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EVENTS: Philly Pride Returns September 4
When: September 4, 2021
Where: Starts at the Grand Plaza at Penn’s Landing
Time: 12:00 pm kickoffAbout Philly Pride
Philadelphia is home to some of the oldest events associated with LGBTQ pride in the United States. One of those events is Pride Day, which takes place on the second weekend of June. It encourages guests to share their own stories and experiences about coming out and to help others in need. The Philly Pride Festival usually takes place from Friday to Sunday every year, and always promises a colorful scene!
The Lesbian and Gay Task Force established a small office in Love Park in the 1980s and decided to host a Philadelphia Pride event that was open to the public. Several hundred people came out for the first parade and festival in 1988. In 2018, the organization celebrated the 30th anniversary of the event. Philly Gay Pride Weekend is now one of the largest events of its type in Pennsylvania.
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Alzheimer’s Association Offers LGBTQ Community Resources for Dementia
I’ll be speaking with Stephen Dolainski soon on an upcoming One Thing or Another Podcast about his experience as a caregiver for a friend with dementia, and about Alzheimer’s Los Angeles’ support group for LGBTQ caregivers. – Mark/Editor
From the Alzheimer’s Association
The LGBTQ community may face particular challenges related to Alzheimer’s and dementia, including finding inclusive and welcoming health care providers, less ability to call upon adult children for assistance, concerns about stigma and higher rates of poverty and social isolation.
Dementia and the LGBTQ community
These documents from the Alzheimer’s Association describe the issues that members of the LGBTQ community and their loved ones experience and offer guidance for navigating these challenges.
- Issues Brief: LGBT and Dementia, a collaboration with SAGE, outlines specific issues of concern related to LGBTQ people with dementia, including stigma, family composition, poverty and social isolation.
- LGBTQ Older Adults and Dementia is a guide for LGBTQ community members living with Alzheimer’s or other dementia.
- This infographic on the LGBTQ community and dementia includes important information about the LGBTQ community and dementia, including data about the challenges members of the community face accessing care.
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EVENTS: Provincetown Events Calendar (Since We’re Here Anyway!)
We’re enjoying our annual trip to Provincetown, with a time share this week every year. This is one of my favorite vacation spots, even with the interminable drive from our home in New Jersey. There’s a lot going on in and around PTown throughout the year, so here’s a link to their events calendar. Check it out, sign up for something, and enjoy!
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Survey Says: It’s a Tie! LGBTSr Subscriber Email Results
The survey results are in: 40 percent of respondents would like to see the LGBTSr subscriber email delivered every two weeks. And the ones who’d like to see it every Friday? 40 percent!
What’s the editor and publisher of a popular website for the over-50 LGBTQ audience to do? I’ll be splitting the baby: sending out the newsletter every two weeks until I have a little more to offer you, then moving to the every Friday schedule I had in the beginning 10 years ago. Hopefully by the time I retire next April I’ll have lots to share with subscribers, and maybe another contributor or three. Until then, enjoy LGBTSr delivered to your virtual doorstep every two weeks. Subscribe here! And thanks for taking the survey.
Mark McNease, Editor
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Savvy Senior: How to Buy the Best Blood Pressure Monitor for You
Listen to my podcast interview with Savvy Senior’s Jim Miller here.By Jim Miller
Dear Savvy Senior,
I just found out I have stage 1 hypertension and my doctor recommended I get a home blood pressure monitor to keep an eye on it. Can you offer me any tips on choosing a good one?
Hypertensive Helen
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Ronni Sanlo’s This Day in LGBTQ History (August 13 – 19)
Ronni Sanlo’s This Day in LGBTQ History makes the past ever-present with daily rundowns of historic events and people.
Ronni Sanlo
This Day in LGBTQ HistoryAUGUST 19
1867, GermanyIn Munich, Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (28 August 1825 – 14 July 1895) is jeered when he attempts to persuade jurists that same-sex love should be tolerated rather than persecuted. He is probably the first to come out publicly in defense of what he calls “Uranism” (homosexuality). Ulrichs coined various terms to describe different sexual orientations, including Urning for a man who desires men (English “Uranian”) and Dioning for one who desires women. These terms are in reference to a section of Plato’s Symposium in which two kinds of love are discussed, symbolized by an Aphrodite who is born from a male (Uranos) and an Aphrodite who is born from a female (Dione). Ulrichs also coined words for the female counterparts (Urningin and Dioningin) and for bisexuals and intersexual persons. Ulrichs is likely the first true gay activist and is seen today as the pioneer of the modern gay rights movement. Published in 1870, Ulrich’s Araxes: A Call to Free the Nature of the Urning from Penal Law is remarkable for its similarity to the discourse of the modern gay rights movement. In it “the Urning, too, is a person. He, too, therefore, has inalienable rights. His sexual orientation is a right established by nature. Legislators have no right to veto nature; no right to persecute nature in the course of its work; no right to torture living creatures who are subject to those drives nature gave them. The Urning is also a citizen. He, too, has civil rights; and according to these rights, the state has certain duties to fulfill as well. The state does not have the right to act on whimsy or for the sheer love of persecution. The state is not authorized, as in the past, to treat Urnings as outside the pale of the law.” -
The Weekly Readlines August 13
BIG CUP: THE WEEK’S BIG STORIESNew York Governor Andrew Cuomo resigned rather than face impeachment over multiple allegations of sexual misconduct, paving the way for the state’s first female governor.
Coming to a bridge near you: President Biden’s ambitious infrastructure bill passed the Senate with significant bipartisan support, paving the way (pun intended!) for progress on his agenda.
And as the Delta variant spreads, some large school districts in Texas and Florida are defying their governors and instituting mask mandates. Now we see them, now we don’t.
NEWS FOR QsHow The LGBT + Community Helped Legalize Cannabis
Editor 99LGBTQ Adults Are Facing Hunger At Almost Twice The Rate As Others, New Data Shows
NPR -
Alzheimer’s Los Angeles Offers Virtual Support Group for Caregivers of LGBTQ Persons with Dementia (Second Monday of Each Month)
I was recently contacted by my friend Stephen Dolainski and made aware of the virtual support groups being offered by Alzheimer’s Los Angeles for caregivers of persons with dementia and/or Alzheimer’s. Steve was profiled in 2019 in Spectrum News for his experience with his lifelong friend Al. He’s a member of this virtual support group and we want to let any caregivers know it’s a vital source available for them, and they can join remotely via Zoom every second Monday of the month from wherever they live.
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Survey Says! How Often Would You Like to See Our LGBTSr Newsletter?
As I start to have more content available again at LGBTSr (travel, book reviews, columns, Savvy Senior, podcasts, and much more!), I’d like to know how often current and future subscribers would like to get the newsletter. I’ve been doing it monthly the last few months after getting the site up and going again. What do you think? Just click to take the survey, one question, easy peasy. Thanks! – Mark
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Gay Travelers Magazine: Pride Journey – Colorado Springs
This article first appeared at Gay Travelers Magazine and is reprinted with permission.
Pride Journey: Colorado Springs
By Joey AmatoDid you know that Colorado Springs is also known as Olympic City U.S.A.? Neither did I. Not only is the city home to the U.S. Olympic Training Center, but Colorado Springs recently celebrated the grand opening of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Museum, a stunning state-of-the-art building showcasing the history of the Olympic games as well as athletes that competed. The 60,000 square-foot facility focuses on the core values of the Olympic and Paralympic movements: friendship, respect and excellence, determination, equality, inspiration, and courage. The museum was voted “Best New Attraction” by USA Today and it’s easy to see why.
Visitors enter a grand lobby and take an elevator to the top level of the building where they can view a chronological history of the Olympic and Paralympic torches, medals, and other items. The museum is divided between the summer and winter games and the self-guided tour includes an emotional video highlighting the greatest U.S. Olympic triumphs as well as some struggles Team U.S.A. has faced along the way.
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Ronni Sanlo’s This Day in LGBTQ History (August 1 – 6)
Welcome to another new feature at LGBTSr: Ronni Sanlo’s This Day in LGBT History. I’ll be posting these every Friday going forward, with that day’s reprinted with permission and links to Ronni’s Facebook Page for the others. I’ve enjoyed her fascinating and vital history rundowns for some time, and I’m delighted to share them here. – MarkRonni Sanlo
This Day in LGBTQ HistoryAUGUST 6
1637The Plymouth, Massachusetts court finds John Allexander and Thomas Roberts guilty of “often spending their seed one upon the other” though they are not charged with sodomy. Both were severely whipped, and Alexander was branded on the shoulder and banished from the colony. Although the colony had made sodomy punishable by death the previous year, it required penetration that was not proven in this case. The men were convicted of men of “Lewd Behavior and Unclean Carriage.” John Allexander [was] found to have been “formerly notoriously guilty that way,” alluring others. He was sentenced by the Court to be severely whipped, and burnt in the shoulder with a hot iron, and to be perpetually banished from New Plymouth. Thomas Roberts was severely whipped and returned to his master. Though Allexander and Roberts had long histories of sodomy in Plymouth, they were spared capital punishment. Allexander, a property-owning man, and Roberts, an indentured servant, not only violated sexual morals, but also transgressed class distinctions. Their punishment, banishment for Allexander and the denial of future land ownership for Roberts, was approximately the same as that of people who participated in illicit sexual acts between men and women. -
OATS and CDC Foundation Launch Virtual Course on Digital Essentials for Older Adult Caregivers (Registration Deadline August 5)
Free, 6-Week Online Course Will Empower Attendees with the Skills Needed to Navigate and Understand the Digital World during the Pandemic and Beyond;
Course Developed to Help Address Major Needs and Concerns of Older Adults and Caregivers During Public Health Emergencies — Identified in New CDC Foundation Study
NEW YORK, July 29, 2021 — Older Adults Technology Services (OATS) from AARP and the CDC Foundation announce the launch of a virtual course on digital essentials designed specifically for older adult caregivers and recipients of care beginning on Monday, August 9. The free, six-week course, Digital Essentials for Older Adult Caregivers & Recipients of Care, will empower attendees with the skills needed to navigate and understand the digital world.
This course is part of a CDC Foundation-supported project designed to help older adult caregivers and recipients of care during the pandemic and beyond. Training sessions include staying connected with friends and family members, best practices for navigating the internet safely, ordering groceries directly to your home, understanding online health resources, and more.
*** Caregivers age 60+ and recipients of care are encouraged to register for the course at Seniorplanet.org/caregiving. The deadline to register is THURSDAY, AUGUST 5. ***
Read the Full Press Release Here
About OATS from AARP
Older Adults Technology Services (OATS) from AARP helps older adults learn to use and leverage technology to transform their lives and their communities. Through its flagship program, Senior Planet, OATS works closely with older adults to create extraordinary experiences in-person and online. As one of AARP’s charitable affiliates, the mission of OATS from AARP is “to harness the power of technology to change the way we age.” To learn more, visit www.oats.org or follow @OlderAdultsTech on social media.