LGBTQ news and entertainment
The Charlotte city council in North Carolina has voted to repeal it’s LGBT protections ordinance.
Harvey Fierstein, Cyndi Lauper, and the cast of Broadway’s Tony Award-winning “Best Musical” Kinky Boots shares this upbeat rewrite of the show’s finale – “Just Be” – weighing in on the current rash anti-transgender bathroom laws. #JustPee
In related news, Lauper performs tonight in Raleigh, North Carolina. According to reports, the proceeds from her concert will be donated to the campaign seeking to repeal the state’s HB2 bill; word is her concert rider requires the Duke Energy Center for the Performing Arts must have a gender-neutral bathroom.
By this point, I’m sure you’ve heard there are jerks out in the world who are way angry that super-department store Target issued a statement letting customers and employees know that the store has a very inclusive bathroom / changing room policy when it comes to transgender folks.
In other words, use whatever bathroom your gender identity aligns with.
On the other side of sanity, haters have signed a petition protesting Target’s position.
Not only that, but there are nutjob protesters now going into Target stores who just start shouting anti-transgender rants. I don’t know about you, but if I was a parent I’d be mad as hell at these folks scaring my kids.
Blogger JoeMyGod shared this video today of one such idiot who actually meets a transgender person, and he really becomes unglued over that.
It’s about 4 minutes, but watch how unhinged this guy is.
And by the way – the nut keeps saying “I can sue you if you touch me.” Really? Store security guards can’t ‘touch’ an unruly person like this?
If you go get rowdy in a bar, I know what happens there…
Fox News’ Megyn Kelly interviewed virulently anti-LGBT Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick last night regarding his opposition to newly issued guidance on transgender students rights in public schools by the Education & Justice Departments.
Kelly attempted to move Patrick past his talking points towards answering her questions, rather than give him airtime for spouting dangerous lies and myths about alleged “transgender bathroom predators.” But Patrick continued to diminish the value of trans students by saying they make up a tiny part of the population.
At one point, Patrick mentioned his role in defeating Houston’s Equal Rights Ordinance last year, saying the legislation would have “allowed men in ladies’ rooms”, but Kelly was quick to challenge him. “Allow men in ladies’ rooms or allow trans women in ladies’ rooms?” she asked.
Patrick quickly deflected, saying, “Megyn, you’re missing this.” But Megyn wasn’t having it. “I don’t think I’m missing anything,” she replied.
Watch below.
North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, appearing on Fox News Sunday, told host Chris Wallace that he will comply with the Justice Department’s Monday deadline to either scrap its transgender bathroom law or face legal action and risk losing federal funds.
McCrory made specific mention of the three working days that the state was given to repeal the anti-trans law.
“I don’t think that three working days is enough time for such a pretty big threat,” he told Fox News. “It’s the federal government being a bully, making law.”
Interestingly, the legislation was passed and signed into law in less than one day. I’m not sure how the governor and state lawmakers couldn’t undo in three days what it did in one.
The Human Rights Campaign brings up the same issue in a statement today:
“If HB2 was passed in a day, it can be repealed in a day, too. Pat McCrory’s excuse that he needs more time to comply with the Department of Justice after he rammed through and signed HB2 in the dark of night in a matter of hours doesn’t hold water,” said HRC Communications Director Jay Brown. “Pat McCrory even admitted on national television that his biggest excuse for passing HB2 is a lie. He couldn’t cite a single example of threats to public safety from non-discrimination ordinances like the one in Charlotte. That’s because they do not exist. HB2 is breaking federal civil rights laws and has put billions of dollars in federal funding on the line. It must be fully repealed immediately.”
Last night on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, author/radio host Dan Savage spoke truth to the current spate of anti-transgender laws popping up in state legislatures now – much to Ann Coulter’s chagrin.
This is how Savage put a point on it:
“They couldn’t demagogue anymore about gays and lesbians because too many of us are out and too many people know us so they took the same old script – oh they’re recruiting children, preying on children, threatening children, creeping in bathrooms. That was what they said about gay men 40 years ago.
“And they’re just taking that now and applying that to trans women and it’s bullsh*t and trans women and men use bathrooms all over the country and have for-ever. And they have no cases to point to where a trans person has exploited a civil rights protection to prey on a child.”
So glad to finally see someone lay that fact out there. Go Dan!
Following quickly on the heels of Donald Trump telling NBC News that he opposes North Carolina’s anti-LGBT hate law HB2, Sen. Ted Cruz rushed out this attack ad using the same, tired false “attack of the transgender women” narrative we’ve seen far too often.
Text of the spot:
“Should a grown man pretending to be a woman be allowed to use the women’s restroom? The same restroom used by your daughter? And your wife? Donald Trump thinks so. It’s not appropriate and it’s not safe. It’s PC nonsense that’s destroying America. Donald Trump won’t take on the PC police. He’s one of them.”
Talking Points Memo has the details:
ESPN announced Wednesday night that it was firing former World Series champion Curt Schilling from his role as a baseball analyst after he posted several anti-transgender memes to his public Facebook profile.
“ESPN is an inclusive company,” ESPN said in a statement. “Curt Schilling has been advised that his conduct was unacceptable and his employment with ESPN has been terminated.”
The memes Schilling posted on Monday appeared to support a recent spate of legislation in various states requiring transgender people to use bathrooms that correspond with their birth sex. After facing intensive criticism online, Schilling doubled down in a lengthy public blog post calling his detractors people “just dying to be offended.”
After taking a day to assess the impact of his posts, ESPN dismissed Schilling.
Schilling has got the network in hot water before. After sharing a meme comparing Muslims to Nazis last August, he was suspended from hosting duties for the duration of the rest of the baseball season. Back on air in February, he received no reprimand for suggesting that Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton “should be buried under a jail somewhere.”
Here’s the meme Schilling shared which was supposed to represent transgender women:
Of course, the wingnuts have all come out in an outrage, but more interesting is the response from Schilling’s wife who took to Facebook to proclaim what a transgender ally Schilling is:
Now, does the person Shonda Schilling describes in her post sound like the “educated” and “loving” person who would post the meme above? I can’t imagine anyone who has trans friends would share that image.
During a town hall appearance this morning on NBC’s Today Show, Donald Trump seemed to oppose anti-LGBT laws like North Carolina’s hateful HB2.
I say “seemed” because during his answer he kept saying “Leave it the way it is.” Leaving it the way it is would mean keeping HB2 in North Carolina., because that’s currently “how it is.”
But the gist of his answer would seem to be in opposition to the legislation that has garnered so much attention and caused so much economic hardship for the state.
Here’s Trump talking on the issue this morning:
“North Carolina did something that was very strong and they’re paying a big price. And there’s a lot of problems.” Trump said. “Leave it the way it is. North Carolina, what they’re going through, with all of the business and all of the strife — and that’s on both sides — you leave it the way it is. There have been very few complaints the way it is. People go, they use the bathroom that they feel is appropriate. There has been so little trouble. And the problem with what happened in North Carolina is the strife and the economic punishment they’re taking.”
UPDATE: Trump’s opponent in the Republican presidential primary blasted Trump for even suggesting opposition to the hate law.
We shouldn't be facilitating putting little girls alone in a bathroom w/ grown men. That's just a bad, bad, bad idea https://t.co/fpj3vUjKuF— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) April 21, 2016
