Australians call to ban PM from Pride over broken promises
Slovak government pushing new anti-LGBT "propaganda" law
🇦🇺 Australia: LGBT people are calling for the prime minister and his government to be banned from Sydney Mardi Gras (that’s Aussie for Pride), over repeated broken promises to the queer community, including walking back a promise to ban anti-LGBT discrimination in religious schools and reneging on having LGBTI people counted in the census.
🇸🇰 Slovakia: Homophobic government legislators appear to be working on a new bill to ban “LGBT propaganda,” mirroring bills in Russia, Hungary, and recently Bulgaria. But the education minister, who is from a different but still homophobic party, says he won’t implement the bill, which will be up for debate in September.
And the government is attempting to shut down criticism by introducing a Russia-style “foreign agents” law that will made it difficult for independent media and nongovernmental organizations to operate in the country.
The far-right government is trying to pick fights all over the country. Last week, a deputy minister got into an altercation at a theatre production of the Irish play “Little Gem,” when he interrupted the show to denounce its sexual themes as being inappropriate for children. Police are now investigating complaints he harassed the theatre company and a complaint from the minister that security assaulted him in trying to get him to leave.
🇫🇮 Finland: Trans activists have exposed some dodgy practices carried out by gender-critical doctors who are directing trans care in the country, and they’re worried this approach will be exported.
EU: A citizen’s initiative to ban conversion therapy in the EU is still collecting signatures but is still a long way off from reaching the required thresholds. If you’re an EU citizen, consider signing it.
🇹🇼 Taiwan: Although same-sex marriage has been legal for five years, binational gay couples that include a partner from mainland China are still effectively blocked from marrying, due to the island’s policy that such couples must marry on the mainland, which does not recognize same-sex marriage. One couple has been in a three-year legal process to challenge the law. A court recently ruled in their favor, but the government is dawdling while it attempts to draft a workaround to the law that balances national security concerns.
🇨🇴 Colombia: The Constitutional Court has reiterated that same-sex couples have the right to establish family property on the same basis that heterosexual couples do. Same-sex couples have been able to marry in Colombia since 2016.
🇵🇪 Peru: Former congressman Carlos Bruce fulfilled a personal dream by marrying his partner in Spain. Peru does not recognize same-sex couples.
Meanwhile, in the States
A map of census results shows the states with the highest percentage of same-sex couples, who on average make up about 1.7% of US households. The states with the highest percentages are all in the western US, the northeast, and Florida.
🐊 Florida: The 11th Circuit Court has allowed a state law barring trans people of all ages from accessing gender-related care to go into effect, while appeals against the law itself continue.
Maryland: Republican former Governor Larry Hogan is running for Senate (and is likely to lose), but The Advocate would like to remind you that he’s never been an enthusiastic supporter of LGBTQ rights and refused to sign several basic LGBTQ rights bills as Governor.
⛰️ Colorado: The state Republican Party has ousted its president in vote after he repeatedly used vile, homophobic language to describe LGBT people.
🌞 California: The campaign to remove the ban on same-sex marriage from the state constitution launched its website with a photo of a straight couple on the landing page. Woops.
Arkansas: A Republican appointee is complaining that the state library board won’t accede to his demands they remove books with LGBTQ themes.