Pet of the week • 10-30-20

On Saturday, April 27, Iraq passed a new anti-LGBTQ+ law criminalising same-sex relationships and transgender identities. The Law on Combating Prostitution and Homosexuality was passed as an amendment to the country’s existing anti-prostitution legislation and reportedly claims to “protect Iraqi society from moral depravity and the calls for homosexuality that have overtaken the world”.

Kanye West is being sued for racial discrimination by one of his former security guards.The lawsuit has been brought forward by Benjamin Deshon Provo – who worked for the rapper (who now goes by Ye) at both his Donda Academy school and at a warehouse used as storage for the Yeezy brand of clothing.In the filing, the former employee alleges that the artist subjected his Black employees to “less favourable treatment than their White counterparts”, and People reported that the lawsuit also claims that Ye “frequently screamed at and berated Black employees”, and ultimately fired Provo for refusing to cut his dreadlocks.The former member of staff began working for the controversial rapper in August 2021, after six months at the Donda Academy. This, he alleges, is when the school relocated and “assigned additional job duties” to employees “as a result of a lack of staffing”.In the lawsuit, he accuses Ye of demonstrating a “stark difference” in the way he treated his Black employees compared to other members of staff, and claims that the rapper was “always abrupt, abrasive, and demeaning of Plaintiff and his Black counterparts” (via Metro).

A man was shot to death shortly after 1 a.m. on Saturday, April 27, inside the Desperados Burgers & Bar at 1342 U St., N.W., which is located on the same block a short distance away from the LGBTQ nightclub Bunker D.C. and around the corner less than a block away from the recently opened LGBTQ bar Crush on 14th Street, N.W.

Gregory Fitzgerald Gibert, 53, who was out on probation, is charged with the second-degree murder of 37-year-old Andrea Doria Dos Passos, a transgender Latina woman who was found deceased in front of the Miami Ballet company facility by a security guard this past week.

GLSEN will host its annual Respect Awards April 29 in New York, with guests including Miss Peppermint and Billy Porter.