason we are doing this is for the trans community of Oxford – it’s for our trans siblings so that they know someone is standing up for them.���

The event is set to begin at 2pm in the Lincoln College building, with panels of trans, non-binary, gender-nonconforming and intersex speakers.

It will then move to Bonn Square, where protestors will hold a rally promoting transgender rights.

“The previous protest for queer rights in Oxford got around 200 attendees, we’re hoping to get double or triple that,” Diman said. “We need that because there will be counter-protestors and hateful transphobes. To counteract that, we need a loud voice.”

He added that the society received a wave of abuse following its April statement calling on the union to “rescind its misguided invite” and that the decision to hold a Pride protest was an effort to prove that trans joy triumphs over adversity.

“A huge pile-on started”, said Diman. “We received thousands of very hateful, abusive and frightening comments. That was something we weren’t prepared for as a small society.

“The thing I noticed was what annoyed the TERFs the most was trans joy. They were really baffled and threatened by trans joy, so I thought that emphasising trans joy is the best way to counter that.”

Pride is still a protest, Oxford University LGBTQ+ Society president says

Diman continued: “We know that there are some very hateful groups like Students Against Tyranny that are planning to arrive, and this is something that has happened in Oxford before.”

“We think there will be some threats in that way, but we are working with the police… we’ll have dozens of people there to keep it a safe situation, we’ll have first aid and field support to offer any kind of support.

“It will be a celebration, but also come prepared – if you’re worried about being outed, you should probably cover your face, and if you’re worried about heated interactions, you should probably stay away from the edges of the protest.”

With several pro-LGBTQ+ community organisations already supporting the Oxford Trans+ Pride protest, the goal for organisers is to turn it into an annual event.

“We are in coordination with some very large queer organisations here,” Diman said. “This is something that couldn’t really have happened otherwise because the trans community here is not that large, but it is very active.

“I believe it can become an annual event, but currently we are just trying to get this first event underway and assess the success afterwards.”

Stock responded to the announcement of Oxford Trans+ Pride in a tweet on Sunday (7 May), branding the protestors “absolute babies“.

Stock has previously equated trans people with those who claim to be “trans-racial” or think of themselves as another race.

She has made headlines in recent months, both for her co-founding of The Lesbian Project, a group created exclusively for cisgender lesbians, and for her involvement in upcoming Channel 4 documentary Gender Wars.

[evangelineartemiasamos]

Stay strong and bring it through parliament, despite the backlash!

[kiramoore626]

Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak caused ‘serious damage’ to LGBTQ+ rights in UK, damning report finds

Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak caused ‘serious damage’ to LGBTQ+ rights in UK, damning report finds An annual report on the state of queer rights across Europe has found that 2022 was the most violent year for LGBTI people across the region in the past decade – and the rise in hate speech is to blame.

[serennn17]

PinkNews also published another article about us on Saturday!

The Pink News just posted this (January 15th). Keep going!!

[frameacloud]

Gabriella Ferlita (February 23, 2024). "A third of trans men can ovulate after undergoing gender-affirming treatment, study finds." PinkNews. https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/02/23/do-trans-men-on-testosterone-ovulate/

tl;dr: This is about transgender men and other transmasculine people who had been on T for at least a year, and had stopped having a period. A third of these people continue to ovulate while they are on T, even though they don't have a period. The type or amount of T doesn't matter, so we don't know why this happens for some people and not others. It's more proof that being on T doesn't protect someone from getting pregnant. People who don't want to get pregnant need to use actual birth control or other methods of contraception.

Here's the full text of the study that the news article is about:

Joyce D. Asseler, Julieta S. del Valle, Susana M. Chuva de Sousa Lopes, Marieke O. Verhoeven, Mariette Goddijn, Judith A.F. Huirne, Norah M. van Mello (February 22, 2024). "One-third of amenorrheic transmasculine people on testosterone ovulate." Cell Reports Medicine 5, 101440. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xcrm.2024.101440 https://www.cell.com/cell-reports-medicine/fulltext/S2666-3791(24)00063-6

[bloggrgirl]

honestly sometimes i love google’s ai. it’s wrong so often it’s totally unusable but when it’s wrong it’s honestly even better