LGBTQ news and entertainment
In this week’s episode of The Randy Report podcast: International pop star and LGBTQ ally Janet Jackson will headline a World AIDS Day concert. Also… Continue reading “Podcast: Janet Jackson + Pulse Nightclub Memorial + More News”
Some news items you might find interesting: • Washington Blade: Pop icon and LGBTQ ally Janet Jackson will headline the annual World AIDS Day concert (December 1) sponsored by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation in Houston at NRG Arena. Continue reading “Janet Jackson To Headline World AIDS Day Concert + More News”
Matthew William Bishop (via Instagram)
Over 400,000 new cases of coronavirus were reported in India on Saturday as the new surge there continues to ravage the country. Forty percent of new cases globally are in India where over 3,000 people a day are dying from the virus. From the Washington Post:
The soaring number of cases prompted the United States to restrict travel from India on Friday. Dozens of countries have begun sending aid to bolster hospitals overwhelmed by patients and short on oxygen.
On Saturday, a hospital in the capital, New Delhi, issued an SOS for oxygen supplies, saying its tank was empty.
Eight coronavirus patients died over the next hour before it was refilled, said S.C.L. Gupta, the medical director of Batra Hospital. The dead included one of the hospital’s own doctors. “We have lost him,” Gupta said.
The 7-day rolling average of new daily cases in India was more than 357,000 on Thursday. That’s five times what it was just a month ago. A tight lockdown last year helped the country avoid huge case numbers, but clearly officials relaxed those restrictions far too soon.
"We are running out of Oxygen. We are in a crisis mode": Executive Director of Delhi's Batra Hospital sends SOS #OxygenShortage pic.twitter.com/Glwo8ORNnd
— NDTV (@ndtv) May 1, 2021
New cases of COVID1-9 worldwide have now exceeded their previous peak with the number of infections higher than it’s ever been. According to the Washington Post, a leading factor for the increase is the intensity of India’s second wave. That country now accounts for nearly one third of all new cases.
It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Earlier this year, India appeared to be weathering the pandemic. The number of daily cases dropped below 10,000 and the government launched a vaccination drive powered by locally made vaccines.
But experts say that changes in behavior and the influence of new variants have combined to produce a tidal wave of new cases.
India is adding more than 250,000 new infections a day — and if current trends continue, that figure could soar to 500,000 within a month, said Bhramar Mukherjee, a biostatistician at the University of Michigan.
One crematorium in the city of Surat says it used to receive about 20 bodies a day, but now it is receiving 100. As of Monday evening, at least 3,023,700 people have died worldwide from coronavirus.
More coronavirus cases are being reported worldwide than ever before. A key factor in the rise: the ferocity of India’s second wave. https://t.co/w1qu0GODW2
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) April 19, 2021
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| Aryan Pasha (image via Facebook) |
Aryan Pasha, an Indian transgender man, made history this weekend when he came in second at the Musclemania bodybuilding competition held in Delhi.
Musclemania is one of the world’s largest natural bodybuilding organizations with several categories (fitness, sports model, physique and natural bodybuilding).
After training for a year, Pasha competed in the Men’s Physique (Short) category.
Pasha, who transitioned at 18-years-old, tells Gaylaxy Mag that he’s had an interest in bodybuilding since a young age. And when he discovered a bodybuilding competition for transgender men held in the United States, he began training for it.
But he was unfortunately denied a visa to travel to the U.S.
Undeterred, he decided to enter the Musclemania event in India in the men’s category.
Buoyed by the full support of his family and members of his gym, Pasha competed this past Saturday in a field of 125 contestants.
“It was my dream to participate in Men’s category,” Pasha told Gaylaxy. “Till now I have won medals in female category but this is what I actually wanted in my life – to complete with other men.”
“I enjoyed every second when I was on stage because this is what I dreamt of,” he added. “I was not nervous at all and just wanted to complete poses like a champion.”
Pasha, who works as a lawyer, says he will next take part in the the International Bodybuilding and Fitness Federation (IBFF) event to be held in February.
That competition features categories for “men” and “transmen.” Pasha intends on competing in both categories.
He says his ultimate goal is to compete at the world level.
Awesome news from India this morning as the country’s high court has overturned a colonial-era law which made same-sex relations illegal.
From The New York Times:
In a groundbreaking victory for gay rights, India’s Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously struck down one of the world’s oldest bans on consensual gay sex, putting to rest a legal battle that stretched for years and burying one of the most glaring vestiges of India’s colonial past.
After weeks of deliberation in the Supreme Court and decades of struggles by gay Indians, India’s chief justice, Dipak Misra, said that the colonial-era law known as Section 377 was “irrational, indefensible and manifestly arbitrary.”
“We have to bid adieu to prejudices and empower all citizens,” he told a packed courtroom.
The court said that gay people were now entitled to all constitutional protections under Indian law and that any discrimination based on sexuality would be illegal.
India’s LGBTQ community rejoices as the Supreme Court decriminalizes homosexuality https://t.co/3vjvfjZLbE pic.twitter.com/b4GuAGG6s2— TIME (@TIME) September 6, 2018
“This monumental decision by India’s Supreme Court finally ends a deeply discriminatory law that violated the dignity and most fundamental human rights of LGBTQ people in India,” said HRC Global Director Ty Cobb. “We congratulate the plaintiffs in this case and the LGBTQ advocates who worked tirelessly for decades to achieve this tremendous victory.”
“We hope this decision in the world’s largest democracy and second most populous country will set an example and galvanize efforts to overturn similar outdated and degrading laws that remain in 71 other countries,” Cobb added.
“The soul of this nation had been bruised and battered because of this archaic law,” said Harish Iyer, an Indian LGBTQ advocate who was involved in the legal challenge to Section 377. “Today, we have reaffirmed our right to our bodies and our right to love. The rainbow flag is proudly hoisted in our hearts and minds as we celebrate this victory.”
With a population of more than 1.3 billion, which accounts for 17% of the world’s population, India is the largest democracy in the world.
Until this ruling, India was the most populous of 72 countries that criminalize same-sex relations.
In 10 countries around the world, homosexual activity may be punishable by death.
We join the people of India & the LGBTQIA+ community in their victory over prejudice. We welcome the progressive & decisive verdict from the Supreme Court & hope this is the beginning of a more equal & inclusive society. #Section377 pic.twitter.com/Fh65vOn7h9— Congress (@INCIndia) September 6, 2018
Another murderer has successfully utilized the ‘gay panic’ defense in an effort to see his prison sentence reduced.
A 35-year-old man in India had been found guilty of the stabbing murder of his friend and was in the 7th year of his sentence when he appealed to the Bombay High Court crying ‘gay panic.’
From Gay Star News:
Originally convicted for murder and given a life sentence, the court reduced his sentence. The court’s changed the man’s sentence to culpable homicide and released him for time already served.
The man appealed his original sentence saying his friend was trying to have ‘unnatural sex’ with him and that’s why he attacked him.
In their ruling the court Justices said the man’s story seemed ‘plausible’.
‘If a person is asked to indulge in an unnatural sex act and assaulted, it is quite probable such a person in the heat of passion would assault the person demanding such unnatural act,’ the justices said.
Gay panic defenses in the U.S. have been banned in California, Rhode Island and Illinois.
In 2013, the American Bar Association approved a resolution condemning the practice.
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| Calum Von Moger |
Some news items you might have missed:
• This selfie by InstaHunk Calum Von Moger (above) just about laid me out. #Woofylicious
• The Supreme Court of India is considering decriminalizing gay sex.
• A Kansas City radio station is throwing anti-LBGTQ Vice President Mike Pence a “sausage fest” as he visits their city. LOL…
• An 8th former Ohio State University wrestler has come forward saying Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan knew about the team doctor’s sexual abuse. The latest accuser says Jordan ‘snickered’ when he told him the physician “held my balls longer than normal.”
• The mother of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooter was told by mental health counselors he shouldn’t have access to guns. She ignored them saying “If he wants to have a gun, he could have a gun.”
• Thailand’s lawmakers are putting the finishing touches to their civil partnerships bill.
• The Human Rights Campaign vigorously opposes Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, Judge Brett Kavanaugh:
“This nominee was hand-picked by anti-LGBTQ, anti-choice groups in an explicit effort to undermine equality — and the prospect of a Justice Kavanaugh threatens to erode our nation’s civil rights laws, block transgender troops from bravely serving this nation and allow a license to discriminate against LGBTQ people in every aspect of American life.”
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| Image via Twitter |
More than 30 cities across the world united on Sunday’s Global Day of Rage to fight for India’s LGBT community after the country’s Supreme Court upheld Section 377 of the Constitution criminalizing homosexuality.
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In Berlin – Annet Audehm / Via Facebook: aaudehm
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| Source: Queer Diasporic |
Much more at Buzzfeed.