05/11/2013 – Scene Magazine – From the heart of LGBTQ+ Life

How to Survive a Plague

Posted on 05/11/201305/11/2013 by Besi

How to Survive a Plague, a documentary about the early years of the AIDS epidemic and the efforts of ACT UP and Treatment Action Group (TAG), will be showing at Duke’s at Komedia, Brighton on Sunday, November 10.

Despite having no scientific training, the self-made activists of ACT UP and TAG infiltrated the pharmaceutical industry and helped identify promising new drugs, moving them from experimental trials to patients in record time.

With unfettered access to never-before-seen archival footage from the 1980s and ’90s, filmmaker David France, who will also be present for a Q&A session, puts the viewer smack in the middle of the controversial actions, the heated meetings, the heartbreaking failures, and the exultant breakthroughs of heroes in the making.

Event: How to Survive a Plague

Where: Duke’s at Komedia, Brighton.

When: Sunday, November 10.

For tickets, CLICK HERE:

For more information, CLICK HERE:

More than 500,000 men a year call the Samaritans to discuss issues surrounding their sexual orientation

Posted on 05/11/201309/11/2013 by Besi

New figures released by the Samaritans identify that more than one in ten calls for help (10.9 per cent) from men talked about issues surrounding their sexual orientation. This compares with only one in forty similar calls from women (2.4 per cent) according to the latest snapshot survey of branches in the UK and Republic of Ireland.

A spokesperson, said:

“We get more than five million calls a year, although many of them are so-called “snap-calls” where there is no actual conversation. It takes a few tries for some people to pluck up the courage to speak.”

The accounts for Brighton and Hove LGBT Switchboard for the year ending March 2012 show they they received 900 calls during the year (average 2.5 calls a day).

For the period ending March 2012 Switchboard received £63,895 in grants, £2,316 in donations, £1,458 from fundraising events and £6,152 from counselling activities to deliver their service which according to the accounts also included 213 counselling hours.

Maria Antoniou, interim chair at Switchboard, said:

“The Samaritans exist to help people at times of severe distress or when they are having suicidal thoughts – and that is how they advertise themselves. The ways that Samaritan volunteers are inducted and supported reflects the level of need they deal with – which can include people committing suicide while they are on the phone. Switchboard on the other hand deals with less urgent situations, and caters for people in less severe circumstances who are not at the end of their tether, but mostly need someone to talk a problem over with – and that is how we advertise ourselves. It is concerning if stats are showing that LGBT people are increasingly seeking out a crisis service.”

Catherine Johnstone, Chief Executive of Samaritans, said:

“Samaritans is there for everyone, gay or straight, at any time. We are absolutely confidential and we don’t make judgements. Whatever your problem, call us and we’ll listen to anything you need to say.”

To contact Brighton and Hove LGBT Switchboard, telephone: 01273 20 40 50 between 5pm-9pm on Monday to Friday and 5pm-7pm on Saturday and Sunday. You can leave a message at any other times for a volunteer to call you back.

Section 28 and the Pre-Launch of LGBT History Month 2014

Posted on 05/11/201309/11/2013 by Besi

The people who brought you Schools OUT, LGBT History Month and The Classroom, have announced two separate events to mark the repeal of Section 28 and LGBT History Month 2014 in November.

The first, The Pink Promotion will commemorate the 10th anniversary of the repeal of Section 28, the law which banned the ‘promotion’ and ‘publication’ of anything supporting a LGBT ‘pretend lifestyle’, on Monday, November 18.

Everyone in the UK is encouraged to wear pink, the symbol of diversity on the day. All UK schools are urged to go pink against prejudice on that day and teachers are encouraged to teach just one lesson from the free National Curriculum-linked lesson plan site The Classroom.

To view The Classroom, CLICK HERE:

To send pictures of yourself in pink, email: media@schools-out.org.uk or promotions@schools-out.org.uk

Tweet: @SchoolsOUT1

Facebook: Schools Out UK

The second event is the Pre-Launch of LGBT History Month 2014, which is due to take place at Bramall Concert Hall at The University of Birmingham on Thursday, November 28.

Next year’s theme is Music, which will be celebrated at the Pre-Launch with music workshops in the morning for secondary schools in the Barber Institute of Fine Art, focussing on LGBT musicians Benjamin Britten, Angela Morley, Ethel Smyth and Bessie Smith, who we have chosen to be the Faces of ’14.

Evening proceedings start at 5.30pm with stalls and networking, then Barbara Nice will host the main event from 6.30pm in the concert hall, with something for every musical taste: from opera to Broadway musical; punk to choral. Participants confirmed for the evening include; The Birmingham Gay Symphony Orchestra; the cast of Rent and Rainbow Voices Choir. The best of the morning’s schools will perform and Vix from Fuzzbox will perform ‘Say it Loud’, the anthem for LGBT History Month 2014.

Speakers include Michael Cashman MEP, Councillor Brigid Jones, LGBT History Month Chairs Tony Fenwick and Sue Sanders, and in the centenary year of Benjamin Britten’s birth, representatives of The Britten-Pears Foundation and Katherine Cockin on Ethel Smyth.

EVENT: LGBT History Month 2014 Pre-Launch

WHERE: Bramall Concert Hall, University of Birmingham

WHEN: Thursday, November 28

TICKETS: £5

To book, CLICK HERE: