Top Stories
Arizona voters expand sports ban on trans students
Arizona voters have decisively approved a measure targeting transgenderstudents and their participation in sports. Proposition 318, also known as the “Protect Girls’ Sports in Arizona Act,” was passed early Wednesday morning, according to a call from Decision Desk HQ, with 41 percent of voters opposing the measure and 59 percent in support at 3:39 a.m. Eastern time. Seventy-nine percent of ballots had been counted at the time the projection was made. Stay up to date with the latest in LGBTQ+ news with The Advocate’s email newsletter, in your inbox five days a week. The measure, which goes into effect January 1, prohibits trans students, K-12, […]
Canada Banned Conversion Therapy. Is Guy Hammond’s Ontario Ministry Still Selling It?
What Uncloseted’s Investigation Found: In 2006, Stephen Boehner’s wife discovered Stephen was gay. Boehner, now a nonbinary 61-year-old, had been holding this secret since they were 12 years old, growing up in the 1980s in rural Nova Scotia. But after 13 years of being married to a woman, the burden was too much to bear. Shortly after their wife found out and not knowing where else to turn, they chose to confide in Guy Hammond, a preacher at the nearby Halifax-Dartmouth Church of Christ. They arranged a private meeting, but it didn’t go as they expected. “He starts laughing, a […]
No pardons for historic gay offences in Northern Ireland since law introduced in 2018
Northern Ireland’s scheme to disregard historic convictions for now-abolished gay sex offences has granted no pardons or disregards in the eight years since it came into force in 2018. Just three people have applied to the scheme since it was introduced, and none of the applications met the relevant criteria. The scheme was approved by the Northern Ireland Assembly in 2016. Offences covered include gross indecency and procuring others to commit homosexual acts. Eligibility requires that the act was consensual, involved someone aged 17 or above, and is no longer classed as an offence. Posthumous pardons automatically apply to anyone […]
Local News
Free Online LGBTQI History: A Sonoma County Timeline Class Discusses the Impact of 12-step Programs on Our Community
LGBTQI History: A Sonoma County Timeline 1947-2000. Mondays 6-7:30pm. Online via Zoom. Join us on November 9 for a conversation about the impact that 12-step programs had on our LGBT Community during the late 1970s-80s Please contact me to enroll and get a Zoom invite:cdungan@santarosa.edu
Transgender History Presentation at Finding History Day Happens Saturday in Santa Rosa
There will ba a discussion of a chapter of transgender history in Sonoma County from 1947–48 this coming Saturday at Finding History Day, held at the Santa Rosa Veterans Memorial Building (details below). The presentation highlights the marriage of a transgender man and a cisgender woman, David and Thelma Warren. In 1947, they obtained a marriage license in Sonoma County and were married in San Francisco. Later that year, David’s sex assigned at birth was discovered, and the couple was reported to the District Attorney’s office. On Thanksgiving Day, as Thelma and David were preparing to host their neighbors for […]
Arts & Entertainment
Electric Tumbleweed at Occidental Center for the Arts Friday November 6
Friday, November 6 @ 8 pm: Electric Tumbleweed at Occidental Center for the Arts. One of Sonoma County’s finest bands returns for our listening and dancing pleasure. Electric Tumbleweed is a psychedelic outlaw country group based in Sonoma County, California. Founded in 2019 by members rooted in bluegrass, country, and psychedelic rock, the music is a hard driving mixture of twangy guitar and psychedelic noise, held together by a steady rhythm section with the cry of pedal steel layered in between it all. Tickets are $20/$15 for OCA members @ www.occidentalcenterforthearts.org; or at the door. Doors open at 7:30 PM. […]
Historians straightwashed a 1600s poet. A new book captures the true legacy of “the Welsh Sappho.”
When the Welsh government in 2021 embarked on what Deputy Minister of Social Partnership Hannah Blythyn described as a project to make Wales “the most LGBTQ+ friendly nation in Europe,” Welsh scholar Norena Shopland was commissioned to help train librarians, museum staff, and archivists on the inclusion of LGBTQ+ history. In 2022, Shopland served as founding researcher in an inspiring and beautifully done countrywide effort to write a local LGBTQ+ open-access online history for each of the twenty-two counties of Wales, providing, she wrote, “a means by which local people, allies and events can be celebrated instead of replicating mainstream narratives and […]
State News
Who Can Vote in California
You must register before you can vote in California. You are eligible to vote in California if you meet all of the following requirements: You cannot register to vote in California if: Voter Registration Requirements To register to vote: If you don’t provide any of these numbers or the state can’t match the number you provide to official records, you will have to show an accepted form of ID the first time you vote. You can use any unexpired photo ID or a non-photo document with your name and address. Common examples include: Same Day Registration California allows voter registration […]
Polyamorous relationships in West Hollywood now offered extra protections
People in “multi-partner domestic relationships” in West Hollywood have just been granted extra protections. The move, which has been in the works for months, was officially adopted at a 2 November, 2026 City Council meeting, after a 5-0 vote. It will go into effect 30 days after it was adopted. West Hollywood, which is in itself an independent city and can enact local legislation, will now recognise and protects the rights of people in polyamorousrelationships with an official register. A “multi-partner domestic relationship” is officially defined as having all individuals involved: being 18 or older; not being related by blood that would bar marriage in […]
