Well, firstly, my heart goes out to Manchester for the tragic happenings outside of Ariana Grande‘s concert last night. Another senseless act that will likely have us worried every time we go anywhere that brings us any kind of joy. We live in a terrifying time, but cannot let fear and evil overwhelm us and keep us from truly living. We can’t let them win.
Photos from this past weekend’s Long Beach Pride might make you feel a tiny bit better.
Model/actress Diora Baird has come out as being in a relationship with a woman (specifically comic Mav Viola), and is also starring a new documentary based on Lisa Diamond’s “Sexual Fluidity” studies. “Real L Word” star Nikki Weiss is producing, and cameras apparently caught Diora’s first date with Mav for the film. “It took me years to accept who I truly was,” Diora tells The Advocate. “I tried to be what was expected of me, but I have reached the point where I don’t want to hide anymore. In all my relationships with men, I knew something was missing and I finally figured out what that something is … I am meant to be in a relationship with a woman. I met Mav on a dating app, Bumble, but she didn’t know that she was still on it. I reached out and messaged her and asked her on a date. … It was the first time I ever asked someone out. We have been in a relationship for six months, and I know without a doubt she is my person.” You may recognize Diora from “Wedding Crashers,” “30 Days of Night: Dark Days,” “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning” or the cover of “Playboy.”
Diora has a 4-year-old, who she says is, of course, her main priority in life. Which is why I hate seeing pieces like this: “Children of Queer Parents Don’t Have it Easy.” However, it does offer some more nuances than generally given to the topic, like how adult children of LGBTQs feel about being called “allies” when they’ve grown up as part of the queer community, and how they often seek out inclusive spaces that sometimes don’t welcome them as a member.
Jury selection has begun for the trial of Bill Cosby for his alleged rape of out lesbian Andrea Constand.
Well, it turns out MØ‘s seemingly Sapphic love song “Nights With You” is not about two women in love or lust, but best friendship. “[The song] was written for my best (and oldest) friend, and the song is a celebration of our friendship and of my love for her,” she said in a press release. “I obviously wanted the video to be about friendship but I wanted it to communicate this in a wide and universal way.” Feel free to keep singing it about your crush.
Some d-bag on an international flight wore a “Make America Great Again” hat and then reportedly referred to female passengers and crew as “Hillary” and lesbians, which he thinks are insults. Things got so unruly, they were forced to land and deplane in San Francisco before finally reaching Newark. Welcome to Trump’s America!
A man writes lovingly about his bisexual wife’s having to mask her true identity because of her family’s Evangelical roots. “As much as it hurts my wife to conceal her heart and her mind from the people who are supposed to support her the most, she continues the facade. Because being cast aside by her parents is unbearable,” he writes. “Our children know she is bisexual. We were able to talk to them, and allow them to ask whatever questions they could think of. This helped them understand what her sexual identity means for her and for our marriage. What it means to them in how they see us as a couple. What it means to them as our children. Turns out our kids were more accepting [than] we could have hoped. Knowing that she has the support of our children has been both a relief and a boon to her ego. She knows in our house, our family loves, no matter how we define ourselves.” Husband/dad of the year?
Semi-related: How LGBTS are being treated within the Catholic church and institutions. Despite a lot of negativity that LGBTQs still face in that realm, there are some, like Fordham University theologian and priest Bryan Massingale, who offer hope. “Justice is inherently public,” he said. “Justice is the social face of love. To insist on private acceptance and compassion for LGBT persons without an effective commitment to defending LGBT human rights and creating a society of equal justice for all is not only contradictory, it is inherently incomprehensible and ultimately unsustainable.”
The world does not have enough lesbian vampire movies, apparently, so the cult classic”Daughters of Darkness” is getting a new sequel: “Mothers of Darkness.” Next up: Sisters of Darkness? Grandmas of Darkness? Female Cousins Twice Removed of Darkness?
This Reddit thread of a female pop star who says her managers won’t let her come out as gay is really popping off. Sadly, I’ve experienced this kind of thing many times, with queer actresses/singers/public figures who are secure in themselves and their sexualities but their “people” blocking them from living their authentic lives and truths. It’s fucking sad, especially when their publicists are lesbians themselves.
Megan Marx and her ex, Tiffany Scanlon, made history when they came out as a couple after both appearing on “The Bachelor” in Australia. But they’ve since broken up, and Marx says she doesn’t “feel like people take my sexuality seriously.” “Being bisexual or sexually fluid, people automatically think it is a publicity stunt,” she said. “Look at some of the most famous people in the world, people like Kristen Stewart or Cara Delevingne or Amber Heard, they’ve all struggled with this where they have a relationship with a woman and people question it.”
A survey in Washington State finds that “the number of 8th and 10th-grade students who have thought about suicide, for example, has increased by at least 6 percentage points in the past decade.” Girls reported a higher rate of suicidal thoughts, with 26 percent of sophomore girls reporting thinking about suicide and 13 percent said they had attempted it.” And with 38 percent of gay and lesbian students having said they had considered suicide (25 percent having attempted it), this indicates that LGBTQ teens (especially those bisexual-identified) are plagued by depression and suicidal thoughts “at least two times the level of classmates who identify as straight.” This is why questions that indicate someone’s gender and sexual identity are incredibly important when it comes to taking public surveys and censuses.
I really enjoyed Nicki Minaj‘s chat with Ellen on her show today, especially Ellen’s reaction when Nicki says “I hate men.” Too good.
Stay safe. Surround yourself in love.
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