Happy Black History Month. If you don’t hear that from anyone else today you’ve heard it from me. It might be the shortest month of the year but absolutely has the power to be the most impactful. As a person living at the intersections of being Black and Queer we are going to celebrate that this month. I’m going to highlight a Black person in history who lives or lived at those very intersections. I’m going to love doing it & I hope you enjoy listening to the stories. Now up first, Netflix is suspended from the HRC’s Corporate Equality Index. Da Brat & Judy are expecting a baby and our Black History Month spotlight today is on Stormé DeLarverie.

00:00 – Welcome & Intro

00:54 – Rate & Review Queer News Ad

01:20 – Intro Music

02:01 – Netflix is suspended from the HRC’s Corporate Equality Inde

05:30 – Da Brat & Judy are expecting a baby

06:17 – Black History Month spotlight today is on Stormé DeLarverie

07:55 – Anna’s Got A Word

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Family, this is your favorite queer radio personality Anna DeShawn here with our queer news from today.

Happy Black History Month. If you don’t hear that from anyone else today you’ve heard it from me. It might be the shortest month of the year but absolutely has the power to be the most impactful. As a person living at the intersections of being Black and Queer we are going to celebrate that this month. I’m going to highlight a Black person in history who lives or lived at those very intersections. I’m going to love doing it & I hope you enjoy listening to the stories. Now up first, Netflix is suspended from the HRC’s Corporate Equality Index. Da Brat & Judy are expecting a baby and our Black History Month spotlight today is on Stormé DeLarverie. 

Our leading story for today is about Netflix and the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index. Every year HRC publishes the Corporate Equality Index which measures a company’s LGBTQ inclusiveness based on a number of criteria; protections from workplace discrimination for LGBTQ people, equitable benefits for LGBTQ+ employees and their families, supporting an inclusive culture inside and outside of the workplace, and social responsibility, which includes whether companies have donated to LGBTQ causes. I think these are all quality ways to measure a company’s policies as it pertains to the LGBTQ community. Well, Netflix has been on the list with a 100 percent score for five years in a row but not this year. In it’s landmark 20th edition of the index HRC decided to suspend them from the list for the way they handled the fallout from Dave Chappelle’s comedy special “The Closer” and good for them. 

I watched it to get my own take and I thought it was disgusting. If you’d like to hear my review visit episode 9 of the podcast which was published on November 29th or checkout my TikTok page where I dropped a video about it as well. Netflix of course disagrees with being left off the list. There statement read, “While we have more work to do, we’ve made real strides on inclusion, including for our LGBTQ+ colleagues…For example, we offer comprehensive transgender and non-binary-inclusive care in our U.S. health plans as well as adoption, surrogacy, and parental leave for same-sex couples. And we’ve also worked hard to increase representation on screen. Netflix is the only major entertainment company to have commissioned and published independent research into diversity in our content so that we can better measure our progress.” I mean these are all really great points & this is why they have been on the list 5 years in a row and identified as a “Best Place to Work for LGBTQ+ Equality” distinction by HRC but according to Jay Brown, senior vice president of research and training at HRC “It’s really about how they’re living into their values, and if they can do more.” Now that’s the point. That right there. Jay went on to say, that the group has been engaging with Netflix since the release of the special, but that “when push came to shove,” it “just didn’t feel like they had earned the distinction of Best Places to Work, really given the harm that was experienced by their trans workers as a result of the way they handled ‘The Closer.” 

HRC debated on whether to give Netflix a 25-point deduction given its history but decided the suspension felt more appropriate given where we are at this moment. Jay is hoping that this suspension sends a message to other companies he said, “My hope is that companies understand that their work is powered by individual workers who have really incredible perspectives on the product, and that involving them early and often and throughout the process is going to do better for your company and for your workers — and trans workers are no different there … Trans workers’ voices matter.” HRC dropped the mic on them with this one. Period. I want to add that there are 842 businesses that met all the criteria to earn a 100% rating. I’ve included a link to the report in the show notes so check it out and see if your company made the list. 

Next, one of my favorite lesbian couples Da Brat & Judy made a big annoucement yesterday on the gram. They’re expecting! They posted a couple of pics hugged up with Brat’s arms around Judy’s waist making hearts around her belly. The caption read, “We are extending the family”. I’m so happy for them. We all got a little glimpse into their life with their reality show Brat Loves Judy and since then I have been a fan. I might be a bigger fan of Judy’s at this point just because I respect her hustle so much. She is on another level, okay. Here’s to them having a low stress and drama free pregnancy. Pregnancy is not for the faint of heart and I’m rooting for them. Congratulations Brat & Judy! 

It’s Black History Month and in every episode this month we are going to celebrate living at the intersections of being Black & Queer. There are so many Black LGBTQ folks who have made history but their sexuality was left out of the story. I’m here to change that. E3 Radio is here to change that. Who they are is just as important as what they did and acknowledging the full depth and breath of someone’s existence can not be understated. We deserve to be seen for all of who we are. Anything less is unjust. So with that we kick off our Black History spotlight with Stormé DeLarverie. As published by NBC News, A biracial, butch lesbian, Stormé was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, and was always a performer. As a teenager, she joined the Ringling Brothers Circus where she rode jumping horses. Then from 1955 to 1969, she toured the black theater circuit as the MC — and only drag king — of the Jewel Box Revue, the first racially integrated drag revue in North America. She worked as a bouncer for several lesbian bars in New York City in the ‘80s and ‘90s, and held a number of leadership positions in the Stonewall Veterans Association. She also served the community as a volunteer street patrol worker, and as a result, was called the “guardian of lesbians in the Village.” Beyond her LGBTQ activism, Stormé also organized and performed at fundraisers for women who suffered from domestic violence and their children. Stormé we see you & we salute you. 

To close out our first Black History Month episode I wish I could play Lift Every Voice & Sing oh but the copywriters would come after me. I ain’t gon do it but I love my Black National Anthem. It was written by James Weldon Johnson in 1900 and composed by his brother John Rosamond Johnson. The world heard it for the first time as part of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday celebration. Now I want to leave you with this portion of the song,  

Stony the road we trod,

Bitter the chastening rod,

Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;

Yet with a steady beat,

Have not our weary feet

Come to the place for which our fathers died.

We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,

We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,

Out from the gloomy past,

’Til now we stand at last

Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of our weary years,

God of our silent tears,

Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;

Thou who has by Thy might

Led us into the light.

Till tomorrow family, peace. 

Sources 

Netflix cut from LGBTQ corporate equality report over Dave Chappelle’s ‘The Closer’

https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/netflix-cut-lgbtq-corporate-equality-report-dave-chappelles-closer-rcna13827

Corporate Equality Index 2022

https://www.hrc.org/resources/corporate-equality-index

Brat & Judy’s Instagram 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CZZkE3_O_Q6/

16 queer black pioneers who made history

https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/black-history-month-17-lgbtq-black-pioneers-who-made-history-n1130856#anchor-StormDeLarverie19202014

Kirk Franklin – “Lift Every Voice And Sing” with Lyrics

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