A Miami woman who was a former contestant on the reality show “Top Chef” was beaten by attackers yelling anti-gay slurs, her lawyer said Tuesday. (more. . . .)
gay
Law prof. Dale Carpenter writes:
It’s hard to work up much sympathy for Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho). He had a perfect legislative score from traditional-values groups, a zero rating from gay civil-rights groups, supported the Federal Marriage Amendment, and refused even to commit to non-discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in hiring for his own Senate staff. But what exactly was criminal about his conduct in that Minneapolis airport bathroom? . . .
. . .What really seems to have happened is that the airport police had received complaints about sexual activity and were acting over-zealously to deter it, regardless of the niceties of state criminal law. Many gay men throughout our history have felt the sting of these public decency campaigns, have been arrested for alleged sex crimes, and have pleaded guilty at unusually high rates in order to avoid the embarrassment and other consequences of being outed. When newspapers print their names, as they often do, the consequences can be devastating. Like them, Craig probably wanted to avoid publicity and pleaded guilty to “disorderly conduct” in a futile effort to save his reputation and his job. Whatever we think of Craig’s views on gay rights, or of the cosmic justice in this particular Senator being ensnared in these particular circumstances, it’s difficult to see how he’s a criminal.
Joe writes about Merv Griffin’s legacy as a closeted gay man:
With enormous wealth, power, and prestige, comes enormous responsibility. Merv Griffin had a moral responsibility to publicly, with great noise, come to aid of his fellow queers, wielding his heavy checkbook. He had a moral responsibility to disavow Ronald Reagan, instead he carried Reagan’s casket. How different might the early AIDS years have been, if Merv Griffin, who had the ear of Ronald Reagan, had coaxed the man to pay some FUCKING ATTENTION? How different would the early plague years have been had Merv Griffin tossed a couple of hundred of his millions to researchers, who were screaming for more government funding?
Official Bearforce1 videoclip of their first single, Bearforce1
– July 25, 2007
A boy band for my bear friends!
[via Jessica Gold Haralson]
By David Amsden
The man sitting across from me would like to tell me his name, but doing so is against his rules. He could tell me a fake name, he says, though not the one he typically uses when meeting a man in the middle of the day, since he has been using the same fake name for so long that it is almost real. Revealing it now would open him up to the potential of recognition, and, frankly, just imagining a scenario like that makes him wonder why he agreed to meet in the first place. He knows how he comes across. So shifty and paranoid. But he is not apologetic. Because when you live two separate lives, as he does, and when you have been maintaining these two separate lives for twenty years, as he has, coming across as shifty and paranoid is something of an inevitability.
I will call him William Dockett, for clarity’s sake. Over the past few weeks, William and I have been e-mailing regularly. This is what I know about him: I know that he is in his early forties and that he lives and works in Manhattan, earning around $200,000 annually in a job he wishes he was more passionate about. I know that he is a registered Democrat who grew up in a nearby suburb. I know that he has been married a decade and that he is the father of a small child. And I know—here his life gets complicated—that when he is at work, and things are slow, he goes to Craigslist and, with a familiar mixture of guilt and resignation and excitement, clicks on the “men meeting men†section of the personals.
(more . . )
I missed most of Leather Pride weekend. ;-(
But I did get to Folsom Street East late in the day and ran into some of my buddies from LJ, TES, and Cinekink. I got to meet Joe.My.God, who was judging the pie eating contest.
And I ran into someone from my office. Yikes!
The best of this weeks blogs by the bloggers who blog them. Highlighting the top 3 posts as chosen by Sugasm participants. Want in Sugasm #84? Submit a link to your best post of the week using this form.
This Week’s Picks
Saying No (lafillemariee.blogspot.com…)
“Would saying no really make it all okay?â€
Beyond slutdom (junohenry.wordpress.com…)
“My eclectic slutfest continues, and I continue to love it.â€
A guide to my erogenous zones (orangeuglad.blogspot.com…)
“Not that you need it, but i thought i’d share it with you.â€
Mr. Sugasm Himself
Pic(k) of the Day (sugarbank.com…)
Editor’s Choice
Small Town (secretlifeofaman.blogspot.com…)
Erotic Writing and Experiences
Back – Pt 1 (sharedcindy.blogspot.com…)
The Diva and the Demon (in-your-pants.blogspot.com…)
Dream (katescuriosita.blogspot.com…)
Feast or Famine…Mr. Hunky Resurfaces….Grrrrrr (classyelegantlady.blogspot.com…)
The Great Outdoors (www.betweensheets.net…)
Halls & Walls (confessions112.blogspot.com…)
In a Velvet Glove (aagblog.com…)
It’s over, baby! (lastbreath.wordpress.com…)
“Lap Dance Lust†(lustylady.blogspot.com…)
Looking For A Shot (part 2) (dirtydetails.blogspot.com…)
Office Masturbation – part 3 (eroticawriter.blogspot.com…)
The Parent Teacher Conference Concludes …. (afterschoolmonologues.blogspot.com…)
Quickie in the Closet (fexual-strustration.blogspot.com…)
The Return of the Mythical Beast of Yore (or 2 Girls, a Guy, and a Sex Drive) (http://fourstate.blogspot.com)
Search Term Erotica II (shayssexcolumn.blogspot.com…)
Sugar Daddy’s Pop (aslipofagirl.blogspot.com…)
Two Cheers For Democracy (joeheather.blogspot.com…)
Sex News, Reviews & Advice
Hitachi Magic Wand Review (stilettodiaries.blogspot.com…)
Review: A Woman Alone At Night (radicalvixen.com…)
Sex Online: The rise of internet porn (blog.babeland.com…)
NSFW Pics, Videos & Audio
Half-Nekkid and All Alone (sweatshopsissy.wordpress.com…)
Half-Nekkid and Getting to Know Each Other (www.tarasnaughtyshop.com…)
HNT: Boudoir (imelda-imelda.blogspot.com…)
Louise Glover – Erotic Model with Beautiful Face and Rount Breasts (seccpics.blogspot.com…)
Phoenix (I Shot Myself) (viviane212.blogspot.com…)
Sexy Wife On Cam (myhotbox.blogspot.com…)
Sultry Sexiness – Pictorial Presentation (eroticjournals.blogspot.com…)
Take in the Movie Trailer for Action Girls’ Latest! (www.taratainton.com…)
Today just hot (http://mypenis.thumblogger.com)
Sex Humor
Top 10 Ways You Know You’re One of the Spanking Models Running The Race For Life (adelehaze.com…)
BDSM & Fetish
A damsel in desperation (blog.atlantabondage.com…)
Delayed seduction (twentyfoursevends.blogspot.com…)
Happy HNT – Corner time for naughty schoolgirl (darkside-journey.blogspot.com…)
Hot-spot (curvaceousdee.blogspot.com…)
I have the urge (gentlygently.blogspot.com…)
Master, how will i tell you if the pain is too much? (www.katiegirl4u.com…)
The Not So Simple Things (puppytale.blogspot.com…)
Obedience (www.kinkerbelle.com…)
The Other Pathway (kinkyfarmwife.blogspot.com…)
Under The Big Top (lolitawolf.blogspot.com…)
Watch me (insidedarkpixie.blogspot.com…)
Without permission… (everythingoze.blogspot.com…)
Sex Advice & Poetry
Beauty Tip # 166 (www.sex-kitten.net…)
Personal History ~ ~ “sexual Poetry†(sexyandallthat.blogspot.com…)
Thoughts on Sex and Relationships
Cybersex, Online Sexuality, and Female Empowerment (deliciously-naughty.typepad.com…)
Falsehoods & Misunderstandings on The Dangerous Road To Truth (part 1) (perverselypoly.blogspot.com…)
Good, bad, naughty, what? (kislee.naughtyblog.net…)
Good Impression (bikersballsandteacherstits.blogspot.com…)
I Love You (thenakedrhetoricaltruth.blogspot.com…)
Polyamory Ain’t for Sissies (practicalpolyamory.blogspot.com…)
“Those ‘other Victorians†(un-cool.blogspot.com…)
The Unwelcome Erection (wanklog.blogspot.com…)
See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday (Fleshbot.com)
Photo: Polina (Met Models)
Please write a short note of support for the Palmer House Hilton, host hotel for International Mr. Leather, thanking them for not discriminating against any guests or groups based on their sexual orientation. The anti-gay group, Americans For Truth, posted an action alert calling for people to protest the “homosexual orgies” that take place at the “sadistic sexual perversion-fest known as International Mr. Leather.” AFT website: http://tinyurl.com/3atcsg
The Palmer House Hilton has been a staunch supporter of the Fair Accommodations Act in working with alternative lifestyle groups, particularly IML. Please email your note of appreciation to:
Stephen Bollenback, CEO
Hilton Hotels Corporation
stephen_bollenbach@hilton.com
Trina Owens
Hilton Hotels Corporation
trina_owens@hilton.com
Peter Lynn, General Manager
Palmer House Hilton
peter_lynn@hilton.com
###
The National Coalition for Sexual Freedom is a national organization committed to creating a political, legal, and social environment in the United States that advances equal rights of consenting adults who practice forms of alternative sexual expression. NCSF is primarily focused on the rights of consenting adults in the SM-leather-fetish, swing, and polyamory communities, who often face discrimination because of their sexual expression.
National Coalition for Sexual Freedom
822 Guilford Avenue, Box 127
Baltimore, MD 21202-3707
917-848-6544
media at ncsfreedom dot org
www.ncsfreedom.org
Turner Classic Movies showcases 44 films covering six decades when it looks at gay pride and prejudice in cinema. Every Monday & Wednesday in June. Thornyc] says “this is probably the most amazing historical gay and lesbian film festival ever put together. . .Half of the films are not available on DVD and broadcast screenings of them are extremely rare, if ever. “
Watch trailer
Download schedule
Screen Out Site
(05-22) 15:29 PDT SAN JOSE — A gay couple from San Jose have settled their lawsuit against an out-of-state Internet adoption service that they accused of violating California discrimination laws by refusing to post the men’s profiles on a Web site where prospective birth mothers could see them.
Michael and Rich Butler, domestic partners since 2000, filed a federal civil rights suit against Adoption.com of Arizona in 2004 after the company told the men it posted profiles only of married, opposite-sex couples.
The adoption company had argued that it was governed by Arizona law, which does not prohibit discrimination against people on the basis of marital status or sexual orientation. It said requiring it to post profiles of same-sex couples would violate its freedom of speech.
But in a March ruling, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton in San Francisco said California law applies to the defendants and allowed the suit to go forward.
Under the terms of a settlement announced today, ParentProfiles.com, a sister company to Adoption.com, cannot post profiles of California residents “unless the service is made equally available to all California residents qualified to adopt in California.”
(more. . . )
The young gays and lesbians stream from subway stops dressed in their flashiest gear: rainbow sunglasses, 6-inch-high gold wedge sandals, a fatigue-printed hoodie, a rhinestone-studded pink Playboy bunny bag.
Hundreds of them make their way through the West Village — home of the gay liberation movement of the 1960s and ’70s — toward the pier overlooking the Hudson River, where a drag queen in a platinum-blond wig and gold bamboo-style earrings swishes past a group of boys in baggy jeans. One shouts, “Hey, baby!” and she stops. With her backside facing the boys, she bends over in her pleated denim miniskirt and flashes them.
They come to this Manhattan pier at night from Brooklyn, Staten Island, the Bronx, New Jersey. The black and Latino gays and lesbians say this is the only place where they can be themselves. Here, boys in Timberland boots and fluorescent sweatshirts know they won’t get beaten up for kissing each other, and girls with cornrows beneath backward baseball caps are not embarrassed to cuddle other girls.
“This was like the first place I could really be exposed to people of my kind, without having to worry about getting bashed,” said Cliff Jones, 20, of Harlem, whose neighbors don’t know he is gay.
Jay Jeffries, 65, is white and gay. He has lived for 40 years in the West Village, where he participated in the first gay rights marches. From his second-floor window, he watches the roller-skating boys with boomboxes pressed to their ears and the fistfighting girls wearing do-rags and jerseys.
He has never felt so out of place.
Residents like Jeffries say they want the gays of the hip-hop generation to take their rowdiness elsewhere. They have demanded stricter curfews at the pier. They have lobbied to close a train stop on weekends to make it more difficult for people from New Jersey to travel to the West Village, and to ban loitering in their neighborhood. They have suggested that park patrol officers — who police the pier — carry guns.
For decades, the West Village has welcomed gay, lesbian, transgender and bisexual people of all backgrounds. It was here that a police raid — which happened frequently in gay bars in the 1960s — at the Stonewall Inn set off the most famous gay riots in this city’s history and fueled the start of the national gay rights movement. But old-timers still living in the West Village are more subdued now. While there are those who accept the young gays who flock to the village in the spring and summer, others can’t relate.
“They’re all out with their radios,” Jeffries said, “and they’re just hip-hopping all over the street.”
Most of the gay teens and 20-somethings who flirt, kiss, smoke, dance and gossip on the pier, across the street from apartments and brownstones, don’t know about the Stonewall riots, Jeffries said. “They’re another generation. These are the people who got the rights” because his generation fought for them.
“There’s no willingness to interact,” Jeffries said, “or to really treat us with the respect we deserve.”
(more . . . )
(AP) Just hours after the White House issued a veto threat Thursday, the House voted to add gender and sexual orientation to the categories covered by federal hate crimes law.
The House legislation, passed 237-180, also makes it easier for federal law enforcement to take part in or assist local prosecutions involving bias-motivated attacks. Similar legislation is also moving through the Senate, setting the stage for another veto showdown with President Bush.
“This is an important vote of conscience, of a statement of what America is, a society that understands that we accept differences,” said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md.
Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the only openly gay man in the House, presided over the chamber as the final vote was taken.
The vote came after fierce lobbying from civil rights groups, who have been pushing for years for added protections against hate crimes, and social conservatives, who say the bill threatens the right to express moral opposition to homosexuality and singles out groups of citizens for special protection.
The White House, in a statement warning of a veto, said state and local criminal laws already cover the new crimes defined under the bill, and there was “no persuasive demonstration of any need to federalize such a potentially large range of violent crime enforcement.”
It also noted that the bill leaves other classes, such as the elderly, the military and police officers, without similar special status.
“Our criminal justice system has been built on the ideal of equal justice for all,” said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, top Republican on the Judiciary Committee. “Under this bill justice will no longer be equal, but depend on the race, sex, sexual orientation, disability or status of the victim.”
Republicans, in a parliamentary move that would have effectively killed the bill, tried to add seniors and the military to those qualifying for hate crimes protection. It was defeated on a mainly party-line vote. (more…)
A major archive of papers relating to the early gay-rights movement in America has been donated to the New York Public Library’s Manuscripts and Archives Division. The Barbara Gittings and Kay Tobin Lahusen Gay History Papers and Photographs consist of letters, photographs, handbills, manuscripts, publications, and ephemera accumulated over nearly 50 years by the late activist and writer Gittings (1932–2007) and her life partner, photojournalist and author Lahusen.
Gittings’s papers document her activities on behalf of gay and lesbian rights from 1958, when she founded the East Coast chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis, the first national lesbian organization. Her writings influenced the American Psychiatric Association’s December 1973 removal of homosexuality from its list of mental disorders. As a longtime leader of the American Library Association’s Gay Task Force (now the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Round Table), Gittings was influential in developing programs to highlight the availability of gay materials for use in libraries. She was awarded an ALA honorary membership in 2003.
Lahusen’s extensive photographic collection includes images of early protesters, portraits of prominent lesbians, and photos chronicling gay activism through 2005. “Barbara and I always wanted our papers and photographs to be cared for and made available in a secure, world-class repository,†Lahusen said. “And we wanted our letters and photos to be surrounded by those of friends and colleagues in the cause. The New York Public Library’s marvelous archive division was the obvious choice.â€
“The collection donated by Barbara Gittings and Kay Tobin Lahusen,†said NYPL President Paul LeClerc, “is a remarkable firsthand chronicle detailing the battle of gays and lesbians to overcome the prejudice and restrictions that were prevalent prior to the activism and protest movements that started in the 1960s.â€
[via fellow librarian badfaggot]
Gallery Carre
