People show the same attitude towards reptiles, rodents, anything they don’t like, as if an animal being dangerous or inconvenient is an actual act of “evil” on that animal’s part and they have to suffer some kind of karmic punishment for …….the way they evolved I guess?

In a series of tweets this morning, the president who lost the popular vote announced that transgender people would not be able to serve in the United States military because of the “burden” of “tremendous medical costs” and “disruption” they would bring about. 

This is utter bullshit. Trans-affirming medical care costs NOTHING compared to the literal billions of dollars we spend on weapons and planes and the many many many other things that the government chooses to spend money on. There are already tens of thousands of trans people serving in our military and in armed forces abroad. They’re doing just fine, and those troops are much better off when they’re allowed proper medical care.

No matter what you think of the military, the very fucking least we could do is respect people who have given their time or their lives. 

President Obama’s final defense secretary, Ash Carter, issued a directive last year that permitted transgender troops to serve in the military, and to undergo reassignment surgery.

That step left a decision for Trump Secretary of Defense James Mattis to make a decision on whether to allow new transgender troops to enter the military.

It wasn’t immediately clear what Trump’s announcement would mean for the approximately 250 transgender people now serving openly in the U.S. military.

Trump during the 2016 campaign called himself a “real friend” of the LGBT community and accused Hillary Clinton of prioritizing “Islamic extremists” over LGBT Americans.

So in honour of the country the founder of this project hails from, we are going to go over some queer Canadian history, though I would love to do next weeks article on an amazing queer Canadian I promised my amazing business partner Grace that I would do Oscar Wilde, so my Canadian post will just be some bonus content.  

This timeline is from when Canada began as a nation, and because of that it does not include the history of Native American’s attitudes towards queer people. But keep following us and we will cover that as it deserves its own article. 

Another thing you may notice is that this timeline is mainly same sex related, and that is purely fo lack of strides made by our country in transgender rights up until more recent years. And I keep we can keep moving forward with that, but it is an unfortunate fact that there was not much progress for transgender people until quite recently.

But here we go, our Timeline of Queer History in Canada, it does not have everything but it had some of the things we thought we could share.

1918

Les Mouches Fantastiques begins, the first Queer themed magazine known to be published in North America. It was an underground magazine that caused great controversy even though only five issues of it were ever published. 

1969

Homosexual acts are decriminalized Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau saying “The state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation.“

1977

Quebec makes discrimination based on sexual orientation illegal, and is the first major jurisdiction in the world to do so, in the same year Canada ends its immigration ban on homosexual men.

1981

3,000 people march in the streets in Toronto to protest the arrest of 300 men from a series of bath house raids.

1988 

Svend Robinson becomes Canada’s first openly gay Member of Parliament, in the same year  The United Church of Canada becomes the first church in Canada to permit the ordination of gay and lesbian ministers

1992

Canada lifts the ban on people who are attracted to the same gender they are legally known as being allowed into the Canadian Forces.

1994 

Toronto Board of Directors was the first CAS in the province to pass a policy that permitted same sex couples the opportunity to become foster parents. In the same year, the Board adopted the position that same sex couples should be allowed to adopt.

1996

Parliament changes the Canadian Human Rights Act to explicitly prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation. 

2001 

Libby Davies becomes Canada’s first openly lesbian Member of Parliament.

2005

Canada becomes the fourth nation to officially allow same sex marriage nation wide

2012 

Ontario Human Rights Tribunal finds that trans folks must be allowed to change the sex designation on government documents, whether they have had transsexual surgery or not, leading to this quote from Barbara Hall: “Transgender people’s rights are human rights.”

2014 

Vancouver School Board introduces a official transgender policy that includes training for teachers in gender neutral pronouns, other pronoun changes and many other things.  

2014