It’s a national embarrassment that we continue to be one of a handful of countries in the world without such a program, but there’s one silver lining in having waited this long: we have the opportunity to do it right the first time around, and create a paid parental leave program inclusive of *all* parents. Such a policy would also make things right with the LGBTQ and adoption community—who are disproportionately denied paid time off.
My piece on Tswalu, South Africa’s largest private game reserve, fro Glass Magazine. Many incredible critters made appearances during my stay (Zazu from the Lion King even tried to break into my room at one point). But the real mission of the reserve only comes into focus after a visit to the Tswalu Founation, where guests can learn about the reserve’s efforts to protect the southern Kalahari against threats like climate change and poaching.
Regardless of what happens on Election Day this year, our current elected officials need to do the right thing and codify LGBTQ Marriage Equality into national law. And then Congress needs to turn its attention to expanding new rights, not just protect old ones. Enacting paid parental leave — something a majority of both parties actually agree on, and that will confer new rights and protections to LGBTQ families, not just enshrine old ones — may be one of the only areas to make that happen.
Concerned about losing access to pregnancy care, and fearful of legal consequences, surrogates and those who work with them are rewriting contracts and changing the way they operate.
Brazil’s largest city São Paulo has long been the heart of the country’s cultural, food, and design scenes — but in recent years, the city has also become a hub for sustainability and innovation.
British Airways asked me and a couple other LGBTQ travel writers to write about a "memorable experience" we've had while traveling as queer people. My piece was about the time a homophobe and I went to a bar together in Greece (sounds like the set up to a bad joke) and hilarity ensued.
This article involved a deep dive into neurofeedback, a "brain training" therapy that has been around for decades — its advocates say the therapy can improve concentration, mood, sleep, and even athletic ability, but it has yet to gain traction in mainstream mental health circles.
A common barrier for LGBTQ parents, and one that isn't recognized often enough as a matter of importance to the queer community, is our country's lack of a comprehensive paid parental leave policy. The United States continues to be the only developed country in the world without a paid parental leave policy. But queer men, in particular, are disproportionately impacted. Even companies offering robust maternity leave policies exclude or provide far lesser benefits to the non-birthing partner.
Ketamine — an anesthetic first popular with the 1970s counterculture movement and then as a club drug known as “Special K” — has recently emerged as a promising mental health treatment. Unlike conventional antidepressants, which work by increasing serotonin levels, ketamine appears to impact a neurotransmitter called glutamate, which is thought to play a role in regulating mood. Read the article here.
Excerpted from Sassy Planet: A Queer Guide to 40 Cities. Jordan doesn’t criminalize LGBTQ+ identities, and trans people can even have their gender marker modified there—but locals say that being openly queer nonetheless carries a huge social stigma in Amman and across the country. Still, homosexuality has been decriminalized in Jordan for consenting people over the age of 16 since 1951. While Amman has few queer spaces, the scene is nonetheless very present, a situation unlike in many neighboring countries, where it has been forced underground. Read the article here.
A new book of photography by Burt Heynen features the intimate moments of queer dads in America. American culture has not been particularly starved of images of gay fatherhood, particularly in recent years. It no longer feels revelatory to see them on television, as it did when “Modern Family” premiered in 2009. Less common are images of gay fathers who aren’t Instagram ready — like two men combing their daughters’ hair. Read the article here.
Deep canvasses require volunteers to be vulnerable with strangers, which can be uncomfortable but effective. A 2016 study published in Science found that 10 percent of voters deep-canvassed on transgender rights shifted their views in a positive direction. “That may not sound like a lot,” said Dave Fleischer, director of the Leadership Lab, a group involved in the research. “But it’s better than zero, which is the result of almost everything else we’ve tried.” Read the article here.
While the United States remains one of the few countries where gestational surrogacy is legal, and widely practiced, it continues to be a source of heated debate. Often missing from the conversation, however, are perspectives of surrogates themselves — and the varied, sometimes deeply personal, reasons that compel them to become surrogates. Read the article here.
On any given day in the United States, over 400,000 children, who have been temporarily or permanently removed from their biological families, are dependent on the country’s foster care system. Yet a perennial challenge facing the child welfare system is recruiting enough foster parents to meet the need — a problem that has worsened during the pandemic.
The pandemic has created new challenges in the foster care system and exacerbated old ones — creating delays in placements and adoptions and forcing some older youth to exit the system amid a public health and economic crisis. The response, moreover, hasn’t been uniform across the country, or nearly fast enough, say child welfare advocates. Read the article here.
Bali may best be known for its notorious nightlife and moonlit beaches, but the region’s lush, mountainous terrain also makes it one of Southeast Asia’s most amazing outdoor playgrounds. The biggest draw for some of Bali’s bolder visitors is the opportunity to summit one of the island’s active volcanoes. Indonesia is part of the Ring of Fire, a horseshoe-shaped path along the Pacific belt where the majority of the world’s seismic unrest occurs.
The nightlife industry has been decimated by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and LGBTQ+ communities—whose members are heavily employed in service and hospitality jobs—have been especially hard hit. Nowhere is this truer than in New York City, a place more accustomed to being the epicenter of queer nightlife and culture than a global pandemic.
The pandemic is not just impacting parents and pregnant people — all prospective parents are facing new challenges.
This article is part of “The Price of Modern Parenting” series for the New York Times.
Each adoption process shares the same ultimate purpose: to unite children who need families with those that want children. Yet, despite this common goal, the price tag of adoption in the United States varies widely.
