Also, the Russian LGBT Network, a long-standing and reputable organisation, have reported that they are directly involved in evacuating LGBT men from Chechnya and have heard their stories first hand.

The Guardian has (anonymised) interviews with two men who escaped Chechnya in the last few weeks: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/13/they-called-us-animals-chechens-prison-beatings-electric-shocks-anti-gay-purge (tw for torture, blackmail and death)

is this a fucking joke

//While I *do* certainly hope this is a joke, I actually do sometimes feel a bit nervous or ashamed or something admitting I’m straight, especially around certain crowds, because I feel like people are automatically going to think that just because I’m straight, I’m also a gay-basher, which couldn’t be farther from the truth. I love gay people as much as gay people do.

^^^ This. Fucking this. I’m almost afraid to say that I’m NOT gay when it comes to tumblr because sometimes y’all assume that every heterosexual person hates you. Hello. IT FEELS LIKE SOMETIMES YOU HATE US. This is not a battle. Or a war. Or a crusade. I love you. I think gay couples are the shit. I fangirl when you hold hands in public and tell haters to fuck off. I am not starting a war. I’m just saying. Let’s all love each other. No enemy. One way or the other. 

OH NO

WHAT HAPPENED

WHAT HAPPENED TO MY POST

IT WAS HIJACKED BY WHINY LAMES

I FANGIRL WHEN YOU HOLD HANDS IN PUBLIC

straight people are the worst thing to happen to me

"I’m afraid of admitting that I’m straight in certain crowds"

I’M AFRAID OF ADMITTING THAT I’M GAY IN FRONT OF FUCKING EVERYWHERE YOU INSENSITIVE WHINY BUTTBABIES WOW WHAT THE FUCK

The consequence of being straight among gay people: "Tumblr gays are so mean!!!!"

The consequence of being gay among straight people: Being shot in front of a bookstore, being beaten in front of a gay bar, being sexually assaulted by straight men, being denied employment in many parts of this country. But you know, false equivalences and such. 

Meanwhile a black trans woman was lit on fire last year, a white lesbian was shot in the head, and  a gay black teen was jumped in front of a liquor store in broad daylight. This is what I’m talking about when I mention our invisibility. As long as gay white men and boys are the only ones  getting any attention not only are the rest of us invisible, but so is our suffering. So when you see me yawning at the “totes cute” gay couples on tv shows and in commercials and on Tumblr you will know why.

You know...

Mathematically Justin Bieber should have collapsed in on himself by now from the massive gravitational forces of his faggotry.

Scientists need to get on this anomaly.

Hey, I don’t give a shit how much you dislike the random pop star of the week, but can we cool it with the homophobic slurs? It’s super super gross.

Southpark redefined the word faggot ages ago. I have some very good gay friends that understand this too. I can find that episode for you.

Really? Some shitty privileged white straight boys “changed the definition” of a homophobic slur?

Well, GOLLY GEE! I guess that makes it Okie Dokie then.

No, god dammit. What kind of patronizing privileged fuckery is that? Just because some crap show “redefined” a slur doesn’t make that slur ok. It doesn’t make it any less offensive and hurtful and homophobic to the LGBTQ+ community. 

I don't give a flying fuck about what some fucking straight guy says the word "faggot" means. Faggot when used as an insult, still means a person who "deviates" for your standards of manhood. It still has ties to homophobic ideas that queer men are somehow "less", "lacking", and "inferior". Straight people don't get to decided what is or isn't a fucking slur towards queer people. 

This is as fucking annoying as white people trying to "reclaim" the n word and trying to "redefine" it. 

I am not quiet during sex. I communicate my desires and ask the same of my partners. I believe that this not only creates a safe sexual environment but makes for the most pleasurable experience for everyone. If I’m making sounds that aren’t words, that more or less means I’m having a good time. People generally respond well to this type of nonverbal feedback; I’ve only had one person object to my use of nonverbal expression, and that was Peter.

Peter is a gay man I slept with once. I met him in a gay bar when I was living in New York, and I thought he was perfect. He worked with homeless queer youth. He had a dog. He was a little taller than average, and stocky, wearing jeans, a T-shirt and Puma high tops. He was bearded. He said things like “you’re so unlike everyone your age” (he was 11 years older than I) and “I never go home with anyone the night I meet them.” When he did come home with me and we were naked in my bed, he kissed my neck, and I moaned, high-pitched and breathy. He stopped, looked me in the eye and said, “Don’t do that. It’s faggy.”

Now, this was several years ago, and I hadn’t yet learned that people like Peter are to be either ignored, laughed at or taught, so I became a caricature of “not faggy”: I grunted (no more moaning), I pretended that I wasn’t hurt by what he said (feelings are for girls, as I recalled learning during childhood), and I tried to act as masculine as possible, because that is the opposite of faggy, the opposite of the femme gay man who gestures, speaks quickly in a high-pitched voice and says “darling.” I became that silly thing because I wanted Peter to love me.

He stood me up on our next date, and I never heard from him again.

Eventually surpassing the typical “what did I do wrong?” stage of self-hatred, I asked myself, “What does it mean that Peter called me faggy for expressing pleasure?” And so I learned that people like Peter are part of a larger problem: pervasive misogyny.

Typically we say that “fag,” “sissy,” “nancy,” “nelly” and “fairy” are homophobic words, and although they certainly are used to perpetuate homophobia, they are not homophobic in and of themselves; the usage of any of these words as slurs usually targets people with male-sexed bodies who do not act sufficiently masculine. They prize masculinity by demonizing femininity. This is probably rooted in some outdated, essentialist reading of gender where women are biologically the weaker, pathetic sex, but we know today that in addition to being totally offensive, gender essentialism is more or less bullshit, because women can vote and work and beat men into submission, and men can cook and clean and stay at home with the kids. But although it was relatively easy to deconstruct the misogyny in Peter’s abuse, getting to the root of why a man, while lying naked with another man and kissing him, would call that man’s expression of pleasure too gay is a more complicated subject. I would suggest that Peter calling me faggy is part of a larger queer cultural heritage.

Queer people live in a constant narrative of struggle; today we struggle for legally recognized marriage, and in 2003 we struggled for the right to have consensual sex, but 60 years ago queer role models fought for the right to exist in public or private. To gain those rights, they used an effective strategy called assimilation, which dictated that queer people look and act as much as possible like straight people. The Mattachine Society and the Daughters of Bilitis both did it intentionally in the ’50s, and it was probably the most aggressive option to say “we are normal, just like you” at a time when police were encouraged to raid gay bars, arrest patrons and publish their names and faces in the newspaper the following day. However, “just like you” literally bleached queer people of color from the movement and rendered trans people invisible, because “just like you” referred to white men in power and their wives who had the sway to validate any queer identity legally. Assimilation was successful in that discrimination against LGBT people is now illegal in many forms, but it also created an “acceptable gay man,” and he was white and masculine and certainly did not say “darling.” It also created and validated a favorite excuse for anti-gay bigotry, “I’m fine with gay people as long as they don’t flaunt it,” because suddenly there were gay people who were not “normal.” “Normal” gay men today ape that heterosexual excuse for bigotry by blaming “abnormal” gays for the the maltreatment of gays as a whole.

Peter is a “normal” gay man, so when my behavior started to drift outside “normal,” he reprimanded me much in the same way that police officers, gym teachers or parents might have done in the ’50s (and today, to be fair). And although the ’50s were over 60 years ago, that attitude remains pervasive: Look at any on gay dating website or smartphone app and you’ll see our twisted heritage as “preferences” based on a hierarchy of who can pass as a successful straight man: “Looking for masc, musc, no femmes, white only.” Though the irony that none of us is straight does not escape me, I’d like to focus more on how regressive this is; we are literally contributing to our own oppression by upholding this bizarre heritage of misogyny created in the ’50s.

So let’s make life easier on all queer people and stop mimicking the worst parts of heterosexism. Who knows? We could even begin to support each other. How revolutionary.

This.

France Legalizes Gay Marriage After Harsh Debate, Violent Protests

PARIS — France legalized gay marriage on Tuesday after a wrenching national debate and protests that flooded the streets of Paris. Legions of officers and water cannon stood ready near France’s National Assembly ahead of the final vote, bracing for possible violence on an issue that galvanized the country’s faltering conservative movement.

The measure passed easily in the Socialist-majority Assembly, 331-225, just minutes after the president of the legislative body expelled a disruptive protester in pink, the color adopted by French opponents of gay marriage.

“Only those who love democracy are here,” Claude Bartelone, the Assembly president, said angrily.

In recent weeks, violent attacks against gay couples have spiked and some legislators have received threats – including Bartelone, who got a gunpowder-filled envelope on Monday. x

I was very surprised this became such an issue considering how much France likes to shout about ‘secularism’ in recent years, which in my mind is just Islamophobia by another name. Also the increase of attacks against gay people in the past few weeks should be an indicator that ‘marriage equality’ does not equal humane treatment. Violence towards the LGBTQ community must be addressed, because what’s the point of being able to get married if you’re not actually alive to do it. 

Congratulations to the lovers and future lovers of France.

This is important everyone. And we should takes notes in America too.

Rappers who publicly support gay marriage

Please stop fucking acting like Macklemore is this special snowflake for being a rapper who supports gay marriage. I know yall love to pretend that black people are homophobes, so obviously the music we make must be homophobic, but that is bullshit and Wacklemore is not the first rapper to publicly support gay marriage.

Hold up. Let’s quickly address how many people on that list have also “accidentally” used harmful gay slurs either in their work or in public:

I’ll give you Lil B, A$AP Rocky, and Queen Latifah.

But now how many of those people have dedicated precious space on an album and creative energy into affirming same-sex relationships?

That was a cute list, though.

Yeah my SO brought up this last night and while it’s true that there’s a trend of giving cookies to white allies while acting as if black people are homogeneously homophobic, this is a pretty good thing to point out. 

Doesn’t detract from the white people getting cookies for doing shit that decent people do while black folks stay getting shit on, though. 

All good points.

My problem is that when the vast majority of black performers use homophobic lyrics, that means black culture is virulently homophobic. But when the vast majority of white performers use homophobic lyrics… we can just let that slide? Are they the exception somehow? I mean, fucking Katy Perry has used some really fucking awful homophobic and transphobic lyrics and people still think she’s an ally.

But Macklemore comes along and he’s the savior of rap music? Fuck that shit.

Reblogging for commentary. 

The bold part because people need to be aware of racists double standards when discussing intersecting oppression. 

Response

my poem, “To JK Rowling, From Cho Chang” “I’m everyone’s favorite character! I totally get to fight tons of Death Eaters and have a great sense of humor and am full of complex emotions!

OH WAIT. That’s the version of Harry Potter where I’m not fucking worthless!” 

I just want to address a couple of things here that I don’t agree with:

1) there were more than 5 “brown” kids in the school. Katie Bell and Lee Jordan spring to mind that I’m pretty sure didn’t make her list (might give her Katie because in the movie I think she was white but in the BOOKS she was black)

2) Harry Potter is told from Harry’s point of view why would he know his headmaster is gay?  Dumbledore know about Harry’s life not the other way around. If you look at the clues you could probably figure it out (look at what he was wearing and the parts with Grindelwald [sp?] it’s pretty easy to draw lines)

3) Do the BOOKS say what nationality she was or was that casting problems of her nationality not matching her name. The double last name thing was pretty messed up.

4) I kinda liked book Cho (movie Cho sucked and can go die in a hole). She was a plot device. She was to show Harry’s interest in girls starting to grow and to start highlighting the loss that Voldemort brings with his return. Let’s also be honest and assume that she and Cedric probably had sex and he was probably her first which would be why she was so conflicted about moving on in the 5th book and all that.

5) By all means be offended about her main purpose. That she was a Ravenclaw. And about what ever else you want to be offended by but remember there is a lot about the books that only JK and maybe her editor knows. Cho probably has a whole background that we don’t know about. There are probably a TON of characters that never made it into the books. There were a lot of characters in the books that could be any race because they had minimal descriptions. Remember the books aren’t perfect nor is JK. 

Hey, thanks for taking the time to write a thoughtful reply to my piece! I’m glad this is creating dialogue. I just wanted to address some of the things you bring up. 1. Thanks for pointing that out — I wasn’t aware those two were people of color. Still, seven instead of five is not much better. (And I was using “five” as kind of a catch-all, general number anyway, since “me, Dean, and the Indian twins” = 4.) 2. But I don’t think we should have to guess. We don’t have to guess about Remus and Tonks, or about any other heterosexual character. I admire that JK Rowling states that Dumbledore is gay, but I think her refusing to put it explicitly in the books is furthering the idea that homosexuality should be a secret and is not appropriate for children. Which does not promote equality by any means. (And by “put it explicitly in the books” I don’t mean by him wearing rainbow robes. I mean, just  come out and say that he was in love with Grindelwald!) 3. No, the books don’t explicitly say that she is supposed to be Chinese, but every source I’ve consulted (admittedly, this is the internet so it doesn’t mean it’s true) seems to say that it was the intention that she was Chinese. But still, the name “Cho Chang” is pretty ridiculous — it’s a caricature of a name. It denies Cho Chang having a real ethnicity, as being anything other than “Asian.” EDIT: Apparently the name can work, as Zhang Qiu or similar spelling, which would be romanized as Cho Chang/Chang Cho. I could go into the research I did, but in the end, I made an error, and I apologize. 4. You even say, “she’s a plot device.” Exactly my point. She’s not a person, like Harry, Hermione, Ron, Neville, Hagrid, etc. all are. She is just the trope of the pretty, Asian, exotic girl who has lots of admirers and is too dependent on boys. And I am not critiquing the realism of Cho’s character. Within the context of the books, it makes total sense that she would be crying all of the time. What I do question is JK Rowling’s choice to depict Cho as a weak, vulnerable person. It is a choice. We forget that characters do not just fall into authors’ laps. Everything from their hair color to their mannerisms is decided. And JK Rowling chose to make Cho fit in with stereotypes of Asian women — and yes, probably unconsciously. I understand that JK Rowling didn’t write her books to combat homophobia and racism, but I would have appreciated a little more intentionality. 5. I’ll admit, the joke about Ravenclaw was totally for the sake of an easy joke. It’s the least valid of my critiques. And yes, Cho probably does have a huge background that we don’t know about — as a diehard HP fan, I’ll be the first to tell you I’ve spent a lot of fun hours poring over JK Rowling’s old website looking for genealogies and miscellaneous character information. It’s truly impressive how much effort JK Rowling put into the series, and Harry Potter will always remain one of my favorite series of all times, both for its message of compassion, and also just because it’s a fantastic story. And I’m not trying to attack JK Rowling specifically. Of course she’s not perfect, nor are the books. I have done racist and homophobic things as well. What I’m doing is using the platform of Harry Potter — one of the most popular & pervasive entertainment series of all time — to comment on a stereotype of Asian women that is present in all forms of media, and hopefully get people to question their assumptions. It’s not supposed to be a personal attack, though I understand that it’s framed that way. Thanks for taking the time to read this — I know it was a lot! I hope my intent is clearer. Please continue the dialogue. ALSO: I’ve gotten a lot of responses about “Cho Chang” being a legitimate Chinese name. I do not have a lot of personal knowledge about Chinese names, but I did research this point. I do know that Chang can also be a Chinese surname, but what I was trying to do was comment on how “Cho Chang” is denied real heritage through her generic, vaguely Asian-sounding name. A more effective critique would have been for me to compare “Cho Chang” with “Ching Chong Wong.” Hope this clarifies that. I definitely understand & respect the critique. EDIT:  Apparently the name can work, as Zhang Qiu or similar spelling, which would be romanized as Cho Chang/Chang Cho. I did know that Chang was Chinese name, but decided to simplify it for the sake of a punchline. I could go into the research I did, but in the end, I made an error, and I apologize.

Certainly the concept of using vaguely Asian sounding names is very problematic. And Cho Chang does sound like it could follow the tradition of just having vaguely Asian sounding words and making a name. The reason I called it out really is because tumblr has a nasty habit of accepting everything at face value without researching it and people were bound to erroneously think Chang is exclusively a Korean surname. It certainly doesn't mean I won't call out problematic Asian naming that robs Asians of ethnic identity. 

I just laughed so hard that I banged my leg against the table next to me and knocked my Mizrahi hamsa ornament off it. I can’t decide if this is creepy, slightly ironic, or the universe’s way of telling me I’m being a Nazi.

Nah bro, that one sentence is all someone needs to tell if you’re any of those things, no physical identification is required.

Fischer needs to get back to us when they start rounding up all the Christians and putting them in concentration camps.

I hope the great majority of Americans are laughing at this shit head.

homofascists

I feel like it's time to remind Fischer that the Nazi didn't kill people like him, but they sure as hell killed a lot of queer people. 

How do YOU view the Republican party survey.

Did you know “IN THE CLOSET” is a sexual orientation but asexual is not?

This segment was great. Taking the survey now!

So. No gay marriage:

Well, it’s good to see such all-inclusive, well-rounded arguments that pertain to people of diverse backgrounds, experiences, and beliefs.

laughing and crying in frustration

Does that fucking say yolo at the bottom of the last one

so if the pope doesnt support marriage equality, it’s “not homophobia and it’s just his beliefs”

but if you say “lol str8 ppl” you’re oppressing heterosexuals

ooookkaayyyy

Reader J. submitted this without comment. I like how this bigot thinks anyone cares when they’re going to “entertain” people’s arguments about “”“equal rights”“”.

"When physically harming a straight person for any reason" This fucker knows full well that no straight person are beaten for being straight so they go on to say "for any reason" to make it look as though they're oppressed and we're suppose to feel sympathetic. 

REPEAT AFTER ME: WAITING FOR HOMOPHOBES/RACISTS/ETC TO "DIE OUT" IS NOT A VIABLE STRATEGY

does this mean they need help?

<3

the new pope is homophobic. wow. shocking. i think i need to sit down to process this completely unexpected and unprecedented news

That first one with it's "disagreeing with your lifestyle" bullshit...