Victory Fund's Annise Parker - Metro Weekly - July 16 2020

LastWord.
People say the queerest things
“I could high five God, but I wasn’t living to the fullest
I was sad. I was depressed. ”
—RICKY MARTIN, in an interview with Proud Radio on Apple Music, discussing the impact of his rise to fame while remaining in the closet.
“There came a moment that I said, ‘We need to stop. We need to stop the tour’...I said, ‘I can’t. I can’t do this. I need to go home.
I need silence. I need to cry. I need to be angry. I need to forgive myself for allowing myself to reach this level, to get to where I’m at.’
And I took some time and I took a sabbatical.”
“Velma was explicitly gay in my initial script.
But the studio just kept watering it down & watering it down. ”
—Filmmaker JAMES GUNN, in a tweet claiming that he wrote the character of Velma as gay in the 2002 film Scooby-Doo.
The character was altered to make her sexuality “ambiguous (the version shot), then nothing (the released version)
& finally having a boyfriend (the sequel),” Gunn said.
For me,
“
what this bill really means is protecting
black trans women,
who are the most vulnerable of the communities we’re trying to protect here. ”
—COLORADO STATE REP. BRIANNA TITONE (D), speaking at a signing ceremony for four pieces of LGBTQ-inclusive legislation,
including a ban on so-called gay and trans panic defenses, and a change to make it easier for trans minors to correct the gender markers
on their state documents. “We really went from a place where discrimination was legalized in the 1990s to where we are today,
where Colorado is a leader,” said Gov. Jared Polis (D), who is gay.
“We don’t allow attacks against people
based on sexual orientation or gender identity
and are updating our policies to ban the promotion of conversion therapy services. ”
—TARA HOPKINS, Instagram’s public policy director for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, speaking to BBC News.
Instagram will remove all content on the social media platform that promotes anti-LGBTQ conversion therapy,
after previously banning adverts that promote the debunked practice.
"Young people need to be able to see themselves
in the people they look up to. ”
—MARTHA MCCABE, retired Canadian Olympic swimmer, coming out as lesbian in an interview with CBC.
"I want to be an example to young female swimmers and help ones who are struggling with this,
so they can see it's normal," she said.
JULY 16, 2020 • METROWEEKLY.COM
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