Articles in Features
Two Spirits airs tonight on PBS, with Yupik tribe member Richard LaFortune
A Native American LGBTQ film “Two Spirits” premieres on PBS’ Independent Lens tonight, Tuesday, June 14, showing on KAKM at 9 pm Alaska time. Two Spirits tells the story of Fred Martinez, his life and violent death, and the history of multi-gendered people in many Native American cultures.
“Two Spirits interweaves the tragic story of a mother’s loss of her son with a revealing look at the largely unknown history of a time when the world wasn’t simply divided into male and female and many Native American cultures held places of honor for people of integrated genders.
Fred Martinez was nádleehí, a male-bodied person with a feminine nature, a special gift according to his ancient Navajo culture. He was one of the youngest hate-crime victims in modern history when he was brutally murdered at 16. Two Spirits explores the life and death of this boy who was also a girl, and the essentially spiritual nature of gender.
Two Spirits mourns the young Fred Martinez and the threatened disappearance of the two-spirit tradition, but it also brims with hope and the belief that we all are enriched by multi-gendered people, and that all of us — regardless of ethnicity, gender, sexuality, or cultural heritage — benefit from being free to be our truest selves.”
The concept of Two-Spirit is explained in the film by LGBTQ Native Americans, including Richard (Anguksuar) LaFortune of the Yupik tribe, director of the media project 2SPR-Two Spirit Press Room and an early organizer of the International Two Spirit Gatherings. LaFortune was born in Bethel, and is currently living in Minnesota working on reducing the suicide rate of Native youth and revitalizing Native American languages.
The American Library Association (ALA) recognized Two Spirits in its 2011 list of Notable Videos for Adults, a list of 15 outstanding films released on video within the past two years that make a significant contribution.
Watch the Two Spirits trailer:
Watch the full episode. See more Independent Lens.
The Two Spirit film blog recently highlighted the contributions and unique history of the Two-Spirit community:
“Many indigenous peoples recognized centuries ago the natural complexity of sexuality and gender, and have identified multiple genders and held an honored role for people now described as “LGBT” as ambassadors, healers, counselors, matchmakers, parents to orphaned children, artists, and medicine people who are seen as having special gifts to contribute to the society because of their Two-Spirit status.
Native American scholars are reclaiming ancient beliefs about gender and sexuality that are found in Native cosmology, traditions and ceremonies, and cultural stories. Unfortunately, the research conducted in scholarly circles rarely, if ever, reaches the general public or the media and therefore has not been a focal part of the public advocacy done on behalf of LGBT and Two-Spirit people.”
Other challenges include the lack of funding for Two-Spirit projects, geographic isolation and homophobia:
“Native Two-Spirit people are more vulnerable to homophobic violence and also to self-inflicted violence and suicide than the general LGBT population. Native LGBT teen suicide is a particularly urgent issue, and clearly a major contributing factor is that many two-spirit youth lack a sense of connection to the inherent dignity and respect that should rightly be afforded Two-Spirit traditions and values. Many Two-Spirit people live in geographic isolation from LGBT resources and/or in cultural separation from their two-spirit traditions. Native LGBT people want to be more connected to each other, and they also want to be more involved in making a difference to LGBT equality work locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally.”
The Two-Spirit community hopes to build on the awareness raised by the film to address these issues:
“The leaders and activists of the Two-Spirit movement are working to shape more progressive national attitudes toward gender and sexuality with the general public and within tribal communities. Two-Spirit people are making the most of the increased awareness generated by the film Two Spirits and other resources to build the framework for long-term development and by working with public sector partners, foundations, philanthropists, and tribal leaders.”
ITVS, the co-presenter of Independent Lens, is supporting the film Two Spirits with community cinema screening events and materials in support of the national broadcast. There are dozens of public screenings around the U.S. and Canada this month, free at libraries and community centers, and supported by the local PBS stations. No screenings are scheduled in Alaska. (Who wants KAKM to host one? Contact them HERE.)
Two Spirits
KAKM – Tuesday, June 14 from 9-10 PM
If you miss it tonight, you can set your DVR for one of the later showings of Two Spirits on KAKM:
Thursday, June 16 — 2:00am
Sunday, June 19 — 2:00am
Monday, June 20 — 1:30am
My first Anchorage Pride, 1983 — and (some of) Identity’s early history
As Pride Week approaches, we thought we’d revisit a few of the Pride Weeks of Anchorage’s past. Last week, Alaska Pride gave us a flashback to 1978. Now we’ll jump forward in time a few years: to 1983, my first Pride in Anchorage, just short of a year after I first arrived in Alaska.
Right now you may be crazy for wearing a dress or pants. You can help change that.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) is the last word defining “mental illness” to mental health, medical, and legal professionals — despite its many flaws and biases. It has a long record of being used to label gays and lesbians as “deviant.” It’s still being used that way against trans people
George Rekers, “Kraig,” and the lie of “ex-gay” therapy
An in-depth investigation exposes the true story of the “landmark case” that made disgraced ex-gay therapist George Rekers’ antigay career. Box Turtle Bulletin spoke with family and friends who knew the real “Kraig” to reveal the tragedy of a terrible experiment on a young boy which haunted him for the rest of his life.
Thanking those who in the past Stepped Up and Stepped Out with Pride
A message from Alaska Pride | originally posted at the Alaska Pride blog
Flashback to July 1978
In this day and age, it isn’t too rare to see Gay Pride marches across the United States and all around the world. In fact, its pretty much expected. Presidents of our nation even declare a month out of the year as Gay Pride Month (when we really should celebrate Pride all year round!).
GLBT folk and our allies get to march in these parades, unhindered and proudly.
That wasn’t always the case…
Lets flashback to Anchorage in July of 1978. This was the reality of that day and age:
Just imagine being someone in this march. These brave marchers had to wear paper bags over their heads for fear of harassment, abuse, and most of all — losing their jobs. Life was already hard enough being GLBT in Alaska in the 1970′s. But to march and show your Pride was even harder.
This Pride, we honor those who took the first steps to ensure that we as a community can march proudly in the streets, open, no brown paper bags over our heads, no disguise. Because of these individuals who Stepped Up and Stepped Out decades ago, we have the luxury to be able to continue Stepping Up and Stepping Out.
So what have you done to make sure that pictures like these become a thing of the past, something that years from now, we will look back and wonder at the incredulity and ignorance of those people?
This year, this Pride, we ask that you Step Up, Step Out, take that paper bag of your head and march proudly with us on June 25. For even today, it is punishable by death to be GLBT in several nations across the world. Today, Pride marches are banned in several nations, like the Pride march banned in Moscow in which marchers were brutalized and arrested (Read more here.)
That will only end when individuals like you end it.
But please, remember that you are walking in the footsteps of giants like Doug Frank, our Grand Marshall for this years Pride. (Read his bio here.) So tread softly, but tread on nonetheless!
Bent News, 5/31/11: Pride fundraisers, & solidarity against hate
Last weekend’s Pride fundraisers, a presidential proclamation, Old Navy Pride t-shirts, and Moscow repression; solidarity against hate in Portland; marriage equality updates from California and Minnesota; a memorial to gay Holocaust victims in Munich; and more in this edition of Bent News.
Gay/lesbian youth are doing better than you think, says Ritch Savin-Williams
LGBT youth are a lot stronger and more resilient than we usually give them credit for. That’s what Dr. Ritch C. Savin-Williams of Cornell University said this past Monday as a guest on Line One: Your Health Connection on KSKA, Anchorage’s public radio station. The program can now be downloaded or listened to online.
Wasilla High School & LGBT youth: A more complex picture
Last week we wrote about the “Bohemian Rhapsody” controversy at Wasilla High School and the wider picture for LGBT youth in Mat-Su schools. Since then, we’ve learned that things might be better for LGBT students at Wasilla High School than our story portrayed.
GLAAD recognizes Anchorage-raised comic book artist
The Anchorage Press last week ran a profile by Scott Christiansen of animation and comic book artist Brad Rader, who did the illustrations for the graphic novel Fogtown (published 2010), a finalist for best comic book in this year’s GLAAD Media Awards of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. (The winning comic book was DC Comics’ Batwoman.)
A majority of Republicans support either marriage or civil unions for same-sex couples
A majority of Republican voters support some form of legal recognition for same-sex relationships, according to a recent poll; and national trends show that a majority of Americans support marriage equality for same-sex couples.
