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    Four queer business owners on Pride under Trump: ‘Our joy is resistance’

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    As the first Pride month under Donald Trump’s second presidency approaches, LGBTQ+ businesses are stepping up, evolving quickly to meet the community’s growing concerns.Since day one, Trump has signed executive orders targeting the LGBTQ+ community, particularly the trans and gender non-conforming population. He aims to eradicate “gender ideology” by enforcing a two-sex binary determined at conception, reinstating and expanding the military ban on transgender service members, and directing agencies to prevent gender-affirming care for youth.This leaves the LGBTQ+ community feeling apprehensive about losing further rights and protections.The Guardian spoke with four queer business owners, and one message was clear: queer businesses are here to support the community now more than ever and spread joy as resistance.Uptick in weddingsBusiness is surging for New England-based wedding photographer Lindsey “Lensy” Michelle as queer couples decide to take their vows, fearing the Trump administration will go after marriage equality. Michelle says she’s only getting louder and even “more queer”.“I’m not changing anything about my business, no matter what the government says,” Michelle said. “We elected a president who doesn’t support this type of marriage, or at the very least doesn’t care enough to try to protect it.”View image in fullscreenShe is seeing queer couples accelerate their wedding plans in fear of Trump and the supreme court overturning 2015’s ruling on Obergefell v Hodges, which recognized same-sex marriages. Michelle currently offers accessible pricing for queer couples.“[Pride] is a good time to remind wedding vendors to stop advertising to only brides or using very gendered language, or assuming that every couple has a bride and a groom,” she said. “Performative allyship is really dangerous, and for businesses June can be a time of greater reflection on how they can be more clear and inclusive.”According to Michelle, there is an emerging trend for queer couples to distinguish legal marriage from a wedding ceremony. Many of her clients explained that they are registering their marriage now out of an “abundance of caution” because they don’t feel like “their rights will be protected”, she said.“It’s a privilege when you’re able to celebrate instead of protest and queerness is always rebellious,” she said. “You protest when things aren’t welcoming to begin with and you celebrate when you’re able to but I think also you have to do both. Otherwise, it becomes quite sad.”After noticing an uptick in demand, she created an LGBTQ+ wedding directory of more than 130 businesses. She didn’t stop there: Michelle then teamed up with five other vendors to throw a queer mass wedding ball for six lucky couples on 5 January.“We don’t really feel like celebrating. We feel like crying and we feel helpless and all we’re trying to do is get married,” Michelle said. “We just wanted to throw a party. This event is coming out of the time of fear and uncertainty, but that’s always been the queer story.”View image in fullscreenThe team behind the wedding ball are “open to the idea” of hosting a similar event in other states, particularly in Republican-led ones.Nine states are urging the supreme court to reverse Obergefell v Hodges.“We’re scared, and I don’t put that lightly,” Michelle said.We will surviveIn Decatur, Georgia, Charis Books & More aims to alleviate the fears the queer and trans community are experiencing.“My job is to support young people and those with children and to say: ‘Look, we have spent most of our history as queer and trans people as outlaws and we can be outlaws again. But, we will survive, we are very creative and we’ll figure out how to get through this time,’” said Errol Anderson, the executive director of Charis Books & More’s non-profit arm, Charis Circle.View image in fullscreenCharis Circle hosts events like story time and offers support groups, especially for the trans community. They have four support groups for trans and gender non-conforming individuals across ages. Georgians in less welcoming parts of the state see Charis “as a beacon”, according to Anderson.“We’re seeing these particularly aggressive attacks on trans people for the past couple years now being mirrored in national legislation and it’s very scary,” Anderson said. “A lot of people right now feel very hopeless, but we need to remember we do actually have a lot of power to speak up for what we believe in and our voices do matter.”Joy as resistanceNew York’s 34-year-old queer bar Henrietta Hudson is returning to its roots as a political activist space, especially as Pride approaches.View image in fullscreen“Acutely since the inauguration, but really since the election, there’s a different tone to how people come to [the bar]. It feels more necessary,” Hutch Hutchinson said. “People are craving to be around other queer people and to be in a safer space. We have to buckle down for the family we have here.”Hutchinson, who uses he/they pronouns, is the director of operations at Henrietta Hudson. He said Pride is already in the air as the bar has seen a surge in energy and purpose.“[Pride] often does feel like a protest and we call our Pride as occupying Hudson, a very definitive statement on us taking up space in the West Village,” he said. “The general feeling at Henrietta Hudson is that we’ve just become more political. This place has been through so many eras of queer resistance and uprising. We are relighting that fire.”They lend their bar to vetted non-profits and local grassroots organizations for events giving back to the LGBTQ+ community, such as a Pride week fundraiser benefiting the BTFA Collective for Black trans femme artists and the annual NYC Dyke March.Hutchinson explained that the bar will always take explicit stances to protect and support the community. It posted a message on their Instagram, calling out the “immoral”, “dangerous” and “unlawful” attacks by Trump’s administration.“We talk, as a [staff] about, what does resistance look like? Sure, resistance is showing up to rallies and supporting the ACLU, learning your rights, marching and protesting,” he added. “But it’s so important for us to dance and to see each other smile and laugh and sing. Our joy is resistance.”Being visible is more importantDown in St Louis, Missouri, art collective Swan Meadow plans to be a safe third space for the community where members can “simply exist as who they are”. Partners Fern and Mellody Meadow, who both use they/them pronouns, emptied their savings to open the collective last fall after a close presidential election.View image in fullscreen“We are always trying to craft events and spaces for people to come to and to sit with complicated emotions and thoughts and to talk to people about them,” Fern said. “It can be isolating and so frustrating to know that things are wrong that are outside of our control, but when you come together as a community, so much positive change can happen.”They open their workshop multiple times a month for free community-focused events such as “crafternoons”. ​Some events act as fundraisers for local mutual aid organizations such as the Community Closet, which distributes free household, cleaning and hygiene items. The collective also offers branding, photography and printing services.The Meadows envision Swan Meadow taking on a larger role in political advocacy for the community.“As pushback becomes more prevalent and discrimination becomes more normal, being visible is more important than ever,” Mellody said. “I’m tired of living through history.” More

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      Google and Home Depot drop Pride Toronto sponsorship amid Trump’s DEI war

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      In another blow to one of the largest celebrations of LGTBQ+ people in North America, Pride Toronto has unexpectedly lost two more major corporate sponsors, just weeks before the festival in a setback the festival’s organizer says is direct result of Donald Trump’s campaign to eradicate diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in the US.Google and Home Depot both announced their plans to abandon the festival in the form of one-line emails, said Kojo Modeste, the executive director of the Canadian event.Organizers have warned that the loss of sponsors will pose operational challenges for Pride Toronto that attracts 3 million attendees annually. Other organisations, including local trade unions, have stepped in to help make up the shortfall, but Modeste told the Guardian he was deeply worried about the celebration’s future.“Am I going to have to drastically cut what the festival looks like for 2026? This is not the place that I want to be in,” he said.Home Depot told the Guardian it continually reviews its non-profit giving and decided not to contribute this year. Google told the newspaper it would be supporting “Toronto Googlers” marching in the parade and “community moments” from Pride.The sudden exit of Google and Home Depot follows the departure in February of three other prominent sponsors. At the time, Modeste did not name them, but on Friday he revealed that they were Nissan, Adidas and Clorox.Nissan Canada said it was unable to sponsor Pride in Toronto due to a “local decision” that it says was based on a reevaluation of marketing and media activities. Adidas and Clorox have been approached for comment.“These are American companies and they are showing their true colours,” said Modeste. “We thought they were with the community, but clearly, they’re not.”Corporate sponsorship not only goes towards paying staff, but hundreds of local artists and to keep Pride as a free event.Modeste said he grew up in a period before widespread Pride celebrations – and did not want that to be the experience of current younger generations. “I don’t want to be the one to have to make that decision, to take Pride away from the community,” he said.The White House’s condemnation of diversity and inclusion efforts has resulted in corporations shirking away from festivals that they once loudly supported, said Sui Sui, a professor at Toronto Metropolitan University whose research focuses on DEI initiatives.Sui said that the move also signals that commitments large sponsors made in the past were tenuous and motivated not because of genuine support, but because of the perceived profitability of aligning with such causes.The months-long purge of US federal government workers by the Trump administration has resulted in the firings of tens of thousands of people, including those who worked in forwarding diversity and equity initiatives.Sui said that the chill around sponsors for pride events has also affected New York City and Philadelphia. Mastercard, Nissan, Pepsi, Garnier and more major backers have abandoned the New York celebration, while Target and Philadelphia Union exited Philly Pride 365.“Canada is following suit,” she said.For the future, Pride Toronto and other pride events may need to rely more significantly on grassroots efforts to keep events going, she said.“It’s for them to see who truly believes the importance of Pride.” More

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      Harrison Butker’s jersey sales rise as right wing lauds Chiefs kicker after rant

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      Harrison Butker’s university commencement address at Benedictine College excoriating Pride month, working women, abortion rights activists and others has prompted the National Football League to disavow his remarks – but the Kansas City Chiefs placekicker’s jersey sales have spiked as conservatives seize on their latest culture war.Butker has also drawn an impassioned statement of support from Josh Hawley, the far-right US senator from Missouri known for his opposition to abortion and a viral video which showed him running away from the mob he incited during the US Capitol attack on 6 January 2021.“We need a different generation of kids that are willing to say no that’s not right, there is such a thing as right and wrong, I’m not going in for all of this lefty garbage and I just thought that his calls for folks to stand up and be bold was great,” Hawley said in reference to Butker during an interview on Wednesday with Spectrum News.An NFL spokesperson on Thursday said the comments Butker delivered as the graduation speaker at Benedictine College five days earlier ran contrary to the league’s “commitment to inclusion”.“Harrison Butker gave a speech in his personal capacity,” said the statement from the NFL senior vice-president Jonathan Beane, the league’s chief diversity and inclusion officer. “His views are not those of the NFL as an organization.”The NFL’s statement aligned relatively closely with a separate one issued by the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (Glaad), which dismissed Butker’s 20-minute address as “a clear miss” and “woefully out of step with Americans about Pride, LGBTQ people and women”.Another notable rejection of Butker’s opinions came in the form of a statement from the Benedictine Sisters of Mount Saint Scholastica, which co-founded the college where the kicker spoke.“The sisters … do not believe that Harrison Butker’s comments … represent the Catholic, Benedictine, liberal arts college that our founders envisioned and in which we have been so invested,” their statement said. “Instead of promoting unity in our church, our nation, and the world, his comments seem to have fostered division.”Yet, in scenes that called to mind the political right wing’s enthrallment with the film Sound of Freedom last year, Butker’s jersey was among the most sold as of Thursday, according to NFL.com.His jersey sales still trailed that of his Chiefs teammate Travis Kelce, whose support for vaccines and the Black Lives Matter movement – as well as his relationship with Taylor Swift – have infuriated the far-right set that is now coddling Butker. However, Butker’s jersey sales were outpacing that of the Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, who has led Kansas City to three Super Bowl victories since the 2019 season.The Kansas City news station KCTV reported that a local store named the Rally House had completely sold out of Butker jerseys amid his speech’s controversy.“Just the demand after the speech – it’s been men and women. It’s been both calling to get his jersey,” the store’s manager, Aaron Lewis, reportedly told KCTV.Hawley on Wednesday then offered himself as one of the most public faces of the conservative delight inspired by the offense Butker caused with his speech.“He talks about not being too nice when you’re standing up for your convictions,” Hawley said to Spectrum News, a little more than three years after he threw up a clenched fist at – and then was caught on video running from – a mob of Donald Trump supporters who carried out the deadly Capitol attack after the former president’s 2020 election defeat to Joe Biden. “And I just think he’s right about that.”In his speech to the conservative Catholic school’s graduating class, Butker referred to “dangerous gender ideologies” in an apparent allusion to Pride month, which has been celebrated annually in June since the Stonewall riots in 1969.He also told the women in the audience that “homemaker” should be the “most important title” they hold.“I would venture to guess that the majority of you are most excited about your marriage and the children you will bring into this world,” Butker said.Among a host of other arguments, Butker contended that access to abortion – which most Americans favor – stemmed from “pervasiveness of disorder”.The 28-year-old Butker’s conservative Catholic beliefs are well known, and so are his on-field exploits, including booting a field goal that forced the decisive overtime period in Kansas City’s Super Bowl victory over the San Francisco 49ers in February.Benedictine, a private liberal arts school about 60 miles north of Kansas City, invited Butker to be its commencement speaker nearly three years to the day after the college removed its chaplain from his position after he disclosed “inappropriate conduct” with a female student.Meanwhile, a report on Friday from the Chicago Sun-Times documented how an Illinois-based monk belonging to the religious order which is associated with Benedictine pleaded guilty to a felony battery charge against a former student of the school where he taught – and has now landed on a list of organization members deemed to have been credibly accused of child sexual abuse.
      The Associated Press contributed reporting More

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      Catholic ‘Pride mass’ in Pennsylvania canceled after protests

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      A Roman Catholic mass to be held in western Pennsylvania this weekend in solidarity with LGBTQ Catholics has been canceled after flyers for the service switched the designation to a “Pride mass”.The cancellation of Sunday mass at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh came at the request of the diocese after protesting emails and calls, some of them threatening, officials said. While the exact nature of the protest messages is unclear, they come at a time when major brands like Target, Bud Light and Starbucks have faced rightwing backlash for using the Pride labeling.The Pittsburgh mass had been organized by Catholics for Change in Our Church with the help of LGBTQ+ outreach ministries, said group’s president Kevin Hayes, and similar in nature to other outreach efforts toward Black or Hispanic parishioners.Trouble arose after independent sponsors of the event promoted the mass with a flyer “that confused some and enraged others”, according the Bishop David Zubik of the Pittsburgh diocese.“This event was billed as a ‘Pride mass’ organized to coincide with Pride Month, an annual secular observance that supports members of the LGBTQ community on every level, including lifestyle and behavior, which the church cannot endorse,” Zubik said in a letter to priests, deacons and seminarians in the diocese.Zubik added that protesters incorrectly assumed that he had approved the event, and that the critics of the mass had used “condemning and threatening, and some might say hateful, language not in keeping with Christian charity”.Bishop Zubik said he asked that the gathering be canceled “given all that has transpired surrounding this event”.Kevin Hayes, president of Catholics for Change in Our Church, said that group members “are very sad and very frustrated”. He added that the goal had been to “just have LGBTQ Catholics feel welcomed as beloved sons and daughters of a loving God and just be affirmed for who they are within the context of the Eucharist, which we feel is appropriate.” More

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      Joe Biden marks Pride month with high-profile support of LGBTQ+ community

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      Joe Biden unveiled new initiatives on Thursday to protect LGBTQ+ communities but hastily postponed a big Pride Month celebration on the White House lawn with thousands of guests from around the country because of poor air quality from the Canadian wildfires.The event, which will now be held on Saturday, was intended to be a high-profile show of support at a time when members of the LGBTQ+ community feel under attack like never before and the White House has little recourse to beat back a flood of state-level legislation against them.The Biden administration announced initiatives designed to protect LGBTQ+ communities from attack, help young people with mental health issues and homelessness, and counter book bans, though the effects may be limited. Biden was to discuss them at the event, which the White House had said would be the largest Pride Month celebration ever held there.Thousands of guests had been invited from around the country for an evening filled with food, games and other activities on the South Lawn. Queen HD the DJ was handling the music, and singer Betty Who was on tap to perform.But the nation’s capital by late morning on Thursday was under a “code purple” air quality alert, the fifth-highest level on the six-level US air quality index, with authorities recommending that everyone limit their exposure to the hazardous smoke wafting south from Canada. District of Columbia schools canceled all outdoor activities for a second day, and the National Zoo also closed.The moves comes as the US’s largest community LGBTQ+ advocacy organization has declared a state of emergency in America when it comes to civil rights. The Human Rights Campaign has issued the statement due to what it said was “an unprecedented and dangerous spike in anti-LGBTQ+ legislative assaults sweeping state houses this year”.The White House was closely monitoring air quality due to hazardous smoke from Canadian wildfires to determine whether to proceed with plans for a Thursday night picnic featuring food, games, face painting and photos.Karine Jean-Pierre, the first openly gay White House press secretary, said Biden, Vice-President Kamala Harris and their spouses were strong supporters of the LGBTQ+ community and think that having a celebration is an important way to “lift up” their accomplishments and contributions.She said LGBTQ+ people needed to know that Biden “has their back” and “will continue to fight for them. And that’s the message that we want to make sure that gets out there.”Biden was announcing that the Department of Homeland Security, working with the justice and health and human services departments, will partner with LGBTQ+ community organizations to provide safety resources and training to help thwart violent attacks.Separately, HHS and the Department of Housing and Urban Development will provide resources to help LGBTQ+ young people with mental health needs, support in foster care and homelessness.Hundreds of bills have been proposed restricting the rights of transgender people, including limiting their access to certain forms of healthcare, and LGBTQ+ advocates say they have seen a record number of such measures in statehouses.After the supreme court last year overturned a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion, Biden signed legislation to protect marriage equality. He continues to urge Congress to send him the Equality Act, which would add civil rights protections for LGBTQ+ individuals to federal law.Polls show that public support for the rights of people who are gay and lesbian has expanded dramatically over the last two decades, with about seven in 10 US adults in polling by Gallup saying that marriages between same-sex adults should be legally valid and that gay and lesbian relationships are morally acceptable.But attitudes toward transgender people are complex: in polls conducted in 2022 by KFF and the Washington Post and by the Pew Research Center, majorities said they support laws prohibiting discrimination against transgender people in areas such as housing, jobs and schools. More

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      Conservatives are bullying pro-LGBTQ+ companies, just in time for Pride Month | Arwa Mahdawi

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      Pride Month is about to get started and you know what that means: the shops are full of rainbow flags and what the Conservative Political Action Coalition (CPAC) has called “demonic paraphernalia”. As insiders know, Clause 3.4 of the Gay Agenda stipulates that during the month of June homosexuals of the world must unite to brainwash the masses and convert innocent heterosexuals to our dastardly ways.For the last few years corporations have happily gone along with all this. They’ve made a big song and dance about how they value things like inclusivity and diversity and human rights. They’ve spoken about how important kindness is. They’ve kowtowed to LGBTQ+ people who have made unreasonable demands that they be treated like people. They’ve talked about dangerous things like respect and acceptance.Now, however, conservatives are fighting back and demanding corporations embrace good old-fashioned bigotry again. The last few weeks have seen a wave of hate campaigns against brands who have aligned themselves with the LGBTQ+ community in even the smallest of ways. The unhinged backlash over Bud Light sending a few personalised cans of beer to the transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney kicked things off. Politicians like Ron DeSantis eagerly weighing in on the manufactured controversy added fuel to the fire. Bud Light’s bungled response to the hate campaign, which appeared to pander to the right, made things even worse.Seemingly emboldened by their success in intimidating Bud Light, conservatives have taken on new targets including Target. Last week CPAC attacked the US retailer because it was selling some products designed by the trans creator Erik Carnell’s brand Abprallen. What exactly was the issue? One of Abprallen’s products is a T-shirt with the slogan “Satan respects pronouns”. According to a statement issued by CPAC this obviously tongue-in-cheek joke meant Target had partnered “with a Satanic designer in promoting demonic paraphernalia”.The Satan T-shirt, it should be noted, wasn’t actually for sale at Target. According to the Daily Dot, the Abprallen merchandise stocked by Target for Pride consisted of an adult T-shirt with the slogan “cure transphobia, not trans people”, a bag featuring a rainbow and the caption “too queer for here”, and a fanny pack that reads “we belong here”. All of which had the folk at CPAC clutching their pearls in horror.It’s weird that they have the time to devote to this hate campaign, by the way, because the group has its own internal issues to deal with: Matt Schlapp, the head of CPAC, was recently accused of groping a male aide. “Matt Schlapp of the CPAC grabbed my junk and pummeled it at length,” his accuser said in a video. Schlapp has denied this, but his accuser is proceeding with a lawsuit seeking millions in damages for alleged sexual battery and defamation.As well as being shocked by phrases like “we belong here”, conservatives lost their collective minds over the fact that Target was selling a swimsuit geared towards trans women. “Did you know @Target also sells ‘tuck-friendly’ bathing suits for children in the Pride section? Well now you do,” a rightwing Twitter account with nearly 291,000 followers wrote. This was an outright lie: the swimsuit wasn’t for kids but that didn’t stop people melting down about it.“Melting down” is putting it lightly. Conservatives went a lot further than just getting angry online or organizing a boycott. “Since introducing this year’s collection, we’ve experienced threats impacting our team members’ sense of safety and wellbeing while at work,” Target said in a statement about the 2023 Pride collection. The threat to employees was so pronounced that Target has removed some of the Pride merchandise in response.Target was in a difficult position and needed to ensure its staff was kept safe. Still, it’s incredibly depressing to see big brands cave to violent intimidation campaigns. Conservatives have been very clear about what they want to achieve from all of this: they want to make corporations terrified to align themselves with the LGBTQ+ community ever again.“The goal is to make ‘Pride’ toxic for brands,” Matt Walsh, a rightwing commentator, tweeted last week. “If they decide to shove this garbage in our face, they should know that they’ll pay a price. It won’t be worth whatever they think they’ll gain. First Bud Light and now Target. Our campaign is making progress. Let’s keep it going.”Unfortunately, their hate campaign is still going strong. Last week, the Los Angeles Dodgers were bullied into disinviting the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a drag charity group, from a Pride event. (The Dodgers then apologized and re-invited them.) Now the outdoor apparel company North Face seems to have become the latest target. The outdoor company has been accused of “preying” on children by having – wait for it because this is really shocking – kid-sized merchandise in rainbow colours. They also featured a drag queen in a Pride advert.North Face has so far refused to pander to the bigots and has stood beside the LGBTQ+ community. “We recognize the opportunity our brand has to shape the future of the outdoors and we want that future to be a more accepting and loving place,” the company wrote in a comment on its Pride post.I hope North Face stays steadfast, and that other companies follow its lead. Certainly brands need to have a plan in place for what happens when the rightwing mob comes for them. Because the mob will come for them: what’s happening right now isn’t just a bunch of bigots getting angry; it’s a coordinated intimidation campaign. I don’t think this can be stressed enough. The same people who go on about free speech are actively trying to shut others up. The people obsessed with cancel culture are trying to cancel anyone who isn’t like them.Companies can choose to stand with hate or they can choose to stand with love. Their LGBTQ+ consumers, and anyone who cares about equality, will be watching.
      Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist More