Controversy over a podcast, the Gay Games announcement, The Proud Awards, court cases, elections and so much more.
Continue our journey back through 2025 with everything that took place in October, Take a deep breath and dive in, there’s a lot to revisit.
News and Politics
Concern was raised over a podcast conversation from the The Equality Project that was designed to promote their Better Together Conference. Soon community groups and organisations were pulling out of the event. The Equality Project put out a statement that didn’t help quell people’s concerns. Across the land people explained why they were going, or not going, or not going. Better Together had another go at an apology.
OUTinPerth went, and when we got there some of the organisations who publicly said they were not going, were actually there….we guess they couldn’t get refunds on the flights or accommodation. Meanwhile, Matt Beard, the European LGBTIQA+ organisation All Out’s Executive Director, who made the offensive comments went to ground and has not been heard from since.
Binary CEO Kirralie Smith vowed to take her recent apprehended violence order to the High Court, the High Court later said they weren’t interested in looking at her case.
The Archbishop of Colombo said he worried about Sri Lanka becoming a tourism destination for LGBTIQA+ people. The country’s President assured him they would not be supporting any moves to promote the country to our communities.
Slovakia brought in laws to define gender as only being male and female, and also banned same-sex couples from adopting children.
In Malaysia a long running sex scandal returned with MPs arguing that MP Azmin Ali should not become party leader because it was once suggested he’d been the subject of a blurry gay sex tape. Indonesia arrested 34 men who they claimed were taking part in a sex party in a hotel.
In the USA a woman was jailed over an assassination attempt on Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanagh. President Donald Trump commuted the sentence of George Santos.
It was last drinks at London’s famous G-A-Y bar. Sarah Mullaly was named the new Archbishop of Canterbury, the first woman to hold the role. A man convicted of multiple sexual assaults in the vicinity of Manchester’s Canal Street gay precinct was sentence to life in prison. King Charles laid a wreath at the new memorial for LGBT service personnel.
A US study found that members of the LGBT communities have poorer mental health outcomes than the average member of society. An Australian report questioned the validly of the UK Cass Review into gender services.
The High Court backed the Albanese government’s decision to deny right-wing podcaster Candice Owns a visa. In the UK a court granted actor turned aspiring politician Laurence Fox a new trial over parts of a case where he was labeled a racist, but it also ruled the finding that he’d defamed two gay men would stand leaving him with a big bill.
WA Liberal MP Andrew Hastie quit the front bench fueling speculation about a future leadership challenge against Sussan Ley. Barnaby Joyce announce he was not going to run for the Nationals at the next election, and there was suggestions he’d join One Nation, and so began a will-they-won’t-they story that rivalled Ross and Rachel.
The Northern Territory’s Anti-Discrimination Commissioner raised concern over recent anti-transgender protests. The Victorian Liberal opposition called for the state’s policy on housing transgender prisoners to be reviewed, the Northern Territory announced they’d be changing their rules in that area.
Transgender health researcher Dr Michelle Telfer was nominated for a Human Rights Award, she didn’t win but it made the commentators on Sky News have conniptions. Thorne Harbour Health boss Simon Ruth stepped down after 12 years of leading the organisation. LGBTIQ Domestic Violence campaigner Ben Bjarnesen announced he would be leaving the organisation he founded.
A court in Cairns heard more details about a case where three young men formed a vigilante gang and attacked a man they lured through the dating app Grindr. Following a string of similar attacks in Victoria RMIT began researching the occurrences.
The Queensland government offered a new definition of what a woman is, but people pointed out there’s actually one in law. A court ruled they’d illegally instigated their ban on puberty blockers, but just hours later they reinstated it via a different pathway.
A new gay club was launched in Sydney and it went really really really badly. They came up with a new name – that people also had problems with. NSW police removed a mural about queer history which was supposed to help build a bridge.
Fake quotes about transgender people participating in sport were attributed to swimmer Mollie O’Callaghan. Robert Irwin was also the victim of A.I generated completely fake news stories claiming he’s opposed to the LGBTIQA+ communities.
On the Local Front
Perth won the rights tov host the 2030 Gay Games! The tourism minister was stoked, and everyone celebrated.
A groundbreaking scientific report questioned a oft-quoted study from Western Australia that claimed youth experiencing gender dysphoria could be convinced to embrace their birth sex.
Rainbow Futures called on the Cook government to take action on long promised laws to ban conversion therapy. The government said they were working on it, despite making a commitment to change the laws as back as 2017.
It was also highlighted that the government had vowed to fix the state’s anti-discrimination laws back in 2015 when a 7-year old school faced legal discrimination from her school. Advocates pointed out she’s probably now getting ready for university, and still not action has been taken.
The government did put out its draft suicide prevention plan for feedback.
The surrogacy legislation moved to the Legislative Council where a long long debate over the proposed changes began, it would go for months. The Greens voiced their support, Liberal Nick Goiran defended his 22-hour speech from 2019 on the topic, Labor’s Kate Doust pushed for the legislation to be sent to a committee for further review, something which was described as a total waste of time. The push failed.
Victorian senator Ralph Babet attacked the Swan Pride Festival accusing organisers of sexualising children. It was a fabulous event and we took heaps of cool photos.
WestPride Archives signed a 10 year deal with Murdoch University. Fremantle Dockers revealed their Pride round jumper for the AFLW. Connections Nightclub was added to the Proud Awards Hall of Fame and everyone looked amazing on the big night.
Bruce Reynolds became the Lord Mayor of Perth, and some new councilors joined the city’s team. David Goncalves became the Deputy Lord Mayor.
Local community radio station RTRFM, the home of All Things Queer, was given the sector’s highest honour.
Ryan Oliver spoke to us about tackling HIV and achieving the 2030 goals. Author Holden Shepard was among the nomineees for Western Australian of the Year.
Culture and Celebrity
Dame Patricia Routledge, best known for television’s Keeping Up Appearances died at the age of 96. Bjorn Andrésen passed away at 70. Dave Ball from Soft Cell and The Grid died aged 66. Neo-soul singer D’Angelo died aged 51.
Dolly Parton assured she was alive after a torrent of A.I generated images showed her on her death bed.
Madonna gave an in-depth interview chatting about spirituality and religion, later in the month she announced unreleased tracks and mixes from her Bedtime Stories album would be coming soon. Sam Smith announced a San Francisco residency to reopen the iconic Castro Theatre. Bumpy delivered a debut album. We chatted to Ben from Miami Horror.
Mel C shared new dance tune Sweat, sampling an obscure Diana Ross song from the 80s. Kim Petras returned. There was new music from Adam Noviello.
Actor Charlie Hunnam recalled his breakout role in Queer as Folk. We got our first look at the Alexander Skarsgard film Pillion. Pentatonix singer Scott Hoying announced he and his husband were expecting their first child. Patti Labelle announced a farewell tour of Australia in 2026.
Elon Musk led a campaign to remove transgender content from Netflix. Pentagon got upset about the streamers hit show Boots, describing it was “woke garbage”. By the end of the year the series was cancelled.
Footballer Bailey Smith was in hot water of over some social media posts that were deemed misogynistic and homophobic, comedian Josh Thomas defended him. Anti-transgeder advocates got up in arms about indie pop star Yungblud inviting a young trans fans up on stage – except it was just a young girl with short hair, who had been taken to the show by her parent.
The winners of the USA’s Lambda Book Awards were revealed. Gay comedian Jessica Kirson said she wished she hadn’t played a comedy festival in Riyadh. YouTube stars Dan and Phil shared that they’ve been in a relationship for yonks.
We found out a new Australian version of TV’s The Traitors would arrive in 2026 with Gretel Killeen as host and Kirby Bentley, Rhys Nicholson and Kween Kong in the cast – please make Rhys a traitor.
We chatted to actor Hunter Page-Lockard about new series Reckless, and finally for to see the film Twinless – it was so good.
