Category: In The News

Gus Kenworthy was terrified about the consequences of coming out as gay in 2015 but the American skier says that his decision prompted a huge outpouring of unexpected support and has allowed him to compete without the weight of the world on his shoulders. Kenworthy, an Olympic silver medal winner in the ski slopestyle at Sochi, came out in a cover story for ESPN The Magazine to become the first openly gay action sports athlete. “I had set myself up for the worst case scenario,” he told Reuters by telephone…

As advocates for LGBTQ employees push to reverse appellate rulings that they’re not protected against workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, a Louisiana federal judge held that a heterosexual employee who was fired after she posted an anti-LGBTQ comment on Facebook cannot claim reverse discrimination or retaliation at the hands of her LGBTQ boss. The scope of protection under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, it would seem, cuts two ways. U.S. Magistrate Judge Richard Bourgeois of Baton Rouge dismissed a suit by Bonnie O’Daniel, a former office administrator for Industrial…

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ended the first legal challenge to a Republican-backed Mississippi law that permits businesses and government employees to refuse to serve lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people because of their religious beliefs. The justices left in place a June ruling by the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the plaintiffs – same-sex couples, civil rights advocates including the head of the state NAACP chapter, a church and others – did not have legal standing to bring the lawsuit. The law, passed by…

(Reuters) A federal judge in Washington on Monday blocked President Donald Trump from banning transgender people from serving in the U.S. military, handing a victory to transgender service members who accused the president of violating their constitutional rights. The transgender service members sued in August to try to block the ban, which had not yet gone into effect, and U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly granted them an injunction halting enforcement of it until their case is resolved. The service members asserted that Trump’s policy violated their rights to due process…

(Reuters) After years of refusing to address rumors about his sexuality, Oscar-winning actor Kevin Spacey said on Sunday he has chosen to live his life as a gay man. Spacey, 58, who won Oscars for “The Usual Suspects” and “American Beauty,” made the declaration in a post on Twitter. He apologized to fellow actor Anthony Rapp in the same post for an incident Rapp said occurred in 1986. Rapp, who went on to star in the Broadway musical “Rent,” was 14 at the time and starting his career. Spacey said…

NEW YORK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) Transgender political candidates scored wins in the first U.S. elections since Donald Trump became president, a sign of their growing acceptance in parts of the country, experts said on Wednesday. Five transgender candidates were victorious, among them a woman who won a heated race for state legislature in Virginia, the highest elected office ever for a transgender candidate, experts said. The results came in the first nationwide elections since Trump, a Republican, was elected last year. The election results show the risk of “moving too…

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) The number of lesbian, gay and transgender characters on U.S. television shows have reached record highs, and campaign group GLAAD said on Thursday that their stories were more important than ever given moves in the United States to roll back LGBT acceptance. In its annual report on diversity on the small screen, GLAAD found 329 regular and recurring LGBTQ characters across all broadcast, cable and streaming TV platforms, including the first asexual and non-binary characters. GLAAD president Sarah Kate Ellis said TV was a critical place for…

LISBON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) Sexual harassment scandals sweeping from Hollywood to other industries globally highlight the need to have more women, gay and black people in power at a time when minority rights are being rolled back, LGBTQ campaigners said on Tuesday. U.S. filmmaker Dustin Lance Black, an lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) activist who won an Oscar for the screenplay for the 2008 movie Milk, said sexual abuse had been ignored for too long in Hollywood. “We’ve heard about the casting couch in Hollywood forever but I think…