UPDATED! Tarek and John in their own words

" ... arrested, searched, caged, questioned, interrogated, videotaped with a ‘Syrian terrorist’, slapped, beaten, ridiculed, hot-boxed, refused phone calls, stripped, shaved bald, accused of being foreign mercenaries. Was it our Canadian passports, or the footage of Tarek performing CPR, or our ice cream wrappers that set them off? They screamed ‘Canadian’ as they kicked and hit us. John had a precisely etched bootprint bruise on his back for a week."

NSRAP Gala Features Canada’s Foremost Queer Journalist

 "I got hooked, I guess, on empowerment, the transformation of The Helpless Queer with no history and an unlikely future into Someone, into a group of Someones, who uncovered a history, who found heroes, who grabbed today and shook it till tomorrow fell out of its pocket and there was a place there in it for us."                            

Queer Acts Theatre Fest Wants You To Play! Deadline Oct. 10

"Halifax Pride’s QUEER ACTS Theatre Festival is pleased to announce its call for submissions for the festival’s 2014 edition. Interested individuals and groups are encouraged to submit a proposal via email on or before October 10, 2013."

I wanna hold your hand….. but what if it isn’t safe?

"Although LGBTQ Canadians have enjoyed equal protections under the law and access to same-sex marriage for quite some time, day-to-day experiences of prejudice and discrimination still exist. One of the most common instances that can lead to such experiences is the simple act of holding hands with the person you love. It’s an act that shouldn’t lead anyone to take notice, but it does. Some people react with happy smiles, but others react with looks of disgust, verbal assaults or physical aggression. Is the solution to stop holding hands and effectively take our relationships back into the closet?" Dr. Karen L. Blair

Solidarity Halifax’s Peoples History Includes NS LGBTQ Struggle

"St. FX History Prof Chris Frazer is well known in Halifax as Drag Artist C. Leah Cruise. Chris will be presenting on queer activism at A People’s History of Nova Scotia. ... Chris will likely be talking about why social equity within the LGBTQ community has been such an uneven development." 

Real Men Get Checked Out!

Eight local gay men are the faces of the recently launched Check Me Out campaign aimed at gay and bi (and bi-curious) men. The smiling models each appear in ads and posters wearing a Check Me Out T-shirt beside the caption “I get checked out... will you?” in what looks like a personal ad.“I liked the idea of ... using someone people might know,” says campaign model and local journalist Simon Thibault.

Art+Activism@NSCAD Host Talk with Visiting Artist Chase Joynt

"I began this project in search of a counter-narrative to my experiences of mastectomy and hysterectomy as they relate to gender and embodiment. What I discovered was an artistic and intellectual collaboration that served to collapse the boundaries of a gendered body as they relate to these surgeries; and conversation that complicated the very notion of a counter-narrative in service of greater things lost and now gained."

                                                                                                            - Award winning artist, Case Joynt

Garry Williamz Delightz Crowdz with Show Tunez at Menz!

On behalf of Wayves, I recently sat down with my friend Garry Williams to chat about his regular, and increasingly popular, Saturday night singalong gig, Show Tunez at Menz Bar. For those who don't know Garry, he's the guiding light of DaPoPo Theatre, one of Halifax's queerest and most political theatre troupes. Garry grew up in Germany, which (to me at least) seems an unlikely place to have fallen in love with that most American of genres, the Broadway musical. But that's just what he did. More after the Jump!

Queer Cancer Researcher Gives Free Talk in Halifax

"On Tuesday, October 1st, Dalhousie’s University's Gender and Health Promotion Studies Unit (GAHPS) and prideHealth are partnering to present  a free, lunch-time talk with Dr. Mary K. Bryson, principal investigator for Cancer's Margins and the Choreography of Knowledge: Toward a Queer Biopolitics and the Mobilization of Public Health Knowledge."

Queer Filmmaker's Series 'Forgive Me' Debuts Tonight with Rave Reviews

Thom Fitzgerald is a busy, busy man! In addition to almost single-handedly saving the Atlantic Fringe Festival, last year Nova Scotia's premiere queer film auteur toured the world with his film, Cloudburst, winning 'Audience Choice' awards at festival after festival. Last fall, he began producing the first of two pilot television series, both of which will feature queer characters and content. Forgive Me premieres tonight and it's getting raves!