The Global Rise of Anti-LGBTQ Laws (Part Three) | This Way Out Radio Episode # 1990
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Ebony Joseph concludes her three-part series on the global rise of anti-LGBTQ laws with a report from activists in Nigeria and Kenya confronting criminalization, censorship, and severe funding cuts. Organizers describe how anti-LGBTQ legislation affects housing, employment, healthcare, and online safety, while warning that many so-called “family protection” bills across Africa are linked to broader international networks of authoritarian politics and religious conservatism. Despite mounting political hostility, grassroots groups continue building coalitions, supporting vulnerable LGBTQ people, and fighting for dignity, equality, and belonging.
In this week’s Newswrap, a record-breaking boycott rocks the Eurovision Song Contest as protests over Israel’s participation intensify amid the war in Gaza, while a new GLAAD report warns that major social media platforms are becoming increasingly unsafe for LGBTQ users. Additional stories include Japan’s growing legal recognition of non-binary people, the delayed opening of a landmark African LGBTQ art exhibition in Washington, D.C., and the European Commission’s decision not to pursue an EU-wide conversion therapy ban despite strong public support.
In a Rainbow Rewind, poet Adrienne Rich reflects on responsibility to both past and future generations in a powerful archival excerpt.
Featured speakers: Adrienne Rich, Ebony Joseph, JUSTIN CHIDOZIE, MOSES, CHEPKIRUI RONOH, GOODLUCK
Credits: Associate Producer/Lucia Chappelle, Producer/Host Brian DeShazor, News writer Jeb Backe, feature producer Ebony Joseph, NewsWrap reporters, Ava Davis and Joe Boehnlein, music by Audra Day, Tom Petty and Kim Wilson
All this on the May 18, 2026 Edition of This Way Out!
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NewsWrap Standard Intro/Outro
Program #1990 Distributed 05/18/26
And in NewsWrap: Eurovision’s 70th anniversary is boycotted in solidarity with Palestine. GLAAD’s annual LGBTQ Social Media Safety Index finds LGBTQ safety worsening on social media. Nearly a year after Trump’s executive order, the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art in Washington D.C. opens the largest exhibition of African LGBTQ+ art. Japan is taking a step toward formal recognition of non-binary identities. The European Commission rejects a ban on conversion therapy but announces they will publish a non-binding recommendation next year to push individual member states to ban the practice— and more international LGBTQ news reported this week by Ava Davis and Joe Boehnlein (News Writer Jeb Backe, News Producers Lucia Chappelle and Brian DeShazor).
Audiences around the world are noticing countries missing from the stage of the 70th anniversary Eurovision. Spain, Ireland, The Netherlands, Iceland, and Slovenia won’t be going to Vienna for the international song competition that some fans call the Gay World Cup. They’re boycotting over Israel’s participation. Eurovision is organized by the European Broadcasting Union or EBU.
The contest’s first non-binary winner is joining the boycotting countries in protest of Israel’s involvement. Nemo returned their 2024 Eurovision trophy, saying in a public statement to social media:
“Eurovision says it stands for unity, inclusion, and dignity for all. Those values made this contest meaningful to me.
But Israel’s continued participation during what the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry has concluded to be a genocide, shows a clear conflict between those ideals and the decisions made by the EBU.”
A spokesperson from the EBU responded that they were “saddened” by Nemo’s return of the trophy but “respect [their] deeply held views.” They said that Nemo will remain a part of the “Eurovision Family”.
This is the biggest boycott in the history of Eurovision. It’s driven the number of participants down to the lowest it has been since 2003. Critics have accused the EBU of double standards, pointing to Russia being barred from Eurovision after its invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In response to Israel’s continued military offensive in Gaza, pro-Palestine protestors have been a presence both inside and outside the event.
LGBTQ safety is worsening on social media – that’s according to the annual LGBTQ Social Media Safety Index published by the queer US-based media monitoring organization, GLAAD. Their research evaluates each platform on “LGBTQ safety, privacy, and expression and the existence of best-practice policies”. Here’s Samantha Lux for GLAAD:
“Instagram and Facebook now have it written into their official rules that it is perfectly acceptable to call LGBT people mentally ill or abnormal. YouTube removed gender identity from its list of protected characteristics in its hate speech policy. And GLAAD's newly released 2026 social media safety index has revealed historically low levels of safety across nearly every single social media platform.”
GLAAD findings show online spaces to be “rife with anti- LGBTQ hate, harassment, and disinformation”. This year’s investigations of TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Threads, YouTube, and X show each platform to have scores as low as 29 out of 100 in their LGBTQ Safety rating scorecard.
After 6 years of investigating social media platforms, GLAAD states that “the central findings tell the same story of platform failure year after year”
GLAAD’s list of solutions remains the same, too. They recommend that platforms strengthen or restore their protective policies and improve moderation. Meaningful transparency and respect for data privacy are also important. GLAAD says platforms can incentivize civil discourse and commit to DEI best practices.
The largest exhibition of African LGBTQ+ art has opened at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art in Washington D.C. After almost a year of delays, nearly sixty pieces featuring thirty artists are on display in the exhibit titled, “Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art”.
The project brings together the works of artists across the African continent and its global diaspora.
The exhibit is co-curated by Kevin Dumouchelle and Serubiri Moses. It was set to open in late May of 2025 in alignment with WorldPride celebrations. But the exhibition was abruptly postponed.
In a statement to the Washington Post last year, a Smithsonian spokesperson cited budget issues as the reason for the postponement. However, observers noted the sudden postponement’s proximity to President Donald Trump’s executive order titled, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” In it the Smithsonian was criticized for having a so-called “divisive, race-centered ideology” that characterizes “American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive”.
The order directed the Presidential cabinet to defund Smithsonian Museum budgets, exhibits, and programs that allegedly “divide Americans on race” and “promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy”, as well as those that recognize transgender identity in any way.
Over a year since the executive order, the exhibition sees the light of day: featuring paintings, sculptures, textiles, photography, film, and video by LGBTQ+ African artists.
Japan is taking a step toward formal recognition of non-binary identities. The Osaka High Court determined that the absence of a non-binary option in Japan’s family registry system violates guaranteed constitutional protections against discrimination.
A 50-year-old non-binary resident of Kyoto filed a petition in twenty-twenty-four to amend their entry in Japan’s registry system, known as the “koseki”. The mandatory database for legal identification and family status only recognizes “male” and “female” gender categories. The Kyoto resident requested changing their designation of “first daughter” to a gender neutral term.
Beginning in Osaka in the late 1990s, individuals began to use the term X-gender for people whose gender identity is neither male nor female. Some groups in Japan such as the Rainbow Action X Lounge have petitioned for the gender field to be eliminated from administrative documents and family registers— adding that if the field cannot be eliminated, additional options beyond male and female should be provided.
The high court found that the lack of a non-binary gender option in the family registry system “violates the spirit of Article 14, Paragraph 1 of the Constitution, which sets out the principle of equality”. The court’s judgement also stated that gender identity is “directly linked to an individual’s personal existence, making it significant legal good”. However, the court ruled that changing the gender entry for this specific case is not appropriate, but the lack of non-binary gender markers should be reconsidered for the national system.
That leaves the fate of gender markers in Japan’s family registry system in the hands of parliament. If the non-binary option is added at a later date, the Kyoto resident’s request could be reconsidered.
The European Commission has rejected a ban on conversion therapy.
Beginning in 2024, the European Citizens’ Initiative gathered over 1.2 million signatures from European Union citizens to ban conversion therapy.
Last month, the petition was brought to the European Parliament which voted in favor of the ban. European Economic and Social Committee president Séamus Boland, stated in a public release, “Let us be absolutely clear: there is nothing to fix or cure. What needs to change is not people, but the systems, attitudes, and structures that deny them their dignity.”
But the European Commission is the only body that can introduce binding legislation in the European Union, not the European Parliament which voted in favor of the ban.
When the matter was sent to the commission, they decided that the European Union does not have the authority to force member states to ban the practice.
Hadja Lahbib European Union Commissioner, spoke to Euro News on Thursday May fourteenth after the decision was released:
“This is the path that we choose because we didn't want to take, you know, decades of discussions [...] So we prefer to build on the goodwill, on awareness and on the fact that if we need, if we still believe that our union is a union of freedom, of expression, of equality, we need to ban these practices”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated that conversion therapy has “no place in our union”, adding that the European Union will publish a non-binding recommendation next year to push individual member states to ban the practice.
Meanwhile, the United Nations has been calling for a global ban of conversion therapy since 2020.