A vigil was held for Nikki Kuhnhausen in Vancouver on Thursday evening. Blair Stenvick It’s been over two years since Nikki Kuhnhausen, a transgender 17 year old in Vancouver, Washington, went missing in June 2019. On Thursday, Kuhnhausen’s killer, David Bogdanov, was sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison—and for Kuhnhausen’s family, friends, and supporters, […]
LGBTQIA+
Posted inTheater & Performance
Remembering Experimental Drag-Punk Icon, Phatima Rude
Phatima Rude at a 2016 performance in Portland. Patrick Buckmaster She had many names: Sister Hateful Sow of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence Inc., Leigh Pankonin, and Pronoun among them. But there was only one Phatima Rude. She was a transgressive performance artist; a literal staple of San Francisco’s avant garde drag scene since the […]
Posted inLGBTQIA+
Comic Book Interview: Captain America Is Gay Now
Hey, who’s the new guy? Marvel Captain America never meant anything to me, until now. The idea has always seemed absurd: He’s a military jock who represents a racist country ruled by the rich — and we’re supposed to root for him? The character turns eighty years old this year, and as far as I […]
Posted inMovies & TV
John Waters, Divine, and the Trinity of Trash
Amen Pink Flamingos Happy Pride Month, queers! Or as I’ve been thinking of it lately, happy Liberation Month. What’s the difference? Oh, just a little filth, crime, and shamelessness. I recently oozed my way through a rewatch of John Waters’ early films, a trinity of trash from the ’70s composed of the notorious movies Pink […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Gay TV History: The Straightening of Chandler Bing
We all know this gay couple. Friends This weekend Friends finished filming a reunion episode, slated to appear on HBO Max at some point, which has me thinking about just how close the show came to featuring what could have been the most prominent gay sitcom character in history. Showrunners came this close to making […]
Posted inLGBTQIA+
More Homophobic Lies Brought to You by Facebook
Facebook employees take a break from profiting off of transphobia to celebrate San Francisco Pride vkaggarwal / Getty Images You will be absolutely SHOCKED to hear that Facebook is making money off of transphobic and homophobic ads on their platform, a thing that has never happened before and surely will never occur ever again. While […]
Posted inLGBTQIA+
On the Anniversary of the March on Washington, Remember Gay Hero Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin Library of Congress Today is the 57th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, a pivotal moment in the 1960s civil rights movement for Black Americans. The occasion is being commemorated with a new March on Washington—and with smaller marches in other cities, including Portland. When we remember the original […]
Posted inLGBTQIA+
The Portlanders Behind the Black Resilience Fund Are Young, Black, Queer—and Hopeful
This article is part of the Mercury’s 2020 all-digital Queer Week coverage. Salome Chimuku and Cameron Whitten Courtesy photos When queer Black Portlander Cameron Whitten first saw that the police killing of George Floyd was making national front-page news in late May and early June, he didn’t expect meaningful, lasting change to come from it. […]
Posted inMusic
Rocker Neil Gust on the Reunion of No. 2, Being Gay in Portland, and Working with Elliott Smith
This article is part of the Mercury’s 2020 all-digital Queer Week coverage. No. 2 photo by Sam Higginson Neil Gust doesn’t live in Portland anymore, and he hasn’t since a relationship drew him out to the East Coast in 2005. But for music fans, the 51-year-old artist is still very much a local, thanks to […]
Posted inLGBTQIA+
Personal Essay: I’m Proud of You
This article is part of the Mercury’s 2020 all-digital Queer Week coverage. Dahlia Belle Image courtesy of author. Traditionally, any decent article written about PRIDE (capitalized for a maximum of fabulous ferocity) must begin with the words “In the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Love, Victor Breaks No New Ground—But Doesn’t Need To
Hulu Being the dutiful critic that I am, I spent an evening recently with Love, Simon, the thoroughly delightful 2018 film about the titular young man coming out of both his shell and the closet during a momentous year in high school. While it had a host of narrative issues, it was as cute and […]
Posted inBooks
Reading List: Queer and Trans Black Authors Through the Decades
This article is part of the Mercury’s 2020 all-digital Queer Week coverage. Author Audre Lorde Spellman College archives In Notes of a Native Son, James Baldwin writes, “I am what time, circumstance, history, have made of me, certainly, but I am, also, much more than that.” These words could be used to describe any LGBTQ+ […]