Latest news with #activism
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Names of Sam Nordquist, Jiggly Caliente, Lady Chablis, and more added to Stonewall Wall of Honor
Names of seven transgender trailblazers were added to the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor at the Stonewall Inn Thursday night. Keep up with the latest in + news and politics. The Wall of Honor posthumously celebrates LGBTQ+ activists, artists, and others who played crucial roles in the LGBTQ+ rights movement. This year's inductees are all transgender at a time when trans Americans are under attack from the federal government and elsewhere. They were inducted by the National LGBTQ Task Force and the International Imperial Court Council. 'This year's focus on transgender trailblazers and changemakers underscores the importance of recognizing our history and the current climate for our trans siblings,' Cathy Renna, communications director for the Task Force, said in a press release. 'As we continue to fiercely battle against attacks on our trans and nonbinary communities, we are honored to uplift their legacies. Their courage inspires our ongoing fight for liberation, both within the Task Force family and across every queer advocacy organization.' 'In these times, when there are radical and extreme campaigns trying to erase our transgender community, the Imperial Courts and Task Force are reminding us all that transgender people have not only always been here, but have also been some of our community's most dedicated activists and leaders,' added Nicole Murray-Ramirez, founder of the Wall of Honor, a San Diego city commissioner, and titular head of the Imperial Court System. This year's honorees are Ruddy Martinez, Chilli Pepper, Lynn Conway, Alan L. Hart, Jiggly Caliente, the Lady Chablis, and Sam Nordquist. Related: Martinez, a.k.a. 'Mami Ruddys,' was the matriarch of Puerto Rico's LGBTQ+ community and a pioneering drag artist, activist, and trans woman who, since the 1980s, opened her home to young queer people rejected by their families. Chilli Pepper appeared on talk shows, including Phil Donahue's and Oprah Winfrey's, in the 1980s to discuss life as a trans woman and debunk harmful stereotypes about trans and queer people. She also was an activist for AIDS awareness. Conway was an electrical engineer, computer scientist, and trans activist. While facing discrimination as a trans woman in her field, she created a simplified method of microchip design and helped develop the Very Large-Scale Integration design. Hart, a physicist and writer, was among the first people to receive gender-affirming surgery and identify and live as a man. He attended medical school after the typhoid epidemic in 1912 and contributed to tuberculosis Caliente, a.k.a. Bianca Castro-Arabejo, died at age 44 on April 27 of this year. The Filipino-American drag queen rose to fame in season 4 of RuPaul's Drag Race and also starred in the sixth season of RuPaul's Drag Race: All Stars. She was a resident judge of Drag Race Philippines and appeared in Pose as Veronica Ferocity. The Lady Chablis, a performer in Savannah, Georgia, was portrayed in John Berendt's nonfiction book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which highlighted the city's underground nightlife scene and a scandalous murder. She played herself in the film based on the book. While publicizing the film, she charmed journalists and audiences with her charismatic presence. Nordquist, a Black trans man from Minnesota, died in February in upstate New York after being tortured for more than a month. Seven people have been charged with first-degree murder in connection with his death. All have pleaded not guilty. Nordquist's family attended the ceremony. 'We just wanted to thank everybody for acknowledging Sam and having Sam being honored on the wall,' his mother, Linda Nordquist, said at the event, according to TV station WHEC. 'There's no words to express how we're feeling.' The Wall of Honor was inaugurated in 2019 with 50 names to mark the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising. Each year, additional honorees are added, joining a living memorial of LGBTQ+ legends such as Leslie Jordan, Gloria Allen, Terrence McNally, Harvey Milk, James Baldwin, Keith Haring, José Sarria, Audre Lorde, Marsha P. Johnson, and Matthew Shepard. This article originally appeared on Advocate: Names of Sam Nordquist, Jiggly Caliente, Lady Chablis, and more added to Stonewall Wall of Honor
New York Times
8 hours ago
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Diana Oh, Fierce Voice for Queer Liberation in Theater, Dies at 38
Diana Oh, a glitter-dusted experimental artist-activist whose theater works intertwined political provocation with profound compassion in rituals of communion with audiences, died on June 17 at their home in Brooklyn. Mx. Oh, who used the pronouns they and them, was 38. The death was confirmed by Mx. Oh's brother Han Bin Oh, who said the cause was suicide. A playwright, actor, singer-songwriter and musician, Mx. Oh created art that didn't fit neatly into categories. Mx. Oh was best known for the outraged yet disarmingly gentle Off Broadway show '{my lingerie play},' a music-filled protest against male sexual violence; it was performed in a series of 10 installations around New York City. A concert-like play — with Mx. Oh singing at its center — '{my lingerie play}' percolated with an angry awareness of the ways restrictive gender norms and society's policing of sexual desire can leave whole groups vulnerable. It was an emphatic and loving assertion of the right to be oneself without worrying about abuse. 'I was born a woman, to immigrant parents,' Mx. Oh said in the show. 'That's when my body became political. That's when I became an artist.' Mx. Oh's Infinite Love Party, which the Bushwick Starr theater in Brooklyn produced in 2019, was not a show but rather a structured celebration with a sleepover option. It was a handmade experience, including music and aerial silks, designed to welcome queer people, people of color and their allies. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Washington Post
9 hours ago
- Washington Post
These voters helped secure Zohran Mamdani's surprise victory
Opinion | This is why the media should not replay viral videos of black men being killed June 10, 2020
RNZ News
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- RNZ News
Rebecca Solnit: the long and winding road
author interview activism about 1 hour ago The indirect route to progress - where there's success without victory - a win perhaps for future generations, if not immediately, is the focus of award-winning Guardian columnist Rebecca Solnit's latest essay collection. No Straight Road Takes You There: Essays for Uneven Terrain argues for the long-term view and the power of collective action, making a case for seeding change wherever possible, and offering us all a path out of the wilderness. Rebecca Solnit talks to Susie about celebrating indirect and unpredictable consequences, and embracing slowness and imperfection, which, she argues, are key to understanding the possibilities of change.
Telegraph
13 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
The anti-colonial ‘witch' behind Palestine Action recruitment drive
An anti-colonial artist whose work is inspired by 'folklore, witchcraft and mythology' can be unmasked as a ringleader behind Palestine Action 's recruitment drive. Gamze Sanli was the speaker at a 'direct action workshop' in which new members were instructed on how to attack targets across the country, including RAF bases. During the workshop, which was accessed by The Telegraph, Ms Sanli told recruits they would be part of a new, sustained wave of attacks on military sites and discussed tactics such as attacking machinery with a 'sledgehammer'. Ms Sanli said that plans to proscribe Palestine Action as a terrorist group were 'draconian and dangerous' and the organisation would 'continue to operate' even if designated as a terror group. It can now be disclosed that the Turkish-Cypriot activist is a graduate from King's College London and holds an MA in human rights from University College London. In a biography on her website, Ms Sanli, who describes herself as a multidisciplinary artist and performer, says that 'her craft weaves folklore and mythology, abolition and political resistance, death and witchcraft'. The biography adds: 'Moving through different mediums, including experimental film and performance, documentary, illustration, embroidery, poetry and music, she reimagines and reframes the world with a queering, anti-colonial lens.' Ms Sanli, who is thought to have lived in an expensive central London neighbourhood near Hyde Park, also says she is the founder of 'Scattered Seeds', a collective of diasporans, migrants and internationalists focusing on anti-colonial, abolitionist, feminist resistance with radical pedagogy, archiving, and art. She works on projects within the intersection of migration and queerness in Belgium as part of a project called 'Queers on the Move'. During the meeting for new recruits, Ms Sanli discussed tactics for breaking into factories and urged people to hit 'everything you can find with a sledgehammer'. She advised them on how to set up autonomous cells able to target military bases without detection. A slide in the call identified three RAF bases most suitable for attack: RAF Cranwell and RAF Barkston Heath, both in Lincolnshire; and RAF Valley, in Anglesey, North Wales. The Telegraph has passed details to police. In 2022, Ms Sanli was one of two Palestine Action protesters who squirted tomato ketchup onto a statue of Arthur Balfour in the members' lobby of the House of Commons. The protest was timed to coincide with the 105th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration – the controversial declaration by the British government in 1917 that became a core component of the British mandate for Palestine. As the protesters sprayed the ketchup, which the group described as fake blood, one said: 'Palestinians have suffered for 105 years because of this man, Lord Balfour – he gave away their homeland and it wasn't his to give.' The two protesters glued themselves to the statue after squirting the ketchup, before revealing a miniature Palestinian flag and shouting 'free Palestine'. Ms Sanli was charged with criminal damage but, following a week-long trial at Southwark Crown Court, she was found not guilty in a unanimous verdict on Dec 18 2023. Speaking at the time, Ms Sanli said: 'We wanted to show that this is not a faraway geopolitical conflict. 'We're talking about apartheid and settler colonialism, violations of the human rights of a whole people, and we need to see that through the lens of British complicity.' During the workshop, Ms Sanli also gave legal advice to new recruits on what they themselves should do if they were arrested. Recruits were warned that if they were arrested, Palestine Action would not pay their legal fees but would offer 'support'. An 'arrest support group' would be on hand to help those detained and recruits were told that if they did not have enough money to pay legal costs, they could rely on legal aid. Ms Sanli also advised them on what potential sentences they would likely get for a range of offences, including criminal damage, trespass and burglary. She did not mention the fact that if Palestine Action is proscribed, anyone who is a member of the group or expresses support for it would face sentences of up to 14 years in prison. Outlining the various strategies for attacking targets, Ms Sanli said that the plan for new recruits was to carry out sustained, serious disruption. In the past, the group had focused on carrying out 'accountable' attacks with the aim of getting caught and raising publicity. The focus for the new cohort was on carrying out covert actions and escaping undetected. They were told not to take phones on raids and to hand over their belongings to neighbours in case their homes were searched if they were arrested. On Friday, four people were arrested by counter-terror police in connection with a break-in at RAF Brize Norton last week. A woman, 29, of no fixed abode and two men, aged 36 and 24 from London, were arrested on suspicion of the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism, contrary to Section 41 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Another woman, 41, of no fixed abode, was arrested on suspicion of assisting an offender. Footage posted online by Palestine Action following the incident showed two people inside the RAF base in Oxfordshire. The clip showed one person riding an electric scooter to an Airbus Voyager air-to-air refuelling tanker and spraying paint into one of its jet engines. Two planes were damaged. The Metropolitan Police has been contacted and asked to confirm if it is investigating the direct action workshops and whether those delivering them may have committed any criminal offences.
