Mardi Gras Party Paused, Blood Donation Rules, Josie Scott, Winter Olympics | Rainbow Briefing — Daily LGBTQIA+ News Podcast Australia

Hi, I’m Louise Poole, and this is the Rainbow Briefing for Wednesday the 4th of February.
Your daily LGBTQIA+ news catchup.

Recorded and produced on Yugambeh and Yuggera land.

In today’s briefing — Mardi Gras makes a tough call, new blood donation rules from April, a rock legend comes out at 63, and the Winter Olympics gets its most rainbow roster yet.

The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Party won’t go ahead this year.

CEO Jesse Matheson announced the decision yesterday, calling it heartbreaking but necessary for the future of Mardi Gras.

The Party has run at a deficit every year since 2020, after losing access to the Royal Hall of Industries — the venue that hosted the celebration for decades.

Without that space, the event became harder and more expensive to deliver.
Last year’s Party cost one and a half million dollars, but ticket sales only covered about ninety percent of that.

Matheson described the organisation as facing an existential threat — and said he couldn’t keep selling expensive tickets to an event he didn’t believe offered value for the community.

Organisers had been working on a reimagined outdoor event at Moore Park for 2026.
But the headline artist pulled out over Christmas, and a replacement fell through just before the long weekend.

A small-scale celebration at the end of the Parade is still being explored — with an update expected by the end of the week.

The festival itself continues, with more than 120 events across February and March.
Several are already sold out, and Matheson is encouraging the community to support independent parties on Parade weekend.

From April, more LGBTQIA+ Australians will be able to donate blood.

The Red Cross blood service — now called Lifeblood — has announced that gender-specific questions are being removed from the pre-donation questionnaire.

Men will no longer be asked if they’ve recently had sex with a man.
Instead, all donors — regardless of gender — will be asked the same two questions:
Have you had a new sexual partner in the past six months?
And have you had more than one partner in that time?

If you answer no to both, you’re eligible.
If you answer yes, you’ll be asked about anal sex — and may need to wait six months for blood donation, though you can still donate plasma immediately.

The change takes effect on April 20th.

It follows last year’s removal of the blanket ban — a policy enforced by the Red Cross and the Therapeutic Goods Administration that excluded gay and bisexual men for decades, and caused real harm and stigma along the way.

More than 600,000 people became newly eligible after that change.

It’s not the end of the journey — but it’s another step forward.

Some beautiful news from Adelaide this week.

Josie Scott — guitarist and vocalist of Australian heavy metal band the Mark of Cain — has come out as a trans woman at 63.

In a statement to fans, Scott wrote that seeing young trans people living freely helped shine a light on the possibility that they could finally be themselves in their autumn years.

Scott says they’ve struggled with gender dysphoria since they were about 8 years old.
They always assumed they’d just live their life and leave clues in songs and journals for family to find later.

But recovering from long Covid in 2022 changed that.
They asked themselves whether they could leave this earth with no regrets — and the answer was no.

The Mark of Cain was often seen as a masculine, testosterone-driven band.
Scott says that worked as a kind of beard.
Much of what audiences read as aggression was really internal rage about not being able to live as themselves.

The band formed in Adelaide in 1984.
Scott says they’ll continue — writing, recording, and performing hard heavy music.
They might look a little more androgynous, but everything else remains the same.

The response from fans and fellow musicians has been overwhelmingly supportive.

The Winter Olympics kicks off in Milano Cortina this weekend — and it’s set to be the most rainbow Games yet.

At least 44 out LGBTQIA+ athletes will compete — a record for the Winter Olympics.
To put that in perspective, there were just seven out athletes at the 2014 Sochi Games.

Among them: Amber Glenn, a queer figure skater who’ll be the first publicly out woman in Olympic figure skating history.

And Elis Lundholm, a Swedish freestyle skier who’ll become the first out trans athlete at a Winter Games.

Women’s ice hockey leads the way, with 22 out players across multiple teams.

And dating app Grindr is stepping up to protect athletes.

Location features will be disabled within the Olympic Village, so people outside can’t browse who’s inside.
Distance visibility will be off by default, and premium safety features — like disappearing messages and screenshot blocking — will be free for all athletes.

It’s the third consecutive Olympics with these protections, after users outed athletes at the Tokyo Games in 2021.

And if you’re on the Central Coast — a queer art exhibition opens tonight.

Glitter and Grit is FunHaus Factory’s Basement Gallery Mardi Gras exhibition in Gosford — featuring works by CMoore Hardy, John Douglas, Bridy Salazar, Guy James Whitworth, and Sandro Nocentini.

Painting, photography, sculpture — five artists exploring queer identity and joy.

FunHaus has built a reputation as a welcoming beacon for young LGBTQIA+ people on the Central Coast — a space to find connection, inspiration, and room to explore who you are.

The exhibition opens tonight at 6pm, it’s free, and runs through to the 1st of March.

That’s the Rainbow Briefing for Wednesday the 4th of February.

I’m Louise Poole and this is independent queer community media.
Your support is crucial to its success.
Share the bulletin, tell your community, leave us a review, and find us on socials.
And if you’ve got community news to share, submit a story at rainbowbriefing.com.au.