Italy: Gay rights activists rally for universal marriage and adoption rights

Donning the gay pride rainbow on their cheeks and holding banners which read "we want equality," "love counts" and "the law and its rights are for everybody," around 20,000 protestors gathered in Rome's famous Piazza del Popolo to protest government plans to implement a civil union bill which fails to recognize their right to legally marry and also adopt their partners' biological children.

Demonstrators say the proposal - which had been reined in in a bid to pass the senate, and is now being assessed by the lower house - only goes part of the way to securing rights for Italy's homosexual families.

"Today's demonstration is meant to show that the Italian people aren't happy with our parliament and government," Pietro Stramba-Badiale, spokesman for civil rights group ParteCivile, told DW.

But it was not only LGBTI activists, Stramba-Badiale added, who were out demonstrating on Saturday.  Read more via DW

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South Africa: Minister of Justice calls on Africa to respect LGBTI people

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South Africa’s Minister of Justice has called on African nations to accept the human rights of LGBTI people and to change their attitudes towards sexual orientation and gender identity.

Delegates from across the continent participated in the “Africa Regional Seminar on Finding Practical Solutions for Addressing Violence and Discrimination Against Persons Based on Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression.” The seminar brought together officials, human rights groups, international and regional bodies, civil society and academics.

In his speech, Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development Advocate Michael Masutha said that the seminar had its roots in the resolution adopted by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights in May 2014 condemning violence and other human rights violations against the LGBTI community. The historic resolution, while largely ignored by African governments, also condemned attacks by states against people on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Masutha said that at the heart of efforts to protect LGBTI Africans from “horrendous violations” was the understanding “that we must change societal attitudes”.  Read more via MambaOnline

World Bank ‘won’t fund’ projects in developing countries that endanger LGBT people

Speaking at the Economist’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’ conference taking place concurrently in London, New York and Hong Kong, the President of the World Bank Jim Yong Kim spoke about proposals to rein in lending to projects that could end up harming LGBT rights.

Explaining why the bank cut off lending after Uganda passed an Anti-Homosexuality Act, he said: “Right at that moment we were about to approve a $90 million loan to support health clinics in Uganda. I worked as a doctor, and this is an important issue for me… but we looked carefully and we found out that it was possible that active discrimination could happen in these clinics, and because of the requirement to report homosexual behaviour, gay men and women could go to these clinics… and we could actually endanger people from the LGBTI community, so we had to stop that loan.”

He continued: “There were a lot of countries who condemned Uganda… but the money still flowed. We were the only ones who stopped the flow of money. The Ugandans were very angry about this… but [I told the board] I felt it was very important to take this stand. One of the questions was, what would be the implication of taking that kind of action? Well, our business has exploded since then. The Ugandans have repealed that law – the court found it unconstitutional.

“But probably the most encouraging thing was a minister of finance from a developing country came and insisted on seeing me one-on-one, and I didn’t know what it was… he came in and said the Prime Minister wanted me to know there was draconian legislation on homosexual activity going through the Parliament, but he wanted to assure me he would veto it, and it would never become law."  

Read more via Pink News
 

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Kiddle the child-friendly, Google-powered search censoring 'bisexual' and 'transgender'

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A new search engine aimed at children blocks words such as “bisexual” and “transgender” and says that they are “bad words”. The search engine uses Google’s technology by allowing people to search in a custom Google search bar. But it is meant to keep children safe, by excluding words that could be damaging to children.

Many of those words lead to pages that could be useful to children, however. And sites related to sexuality, gender and other important topics are still being missed. The site also still allows people to see adult content when searching for words like Pamela Anderson, and does not filter a story about a Danish radio host killing a rabbit.

The site says that its search results “are either handpicked and checked by our editors or filtered by Google safe search”. That process means that people “get kid-oriented results without any explicit content”.  Read more via the Independent

Twitter asks for nonprofit help in fighting trolls

Twitter’s new Trust & Safety Council, backed by a wide variety of nonprofits, aims to tackle one of the major struggles that it and its users have faced over the years: the proliferation of harassment on the social network.

The social network, which has faced some high-profile defections in recent months announced that it was collaborating with more than 40 nonprofits on the council. Among the new members are the National Cyber Security Alliance, GLAAD, the Internet Watch Foundation, the Anti-Defamation League, and the Dangerous Speech Project.

“To ensure people can continue to express themselves freely and safely on Twitter, we must provide more tools and policies,” said Patricia Cartes, the company’s head of global policy outreach. Read more via Associations Now

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Nigeria: The trials of modern LGBT life

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excerpt: I’ve dedicated some time to write articles on the gay issues in Africa, with a special focus on my home country, Nigeria. The great thing about sharing my story, aside from creating awareness, is that I’ve met lots of African gays who share their own stories, including a friend of mine, Sam, who was in Lagos, when he went to a café to meet up with a guy he found on Grindr last year. The guy followed him from the cafe and asked Sam for his phone. Suddenly, two guys appeared, telling Sam to cooperate. It dawned on him that this was a set up.

Instinctively Sam began yelling, “Thief!” to draw attention from passers-by. He had no gay content on his phone so these men couldn’t prove anything. The men began yelling, “Gay, Gay, Gay!” thinking the passers-by would attack Sam. Sam, with the confidence that there was no evidence of his sexuality, told them he’d get the police involved.

Three passers-by stopped and asked what was wrong. The men told them that Sam was gay and they set a trap for him. They said they had proof that Sam was gay. By then, eight people had joined the onlookers. A lady spoke up, “If he is gay, what’s your business?” Someone else said, “Homosexuality is legal is several countries, what’s your point?” Read more via EQ views

Cameroon: Plea to to Pope, Restrain gay-bashing Catholics

In Cameroon, a recent resurgence of anti-LGBTI rhetoric from the Catholic Church has come in for criticism from the Douala-based advocacy group Alternatives-Cameroon, which fights AIDS and supports human rights for sexual minorities.  In this press release, Alternatives-Cameroon asks Pope Francis to intervene:

We recalled that during the Synod on the Family, held a few months ago, the same prelate declared homosexuality to be a threat to the family. Cardinal Tumi [Cardinal Christian Tumi, the retired archbishop of Douala] even declared that homosexuality was a “threat to the human race.” Catholic lawyers depicted homosexuality to be a clinical pathology that should attract the attention of different hospitals.

This Church wants more than ever to set Cameroonians against each other, ignoring its mission to promote love, tolerance and peace. Has history not taught it a lesson? From slavery to the Holocaust to the Rwandan genocide — now it’s the turn of homosexuals. Read more via 76crimes

UN: Banning homosexuality fosters hate crime and homophobia, says report

Criminalising homosexuality amounts to torture in many of the 76 countries where same-sex relationships are outlawed, a United Nations report has declared. Prof Juan Mendez, the organisation’s special rapporteur on torture, has called for decriminalisation in his latest submission to the UN’s human rights council on the grounds that the bans – which sometimes carry the death penalty – legitimise homophobia and hate crimes.
 
In one of the strongest denunciations of laws that are enforced in many African, Asian and Middle Eastern states, Mendez, a former Argentinian political prisoner, urges governments to reconsider their statute books: “A clear link exists between the criminalisation of LGBT persons and homophobic and transphobic hate crimes, police abuse, community and family violence and stigmatisation,” his report says. 
 
The report says that in countries where homosexuality is criminalised “men suspected of same-sex conduct are subject to non-consensual anal examinations intended to obtain physical evidence of homosexuality, a practice that is medically worthless and amounts to torture or ill-treatment”.

The UN special rapporteur’s statement will provide legal support for groups such as the London-based Human Dignity Trust  which campaigns to overturn criminalisation. Read more via Guardian 

The Gender Fluid Tribes of the Colombian Amazon

My first experience of photographing LGBT tribe communities was the muxhes of the Oaxaca isthmus in Mexico, where I'm from. They are part of a homosexual community that has transcended the idea of gender to assume an exaggerated female identity—based on the constant search for beauty. You might say they have developed a so-called "third gender." I photographed their world for several years.

Later, I got involved with a photography project in the Colombian Amazon jungle called 20 Fotografos Amazonas. I wanted to immerse myself in the jungle—in its colors, its myths, its legends. It was there I discovered the Ticuna tribe, another homosexual community with strong similarities with the Oaxaca muxhes. I was struck by how similar their skin color was, how both tribes were preoccupied with the accentuation of excess, and, above all, how the identities of both communities are shaped by femininity. Read more via Vice

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Australia’s first out gay MP uses maiden speech to speak out for gay people

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Australia's first openly gay MP in the House of Representatives used his maiden speech to denounce homophobia and people who “peddle prejudice”.

Trent Zimmerman won the seat of North Sydney in a by-election after his predecessor, former federal Treasurer Joe Hockey, quit politics in 2015. After he was sworn into parliament a month ago, Zimmerman vowed to work for the rights of LGBTI people and for the issues important in his electorate.

At 12.30pm today, he rose to deliver his first speech as an MP, flanked by marriage equality advocate and far north Queensland Liberal MP Warren Entsch who wore a rainbow tie in support. Zimmerman’s speech proved to be popular, going viral and trending on Twitter nationally for more than five hours at the time of print.  Read more via Star Observer

Australia: Christian lobby seeks anti-discrimination 'override' for plebiscite campaign

The leading advocates for a "no" vote on same-sex marriage are pushing the federal government to "override" anti-discrimination laws during the upcoming plebiscite campaign. The Australian Christian Lobby are calling for the temporary change to ensure the "no" camp can speak freely during the debate to legalise same-sex marriage.

ACL managing director Lyle Shelton told Fairfax Media his organisation was very concerned about fairness during the campaign as state anti-discrimination laws in particular have "such a low threshold". Mr Shelton warned those who argued against same-sex marriage would be faced with the "constant threat of quasi and full-blown legal action." Anti-discrimination laws vary, but include laws against "any public act that could incite or encourage hatred, serious contempt or severe ridicule."

The Law Council of Australia said any exemptions to discriminatory behaviour when it came to marriage equality "should be construed as narrowly as is absolutely necessary": "People cannot use their religious beliefs as an excuse for unlawful discrimination in business and the same principle would apply to public political campaigns," president-elect Fiona McLeod said.  Read more via SMH