Happy Pride!
Happy Pride Month!
June marks the start of Pride Month. For over 50 years Pride Month has celebrated the self-expression and individuality of LGBTQ+ people and raised awareness of the issues they face around the world. With hard-won human rights under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with all of our queer community members, whether they're lesbian, ace, aro, gay, trans, bi, intersex, or any other gender or sexual minority.
PassThePride Festival
In recognition of the contributions LGBTQ+ people bring to both our community and to cinema more widely, PassThePopcorn is featuring a collection of user-run events called PassThePride.
Pride Film Fest
First up is the Pride Film Fest, where users can nominate and vote on movies in the categories Best LGBTQ+ Picture, Best LGBTQ+ Acting, Best LGBTQ+ Documentary, Best Gay Sex™, and Best LGBTQ+ Representation. Nominations are open from June 1st through 7th, watching and voting on finalists from the 8th through the 29th, and winners announced on June 30th. Check out the Pride Film Fest forum thread to participate!
Upload Contest
Media created by or for minorities often faces an uphill battle to gain approval, funding, advertising, and access, especially intersectional content. We currently have around 4,000 LGBTQ+ related films on the site, but we want to see that number grow!
Head over to the upload contest forum thread to read the rules and get started.
Stories of Pride
There are often many memorable moments in the process of self-discovery, from an "awakening" - the first things that put someone on a path towards better understanding their gender or sexuality - to coming out, whether for the first time or the five-hundredth. We want to celebrate your joy and share in your hardship, if you're willing to write about it in the Stories of Pride thread.
Get Points for Donations
LGBTQ+ people face many risks when coming out or being themselves - losing friends and family, jobs, housing, healthcare, and more. On top of the challenges of discovering yourself, these mean young LGBTQ+ people are at much higher risk for mental illness, and four times more likely to attempt suicide than their peers.
The Trevor Project is a US non-profit working to end suicide among LGBTQ+ young people with phone/text crisis counseling, advocacy, research, and education.
The Trans Lifeline is a US non-profit that offers a peer support hotline for trans, non-binary, and questioning people, as well as microgrants for name changes and other trans-related expenses.
Last year's charity drive was hosted by gamersriseup, who will again be helping to distribute bonus points to users who donate to one of these charities. This is an excellent opportunity to boost your buffer while supporting a worthy cause, and we'll even make an exception to our usual practice and allow users on ratio watch to exchange this BP for upload credit.
To participate, head over to the charity drive forum thread!
Rule Reminders
Our chat rules ask that each of you treat others as you would like to be treated. Please keep this in mind during your participation, treat others with respect and dignity, and report any messages you find that fail to do so. Trolling, bad-faith discussions, "just asking questions", and other disruptive behavior will not be tolerated.
Special Thanks
We would like to thank gamersriseup for hosting the donation drive; F00D, Ohelig and hyperstupid for bankrolling these PassThePride events; komic and heresie for hosting them through the PassThePride account, and the #lgbtq IRC channel for their input.
Now go gay up the place!