Taxpayer-funded adoption and foster care agencies in Michigan may use their religious beliefs as a reason to discriminate against same-sex and unmarried couples, a federal judge ruled yesterday, overturning a settlement that had been reached earlier this year.
Toy giant Mattel has just launched a new line of dolls without pre-assigned genders. Each doll comes with long and short hairstyle options and a variety of wardrobe pieces including pants, skirts, and more, so kids can make them fit whatever gender identity and expression they wish.
Every social justice hero was once a child. Some became activists as children; others did so as adults because of things they experienced when they were young. A new middle-grade book from the prolific Robin Stevenson explores the childhoods of activists in the LGBTQ, racial, disability, labor, immigrant, and women’s civil rights’ movements, among other areas, offering young readers both information and inspiration.
This week is Banned Books Week, the annual event from the American Library Association (ALA) honoring the freedom to read! Half of the books in the ALA’s latest Top Ten Most Challenged Books list are there because someone objected to their LGBTQ content—underscoring how much work is yet to be done on the path to equity and justice. Here are some ways you can support Banned Books Week and the authors behind books that have faced challenges!
A children’s book that tells of one boy creating a love song for another, carrying on the Mexican serenata tradition of serenading one’s beloved, is the inspiration for an award-winning new short film.
When the first same-sex couple to marry legally in the United States, Hillary and Julie Goodridge, was feeling stressed from public attention, they didn’t want to seek couples’ counseling. Julie told NPR this past May, “It felt like too much of a risk.” They divorced a few years later. Their daughter Annie, who was 10 at the time, said in retrospect, “I felt like our family let everyone down.” Their situation highlights a long-time problem for the LGBTQ community and other marginalized groups: the pressure to be perfect. Two new books, however, each look at topics often associated with failure—relationship break-ups and reproductive losses—in order to help LGBTQ people and our children better navigate them.
A fourth married, same-sex couple is suing the U.S. State Department for refusing to recognize the U.S. citizenship of their child—in this case, despite the fact that both parents are U.S. citizens. The department is treating the child as “born out of wedlock.”
Jessica Love, whose picture book Julián Is a Mermaid tells the story of a gender creative child and his grandmother, has won the 2019 Klaus Flugge Prize for “the most exciting and promising newcomer to children’s picture book illustration.”
The SEA LIFE London Aquarium has announced that a chick born recently to a female penguin pair will be the first penguin at the aquarium not to have an assigned gender. Regardless of gender, however, we know it will look good in a tux when it grows up!
A new book offers LGBTQ-inclusive, simple explanations of terms and ideas about gender, sexuality, and family for children in older elementary grades.
