This week there was an article in the New York Times about two gay men of Native American descent in Oklahoma who are planning to take advantage of tribal law to marry although gay marriage is illegal in the state. Also on Advocate.com, I found another article about Indigenous LGBTs titled “Eight LGBT Native Americans You Should Know”.
If Indigenous peoples are a minority in our society, then Indigenous LGBTs are a minority within a minority. Just like other LGBT people, Indigenous LGBTs face various issues related to health care, discrimination, and identity but their situation may be made more difficult due to their remote location, lack of education, and so forth.
NativeOUT is one of the few organizations working on behalf of Indigenous LGBTs and “Two Spirit” people—those manifesting both masculine and feminine traits and who could be considered as transgender, found traditionally among many Native Americans and Canadian First Nations communities. NativeOUT was originally founded as a local social group and then evolved into a national nonprofit volunteer education, multimedia, and news organization actively involved in the Indigenous LGBT community of North America. Their main mission is to work for social justice in rural and urban communities that benefit Indigenous LGBT and Two Spirit people.
As for the Two Spirit, this website has some explanations and information about articles, books, movies, etc.
