09/05/2019 – Scene Magazine – From the heart of LGBTQ+ Life

Brighton Naked Bike Ride partners Extinction Rebellion to highlight climate crisis

Posted on 09/05/201913/05/2019 by Besi

This year’s Brighton Naked Bike Ride welcomes fellow environmental campaign group Extinction Rebellion, in their shared cause of alerting the world to the worsening climate crisis.

UNITING under the banner “We are Nature!”, the ride will form a colourful and noisy procession through Brighton & Hove on Sunday, June 9 joining other UK rides at the start of national Bike Week, and several other World Naked Bike Ride events across the globe.

Extinction Rebellion has staged a series of creative, radical actions around the country, including the recent sit-down protests in central London.

Locally, they have held a mass ‘die-in’ in Churchill Square and a fete-themed protest outside Barclays Bank against their investment in fossil fuels. They aim to raise awareness of the urgency of dealing with climate change, and encourage people to take action to ensure that the planet remains habitable.

Brighton Naked Bike Ride is supporting them in calling on the government to tell the truth about how deadly the climate situation is, and to enact legally binding policies to reduce UK carbon emissions to zero by 2025.

Brighton & Hove Council have already backed a climate change emergency motion.

Ride organiser Duncan Blinkhorn said: “Moving to a future that is safe from climate chaos requires us to make better use of the Earth’s limited resources, and stop pumping carbon into the atmosphere. World Naked Bike Ride demonstrates that less can be more: less consumption, less pollution, less clothes even! With just bikes and body power, we are campaigning for better road safety, a more stable climate, cleaner air and… more fun!”

Alice Doyle from Extinction Rebellion Brighton, added: “We’re not just campaigning about the extinction of global animal and plant species, but about the potential extinction of human beings due to man-made pollution and climate change. We are part of nature, and thus equally vulnerable to the environmental crisis we have caused. We’re joining this ride, and supporting the event, as a powerful symbol of both our vulnerability to pollution and our power to change it.”

Up to a thousand riders are anticipated to assemble on Sunday, June 9, from 11am, at Preston Park, Brighton. Participants will decorate their bikes and bodies before the ride heads off at 1.30pm.

Accompanied by a fleet of sound systems, the ride will travel along the seafront via Brighton Palace Pier, back down Western Road, through the Lanes, North Laine and Kemptown, before finishing at Black Rock naturist beach.

Participation is free, family-friendly and “as bare as you dare”. Participants are encouraged to paint their bodies and decorate their bikes with environmental messages under the We are Nature! theme.

For more information about the event and how to take part, click here:

Greens to honour city’s suffragette history

Posted on 09/05/2019 by Besi

Commemoration plaque to be unveiled at former city centre branch of Women’s Social and Political Union.

BRIGHTON and Hove will tomorrow honour the brave contribution of Brighton and Hove suffragettes as the city unveils a plaque at the former city centre office of the Women’s Social and Political Union.

One of the most active in the country, the Brighton Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) office at 8 North Street Quadrant became a key hub in the nationwide campaign to secure some women’s right to vote.

Opening in 1909, more than 150 women attended meetings there, including Mary Clarke, sister of Emmeline Pankhurst and Minnie Turner, leading campaigner for women’s suffrage.

A plaque at the former office will be unveiled at a commemoration event near the Clock Tower tomorrow, May 10 at 2.15pm.

Green Councillor Phélim Mac Cafferty said: “101 years after women first won the right to vote Greens are proud to stand alongside all of those seeking to commemorate the brave and important contribution of Brighton and Hove suffragettes.

“Acknowledgement of this important shared history follows repeated calls from the Greens for better recognition of the role our city played in securing women’s right to vote. Last year I wrote a letter to our council’s most powerful committee calling for a blue information plaque at the site of the former WSPU offices. We are also proud to support the appeal for a statue dedicated to active local suffragette Mary Clarke.

“Because history continues to cast a shadow over the present, we also successfully pushed a set of proposals that aim to increase the participation of women in politics and we have called for Brighton Museum to adopt a quota for more women artists. The city has just elected 11 women to join our group of Green Councillors and Greens join with others celebrating the role of the suffragettes in securing a future for women in public life.”

Councillor Lizzie Deane, ward councillor for the St Peters and North Laine area that includes the site of the new plaque, added: “Suffragette women worked incredibly hard and took enormous risks in the cause of universal suffrage. Having been re-elected just last week to represent local residents I appreciate only too well that this would not have been possible without the extraordinary sacrifices made by women of previous generations, and I am enormously grateful to them. I am delighted that there is to be a blue plaque as a permanent reminder of what they achieved, and it is only fitting that they should be honoured in this way.”

Fringe THEATRE REVIEW: Quintessence @Sweet Works 2

Posted on 09/05/2019 by Besi

Ever since Isaac Asimov wrote his series of Sci Fi books about the rise of the robots, we have feared what Artificial Intelligence (AI) might lead to.

IN her one-woman show Quintessence, Emily Carding cleverly and thoughtfully combines a view of a post-apocalyptic world with the undying power of Shakespeare’s plays.

I know it sounds a bit bizarre but my oh my how well it works. Global warming leading to famine and global war finally wipes out the human race. As the show opens, the avatar Ariel, a first generation android addresses us on the centenary of the birth of the AI generation that now inhabits the earth.

With black and white contact lenses, Emily is every inch the robot, humourless, dry, scary and infallible.

Brilliantly the show interlaces her eerie flat-voiced robotic story-telling with highly impassioned relevant passages from the Bard’s greatest plays.

There is a frightening logic about AI she is telling us. The robots literally base their whole society on Shakespeare’s view of the world. Their main raison d’etre is to re-create humanity because mankind must thrive.

Their early attempts are actually successful, but they believe the signs of adolescence – moodiness, anger etc are signs of imperfection and the failure of their experiment. Because AI rules don’t allow them to painlessly destroy the humans they have made, they cast them outside their protected bio-domes presumably to die in the wilderness, much as Prospero treated the deformed creature Caliban in The Tempest.

In their attempt to recreate humans, the robots decide they must remove those elements of the human character that led to its doom – hate, anger, the need for power. You can see the scary logic of this machine world but of course we know it will all end in tears.

It is Shakespeare’s “so potent art” that leads them in all things even when the great writer seems to contradict himself. Ariel is puzzled why his greatest tribute to love – Romeo and Juliet – only leads to hate and death. The end is predictably inevitable.

Emily Carding, directed by Dominique Gerrard gives a stunning performance as our monotone robotic guardian angel. And in the Shakespearean passages she is strong, energetic and full of emotion.

To be or not to be is a binary question which the robots can identify with – zero or 1, thrive or not thrive. But in the end the seeds of destruction are hidden in the seeds of creation.

Quintessence plays at Sweet Werks 2 in Middle Street, Brighton as part of Brighton Fringe till May 12.

To book tickets online, click here:

Review by Brian Butler

Brighton Rainbow Fund announce new funding rounds now open

Posted on 09/05/201909/05/2019 by Graham Robson

Brighton Rainbow Fund announce new funding round and new funding opportunities for local LGBT+ projects.

THE Brighton Rainbow Fund distributes money raised throughout the year from Community Fundraising by Brighton Pride, Bear-Patrol, Brighton Bear Weekend, LGBT+ venues, other businesses, individual donors, and collection tins around the city.

The Annual Grants Round is now open for applications. As in previous years, there is no upper limit on the amount that can be applied for, or the number of projects from any organisation.

Funds are not limitless however and applications must show evidence of need for, and benefit from, the services that are seeking support.

Applications must be received by August 31, and applicants will be invited to discuss their projects with the Independent Grants Panel in early September, with decisions being made and announced soon after.

Chris Gull, Chair of Trustees of The Charity said: “We are looking forward to hearing about ways that the money raised by the hard work of LGBT+ communities’ volunteers and businesses, and from donations, can be distributed to support the valuable work done by our local projects which benefits those in our communities who face the challenges that being LGBT+ can bring.

Apart from their well established Annual Funding Round they are also announcing three new initiatives aimed at addressing the scourge of social isolation and loneliness that particularly affects our LGBT+ communities.

All three will be open for applications at all times, and also Sussex wide.”

Grass Roots Community Fund
Seed funding for new volunteer led LGBT+ projects, groups and organisations with no paid staff. Applications Up to £1000.

MeetUp.com Fund
Up to £250 a year. To encourage LGBT+ specific meet up groups to do anything..yoga, gardening,
knitting, theatre, The sky is the limit!

Bursary Fund
To encourage membership of LGBT+ sports and social groups. Any such group can apply to register a Bursary Fund of up to £1,000 per year with the fund, and can drawer on this to make it possible for individuals who have financial barriers to engaging fully in their activities to do so. Examples are allowing a discount on membership fees, buying kit or equipment, contributing to costs of joining in tours..

For details of criteria for any application, together with on-line application forms, click here:

The plight of refugees – on film

Posted on 09/05/2019 by Besi

Three academic films about refugees will be shown during the Brighton Fringe Festival – one on trafficking and sex work, another on a man selling sex as a transvestite and the third on a refugee musician’s life.

THE films, showing at the Sallis Benney Theatre in Grand Parade on Tuesday, May 28 as part of the Brighton Fringe Festival, have been organised by the University of Brighton’s Centre for Spatial, Environmental and Cultural Politics.

Travel will be showing at 2pm and tells the story of eight Nigerian women with experiences of migration, sex work and trafficking in Paris. It was shown in the 2017 Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival.

At 3pm Samira explains how Karim, an Algerian man selling sex as a transvestite, obtained asylum as a transsexual woman and now wants to return home as the male head of his family.

Amir: An Afghan Refugee Musician’s Life in Peshawar at 5pm is based on ethnomusicological research conducted in Afghanistan in the 1970s by Professor John Baily (Goldsmiths, University of London). It was awarded the Special Jury Prize at the Bilan du Film Ethnographique 1986 in Paris, and the Award for Excellence at the 1989 American Anthropological Association Film and Video Festival. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with Director John Baily.

Event: Refugee and Migration Film Festival, Part 1

Where: Sallis Benny Theatre, 58-67 Grand Parade, BN2 0JY

When: Tuesday, May 28

Time: 2pm

To book tickets – £10 and £5 for students and unwaged, click here:

Royal honour for social workers

Posted on 09/05/2019 by Besi

Two social workers from Brighton & Hove City Council have been invited to a Royal Garden Party.

THE invitation to Buckingham Palace on Wednesday, May 15 follows a visit to the city last year by the Children’s Minister, Nadhim Zahawi MP.

Jennifer Parr (pictured left) and Ruth Nathan took the minister on a programme of working visits meeting local families and learning first-hand about some of the difficulties they face.

Jennifer said: “He said he really enjoyed the day and found it a real learning experience.

“As a social worker it’s so lovely to have the work we do recognised. It really means a lot to us.”

Ruth added: “Social work is a vocation and it’s something I’m very proud to do.”

If you have concerns about the welfare of a child in Brighton & Hove:

email: FrontDoorforFamilies@brighton-hove.gov.uk
Or telephone: 01273 290400 during working hours.

Lord Mayor to lead 11th Exeter Pride march

Posted on 09/05/2019 by Besi

Lord Mayor of Exeter to lead the Pride march to mark Devon’s biggest free celebration of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT+) communities in the South West.

COUNCILLOR Rob Hanford will start the largest Rainbow Flag parade the city has seen as part of Exeter Pride at noon on Saturday, May 11, with thousands of people taking part in the march along Exeter’s High Street and watching the parade which will include community groups, police, firefighters, students, trade union, business groups and individuals.

It will include Street Heat samba band, Morris dancers, two 50-metre rainbow flags, roller skaters, dancers, a Devon County Council gritter lorry, a police car, ambulance, fire engine and LGBT+ football and rugby teams.

The Lord Mayor of Exeter will officially open the main stage at the end of the march.

Entertainment will include live bands and cabaret acts on two stages and there will be a marketplace with more than 80 stalls.

There will be a health zone, family zone, workshops, panel debates, gender diversity hub and talks, drumming circle, ceilidh and much more.

There will be information and advice from local, national and international organisations, as well as demonstrations and fun activities.

The evening will include a cabaret evening and DJ at Exeter Phoenix, admission by wristband only.

Adam Rank, Chair, Exeter Pride chairman, said: “It’s been a privilege to have been involved with the 11th Exeter Pride. It has been hard work, but so rewarding to help make this a community event that we can all be part of.

“We are incredibly lucky to have been able to build on the hard work of 10 previous committees, allowing us to continue as the grass-roots community festival that we are.

“Our event in 2018 was judged to be such a success that we were delighted to have been awarded the Exeter Living Event of the Year award.

“This year we have a bigger and better event planned with all the favourites plus many more workshops and classes, 80 stalls, the gender diversity hub, a main stage and showcase stage and a fantastic evening of entertainment.

“For the second time Gandy Street has been licensed to allow for a real street party feel, with a drag catwalk competition.

“Make sure you buy one of the annual Exeter Pride discount cards, which offer discounts at many venues across the city and also ensure you buy an Exeter Pride wristband.

“We are one of the largest free Pride events in the UK, and we do it all without large-scale public funding or massive corporate sponsors. We rely on you, our supporters and our local partners and freely admit that we couldn’t do it without you. Please remember Exeter Pride is a registered charity.

“For us Pride is a day to celebrate, remember and show off our local LGBT+ community, as well as embrace our local Exeter community, because we are all part of more than one community. And this is Exeter Pride, proud of you, and proud of Exeter.”

Alan Quick, co-founder of Exeter Pride, said he was delighted how the annual event had grown since the very first Pride in the city in 2009.

He said: “Without the support of previous trustees, volunteers, committee members, sponsors, partners and other supporters, as well as those currently involved, Exeter Pride would not be the tremendous annual event it is now.

“Year-on-year it has grown thanks to the active involvement of so many people.

“Those people have helped Exeter Pride fulfil its aims, to promote equality and diversity for the public benefit and in particular the elimination of discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity through awareness-raising, advancing community education, and by holding an annual LGBT+ festival.

“Whilst Exeter Pride is a celebration of how far we have come with regards to equality, the charity is also keen to recognise and to educate on LGBT+ history, contributions to culture, and raise awareness of on-going LGBT+ struggles in the UK and further afield.”

For more information about Exeter Pride, click here:

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Day: May 9, 2019

Brighton Naked Bike Ride partners Extinction Rebellion to highlight climate crisis

This year’s Brighton Naked Bike Ride welcomes fellow environmental campaign group Extinction Rebellion, in their shared cause of alerting the world to the worsening climate crisis.

Fringe THEATRE REVIEW: Quintessence @Sweet Works 2

Ever since Isaac Asimov wrote his series of Sci Fi books about the rise of the robots, we have feared what Artificial Intelligence (AI) might lead to.

Brighton Rainbow Fund announce new funding rounds now open

Brighton Rainbow Fund announce new funding round and new funding opportunities for local LGBT+ projects.

The plight of refugees – on film

Three academic films about refugees will be shown during the Brighton Fringe Festival – one on trafficking and sex work, another on a man selling sex as a transvestite and the third on a refugee musician’s life.

Royal honour for social workers

Two social workers from Brighton & Hove City Council have been invited to a Royal Garden Party.

Lord Mayor to lead 11th Exeter Pride march

Lord Mayor of Exeter to lead the Pride march to mark Devon’s biggest free celebration of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT+) communities in the South West.

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This year’s Brighton Naked Bike Ride welcomes fellow environmental campaign group Extinction Rebellion, in their shared cause of alerting the world to the worsening climate crisis.

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Commemoration plaque to be unveiled at former city centre branch of Women’s Social and Political Union.

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Ever since Isaac Asimov wrote his series of Sci Fi books about the rise of the robots, we have feared what Artificial Intelligence (AI) might lead to.

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Brighton Rainbow Fund announce new funding round and new funding opportunities for local LGBT+ projects.

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Three academic films about refugees will be shown during the Brighton Fringe Festival – one on trafficking and sex work, another on a man selling sex as a transvestite and the third on a refugee musician’s life.

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Two social workers from Brighton & Hove City Council have been invited to a Royal Garden Party.

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Lord Mayor of Exeter to lead the Pride march to mark Devon’s biggest free celebration of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT+) communities in the South West.

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