JUDAS

Looking at the present state of LGBTQIA+ rights in African countries' legislation, it would seem western countries are its trailblazers. The Netherlands legalised gay marriage in 2001 with more powerful countries, such as America, legalising it in 2015. This is a stark contrast to Africa, where half of the world's 69 countries which criminalise gay marriage reside. For the queer citizens of these 34 African countries, living as their authentic selves is impossible in the face of rejection by family, friends and the law. For these people and modern society at large, it may seem it's been like this forever. However, when we look to the past, to forgotten history, we can see this is not the case. Firstly, let's look at pre-colonial attitudes towards aspects of some African societies which didn't conform to European views around sexuality and gender. Social conventions vastly different to European practices exist and still do across Africa's countries and tribes. O...

Born  in Singapore in 1981, 'Tila Tequila' is an American TV Personality, and, get this, Bisexual! Her 2007 'bisexuality-themed' MTV show, (very creatively) entitled 'A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila' was MTV's  second highest-rated series premiere of that year. She's kind of an icon, and she'd be my new Gemma Collins had she not posted a photo of herself in a 'scantily clad SS uniform' in front of Auschwitz, and posted an article she'd written entitled 'Why I Sympathise with Hitler: Part I,' but we'll get to that another time. My main enquiry, of course, is to ask: why was there more than one part? Why wasn't one part enough, Tila?     One of the show's most chaotic images. So, the show, why we're all here. MTV's ' A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila' (2007) is both one of the most distressing and entertaining pieces of reality TV I have ever consumed - and I've been through two seasons of 'My Uno...

  An illustration from 'TimTum: A Trans Jew Zine.' In the modern day, religion is seen as incompatible with queerness. Because traditional biblical and Talmudic readings have historically enforced conservative ideals on religious communities, we see religion as anti-Queer. In reality, whilst much biblical interpretation is anti-Queer, the original scripture is either ignorant or inclusive of gender non-conforming identities. Today I'd like to talk about the diversity in gender identity that we see in the Talmud - the primary source for Jewish law, tradition, philosophy, ethics, and history. The Talmud defines six genders, six! That means that when the Babylonian Talmud was written, in the year 500sih - Jewish authorities thought that the populations of non-binary genders were significant and diverse enough to fall into four non-binary categories. The six genders defined in the Babylonian Talmud are as follows: - Zachar (זָכָר) - AMAB, living as male; - Nekevah (נְקֵב...