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New league for LGBT+ Ten Pin bowlers

The Diverse City Bowlers League has been created to introduce a competitive element to a group of social ten-pin bowlers who have been meeting regularly in Brighton since 2008.

They have seen their bowling skills improve over the years and now feel ready to take part in, and organise bowling competitions.

They aim to affiliate with the British Ten-Pin Bowling Association (BTBA), and have already affiliated with The International Gay Bowling Organisation (IGBO). Through this affiliation they have had several contacts from European gay bowling groups who are very enthusiastic for a bigger, joint event.

They are the first gay bowling group in the UK to affiliate with IGBO, and through this affiliation they will be able to take part in global competitions such as Gay Games.

Whilst being an LGBT+ run group they are open to anyone who is accepting and non-homophobic. They bowl fortnightly at Hollywood Bowl Brighton Marina, where the staff and management of the centre have been extremely helpful in setting up their league and provide a very gay friendly and safe environment.

Their lanes are currently in the process of getting recognised by BTBA which means the tournaments they organise will be fully sanctioned. Organisers send their thanks to Hollywood Bowl again for their support and enthusiasm.

Their primary aim is to create a friendly, fair and competitive league that will cater for all abilities, and a safe, warm atmosphere where people can enjoy bowling with like-minded people. Help will be offered to those who want it and coaching sessions will be arranged for those of us who are interested.

The friendly and social side of bowling is important to them, and socialising after bowling and at other times is encouraged but not compulsory.

They are encouraging new bowlers from clubs, bars and as many of the friendly and supportive gay groups in Brighton and Sussex as possible. Invitations have already been sent out to several local organisations, and organisers hope to see them joining them for a game of fun and skill.

Their contacts at BTBA have been very kind and receptive as well.

Lee Hart, Head of Equality and Diversity, Terry Searle, Director of Sport Development, and Jerry Moll, Assistant to the Chairman, say: “Their strapline ‘People Matter’ incorporates BTBA’s attitude to making Ten-Pin Bowling as inclusive as possible”. BTBA is also interested in sanctioning a National Competition for LGBT+ members, and would work with them to deliver the tournament which could possibly become an annual event.”

They currently have no membership fees, nor sponsorship. The cost of playing is £9 for three games. This may well change as they group grows, so far the small group has financed several setup costs amongst themselves. In future, they will eventually need a symbolic membership fee to cover costs, especially for sanctioning their local tournaments through BTBA.

It is easy to get in touch with them through their website, Facebook and Twitter pages and new players are always welcome.

For more information, click here:   

www.facebook.com/dcbowlers

www.twitter.com/diversebowlers

Memorial benches to ‘Mouse and Gloria’ dedicated

Friends and colleagues of Michael ‘Mouse’ Burton and Gary ‘Gloria’ Swan gathered under cloudy skies in New Steine Gardens, on Sunday (July 23) to dedicate two memorial benches in both their names.

Both Michael and Gary who died unexpectedly towards the end of 2016 were very popular on the commercial LGBT+ scene, having worked at different times over the years at Revenge, Bar Revenge, Legends, The Star and Charles Street.

Friends decided that they would like to do something in their memory and Revenge, Bar Revenge, Queens Arms, Charles Street and Legends staged a weekend of fundraising to pay for two benches to be installed in New Steine Gardens, home to the Brighton Aids Memorial.

A partnership of LGBT+ venues including Revenge, Bar Revenge, Charles Street, Legends and Queens Arms came together at the end of March for a Unity Fundraising Weekend, raising £2,186.30 to purchase two memorial benches in memory of their former employees.

Chris Marshall and Andrew Roberts the general managers of Charles Street and Revenge respectively spoke on behalf of the community.

Phil Callaway responded on behalf of Mouse and Ian Swan, spoke on behalf of his brother Gloria before everyone present raised a glass of bubbly in memory of them both to the music of Simply the Best by Tina Turner.

Sound and gazebo for the event were provided and assembled by the volunteers of the Brighton & Hove, LGBT Community Safety Forum.

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Angry reaction to Pride in London’s decision to investigate CEMB

The LGBT Humanist charity the Pink Triangle Trust (PTT) has reacted angrily to the decision taken by Pride in London to ask its communities team to investigate the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain (CEMB) with a view to possibly banning it from future Pride events.

George Broadhead

The decision to investigate was taken after organisers of Pride in London received a number of complaints regarding some placards carried by a group during this year’s parade in London on July 8.

PTT Secretary George Broadhead, said: “This decision is appalling. The accusation from the East London Mosque that the CEMB was inciting hatred against Muslims at this year’s London Pride event is baseless nonsense. East London Mosque seems to have made a brazen attempt to deflect criticism of its bad record on LGBT rights. It has a history of inviting ultra homophobic speakers to its meetings. Human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell has revealed that he has asked the mosque to meet LGBT Muslims 11 times since 2015 – and all his invitations had been rejected. 

“Pride in London seems to be ignoring the widespread Islamic hostility to LGBT+ relationships and rights, notably the barbaric treatment of LGBT+ people in Islamic theocracies like Saudi Arabia in which Sharia Law dictates that they are publicly beheaded, stoned or flogged.

“The Islamic penalty for apostasy (abandoning the religion) is death, and this of course applies to members of the CEMB, and a recent survey has indicated that more than half of British Muslims (52%) think homosexuality should be illegal and nearly half (47%) think it is inappropriate for gay people to teach in schools.

“The PTT maintains that the CEMB has every right to draw attention to hostility from Islam and urges Pride in London organisers not to place religion beyond criticism. This would be a highly regressive step and contrary to its presumed aim to counter homophobia from any source.”

A spokesperson for Pride in London said: “We do not feel it is our role to make a legal judgement about offense or freedom of speech. However, it is our role to determine if a group has broken our code of conduct and whether they can be permitted to march again in future parades.

“It has been argued that some of the placards are a legitimate form of protest. However, there were some placards we feel may have the potential to breach our code of conduct.

“We have referred these complaints to our Community Advisory Board, who assess every parade entry after each year and decide on which groups will be allowed to march again. This decision will be taken prior to the opening of parade entries in 2018.

“LGBT+ Muslims play a vital and important role in London and in Pride. We recognise that Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Muslims face discrimination on both sides, from people within their faith and also from within the LGBT+ community.

“Over the years the parade has been a place of acceptance for LGBT+ Muslims and this year Imaan, the LGBT+ charity was voted the winner of the best walking group in the parade for the diversity and passion they displayed.

“Equally, it is also very important that individuals who once did but no longer follow the Muslim faith have a welcome place in the Pride parade. We acknowledge the difficulties individuals leaving the faith can sometimes encounter and do not in any way seek to diminish the significance of those experiences.

“We are eager to stand side-by-side with every community that supports LGBT+ people at home and abroad. Equally, we also feel that the LGBT+ community can and must do more to tackle hatred and bigotry in all its forms, especially racism and Islamophobia.

“We believe Pride in London must continue to play a vital role in supporting LGBT+ Muslims, and will be meeting with the organisations concerned, community groups and charities to further these efforts. It is our ambition to build common ground to stand up for communities that are more harmonious and supportive, valuing all citizens, no matter their faith or sexuality.”

PREVIEW: Ali Macfarlan’s Pre-Pride Comedy Carnival

This year Dr Brightons has seven fabulous acts, for their Pre Pride Comedy Carnival, including some rapidly rising LGBT+ comedy stars.

Ali Macfarlan
Ali Macfarlan

Featuring Russell David Arathoon, the winner of Hastings Festival Fringe and Comedy Store Gong Show finalist and headliner, Victoria Howden #LesbolandTheMusical.

An unmissable line-up of comics hosted by MC extraordinaire Ali Macfarlan.

Full line-up:

♦ Lisanne Fridsma

♦ Ben Robson

♦ Russell Arathoon

♦ Deborah Lennard

♦ Dom Patmore

♦ Katherine Atkinson

♦ Victoria Howden

♦ Roxy Bourdillon


Event: Ali Macfarlan’s Pre-Pride Comedy Carnival

Where: Dr Brighton, 16-17 King’s Rd, Brighton BN1 1NE

When: Wednesday, August 2

Time: Doors open 7.30pm, show starts 8pm – 10pm

Cost: £5 all proceeds to the Rainbow Fund.

The Rainbow Fund make grants to LGBT+/HIV organisations who deliver effective front line services to LGBT+people in the City of Brighton and Hove

Brighton businessman bids to become Mr Gay Europe – Campaign Day 9

Matt Rood has lived in Brighton for the last fifteen years. His job is his passion. He’s a dog walker and trainer and has his own company called ROODDOG. His other passion is fitness and he goes to the Underground gym in Brighton five or six times a week.

The last two years have been an emotional journey for Matt following the breakdown of his marriage. A friend came across the competition for Mr Gay Europe and encouraged him to apply.

Matt said: “I’m a very enthusiastic guy and love setting myself new challenges so I went for it. I hired the best personal trainer in town Sam Bird to help keep me focused and positive enabling me to be successful and reach my goals.”

A formal interview with Stuart Hatton former Mr Gay World 2014 followed, then a cv round, a photo round and two Skype interviews with the board of directors of Mr Gay Europe. He completed each round successfully and was awarded his new title, Mr Gay England.

Contrary to common perception, Mr Gay Europe isn’t a beauty pageant, it’s more about understanding LGBT+ law, LGBT+ rights and being cultured within the LGBT+ communities.

The Mr Gay Europe competition takes place in Stockholm, Sweden from August 1-6 when Matt will be competing against contestants from fifteen other countries.

The competition includes different rounds ranging from a formal interview, a written exam on the contestants knowledge of LGBT+ law, a social media challenge, a team challenge, a congeniality round, a fitness round and a round on the contestants campaigning work.

Matt’s campaign for the competition is called Pride Families. For three years he was a foster carer and helped ten children. He wants to use his new title as Mr Gay England and his experience as a foster carer as a platform to promote awareness showing that LGBT+ people can adopt and foster children providing them with loving, safe and nurturing homes.

In September, Matt will be working with Brighton and Hove City Council to launch a new fostering and adoption campaign and on July 8 will walk on the London Pride march with the fostering and adoption charity, New Family Social.

He added: “I’ve linked up with a local school too, as I believe the only way to combat discrimination in future generations is to work with children and teach them through respect, happiness and love for each other.”

Voting for Mr Gay Europe goes live on July 17 and you can vote online until August 4. Matt needs your votes as this counts for 20% of his final marks. Most importantly you can vote everyday the online voting is live to get a campaign going for him.

Matt concluded: “This has definitely been a whirlwind journey so far. I am loving every minute and I know if I win Mr Gay Europe the hard work starts there. I have the passion, motivation and drive to be a positive role model for our LGBT+ communities. So please vote for me.”

To vote for Matt and bring the title of Mr Gay Europe to Brighton, click here:

You can vote each day as Matt’s campaign gathers speed.

Brighton & Hove Sea Serpents RFC celebrate club’s progress at annual dinner

The Brighton & Hove Sea Serpents Rugby Football Club held their annual dinner at Hove Rugby Club on Saturday, June 24, attended by players, friends and supporters.

Player's player of the Year Ryan Butcher with Club President Cllr Peter West
Player’s player of the Year Ryan Butcher with Club President Cllr Peter West

Following a lovely three course dinner the President of the club, Cllr Pete West, Mayor of Brighton & Hove in 2016-17 highlighted the Sea Serpents achievements in the short period since they formed, and looked forward to helping them, through his contacts with the Brighton Fringe and Dutch Ambassador to help build links to prepare for their visit to Amsterdam in June 2018 to play in the Bingham Cup.

Geraldine Brown the Chairman of Hove Rugby Club also spoke highlighting the importance of celebrating diversity in all sports.

The Kangaroo Court followed. For those not acquainted with this ancient tradition, the Kangaroo Court represents an opportunity for teams to dispense their own mob-justice on players for perceived misdemeanour’s committed throughout the season. The club chairman as judge oversees the proceedings whilst the captain takes on the role of the prosecution.

I remember very little after that except all the players who received an award drank a pint a beer very quickly followed by a shot chaser.

Club awards were given to:

♦ Special Award: Ian Shepherd for designing the Serpents club logo

♦ Coach’s Award: Zack Kaye

♦ Support’s Award: Colin Blake

♦ Most Improved Player: Tricky Dicky

♦ Clubman of the Year: Russell Kingaby

♦ Captains Award: Paul Nellis

♦ Player’s Player: Ryan Butcher

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Want to play Rugby? For more information about the Sea Serpents, click here:

Bahamian LGBT+ activist Helen Klonaris at Charleston by Maria Jastrzębska

This autumn Small Wonder, the festival dedicated to short stories, is hosting Bahamian writer and LGBT+ activist Helen Klonaris as its British Council International Writer in Residence.

The festival takes place in Charleston, once home to the Bloomsbury group.

A human rights activist, Helen Klonaris’ early years were spent raising awareness around issues that ranged from capital punishment to violence against women to discrimination against LGBT+ Bahamians. She also co-founded organisations and journals such as The WomanSpeak: A Journal for Caribbean Women’s Literature and Art. Much published in journals and anthologies, with Amir Rabiyah she co-edited Writing the Walls Down: A Convergence of LGBTQ Voices, published by Trans-Genre Press, 2015. Her debut collection of short stories, If I Had the Wings, is just out from Peepal Tree press. It’s dynamite. These stories take your breath away, her award-winning story Cowboy has already had me in tears.

When she heard about the residency she wrote: “I was quite emotional when I found out… I’m an islander, and I like to think of short stories as small places where the possibilities for transformation are potent…These times need our stories, I think.”

I caught up with her by internet transatlantically:

HK: I’m speaking to you from a lesbian land collective in Mendocino… it’s pitch black and there’s a full moon out and I can hear a lone bull frog braying down by the pond…

MJ: You’re involved in too many amazing projects to mention, when do you manage to write as well?

HK: I like writing in bed. Maybe that’s because bed is so closely connected to dreaming and for me writing comes from that place, the unconscious. I’m intrigued by the way a story begins with a persistent image, and how I walk around with that image, just watching and listening, until it tells me where it wants to go and how. Writing is this dialogue between the conscious mind and the unconscious… the conscious mind asks questions, the unconscious mind sends pictures, sounds in response and then they are in this very long conversation that becomes a story.

MJ: You live between your native Bahamas and California now, right? How differently did you experience the LGBT+ communities there?

HK: Yes, when I first moved out to the Bay Area I felt as if I had missed a pivotal moment in US LGBT+ history, that somehow all the battles had already been fought, whereas, in the Bahamas, our communities are still emerging politically. There isn’t a great deal of visibility. We don’t have LGBT centres, or Pride parades, or large advocacy groups; we do have specific people who are spokespersons for the community, who are doing an amazing job of keeping LGBT issues in the public eye and ear. I was actually a founding member of one of the first out LGBT organizations in the Bahamas – the Rainbow Alliance, which sadly doesn’t exist anymore.

MJ: Can you say a bit more about why ‘these times need our stories’?

HK: I suppose I have always lived with a sense of urgency – a feeling that the everyday I was living in the Bahamas was so impacted by the legacies of colonialism and slavery, for example, that I could not pretend otherwise. I think I became a writer to talk back to ‘these times’. I was also a daughter of Greek immigrants, a queer Greek Bahamian girl growing up in a deeply religious community and country, one where you could not question the status quo without being told “God said so,” end of story. Well I didn’t think it was the end of the story, in fact, I thought, we need a new story. Lots of new stories to upset, upend, break out of these old stories and live something we haven’t imagined yet.

And now, here I am years later living in the US at a time when the leadership of this country is unabashedly calling us to build walls, keep immigrants and Muslims out, institute ‘law and order’ as a response to the continued police aggressions (and killings) of men of African descent, and ignore Indigenous rights, women’s rights, and on and on. What I’ve noticed in these first months of this leadership is the overwhelming feeling that people like myself are powerless. The machinery of the government is huge and rolling out and there’s nothing we can do about it. Except there is. A story may be a small thing. But it’s like the tale about the Emperor’s new clothes. It’s the child, small, young, closest to the unconscious who can see what is actually happening and says exactly what is needed to wake everybody up. That’s how I see short stories. And that’s why they’re so important right now, because we cannot afford to be asleep to the lies of power.

MJ: What has given you the strength to keep going?

HK: I come from an incredible community of writers in the Bahamas – poets like Marion Bethel and Lelawatee Manoo Rahming and Lynn Sweeting and Patricia Glinton Meicholas whose folk tale “The Gaulin Wife” so inspired my own story “The Dreamers” about a boy who grows wings and flies… so many others…they are my roots, they have been a tremendous part of the shaping of my identity as a Bahamian writer; their work remembers me to myself over and over again when I have despaired that as an island woman my life was somehow too small to matter. I know that isn’t true. Islands are the engines of evolution, I heard a scientist once say. And like islands, yes, stories are sites of extraordinary possibility.

MJ: What are you looking forward to at Small Wonder and what’s next?

HK: I’m looking forward to meeting other writers and to reading from my brand new book, meeting folks who are short story lovers… I’m looking forward to being on the land where Virginia Woolf walked and wrote, where her sister Vanessa Bell lived and loved and painted… I’d love to run into their ghosts in the garden. Now that If I Had the Wings is out in the world, I’m working on finishing a collection of essays – personal essays on imagination and whiteness and what it might take to transform a white supremacist consciousness. And creeping upwards through my unconscious is a novel, or what feels longer than a short story. We’ll see. This festival is giving me ideas and already there’s a new short story that wants to be told. Maybe it will show itself when I get to Charleston. I hope so.

Small Wonder takes place at Charleston, Firle, East Sussex BN8 6LL from Wednesday 27 September 27  – Sunday, October 1. http://www.charleston.org.uk/whats-on/festivals/small-wonder/

If I Had the Wings Helen Klonaris; Peepal Tree 2017.  ISBN13:9781845233464  £9.99

For more information, click here: www.peepaltreepress.com

www.peepaltreepress.com

 

 

Maria Jastrzębska co-edited Queer in Brighton’s anthology and was co-founder of Queer Writing South.

PREVIEW: Calabash returns to Pride with the Queer Takeover

After a two year hiatus Calabash return to Pride with The Queer Takeover at the Fortune if War on Brighton seafront, a venue renowned for its alfresco parties.

On Pride Saturday (August 5), Calabash will take over proceedings at the Fortune of War with a whole roster of urban, underground dance and disco DJs with an aim to create an ‘unapologetically inclusive Queer space’.

DJs will include Affy GoBang, DJPushyC, Wildblood and Queen Josephine and special guest Grace Sands to name a few. The event will be open air (weather permitting) and will run to the early hours of Sunday morning (August 6).

Money will be raised with a donation entry on the door and throughout the evening for the Rainbow Fund who make grants to LGBT+/HIV organisations who deliver effective front line services to LGBT+ people in the city.


Event: Calabash present The Queer Takeover

Where: The Fortune of War, 156 King’s Rd, Brighton BN1 1NB

When: Saturday, August 5

Time: 6pm – 3am

Cost: Free donation on the door for Rainbow Fund

New infections of HIV in gay men locally falls

New data published by Public Health England reports a 50% fall in the rate of new HIV infections among gay men in Brighton & Hove.

At the end of 2016, five HIV clinics in London reported they had seen a significant reduction (by 40% or more) in new diagnoses of HIV in the previous year (2015). Clinicians in Brighton have recently analysed their own local data over a longer period of time.

While they report much variation in local figures from month to month, over the last four years Brighton has in fact seen a decline from an average of six new diagnoses per month just over four years ago to around three per month by May of this year. The figures have only just been analysed and clinicians are in the process of performing further analyses in order to understand more about the reasons for the decline.

Duncan Churchill
Duncan Churchill

Duncan Churchill, Consultant in HIV Medicine at Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust, said: We believe that there are several reasons for the reduction in HIV incidence locally (and elsewhere). These include increased HIV testing, particularly in high risk men who have sex with men; rapid initiation of antiretroviral treatment in people who do test HIV positive (meaning that they very soon become incapable of transmitting HIV to anyone else), and possibly a contribution from pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). This latter intervention is of course not available routinely on the NHS, but we do have around 120 individuals who have accessed PrEP locally in the PROUD and DISCOVER studies, and we support/monitor a number of others who purchase their own PrEP.”

Gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men continue to account for half of all people living with HIV in England and remain the group most at risk of acquiring HIV infection.

Cowboys and Queens raise £300 for Rainbow Fund

DJ Claire Fuller receives certificate from Rainbow Fund Chair, Chris Gull, after raising £300 at her Cowboys and Queens cabaret dinner and dance at the Old Ship Hotel at the end of June.

Claire Fuller receives certificate from Rainbow Fund Chair, Chris Gull for raising £300
Claire Fuller receives certificate from Rainbow Fund Chair, Chris Gull for raising £300

The money was raised from the raffle during the dinner which was hosted by Kara Van Park.

Chris Gull said: “The Rainbow Fund is delighted to receive the donation of £300 raised from the raffle held during the Cowboys and Queens event recently. This demonstrates, yet again, the vital role that we play in ensuring that funds raised by community events are distributed fairly, to support the local groups and organisations that support people from our LGBT+ and HIV communities. Our thanks to everyone involved.”

The Rainbow Fund makes grants to local LGBT+/HIV organisations who provide effective front line services to LGBT+ people in the city.

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