Issue Highlights
Not just St. Valentine's Day, Feb 14 is also World 'Bonobo' Day; all you need to know about 'Make Love, Not War' apes
Bonobos are one of the species termed "endangered." They are known for their ways of maintaining relationships and settling conflicts through sex.
Most US Republicans sympathetic to Christian nationalism, survey finds | US news | The Guardian
According to a national survey released on Wednesday by the Public Religion Research Institute and Brookings Institution, 29% of white evangelical Protestants qualify as Christian nationalism adherents while 35% qualify as sympathizers.
Opinion | What’s It Like Being Trans? 12 Transgender Americans Discuss. - The New York Times
Why are so many nontrans Americans judging and opining about trans adults and children rather than listening to them?
LGBTQ Social Justice
Organization hopes to eradicate LGBT-phobia from Martinique within 10 years – Erasing 76 Crimes
We no longer fight for rights, but we fight for the application of rights, because a lot of changes have taken place over the last ten years. For an association like ours, this implies a real paradigm shift, after ten years of activism in pedagogy. Our objective is to continue the dialogue around the deconstruction of prejudices, however we are now also an association of defense of the rights and we recently changed our statutes going in this direction.
Intersex People Deserve Reparations for Non-Consensual Surgeries | Teen Vogue
According to Human Rights Watch and interACT, in 2022 legislative sessions, 22 states had a pending or proposed bill that would “purport to authorize intersex surgery.” Three more states, Arizona, Arkansas, and Alabama have passed such bills. Legislative sessions in 2023 could see more attacks on intersex bodies.
Republicans across the country push legislation to restrict drag show performances | CNN Politics
Bills in at least 11 states across the country are working their way through legislatures, though none have yet been signed into law, according to a CNN review.
OPINION: Amid Record anti-LGBTQ+ bills, conversion therapy bans are a beacon of hope | OPENLY
Multiple U.S. states are considering bans on conversion therapy - a practice that aims to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity
The Under-the-Radar Legal Battle Protecting Health Care for Trans People | Them
The momentum to guarantee Medicaid coverage for transgender medical care is a ray of light at a time when trans rights are under sustained attack from Republican state legislators, who are pushing bills across the country to restrict gender-affirming care.
3 Queer High School Seniors on the Reality of 'Grooming'
The GOP would have many believe that students are inundated with sex and gender conversations daily when, in reality, most never hear about those topics in school.
School District Rallies Behind Superintendent Targeted by Antigay Letter
Dawn Clements resigned as interim superintendent of Ben Hill County schools after a letter condemned her for being "openly gay." The community wants her back.
North Carolina Senate Passes Anti-LGBT Bill In The Name Of ‘Parents Rights’ ｜ uPolitics.com
The proposal passed the Senate 29-18. It is heading for the South Carolina House, where Republicans remain one short of a supermajority. One Democrat would have to be swayed to the right to pass the bill.
Florida schools tell teachers: Hide your books to avoid felony charges - The Washington Post
Unsure what titles violate new state rules, two school districts tell educators to conceal every book for now
As a Queer Floridian, New College Was My Haven. Now, DeSantis is Trying to Destroy It | Them
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis plans to overhaul his state’s public colleges and universities. He’s started with the most progressive one.
How Orlando’s gay community, after Pulse, helped spur proposed changes to blood donor rules ｜ Orlando Sentinel
“The fact that so many gay and bi men here in the Orlando area volunteered to participate in this historic study, I think, is a really great thing,” said former Florida Rep. Carlos Guillermo Smith. “Our own community here in Orlando deserves credit for helping to improve this policy.”
Great Apes & Gibbons
Changing circumstances turn ‘sustainable communities’ into deforestation drivers: Study
About 90% of people globally living in extreme poverty, often subsistence communities, rely on forests for at least part of their livelihoods—making them the first ones impacted by forest loss.
Canopy bridges connect forests, wildlife, and international researchers
Canopy bridges provide a simple solution to this problem by allowing animals to cross over roads safely and maintain gene flow between populations.
On the edge of extinction: why western chimpanzees matter – photo essay | Guinea | The Guardian
he Chimpanzee Conservation Centre in Guinea, one of the few international institutions trying to protect this group of apes, and the only one that releases rescued chimpanzees into the wild – a project now in danger
Bonobo apes pout and throw tantrums — and gain sympathy
Primates that showed infantile behaviour after losing in a conflict drew consolation from their companions.
Why Congo’s most famous national park is betting big on crypto | MIT Technology Review
In an attempt to protect its forests and famous wildlife, Virunga has become the first national park to run a Bitcoin mine. But some are wondering what the hell crypto has to do with conservation.
Philanthropy
To shift power, fund entire ecosystems - Alliance magazine
As donors localize and place big bets, they should ask themselves if their funding will help sustain the ecosystem, if it will generate conflict between organizations, if it will help democratize funding, or if, perversely, it will serve to concentrate power or leave grantees overly dependent and ‘donor driven.’ Perhaps funders could begin to think about how widely they are able to spread their funding and how doing so can support positive inter-organizational dynamics, rather than how large they can make a singular grant.
There’s a New Giant in Climate Change Philanthropy. Here’s Everything We Know So Far | Inside Philanthropy
While Sequoia doesn’t share who its donor or donors are, multiple partners and grantees said the foundation is an offshoot of Wellspring Philanthropic Fund, a human rights and social justice backer launched by three secretive hedge fund founders. A Sequoia representative confirmed that it “spun out” from Wellspring, originally using its back office.
In Practice: How Foundations Can Compensate Stakeholders for Their Time - Leap Ambassadors
When it’s philanthropy benefiting from the time and expertise of a stakeholder, it subtly acknowledges the power imbalance embedded in the foundation-grantee relationship. Being generous with immense wealth sends the right kind of message philanthropy should have for the citizen and grantee community it serves.
How Gender Differences Show Up (and Don’t) in CEP’s Grantee Perception Report - The Center for Effective Philanthropy
The positive: There are very few statistically significant differences between the experiences of men and women, including in their ratings of the quality of relationships they have with their funders. The alarming: There is a pattern of differences in which respondents who identify as nonbinary, gender nonconforming, or who select multiple gender identities are having less positive experiences with their funders than respondents who identify only as men or women.