GLYNI - Gay and Lesbian Youth Northern Ireland » coming out

Stand Up – for LGBT Youth and their Families

Youth.Worker — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 22:53:05 +0000

Stand Up! LGBT Awareness Week is brought to you by BeLonG To Youth Services the national youth service for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Young People.

Don't Stand for Homophobic Bullying!!!

Stand Up! is encouraging all young people to show their support for their LGBT Friends!

Visit www.belongto.org for further information, and become a fan on the Stand Up! page on Facebook.

The week runs from 9th-18th April.

To the theatre, darling!

Youth.Worker — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 00:26:37 +0000

SPRING!

Less spending on oil, gas and plumbing repairs…more on queer artsy goodness, woo hoo! Here’s some great LGBT cinema and theatre coming your way in the next month…

Check out CROOKED, a new lesbian-themed play by Queen’s University Drama students
Brian Friel Theatre (QFT Building)
23rd-25th March 7.30pm £6/£4

“CROOKED takes an intimate look at sexual identity and acceptance, in a bittersweet comedy that highlights how vulnerable we are at the hands of others.
Laney Waters has just moved to Mississippi with her mother, Elise. The fourteen-year-old suffers from dystonia, a condition which causes the muscles in her back to seize up. At a crucial point of adolescence, Laney’s condition isolates her from those at her new school and she seeks refuge in the sanctuary of the short stories she writes.
Enter the impressionable, overweight sixteen-year-old Maribel Purdy, the daughter of a Holiness Church Preacher. She is also cut off from her peers due to her weight and her extreme and alienating openness about her religious beliefs. The girls quickly strike up a strong friendship and teach each other new lessons in life, redemption and love…”

Group bookings of 10 or more people will be offered the concessions price of £4 when they book by calling the booking line on 02890 971382 and quoting “CROOKED SPECIAL GROUP OFFER”.
Further details and booking at www.brianfrieltheatre.co.uk

The 10th Belfast Film Festival kicks off in April (15th-30th) with some highly anticipated films in the Same Sex Cinema strand…

We’ll finally get to see the very brilliant I Killed My Mother (J’ai Tue Ma Mere), a film that was originally scheduled for OUTBURST ’09 but unfortunately had to be replaced at the last minute. Alternating between hilarity and horror, it’s tale of a young gay man coming of age while struggling with his tortured relationship with his mother.

Also highly recommended is City of Borders, a powerful documentary that follows the daily lives of five Israeli and Palestinian LGBT people as they navigate the minefield of politics, religion and discrimination to live and love openly. It’s very moving and the parallels to Belfast are uncanny at times.

You’d be mad (mad!) to miss the wonderful Topp Twins – Untouchable Girls, a film about New Zealand’s national-treasure-lesbian-comedic-singing-duo. Every country should have one.

For full details and bookings, see the Same Sex Cinema strand at www.belfastfilmfestival.org

Don’t go changin’….
love from
OUTBURST x

What’s Happening in GLYNI?

Youth.Worker — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 00:45:03 +0000

See our calendar for events in GLYNI over the next few months.

We have everything, from the special screening of Stonewall’s new FIT film, to creating an effective Anti-Homophobic Bullying Campaign for NI, from meeting with the NIABF Coordinator to meetings with Family Ties and Brook Clinic, as well as inviting the Children’s Commissioner to meet the members on May 17th, to mark International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia.

Over the next couple months, GLYNI will also be planning our participation in Belfast Pride, as well as continuing to update our website and create a fabulous newsletter.

Our drop-in continues to run on Friday nights, with our Peer Educators in training on Friday nights.

It’s all a buzz at GLYNI. So if you’re young (aged 14-25) and L G B or T, or somewhere in between but not quite ‘straight’, feel free to come along. You can join GLYNI through our website!!

US senator Roy Ashburn, known for obstructing gay rights, comes out!

chocobo_crossing — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:32:21 +0000

A conservative US state senator who has voted against gay rights consistently during his 14 years in government has came ‘out of the closet’ – he is gay!

Republican Roy Ashburn came out during a radio interview in California, for KERN radio, where he said, “I am gay… those are the words that have been so difficult for me for so long.”

The 55-year-old divorced father-of-four has been on leave since an arrest last week on suspicion of driving under the influence. He said that his coming out was prompted by rumours that he had visited a gay nightclub before the arrest, which took place in Sacramento on 3 March, and felt he needed to address these rumours. So, I guess that means that the rumours were true :P

He insists that his voting on the gay rights bills reflected the way his constituents wanted him to vote, i.e. on their behalf, rather than him voting on his own “internal conflict”. (Pity he couldn’t make a stand, maybe stick to his own convictions, though I guess we sometimes punish politicians for doing just that as well. Hmm.)

Roy has a record for voting against gay rights measures. Last year, Mr Ashburn opposed a bill to establish a day of recognition to honour murdered gay rights activist Harvey Milk. He has also voted in the statehouse against efforts to expand anti-discrimination laws and recognise out-of-state gay marriages.

Peace, out! – Matt

What’s In Your Closet?

chocobo_crossing — Sun, 25 Mar 2007 17:50:08 +0000

The Coming Out Resource, compiled by GLYNI and funded by The Youth Council for Northern Ireland, is ready to go to the designers!! However, we still need input from you, the young people. What we would like, are your stories and those of your families and friends, your experiences of coming out, the positives the negatives. We’d also like your experiences if you’ve been the victim of homophobia, or feel that your school/youth organisation or local community just doesn’t seem to include you in the services they provide. What can they do to help you develop more fully as a young person? You can give as much detail as you feel comfortable with, however, we ask that you omit personal details such as yours/peoples’ names and those of schools/organisations and their staff etc. We’re keen to represent as many different experiences from across Northern Ireland as possible, whether you identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, curious/undecided, or trans.

So you can write them in an email, send them through text or taking it to a different level, you can also send mobile or webcam vids. You can send them by text to 07707216921 (SMS only) or by email to resource@glyni.org.uk (stories, mobile/webcam vids etc). Please note, if you send a mobile or webcam vid featuring yourself, GLYNI will assume implied consent to include this on the resource. Please ask permission from any other persons who may appear also. All mobile numbers and emails received will be treated with the utmost confidentiality, and will only be used in the event that we lose your contribution, or you express an interest to be kept up to date on the resource distribution.

We’d also like to hear from any youth organisations out there who have any videos (e.g. training videos, You-Tube videos) with an LGBT theme. If you would like it to be included within the resource to help other young people and their families, please email us with details.

There is limited time left, so get your say quickly. This is going to be the only resource of its kind in Northern Ireland, you should be a part of it!

What’s In Your Closet? will be launched by the Summer and will be available for distribution soon afterwards. Further details on how to get a copy will be available then.