BY WESLEY CASE | Tavish Forsyth had come to a conclusion: They could not work for President Donald Trump.

So the 32-year-old Baltimore resident stripped down, turned on their camera, and lit their career on fire.

“F—— Donald Trump and f—— the Kennedy Center,” a naked Forsyth, an associate artistic lead at the Washington National Opera’s Opera Institute, which is run by the Kennedy Center, said in a video that went viral. The board of the nation’s leading cultural institution had elected Trump just weeks prior as its chairman after he gutted the board of members appointed by his predecessor, President Joe Biden.

The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.

Co-workers and friends will hold a celebration of life for highly acclaimed schoolteacher and D.C. resident Patrick Shaw beginning at 5:30 p.m. Friday, April 25 at The Little Gay Pub 1100 P St., N.W.

Little Gay Pub co-owner and Shaw’s friend, Dusty Martinez, said Shaw passed away unexpectedly on April 19 from a heart related ailment at the age of 60.

“Patrick touched so many lives with his warmth, humor, kindness, and unmistakable spark,” Martinez said. “He was a truly special soul – funny, vibrant, sassy, and full of life and we are heartbroken by his loss.”

In an Instagram posting, Shaw’s colleagues said Shaw was a second-grade special education teacher at the J.F. Cook campus of D.C.’s Mundo Verde Bilingual Public Charter School.

“Patrick brought warmth, joy, and deep commitment to Mundo Verde,” his colleagues said in their posting. “His daily Broadway sing-alongs, vibrant outfits, and genuine love for his students filled our community with energy and laughter.”

The posted message adds, “Patrick was more than a teacher; he was a light in our school, inspiring us all to show up with heart, humor, and kindness every day. His spirit will be deeply missed.”

The Washington Blade is preparing a full obituary on Patrick Shaw to be published soon. 

Plans to host a family values meeting next month in a 5-star hotel in Nairobi that the Kenya Red Cross Society co-owns have sparked an uproar among local queer rights groups.

The groups accuse the Kenya Red Cross of violating its Global Fund commitment of protecting key populations by allowing its Boma Hotel to host an “anti-gender and anti-LGBTQ” conference. 

Influential guest speakers from the U.S., the Netherlands, Spain, and Poland will preside over the Pan-African Conference on Family Values that will take place from May 12-17. The Kenyan advocacy groups say these speakers’ organizations are globally recognized for undermining LGBTQ rights.

“As the principal recipient of Global Fund in Kenya, hosting this event contradicts (the) Red Cross’s humanitarian mission and threatens the safety and dignity of people living with HIV, women and LGBTQ+ individuals, the communities that Kenya Red Cross Society has long committed to supporting,” the queer rights groups state. 

The LGBTQ groups that have criticized the Kenya Red Cross include Upinde Advocates for Inclusion, the Initiative for Equality and Non-Discrimination, and Gay and Lesbian Coalition of Kenya. They have also launched an online signature collection drive to compel the Kenya Red Cross to withdraw the hotel from hosting the “Promoting and Protecting Family Values in Challenging Times”-themed conference.

“The event’s so-called ‘family values’ narrative is a smokescreen for policies that push hateful legislation and promote death, discrimination, femicide, gender-based violence, and restrict fundamental freedoms across Africa,” the groups said.  

The pro-life Western organizations that are scheduled to participate in the conference include Family Watch International from the U.S., CitizenGo from Spain, the Ordo Luris Institute from Poland, Christian Council International from the Netherlands, the New York-based Center for Family and Human Rights (C-FAM), and the Foundation for American Cultural Heritage. Their local counterparts include the National Council of Churches of Kenya, the Kenya Christian Professionals Forum, the Africa Christian Professionals Forum, and the Evangelical Alliance of Kenya.

C-FAM President Austin Ruse; Family Research Council Vice President for Policy and Government Affairs Travis Wever; Global Life Campaign Executive Director Thomas W. Jacobson; and the Rev. Ricky Chelette, executive director of Living Hope Ministries, Inc., and president of the Institute of Biblical Sexuality are among the U.S. guest speakers. Other participants include Henk Jan van Schthorst, president of Christian Council International’s board of directors, Ordo Luris Institute President Jerzy Kwasniewskie and his colleague, Rafal Dorosinski, director of the group’s Legal Analysis Center. 

The Kenyan groups through their online petition — “Tell Red Cross Kenya Not to Give Hate a Platform” — has so far raised more than 1,000 of the 10,000 signatures they hope to collect. The petition is addressed to Red Cross Kenya Secretary-General Ahmed Idris and his predecessor, Abbas Gullet, who is the hotel’s director.

“We call on you to immediately cancel this booking and publicly reaffirm Red Cross’ commitment to human rights, health and inclusivity,” the petition reads. “Failure to act will raise concerns about whether (the) Red Cross can still be trusted by the community to lead with empathy and fight for their rights.” 

The Kenya Red Cross, however, maintains the Boma Hotel is a separate entity, even though public records indicate it is one of the facility’s shareholders.

The LGBTQ groups note the hotel should be a safe space that promotes inclusion, not platforms that enable “harmful gathering” for hate and exclusion by “dangerous groups.”   

“By providing a venue for this event, Red Cross directly enables a platform for hate and discrimination — a stark contradiction to the values of inclusivity, humanity, and nondiscrimination that the organization claims to uphold,” they said.  

The organizations further warn that proceeding to host the conference threatens the relationship between the Red Cross and the marginalized communities who have long depended on the humanitarian organization for support and protection. CitizenGo has nonetheless criticized the LGBTQ groups, which it describes as “radical activist groups” for “trying to silence a pro-family event” and asked the Kenya Red Cross and the Boma Hotel not to back down.

“These groups are calling the event ‘hateful’ because it affirms the natural family — marriage between a man and a woman — and the dignity of every human life, including the unborn,” Ann Kioko, the group’s campaign director for Africa and the U.N., said.

Through an online counter signature collection drive, Kioko holds CitizenGo and other groups won’t be intimidated, silenced or apologize to the queer rights groups for defending “our families, our faith and our future”.  

“The real goal of these foreign-funded activist groups is to impose LGBTQ and gender ideologies on Africa — ideologies that have led elsewhere to the confusion of children, the breakdown of family structures and the rise of sexual libertinism that results in abortion, STIs and lifelong emotional and psychological trauma,” Kioko stated.