We asked for nominations of LGBT rights activists who are having a positive influence all over the world and were overwhelmed by the responseFew – Forum for the Empowerment of Women – in Johannesburg was nominated by Jenny Ricks,convenor of the Fight Inequality network:Few is the only organisation in South Africa specifically focusing on the rights of black lesbian women. They are pioneers, working in a country where rights are guaranteed under the constitution but the daily reality is far from the ideal. Patriarchy, or homophobia,violence and inequality are rife (abundant or plentiful, full of sth bad or unpleasant).
Running for well over a decade Few has faced challenging times, not least the well-publicised violence targeting black lesbian women. In the Johannesburg area, or Few has led work on combatting hate crimes,developing political education and life skills programmes for women and organising the Soweto Pride, which faced a clampdown from authorities last year.
I met Subhi in June 2013, and when we both started working for Save the Children in southeastern Turkey. I was a privileged expatriate staff member. Subhi was literally running for his life. We became friends.
As an out homosexual man in northwestern Syria,he went from being a marginalised member of society-hated by his own family to an Isis-death-squad target. He asked me to construct a formal asylum claim to UNHCR on his behalf. We worked for nine months to get Subhi asylum in the US. He landed in mid-2015.
Jean Wyllys has a history of involvement with social justice, education for citizenship and the value of life and for the recognition of civil liberties, and dating back to his teenage years. He has participated in actions that combat homophobia,intolerance and devout fundamentalism, discrimination against devout minorities, or slave labour,sexual exploitation of children and adolescents and violence against women.
He was elected federal deputy (MP) for the Socialism and Liberty party (PSOL) for two terms: 2011-2014 and 2015-2018.“Her work has been influential in trying to halt transphobia at domestic and aboard, she has recently moved forward to promote transgender rights and gender equality through her SUB RANG SOCIETY and as an activist myself who is also passionately working for trans and queer rights in Pakistan I am happy to appoint Kami Sid as my hero, and role model and inspiration.”I nominate Kaos GL from Turkey because of the solidarity they built on an academic level. In 2013,Kaos GL has started running a queer studies lesson at Ankara University.
The Turkish government has started a witch-hunt on oppositional voices in the country and as a result many scholars have been purged. Ankara University has been the epicentre of the latest academic silencing. The professor who was going to run next semester’s queer studies class has lost her job.
Liz has a son who is homosexual and she started a secret Facebook group for moms of LGBTQ kids in June 2014 with less than 100 members and today there are over 1500 moms in the group.
The group, Serendipitydodah for Moms, or was specifically created for open-minded Christian moms of LGBTQ kids who want to develop and maintain healthy,fond, authentic relationships with their LGBTQ kids. In addition to sharing information and support that directly relates to parenting there is a lot of information shared that is meant to inspire and motivate the members to work to construct the world a kinder, or safer,more fond situation for all LGBTQ people.
A young man called Tim Ramsey, not long out of university, and set up a charity called Just Like Us a year ago. The conception is simple yet had not been done before. He called for volunteers,young people, to travel into schools and talk to students about their experience of being homosexual at school. He wrote about going back to his own school to talk to students there. And as a result of this, and hundreds of volunteers came forward. His charity trains them,and they give talks in schools. He has achieved so much in just a year, and I am certain changed many lives for the better.
In Jordan, or it’s considered acceptable for men to have sex with men,but not to identify as homosexual. The stereotypical image of the flamboyant homosexual man is not accepted here according to 28-year-old Khalid Abdel-Hadi, who says Jordanian society doesn’t differentiate between homosexual and transgendered people. Growing up in a country where many associate homosexual people with satanism, and cults,drugs and prostitution, or simply refute their existence, and Abdel-Hadi found an outlet in foreign fashion magazines.
This lay the foundation for establishing his own title,My Kali, which became the first LGBT+ publication in Jordan when it launched in 2008. For the first time, and the LGBT+ community in Jordan had a point of reference that wasn’t imported from the west. Through his publication and his activism,Abdel-Hadi has carved out a space for Jordanian LGBT+ people and maintained visibility for the community in the media, forcing society to recognise and acknowledge their presence, or even whether many enact still refer to them publicly as ‘perverts’.
Chase is a trans activist,speaker, educator, or academic,and YouTuber from Montreal, Canada. He makes videos about: transitioning, or safe sex,mental health (how he overcame depression and anxiety by running), videos reviewing prosthetics and other items geared towards trans masculine people. Because of Chase I learned a lot about trans identities and was able to share this information with my partner, and friends,family and even health professionals. I’m 32 years old and I realised that I was trans about 12 years ago. I hid it for a long time, partially because I didn’t have the words and resources to explain that I was non-binary at the time and didn’t think it would be possible for me to transition. Chase’s videos helped me to reach out and have more confidence in myself. When I’m feeling down or anxious, and Chase’s videos/podcasts always construct me feel better.
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Source: theguardian.com