Fabrice Houdart | A weekly newsletter on LGBTQ+ Equality
This week: Erdogan, Gonorrhea & Kissing, Riyadh is the new Ptown, LGBTQ+ billionaires, Winter Boy and Free Fall, the Bud Light/Anita Bryant collab, why this newsletter is an hour late & more...
Welcome to my weekly equality news digest, where I share important (and much less important) news, updates, and commentary about the global LGBTQ+ equality movement at the intersection with business.
This week: Erdogan, Gonorrhea & Kissing, Riyadh wants to be the new Ptown, LGBTQ+ billionaires, Winter Boy and Free Fall, the Bud Light/Anita Bryant collab, why this newsletter is an hour late, and more...
Global News
Turkey: the clay feet of strong men
It is the hallmark of authoritarian leaders globally: peppering one’s campaign with some homophobic and/or transphobic flavor. Erdogan, who has branded himself as the champion of religion, tradition, and “family” in the secular Turkish republic, will be reelected, according to the New York Times. Yet, this week, he felt the need to assert, very eloquently:
"We are against the LGBT"
Gonorrhea: now available via kissing
I checked, and Gonorrhea is NOT trending on Twitter despite these developments. Thanks to some Australian researchers, Cipro on your night table is no longer a statement about your virtue. Instead, the disease could have been contracted through kissing. I wish I had been told earlier, but that is our story. Isn’t it ? we are always born twenty years too prematurely. Anyway, Gonorrhea is also becoming antibiotic-resistant. A caveat, the researchers meant "French kissing" (see here):
“We think it is possible to catch gonorrhea via kissing,”
India: a place where marriage is everything
NPR had a piece on the Supreme Court hearings (here) yesterday. Times of India suspects the decision might push the ball into the parliament’s court, which would constitute a setback, as I previously discussed. This week, we heard arguments on whether the Right to Marry is a fundamental right under the Right to Life; you can watch the replay of Day 8 here and whether gay marriage will affect India’s natality rate (it won’t). I am convinced same-sex marriage will prevail, but whether the court will provide a husband for my wondrous friend Krishna remains unclear.
Saudi-Arabia: Riyadh is the new Provincetown
CNN Reported this week that the Saudi Tourism Authority amended the Q&A section on its website (strangely, nobody featured a link) to state that gay visitors are welcome in the Kingdom. It reminded me of another glorious moment in 2018 when a former GLAAD staffer/model/actor took it upon himself to celebrate the vibrant Saudi democracy after an all-expenses paid trip to the Kingdom. You, people, are too young to remember, but I snarked about it then, and I am snarking about it now. As a reminder, including to CNN, Freedom House gives Saudi Arabia an 8 out of 100 ranking in its index, which is considered low:
“Everyone is welcome to visit Saudi Arabia, and visitors are not asked to disclose such personal details,”
Asian Development Bank: the Safeguards campaign continues
Last week, APCOM and ILGA Asia delivered letters from regional LGBTQ+ organizations to ADB’s President Asakawa during its 56th annual meeting at Incheon, South Korea. The idea is that we are marginalized and do not benefit equally from the Bank’s development efforts. Most shareholders are supportive except for a small group led by China that thinks LGBTQ+ people can survive on the crumbs of development: the famous “queer trickle-down effect” in advanced economics. Read more here.
U.S. News
George Santos and a judge have a heart-to-heart conversation
And yet, why does it feel more like a coronation than vindication? Like Elizabeth Holmes or Anna Delvey before him: a condemnation of the most famous gay American man in the world is a getaway to more press coverage, opportunities for public redemption, fame, and money (in that order). He might not get Congress’ lifetime pension, but he will surely get back on top. And yet Santos committed real crimes: seven counts of Wire fraud, three counts of Money laundering, two counts of Making false statements to the House of Representatives, one count of Theft of public funds (COVID money), and 0 Counts of stealing money for a vet’s puppy. See more about the indictment here and here. The greatest taboo is how Santos' lies played out with his experience of growing up gay in a heteronormative world.
Florida: a legislative session like no others
This list of bills passed by the Florida legislature during these sixty days is worth a read. From further limiting abortion rights to expanding the ban on LGBTQ+ content in schools to children over 30 years old, Florida’s political agenda is just antagonistic. It does fit with the inter-generational gap and a brewing demographic revolution narrative: Florida has the highest percentage of senior citizens (21%) in the U.S.
Anheuser Busch: working hard for its 31 pieces of silver
To distance itself further from the right-wing media-hyped backlash, Anheuser-Busch has reportedly told its distributors that it cut ties with the "third-party ad agency" responsible for the Mulvaney ad and that the controversy is due to social media misinformation. The logical next step would be a new Bud Light campaign with the ghost of Anita Bryant. Maybe the soundtrack could be Anita’s “my little corner of the World,” which could also be the State’s anthem:
And if you care to stay,
In my [tacky] little corner of the world,
Then we can hide away [from reality],
In my little corner of the world.
“Save the Rainbow Flag” campaign
The Gilbert Baker Foundation’s clever Save the Rainbow Flag campaign is fighting local homophobic legislation aiming at banning the flag. You can see a map of these legal battles here.
From the Boardroom
What do you mean by “modern” exactly?
Two of the top 25 Modern Boards listed by Fortune magazine today have an LGBTQ+ Board member. That is about four seats out of 250. The 10th Board, Walgreens, has Nancy M. Schlichting, and the 23rd, Ralph Lauren, is the gayest Fortune 1000 Board with three LGBTQ+ Board members. If that is modern, then I am Gen-Z…
From the semi-cultural desk
The Hot Scot at the King’s Coronation
I did not watch the coronation because I am a busy single father amid his middle-life crisis, BUT I read about the dapper 39-year-old Major Johnny Thompson. Thompson is the King’s — and formerly Queen Elizabeth II’s — equerry, which Charles got as part of his inheritance (I am hoping for an unauthenticated Delacroix and mismatched silverware). Thompson is married, not that it ever stopped you. Read more here.
Winter Boy
I finally watched “Le Lycéen” (Winter Boy), a French movie about a gay 17-year-old dealing with his father’s death. At times it felt raw, but the fact that there is a movie delving into the grief of a young gay man in 2023 is a miracle. Also, I always promote sad gay films, but this one does not fall into that category because… it is not a gay movie. As stated in the NYTimes review:
“Lucas is gay, and one of the strengths of Honoré’s film is how unassumingly the character’s queerness is depicted.”
Free Fall
Granted, I am a bit late, ten years late; last night, I watched Free Fall, a 2013 German movie (available on Hulu) about a policeman falling in love with a colleague. I also love Max Riemelt (although I always confuse him with Matthias Schoenaerts - they look identical). It has a 7.5 on IMDb. Watch the trailer here.
Pride: much louder than the Trolls
Someone asked me how the ongoing Bud Light narrative may affect this year's Pride Month marketing campaigns. So I shared my thoughts on why Pride flies way above the voices of a few unhinged anti-LGBTQ+ activists on social media. Instead, it commemorates a truly insane revolution in Hearts and Minds over 50 years which will restore your trust in humanity. Read my thoughts here if you are so inclined.
LGBTQ+ Billionaires
QueerBio made a list of queer billionaires (deceased, living, or both) - I could see a few glaring omissions of some of your well-heeled friends. At least I wasn’t part of it, which did happen in the past (see below), adding insult (being singled out as a capitalist) to injury (being broke).
“Jon Stryker, founder of Arcus Foundation, and his husband, Slobodan Randjelović; Tim Gill of the Gill Foundation; Fabrice Houdart, head of [the company that we don’t name] […] and Mark S. Bonham of the Bonham Centre for Sexuality Studies in Toronto, Canada, are all extremely wealthy gay men institutionalizing gender identity ideology globally with the addition of Transgender, Queer, and Intersex (T+) to the LGB acronym within their LGBT non-governmental organizations (NGOs). “
Not easy to be Father Martin
Fr. James Martin has been essential in building bridges between the Catholic Church and LGBTQ+ believers, but it does not come without constant criticism, as highlighted in this piece.
Also, I found something cute for your Pride outfit
The Gay Agenda
June 5: the second Outright Gala in NYC
OutRight’s Celebration of Courage occurs in New York City on June 5. You can buy tickets here. The Honorees were announced in a Hollywood Reporter article yesterday.
V turns 60
Yesterday the internet celebrated Justin Vivian Bond’s sixtieth birthday. I will never forget watching V going down wooden stairs in Tenessee singing Nina Simone’s 22nd Century when I was 30. My first taste of unconventional living!
I know this newsletter is one hour late, and I apologize; I had a busy morning providing moral support to my friend George on his way to the courthouse. However, I hope my flakiness does not preclude you from sharing this newsletter with your network. God knows I need the readership…