Same-sex couples will now be able to marry officially in the British Antarctic Territory. The Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) has announced plans to launch a consultation in order to review same-sex marriage legislation in the British Antarctic Territory (BAT). Although same-sex marriage became legal in the BAT at the same time as the law
Author Archive: LGL
There is now a record 51 openly LGBTI athletes competing in the Rio Olympics. Olympic swimmer Rachele Bruni has won silver in the 10km marathon, and she decided to come out by dedicating the medal to her supportive girlfriend. Thanking her ‘beloved’, Diletta Faina, who had accompanied Bruni to Rio, after her second place finish.
Ian Jobling, Director of the Centre for Olympic Studies at the University of Queensland, looks at the history of gay Olympians. Sport remains “one of the last bastions of cultural and institutional homophobia” in Western societies. The first openly gay Olympians did not compete until the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics. But the first known gay Olympic
‘Now the whole world sees that Odessa is really an open and safe city. A city in which there is a place for all.’ Ukraine held its first Pride March outside Kiev at the weekend – and it went without any major incidents. On Saturday (13 August), between 50 and 100 marchers came together on
This amazing rainbow staircase was unveiled in the heart of Iceland’s capital ahead of this month’s Pride parade. Reykjavik Pride took place over the last weekend, with thousands flocking to the parade through the city centre. Ahead of the event, the steps to one of the city’s oldest institutions, Menntaskólinn í Reykjavík school, were lit up
The Georgian President has shot down a proposed referendum on a new constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. A petition calling for the referendum in the country had gathered 200,000 signatures. However, in a press conference this week, Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili flatly rejected the proposal to hold a referendum that would constitutionally define marriage as
More than half a dozen LGBT activists from the Arab world are expected to attend a first-of-its-kind meeting this weekend in Rehoboth Beach. The meeting — which will include advocates from Lebanon, Syria, Sudan, Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and the Gaza Strip who live in the U.S. — will take place at a private home
Great news for transgender people born in Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania just became the 12th state in the U.S. to modernize their birth certificate policy! Under Pennsylvania’s new policy, individuals no longer need to provide proof of surgery to update the gender marker on their birth certificate. That removes a significant hurdle for many transgender people. Under Pennsylvania’s
Our EVS volunteers are not volunteering just for equality of LGBT* people in Lithuania, but they stay in contact with their homeland LGBT* organizations and support them from abroad. Our current EVS volunteer Veronika from Slovakia is a good example of this practice. One of her learning goals on her EVS is to improve her
Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić has appointed an openly gay politician to his cabinet, in a historic first in the conservative country. Mr Vučić, who leads the right-wing Serbian Progressive Party, has been Prime Minister since 2014 and recently won re-election. This month he has been outlining his new government and re-appointing his Cabinet. As part of the