Our blood donation rules need a makeover. Let's start with who is allowed to give.

Who could be donating blood that isn’t? One answer: Queer men.

Despite the desperate need for blood donations, very few people who can donate blood in the United States actually do.

"Of the eligible donors — and I think about 38% are eligible to actually donate — there's probably about 3 or 4% that actually do donate. That's alarming," said Red Cross spokesman Joe Zydlo in a recent interview.

The American Red Cross released more statistics about blood donation ahead of World Blood Donor Day on June 14.

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Why is hardly anyone talking about this murdered gay man?

Mourners huddled near Stonewall National Monument in New York City on January 24 to remember a beloved Russian pop star taken too soon.

Believed to have been gay, Zelimkhan Bakaev became the face of a horrifying, state-sanctioned crackdown on gay and bisexual men in Chechnya, a semi-independent state in southern Russia. His name may be unfamiliar to most Americans, but Bakaev's heartbreaking story is one worth sharing.

Photo by Aaron Hooper, courtesy of RUSA LGBT.

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Congress just slammed the 'gay purge' in Chechnya. What's Trump's breaking point?

It's been seven months to the day since The New York Times published an alarming report about state-sanctioned violence targeting queer men in Chechnya.

The Times, citing Moscow-based newspaper Novaya Gazeta, had reported men believed to be gay or bisexual were being arrested and killed en masse by Chechen officials. At least 100 people — but likely many, many more — have been swept up in the region's "gay purge."

Russia police arrest an LGBTQ activist in 2015. Photo by Dmitry Serebryakov/AFP/Getty Images.

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'People who just don’t exist': 6 things to keep in mind as gay men disappear in Chechnya.

More than 100 gay men have quietly been "rounded up" by law enforcement in Chechnya, a semi-independent state of southern Russia, according to Moscow-based newspaper Novaya Gazeta. At least three men are believed to have been killed.

This atrocity may be happening on the other side of the globe, but the message it's sending to the world hits very close to home.

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