National
GLAAD gives social media failing grades over lack of protections for LGBTQ users
Findings: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and YouTube and all platforms receive scores under 50 out of 100
GLAAD, the world’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) media advocacy organization, released the findings of its second annual Social Media Safety Index (SMSI), a report on LGBTQ user safety across five major social media platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok.
The outcome says GLAAD is an utter failure to protect the safety of LGBTQ+ users.
The 2022 SMSI introduces a Platform Scorecard developed by GLAAD in partnership with Ranking Digital Rights and Goodwin Simon Strategic Research. The Platform Scorecard utilizes twelve LGBTQ-specific indicators to generate numeric ratings with regard to LGBTQ safety, privacy, and expression. A listing of the indicators is available here and below. After reviewing the platforms on measures like explicit protections from hate and harassment for LGBTQ users, offering gender pronoun options on profiles, and prohibiting advertising that could be harmful and/or discriminatory to LGBTQ people, all platforms scored under a 50 out of a possible 100:
● Instagram: 48%
● Facebook: 46%
● Twitter: 45%
● YouTube: 45%
● TikTok: 43%
Primary Platform Scorecard indicators include:
● The company should disclose a policy commitment to protect LGBTQ users from harm, discrimination, harassment, and hate on the platform.
● The company should disclose an option for users to add pronouns to user profiles.
● The company should disclose a policy that expressly prohibits targeted deadnaming and misgendering of other users.
● The company should clearly disclose what options users have to control the company’s collection, inference, and use of information related to their sexual orientation and gender identity.
● The company should disclose training for content moderators, including those employed by contractors, that trains them on the needs of vulnerable users, including LGBTQ users.
“Today’s political and cultural landscapes demonstrate the real-life harmful effects of anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and misinformation online,” said GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis. “The hate and harassment, as well as misinformation and flat-out lies about LGBTQ people, that go viral on social media are creating real-world dangers, from legislation that harms our community to the recent threats of violence at Pride gatherings. Social media platforms are active participants in the rise of anti-LGBTQ cultural climate and their only response can be to urgently create safer products and policies, and then enforce those policies.”
GLAAD also released new data from a May 2022 study conducted with Community Marketing & Insights. 84% of LGBTQ adults agree there are not enough protections on social media to prevent discrimination, harassment, or disinformation. 40% of all LGBTQ adults, and 49% of transgender and nonbinary people, do not feel welcomed and safe on social media.
Additionally, the newly released 2022 ADL Online Hate and Harassment report found that 66% of LGBTQ users experienced harassment online, with 54% of LGBTQ users reporting severe harassment including sustained harassment, stalking, or doxxing.
In addition to the Platform Scorecard, GLAAD’s SMSI provides specific recommendations to each platform to improve LGBTQ safety.
Additional trends reported in the SMSI include:
● Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric on social media translates to real-life harm, including reported levels of increased severe harassment for LGBTQ users when compared to 2021.
● The problem of anti-LGBTQ hate speech and misinformation continues to be a public health and safety issue. Viral misinformation and inaccuracies have been cited as drivers of many of the nearly 250 anti-LGBTQ bills introduced in states around the country this year. Platforms are largely meeting this dangerous misinformation with inaction and often do not enforce their own policies regarding such content.
● Issues like the promotion of so-called “conversion therapy,” targeted misgendering and deadnaming, and lack of true transparency reporting, remain prevalent for select platforms. Only select platforms prohibit actions like targeted misgendering and the promotion of conversion therapy. These actions need to be prohibited across the industry.
● Companies possess the tools they need to effectively curb anti-LGBTQ hate and rhetoric but instead are prioritizing profit over LGBTQ safety and lives.
Recommendations across platforms include:
● Improve the design of algorithms that currently circulate and amplify harmful content, extremism, and hate.
● Train moderators to understand the needs of LGBTQ users, and to moderate across all languages, cultural contexts, and regions.
● Be transparent with regard to content moderation, community guidelines and terms of service policy implementation, and algorithm designs.
● Strengthen and enforce existing community guidelines and terms of service that protect LGBTQ people and others.
● Respect data privacy, especially where LGBTQ people are vulnerable to serious harms and violence. This includes ceasing the practice of targeted surveillance advertising, in which companies use powerful algorithms to recommend content to users in order to maximize profit.
The May 2021 inaugural edition of the Index was the first-ever and only tech-industry baseline of LGBTQ user safety. In this past year, GLAAD has worked with platforms and applauded major achievements within the tech accountability space, including TikTok’s amendment to its community guidelines in March 2022 in which an explicit prohibition against targeted misgendering and deadnaming was enacted, per the 2021 SMSI’s recommendation. As noted in this year’s SMSI, such a prohibition does not exist on Facebook, Instagram, or YouTube.
Congressional hearings, alarming research findings of the spread of misinformation, and massive media coverage have laid bare the urgent need for independent regulatory oversight of these companies — with virtually universal agreement about the need for industry-wide transparency and accountability. The GLAAD SMSI adds LGBTQ recommendations to this necessary and urgent dialogue.
“All platforms should follow the lead of TikTok and Twitter and should immediately incorporate an explicit prohibition against targeted misgendering and deadnaming of transgender and non-binary people into hateful conduct policies,” said GLAAD’s Senior Director of Social Media Safety, Jenni Olson. “This recommendation remains an especially high priority in our current landscape where anti-trans rhetoric and attacks are so prevalent, vicious, and harmful. We also urge these companies to effectively moderate such content and to enforce these policies.”
Read the entire report and its findings:
Arizona
Shooting outside gay bar in Ariz. leaves three dead
Tucson police investigating double murder-suicide as a hate crime
Three people were fatally shot outside a gay bar in Tucson, Ariz., early Monday morning, about a mile from the city’s nightlife district.
Police have said the shooting, which took place in the parking lot of Venture-N bar at 1239 N. 6th Ave., was likely a hate crime and a double murder-suicide following a verbal altercation.
The suspect, Ousman Ceesay, allegedly shot Vincent Anthony Siqueiros and Cameron Davis Capara while they were outside the club around 12:30 a.m. Monday.
Reports show Capara and Siqueiros were pronounced dead at the scene. Ceesay died after being taken to a local hospital with gunshot wounds.
Police have also said that Ceesay was carrying a list of LGBTQ businesses at the time of the shooting.
Arizona Public Media has said police are investigating the case as a hate crime because the suspect was carrying a note containing the names of multiple LGBTQ-associated businesses.
“I am deeply saddened that another senseless loss of life has happened in our community,” Tucson Police Chief Monica Prieto said in a statement. “Bias-based crimes are especially heinous and have no place in our community.”
According to Prieto, there is no imminent threat to the community, and the Tucson Police Department is working to provide extra protection to various LGBTQ businesses across town.
Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva, who represents the area, issued a statement condemning the act of violence, which appears to have been at least in part motivated by homophobia.
“I am disgusted and deeply saddened to learn of a targeted act of hate and the cold-blooded murder of two members of our LGBTQIA+ community, Vincent Siqueiros and Cameron Capara, at the Venture-N bar in Tucson last night. This horrific attack is a painful reminder that even in welcoming communities like Tucson, hate and violence against the LGBTQIA+ community still exist.”
“When that hate is combined with easy access to firearms, the consequences can be deadly. I am sick and tired of Congress refusing to lift a finger to protect our communities while, every day, dozens of people are shot and killed across the country. It does not have to be this way. The House of Representatives is returning to session this week, and our first action should be passing common-sense gun safety reforms that we know can save lives.”
Other federal lawmakers also condemned the shooting.
The Congressional Equality Caucus, which is made up of federal legislators advancing LGBTQ interests, issued a statement after news broke.
“Our hearts are with the friends and loved ones of the victims of this devastating attack outside a Tucson gay bar and with the Tucson LGBTQI+ community,” it said on X. “No one should fear violence because of who they are — and we’re going to continue fighting to build a world where no one does.”
The Human Rights Campaign, the largest LGBTQ organization in the country, released a statement following the shooting.
“We are heartbroken by the loss of Vincent Anthony Siqueiros and Cameron Davis Capara and our hearts are with their families, loved ones, and the entire Tucson LGBTQ+ community. Once again, we are reminded that gun violence robs people of their lives, destroys families, and devastates communities.”
A candlelight vigil honoring the victims is planned for Sept. 2 at 6:30 p.m. at Catalina Park in North Tucson.
Congress
HRC president campaigns for Chris Pappas in NH
Gay congressman running to succeed retiring U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen
Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson on Sunday campaigned for U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.) in New Hampshire.
Robinson traveled to Manchester, the state’s largest city, nine days before the Sept. 8 primary that will determine who will vie for retiring U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.)’s seat.
We’re hitting the pavement across New Hampshire to fight for a freer, fairer future for everyone.
Glad to have Human Rights Campaign President @KelleyJRobinson join us for a canvass launch in Manchester today. pic.twitter.com/XWCEaQxy4o
— Chris Pappas (@ChrisPappasNH) August 30, 2026
Former U.S. Sen. John E. Sununu, who represented New Hampshire in the U.S. Senate from 2003-2009, will face off against former U.S. Sen. Scott Brown, who represented Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate from 2010-2013, in the Republican primary.
Karishma Manzur is among the Democrats challenging Pappas.
A poll the University of New Hampshire Survey Center released on Aug. 26 shows Sununu is ahead of Brown. The same survey shows Pappas ahead of Manzur and his other Democratic challengers.
The UNH Survey Center poll shows Sununu ahead of Pappas by a 45-43 percent margin if they were to face off in the general election. The margin of error is +/-2.1 percent.
Pappas would become the first openly gay man elected to the U.S. Senate if he were to win in November.
National
Milo Yiannopoulos deported to UK
ICE arrested far-right provocateur in New Orleans on Thursday
Editor’s note: The Department of Homeland Security on Saturday said Milo Yiannopoulos has been deported to the U.K.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Thursday arrested far-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos.
A DHS spokesperson in a statement sent to the Washington Blade said ICE arrested Yiannopoulos, who they described as “an illegal alien from the United Kingdom,” at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.
The DHS spokesperson said Yiannopoulos “legally entered the country” in New York on May 14, 2019.
“He chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s laws,” said the spokesperson.
The DHS spokesperson said an immigration judge on July 22 “issued a final order of removal” for Yiannopoulos “after failing to show up for his immigration hearing.” The Times-Picayune newspaper in New Orleans on Friday reported Yiannopoulos is being held at an ICE detention center in Alexandria, La., which is about 200 miles northwest of the Crescent City.
“He will remain in ICE custody pending removal,” said the DHS spokesperson.
Yiannopoulos has, among other things, repeatedly targeted transgender people and Muslims.
The American Conservative Union, which organizes the annual Conversative Political Action Conference, in 2017 disinvited Yiannopoulos from speaking at that year’s CPAC after a video in which he appeared to condone sex between adults and underage boys emerged. Yiannopoulos subsequently resigned from Breitbart News, a far-right news website, where he had been a senior editor.
Yiannopoulos later that year married his boyfriend in Hawaii. The far-right provocateur in 2021 claimed he was an “ex-gay.”
The Australian government in 2019 banned Yiannopoulos from entering the country “on character grounds.” Yiannopoulos was also banned from Facebook, Twitter (now X), and other social media platforms.
The Times-Picayune reported Yiannopoulos “most recently worked for” Ye, formerly known as Kanye West.
The controversial rapper is scheduled to perform in New Orleans on Friday.
Laura Loomer, a far-right conspiracy theorist who is close to President Donald Trump, has called for Yiannopoulos’s deportation. Loomer on Friday wrote on X that she “reported him to ICE and the FBI” after he “called for me to be assassinated.”
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