The QU

Chicago artist on the rise – Frank Mares

The Qu loves featuring local queer artists and their work, Frank Mares is someone who I have had the pleasure of knowing for some time. He is a driven projection designer, animator, and all around funny guy, once you get to know him. Below is an animation that he recently completed…his drawing style is unique and I just know that he is a Chicago artist on the rise! You can check out his website at frankmares.com!

A special message from BIG DIPPER!

Hi Friends!

Happy New Year! I just put out a new Big Dipper EP – THEY AINT READY
It’s available for a FREE Download!
Check it out!

xo
BIG DIPPER

NOH8 Campaign’s 4th Anniversary Party featuring KERLI

Whenever I can, I will always send hometown love to Adam Bouska and all the amazing things he is doing because of NOH8! Congrats on 4 years to him and his entire team!

The exclusive inside look into the celebrity party celebrating NOH8 Campaign’s 4th Anniversary at the Avalon in Hollywood. Featuring LeAnn Rimes, Skylar Grey, Kerli, Jamar Rogers, DJ tyDi. Red carpet features Jessica Clark, Gene Simmons, Cast from Days of our Lives and many more!

The party featured a performance by Island/Def Jam recording artist KERLI of her hit dance single “The Lucky Ones,” which is #5 on the Billboard Dance/Club Chart this week.

Marcia’s Law – The Hypocrite

Hyp-o-crite:

–A person who pretends to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that he or she does not actually possess, especially a person whose actions belie stated beliefs

–A person who feigns some desirable or publicly approved attitude, especially one whose private life, opinions, or statements belie his or her public statements

By Marcia Prichason
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was angry. In fact, he was furious. 66 days after Hurricane Sandy devastated the New Jersey coastline, Congress refused to vote on the release of federal disaster funds; much needed aid that would assist his constituents as they struggle with the aftermath of that devastating storm.

Christie expressed his utter contempt for his fellow Republicans. He stated that the House of Representatives was hurting the people of New Jersey because they refused to vote on the $60 billion aid request that would enable them to rebuild.
He further vehemently expressed his opinion that the people of New Jersey were being treated like second class citizens. Governor Christie declared that he would do everything in his power to ensure that New Jerseyites are treated with the same dignity, respect, and consideration as everyone else.

The Governor has every right to be outraged. New Jersey is a mess. Homes, businesses, and lives were lost to that storm. In every other case involving a natural disaster, the federal government has acted quickly to provide the necessary funds for recovery.

Yet, while Governor Christie decries the treatment his state’s citizens have received for the disaster, he perpetuates a less than equal status for some of the citizens he purports to protect. Governor Christie refused to sign into law the marriage equality bill that his own state legislature passed. By denying equal rights to the approximately 353,000 LGBTQ individuals in New Jersey, he shows utter contempt and callous disregard for their dignity. And that is what makes him a hypocrite.

With respect to the aftermath of the storm, Governor Christie shows great empathy for his New Jersey constituents. He wants the same treatment for his people that the people of Louisiana and Texas received. In short, he wants equality. But, “his actions belie his stated beliefs.” He doesn’t want the same treatment for people in his state who are LGBTQ. They are, according to Chris Christie’s actions, second class citizens.

The Governor is not the only politician who is a hypocrite. Only recently, for example, has Dick Cheney come forward in favor of marriage equality. It became personal for him when his daughter, who is a lesbian, wanted to marry. Newt Gingrich, too, has recently spoken about marriage equality; indicating that it’s time this country treated all citizens equally. Of course, neither of them spoke favorably about Gay rights when they were seeking or holding political office. It wasn’t politically convenient then. Their recent “statements belie their (previous) public statements.” They are hypocrites.

But, the hypocrisy doesn’t stop there. The Republican controlled House of Representatives continues to spend millions of dollars defending DOMA. They are using taxpayer money to support a position that the majority of Americans now view as obsolete. Public officials are elected to serve and represent the people. They “feigned desirable or publicly approved attitudes” to get those votes and now, egregiously act in direct contradiction to the will of the people. They are hypocrites.

In Illinois, the Religious Freedom and Marriage Equality Act has stalled once again. The struggle for marriage equality continues. Legislators who oppose the bill maintain that civil unions are enough; gay people should be satisfied with being “almost” equal. Although it is certain that they would vote differently if THEIR rights were “almost” equal, they contest equality for the LGBTQ citizens of Illinois. They are hypocrites.

As fair minded Americans, we cannot take our cues from politicians who are incapable or unwilling to feel either empathy or understanding. They enact laws that guarantee equality only if it personally affects them. It is imperative that every person be treated with dignity, respect, and equal protection under the law. We must, as thoughtful citizens, press for equality. We must let our politicians know that we will accept nothing less.

But, we have to do even more than that. We must do much more if we envision a society in which every individual is accepted, valued, and appreciated for who they are. We must raise our voices and demand equality at every turn. We MUST; if we do not, our silence makes US the hypocrites.

…And I’m just a mom who loves her son…

Jodie Foster’s Golden Globe Speech

So Jodie Foster came out again, kinda.

Accepting the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award, Foster spoke obliquely about her relationship with Cydney Bernard, her former partner of 20 years with whom she has two sons. Foster called her “my heroic co-parent, my ex-partner in love but righteous soul sister in life, my confessor, ski buddy, consiglieri, [and] most beloved BFF of 20 years.

“I am so proud of our modern family,” she added,” as her two boys in the audience smiled.

The 50-year-old Academy Award-winner (for “The Silence of the Lambs” and “The Accused”) has always been protective of her private life, and though she has not hidden her relationship with Bernard or her sexual orientation, she has not allowed it to be fodder for interviews.

Knowing how to approach, and what to say when it comes to gender and sexuality can be tricky. We have lived in a male/female world for so long, that when approached by something that is different to us then what we are used to, it is easy for ignorance to show it’s ugly head. Below is a cute little booklet that lays out what you need to know, and hopefully clear up any confusion. Please read this and take the time to share it. You can’t understand until you are educated.

France hit by anti-gay marriage protests
Hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets of Paris in protest against a proposed law that would legalise gay marriage in France. People travelled from all over France for the demonstration supported by leaders of the centre-right opposition, the Catholic church and the Muslim community. Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands reports from Paris.

Generation LGBTQIA

(via New York Times)

STEPHEN IRA BEATTY, a junior at Sarah Lawrence College, uploaded a video last March on We Happy Trans, a site that shares “positive perspectives” on being transgender.

The University of Pennsylvania freshmen, from left, Anastasiya Kudryashova, Roderick Cook, Britt Gilbert, Kate Campbell, Gabriel Ojeda-Sague and Santiago Cortes.

In the breakneck six-and-a-half-minute monologue – hair tousled, sitting in a wood-paneled dorm room – Stephen exuberantly declared himself “a queer, a nerd fighter, a writer, an artist and a guy who needs a haircut,” and held forth on everything from his style icons (Truman Capote and “any male-identified person who wears thigh-highs or garters”) to his toy zebra.

Because Stephen, who was born Kathlyn, is the 21-year-old child of Warren Beatty and Annette Bening, the video went viral, garnering nearly half a million views. But that was not the only reason for its appeal. With its adrenalized, freewheeling eloquence, the video seemed like a battle cry for a new generation of post-gay gender activists, for whom Stephen represents a rare public face.

Armed with the millennial generation’s defining traits – Web savvy, boundless confidence and social networks that extend online and off – Stephen and his peers are forging a political identity all their own, often at odds with mainstream gay culture.

If the gay-rights movement today seems to revolve around same-sex marriage, this generation is seeking something more radical: an upending of gender roles beyond the binary of male/female. The core question isn’t whom they love, but who they are – that is, identity as distinct from sexual orientation.

But what to call this movement? Whereas “gay and lesbian” was once used to lump together various sexual minorities – and more recently “L.G.B.T.” to include bisexual and transgender – the new vanguard wants a broader, more inclusive abbreviation. “Youth today do not define themselves on the spectrum of L.G.B.T.,” said Shane Windmeyer, a founder of Campus Pride, a national student advocacy group based in Charlotte, N.C.

Part of the solution has been to add more letters, and in recent years the post-post-post-gay-rights banner has gotten significantly longer, some might say unwieldy. The emerging rubric is “L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.,” which stands for different things, depending on whom you ask.

“Q” can mean “questioning” or “queer,” an umbrella term itself, formerly derogatory before it was appropriated by gay activists in the 1990s. “I” is for “intersex,” someone whose anatomy is not exclusively male or female. And “A” stands for “ally” (a friend of the cause) or “asexual,” characterized by the absence of sexual attraction.

It may be a mouthful, but it’s catching on, especially on liberal-arts campuses.

Click here to read more!