News
Dutch LGBT advocacy spans more than a century
Formal gay activism in the Netherlands began in 1911 over consent law
A rainbow flag outside the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam (Washington Blade photo by Michael K. Lavers)
AMSTERDAM — Formal Dutch LGBT advocacy began in 1911 when the Netherlands raised the age of consent for same-sex sexual relations from 16 to 21.
Koen van Dijk, executive director of COC Nederland, a Dutch LGBT advocacy group, told the Washington Blade during an interview in his Amsterdam office earlier this month the measure prompted gay men to respond against it.
“That spurred gay men that were insulted by this legislation, but were also offended by it to become more organized and start working on change,” he said.
COC Nederland can trace its origins back to the late 1930s when a group of gay men who primarily lived in Amsterdam begin to publish a magazine called “The Right to Live.”
Gay organizing in the Netherlands came to an abrupt halt in 1940 when Germany invaded the Netherlands. Those who published the magazine burned their archives and went underground because van Dijk said they “heard stories of what happened to gay people in Germany” under the Nazi regime.
Amsterdam’s oldest gay bar, Café t’Mandje, opened in 1927. (Washington Blade photo by Michael K. Lavers)
Café t’Mandje, the country’s first gay bar that lesbian Bet van Beeren opened in what is now Amsterdam’s Chinatown in 1927, remained open during the war. Van Beeren hid Jews and smuggled weapons to the Dutch resistance in her establishment throughout the occupation. She even bribed German soldiers with alcohol.
“The Right to Live” began to publish after the war ended in 1945, and COC Nederland formally came into existence on Dec. 7, 1946. It began as a social club under the acronym Center for Relaxation and Culture or Cultuur-en Ontspanningscentrum (COC) in Dutch, and had two offices in Amsterdam and The Hague.
“It was a social club where people could meet behind closed doors,” van Dijk said. “Discrimination was still very high in the Netherlands at that time. People would actually lose their jobs if they were out at work and could lose their homes.”
LGBT equality and acceptance remain group’s objectives
COC Nederland has two broad goals: Personal emancipation of LGBT people and the promotion of greater acceptance of gay men and lesbians in the country through legislation and social acceptance.
Lawmakers in 1971 equalized the age of consent for same-sex and opposite-sex sexual relations. The Dutch government in 1973 formally recognized COC Nederland, which at that time was known as the Dutch Association for Integration of Homosexuality COC.
The Netherlands in 2001 became the first country in the world to extend marriage rights to gays and lesbians.
Van Dijk was quick to point out COC Nederland continues to work on a host of issues in spite of the country’s liberal and pro-gay reputation.
A 2009 report the Dutch Ministry of Justice commissioned found 70 percent of LGBT people in the Netherlands have experienced harassment because of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity and expression. A third of respondents said they experienced physical violence.
One-third of Dutch LGBT employees are not out in the workplace, while more than 30 percent of people in the Netherlands said they find gay people kissing in public shocking.
COC Nederland’s GSA program is now in two-thirds of the Netherlands’ public high schools. (Washington Blade photo by Michael K. Lavers)
Van Dijk said anti-LGBT bullying in Dutch schools remains a problem — COC Nederland in 2008 launched a program based on Gay-Straight Alliances in the U.S. to combat homophobia and transphobia. The initiative is now in two-thirds of the country’s public high schools.
“The layer of tolerance is thinner than it looks at first glance,” van Dijk told the Blade, noting anti-LGBT attitudes remain among specific religious and ethnic groups in the Netherlands. “There’s a whole spectrum of intolerance that is still really worrying.”
COC Nederland: Dutch government is an ally
Van Dijk said lawmakers have been responsive to concerns his organization and other LGBT advocacy groups have had over specific issues.
Dutch lawmakers last September passed a law that said a resident of the Netherlands could only sponsor their partner for immigration purposes if the couple had already legally married in the foreign-born spouse’s country of origin. The Netherlands is one of only 14 countries in which gays and lesbians can legally marry.
Lawmakers quickly repealed the statute after COC Nederland and other LGBT advocates expressed concern.
“We had to go to Parliament, go to our government to say you probably don’t mean this happening, but this will make our lives more difficult,” van Dijk said. “They’ve been very responsible.”
Van Dijk said LGBT asylum seekers in the Netherlands remain particularly vulnerable because the government places them in housing with their countrymen who may subject them to anti-gay harassment and violence. He noted officials are sometimes unaware of this treatment, while others may blame the victim who experiences mistreatment because of their sexual orientation or gender identity and expression.
“For them a gay man is 40, wearing a pink boa standing on a boat at gay Pride,” van Dijk told the Blade. “They don’t recognize LGBT people and that they have a different view of how good they should be or take care of themselves in that situation. So we need to really work with organizations like them, or care organizations for the elderly.”
State Secretary for Security and Justice Fred Teeven in 2011 introduced a bill for which COC Nederland and the Transgender Network Netherlands had lobbied for years that would allow trans people to change their gender on their birth certificates, passports and other official documents without undergoing sterilization and sex-reassignment surgery before petitioning a judge to grant the request.
Argentina President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner last year signed a law that allows trans Argentinians to legally change their gender on official documents without surgery and an affidavit from a doctor or another medical provider. The Dutch measure is similar to the Argentine law, but it would still require a trans person to obtain a statement from an “expert” to legally change their gender.
The proposal would also eliminate the need to petition a judge to approve a person’s request to legally change gender.
“It’s an invasion of rights,” van Dijk said in reference to current Dutch law. “It’s the integrity of the body; it’s privacy.”
The main chamber of the Dutch Parliament earlier this year approved the bill, but the country’s Senate has yet to act upon it. Van Dijk said he remains hopeful senators will vote on the measure in the fall once they debate a bill that would allow a married lesbian to petition municipal officials – and not go before a judge as current Dutch law mandates — to receive full parental rights of her spouse’s child she conceived through artificial insemination.
“The Senate is not working very fast at the moment, but we have good hopes that within a year it will all be fixed,” van Dijk said.
COC Nederland also works with LGBT rights advocates in Eastern Europe, Africa and other areas throughout the world.
The organization in April staged a protest outside the meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte over Russia’s LGBT rights record. More than 3,000 people last month protested a Russian law that bans gay propaganda to minors and other anti-LGBT measures in the country during a Kremlin-sponsored concern in Amsterdam’s Museumplein that van Dijk said was designed to “acquaint the Dutch audience with the beauty and diversity of Russian culture.”
Authorities in the Russian city of Murmansk in July arrested four Dutch LGBT rights advocates who are not affiliated with COC Nederland for violating the country’s gay propaganda law while filming a documentary about LGBT life in Russia.
Van Dijk described Russia’s LGBT rights record as a “disgrace,” but said COC Nederland does not support calls to boycott the 2014 Winter Olympics over the issue.
“What we’re doing is listening to our counterparts in Russia and [they’ve asked] us to come over instead of to boycott,” van Dijk said. “We’re not going to explain to them what’s best for them. They should explain to us what is best for them.”
Minnesota
Flanagan beats Craig in Minn. Senate primary after winning key LGBTQ endorsements
The race highlights a growing ideological shift within the Democratic Party, as Democrats increasingly seek a more robust pushback against Trump.
Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan won the Democratic primary for the Senate in Minnesota, as progressive Democrats continue to clinch nominations across the country.
On Tuesday night, NBC News called the race for Flanagan, who received 59.0% of the state’s Democratic primary vote, while her opponent, Rep. Angie Craig, received 39.4%. Flanagan ran against Craig for retiring Sen. Tina Smith’s seat.
Smith, along with Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., endorsed Flanagan, while House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., backed Craig.
Flanagan also received the endorsement of the Christopher Street Project, a transgender rights organization that has been at the center of efforts to counter the Republican Party’s push against transgender rights. The group chose Flanagan over Craig in part because Craig has not co-sponsored the Trans Bill of Rights, legislation that has been introduced multiple times in Congress and seeks to establish federal protections for transgender Americans.
The endorsement underscored a key difference between the two Democrats on LGBTQ issues. While Craig is the first openly lesbian mother in Congress, the Christopher Street Project said LGBTQ identity alone is not enough without a strong commitment to transgender rights as they are increasingly debated in legislative offices around the country.
In 2022, the Human Rights Campaign, the largest LGBTQ advocacy organization in the U.S., endorsed Flanagan’s re-election campaign for lieutenant governor alongside Tim Walz, calling the duo “Champions of Equality.”
Flanagan called the race an expensive fight of the “many versus the money,” Flanagan told NBC News’ “Meet the Press Now.” Craig and her allies combined to spend nearly $20 million on the airwaves, while Flanagan and her allies spent $4.7 million, according to AdImpact and NBC.
“I’m running to make sure that people can afford the lives they want to live,” Flanagan said. “I want to get big money out of our politics, and I want to fight for things like ‘Medicare for All’ so that people aren’t just paying for health insurance but actually have access to health care.”
Flanagan criticized Craig, who is in her fourth term, for not standing up enough to President Donald Trump’s administration, a characterization Craig disputed. Craig flipped a competitive House seat in the Twin Cities metro area and had argued that she was the best candidate to win in November.
Craig faced criticism for voting for the Laken Riley Act, an immigration detention measure that Trump signed into law shortly after he started his second term in January 2025. Craig said she later regretted that vote.
Flanagan has been vocal about her stance on abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In a recent Minnesota Public Radio debate she said that ICE “has to be ripped apart.” Flanagan said she does support immigration enforcement to ensure secure borders.
Immigration and ICE debates are especially pertinent in the Twin Cities, as ICE agents fatally shot two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, in Minneapolis during an enforcement crackdown at the behest of President Trump.
Despite the contested race, Craig made it clear that Democrats are committed to unifying.
“We have an existential crisis in our nation with Trump and Republicans, and so I would be right by the lieutenant governor’s side asking my supporters to support her,” Craig said. “The most important thing in this election is that we beat Republicans. That’s what matters.”
On the Republican side, former NFL sideline reporter Michele Tafoya won the Senate primary. Considered an outsider to the Republican Party structure, she did not win the state GOP’s endorsement at the May convention, where delegates instead backed retired Navy SEAL Adam Schwarze.
She has run her campaign on a slew of issues Republicans have deemed worthy — including transgender sports participation, corruption, and minimizing illegal immigrants in the area.
This recent pattern of moderate and centrist Democrats raising huge funds — in many instances backed by major PACs — only to lose to more progressive and less experienced candidates is growing as more people grow disillusioned with the Democratic Party’s inability to push back against Trump and Republicans. A similar outcome happened in Michigan’s Democratic primary last week when progressive physician Abdul El-Sayed won over incumbent U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.).
Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, who decided not to run for re-election, stayed neutral in the Senate primary but his wife, Gwen, backed Craig over Flanagan, the governor’s ticketmate.
The Senate seat will be determined in the election on Tuesday, November 3, later this year.
District of Columbia
Gay ANC commissioner sues D.C. over police ‘failure’ to pay reward money
Lawsuit says information led to conviction in murder, armed robbery cases
Gay D.C. Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Tom Donohue on Aug. 11 filed a lawsuit in D.C. Superior Court charging that D.C. police acted improperly and violated a local law by not paying him $30,000 in reward money for his role in helping police identify and arrest — and obtain the subsequent conviction — of one man charged with murder and another man charged with armed robbery in separate cases.
Although the lawsuit alleges improper action by D.C. police in carrying out the city’s Crime Solvers reward program, it names as defendants the District of Columbia and the Office of the Attorney General for D.C., which, among other things, defends the city against lawsuits.
Donohue, who is a member of the city’s ANC Rainbow Caucus consisting of LGBTQ elected ANC members, held a news conference outside the D.C. Superior Court building on Aug. 11 to talk about the lawsuit before entering the courthouse to officially file it.
The lawsuit states that Donohue “provided key video evidence that led to the arrest and conviction” of a man initially charged with first degree murder for allegedly running over a bicyclist with his car after the two got into an argument.
The lawsuit states that police had offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the defendant in that case, but police “arbitrarily slashed the payment to $5,000 without prior notice or policy justification.”
Court records show that D.C. resident Eric Beasley was charged with first degree murder for killing David Farewell, 45, by hitting him with his car on Sept. 4, 2020, on the 2100 block of Young Street, S.E. The records show the evidence for the case was based in large part on video camera footage of the incident obtained by police. Donohoe has said he provided that video camera evidence.
The records show that during Beasley’s October 2023 trial a jury was unable to reach the required unanimous verdict, and the judge declared a mistrial.
According to the records, Beasley later agreed to an offer by prosecutors to plead guilty to a lesser charge of involuntary manslaughter and was sentenced in September 2024 to eight years in prison, a development that angered the victim’s family members who called it a “slap on the wrist,” according to a Fox 5 News report.
Donohue’s lawsuit says the second case in which he provided police with pivotal information involved a series of armed robberies known as the Fairlawn Serial Armed Robbery Spree that occurred in the Fairlawn neighborhood in Southeast D.C. in 2023 near where Donohue lives.
The lawsuit says evidence consisting of video surveillance footage provided by Donohue to police enabled police to determine they initially wrongfully arrested an 18-year-old male for the robberies. “Using Plaintiff’s security video, MPD identified, arrested, and convicted the actual robber, David Crocker, who was sentenced to 18 years in federal prison,” the lawsuit states.
It says one of the detectives investigating the case recommended a $10,000 reward for Donohue’s help in the case based on the police Crime Solvers reward program. The detective’s recommendation was approved by then-Assistant D.C. Police Chief Kyle Ramey on Aug. 4, 2025, according to the lawsuit.
But it adds, “Nevertheless, MPD improperly withheld payment.”
When contacted by the Washington Blade for comment on Donohue’s lawsuit allegations, a D.C. police spokesperson said “MPD does not comment on pending or ongoing litigation.”
Gabriel Shoglow-Rubenstein, who serves as press secretary for the D.C. Office of the Attorney General, which will be defending the city against the Donohue lawsuit, said he would look into obtaining a possible comment but said the office has a similar longstanding policy of not commenting on pending litigation.
“This action arises from the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department’s arbitrary, bad-faith, and legally unsupportable failure to honor its public reward promises and administrative obligations to Plaintiff,” the lawsuit states.
It says the MPD violated the city’s Freedom of Information Act or FOIA law by not responding to Donohue’s request for information and documents related to the decision not to pay him the full reward money.
“MPD’s reduction of Plaintiff’s homicide reward from $25,000 to $5,000, and its withholding of his approved $10,00 robbery reward, were undertaken completely devoid of written standards, making such decisions inherently arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of administrative discretion,” it says.
It calls for Donohue to be awarded $30,000 in compensatory damages consisting of the $20,000 “unpaid balance” for the homicide case reward and $10,000 for the robbery case reward. It also calls for reimbursement for “reasonable” litigation costs and attorney’s fees. Donohue told the Washington Blade that at this time he is representing himself without an attorney.
Donohue told the Blade that the refusal by D.C. police to pay him the full reward money also limited his plans to donate some of that money to the family of murder victim David Farewell to help pay for a burial stone. He said that due to the family’s limited resources Farewell is buried in an unmarked grave
Delaware
New LGBTQ visitor center slated for Wilmington, Del.
The Collective to feature gift shop, queer museum, more
During Pride month this year, the Delaware Sexuality and Gender Collective (DSGC) announced plans for The Collective, which will become Delaware’s first LGBTQIA+ visitor center and Wilmington’s first dedicated LGBTQIA+ space in nearly 40 years.
“We’ve been talking about the concept of a brick-and-mortar space for a long time,” said Noah Duckett, co-founder of DSGC.
A licensed clinical social worker, Duckett co-founded DSGC with his mother, Julissa Coriano, in 2018. DSGC is an independent nonprofit organization that provides vital clinical and educational support, social programming and direct-need support to the LGBTQIA+ community.
Some of the programs DSGC offers include a free clothing closet for the trans community, meal support for people recovering from gender-affirming surgery, connections to pro bono legal services, a biannual Pride Market featuring over 100 LGBTQIA+-owned small businesses, and more.
“Our vision for The Collective is a place where our community can come to learn, create, work and be inspired,” said Coriano.
The Collective will feature a visitor center and gift shop highlighting LGBTQIA+-owned businesses in Delaware.
“I think that this is something that’s going to benefit our community so much,” said Duckett.
Some of the LGBTQIA+-owned businesses that DSGC has already partnered with include Stress Induced Art Attack, Moonbeam Art Collaborative, Voce Coffee, Groovy Gemini Co., Scout Cafe, Macaron Social and Huxley and Hiro.
“Specifically in Wilmington, we haven’t had an LGBTQIA+-dedicated space in almost 40 years,” said Duckett.
The Griffin Community Center, which operated from 1986 to 1990, was Delaware’s first LGBTQ+ community center. The Griffin was founded by Ivo Dominguez Jr. and James C. Welch and provided a range of community services during the height of the HIV/AIDS crisis, including AIDS hotlines, organizational offices and meeting space. The center ultimately closed because of a lack of financial support.
Duckett said DSGC hopes The Collective will carry on The Griffin’s legacy while building a sustainable space for the LGBTQIA+ community.
“I think now more than ever, there’s more and more spaces closing their doors. More and more spaces are losing funding, seeing reduced funding and reduced access, especially LGBTQ+ organizations and communities,” said Duckett.
The Collective will also feature Delaware’s first LGBTQ+ history museum, curated by LGBTQ+ historian Carolanne Deal.
“We don’t have any permanent displays in the state about Delaware’s queer history, and we want people to be able to access that history any day of the year, not just during Pride Month,” said Deal.
With a master’s degree in art history for museum professionals, Deal has more than seven years of experience in curatorial work and hands-on collections care.
“It’s mainly going to be a graphic display with photographs, articles and accessible text that draws people in and creates a story for the community,” said Deal.
Although the museum will not initially have an object collection, Deal said she hopes to add physical archival pieces in the future.
“Delaware has been at the forefront of a lot of queer civil rights, and it’ll be really amazing to have that enshrined in a permanent display that’s not only up for Pride Month,” said Deal.
Duckett said DSGC is currently raising funds with the goal of beginning construction this summer and opening by the end of the year.
Duckett told the Blade that fundraising efforts have reached just under $29,000 and that the organization is awaiting several major donations from community partner organizations.
However, he said DSGC continues to be denied many grants tied to federal or state funding because of restrictions on those funds being used for LGBTQ+-serving organizations.
“Private and corporate donations are absolutely vital,” said Duckett.
Anyone interested in supporting the construction and renovation of The Collective can donate online or contact [email protected] for more information.ose funds being used for LGBTQ-serving organizations.
“Private and corporate donations are absolutely vital,” said Duckett.
Anyone interested in supporting the construction of The Collective can donate online or contact [email protected] for more information.
Flanagan beats Craig in Minn. Senate primary after winning key LGBTQ endorsements
Gay ANC commissioner sues D.C. over police ‘failure’ to pay reward money
New LGBTQ visitor center slated for Wilmington, Del.
Jason DePuy on coping with homophobia in ‘Big Brother’ house
