LGBTQ Nation

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GOP state officials are so mad that doctors support trans healthcare that they’re intimidating them

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Earlier this week, 20 Republican attorneys general banded together to send a letter to the leadership of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), the national professional association for pediatricians, accusing them of breaking the law for supporting age-appropriate and life-saving gender-affirming care for trans youth. 

The letter accuses the organization of violating consumer legal protections for allegedly deceiving the public on the reversibility of puberty blockers while also seeking detailed information on their internal evidence assessments and communications.

The letter was sent by Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador. 

According to journalist Erin Reed, this letter holds no legal weight, and as such, the AAP is under no obligation to respond.

The letter claims that puberty blockers, a form of medication given to youth to temporarily delay puberty so that they can better understand their identities before the permanent effects of puberty set in, are unsafe and not reversible. In support of this, it cites the Cass Review, a review of the literature on puberty blockers in transgender youth that has been used to justify bans on puberty blockers in the United Kingdom.

However, the letter does not mention the numerous critiques of the Cass Review, all of which suggest that it got much of the science wrong, failed to consult with proper experts, and left out pertinent research that should have changed the conclusion.

A separate review by the Sax Institute, which was commissioned by the New South Wales, Australia, Ministry of Health, found that puberty blockers are safe, effective, and entirely reversible. It drew from established research on not only transgender youth but youth with precocious puberty, or early-onset puberty, who wanted their puberty delayed to be more in line with their peers.

Research on precocious puberty and puberty blockers has been happening for decades, and it all supports puberty blockers as safe and life-saving.

The letter also cited news articles, fringe journal pieces, and opinion pieces from anti-trans advocates in support of their claims. Among those cited is Leor Sapir, a non-expert who publishes on the conservative Manhattan Institute-backed outlet City Journal.

The letter’s citations also include news articles from New York Times’ Azeen Ghoryashi, who some have criticized for allegedly biased coverage of transgender issues, and psychiatrist Dr. Stephen Levine, who frequently provides expert testimony in court cases opposing gender-affirming care while often being dismissed due to judges finding he lacks professional experience with gender-affirming care.

The letter also claims that the widely regarded World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) is unreliable, citing in support of this a set of leaked documents from the organization’s internal communications called the “WPATH Files.” Reed found these leaks contained over 200 factual errors regarding gender-affirming care and judged them as containing irrelevant information regarding the professional merit of WPATH.

The letter concludes by demanding all internal communications held with WPATH in relation to their Standards of Care, detailed information regarding the AAP’s views on puberty blockers, and its views on the leaked WPATH Files.

LGBTQ Nation reached out to the American Academy of Pediatrics for comment. However, they did not respond before the publication of this article.

Other states that are represented here include Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia. There are also two signatures from the Speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives and the President of the Arizona Senate.

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HRC blames anti-LGBTQ+ politicians for national rise in hate crimes

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Anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes have been on the rise in the past year, standing in stark contrast to the overall downward trend of violent crime, according to the FBI’s most recent annual crime reports. The Human Rights Campaign says that anti-LGBTQ+ politicians are contributing to the violence.

In 2023, over 2,402 incidents of sexual orientation-based hate crimes were reported within the past year, a figure that is 500 higher than the amount reported in 2022.

In 2023, there were 401 reported gender identity-based hate crimes, with 146 targeting someone who was gender non-conforming. 

These figures stand in contrast to the overall trend of hate crimes. The data shows a smaller increase of around 2%, from 11,634 overall reports in 2022 to 11,862 reports in 2023. However, anti-violence advocates say that police departments significantly undercount the number of hate crimes due to bias or underreporting by queer people who may distrust law enforcement.

The report also references research from the Human Rights Campaign showing that these hate crimes have a disproportionate impact on Black trans women.

Not all of the reported hate crimes involved violent incidents, but rather a range of bias-motivated incidents that police report as hate crimes. The majority of hate crimes are those motivated by racism and xenophobia, particularly against immigrants and people of color, especially Black individuals.

The recent increase anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes is smaller than the the increase that occurred between 2021 and 2022. The year 2022 saw a 13.8% increase in reported crimes based on sexual orientation and a 32.9% increase in crimes based on gender identity compared to 2021.

“Every lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer person in this country should be free to live their lives without fear that we’ll be the target of a violent incident purely because of who we are and who we love,” Kelley Robinson, President of the Human Rights Campaign, said in a statement, 

“Unfortunately, the latest FBI hate crimes data shows that even as public acceptance of LGBTQ+ people continues to grow, and overall crime continues to decline, hate crimes against us are not yet showing signs of subsiding. Make no mistake, politicians who spread disinformation and demonize our lives are contributing to this violence.”

In contrast to hate crimes, violent crimes overall decreased by 3% from 2022 to 2023. Murder and non-negligent manslaughter saw a 11.6% decrease, rape saw a 9.4% decrease, aggravated assault decreased by 2.8%, and robbery decreased by 0.3%.

Violent crime as a whole has been on a downward trend since a peak during the pandemic. Levels are now back down to comparable rates from before the pandemic, where it has been steadily decreasing since the 1990s.

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Despite new protections, LGBTQ+ people face massive discrmination in the workplace

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LGBTQ+ people are more likely to experience discrimination at work in spite of laws against it, according to reporting from The 19th.

A study released by the Williams Institute last year shows that 17% of LGBTQ+ adults received harassment and discrimination on the job within the past year of reporting. 47% have experienced it at some point in their lives.

“You would hope things have gotten better,” said Brad Sears, the founding executive director of the Williams Institute and a co-author of the report

Many report having to stay in the closet at work out of fear of reprisal for their identities. Almost half of LGBTQ+ adults were not out to any of their coworkers, and this had protective effects in keeping them free from discrimination. Those who were out at work experienced three times the amount of discrimination.

“A lot of people, even if they are out, they’re kind of downplaying their identities in the workplace,” Sears said. “Maybe they use a different voice or different mannerisms at work, or they don’t dress exactly how they would otherwise dress when they’re not at work, or they use a bathroom that they would prefer not to be using at work.”

Nonbinary people, in particular, received disproportionate discrimination for their identities, with coworkers harassing them for not neatly fitting into either a masculine or feminine box. Many were passed over for promotions, were called slurs, and were isolated in their workplace. 

The data suggests that three in five nonbinary people have been discriminated against at work, which also includes things like being fired or passed over for a job. One in five report facing physical harassment, being “assaulted,” “attacked,” or “strangled.” One in four are currently experiencing such discrimination at their jobs and are often victims of multiple sources of discrimination.

“Oftentimes, I was passed up for a promotion because I wasn’t ‘manly’ enough, and they doubted my ability to lead a team,” a Latine nonbinary person said in the survey.

A Latine nonbinary participant from Colorado said in the survey: “A co-worker strangled me at a counter and said he was trying to ‘give a girl a massage.’”

And a Black nonbinary person from Connecticut said that they heard their manager talking “disparagingly” about them behind their back. 

The Williams Institute cites a lack of clear company policies that protect nonbinary individuals as a cause for much of this discrimination. Many company policies across the nation fail to explicitly outline nonbinary individuals as being included as a protected class, instead saying protections apply only to men and women. Some opponents of trans rights cite their interpretation of Title VII in justification, claiming that it does not extend to protections based on gender identity and only extends to sex.

Much of this discrimination is due to a lack of company policies that explicitly protect nonbinary individuals, with loopholes being present to allow for such discrimination, including in some legal interpretations.

Sears concluded, “LGBTQ+ people are not monolithic. They’re different, they have intersecting identities … and those are leading to differences that are important in the workplace.”

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YouTube suspended a queer Nigerian film distributor’s channel. Now they’re fighting back.

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A Nigerian distributor of independent gay romance films is fighting to get its YouTube channel back.

Earlier this month, Omeleme TV launched an online petition aimed at getting YouTube to reinstate its original account after the streaming platform removed its channel, claiming Omeleme TV had violated its policy “on spam, deceptive practices and scams.”

But in its petition, Omeleme TV argued it has never violated YouTube’s policies and has “always complied with their rules and regulations accordingly.”

An Omeleme TV spokesperson, who wished to remain anonymous, told The Washington Blade that YouTube has not indicated “the main issue” that resulted in its deplatforming.

In its petition, Omeleme TV notes that “same-sex love is often denied and shrouded in taboo” in Nigeria, where homosexuality is illegal and same-sex relationships are punishable by up to 14 years in prison under the country’s Same-Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Act. “Deleting our YouTube page is basically shutting [out] the voice of the queer folks in the region,” the petition states.

As the Washington Blade notes, Omeleme TV launched its YouTube channel last September. At its peak, the channel reportedly had over 5,000 subscribers and had been monetized. 

Its first film, Nearly All Men, directed by Akpos Otubuere, was initially posted in October 2023. By November 4, 2023, the film had garnered 5,500 views according to a post on the channel’s official Instagram account. This past June, the channel premiered its second film, Pieces of Love, which received over 500,000 views in 24 hours, according to a June 22 Instagram post. A screenshot posted on August 2 appears to show that the film had reached 101,000 views.

The following day, nearly 10 months after Nearly All Men went live on YouTube, a post on Omeleme TV’s Instagram page stated that the channel’s operators had chosen to remove the film after the platform “flagged a particular score.”

The channel’s spokesperson told the Washington Blade that Omeleme TV faced an initial copyright claim over a song in one of its films. In the process of settling the copyright issue, they discovered that Nearly All Men had not, in fact, been monetized. According to the Blade, the channel pulled the film and reuploaded it with a new original song.

It’s unclear when this version of the film was posted or how long it remained on YouTube, but on August 15, a post on the channel’s Instagram stated that “after back and forth with YouTube” over the platform’s policies on adult content, Nearly All Men would be reposted the following day, “BUT, the 18+ scenes in the movie will be up soonest in the next few days [sic].”

Omeleme TV’s spokesperson told The Washington Blade that YouTube flagged the film again on August 18. “This time they claimed it is not ad friendly, but it does not affect the channel and that we can only earn and be viewed by premium subscribers,” they said.   

On September 3, Omeleme TV posted another update on Instagram, indicating that Nearly All Men had been flagged several times. Rather than edit scenes out of the film, Omeleme TV announced that Nearly All Men would return to its channel as a “premium” members-only video due to scenes containing nudity.

“We are sincerely sorry that it’s not open to everyone,” the channel wrote in another September 3 post. “Like we said earlier YouTube is strict on nudity and editing out those scenes entirely from the film jeopardizes the aim/purpose of the entire film.”

A September 6 post announced that the film was once again live for premium subscribers.

Two days later, on September 8, Omeleme TV reported via their Instagram account that their channel had been removed from YouTube. A screenshot posted on their @nearlyallmen X account indicates that the platform removed the channel for allegedly violating its policy “on spam, deceptive practices and scams.”

In a September 10 response to the @nearlyallmen X account, @TeamYouTube noted that Omeleme TV had “already appealed & received an email outlining the final decision” not to reinstate the channel.  

“We know it wasn’t the outcome you were hoping for, but there’s nothing more we can do on our end as these decisions are made very carefully,” the @TeamYouTube account wrote.

The Omeleme TV spokesperson told the Washington Blade that YouTube “did not in any way specify the actual violation or spam.” They also noted that YouTube had never once given the channel a “strike.” The platform issues “strikes” to channels for a second violation of its policies following an initial warning for a first violation. 

Under its “Community Guidelines strike basics,” the platform does note that it “may remove content for reasons other than Community Guidelines violations. For example, a first-party privacy complaint or a court order. In these cases, your channel won’t get a strike.” It also notes that in certain instances “a single case of severe abuse will result in channel termination without warning.”

Omeleme TV has since launched a new YouTube channel, though it has only uploaded Pieces of Love and the trailer for Nearly All Men so far. And with only 98 subscribers, its reach has been drastically reduced and falls far short of the 1,000 subscribers required before it can monetize its content.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=43L1yUusH28%3Ffeature%3Doembed

And it continues to fight to have its original channel restored. In its petition, which 170 signatures toward its 200 goal, Omeleme TV says that it plays a crucial role in normalizing same-sex relationships, “providing visibility and affirmation for LGBTQ+ individuals, both young and old,” in Nigeria.

“YouTube remains our major source for distribution of these films to queer folks all over the world,” the channel’s spokesperson told the Blade. They continue to believe that YouTube has somehow made a mistake, that the platform, “being a safe space for filmmakers all over the world, will do the right thing by restoring our channel for their esteemed viewers.”

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Taiwan will now recognize same-sex marriages of Taiwanese-Chinese couples

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Taiwan officials have announced same-sex marriages between citizens of Taiwan and China will now be recognized in the breakaway republic.

Taiwan was the first Asian country to recognize same-sex marriages in 2019.

The move means that cross-strait same-sex couples can get married and their unions will be recognized in Taiwan. But like most things in the fraught relationship between the two countries, it’s complicated.

Like their cross-strait straight peers, gay couples will have to get married in a third country that recognizes both China and Taiwan and where there’s also marriage equality. Once back in the island nation, they’ll then be able to legally register their marriage.

But in addition to relevant documentation like a marriage certificate, the couple will undergo an extensive interview process at their point of entry into the country.

Liang Wen-chieh, the deputy head of Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, said the tough standards for cross-strait couples are in place “to prevent cross-border fake marriages and avoid problems of national security and social order.”

“Only after passing the interview on the border (at the airport and ports) can they enter the country to register their marriages. This is our current principle for cross-strait marriages,” he said, according to AFP.

After the interview, “the couple can proceed with marriage registration at a household registration office,” he added.

Despite the expansion of equal marriage rights, Chinese spouses in same-sex couples will have difficulty obtaining official Taiwan identity documents.

Chinese nationals have long had to relinquish their “household registration” in China in order to obtain permanent residency in Taiwan. But China doesn’t recognize same-sex marriages, so they’re unlikely to approve a partner’s deregistration.

Without that, the Chinese partner can’t obtain a Taiwanese ID, let alone one that indicates they’re married — at least for now.

The Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights, along with other equality organizations, said in a group statement that the changes for cross-strait couples were “a long-awaited, difficult but navigable path home.”

They also remarked that the requirement to get married abroad meant that gay couples  “still have higher economic and class barriers to marriage.”

Taiwan recognized same-sex marriage in 2019 when the country’s high court ruled that the definition of marriage between a man and a woman was unconstitutional.

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Ron DeSantis bans Florida’s sex ed classes from mentioning anatomy & contraceptives

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The Florida Department of Education (FLDOE) has ordered local school districts to submit their sex education plans to the state for approval. The FLDOE has also said the classes must promote abstinence and cannot include discussion of contraception or pictures of reproductive health organs.

The sex-ed takeover removes local discretion when it comes to district sex education classes and materials.

For some time, Florida law has mandated that sex-ed lessons emphasize the “benefits of sexual abstinence as the expected standard and the consequences of teenage pregnancy” for grades 6 through 12.

But now the state has removed any local control of additional information school districts can provide their students.

A memo written by Broward County administrators obtained by The Orlando Sentinel summarized the district’s verbal interactions with state officials regarding their takeover of sex ed in the state. The state provided no written instructions provided for districts.

“Pictures of external sexual/reproductive anatomy should not be included in any grade level,” the memo recorded state officials as saying. “Contraceptives are not part of any health or science standard” but could be mentioned as a “health resource,” though “pictures, activities, or demonstrations that illustrate their use should not be included in instruction in any grade level,” it said.

“Different types of sex (i.e., anal, oral, and vaginal) cannot be part of instruction in any grade level,” state officials added, according to the Broward memo.

Orange County schools previously started their lessons in 5th grade with one class devoted to the physical changes of puberty. High schoolers had discussions about contraception and sexually transmitted diseases.

Now the state must approve any additional curriculum and they’ll either deny the additions or ignore them, forcing local districts to cancel sex-ed classes altogether until the state addresses their plans.

Elissa Barr, a professor of public health at the University of North Florida and a member of the sex ed advocacy group Florida Healthy Youth Alliance, has been keeping in touch with local school officials and compiling a list of words and phrases they’ve been told to remove from their reproductive health plans.

These words include abuse, consent, domestic violence, fluids, gender identity and LGBTQ information, she said.

Removing the word “fluids” from lessons will make it hard to teach about how HIV is transmitted, for instance, since it spreads through blood, breast milk, semen and vaginal “fluids”.

“That’s science,” Barr said.

The verbal feedback that Orange school district officials got was plain: Throw out your plan and just use the state textbook.

“The FDOE strongly recommended the district utilize the state adopted text,” the district said in an emailed statement to the Sentinel.

The state textbook preaches abstinence as the only effective way to prevent STDs and pregnancy, and there’s no mention of contraception. The text also encourages students to go on group outings rather than spend time alone with a date.

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Trump campaign launches ad attacking Kamala Harris for supporting trans people’s health care

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A new political ad from former President Donald Trump delves deep into transphobia, highlighting Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris’ support of providing lifesaving care to transgender inmates (something required by federal law) and showing pictures of her next to a drag queen, a trans woman, and a nonbinary person.

“Kamala is for they/them,” the 30-second ad says. “President Trump is for you.”

The ad primarily accuses Harris of supporting “taxpayer-funded sex-changes for prisoners and illegal aliens” — a crude restatement of her 2019 ACLU questionnaire answer that all federal prisoners, including trans immigrants detained by border agents, deserve medically necessary care, which includes gender-affirming care and surgeries. The Constitution requires U.S. prisons and detainment facilities to provide such care, and courts have upheld this requirement, but some facilities still deny it to inmates.

“It’s hard to believe, but it’s true. Even the liberal media was shocked,” the ad states. To substantiate its claim, the ad shows Harris’ video interview with the National Center for Transgender Equality, in which she declares her support for providing care for trans inmates.

Neither one has anything to do with the federal government’s decades-long obligation to provide essential medical care to all inmates. 

The transphobic attack isn’t surprising. Both Trump and his running mate Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) have lied about Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D), allowing his state’s government to “kidnap children” from unsupportive parents to change their gender. The claim is untrue, as Walz has never signed any such law or order, nor are state officials legally authorized to take trans kids away from unsupportive parents.

Trump has also claimed that schools are conducting surgeries on trans youth without parental consent. This is also a lie. No schools are providing such surgeries, doctors typically refuse to provide such surgeries to minors, and doctors never provide gender-affirming surgery to minors without parental consent.

Furthermore, the Republican National Platform pledges to “keep men out of women’s sports” and cut federal funding for any schools “pushing radical gender ideology” or “inappropriate sexual or political content on our children.”

Chapter 9, Section 5 of the platform promises to “end Left-wing gender insanity,” stating, “We will keep men out of women’s sports, ban Taxpayer funding for sex change surgeries, and stop Taxpayer-funded Schools from promoting gender transition, reverse Biden’s radical rewrite of Title IX Education Regulations, and restore protections for women and girls.”

Down-ticket Republicans are also incorporating transphobia into their political messaging. 

One recent TV ad from the National Republican Congressional Committee accuses Democratic Texas state Rep. Vicente Gonzalez of “push[ing] sex changes for kids” even though he told the Texas Tribune that he has “never supported tax dollars paying for gender transition surgeries and never will.”

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) has also published ads accusing his opponent, U.S. Rep. Colin Allred (D-TX), of being “wrong for our girls,” a reference to Allred’s support of the Equality Act, a federal bill that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to federal anti-discrimination protections.

Allred was a co-sponsor of a resolution to create a “Transgender Bill of Rights to protect and codify the rights of transgender and nonbinary people under the law and ensure their access to medical care, shelter, safety, and economic security,” the Texas Tribune noted.

Allred’s campaign called the ads a “disgusting, false attack, and another example of how Ted Cruz only wants to divide Texans.” Allred and Cruz are polling very closely in a high-profile race that could help determine party control of the Senate.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=0RzvjuBmR3k%3Ffeature%3Doembed

U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) released an anti-trans ad featuring Riley Gaines, a former competitive collegiate swimmer who launched a career as a spokesperson against trans athletes after she tied for fifth place with trans University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas in the 200-yard freestyle at the 2022 NCAA championship.

In the ad, Gaines says that Hawley’s Democratic opponent Lucas Kunce “supports the radical trans agenda” and falsely claims that he supports “sex change operations for minors.” Doctors rarely ever conduct such procedures on minors. Gaines also claims that Kunce supports “boys in girls bathrooms” and “explicit teaching in grade school,” though both are distortions of his support for LGBTQ+-inclusive school policies.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=2-OCc25Q8qA%3Ffeature%3Doembed

“It’s really disgusting that these politicians think they can use trans people, and more specifically trans youth, as a political tool to win points,” Chase Glenn, the trans male executive director of the Alliance for Full Acceptance, told the Associated Press.

Republican campaigners and polls indicate that transphobia resonates with conservative Christian voters. In fact, the Republican National Platform promises to legally protect Christians who discriminate against LGBTQ+ people. 

However, a March 2024 poll showed that 53% of voters oppose candidates who campaign against transgender people. While that might sound like a slim majority, such a majority could help determine which candidates win in close races.

An August 2023 Economist/YouGov poll found that majorities of voters mostly care about inflation, taxes, jobs, the economy, government spending, and immigration.

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Book bans have increased nearly 200%. Florida and Iowa are partly to blame

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Over 10,000 books have been banned across the entire United States over the past school year. The trend has seen a particularly strong increase in states with a strong Republican presence, according to the free-speech nonprofit PEN America. 

This is a major increase compared to the 2022-2023 year, which saw a total of 3,362 books banned across the country.

Florida and Iowa are leading in the total number of bans, with over 8,000 recorded between the two states. This number is largely due to the increasingly strict laws on book bans. 

The banned books include Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie; the famous work on anti-Black racism Black Reconstruction in America, 1860-1880 by W.E.B. DuBois; Alex Haley’s book about the lived experience of slaves, Roots: The Saga of an American Family; and James Baldwin’s autobiography Go Tell It On the Mountain.

Iowa’s bans stem from Senate File 496, a law restricting LGBTQ+ books from grade seven and below along with total bans on books deemed to contain sexual content. Florida’s House Bill 1069, backed by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), resulted in a similar ban, albeit a much more strict one.

PEN America cites other laws from Utah, Tennessee, and South Carolina as contributing to these increase in banned books as well.

Individual school districts have also had a hand in banning many books. The Elkhorn Area School District in Wisconsin, for example, banned over 300 books over a several month period.

PEN America says that the types of books banned “includes books featuring romance, books about women’s sexual experiences, and books about rape or sexual abuse as well as continued attacks on books with LGBTQ+ characters or themes, or books about race or racism and featuring characters of color.”

The organization also emphasizes that these numbers are an undercount of the actual amount of banned books since many book bans go unreported. Additionally, the organization says schools have also implemented “soft” book bans, including policies that cause greater hesitancy to check out books from libraries, restrictions on who can check out restricted books out, book fair cancellations, and the removal of classroom collections.

Six major book publishers are currently suing the Floridian government after hundreds of their books were pulled from libraries, cutting severely into their profits and discriminating against their authors.

A Florida school district recently agreed to re-shelve 36 books to settle a lawsuit concerning multiple banned books, including And Tango Makes Three, an often banned children’s book about a gay penguin couple raising a chick.

Iowa’s book ban was recently brought back into law when a permanent injunction against the ban was overturned by an appeals court.

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They provided lethal heroin to a trans icon. Now they’ll pay the price.

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The two men who provided the narcotics that caused the death of trailblazing trans activist and actress Cecilia Gentili have both pleaded guilty to distributing the drugs.

Gentili, 52, died in her Brooklyn apartment from fentanyl-laced heroin that authorities say she received from the men, Michael Kuilan, 44, and Antonio Venti, 52.

Prosecutors said Gentili was found dead in her bedroom in February from the combined effects of controlled substances including fentanyl, xylazine (a vetrinary sedative), cocaine and heroin. The heroin, laced with fentanyl, was provided by Kuilan and Venti.

On Monday, Kuilan on Monday pleaded guilty to possession and possession with intent to distribute both of the drugs, according to a statement from the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York. Kuilan also pleaded guilty to a charge of gun possession following an earlier conviction that barred him from carrying a firearm.

Venti pleaded guilty to narcotics possession in July.

Text messages, cell site data, and other evidence revealed that Venti sold the fentanyl and heroin mixture to Gentili on February 5, 2024, and that Kuilan supplied Venti with the lethal narcotics. 

As part of their plea agreements, Kuilan and Venti agreed that they caused Gentili’s death. In addition, law enforcement searched an apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn belonging to Kuilan and found hundreds of baggies of fentanyl, as well as a handgun and ammunition.

“The perpetrators of the tragic poisoning of Cecilia Gentili, a prominent leader of the New York transgender community, have now both admitted their guilt in selling the lethal drugs that have caused this heartbreaking death,” said U.S. Attorney Breon Peace. “These drugs, heroin and fentanyl, have caused so much pain throughout our community.  I hope this case will bring a sense of closure to Gentili’s family and serve as a warning that this Office will be relentless in holding fentanyl dealers accountable.”

“While these guilty pleas can’t undo the tragic loss,” Peace added, “it sends a message that we will do everything we can to make sure those responsible for drug related deaths face the consequences for their actions, and the families of those who lost their lives receive justice.”

Gentili’s death shocked the transgender community in New York, where she received an outpouring of grief from local prominent figures, including nightlife legend Amanda Lepore and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), as well as her fellow cast members on the trans-centered TV series Pose.

The Argentina native was honored with a memorial service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan, attended by over a thousand mourners. The joyous and “scandalous” service earned condemnation from the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York City.

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Gay and bisexual men have different levels of body satisfaction, study finds

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New research suggests bisexual men experience body dissatisfaction differently from gay men.

Bi men are reportedly less motivated to be lean and show a lower dissatisfaction rate with their muscularity, while gay men show a higher drive, according to psychologists at Nottingham Trent University (NTU), in the UK.

After interviewing more than 370 gay, bisexual and straight cisgender white men as part of a study on body satisfaction, the study showed that men who identify as bi are more likely to have the same sort of opinions about body satisfaction as straight men.

However, results for other concerns, including height, penis size and capability, remained consistent among all sexual orientations.

The study, “Tackling bisexual erasure: An explorative comparison of bisexual, gay and straight cisgender men’s body image” was published in an effort to tackle the “homogenous” way that gay and bi men are grouped in research.

A person lifting a small dumbell.
New research has shown why bisexual men should not be grouped with gay men when it comes to body image. (Getty)

Dr Liam Cahill, the project’s lead researcher and a lecturer in LGBTQ+ psychology at NTU, said the traditional act of grouping bisexual and gay men is outdated.

“Traditionally, bisexual men have been grouped in the same category as gay men when it comes to body image research,” he said. “Our findings show they are unique in how they experience differences in their body image.”

While society generally has a preference for men to be “muscular or lean with low body fat,” bisexual men’s dissatisfaction with their physique is only compounded when integrating with the gay community, he added.

However, the study’s results still suggest that, while bisexual and straight men are less dissatisfied with their muscularity, societal pressures still influence all men – regardless of sexuality.

“When it comes to increased pressure and dissatisfaction related to muscularity, previous studies have found that gay men’s stronger preference for muscular partners may contribute to their higher levels,” Cahill said. “This is a pressure that bisexual men may only experience when they are integrated with the gay community, hence their dissatisfaction is lower.”

This means that bi, straight and gay men all experience the same motivation to gain muscle and lose body fat, but gay men are typically more dissatisfied with the results.

“The experiences of bisexual men are often overlooked in research,” the study concluded. “Bisexual people experience greater stigma, marginalisation and prejudice than other sexual [minority] identities.

“As of the most recent review of this issue, only a small number of studies have explored bisexual and gay men’s body image differences.

“Our findings contradict the view that bisexual and gay men experience similar body-image concerns concerning their drive for leanness and muscularity dissatisfaction.”

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