The festival, now in its second year, continues to grow, drawing attendees from across the Midwest to join in the
celebrations.
LGBTQ+
While gaining some understanding of how one identifies is the first step toward being authentic to oneself, what comes next for many LGBTQ+ youth is confusion, anxiety, depression, isolation, fear and discrimination. Help is available if one is willing to reach out.
Michigan has the highest percentage in any state in the U.S. of transgender adults without a form of ID that has the correct gender listed at 77.7% of transgender adults. Nationally, it is estimated that more than half of transgender adults, or 476,000 people, lack an accurate ID.
“This is a suicide prevention bill, period,” Equality Michigan Executive Director Erin Knott said in a prepared statement. “With 15% of Michigan’s LGBTQ+ youth reporting being threatened with or subjected to conversion therapy, this historic effort to end conversion therapy is literally life-saving for LGBTQ+ young people in our state.”
Amy Davidhizar of Cass County responds to what she calls a “smear campaign directed at this Saturday’s Three Rivers Pride Festival” led by St. Joseph County Road Commissioner Jack Coleman and others.
The following letter was submitted to Watershed Voice for publication by Rev. Brenda Deily of The First Presbyterian Church Three Rivers/Centreville.
Watershed Voice Executive Editor & Publisher Alek Haak-Frost addresses the harmful and factually inaccurate messaging making its rounds on social media regarding Three Rivers Pride.
With Thursday’s planned signing by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of an expansion of the 1973 Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act (ELCRA), LGBTQ+ advocates are savoring a hard-fought victory and looking ahead to where the fight for equal rights goes now.
The U.S. Senate approved legislation Tuesday that would enshrine protections for same-sex and interracial marriages, codifying many of the rights that would disappear if the U.S. Supreme Court were to overturn those landmark decisions the way it overturned the nationwide right to an abortion this summer.
Three Rivers Pride is now accepting donations to establish an annual Three Rivers Pride Celebration through its fiscal sponsor Main Street Media Group (Watershed Voice).
A small West Michigan library was essentially defunded in this week’s primary election in a dispute over the LGBTQ+ material in its collection, although advocates say it represents more than just a dispute over books, but an assault on personal liberties.
At the top of this week’s episode Alek and Doug address Monday’s troubling news that teachers within the Three Rivers Community Schools system were asked to remove Pride flags in their classrooms in response to an “external challenge” by an unidentified party.
The hosts of Keep Your Voice Down are also joined by Sarah Lee, Director of Marketing Communications at the Kalamazoo Community Foundation. The trio discusses Sarah’s role at KZCF, her upbringing in Malaysia and how she became deeply rooted in Kalamazoo, the importance of being “equity-minded” when addressing matters of social and racial injustice, the foundation’s efforts to support local journalism, and the story behind the formation of the Southwest Michigan Journalism Collaborative.
A petition-driven initiative to prohibit discrimination against LGBTQ people in Michigan is now dead after the Michigan Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to weigh in on whether organizers collected enough signatures
As the U.S. Supreme Court plans to hear in December a challenge to Mississippi’s abortion ban that could overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision — some LGBTQ+ advocates are concerned that threats to same-sex marriage are on the horizon.
Several recent studies have found the COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted the financial stability of LGBTQ+ individuals across the United States.
After a student-led Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) club at Whitehall High School sent out an email to the student body that included resources about sexuality and identity during Pride week, that kickstarted an often-heated conversation in the small West Michigan community about where the line is between schools and families in talking about LGBTQ issues.
B.A. Schaaff argues while the U.S. has had some “encouraging wins at the national level” regarding LGBTQ+ rights “[…] there is still more work to do, and our pride can come at a price.”
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed an executive directive Monday requiring the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to take action to prohibit the use of state and federal dollars for the practice of conversion therapy on minors.