Happy Sunday Funday! May the wind always be at your back and a can of beer in front of your face.
Megan Rapinoe is Engaged
This is Erika Linder Looking Longingly Through a Window
I hated Harold and Maude, but it’s a lot harder to hate out andro model Erika Linder playing the part of a young queermo who falls for an older woman in this Of Monsters and Men video based on the 1971 film because Erika’s face is in it, so.
Tiny Victories Round-Up
+ Target doesn’t want to gender your child’s choices anymore, which seems like a nice gesture.
+ Nepal just issued their first third-gender passport.
+ Texas is going to let this gay dude’s marriage be reflected on his death certificate, which seems like a “too little too late” situation but like, sometimes it’s good to see the glass as half-full.
+ San Francisco’s first high school level LGBT history course is officially happening. LET THE WILD RUMPUS START! The art school teaching the college prep class is going to include lessons on marginalized groups, the Stonewall riots, DADT, marriage equality, and more.
‘‘This is history. This is an experience that happened,’’ Ruth Asawa School of the Arts instructor Lyndsey Schlax recently told the San Francisco Chronicle. ‘‘How can we not teach history? That’s what we do.’’
Gay Marriage Might Be Coming to Australia
An Australian lawmaker is putting a gay marriage bill before the Parliament on Tuesday, and the nation’s Human Rights Commissioner is pushing to separate the definitions of civil and religious marriage. It’s all happening, y’all. IT’S ALL HAPPENING.
The measure by Warren Entsch has supporters among the governing Liberal-National coalition, as well as the opposition Labor Party and the smaller Greens, the newspaper reported, citing Terri Butler, a Labor member of parliament who supports the legislation. The proposal would change the definition of marriage to say it’s between two people, rather than a man and a woman, the newspaper said…
“The Liberal Party loses nothing, gains much by accepting this is an issue of conscience for its elected reps,” Abbott’s sister, Christine Forster, wrote on her Twitter Inc. account Thursday.
Meet the First Trans Person to Run for Office Ever in Venezuela
This is Tamara Adrian. She’s a fucking badass.
Ida B. Choazz is a Roller Derby Hero / National Treasure
A roller derby player from Spokane ran across four lanes of traffic on a freeway to stop a purse-snatcher. I bet a bunch of people were like “did she just do that?” and I also hope that she turned to them and said, “yes daddy I did.”
Baby’s Orange Balloon Makes Her Fly
BUT SARAH WALSH.
Eh, that’s been over for a long time. She was pretty cute though imo.
I think it’s a step in the right direction for target, but what would be even cooler would be if they started grouping toys based on category instead of gender, because there will still be the “boys aisle” and “girls aisle”, even if it’s not labeled that way. Like all Legos in one aisle and all action figures in another, instead of Barbies and Lego friends in one aisle and Lego City and Marvel figures in another.
This seems like a great idea
From what I read, I think that Target is in the beginning stages of figuring out how exactly to implement their news policies into “on the floor” action in their store layout now. I’ve seen a few people making suggestions like the one you proposed. I’m hopeful that Target incorporates them into their new layout!
Wishes for the coming week: Rose gets a new balloon, and Australia gets itself into the 21st century.
I’m not too hopeful re Australia- the chances of our awful, awful pm giving in to the inevitable don’t seem high. And our ‘left wing’ party aren’t exactly hounding him about it
Agreed. I’m firmly of the opinion that marriage equality will never occur in Australia while Tony Abbott is Prime Minister.
For it to occur he has to allow the LNP a conscience vote and even then it’s still only a 50/50 chance on current estimates of who is for and against the legislation. This is despite the community being broadly behind it.
Why can’t a balloon make me that happy? ? ?
I love roller derby names. Just sayin’.
On one side of the fight we’ve got the Liberals, who aren’t allowed a conscience vote on the issue of marriage equality, so they are forced to vote with their leadership’s archaic views.
On the other side we’ve got Labour, who are allowed a conscience vote. But at their recent national conference, voted not to adopt a binding vote on same-sex marriage.
And in the middle of this we’ve got the Australian public, holding at about 70% in favour of marriage equality.
While the Reptile Overlord is in charge, nothing will charge. Unless Malcolm Turnbull suddenly becomes PM, we can’t expect anything useful from the Liberals. We’ll have to wait for Labour to get in (2016 – please Australia) and vote marriage equality in within their first 100 days, as promised by Bill Shorten at their recent national conference.
But this cross party bill is certainly a step in the right direction. Slowly but surely we’re getting there.
Well it looks like the meeting at 3:15 today will be the deciding factor. If the LNP party room decides for a free vote then we might have marriage equality in Australia this year, if not then it won’t happen in this term of parliament and probably not in the next term either.
Very unlikely to happen in todays meeting. The Nationals were purposely brought along to ensure a “no vote”.
These people disgust me.
It still blows my mind that people voted for this government.
And after five hours of debate where the people speaking were mostly opposed to marriage equality, the LNP votes to not have a free vote.
Vote was 33 for, 46 opposed so not even close. Had Abbott not called in the 9 national members it would have been a lot closer and it may have been enough to swing the vote the other way.
This now means any bill up before parliament in this term of government will fail with the 90 LNP members voting it down. And unless the LNP changes this policy after the next election then there will be no marriage equality in Australia until at least 2019 (assuming we get a ALP government next term and they stick to their promise of a binding vote after 2019 and they remain in power after 2019).
As a Venezuelan Tamara Adrian’s candidacy makes me really happy. Hopefully it’s a step in the right direction, Venezuela needs all the support it can get in this area (not to mention every other part of the government…)