Blythe del Kuzio

Chelsea Gilliam, a Black transgender woman, is suing Maryland prison officials for allegedly imprisoning her for months with cisgender men, one of whom attacked and raped her. Gilliam said officials also placed her in solitary confinement and denied her necessary medical treatment. Police initially arrested Gilliam on an assault charge near the end of 2021. Officers then detained her in two prisons — the Baltimore City Correctional Center and the Maryland Reception, Diagnostic and Classification Center — between December 17, 2021 and May 13, 2022, The Baltimore Sun reported . Related Stories I am a trans woman who was incarcerated in a men’s prison. Here’s what you need to know. The fact that these people don’t see me as vulnerable, as feminine, as prey, and as without power or protection is outrageous and infuriating.  During this time, Gilliam said she hadn’t been convicted of a crime. Against prison policy, officers at the first named prison repeatedly misgende...

A national civil rights group has warned that hate crimes will likely spike during the 2024 presidential election, just as they have during each of the last four presidential elections. The group, the Leadership Conference Education Fund (LCEF), analyzed FBI hate crime data over the last 15 years and published their findings in a recent report . Related Stories Hate crimes are on the rise. So why aren’t they being prosecuted? The laws that are supposed to help send a message about bias-related attacks are largely window decoration. The report found that during the 2008 election season, attacks against racial and ethnic minorities spiked — especially as white nationalist and anti-government groups saw then-candidate Barack Obama poised to become the nation’s first Black president. In 2013, during and immediately following Obama’s re-election campaign, the number of hate crime victims increased by nearly 6.6%, according to data from the Department of Justice (DOJ). Hat...

“The first song that you love that your parents hate is the beginning of the soundtrack of your life.” For millions of people around the world, that song came from Little Richard.  Related Stories What critics are saying about “Little Richard: I Am Everything” The iconic singer’s contradictions are at the heart of director Lisa Cortés’s “exhilarating” new documentary. That quote comes from gay filmmaker John Waters, who professes his love for the icon in the trailer for the new documentary, Little Richard: I Am Everything . The new documentary, directed by Lisa Cortés, explores Richard’s life, loves, and legacy in breathtaking detail, delicately exploring his struggle to balance his homosexuality with his religious upbringing, and how his art changed the world for the better. With songs like “Tutti Frutti” and “Good Golly Miss Molly”, the once-in-a-lifetime artist is often credited for birthing rock ‘n roll. Often imitated but never replicated, Richard was discre...

TikTok star Loren Schaffer Rosko eviscerated anti-trans trolls who misgendered her cisgender little sister because of the way she looks. In a searing video, Rosko exposed the hypocrisy of anti-trans folks, one of whom commented on a photo of her sister to say, “I’m sorry, did you say HER?? That is a him.” Related Stories Nonbinary son of Montana’s GOP governor is lobbying their father to protect trans people David Gianforte blasted their father’s hypocrisy as he claimed to “respect” trans youth while taking away their rights. Rosko said this person clearly thought they were typing “the ultimate burn” and pointed out that because her sister, Lindzey, was assigned female at birth and identifies as a woman, anti-trans people would actually hate for her to use he/him or they/them pronouns . So accusing her of being a man doesn’t make sense. “It’s 2023, and apparently, we’re still doing this,” Rosko began. “Lindzey is a girl. She was born a girl. I get it, she looks mascu...

On Wednesday, President Joe Biden issued a proclamation acknowledging the 70th anniversary of the Lavender Scare – a 1950’s firing spree which took place after President Dwight D. Eisenhower (R) signed an executive order banning LGBTQ+ people from working for the U.S. government, accusing gay and lesbian employees of working with the Soviet Russian Communist Party to compromise the country’s national security. “We must reflect honestly on the darkest chapters of our story and on how far we have come,” Biden wrote, decrying the “decades-long period when 5,000 to 10,000 LGBTQI+ Federal employees were investigated, were interrogated, and lost their jobs simply because of who they were and whom they loved.” Related Stories Six decades later, the Lavender Scare is still with us “The Commission has information that you are an admitted homosexual. What comment do you wish to make regarding this matter?” The Lavender Scare began in 1947 and continued throughout the 1950s unde...

Rasheeda Williams, a 35-year-old Black trans woman who appeared in a recent documentary on trans sex workers, was murdered last week in Atlanta, Georgia. Police have arrested an unnamed 17-year-old male suspect . On April 18 at 10:42 p.m., police officers found Williams at a west-central shopping center. She had an apparent gunshot wound and was not alert, conscious, or breathing. Homicide investigators pronounced her dead at the scene, the Atlanta Police Department (APD) said in a statement. Related Stories Amazon may be removing t-shirts supporting trans people’s right to own guns The shirt proclaimed “Trans Rights or Else” with four rifles in the colors of the transgender Pride flag. “Homicide investigators responded and are… working to determine the circumstances surrounding” her murder, the APD said. No motive was given for her slaying nor did the police release details about the 17-year-old suspect and his possible connection to the murder. Their statement noted...

Members of the Florida GOP recently spoke out about their frustrations with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), and now, as it becomes increasingly clear DeSantis will soon announce a presidential run, more Republicans are abandoning ship. According to the New York Times , one powerful DeSantis backer – billionaire hedge fund manager Ken Griffin – may be waffling on whether he will throw his support behind the anti-LGBTQ+ governor in his likely run for president. Related Stories Democratic lawmaker trolls Ron DeSantis with bill to get Disney to leave Florida The “Mickey’s Freedom Restoration Act” slams Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and says Disney is more than welcome in North Carolina. Griffin has reportedly “taken issue in private conversations with some of Mr. DeSantis’s policy moves and pronouncements,” according to sources close to him. The sources said Griffin was worried by DeSantis’s proclamation minimizing the Russian invasion of Ukraine and is also upset by Florida’s six-we...

The American Library Association (ALA) is out with their latest list of the most banned and challenged books, a dubious honor accorded books in library collections in the United States enduring the highest number of attempted bans and demands for censorship. The list is aggregated by the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom from reports filed by library professionals and community members, as well as from news stories published throughout the U.S. Related Stories Missouri GOP votes to slash state library funding over LGBTQ+ books Republicans slashed the budget to retaliate against a lawsuit accusing the GOP of banning hundreds of library books. Because many book challenges go unreported, the ALA Banned and Challenged Book List is only a snapshot. The organization says a challenge to a book may be resolved in favor of retaining the book in a collection, or it can result in a book being restricted or withdrawn from a library. The most recent list covers bans and chal...

San Diego will open a 45-bed shelter for homeless LGBTQ+ youth run by the local LGBT Community Center, the San Diego Housing Commission announced earlier this month. The commission has allocated $1.5 million for the shelter as part of its overall plan to address local homelessness. The San Diego LGBT Community Center is now seeking out a permanent location for sheltering queer and non-queer youth between the ages of 18 and 24. While the permanent location is expected to open later this year, the center will open up two interim 21-bed shelters within the next 60 days inside the neighborhoods of Clairemont and Point Loma, The San Diego Tribune reported . Related Stories Meet the amazing people rewriting the narrative about LGBTQ youth homelessness  “I never want anyone to have the experience I had.” The San Diego LGBT Community Center is currently recruiting staff and volunteers. It will also partner with San Diego Youth Services and the YMCA of San Diego to provide...

The right wing’s weeks-long outrage over Bud Light’s partnership with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney is still burning bright. As conservatives across the country commit to never drinking Bud Light again, one Florida restaurant owner has decided to completely ban the beverage (and anything from Bud Light’s parent company Anheuser-Busch) from his establishments. Joe Penovich, owner of the Grills Seafood Deck and Tiki Bar, recently posted a statement on Facebook saying he made the decision to eliminate Bud Light from his restaurants “because of their support of something that is in direct opposition to our Biblical faith.” Related Stories Ron DeSantis promises to boycott Bud Light before admitting he prefers LGBTQ+-friendly Guinness DeSantis said that Bud Light “lost a customer” and then admitted he doesn’t even drink it. At the beginning of the month, Mulvaney posted a sponsored video to Instagram where she received custom Bud Light beer cans with her face on...

In 1978, Village People, a disco band of six men deliberately stylized as sexy macho gay characters, released its album Cruisin’ . The album featured “YMCA,” an upbeat disco track praising the Young Men’s Christian Association’s (YMCA) community centers as a great place for physical recreation and temporary lodging. But what is the meaning of the song “YMCA”? The catchy song quickly became a hit — arguably ranking it among the 100 greatest dance songs of all time. The gay community also quickly adopted it as an anthem, especially since the song proclaims that a “young man” can find “everything for you men to enjoy” and “many ways to have a good time” as they “hang out with all the boys.” Some gay men interpreted the lyrics as an allusion to cruising for sex at the YMCA’s facilities. But Village People’s straight Black lead singer Victor Willis — who dressed as the group’s policeman and co-wrote the song with the band’s straight producer Henri Belolo and its gay producer Jacques Mora...

Transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney just released a video to tell her followers that she’s alright after being the target of a hurricane of abuse from the right this past month. Mulvaney has been documenting her transition on social media for over a year. On April 1, she posted a video to Instagram with some custom Bud Light cans that had her face on them. Bud Light sent her those cans for the sponsored video and to celebrate her recent 365 days of being a girl. Related Stories John Oliver blasts Anheuser-Busch for lackluster response to brutal Dylan Mulvaney backlash Oliver said the company’s new ad caters to anti-trans trolls and feels like “the results of feeding an AI program the prompt ‘America freedom I’m sorry.'” In the weeks since she posted that 50-second video, conservatives lost their minds, posting videos as they dumped out Bud Light beer and shot up cases of Bud Light with semiautomatic rifles. Elected Republicans claimed that Mulvaney was a pedop...

New research published in The Lancet HIV indicates that transgender women who receive gender-affirming medical care are less likely to contract and transmit HIV. This surprising finding is probably due to the health education trans women get while recieving such care. The study revealed that about one in 200 trans women in the U.S. contract the immunodeficiency virus each year. Related Stories Biden administration sues Tennessee over trans gender-affirming care ban The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the state, saying that the law violates transgender people’s Equal Protection rights. Researchers, led by Dr. Andrea Wirtz of John Hopkins University, followed 1,312 HIV-negative trans women in-person and online in six U.S. cities including Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Miami, New York City, and Washington, DC, and through a digital mode in 72 smaller eastern and southern U.S. cities. The ongoing study started in 2018 and included in-person or online health c...