Karel Bouley is a history-making LGBTQ broadcaster, entertainer, author, singer, and activist. With his late partner Andrew Howard, he became part of the first openly gay radio talk-show duo on a major-market U.S. station when “Karel and Andrew” joined KFI AM 640 in Los Angeles in 1998. After Howard’s death, Bouley pursued a landmark California wrongful-death case that helped affirm domestic partners’ legal standing to sue retroactively. Karel rose to prominence on KFI AM 640 in Los Angeles and KGO AM 810 in San Francisco, later expanding his work through Free Speech TV, Karel.com, YouTube, and The Karel Cast podcast. His career spans journalism and commentary, including work associated with HuffPost, The Advocate, Billboard, CNN, MSNBC, and LGBTQ entertainment media. He has also released dance music, authored books including You Cannot Say That! and Shouting at Windmills, and remains active as a voting member of NARAS/The Recording Academy, GALECA, and SAG-AFTRA. Karel now lives and creates in Las Vegas. Interview conducted July 8-9, in Kyiv local time.
Karel Bouley and Scott Douglas Jacobsen survey worsening LGBTQ rights worldwide, including restrictions in Senegal, Indonesia, Australia, Bangladesh, Turkey, and the United States. They discuss political scapegoating, religious-right influence, museum censorship, gender-affirming healthcare, J. K. Rowling’s impact, and generational change. Broadcasting from Ukraine, Jacobsen also reports on Russian missile attacks and Patriot shortages, while Bouley connects human rights, healthcare costs, media influence, and the moral value placed on human life amid growing global authoritarianism today.
Karel Bouley: It is that time of week again: This Gay Week with Scott Jacobsen from The Good Men Project. It is The Karel Show. I am Karel. It is time for This Gay Week with Scott Jacobsen from The Good Men Project and many other publications, including rabble.ca and others. He is still in Ukraine, where there is a critical shortage of air-defence interceptor missiles, so we are not going to be so flippant this week. If he hears a bomb, I am going to tell him to take cover. Last week, he heard an explosion. The strike was in the news the next day.
It was in the news the next day, by the way. The one that hit near your location was in the news, and you were live on air with me when it happened. I do not know. I am not thrilled that you are in the middle of this. I know you are a x. I know you are doing your job. I am still not thrilled. When do you come back? Come on, it is so near. That is not good.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: The next seventy-two hours are expected to be dangerous.
Bouley: Alright. You are speaking quietly in the war zone. Maybe you do not want to draw attention to yourself. They say a projectile—one of the larger ones.
Jeremy Piven has that comedy bit where he says, “The Rock never had an acting lesson, and he is the richest man in Hollywood. I am doing a comedy show next to a Dave & Buster’s.” Then he puts the microphone down and says, “Can you hear me in the back?” They say, “Yeah.” He says, “Why? Because I had fucking acting lessons.” Jeremy Piven doing comedy is funny.
Alright, before we begin the other stories, we will start with the one we reported on first. It then became a big, big story, and everyone was talking about it. Of course, we did it here first.
That is, Turkey is not allowing the cruise ship carrying Patti LuPone to dock. I want to say a few things about that. First of all, the voyage was chartered by Atlantis Events and promoted as an all-gay cruise. That description does not necessarily establish the sexual orientation of every individual passenger, but it was an LGBTQ-focused cruise carrying approximately 2,000 passengers, with Patti LuPone scheduled to perform. That is the first thing.
Second of all, I will go back to this: it is time for gays and lesbians to stop what I will call convenience spending. It is time for us to flex more of our financial power. Turkey is not where you should be spending it. Although same-sex sexual activity is legal in Turkey, the country’s authorities have increasingly restricted LGBTQ rights and events. We report here every week on new anti-LGBTQ actions in Turkey. It is not a place where gay people should be spending money right now.
I am glad the ship did not dock there. We do not need to be spending our money there. Pick a port in a country that actually supports us. It became a very, very big story.
Jacobsen: That ship has sailed.
Bouley: Yes, that ship has sailed.
Bouley: Everyone was talking about the gay cruise and Turkey. I was too busy watching Neil the Seal. My entire free time is now spent watching Neil the Seal.
Jacobsen: Tell me who Neil the Seal is. I do not know Neil the Seal. You introduced me to that young boy who cooks up a storm.
Bouley: Carter! Yes, Carter. Carter is on a cruise ship right now. He is on a cruise with his family and cooking. He was making mocktails yesterday. You have to find Neil the Seal. He has more followers than many celebrities.
He is a southern elephant seal who has repeatedly come ashore in populated areas of Tasmania, often during his moulting periods, and causes considerable disruption. He hates traffic cones—or, at least, he enjoys flattening and playing with them. He has blocked roads, interfered with traffic, and prevented people from reaching their vehicles or going about their day. People love him.
There are public fears that Neil could eventually be euthanized if crowds continue approaching him and create a serious safety risk, although authorities have not announced a plan to euthanize him. Thousands of people have signed a petition asking authorities to rule out euthanasia. He is very famous. He is all over the internet.
I love it. He is a rebel. He will not be contained. He is a teenage boy, and he is thrashing everything in his way. I love the little seal. I hope nothing bad happens to him, but that is how life is. The next thing we find out—
The more famous he becomes, the closer people get. The locals know to leave him alone and drive around him. If he is destroying your car, watch. I am at Karel.com daily. You are missing out. Get the podcasts, videos, blog, and recipes at Karel.com. That is Karel.com.
Showtime is here, no time to fear. Karel is so near because Showtime is here. So, on with the show. Let us give it a go. Karel is the one you need to know.
As I was saying, it is always the tourists who have to ruin everything. Alright, let us start this whirlwind cavalcade. Pick a story, spin the wheel, and let us go.
Jacobsen: According to PinkNews, Senegal’s National Assembly amended the Constitution on June 29 to define marriage exclusively as the union of a man and a woman. All 129 assembly members present voted for the change. Same-sex marriage was already not legally recognized, while consensual same-sex sexual activity has been criminalized under Article 319 of the Penal Code since 1965. They have essentially intensified an existing prejudice.
Bouley: Yes. By the way, my listeners and viewers love you. They are going to tell me, “We could not hear Scott.” Bump up your audio if you can.
Here is the situation with Senegal and Dakar. There is considerable prejudice in that region. I used to work with Vesta Williams, the now-deceased R&B artist. She went to Senegal to perform, and when she arrived, she experienced racism that you would not believe.
In America, she was treated like any other Black woman. In Senegal, according to what she told me, she was treated like a white person because she was a light-skinned Black woman. People said that her blood was polluted and that she had slave-master blood in her. She felt like an outsider in Africa, even though she was African American. Senegal has never been a bastion of acceptance for everyone.
I am not surprised. Each week, we discuss African nations and what they are doing. In Senegal, they are not instituting an entirely new ban, as you said. They are tightening restrictions rooted in old hatreds and prejudices.
American religious-right organizations have been involved in anti-LGBTQ advocacy across Africa, including documented strategic cooperation with activists in Senegal. However, I cannot say with certainty that American organizations financed this particular constitutional amendment. There is evidence of broader American influence, but the specific financial claim would require proof.
African countries have larger problems than gay people. Among their greatest problems are finances, funding, and resources. When foreign evangelical organizations offer assistance while promoting particular policies, political leaders may have incentives to listen. Do I know with complete certainty that direct funding caused this amendment? No. I do not. However, this kind of religious-right influence has been documented elsewhere in Africa and, more recently, in Senegal.
It sounds to me like outside religious-right organizations are influencing policy in African countries through money, advocacy, networking, or strategic support. We will see. That is my interpretation. Political actors often go where the support is.
Senegal has other serious problems, including poverty, food insecurity, housing pressures, and vulnerability to drought. The last thing the government needs to worry about is who wants to marry whom. Political leaders may focus on the issue because organized groups encourage them to do so and because targeting a minority can be politically expedient.
Jacobsen: Another factor is political expediency at the expense of a minority population. The phrase “between a man and a woman” also reflects language commonly used by Christian conservative movements.
Bouley: It may reflect Christian conservative terminology, but the Bible does not directly discuss modern civil same-sex marriage or define it in contemporary legal terms. Much of this political framing is constructed later.
I heard a great preacher, Scott—and I almost choked on those words—but I did hear a great preacher. He said, “America is not a Christian nation, so please stop with all of this. If we were a Christian nation—”
We would not have begun by killing and displacing Indigenous peoples and then relegating many survivors to poverty. Estimates of Indigenous deaths throughout the Americas vary enormously, and disease caused much of the catastrophic population decline, alongside warfare, forced removal, enslavement, and colonial violence. Those are not things Christians should do.
We would not then have built much of the nation’s economy through the labour of enslaved people whom enslavers beat, exploited, and killed. That is not a Christian thing to do. The Book of Exodus tells the story of God freeing the Israelites from bondage. However, the Old Testament also contains laws regulating slavery rather than abolishing it, so the Bible’s position on slavery is more complicated than simply saying that God clearly prohibited it.
This preacher said that we would not have founded a nation whose economy and political order were deeply entangled with slavery. We certainly would not have gone to war partly over the preservation and expansion of slavery. That is not something a Christian should do.
He said that we would not discriminate against gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, or any other people. We would not judge them or regard them as anything other than children of God, worthy of dignity as they are. That is what he believed the Bible called Christians to do.
Stop calling yourselves Christians and stop calling it a Christian nation because, first, you do not behave like Christians and, second, neither does your country. I thought that summed it up well.
It is not Christian to legislate against gay people. It is not something that Christ would want, and it is not something the Bible demands in the form of modern anti-LGBTQ legislation.
The Bible does contain passages traditionally interpreted as condemning certain forms of same-sex sexual conduct, so it is not accurate to say that it never addresses the subject. However, the modern word “homosexual” did not exist in the biblical languages and first appeared in a major English Bible translation in the twentieth century. The ancient passages do not discuss modern concepts such as sexual orientation, same-sex civil marriage, or LGBTQ identity in contemporary terms. The word was introduced by translators, not by a pope rewriting the Bible.
They disguise this as a religious or Christian position, but hatred and bigotry are not Christian virtues. Anyone who thinks hatred against gay people is biblically prescribed is not behaving like a Christian. That is according to a preacher, not merely me. Hallelujah. Praise Jesus.
I am ordained, so I suppose I am also a preacher. I can perform legal marriages.
Jacobsen: You can?
Bouley: Absolutely. I have done it. I have performed five marriages.
Jacobsen: “Performed” is the right word for how you do it?
Bouley: Trust me, they were entertained—except at one where I accidentally revealed that the bride was pregnant and the family did not know.
Jacobsen: Some of the most popular programs among humanists in Canada are their officiant programs.
Bouley: How do you know? You have not been there in months.
Jacobsen: Officiants. Sorry.
Bouley: Are you even still Canadian? Slava Ukraini.
Jacobsen: The customary response is “Heroiam slava,” meaning “Glory to the heroes.” It is a Ukrainian patriotic call-and-response.
Bouley: It is somewhat like saying, “Peace be with you.” And responding, “And with your spirit.” I grew up Catholic. We are good at repetition. The priest says something, and the congregation responds with something like, “And with your spirit.” It is very ritualistic and, from the outside, can seem strange.
Shall we move on to Indonesia? The news is not much better there, but we can go there.
True story: Two of my best friends have been together for more than twenty-five years. I have known one for over thirty years and the other for about twenty-five. One partner’s family is from Indonesia. My best friend of thirty years never accompanies his partner when he visits that side of the family.
They have not been legally married, but they consider themselves married. I asked why he never went with him. He said, “They are Indonesian.” I asked, “What does that have to do with it? You are his partner.”
He explained that the family does not accept his life or their relationship. They do not discuss it when his partner is there. I thought, how sad it must be to visit a family that will not acknowledge the most important relationship in your life. The family is the one missing out.
Jacobsen: That is sad—and very real for many people.
Bouley: Yes. Even in the United States, which is not Indonesia, many families still do not accept LGBTQ relatives.
Indonesia has faced the same pattern we have seen elsewhere. During Pride Month in June 2026, harassment and attacks against LGBTQ university students reportedly escalated. Human Rights Watch also reported that at least 10 public universities had adopted discriminatory regulations or restricted student journalism and social media discussions concerning gender and sexual diversity.
Human Rights Watch says these attacks highlight the need for government action. The action is needed, but that does not mean it will happen.
Harassment and attacks against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender university students in Indonesia escalated during Pride Month in June 2026. Human Rights Watch reported that at least ten public universities had recently adopted discriminatory regulations and were restricting student-media coverage and social-media discussions concerning gender and sexual diversity, thereby undermining freedom of expression.
I was not aware that academic freedom and freedom of expression were particularly secure in Indonesia. The administrations of these universities should take immediate steps to protect both. They probably will not. The government should review and revise laws and policies that facilitate attacks against LGBTQ people. It probably will not.
Indonesian authorities are looking the other way during this upsurge in attacks against LGBTQ people. In response to Pride Month celebrations, the conservative Indonesian Ulema Council declared that what it called “sexual deviation” should carry criminal penalties more severe than those for adultery. It also prepared a draft law intended to criminalize campaigning for LGBTQ rights.
These may be people who cheat on their wives. Some may be on the down-low, having same-sex encounters without telling anyone. Some may have private sexual interests of their own, yet they are going to call me a sexual deviant only when I do it properly.
President Prabowo Subianto signed a decree in October 2025 concerning Indonesia’s national defence policy. The decree stated that threats to national security could also arise from non-military factors, including what it called “the spread of LGBT culture.”
Some man in a silk outfit signs a piece of paper, and suddenly we are all expected to fall and wet our pants. Somehow, a blowjob is now a problem for national defence.
I am sorry. You have to laugh. A threat to national security? Are they afraid we are going to throw glitter at the enemy?
Jacobsen: The American military is using similar framing. These governments portray LGBTQ identity as an ideological attack, meaning that they treat it as a form of information warfare.
Bouley: Right. It has little to do with national security and much more to do with public messaging about what is considered acceptable and what is not.
I feel bad about laughing because the underlying violence is serious. Arus Pelangi, Indonesia’s LGBTQ umbrella organization, documented 94 cases of violence targeting LGBTQ individuals, involving 141 victims during 2024 and 2025.
I would say that is unacceptable, but it is only considered unacceptable by LGBTQ people and their allies. It is entirely acceptable to parts of the MAGA movement and to similar movements elsewhere in the world. Whether it is considered acceptable depends on where one is sitting.
Jacobsen: There is a faction within those movements that might help, although it rarely does: libertarians and free-speech absolutists. They do not necessarily have to support LGBTQ rights broadly. They could oppose restrictions on expression and recognize a shared interest in protecting civil liberties.
Bouley: Australia has rejected all eight LGBTQIA+-specific recommendations made during its latest United Nations human-rights review. More than 120 UN member states made approximately 332 recommendations to improve Australia’s human rights protections.
The recommendations concerned a range of marginalized groups, including children, women, people with disabilities, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers. However, LGBTQIA+ people were the only group for whom the Australian government did not accept a single recommendation.
The government did not necessarily accept every recommendation concerning the other groups, but it accepted at least some recommendations relating to them. Heaven forbid that any of those marginalized groups might also include LGBTQIA+ people. The entire thought process escapes me.
There were eight LGBTQIA+-specific recommendations. They included removing exemptions that allow religious schools to discriminate legally against LGBTQIA+ students and staff; eliminating legal exemptions that permit discrimination against transgender, gender-diverse, and intersex people; conducting public-education campaigns to reduce stigma and discrimination; introducing a national ban on conversion practices; prohibiting medically unnecessary surgeries on intersex children; and improving systems that allow transgender and gender-diverse people to change their legal gender without intrusive requirements.
The Australian government declined to accept all eight recommendations.
Alright, the Australian Human Rights Commission criticized the government’s response. It noted that comparable countries generally accept approximately three-quarters of the recommendations they receive. The Australian government agreed only to recommendations concerning reforms that were already in place or underway.
It essentially ignored more than 200 recommendations for new reforms that could substantially improve the rights, health, and safety of First Nations peoples, people with disabilities, women, children, culturally diverse communities, LGBTQIA+ people, and people in detention.
By the way, I know it is LGBTQIA+. I often say “gay.” Get over it; I am old. This leaves a significant gap between Australia’s international human-rights commitments and its domestic practices.
I also generally avoid using the phrase “queer community.” It is not because I am offended by it or because I do not consider myself queer. I grew up in an era when that word was commonly used as a slur, so it is not a term that I use casually.
This is another example of the government being highly selective and targeted in its response: it accepts recommendations concerning some groups but rejects every recommendation concerning this particular group. There is no legitimate reason not to accept them.
Jacobsen: It seems to be a government committed to maintaining the status quo.
Bouley: That is the central issue. In Bangladesh, there have been reports of an anti-lesbian police operation in the southern district of Barguna and anti-LGBTQ vigilante actions in the central district of Faridpur. Human-rights organizations have denounced these actions.
On June 11, an adult woman and two adolescent girls were reportedly sent to jail in Barguna following allegations that they were involved in a consensual same-sex relationship. A thirteen-year-old schoolgirl was also reportedly placed in protective custody under a court order because authorities alleged that she had been exposed to “lesbian propaganda.”
What does that mean? Did she buy a cat? Did she rent a U-Haul?
The detention of adolescent girls raises serious concerns.
You think? Bangladesh’s laws concerning sexual consent are complicated and inconsistent. The minimum legal age for marriage is generally eighteen for women and twenty-one for men, although the country’s child-marriage law contains a controversial exception for undefined “special circumstances.” The Penal Code and later legislation have also contained conflicting age thresholds concerning statutory rape, so it would not be accurate simply to say that the age of consent is eighteen for women and sixteen for men.
Bangladesh has much larger problems than gay people. Is that not true of nearly every country we discuss? Poverty and inadequate housing remain serious concerns. Parts of the country face unsafe water, sanitation problems, food insecurity, overcrowding, and severe climate vulnerability. What are the authorities worried about? Lesbians.
Jacobsen: LGBTQ people are an easy political scapegoat. It is a political token.
Bouley: Exactly. They become a convenient target—apparently even a supposed threat to national security, provided they do it correctly.
What else is on our nonstop list?
Jacobsen: Every week, I have to leave out a substantial number of stories. I have to select those that appear most relevant. There is an enormous list that I could present each week. We could have a much longer show, or we could move rapidly through a larger number of stories.
There are genuinely positive developments, but they are dwarfed by the number of negative stories each week. We are clearly experiencing a global period of regression. There is no question about that, in my opinion.
Bouley: You want me to jump out of the second-storey window. That is what you are trying to accomplish. It is only two floors, so I probably will not hurt myself. I may break something.
I want to expand on that point because this is not happening only to gay people. Educated, progressive, liberal, open-minded, and tolerant people are under pressure across the globe. Right-wing movements are gaining strength in many countries.
Look at what is happening in Great Britain with Nigel Farage. He is a fucking asshole, and he received a £5 million personal gift from Christopher Harborne, a British cryptocurrency billionaire based in Thailand—not “some Chinese guy.” The gift and whether it should have been declared have become subjects of political and regulatory scrutiny. Farage denies wrongdoing and says the money was intended for his personal security.
Now people are saying, “You should not have accepted it,” or, “You should have reported it.” He has resigned his seat so that he can run again in a by-election. He appears likely to win because Clacton is a strong Reform UK constituency, and many voters there support the same populist politics associated with Trump and MAGA.
He seems to think that winning the by-election will put an end to the £5 million controversy. It will not. A local election result cannot settle questions concerning disclosure, parliamentary standards, or any continuing investigation. However, he appears to believe that it will.
He is on the far right, and many far-right leaders and parties are gaining ground.
Then again, in other parts of the world, enlightened, liberal, left-leaning, or socialist candidates are also winning. You are right: there is a battle underway for the soul of many nations, not only the United States.
At the moment, we are in a period when the uglier forces appear to be winning. However, politics is cyclical. In a year, we could be sitting here discussing how half of these measures have been repealed because the political pendulum has swung in the other direction.
The Art Museum of the Americas in Washington, D.C., cancelled Nature’s Wild with Andil Gosine. The works were inspired by Gosine’s 2021 book, Nature’s Wild: Love, Sex, and Law in the Caribbean, which examined art, activism, sexuality, colonialism, and law in the Caribbean.
That same period, the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art made last-minute changes to a travelling exhibition featuring women, queer, and transgender artists. The exhibition, previously titled Transfeminisms, was presented in Scottsdale as There Are Other Skies.
In April 2025, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art postponed Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art, a group exhibition featuring LGBTQ+ African artists. It had been scheduled to open in late May to coincide with WorldPride in Washington, D.C. The museum cited budget constraints and insufficient private funding. However, the timing drew scrutiny because the postponement followed Trump administration directives targeting what it called “divisive” or “anti-American” ideology in federally supported cultural institutions. The exhibition ultimately opened on January 23, 2026.
The timing was difficult to ignore, especially after other WorldPride cultural events were relocated or altered following leadership changes at the Kennedy Center. There appears to be considerable pressure and self-censorship affecting art institutions across the United States.
There was also a work called Transforming Liberty—with “trans” emphasized—which depicted a Black transgender woman as the Statue of Liberty. That work was reportedly removed from an exhibition.
After criticism of another alteration, a Smithsonian spokesperson disputed claims of censorship and said the institution wanted additional time to contextualize the works. That explanation may be accurate, but it also reflects how cautious institutions have become.
Across town in June 2025, the Art Institute of Chicago presented the travelling exhibition devoted to the nineteenth-century French artist Gustave Caillebotte. At the Musée d’Orsay and the Getty, it had been titled Gustave Caillebotte: Painting Men. In Chicago, the title was changed to Gustave Caillebotte: Painting His World.
Caillebotte’s work frequently focused on male bodies, male labour, masculinity, and relationships among men. Some viewers and scholars consider aspects of it homoerotic, although there is no firm evidence establishing Caillebotte’s sexual orientation.
Jonathan D. Katz, the curator of The First Homosexuals, said, “We are not asking them to say that Gustave was gay. We are asking them to leave open the possibility and foreground the ambiguity of these questions in the late nineteenth century.”
The Art Museum of the Americas and the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art reportedly did not respond to requests for comment about the cancellation and alteration of these LGBTQ-related exhibitions.
Many museums depend heavily on private funding. Curators and directors may worry that wealthy donors will withdraw support from exhibitions addressing queer or transgender subjects.
One museum director reportedly told an artist whose exhibition had been cancelled, “Yours is precisely the exhibition I would like to show, and therefore it is the one that I cannot.”
Is that not a powerful statement?
Jacobsen: It is.
Bouley: I want to make a joke because art is gay. Going to a museum is about as gay as it gets.
It is also good for you mentally. Cultural participation may support cognitive and emotional well-being, although visiting museums cannot simply be said to prevent Alzheimer’s disease.
Many important artists were or may have been gay, bisexual, or otherwise sexually nonconforming. Are they going to remove Caravaggio? Historical records indicate that he had relationships and legal encounters involving men, although the exact nature of his sexuality remains debated.
Are they going to destroy the Sistine Chapel because Michelangelo’s sexuality has been the subject of historical discussion? His surviving poetry contains intense expressions of affection toward men, but historians continue to debate how those writings should be interpreted.
What about Frida Kahlo? She had documented relationships with both men and women. Are they going to remove every Kahlo painting?
There are countless artists whose sexualities, gender identities, relationships, and works do not fit neatly within conservative expectations. I do not see how institutions can sanitize art history, but they appear to be trying.
Again, I rest my case: art is gay.
What else do we have? Did we cover everything?
Jacobsen: There is more bad news.
Bouley: Do not worry; there is always more bad news.
Jacobsen: This next item is not necessarily as controversial. It is more of a personal interpretation. It is not entirely new, but it reflects the continuation of an existing dispute.
The owners of the Stonewall Inn have said that J. K. Rowling’s statements have harmed LGBTQ people around the world.
Bouley: I never accepted Camilla Parker Bowles. She knowingly had a relationship with a married man and contributed to Princess Diana’s pain. As far as I was concerned, she should never have become Queen.
Queen Elizabeth II had initially indicated that Camilla would be known as Princess Consort when Charles became king. However, in February 2022, the Queen expressed her “sincere wish” that Camilla would be known as Queen Consort. After Queen Elizabeth’s death and Charles’s accession, Camilla became Queen Consort and was later styled Queen Camilla following the coronation.
On June 30, the final day of Pride Month, Queen Camilla appeared in a photograph with J. K. Rowling. The meeting took place at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh and concerned children’s reading and literacy. However, because of Rowling’s highly controversial statements about transgender people, the timing of the photograph provoked considerable criticism.
“TERF,” I believe, stands for “trans-exclusionary radical feminist.”
It does hurt the LGBTQ movement when someone who wrote books celebrated for inclusiveness, friendship, and multiculturalism becomes one of the world’s most prominent opponents of transgender inclusion. She is among the last people many readers expected to take that position.
Rowling’s public criticism has concentrated heavily on transgender women, women-only spaces, legal definitions of sex, and medical transition. However, it is not accurate to say that she has never discussed transgender men. She has also commented on young people assigned female at birth, transition, detransition, and broader gender-identity policies.
She argues that biological sex matters and that trans women should not automatically be treated as women in every legal or institutional context. Her critics regard many of these statements as demeaning and harmful to transgender people. Rowling rejects the description of herself as transphobic and says that transgender people deserve safety and protection.
My question is this: when did we start looking to the author of Hufflepuff for moral or scientific guidance on transgender issues? She writes fantasy novels for children. Good for her. She also writes adult crime fiction under the name Robert Galbraith, and those books have been commercially successful.
However, she is not a physician, scientist, psychologist, theologian, or specialist in transgender health. Her expertise as a novelist does not make her an authority on gender medicine or public policy.
I could not care less what she personally thinks about transgender people, except that her statements have consequences. When a person with her enormous platform makes these comments, millions of people read them, and that can contribute to hostility toward transgender people.
Many transgender people may not care what she says personally. Who is she, after all? She is an extremely wealthy and influential author who made much of her fortune from children’s novels. She is not a great scientific or philosophical authority.
Her opinion and a quarter will not get you very far. We used to say that it would get you a telephone call, but there are no pay phones anymore. Perhaps it will buy you a paper clip or part of a piece of gum.
It is sad. The owners of the Stonewall Inn have said that they believe Rowling’s global platform and public statements have harmed LGBTQ people around the world. That may give her too much credit, but her influence is undeniably substantial.
Many of the people we discuss are extraordinarily self-important. A leader signs a document and acts as though gay or transgender people have suddenly disappeared from the country. No, they have not. You put on a silk robe and signed a piece of paper with a pen. Gay people are still there. They will continue living their lives, even if they must avoid the police.
We are not going anywhere—especially not to Turkey.
These people act as though their declarations can erase entire communities. How self-important must Rowling be to believe that her opinion on transgender people should determine public policy?
Jacobsen: Her views matter politically because she has considerable wealth, cultural influence, and the ability to support organizations, legal cases, and political campaigns.
Bouley: That is true. She is not a legislator, and she has never held elected office, but she can donate money to groups and campaigns that influence laws and court cases. That gives her views practical consequences far beyond an ordinary private opinion.
She remains internationally famous, particularly among people who grew up with Harry Potter. Younger audiences may also encounter her work through the new television adaptation.
I have not watched it because, for me, there is only one Harry Potter: Daniel Radcliffe. There is no need to redo it. The original films are fine as they are.
Rowling wrote the books, and I read all of them. I no longer own them, but I read them all. They were good books. She is a talented author.
Her opinions about transgender people are another matter entirely. They are dreadful.
Jacobsen: I assume that sexual orientation—whether someone is homosexual, heterosexual, bisexual, or otherwise—is simply part of the diversity of the human species. As I noted last week, variation in sexual orientation is part of our evolutionary and ancestral history. The question is not what one famous person thinks about it. The question is what the scientific evidence tells us about the diversity of human sexual orientation and desire.
Bouley: I think the hardest thing for a human being to say is, “My opinion does not matter.”
When I was on CNN, they asked my opinion about abortion because it was in the news. I said, “My opinion on abortion does not matter.”
They said, “What do you mean? Of course it matters.”
I said, “No, it does not. I am a man. I cannot become pregnant. I do not have a uterus or ovaries. My opinion should not be the determining factor in decisions about women’s reproductive healthcare.”
They were shocked on CNN when I said that.
Jacobsen: If I may, there is a subtle distinction.
It is not that you cannot have an opinion. Rather, when it comes to legislation, public policy, and healthcare, your opinion should not carry more weight than the evidence or the expertise of those who work in those fields.
That is generally my position as well. On many issues, I prefer to defer to people with the relevant training, expertise, and experience because it is their full-time profession.
Bouley: That is why you are here, and I am here. You are a straight man talking about gay issues, so you invite someone with the lived experience of being a gay man to add depth and perspective to these stories because you have not lived my life. Although you could. My viewers think we would make a cute couple. They said you were cute. I assumed they meant we would make a cute couple. Hands off, girls. Hands off.
Jacobsen: For twenty-seven months, I worked seven days a week at an equestrian facility with approximately sixty to sixty-five horses, depending on the season. I did ranch labour, landscaping, gardening, and related work. I was essentially the only full-time male staff member.
Most of the clients were women. Most of the staff were women.
Near the end of my time there, before transitioning into journalism and travelling to Europe, particularly Ukraine during the war, I was speaking with the stable manager. She was a very kind and hardworking woman.
During our conversation, she told me that virtually every staff member and many clients had gone to her because she served as an intermediary between them and the barn manager. A well-known family ran the facility.
She eventually said, “So… everyone has been asking me: Is Scott gay?”
Apparently, nearly everyone had asked.
I had no idea. Everyone had been wondering based on how I presented myself.
Bouley: No one asked you directly?
Jacobsen: No.
Bouley: It is a lot of work around horses. Men, women, horses—what is your pleasure?
Jacobsen: Some things can only be discussed in the proper context.
Some equestrian facilities are run in ways that keep staff and clients quite separate, particularly at wealthier barns. This one was more integrated. Workers, clients, and trainers interacted regularly, creating a more lateral social environment.
Bouley: They all wanted you. They were asking because they wanted to ask you out. That is the reason.
This morning at the park, I saw Cute Man on Wheelie—CMOW, as I call him. He is a cute guy using a wheelchair, and he has two Dobermans. He knows I call him that. I say hello to him every morning.
So, is there a Mrs. Cute Man on Wheelie?
Or a girlfriend?
Or a boyfriend?
I come from a generation when you could not simply ask. You did not ask whether someone was gay. Now I tell myself that those days are gone. Do you want to know something about someone? Ask. Do not play coy.
Still, I think most people would be taken aback if you walked up to them and said, “Are you gay?”
I flirted at the park this morning. Yes, I did.
Jacobsen: Speaking of horse barns, I once asked one of the clients, “Is there such a thing as barn drama?”
She paused, looked at me slyly, and said, “Yes.”
That set the tone for the next two years and three months of working there.
Gossip—particularly horse-girl gossip—is an enormous part of barn and equestrian life. Asking indirectly is part of that gossip culture. People also do not necessarily want to approach someone directly.
Bouley: Any man who rides dressage is gay. Come on. Hello. You are riding a prancing horse.
Jacobsen: People joked with me about that.
I have a jacket from Major League Show Jumping. Five-star competition is the highest international level, below and including Olympic-calibre competition. I did something kind for some women at the barn, and an Olympic trainer gave me the jacket. It is very nice.
We were discussing a major equestrian venue in California, and the person who gave me the jacket said that at least half of the trainers were gay.
Bouley: Yes—hello.
It reminds me of straight men who enter the fashion industry and become upset when a male photographer hits on them. You are a fashion model. Some of the people around you are going to be gay, and some people will sleep with almost anyone to get work. Do not act shocked when someone asks.
Jacobsen: In the United States, more than forty hospitals had restricted or ended some forms of gender-affirming care for young people between January 2025 and May 2026, although several later resumed services after court decisions or policy changes.
Bouley: This is one of the stories we should close with because it illustrates that, when we discuss these policies every week, we are not merely discussing abstract rules. We are discussing people’s lives.
Those hospitals provided healthcare to transgender children, teenagers, young adults, and their families. When hospitals stop offering treatment because of political pressure, patients lose access to clinicians who know their medical histories and understand their needs.
It is not the same as a hospital refusing to treat heart attacks, because the treatments and circumstances are different. However, the underlying concern is serious: political officials are pressuring hospitals to withdraw forms of care that patients, families, and clinicians may consider medically necessary.
Hospitals should make clinical decisions based on evidence, professional standards, patient circumstances, and the law—not merely on the ideological preferences of the administration in Washington.
That is dangerous. It would also be dangerous for a hospital to reject established evidence for vaccination and instead promote an inadequately supported alternative treatment.
Jacobsen: That is why policy matters and why the political tone of a country matters.
Bouley: Exactly. Hostility toward gay and transgender people has become more publicly acceptable in parts of American politics. Donald Trump did not create every form of anti-LGBTQ prejudice, but his movement has helped legitimize language and policies that many public figures previously avoided.
It was bad under Reagan, particularly during the AIDS crisis, but conditions later improved in the United States and elsewhere.
Consider Ireland. In 2015, Ireland approved marriage equality through a national referendum, with 62.07% voting in favour. It became the first country to legalize same-sex marriage by popular vote. Ireland was still a strongly Catholic country, although the Catholic share of the population was already declining.
How did the campaign succeed? One important part of the campaign was presenting marriage equality as a matter of family, citizenship, and national belonging.
“These are our people. They are our children, our brothers, our sisters, our aunts, and our uncles. They are Irish citizens, and they deserve the same rights as every other Irish citizen.”
That appeal to family and national solidarity helped overcome religious opposition. People who might once have been expected to oppose same-sex marriage voted for it.
That is one admirable thing about Ireland: marriage equality became law, and the country moved forward.
Abortion is also legal in Ireland under the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018. It is generally available during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy and later in certain circumstances involving serious risks to the pregnant woman’s life or health or a condition likely to cause the fetus’s death. Access remains contested, and practical barriers continue.
Ireland also introduced legal gender recognition based largely on self-declaration through the Gender Recognition Act 2015. That was a significant advancement, although transgender people still report difficulties involving healthcare access, waiting lists, discrimination, and proposals to change the law.
I saw some troubling rhetoric there after Trump returned to office. People do not realize how long it may take to undo the international damage caused by Donald Trump’s political influence.
That is why I now have this movement: laugh at MAGA, pity them, and feel sorry for them. Many of them behave as members of a personality cult centred on Donald Trump.
A federal jury found Trump civilly liable for sexually abusing and defaming E. Jean Carroll. On July 8, 2026, a federal judge ordered the release of approximately $5.8 million—the original $5 million award plus interest—to Carroll after the Supreme Court declined to hear Trump’s appeal. That is more accurate than saying that the court found him liable for “practically raping her.”
I feel sorry for his followers. Eventually, people may begin laughing at them and treating their politics as socially unacceptable again. When that happens, anti-gay sentiment may once more give way to greater acceptance.
Young people of your generation are generally much more accepting of gay and lesbian people than older generations. Whatever selective stories the media may promote, younger Americans broadly support equal rights and same-sex marriage at high rates. The exact percentage depends on the survey, the question, and the age group, so it is better not to assign a single figure to every younger generation.
As older generations pass away, we are likely to see further generational change. It may take ten or fifteen years, but the broader trend remains toward acceptance.
Jacobsen: A brief footnote: Two questionable narratives are circulating in the American media.
The first is a broad Christian revival among young men. The evidence is mixed. Gallup recently found an increase in the proportion of men aged eighteen to twenty-nine who said religion was very important in their lives. However, analyses of church attendance and religious identification do not consistently demonstrate a widespread revival. Some of the apparent narrowing of the religious gender gap is also explained by young women becoming less religious.
Bouley: That is funny. I said yesterday that Turning Point USA would have people believe that an entire generation of young men is becoming radically Christian.
Jacobsen: There is not enough evidence to make that sweeping claim. Researchers such as Ryan Burge and others who study religion have cautioned against treating a handful of anecdotes or selected surveys as proof of a mass revival.
The second questionable narrative is that young adults are undergoing a broad conservative resurgence. Young men between approximately eighteen and twenty-nine have become somewhat more conservative than young women and, on some measures, somewhat less liberal than comparable young men in recent years. However, younger adults overall remain comparatively progressive on many social issues.
I would go further. Many young people are attracted to democratic socialism and economically left-wing policies. Zohran Mamdani has become a hero to many younger progressives. In Colorado, democratic socialist Melat Kiros defeated longtime Representative Diana DeGette in the Democratic primary for the state’s First Congressional District.
Alright, Scott Jacobsen, reporting from Ukraine for This Gay Week. Tune in every week.
Talk about self-important: a Republican congressional candidate in Broward County says that people cannot be born gay because, apparently, he knows everything.
Thank you very much. Please stay safe. Hide. No heroics.
Jacobsen: I remember waking up to the news that thirty-one people had been killed in the July 2 Russian bombardment. More than one hundred others were reported injured.
Ukraine has defences against many drones, although no system is completely effective. Ballistic missiles are a different and particularly dangerous problem because they travel at very high speeds and require specialized interceptors.
During the July 2 attack, Russia launched seventy-four missiles and 496 long-range drones. Ukrainian authorities said that thirty-one people were killed and 102 were injured.
Bouley: If I am not mistaken, approximately 70% of the weapons used in these attacks are drones?
Jacobsen: Drones often constitute the majority of the weapons launched during large Russian barrages, but the proportion varies considerably from attack to attack. In the July 2 attack, drones accounted for more than 70% of the aerial weapons launched.
Bouley: How often is Russia launching ballistic missiles? They are expensive, and some say Russia is running out of them.
Jacobsen: Predictions that Russia was close to exhausting its missile stocks have repeatedly proved too optimistic. Russia has continued producing and launching ballistic and cruise missiles, although the number and composition vary between attacks.
Western media have sometimes offered overly optimistic interpretations of Russia’s remaining capacity. The overall situation is more dangerous now, particularly because Ukraine faces a critical shortage of anti-ballistic interceptors.
There have been several major attacks during recent months, but I do not want to give precise figures from memory without checking each one. The July 2 attack is clear: seventy-four missiles and 496 drones.
Ukraine may be able to intercept many drones through aircraft, mobile fire groups, electronic warfare, and other systems. Ballistic missiles can cause enormous damage, and only a limited number of systems—most notably Patriot batteries—can reliably intercept certain types of ballistic missiles.
Bouley: Trump recently said that the United States would permit Ukraine to produce Patriot air-defence systems or missiles. However, that is a long-term measure, is it not? Ukraine cannot establish that production within a week. It will take months or perhaps years.
Jacobsen: My first qualification is that I am not an expert in military armaments.
My initial assessment is yes: it is a long-term project. The precise terms of the proposed licence remain unclear, including whether it would cover complete Patriot systems, interceptor missiles, components, or assembly from imported kits.
Experts have estimated that even establishing a pilot production line could require at least eighteen to twenty-four months, while broader domestic production could take considerably longer. Therefore, it would not resolve Ukraine’s immediate shortage of interceptors.
I want to be very clear about why I am here. Two principles are foundational. First, I am here based on human rights. Second, I am here to conduct independent reporting.
The moral framework here is clearer than in many other wars. Russian forces and occupation authorities have committed the overwhelming majority of documented violations and crimes, although Ukrainian personnel have also been accused of violations that should be independently investigated. United Nations investigators have described Russian torture as widespread and systematic.
That is the first point.
The second is that I am here as a foreigner, and I am very conscious that Ukrainians should determine the future of Ukrainian society. That principle is extremely important to them and should be acknowledged. Ukraine is facing military aggression and Russian propaganda while also receiving foreign assistance that may come with political conditions.
Bouley: At the NATO summit on Wednesday, Trump was asked whether the United States would send additional Patriot interceptor missiles while Ukraine develops its own production capacity. He said that “some” could be supplied immediately, while also saying that the United States needs interceptors for its own defence.
He also said that Ukraine could begin producing them “pretty quickly.” The article does not explain what “quickly” means. It sounds as though he is willing to consider sending some interceptors as a bridge until production becomes possible.
However, American inventories are also under considerable pressure. The United States and its allies have used large numbers of air-defence interceptors in recent conflicts, and production cannot be increased overnight.
Jacobsen: The conflicts involving Israel, Iran, the United States, Russia, and Ukraine are not directly equivalent. They involve different legal, military, and geopolitical circumstances.
Bouley: By the way, I was wrong about the price. A modern PAC-3 MSE Patriot interceptor costs approximately $4 million, not $1.3 million. They are extraordinarily expensive.
The export price may be higher once training, logistical support, spare parts, and other services are included. Licensed domestic or European production would involve a different arrangement.
The United States also has an enormous geographical advantage: two oceans on either side.
Jacobsen: Ukraine does not.
Bouley: Right.
Many American presidents and military strategists have observed that the Atlantic and Pacific oceans have protected the continental United States from many of the invasions and wars experienced elsewhere. European countries have historically faced invading armies across land borders in a way that the United States generally has not.
Although, as you all melt over there, geography is not protecting anyone from climate change.
A newly produced Patriot battery costs more than $1 billion. The radar, launchers, command equipment, and other system components cost approximately $400 million, while an initial complement of missiles can cost approximately $690 million. That brings the total to roughly $1.1 billion for a battery supplied with interceptors.
Patriot production also depends on a highly complex supply chain involving hundreds of components, contractors, specialized technologies, and trained personnel. Some components have lead times exceeding two years.
That does not necessarily mean that every missile spends two full years physically moving down an assembly line. It means that expanding production, obtaining specialized parts, training workers, establishing secure facilities, and delivering completed interceptors can take years.
Therefore, Ukraine cannot simply begin building complete Patriot interceptors today and have a large supply available within weeks.
Jacobsen: It would have to form part of a long-term security strategy. Ukraine shares an enormous border with a state that has demonstrated sustained, multigenerational aggression.
Bouley: Right. Domestic production will not solve the immediate shortage, but it could help deter future wars or protect Ukraine after a ceasefire or peace agreement.
Experts estimate that even a pilot licensed production line could require at least 18 to 24 months to establish, with additional time before substantial numbers of weapons become available. The process would require technical documentation, training, industrial infrastructure, secure supply chains, and international cooperation.
Alright, Scott, stay safe.
Every time I wake up and see that ten, twelve, or eighteen people have been killed in Kyiv, I worry.
I am Karel. Be who you want to be, as long as you do not hurt anybody.
Thank you for joining us for This Gay Week, along with our Ukraine update from someone who is actually in Ukraine.
Has that not always been the calculation in American healthcare? Why do we not have universal healthcare? The answer is always, “The cost.”
How much is a human life worth?
I will close with a personal story that illustrates how this works.
My sister’s partner—a man, because nowadays when you say “partner,” people sometimes wonder whether you mean a man or a woman—has been with her for more than twenty years.
I do not like him, and apparently neither does the local wildlife, because a scorpion stung him. They live in Arizona.
Three days ago, he was gardening when he reached down and was stung by a large scorpion. His hand immediately developed intense pain. The pain then spread toward his wrist, elbow, shoulder, and rib cage.
They rushed him to the hospital. According to the account relayed to me, the doctor essentially offered good news and bad news.
The good news is that antivenom is available for severe Arizona bark scorpion envenomation. The bad news was the potential cost.
The doctor asked whether he had insurance. He said that he did not. The family was reportedly told that the treatment could cost approximately $50,000 because the hospital might charge about $10,000 per vial, and multiple vials could be required.
Charges of that magnitude have occurred in Arizona, although the precise price and number of vials vary by hospital, patient, and treatment protocol. Many healthy adults recover with observation, pain control, and other supportive treatment. Antivenom is generally used when serious neurological or systemic symptoms develop.
They asked what would happen without it. The doctor reportedly said that the hospital would observe him and provide supportive care for several hours, treating symptoms as they emerged. If he developed severe complications—such as breathing difficulty, uncontrolled muscle movements, abnormal eye movements, excessive salivation, or another life-threatening reaction—antivenom could become medically necessary.
It is important to distinguish medical criteria from insurance status: emergency departments are legally required to evaluate and stabilize emergency medical conditions regardless of a patient’s ability to pay. However, uninsured patients can still face enormous bills, and cost may influence treatment discussions in practice.
In that moment, his life appeared to have a $50,000 price tag.
I told my sister, “Tell them to give him the treatment. We will deal with the bill afterward.” That might mean negotiating the bill, applying for financial assistance, arranging payments, or—in an extreme case—considering bankruptcy.
That is how the value of a human life can appear in the American healthcare system: as a dollar amount on an invoice.
We are constantly confronted with that question. Unfortunately, human life often seems to be valued very cheaply. Governments are willing to use people as cannon fodder, and individuals sometimes commit murder for trivial amounts of money.
I watch all of these true-crime programs. I found a Netflix series called Worst Neighbour Ever. It tells stories of disputes between neighbours that escalated into serious violence and murder.
We have been talking about whether the United States is a Christian nation. While watching the program, I found myself thinking, “I bet some of these people identify as Christians.”
What happened to “Love thy neighbour”?
In one case, a conflict between neighbours escalated from harassment and assault allegations to a fatal shooting. The precise details are more complicated than one person simply slapping another and then being murdered because the punishment was considered insufficient, but the central point remains: a neighbourly dispute ended in lethal violence.
I have watched many cases in which people robbed someone of five or ten dollars and killed one or two people in the process. Others have killed someone while stealing a vehicle worth only a few thousand dollars.
It is horrifying how little value people sometimes place on another human life—particularly when that life belongs to someone from a marginalized group.
We will leave it there.
I am Karel. Be who you want to be. Do not hurt anybody.
Scott, stay safe. We will see you next week.
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Scott Douglas Jacobsen is a Writer-Editor for The Good Men Project with more than 1,900 publications on the platform. He is the Founder and Publisher of In-Sight Publishing (ISBN: 978-1-0692343; 978-1-0673505) and Editor-in-Chief of In-Sight: Interviews (ISSN: 2369-6885). He writes for International Policy Digest (ISSN: 2332–9416), The Humanist (Print: ISSN, 0018-7399; Online: ISSN, 2163-3576), Basic Income Earth Network (UK Registered Charity 1177066), Humanist Perspectives (ISSN: 1719-6337), A Further Inquiry (SubStack), Vocal, Medium, The New Enlightenment Project, The Washington Outsider, rabble.ca, and other media. His bibliography index can be found via the Jacobsen Bank at In-Sight Publishing comprised of more than 10,000 articles, interviews, and republications, in more than 200 outlets. He has served in national and international leadership roles within humanist and media organizations, held several academic fellowships, and currently serves on several boards. He is a member in good standing in numerous media organizations, including the Canadian Association of Journalists, PEN Canada (CRA: 88916 2541 RR0001), and Reporters Without Borders (SIREN: 343 684 221/SIRET: 343 684 221 00041/EIN: 20-0708028), and others.
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