"Catching Feelings" by Christine and the Queens and Cerrone

Rahim Redcar has revived the band name Christine and the Queens for this infectious, dance-y collaboration with Cerrone, the legendary disco musician, composer, and producer. "Catching Feelings" sounds like something I might have heard on the radio growing up...

https://www.christineandthequeens.com/
https://rahimredcar.com/
http://www.cerrone.net/

Pride Month: You Are Not Alone

*LGBT National Hotline: Call 888-843-4564 for confidential support and resources. This hotline is available Monday–Friday from 4 PM–12 AM ET and Saturday from 12 PM–5 PM ET.

*Youth LGBT Hotline: Call 800-246-7743 for confidential support and resources for youth 25 and under.

*Senior LGBT Hotline: Call 888-234-7243 for confidential support and resources for those 50 and above.

*Coming Out Support Hotline: Call 888-688-5428 (888-OUT-LGBT) for a safe space to discuss coming out.

*Trans Lifeline: Call 1-877-565-8860 for peer support from trans people. This hotline is available 24/7 in the United States.

*Trevor Project: Call 1-866-488-7386, text START to 678-678, or chat online.

*SAGE LGBT Elder Hotline: Call 1-877-360-LGBT (5428) to connect with friendly responders.

*National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: Call or text 988 for crisis or suicide support. This service is available 24/7 anywhere in the United States.

*THRIVE Lifeline: Text "oSTEM" to +1 (313) 662-8209 for text-based crisis support.

Happy Pride Month 2025!

June is LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transexual, Queer/Questioning) Pride Month to commemorate the Stonewall riots, which occurred at the end of June 1969 (look for my annual blog posting about this important date on the 28th).

Why Pride?

Despite the fact that Pete Buttigieg, an out and proud and well adjusted and brilliantly smart gay man ran a highly successful campaign for President of the United States (remember how everyone said that we no longer have any racism in the United States because a black man was President?), we still have a tremendous problem with homophobia here (especially with the new administration of darkness attacking LGBTQ rights) and around the world. Pride Month is a positive stance against the daily shame, social stigma, discrimination, and violence that the LGBT community still faces here in the United States. In fact, a recent report from the policy research Williams Institute at UCLA showed that LGBT+ people in the United States are NINE TIMES MORE LIKELY THAN NON-LGBT+ PEOPLE TO BE THE VICTIMS OF VIOLENT HATE CRIMES. Gay children are routinely kicked out of their homes and disowned by their families, gay kids and teens and young adults are routinely bullied or attacked or beaten and many end up committing suicide because they are told they are sick or going to hell, and many gay men and women are attacked and beaten and murdered--sometimes in their own homes, while political attacks against the LGBTQ community have increased with destructive, radical conservatives insisting that anyone who stands for LGBTQ rights is somehow "grooming children" for sexual exploitation. In fact there were over 800 anti-LBGTQ bills introduced last year alone. Yet that pales in comparison to some other unfortunately backward places around the world where gay men and women are routinely tortured and slaughtered--sometimes by government-sanctioned assassins, governments who insist that there is no such thing as homosexuality and that such ideas are evil imports from the Western world (Ghana imposes actual JAIL SENTENCES for anyone just identifying as LGBTQ).

The LGBTQ Pride celebration is about the right of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and transgendered individuals to exist without being prosecuted, persecuted, tortured, or murdered, not about "not being straight."

The rainbow flag is a universal symbol of hope for LGBTQ people around the world. It first flew in San Francisco's United Nations Plaza for Gay Pride Day, on June 25, 1978. It originally had eight colors--two more than today's version--and was designed by Gilbert Baker, an openly gay artist and activist who sewed the whopping 30' x 60' flag by hand. He had been commissioned to design a symbol for the LGBTQ community by his friend Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in California.

Gilbert Baker, heading the Stockholm Pride Parade in 2003.
(Credit Fredrik Persson/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images)

Baker died in 2017, aged 65. In a 2015 interview with CNN, here, he revealed the rationale behind the design of the flag. "We needed something to express our joy, our beauty, our power. And the rainbow did that," he said. "We're an ancient, wonderful tribe of people. We picked something from nature. We picked something beautiful."

https://gilbertbaker.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_flag_(LGBT)