Sex and Relationships

A new study identified the determinants that affect a woman’s risk of sexual dysfunction and sought to determine the effectiveness of hormone therapy in decreasing that risk and modifying sexual behaviour. Study results are published online in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society (NAMS). Sexual dysfunction often accompanies the menopause transition. Yet, not all women experience it the same. Although hot flashes easily rank as the most common symptom of menopause, the transition is often accompanied by other issues, including changes that affect a woman’s libido, sexual satisfaction, and overall sexual behaviour. Because hormone therapy is the most-effective treatment option to help women manage menopause symptoms, it was the focus of a new study desig...

When Priya’s boyfriend posted a nude photo of her online, he told her it would give her a confidence boost by making her an object of desire for other men. Instead she felt powerless knowing that someone she loved had shared an intimate photo without her consent. “He said all these people dream of having you but only I get to have you,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation from Mumbai, not wanting to reveal her real name. Priya’s story is all too common. There has been a global rise in online harassment of women and girls in the past year, usually by abusive partners or ex-partners who are stuck at home in front of a screen due to coronavirus lockdowns, according to U.N. Women. For Priya, it was the start of a series of privacy breaches as her boyfriend began to control h...

Drawing attention to the issue of female foeticide with her Netflix horror film, Kaali Khuhi, veteran star Shabana Azmi was also a part of 2020’s much-acclaimed feminist OTT movie, Mee Raqsam that was an ode to the strong bond between a father and his daughter. While co-producing Mee Raqsam with brother Baba Azmi was a tribute to their father-poet Kaifi Azmi, Shabana’s clutter-breaking approach to OTT content was widely appreciated for making a strong case for women empowerment. In a recent interview with Harper’s Bazaar India, the 70-year-old actor challenged the myths of masculinity and redefined “mardangi”. She shared, “The empowerment of women depends on how we raise our boys. Have we questioned why masculinity is always about power and strength, about mardangi (manhood)? Why is mar...

Authorities in the Polish city of Krakow have become the first to include financial support for an LGBT shelter in a country where the community has faced hostility from the government. The shelter offers temporary accommodation and psychological counseling for up to 12 homeless LGBT people. It has been run by a charitable foundation, The Voice of the Heart, since 2016, but has struggled financially. The city is giving some some 184,000 zlotys ($50,000) to give stability and a general boost to the shelter over the next two years. The decision comes at a time when Poland’s right-wing government is using rhetoric that is hostile to those who identify as other than heterosexual, and some local communities have declared themselves “free of LGBT ideology.” Nationwide gestures of sup...

When Angel Lama sashays down the catwalk in the Miss Universe Nepal finals on Wednesday she will make history as the first transgender woman to be a finalist in the Himalayan nation’s most glamorous annual event. Nepal ranks among fewer than a dozen countries in the world that accept trans contestants in their national pageants and only the third in Asia after Myanmar and Mongolia, according to LGBT+ activists. The move comes after new management relaxed the criteria for height, weight and appearance, and allowed any “bold, beautiful and confident woman” between 18 and 28 years to participate. “I have come to Miss Universe Nepal to show the diversity of people in the society,” Lama, 21, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation, who will compete against 17 other finalists. “If I stan...

LondonFrom mass job losses to soaring domestic violence, the rise of revenge porn and a widening gender poverty gap, 2020 has threatened to hobble progress on women’s equality as the Covid-19 pandemic wreaks global havoc. U.N. experts predict the gender poverty gap will widen in 2021 amid the economic downturn. Here are 10 set-backs women faced this year: Caring duties/Unpaid Labour Even before Covid-19, women were doing three times as much unpaid care and domestic work as men, according to U.N. data, but this has soared in 2020 with women undertaking the lion’s share of caring for sick family members and children off school. One survey of parents in five wealthy countries showed mothers’ unpaid work at home had nearly doubled to 65 hours a week - almost a third more than fo...

The first Sunday in September would have been Jenna Sood and Nina Woolf’s wedding day, with 100 friends and relatives revelling at the Brooklyn restaurant where they had their first date. Covid-19 cancelled that. So the fiancees turned their attention -- and the newfound funds in their bank account -- to a different rite of couplehood: buying an apartment. “Maybe we’re not going to have this amazing party,” Woolf said. “But we have a down payment.” New York City couples who called off wedding festivities during the pandemic are finding comfort -- and opportunity -- in real estate. Forced to forgo planned gatherings because of social-distancing rules, they’re suddenly flush with extra cash in the best buyers’ market in a decade. So they’re affirming their unions by searching for ho...

Swiss lawmakers voted on Friday to legalise same-sex marriage and allow transgender people to change their legal gender by making a declaration, marking a major step forward for LGBT+ rights in the country, campaigners said. The gay marriage law is likely to be tested in a nationwide referendum next year before it takes effect, but rights activists said they expected it to secure popular support. “This is not only a milestone in the fight for the rights of the Swiss LGBT population, but also an important victory for their dignity, their acceptance and their inclusion in society,” Marriage For All, a campaign group, said on its website. Switzerland had lagged behind other parts of western Europe on LGBT+ rights, with political institutions tending to be more conservative than the p...

A U.S. federal court overturned a Ohio state ban on Wednesday that prevented transgender people from changing the sex designation on their birth certificates, in a victory for LGBT+ advocates who said the law led to discrimination and harassment. The decision found that the ban, implemented by the Midwestern state in 2016, was unconstitutional. Laws vary among U.S. states regarding trans people changing the sex on birth certificates, with some states requiring medical procedures to be completed. Only the state of Tennessee does not allow trans people to change the sex on their birth certificate in any circumstance, although the law is under legal challenge. U.S. District Judge Michael Watson noted in the ruling that before 2016, Ohio had permitted trans people to make such chan...

Almost 400 global religious leaders, including anti-apartheid campaigner Desmond Tutu and Britain’s Bishop of Liverpool, called on Wednesday for countries to overturn bans on same-sex relations and end LGBT+ conversion therapy. Sixty-nine United Nations member states still outlaw gay sex, according to the 2020 State-Sponsored Homophobia report released by the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA World) on Tuesday. Only Brazil, Ecuador, Malta and Germany have instituted forms of nationwide bans on conversion therapy, which aims to alter a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. Organised by the Ozanne Foundation charity, the declaration has been signed by faith leaders from 35 countries, including representatives of the world’s main rel...

Filmmaker Gauri Shinde along with author and wife of actor Ayushmann Khurrana, Tahira Kashyap Khurrana on Monday took part in a panel discussion ‘Mind Your Mind,’ to discuss children’s mental health. Besides Khurrana and Shinde, the panel included several child psychiatrists and school principals. Kashyap who is a mother of two took the opportunity and spoke at length about breaking the news to her children and explaining to them about the challenges she experienced while dealing with her health. “Mind Your Mind is a rather important forum to address the issue of children’s and teenager’s mental health. Unfortunately, mental health is something that is considered a taboo and conveniently brushed under the carpet. Somehow, nobody wants to believe that even our children can go through dep...

The Mexican Catholic Church’s highest-ranking bishop agrees with recent comments by Pope Francis in support of civil unions for gay couples, the prelate told Reuters. Mexico is the second-biggest Catholic country after Brazil with around 80% of its nearly 130 million people affiliated with the church. It has historically been conservative-leaning on social issues. Cardinal Carlos Aguiar, archbishop of Mexico City, said in an interview that he backs the pope’s comments from a documentary that premiered in October and used previously unseen footage from an interview he gave to Mexican broadcaster Televisa. The comments marked the first time a sitting pope had advocated any legal protections for gay couples. “I completely agree,” said Aguiar, a long-time ally of Pope Francis. In t...

Two Indian firms, the Godrej Group and Hindustan Unilever, were named top employers for LGBT+ people on Thursday, in the country’s first workplace equality index, launched two years after it decriminalised gay sex. The other 19 gold award winners - with LGBT+ inclusive policies such as gender neutral bathrooms and health insurance for same-sex partners - were all international firms, including tech giant Microsoft and services company Accenture. Hindustan Unilever is the Indian subsidiary of the British consumer giant. “We are all in early stages of the inclusion journey in India,” said Parmesh Shahani, head of Godrej India Culture Lab, which hosts events to encourage diverse thinking, and is part of the conglomerate, which includes chemicals and property firms. “I am happy tha...