Genderandsexuality

Genderandsexuality News

Explainer: As Madras HC prohibits conversion therapy, a look at history of traumatic 'cures' for queer individuals
Lifestyle

Explainer: As Madras HC prohibits conversion therapy, a look at history of traumatic 'cures' for queer individuals

It is vital to note the pseudoscientific nature of conversion "treatment", which perceives sexual and gender orientation as a "mental illness" and homosexuality as "abnormal".

'I feel the pain of having nowhere to go': A Manipuri trans woman recounts her ongoing lockdown ordeal
India

'I feel the pain of having nowhere to go': A Manipuri trans woman recounts her ongoing lockdown ordeal

Siku, a Nupi Manbi (trans woman) from Manipur, found her job and life in Bengaluru suddenly at end with the lockdown. Having returned to Manipur, however, Siku has had an especially difficult journey that is nowhere close to its end.

Women still get judged harshly for having casual sex: Persistence of unfounded stereotypes at play
Lifestyle

Women still get judged harshly for having casual sex: Persistence of unfounded stereotypes at play

Why do women continue to be denigrated as they become increasingly open and willing to go to bed with others at their own whim, of their own accord?

The Queer Take: Lessons from Tina Turner, Princess Diana and Rekha's revenge lookbooks
Lifestyle

The Queer Take: Lessons from Tina Turner, Princess Diana and Rekha's revenge lookbooks

There must be a reason that tragic female figures making public statements through their image hold sway over the queer imagination.

The double lives of gay men in China's Hainan province: Navigating visibility and invisibility in public spaces
long-reads

The double lives of gay men in China's Hainan province: Navigating visibility and invisibility in public spaces

How gay men in Hainan understand themselves, build communities and negotiate the pressures to conform to the heterosexual life script of marriage and reproduction.

Bangladesh's Boishakhi TV hires country’s first-ever transgender news anchor, to champion trans visibility and rights
World

Bangladesh's Boishakhi TV hires country’s first-ever transgender news anchor, to champion trans visibility and rights

Tashnuva Anan Shishir, who previously worked as a rights activist and actress, debuted on Dhaka-based Boishakhi TV on Monday, International Women’s Day.

In COVID-ravaged America, much ado about masturbation: What Jeffrey Toobin's Zoom faux pas exposes
World

In COVID-ravaged America, much ado about masturbation: What Jeffrey Toobin's Zoom faux pas exposes

This week, the world of the autoerotic was thrown into the spotlight: Jeffrey Toobin, scholar, author and legal analyst for CNN and The New Yorker, was suspended after he was spotted masturbating on a Zoom event.

The Queer Take: Contemplating 'allyship', 'safe spaces' and my refusal of new-found properties in LGBTQ+ discourse
Lifestyle

The Queer Take: Contemplating 'allyship', 'safe spaces' and my refusal of new-found properties in LGBTQ+ discourse

As I write this column just after Pride Month and I realise I haven’t always been this grumpy gay that doesn't want to join the parties and parades. So what changed?

Growing up mixed-race, queer and femme, how Saroj Khan provided me the keys to the vehicle of my body
Entertainment

Growing up mixed-race, queer and femme, how Saroj Khan provided me the keys to the vehicle of my body

In hindsight, I was always meant to fall in love with Saroj Khan. So here’s our convoluted love story: are you ready?

Faced with daunting challenges in lockdown, trans men in India rely on online, offline support from community
India

Faced with daunting challenges in lockdown, trans men in India rely on online, offline support from community

The lockdown has not only caused trans men in rural and urban India to be stuck in unsupportive quarantine spaces, but also increased the inaccessibility of regular testosterone shots and gender affirming surgery, thus adding to their dysphoria and other mental health issues.

Schitt's Creek to Made in Heaven, why wave of LGBTQ+ content has met with complicated reception from queer folk
Entertainment

Schitt's Creek to Made in Heaven, why wave of LGBTQ+ content has met with complicated reception from queer folk

In speaking to queer people from across generations, it seems there is a complicated reception to this new tsunami of LGBTQ+ content.

The Queer Take: Price of admission into bois locker room-like spaces is ability, willingness to dehumanise the other
Lifestyle

The Queer Take: Price of admission into bois locker room-like spaces is ability, willingness to dehumanise the other

The common defense of this straight male culture has been that it is a “safe space” for men to be themselves, to say the politically incorrect thing, to let it all hang out. It is their safety valve. In reality, if one reads through the messages on similar forums like the recent ‘bois locker room’ one could go as far as to say: these aren’t safe spaces at all.

Bois Locker Room case underscores vital need for radical, political reimagining of an education that liberates us
India

Bois Locker Room case underscores vital need for radical, political reimagining of an education that liberates us

The Bois Locker Room and the crisis of our society in its current breakdown have a lot to say about each other. Both of them tell us that we have reached the limits of the system we live in. If the way out is together, then we need an education on what it means to do that.

Friendship as Social Justice Activism examines unconventional forms of kinship as catalysts for change
Lifestyle

Friendship as Social Justice Activism examines unconventional forms of kinship as catalysts for change

How do people who meet as part of movements navigate desire, love and heartbreak? Friendship as Social Justice Activism: Critical Solidarities in a Global Perspective offers similar conversations.

Crux of 'bois locker room' case lies in unpacking link between performance of masculinity and sexual violence
India

Crux of 'bois locker room' case lies in unpacking link between performance of masculinity and sexual violence

As the criminal justice system is set in motion in the #boislockerroom case, it is important that we keenly focus on how notions of masculinity — especially amongst adolescents — contribute to sexual violence, and how societal responses, including legal action against the accused, need to account for these factors

'Bois locker room' case pushes us to examine if — and how — technology is shaping misogynistic attitudes towards sex
India

'Bois locker room' case pushes us to examine if — and how — technology is shaping misogynistic attitudes towards sex

Cases such as bois locker room could be a collective failure of society, of teachers and parents, in not making safe spaces for discussing cyber hygiene or netiquette.

Social distancing, self-isolation aren't just coronavirus-related terms, they've long marked everyday lives of queer, marginalised
Lifestyle

Social distancing, self-isolation aren't just coronavirus-related terms, they've long marked everyday lives of queer, marginalised

'I know what you are thinking: Yet again, the — queer, femme, Black person — speaks of dirty things like desire at a time of disease and death. Well, it is difficult only for those who have made a division between the three.' | Joshua Muyiwa writes in #QueerTake

In Fearless, Amneh Shaikh-Farooqui offers an illustrated chronicle of Pakistan's women's rights movement
Lifestyle

In Fearless, Amneh Shaikh-Farooqui offers an illustrated chronicle of Pakistan's women's rights movement

The timeline in Fearless, which begins in 1943 and goes on till 2018, is helpful in understanding the political context within which the Pakistani women featured in the book made their mark.

During coronavirus outbreak, there's much we cannot control. But we can deal with the misogyny of the 'Wife Joke' 
Opinion

During coronavirus outbreak, there's much we cannot control. But we can deal with the misogyny of the 'Wife Joke' 

Knowing how the coronavirus lockdown is ravaging our country, if you have a roof over your head and a couple of meals lined up, very few people can currently feel sorry for themselves — except of course for the archetype of the man in the Wife Joke | Nisha Susan writes