As always, if you know of news I didn't mention, please post it in here with my thanks.

The Bad News

Georgia governor Brian Kemp (R, of course), signed into law Senate Bill 1, banning trans students from sports (of which in the state of Georgia there are currently zero). Signed earlier this month from bills proposed by Frontline were Senate Bill 36, which justified LGBTQIA+ discrimination under the guise of 'religious freedom', and passed but unsigned is SB185, banning trans inmates from gender affirming care. The linked article goes into detail about the threats of a religious organization called Frontline (a member group of the Project 2025 Advisory Board), which has a number of bill proposals on their website - of which this was one - also about the lessons that can be learned about the use and power of activism.

The Department of Education has been burning down its Civil Rights division, which has been horrible for students of all kinds.

A summary of reactions about the report that the regimeadministration released last week:

• It claims that current research on the effects of gender-affirming care is of "low quality", without saying why.
• It promotes the torture method known as 'conversion therapy'.
• An extensive fact-check of it by Erin Reed calls it "full of lies and pseudoscience".

The yam-faced buffoon in the white house President has said, as he was signing an executive order, that America should "forget about" the separation of church and state. It also established a commission on religious liberty, including such theocratically aligned jerks persons as Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York (who claimed allowing same-sex marriage would lead to incest), former HUD Secretary and outright homophobe and transphobe Ben Carson, Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick (who ordered Texas to ignore Obama-era federal protections for trans students amongst other horrible things), and "Dr." Phil McGraw presumably to show a doctor's perspective, even if it is one who hasn't held a license to practice since 2006).

While we're talking about the rotten yam it, here's a list of all the things about the LGBTQIA+ community that Project 2025 said they wanted to do and how much of it Trumpy-dumpy has done.

Also, the proposed budget doesn't just suck, it gnaws.

And the Feds stopped monitoring crimes against trans victims. This comes in the wake of the defunding of the National Prison Rape Elimination Act Resource Center.

Tennessee passes a law allowing doctors not to treat anyone if it "violates their morals", their ethics, or their religious beliefs. I'm sure there is absolute no way this can go wrong, ever.

In Pittsburg on Friday night, the Pittsburgh Nuisance Bar Task Force conducted an unplanned inspection while there was a drag show going on featuring legendary guest Amanda Lepore. The unplanned inspection was closer to a raid, with 20 members of the State Police, Fire Department, and Health Department along with the State Liquor Control Board. They did find violations of the rules, but it also caused a number of people to remember the old-school raids on queer clubs. In its wake, the mayor released a statement that included the following:

However, we need to be thoughtful about the fear that the sudden appearance of multiple armed officers can cause. We also need to have safeguards in place that ensure that NBTF complaints cannot be used to target vulnerable populations. I’ve asked PBP Acting Chief Martin Devine and Public Safety Director Lee Schmidt to review not only this incident but the operation of the task force more broadly to ensure that we do our work with the greatest sensitivity to historical trauma and that we put any additional safeguards in place so that the process cannot be manipulated to harass any of our residents.

Not only are they prepared to do this work, but they plan to participate in an upcoming discussion about their findings and how we can better address these incidents with the City’s LGBTQIA+ Commission. I take personal responsibility for ensuring that our City Services are equitable and we will continue to work to build trust and prioritize the safety of our most marginalized residents.

Let's see how this goes in the future.

Looking internationally, and checking on UK sports, we see that the English and Wales Cricket Board has banned all trans women from play at all levels.

The Scottish Conservative Party has been pushing the Scottish National Party to cut ties with the UK's Stonewall charity, and the SNP First Minister, John Swinny, said "“We are committed to supporting LGBTQI+ people, including through funding for Stonewall, to advance equality for this group.", to which the spokeshorrorperson for the Scottish Conservatives, Tess White, said the refusal was "shocking", showed the SNP was "in thrall" to Stonewall, and that “Various organisations have shown common sense and withdrawn from this programme in recent years, including the Scottish Parliament itself, as well as the BBC and the [Equality and Human Rights Commission] EHRC." Proving again that conservatives want to make sure they always have a group to throw under a bus on hand.

Lady Gaga was throwing a free concert on the Copacabana Beach in Brazil on Saturday. Two men tried to recruit teens for a plot to bomb the concert, to get attention on social media while targeting the LGBTQ+ community that they expected to be there. (There was also a report that someone claimed they were going to perform a“satanist ritual by killing a child or a baby” and they were also arrested.) It was foiled, thankfully, and the concert went on with an estimated two and a half million people in attendence.

Fresh off the press: Woman says security guard at Liberty Hotel in Boston confronted her in bathroom, asked to prove gender. The hotel claims there were two people in a stall; the women deny it; it's going to keep happening to everyone whose appearance is gender-nonconforming on all sides.

The Good News

From the state of Washington, we get this bit of good news:

During Monday’s Legislative Session, the Spokane City Council voted 5-2 on an ordinance that ensures equitable protections for the LGBTQIA2S+ community regarding discrimination and affirms the right to seek gender-affirming care.

Some of the language for the ordinance also states the city will “acknowledge the inherent risks faced by the LGBTQIA2S+ community in Spokane, particularly due to federal policies and interjurisdictional legal processes from states that do not recognize LGBTQIA2S+ rights or are working to deny such individuals access to essential medical care, including gender-affirming care.” Also, the policy “prohibits the city from collecting or disseminating information about anyone’s sex assigned at birth, unless it’s related to a criminal investigation.”

In Colorado, House Bill 1312 is two sets of votes and some procedural ironing away from the Governor's pen after some editing. The proposal would expand the state’s antidiscrimination law to include intentionally, repeatedly “deadnaming” or misgendering a transgender person. From the linked story:

Should it pass into law, the bill would still protect transgender people from being misgendered or deadnamed, or referred to by the name they used before they transitioned, in discrimination laws for places like work and school. It would also enact shield-law protections for Coloradans against other states’ anti-transgender policies, and it would make changes to policies for name alterations on marriage certificates and gender markers on driver’s licenses.

But the bill’s Democratic sponsors — Sens. Chris Kolker and Faith Winter — fully removed the bill’s most controversial provision: a new requirement for family-court judges to consider one parent’s misgendering or deadnaming of their child in custody proceedings. They also stripped language related to publishing materials that deadname or misgender someone.

The concern was about the now-removed shield law provision "which would prohibit Colorado authorities from removing a child receiving gender-affirming care from a parent’s home because of another state’s laws", citing that it may violate interstate agreements and would put the state at “immense legal risk.” to which I have to say, fuck Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma.

Due to a lot of lobbying, a small miracle happened in, of all places, the Florida legislature: four anti-LGBTQIA+ affirming bills moved precisely nowhere in this legislative session.

In total, four anti-LGBTQ+ affirming bills failed to move forward. The proposed legislation included a Pride flag ban (HB 75/SB 100) that would’ve prohibited government institutions, including schools, from displaying flags deemed “political”—a thinly veiled attempt to erase queer visibility. Another, nicknamed the “Don’t Say Gay or Trans at Work” bill (HB 1495/SB 440), sought to censor any workplace discussion of LGBTQ+ issues and essentially allow the harassment of trans employees. A third bill (HB 1571/SB 420) targeted local governments, attempting to strip cities and counties of their ability to recognize or protect LGBTQ+ people at all. And the fourth (HB 731/SB 1710) aimed to gut DEI programs in state agencies by banning the use of state funds for any diversity-related initiatives.

Over in Arizona, Governor Katie Hobbs stamped vetos on bills that would ban birth certificate gender updates, remove state funding for any institute of higher education in Arizona that provided courses related to "Diversity, Equity and Inclusion" which it defined so badly that mentioning that gender identity existed could do it, and a similar bill for state agencies. She stated, "I encourage the Legislature to focus on real issues that matter and impact people’s everyday lives.” Republicans in the Arizona Legislature proceeded to call for adjournment so they could run to a nearby CVS and empty it of Solarcaine and aloe vera gel.

Non-binary Instagram influencer Trisha Paytas donated $10,000 to the charity Trans Lifeline. She's been a figure of some controversy in the past,due to some accusations of exploiting the trans community for clout, but appears to be better now.

Travel writing group Lonely Planet has released a LGBTQ-centric travel guide, which is now available on their store in physical and ebook versions. (I make no money off of this.)

And now in the Cinnamon Roll part of the good news, let us present the following:

A list of 14 celebrities who openly and proudly support their trans children.

And of course, we must end, as we ever do, with Pablo Pascal, because he is a wonderful human being. If you're not sure really, ask his sister Lux Pascal.

I'll be honest, I expected to do these biweekly or weekly, but things are moving so fast it's hard to keep up. But needs must. Be chill, friends, and hold onto hope.

Don't give up 'cause you have friends
Don't give up you're not the only one
Don't give up no reason to be ashamed
Don't give up you still have us
Don't give up now we're proud of who you are
Don't give up you know it's never been easy
Don't give up 'cause I believe there's a place
There's a place
Where we belong