Tag Archives: LGBT culture

The New York Times reports: Larry Kramer, the noted writer whose raucous, antagonistic campaign for an all-out response to the AIDS crisis helped shift national health policy in the 1980s and ’90s, died on Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 84. His husband, David Webster, said the cause was pneumonia. Mr. Kramer had weathered illness for much of his adult life. …

Entertainment Weekly reports: Pixar’s movie lineup still leaves much to be desired in terms of LGBTQ inclusion, but a short film released on Friday shows there is the capacity to bring these stories to life through tearjerking animation. Out, the latest Pixar short released through Disney+’s SparkShorts series, arrived this week with the story of Greg as he moves in …

Canada’s Global News reports: The federal government measured how “comfortable” Canadians felt with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people playing significant roles in their lives, Global News has learned, part of what the government says was a preliminary assessment to better understand the challenges faced by Canada’s LGBTQ2 community. And the answer, so far, is encouraging: 91.8 per cent of …

From a new report by Pew Research: Gay, lesbian and bisexual adults are substantially less likely than straight adults to affiliate with a religious group. Four-in-ten (41%) identify as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular,” compared with just 22% of straight adults who say the same. The survey asked respondents whether they identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or straight but …

The New York Times reports: “RuPaul’s Drag Race” and its behind-the-scenes spinoff, “Untucked,” are cultural touchstones that have launched catchphrases and minted stars. But neither series has ever lit up the ratings. Recent episodes of each series garnered only a few hundred thousand viewers and were the 285th and 359th most-viewed shows in the cable ratings for the week of …

NPR reports: LGBT people are typically depicted as city and coastal dwellers. And those who live in rural America are often characterized as people yearning to escape rural life for more acceptance in urban areas. But a new study from the Movement Advancement Project, a think tank that advocates for LGBT equality, shatters that stereotype. Between 2.9 million and 3.8 …

The Guardian reports: LGBT characters are at an all-time high on television, according to new findings. The annual Where We Are On TV report has found that 8.8% of regular characters expected to appear in the next year on US network television are LGBT, up from 6.4% the previous year, with 50% of them people of color. There was also …

The Boston Herald reports: Bay State schools will be able to try a new curriculum with LGBTQ-themed history, English and health this fall that proponents say is an effort to help all students see themselves reflected in classrooms. The curriculum, developed by a team of teachers with Massachusetts Safe Schools Program for LGBTQ Students and the Massachusetts Commission on LGBTQ …

This week it’s been 25 years since the simultaneous release of Madonna’s Erotica album and her still controversial S&M-filled coffee table book, Sex. Legendary Rolling Stone critic (and longtime JMG reader) Barry Walters has written a deep dive into their legacy and how they addressed the then-raging AIDS pandemic, which tore through Madonna’s inner circle. Walters unpacks quite a bit, …

NBC News reports: More than half of London’s LGBTQ pubs, clubs and music venues have closed in the last decade, new research commissioned by the city’s mayor shows. The number of venues for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer Londoners has fallen to 53 from 125, a loss of nearly 60 percent since 2006, according to an audit by the …

Gentle readers, I’m rerunning my annual Pride rant for the thirteenth year. I wrote this post in 2005 a couple of days after attending Pride in NYC. In the following years I’ve reposted it in advance of Pride in the hope of encouraging you to attend your local events. Have a wonderful Pride Month. Love each other. Watching The Defectives …

DNA Info reports: Just after the 1969 Stonewall riots — largely considered a seminal moment in the quest for LGBT rights — many gay rights groups were still organizing in the shadows, quietly meeting in neighborhoods such as Brooklyn Heights to lay the groundwork for the movement. The historic preservationists working on the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project are now …

From the Los Angeles Times: The Times has updated its guidelines for covering the LGBTQ community. As our understanding of gender and sexual orientation evolves, so does language. The Times’ goal is to be contemporary, clear and flexible, while maintaining consistency of style. “Queer” previously was considered a term to avoid because of its history as a pejorative. However, “queer” …

This story makes its thirteenth annual appearance on JMG… Grand Central Terminal functions as the mechanical heart of midtown New York City, pumping out several thousand workers and tourists on one beat, then sucking in several thousand more on the next. The rhythms of the terminal are fascinating. Beat. Four thousand, inbound from New Haven. Beat. Three thousand, outbound to …

From the Indianapolis Star: Gay bars are going out of business fast. Since 2015 at least five have closed their doors in Indianapolis, about half the city’s total. Among the casualties: the venerable Varsity, the city’s oldest gay bar, dating back to the 1940s. In the past six months Talbott Street, long-known for its drag shows, closed, as did the …

Portland’s NBC affiliate reports: The only gay nightclub in Portland is closing. The owner calls it a bittersweet sign of the times. “We don’t have the crowd we used to,” said Joshua Moody, who has owned Styxx for 12 years. It’s in line with a nationwide trend: as more members of the gay community branch out and feel welcomed and …

Back in May, we had quite a conversation about an Infiniti car commercial that satirized (or paid tribute to, depending on your perspective) a young man coming out to his father. JMG reader Bill today tips us to a new ad which is on the same theme, but is for a website that is somewhat more on point. Watch below.

Provincetown legend John Michael Gray, one-half of the eternally famed Hat Sisters, has died of cancer. I first learned of the Hat Sisters back in the 80s from their regular appearances in the comic strip The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life Of Ethan Green and was completely starstruck when I finally met them in person at Provincetown’s Boatslip in 1994. Since …

The corporate owners of the popular lesbian pop culture site AfterEllen are pulling the plug after 14 years. Editor-in-chief Trish Bendix eulogizes the site for the Advocate: Here are the facts: Evolve Media purchased AfterEllen from Viacom two years ago. They gave us two fiscal years to become their LGBT property and profit in that space, and they found we are …

Dark Horizons recaps: Protagonist and Helsinki Filmi have unveiled the first teaser trailer for Dome Karukoski’s anticipated biopic “Tom of Finland” about groundbreaking Finnish artist Touko Laaksonen who adopted the moniker ‘Tom of Finland’. The project is still being edited ahead of its release in February next year. A pioneering figure in late 20th century gay culture, Laaksonen (Pekka Strang) …