Tuckahoe NY Pride

Amrou Al-Kadhi is an Iraqi‑British writer, filmmaker, and drag performer (as Glamrou) whose work explores queerness at the intersections of diaspora, faith, and gender nonconformity. In the memoir Life as a Unicorn , Al-Kadhi traces growing up between cultures and coming into a flamboyant, non-binary identity, showing how performance can be both shield and truth. Their essays and screen work often examine desire, shame, and liberation under heteronormative and racist pressures. With humor and vulnerability, Al-Kadhi expands contemporary LGBTQ storytelling beyond Western templates, centering resilience, community, and self-fashioning. They foreground chosen family and the politics of visibility in media and space.

Quote: “Queer and trans people show the world what it is to be free, and people who have dedicated their lives to shackling constructs that have been unquestioned feel completely threatened by this—it is our freedom that makes people hate us.”

Photo credit Frank Schulenburg