China: LGBT Consumers, how luxury can tap a $300 billion market

Long an important target for marketers in the West, LGBT consumers often have higher disposable incomes and lead consumer trends. With public acceptance of LGBT people continuing to grow worldwide, it’s time for brands to think global when developing their marketing strategies to this community. Case in point: as the second-largest economy—and home to the largest LGBT population—in the world, China deserves serious attention.

According to Hong Kong-based venture capital firm LGBT Capital, the annual purchasing power of China’s 70 million-strong LGBT population amounts to $300 billion, compared to $870 billion for Europe and $750 billion for the United States. Despite its size and huge potential for growth, virtually no Western brand has formally engaged this community, mainly due to its invisibility in public and in the Chinese media. But that’s quickly changing. Read More

Taiwan: Gamania becomes first company to recognize gay marriage

Computer game developer Gamania has become the first listed company in Taiwan to recognize same-sex marriage by extending marital leave to gay employees. Gamania said it realized that gender equality was a global trend, with tech companies such as Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Intel, HP and eBay throwing their support behind gay marriage in the US. It added that it was important create an happy work-life environment for staff. Read More

US: IBM has 'strong opposition' to Louisiana religious freedom bill

IBM voiced its "strong opposition" to Louisiana's religious freedom bill (HB 707) backed by Gov. Bobby Jindal, a week after the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau also asked that the bill be dropped over fears that it would tarnish the state's open and accepting image.

"We are deeply concerned by reports that you intend to support this legislation. IBM has made significant investments in Louisiana including most recently a technology services delivery center in Baton Rouge, creating new jobs for Louisiana workers," wrote James Driesse, IBM senior state executive. "A bill that legally protects discrimination based on same-sex marriage status will create a hostile environment for our current and prospective employees, and is antithetical to our company’s values."

IBM's prominent, 800-job facility in downtown Baton Rouge is being built only few blocks away from where the legislation will be debated. The company is expected to bring 400 jobs to Monroe in the northern part of the state.  Read More 

China: Google, IBM, Ford and McKinsey attend first LGBT job fair

The event was organized by WorkForLGBT and Shanghai LGBT Professionals as part of its second, annual LGBT Corporate Diversity & Inclusion Conference. Both the conference and job fair – held in conjunction with Kanzhun.com – took place at the Langham Xintiandi Shanghai.

Around 200 HR leaders and LGBT employees attended the conference, and around 400 LGBT Chinese job-seekers attended the job fair, which featured 17 Fortune 500 companies. 

WorkForLGBT founder, Steven Paul Bielinski, said that LGBT job seekers were keen to meet with representatives of companies that had comprehensive diversity and inclusion policies: "Talented LGBT employees from all across China traveled to Shanghai to be part of this groundbreaking job fair. Inclusive employers with programs, policies, and a corporate culture where LGBT employees can bring their authentic selves to work are their first choice."  Read More

Australia: PwC appoints advisory board for greater diversity and inclusion

PriceWaterhouseCoopers Australia has announced a number of appointments to a new external advisory board that will be charged with moving the firm towards greater diversity and inclusion.

The professional services company is already regarded as a market leader in this field. It held the number one spot in 2012 and second place in 2013 in Australia's Pride in Diversity's Workplace Equality Index – which ranks best employers for LGBTI individuals. It scored 100% on the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index in 2015 and 2014, and also regularly features in Stonewall’s Workplace Equality Index in the UK.

‘PwC is determined to be different and our external advisory board is one of the ways we are doing this,’ said PwC Chief Executive Luke Sayers in a statement. ‘This is a continuation of our deep commitment to creating a more diverse and inclusive workforce.' Read More

Russia: Meet the badass mom who’s taking on the gay propaganda law

Elena Musolina grew up thinking homosexuality was an affliction of alcoholics and drug addicts. Now she marches alongside her son at LGBT rights protests and goes head-to-head with Russia’s most vocal anti-LGBT politician.

When Musolina joined Coming Out’s support group for parents of LGBT kids in 2011, she didn’t expect it would become political. But that changed when the “gay propaganda” ban made her feel like her son was a second-class citizen. Musolina, a petite 68-year-old, comes to LGBT rights demonstrations in St. Petersburg with other mothers in Coming Out’s parents club, which she now helps lead. 

The group is now under threat after Coming Out was branded a “foreign agent” under a 2012 law that requires NGOs receiving foreign funding and engaging in what the government broadly deems “political activity” to register as such. Read More

UK: Mother of bisexual asylum seeker will sue Britain if they send her son home to die

A Jamaican bisexual asylum seeker could be deported at any moment after being detained by the UK government. Orashia Edwards, 32, was ruled to be lying about his sexuality in the final judgment of his asylum case earlier this month.

This is in despite of a man in the UK saying he has been in a relationship with Edwards for the past two years and his entire family being British citizens. Two specialists living in Jamaica have also written on Edwards' behalf to the UK, saying it is not safe for him to return.

His mother warns that if her son is sent home, she will sue the UK government for deporting him to a place where he could very easily be killed.  Read More

Egypt: Deport me!

After the court ruled it is legal to deport LGBT people from Egypt, the story went viral abroad. It’s strange because LGBT Egypt has not been in the international news much for months. When you deal with the media, you get used to its collective movements, puzzling as tidal motions when it’s too cloudy to see the moon, or the startled shuddering of gazelles racing in unison through tall grass.

But other terrible things happened here recently. A man acquitted on charges of homosexuality tried to burn himself to death in despair. Police arrested an accused “shemale,” splaying her photos on the Internet. Egypt’s government threatened to close a small HIV/AIDS NGO because it gave safer-sex info to gay men. None of these got such press. The contrast is striking.

I learn three things from all this. First: our attention span isn’t what it used to be. The attention span of news consumers, and activists among them, shrivels; and that’s a problem. Read More 

Russia: Clashes and flash mobs on the Day of Silence in St. Petersburg

LGBT activists and their allies held two Day of Silence rallies aimed at eliminating discrimination, hatred and violence against sexual minorities. One march included call outs to banned LGBT teens support project “Children-404″. Another rally from Vosstaniya Square to the Kazansky Cathedral involved participants with their mouths covered with red tape.

There were several unsuccessful attempts to disrupt the events, but thanks to nearby police officers, the rallies continued and peace was kept. Read More

More and more actions announced for IDAHOT 2015

Created in 2004 to draw the attention of policymakers, opinion leaders, social movements, the public and the media to the violence and discrimination experienced by LGBTI people internationally. In under a decade, May 17 has established itself the single most important date for LGBTI communities to mobilise on a worldwide scale.

The Day represents an annual landmark to draw the attention of decision makers, the media, the public, opinion leaders and local authorities to the alarming situation faced by lesbian, gay, bisexuals, transgender and intersex people and all those who do not conform to majority sexual and gender norms.

May 17 is now celebrated in more than 130 countries, including 37 where same-sex acts are illegal, with 1600 events reported from 1280 organizations in 2014. These mobilisations unite millions of people in support of the recognition of human rights for all, irrespective of sexual orientation or gender identity or expression. Read More

Japan: Rainbow parade celebrates LGBT equality push

Some 3,000 lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people paraded through Tokyo’s Shibuya district to demonstrate their hope that Japanese society will continue to forge ahead with recent moves to embrace equality and diversity.

This year, LGBT participants and proponents seemed particularly joyous, emboldened by what they see as a blossoming of LGBT-friendly moves by municipalities and companies. “The mood is definitely different this year. All the flyers or other goods we have prepared for visitors are disappearing like mad,” said transgender Fumino Sugiyama, one of the event’s chief organizers. 

Amid the surge in public interest in LGBT issues, organizers decided to extend the festival to two days for the first time, Sugiyama added.  Read More

A young man who survived “ex-gay ministries” taught me what it means to be a Christian

The campaign against marriage equality sent me fleeing from the church. Here's what brought me back. - Rachel Held Evans:  "If Christians in East Tennessee wanted to send the message that gay and lesbian people would be uncomfortable and unwelcome in our churches, that their identity would be reduced to their sexual orientation and their personhood to a political threat, then we’d sure done a bang-up job of communicating it...

A man I didn’t recognize invited us to attend a meeting that night to discuss the “radical homosexual agenda in America and how Christians should respond to it.” He spat out the word homosexual the same way others spat out the words liberal, feminist, and evolutionist, and it occurred to me in that moment that maybe I wasn’t the only one who brought an uninvited guest to church on Sunday morning. In a congregation that large, there was a good chance the very people this man considered a threat to our way of life weren’t out there, but rather in here—perhaps visiting with family, perhaps squirming uncomfortably with the youth group in the back, perhaps singing with the worship band up front. How lonely they must feel, how paralyzed.

...Seven years after the “Vote Yes On One” campaign sent me fleeing from the church, I discovered church again in an unlikely place: the Gay Christian Network’s annual “Live It Out” conference in Chicago. I spoke at the conference as an ally, but within hours of arriving at the Westin on the Chicago River, it became clear I had little to teach these brothers and sisters in Christ and everything to learn from them. Read the full excerpt from "Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving and Finding the Church" Read More