Pope Francis to Meet With Gay, Transgender Prisoners

Inmates from a unit for gay, transgender, and HIV-positive people will be among those Francis meets with in Naples Saturday.

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Trudy Ring

www.advocate.com/politics/religion/2015/03/20/pope-francis-meet-gay-transgender-prisoners

A Look At The 10 U.S. Metro Areas With The Highest LGBT Populations
The West Coast has a significantly higher number of cities with burgeoning lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) populations, a new Gallup Poll has revealed.

The San Francisco metro area came in on top of the new survey, with 6.2 percent of its population identifying as LGBT, followed by Portland, Oregon and Austin, Texas at 5.4 and 5.3 percent, respectively. Also making an appearance in the top 10 are Seattle (4.8 percent) and Los Angeles (4.6 percent).

Collectively, the list includes metro areas from every region of the U.S. with the exception of the Midwest. Also noticeably absent from the list was New York, although 4 percent of its population does identify as LGBT.

As Time pointed out, the Gallup analysis is based on a survey of 374,325 adults, and was conducted between June 2012 and December 2014.

Read more about the Gallup poll here, or check out the top 10 cities with the highest LGBT populations in the slideshow below.

www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/20/metro-areas-lgbt-population-_n_6911232.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices&ir=Gay+Voices

HRC Interns Get Out the Vote in Jacksonville

One of the many exciting things about being an intern at HRC is having the chance to see how the nation’s largest LGBT advocacy organization makes change and how as interns, you are able to be part of that change.
HRC.org

www.hrc.org/blog/entry/hrc-interns-get-out-the-vote-in-jacksonville?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed

An Open Letter to HBO: Save Looking

Without Looking, TV will return to featuring gay men as supporting foils for straight characters. 

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Jim Halterman

www.advocate.com/commentary/2015/03/20/open-letter-hbo-save-looking

A matter of Pride: 6 of the sexiest for 2015

Pride celebrations are heating up – where will you be flying the flag?

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G2003

www.gaystarnews.com/article/matter-pride-6-sexiest-2015180315

Every Vote Counts in Jacksonville

At HRC, we know that Every Vote Counts in every election and that LGBT and ally voters play a critical role in elections when we decide to vote.
HRC.org

www.hrc.org/blog/entry/every-vote-counts-in-jacksonville?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed

Jeb Bush, Chipotle And The Antigay Republican Death Grip Of ‘Religious Discrimination’

There’s an increasingly popular strategy among antigay legislators that allows them to promote discrimination against LGBT people without actually saying the words, and 2016 Republican presidential hopeful John Ellis Bush (who knew ‘Jeb’ was just his initials?!) is fully on board.

Gone are the days when politicians can come out and make targeted antigay remarks without facing backlash (though some still try), so they’ve come up with a new rhetoric to wiggle around those pesky do-gooders.

They aren’t anti-gay, they’re anti-religious discrimination. It’s more of a death grip than a strategy, but it allows them to introduce bills granting people the legal right to discriminate against LGBT people without ever even having to hint at the word “gay.” Some Republican strategist must have been gifted a nice bonus for that one. Maybe an all-access pass to CPAC, the Woodstock of boring assholes.

Here’s how J.E.B. recently tap danced around the topic. When asked about pending Georgia legislation aimed at protecting the state’s oppressed Christian religious folks, he said:

Jeb Bush makes his case to Georgia lawmakers – and wades into a thorny debate. t.co/vrcs7ItA8m #gapol pic.twitter.com/9BavGHXKOi

— Greg Bluestein (@bluestein) March 19, 2015

Here’s the text, which is as confusing to read as it is to listen to:

“I don’t know about the law, but religious freedom is a serious issue, and it’s increasingly so, and I think people that act on their conscience shouldn’t be discriminated against, for sure. There should be protections, and so, as it relates to marriage equality — and that may change, the Supreme Court may change that. That automatically then shifts the focus to people of conscience, and, I don’t know, have their faith make — they want to act on their faith, and may not be able to be employed for example.”

Classic. Just like “voter I.D.” laws are all about cutting down on non-existent voter fraud, and not, you know, disenfranchising minorities and poor people from casting votes, religious discrimination laws are simply there to protect “people of conscience.”

And as is usually the case in American politics, it gets much more farcical.

In a recent op-ed in the Washington Examiner, Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) draw a comparison between so-called religious discrimination protections and, get this, Chipotle’s announcement that it will stop carrying pork at many locations due to a supplier’s violation of animal welfare standards.

Because freedom.

“It is crucial that the same freedom of conscience enjoyed by the leadership of Chipotle remain equally available to business owners of faith,” they wrote. “Indeed, much more so, as freedom of religion is explicitly protected by the First Amendment. We cannot simultaneously laud the leaders of a business motivated by a commitment to environmental sustainability and discriminate against the leaders of a business motivated by religious belief.”

Is that the best they can do? Really?

A Chipotle spokesperson broke it down in one breath. “It’s a pretty ridiculous comparison,” Chris Arnold told The Huffington Post. “Our decision not to serve pork that doesn’t meet our standards isn’t discriminating against any customers or group of customers.”

The Human Rights Campaign added its befuddled logic:

“Using Chipotle’s business decision to not stock carnitas as a defense to give corporations having religious beliefs special legal protections is ludicrous,” said David Stacy, government affairs director for the Human Rights Campaign. “It adds nothing and indeed trivializes a very serious debate about whether corporations should be able to refuse to hire some employees and turn away some customers based on who they are or who they love.”

An aide for Sen. Lankford said, “The column says nothing about gays; it’s about the importance of businesses being able to make decisions in line with their values. It’s as simple as that.”

Is that what they tell themselves to fall asleep at night?

Dan Tracer

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