*Ricco Muller (left), Mr. Gay Switzerland, is the new International Mr Gay for 2009. My vote goes to the first runner up, Byron Samuel Kojo Adu (Mr. Gay Australia, right). The distinct lack of Caucasianess in the two top entries is interesting... What's that about the mainstream gay media being one big conspiracy against non-whites?
*X-Men characters lock lips for Marvel's first gay kiss.*What would happen if three explosive devices were detonated at the Olympic Games? You'd hear about it. A lot. Yet only by trawling gay media outlets did I come to learn about the terrorist attacks on the Outgames in Copenhagan. An athlete describes what happened.
*Here's a clip of the opening ceremony...
*Uganda beefs up anti-gay laws.*Human Rights Watch calls on Burundi "to reverse its law criminalising gay sex."
*India's Supreme Court may hear an appeal on the recent decriminalization of homosexual sex after all.
*Iraq: Fundamentalist militia are targeting homosexuals to signpost the fact that they remain powerful despite the US and Iraqi militaries' efforts to curtail them; at least 82 gay men have been murdered since December.
*Gay Iraqi refugees accuse US military of torturing, executing gay Iraqi civilians.*So - just what's it really like being gay and Muslim?
*Albania to approve gay marriage. Homosexuality was illegal until 1995 in the predominantly Muslim country.
*UK: The Quakers vote to extend their marriage ceremony to same-sex couples - and call on the Government to change the law on gay marriage.*The Anglican church could learn a thing or two from them...
*Australia today saw a National Day of Action for Same-Sex Marriage, with protests, rallies and illegal weddings in various capital cities. But the Australian Prime Minister isn't budging on the colony's gay marriage ban.
*The wedding of BBC children's presenter Andrew Robertson to his partner Craig Atkins is the cause of a tornado on the Isle of Lewis. Apparently.
*All this talk of gay marriage! These controversies! But what about basic rights - and protections against discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodation.
*Everyone's Gay in Amsterdam!
*BT is the most gay-friendly company in the enitre world!*Soulja boy tell 'em: "the British Army's official publication Soldier mag
azine shows Trooper James Wharton – openly gay – clad in his dress uniform, complete with Iraq medal, next to the headline Pride."*No restrictions for this year's Belfast Gay Pride parade.
*London's annual Gay Sports Day will be held on 31st August; events include "a space hopper obstacle course, a drag relay, the handbag throw and the 50m mince." Here's last year's best bits:
(Isn't it funny when you spot someone in a random YouTube clip whom you once had ill-advised sex with. Or is that just me...)
*A Gay Council of Britain? Interesting piece on the "misrepresentation of gay people in the media, often by gay people themselves."
*The police don't like gays on TV.
*And these police are giving the media a field day; the gay police officers who became the first British same sex couple to have a baby through a relative are both married to other men! A murky tale of love, lies and handcuffs.
*The number of boys calling ChildLine about their sexuality has trebled in the last five years.
*And why anti-gay violence will get worse.
*The last giant Pinta island tortoise, aged 90 and said to be in his sexual prime, has finally come up with the goods. Dirty old man.*Australia and the Pacific guilty of the mass extinction of animals and plants; 1200 bird species alone have become extinct in the Oceania region.
*At the other end of the spectrum, more than one million camels are eating the Australian outback; a planned cull will only match the animal's birthrate.
*Many commercial fish stocks are recovering - but 63 per cent of fish populations are still at unsustainable levels.
*That news will be no comfort to the rare fin whale wrapped around the bow of the Sapphire Princess. The cruise ship was returning from an Alaskan nature cruise.
*Fat cat BHP Billiton turns its back on the Orang-utans it promised to help; they'll likely be wiped out.
*Remember last week's story about the blind dog with guide dog? Here's the happy ending.
*This dog has been missing for 9 years. She was found 1,200 miles away from her original home in Brisbane.*Pussy on a bus.
*Ants that get off on electricity.
*A US man decided to pray for his daughter to get well, instead of seeking medical help. This story demonstrates the very real danger of religion.
*The Chinese boy who drinks petrol. He wants to be a Transformer, you see. "For the five years that he was drinking fuel he turned stupid," his father apparently said. This is a picture of a random Chinese boy, otherwise this space would just have words in it:
*And since we're in a silly mood, how about the LA sperm bank that's offering celebrity look-a-like donors. Another reason why most people shouldn't be allowed to have babies.
*President Obama shares a beer with race-card playing moron Professor Henry Louis Gates and the white police officer who lacks the status and authority of the two rich and powerful black men. Now remind me, who's the victim here?*Now how about some genuine racism? Ladies and gentleman, the insanity and enduring racism of the American right. (And it is.)
*Zimbabwe allows the BBC and CNN back after an eight year ban.*Zimbabwe's blood diamonds.
*The FINA World Championships in Rome; in pictures.
*An Asian man in Manchester who referred to police officers as 'white redneck hooligans' is found guilty of making racist remarks. "You demonstrated towards the officers hostility based on their membership of a racial group," the judge told him.
*The government will target white, working-class estates in an effort to steer them away from the far-right.
*Our future Prime Minister shows his true colours. Pathetic accidentally-on-purpose attempt to appear cool.
*It's time to remove the threat of legal action against those who assist with euthanasia.*12,000 independent shops and 7,000 branches of major chains have already closed this year in England and Wales. Some 560 shops once part of collapsed chain Woolworths still sit empty.
*Flagship youth jail is a holiday camp: plasma TVs, Nintendo Wii and a choice of seat covers for the toilets in prisoner's ensuite bathrooms.
*A man who used a compact mirror to look up women's skirts on London Underground escalators is sent to jail for a year. The judge told him, "You must get a grip on yourself."*Robin Hood Gardens (right) - an architectural masterpiece (video)?
*London needs another two million trees to combat climate change.
*The oldest pot plant in the world.*Trafalgar Square's Fourth Plinth played host to a sexual health worker on Tuesday.
*SUPERGAY! London's bank holigay weekend party "where breeders pay and faggots get in free."*Alaska's biggest tundra fire.
*The world will heat up faster than predicted in the next 5 years.
*On the bright side, Earth is unlikely to be obliterated by a comet. That's alright then.
*Boffins have created a living computer from E. coli bacteria.
*Synthetic glass leaves that generate electricity.*And then there's the fire-fighting robots. I prefer them with charcoal smeared faces and muscles, myself.
*Its ok 2 txt: "Texting those who couldn't be there lets everyone feel they're part of a larger social network."
*Skunk cannabis can cause psychosis in healthy people.
*Tanning beds cause cancer. The risks increase 75 per cent when
*Car exhausts spew out particles that kill some 3,000 Londoners a year.
*17 per cent of gay men in Chicago are HIV-positive.*Oliver is perfectly healthy, but for 20 days he'll take two different HIV drugs. Welcome to the world of the professional lab rat.
*Red wine increases women's sexual desire. That information is of no use to me, but maybe you can drop it into conversation sometime.
*And whilst we're at it, you can use this little nugget too: blinking means we lose 6 seconds of information every minute.
*Paracetamol can easily cause permanent - even fatal - liver damage. The US Food and Drug Administration wants to ban it from prescription drugs.*Exquisite Bodies, a new exhibition in London showcasing the Victorian approach to medical teaching.
*Michael Jackson's hope and ruin.*Michael Jackson's child-sized porcelain doll, with dress, with whom he slept.
*Michael Jackson's false nose. It's missing, too.
*Mika having a technicolor tantrum in his boxers.
*JLS get their tits out in Leeds. Sigh.
*"Circumstantial homosexuality" in the new Sherlock Holmes film.*Plastic face Rupert "I haven't had any work done" Everett's unpleasant comments (see last weeks edition) get him sacked.
*What's your TV show of the noughties?
*Joan Rivers freaks out on the set of her Comedy Central Roast. Brilliant.
*This year's Big Brother is the least watched of any of its 10 series.
*Sree Dasari, who was evicted from the Big Brother house last month, was rushed to hospital after slashing his wrists. He was said to have become distressed whilst watching the show. I blame Noirin.*Dancing queens: a gay and transgendered dance crew will feature on Randy Jackson Presents America's Best Dance Crew. Vogue Evolution aims bring vogue and ball culture to the mainstream:
*The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation have released their third annual Network Responsibility Index; HBO tops the list: "virtually all non-sports original HBO series included LGBT content."
*A show reel of all the gay bits from a week of college frat house soap opera Greek.*Roseanne dresses up as Hitler and makes gingerbread Jews.
*Doctor Who is officially the most successful sci-fi series of all time.
*Doctor Who is covered in the Radio Times (right). I'm starting to like the new TARDIS exterior.
*Ricky Whittle imitates the Beckham (yawn) Armani campaign. Of the tedious footballer, Whittle said, "I'm not being funny but even I'd go there!"*Skills you might not have thought of: condom snorting (video). Think I'll give that one a miss.
*Aspray. It does what it says on the tin.*A house made of Lego. Each full sized brick requires 272 Lego blocks.
*Furniture held together using ratchet straps in tension.
*Minor British Institutions: seaside rock.
*51 Conspiracy Theories That Don’t Exist But Should.*Mark Leduc, the openly gay Olympic boxer, 1962-2009.
*Gayatri Devi, the last queen of India, 1919-2009.
*Michael Summerton, one of the original Daleks, 1943-2009.
On the cover: The photography of Alan Chaves.
POSTSCRIPT
"You know, we might just as well not have bothered to come. The whole thing's been ridiculous."
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8 comments:
I thought you'd be more sympathetic to the plight of those of us-- especially black and latin brothas in the U.S.-- who must deal with the indignity and injustice of racial profiling (sometimes daily), in part because you yourself are personally familiar with the ways in which cops can power-trip. The Gates case is a case of a power-tripping cop, of the sort I have also personally experienced-- perhaps more than you. I'm sorry, Monsieur Garcon, but your reading of the Gates story seems myopic. Normally, I would criticize Henry Gates for his excessive elitism, in the tradition of W.E.B. DuBois' "Talented Tenth", as well as his and Obama's elitist tendency to lecture working and unemployed black folk with cultural prescriptions reminiscent of Booker Washington's lectures to southern black sharecroppers. But in this case-- he is not playing "the race card" and he is indeed the victim. Normally, I too would focus on the political-economic class position of Officer Crowley, and view Gates' class position as a famous, petty bourgeois intellectual as trumping Crowley's ostensibly "lesser" perhaps "middle class" "labor-aristocratic" position. But remember-- Crowley had no idea who Gates was when he arrested him in his home-- and he arrested him after Gates gave him his Driver's License. Gates was arrested for being an "Uppity Negro", loud and belligerent-- and for yelling in his own home. Gates was arrested for being an arrogant black man --a Harvard snob in Crowley's eyes--who dared to ask a cop for his name and badge number and dared to talk back and question the literal gang of cops in and around his house.
Since I appear to be a black man with long unruly "dreadlocks" (locks to dread), I've been unjustly questioned and interrogated by power-trippin cops so many times, its obnoxious. Once, when I was hit by a car in my neighborhood, about 2 blocks from my house, the cops came to the scene. I was unconscious and actually near death (a good Samaritan lady walking by saved me, not the cops). As I lay unconscious on the ground bleeding from head to toe, the cops preceded to perform an investigation on me, asking people in the neighborhood if they thought I was on PCP and if I was part of the Gangsta Disciples. Rather than attend to my sorry state, they investigated me. Prior to the accident I had been rushing to catch a bus to a graduate school university lecture-- so no, I'm not a Disciple.
Gates, who is 58, 5'7" and walks with a cane made no threats, was no threat and yet he was arrested. Crowley "acted stupidly" and power-tripped, becuase 'who does this upiity Harvard negro think he is talking back to me'.
Those of us who grew up in the racist South (New Orleans) or in racist Boston (Boston was the home during the 70s of one of the most successful White Supremacist efforts to resist integration and the Civil Rights Movement) know all to well how cops can power trip on latin and black women and men -- regardless of our politcal-economic position in society. Our mothers, daughters, sisters and grandmothers are often subject to similar subconscious suspicions and devaluations, and unles you're Oprah or Michelle Obama or Sotomayor, a black or latina woman isn't immune to profiling/ stereotyping/ politcal-economic prejudice.
Anon - I'm totally sympathetic. As you point out, I'm familiar with the ways of the police. The most recent episode (which I assume you're referring to) is the tip of the iceberg.
Let me be clear - I'm not suggesting for a moment that the officer was innocent of any wrong-doing. He may well have been heavyhanded.
However, there's a number of factors at play here, and you hit the nail on the head yourself:
"Normally, I too would focus on the political-economic class position of Officer Crowley, and view Gates' class position as a famous, petty bourgeois intellectual as trumping Crowley's ostensibly "lesser" perhaps "middle class" "labor-aristocratic" position."
Brilliant. Please, come and write my blog for me!
But come on - did Crowly really not know who Gates was? Unless he's a complete idiot, he'd have taken into account body language, dress, speech, even age. Gates isn't Soulja Boy, I'm sure he can string a sentence together quite well, and I can see from the pictures that he wasn't dripping bling. So how did Gates present himself to the officer, who was, like it or not, just doing his job? We all have to take responsibility for how we conduct ourselves. Gates behaved appallingly, and paid the price.
Let's try and look at it from the cop's point of view (as much as it pains me to say that): he's been called there by a concerned neighbour. He'd be remiss if he just took Gates' word for it and sauntered off to stuff his gob with donuts. He's going cover his ass.
Now I realise this is America and that this is a situation between a white cop and a black man. However, if the cop had been black, do you think Gates would have reacted differently? He would still have been a jerk, but he wouldn't have made it a racial issue (although I've witnessed plenty of black people racially abusing other black people in positions of power simply for doing their jobs; and further to that, I've consistently witnessed black British/black Americans denigrating my own African colleagues...)
This isn't a racial issue. It suits Gates to portray it as such. Social status, money and power transcend race, and Gates has all of that. As you say, he's a famous, petty bourgeois intellectual, and a self-serving little creep.
I'm angry because his revolting performance detracts from the very real racism that pervades society, and impacts upon those genuine victims of racism. He should be ashamed of himself.
Okay, after reading your comment to Anon. I see your point against Gates. I too felt that Gates had taken an unfortunate position in this horrible affair. And he had demeaned and belittled the whole idea of what racial discrimination is by calling this a racist incident when there was no indication that this was so.
But Crowley is still an arrogant bastard with a gun.
Curious - Crowley is a cop. Of course he's an arrogant bastard. He was probably a bully in school too. lol
In a way, he and Gates are made for each other. I see a sitcom coming out of this. The storyline would be that Crowley gets fired and Gates, realising that he's at fault, hires him as his bodyguard. Imagine, what a lark!
Or, Crowley keeps his job but decides he needs to go to night school he can further his career and guess who his instructor turns out to be? Then we'll have week after week of inane nonsense where we'll want both of them locked up for our own protection.
"Gates behaved appallingly, and paid the price."
Arrest should never be the price one pays for rudeness and arrogant belligerence. That's why the charges were quickly dropped against Gates.
Therefore, Crowley is the one who behaved appallingly and illegally, and against the advice of his lawyers (including Charles Ogletree-- a leading black legal intellectual) Gates refuses to sue the Cambridge Police Dept. He has a right to and would win.
Politically, I seldom side with the bourgeois State or with cops who defend bourgeois property. I try to keep aware of and fight illegal uses of State/ cop authority.
Our disagreement is slight-- I am more sympathetic to Gates, even if he was behaving like an arrogant, elitist prick.
"Arrest should never be the price one pays for rudeness and arrogant belligerence."
I have a Nigerian colleague who would respond to that statement with something along the lines of, "Rubbish! In my country, he would be beaten like a dog."
lol
Perhaps my reaction to Gates is overly emotional, fuelled by a loathing for Gates and what he represents. I looked at this as an issue of class, social status et cetera, rather than a racially motivated incident. So maybe I got this one wrong.
By the way, it's irritating that someone with such a strong voice and a knack for rational debate is Anonymous...
Garçon Stupide "So maybe I got this one wrong." I don't think there is a right or wrong. You have a different opinion that's all. And everybody has a right to their own opinion.
But even with that said, personally don't agree with you on this one. :) I personally believe Srt. Crowely was in the wrong. But I do agree with you in theory, that many aspects of our life is defined by classicism (both economic and education), more so than racism. But in America, as I'm sure you are aware, there is a huge social weight anchored by slavery, segregation and civil rights. Often we see classicism (both economic and education) through racism glasses.
I honestly believe that most people are not racist today, that is using the hardcore definition of racism - that some races are inferior to others.
But there is sometime prevalent that exists, that is less than racism, but real. I'm not exactly sure how to define it. It's about by us not knowing "other's" life experiences. Especially, oppressors not knowing the oppressed's life experiences. Many whites don't understand the U.S. black's life experiences; men don't understand women's life experiences; hetro don't understand gay's life experiences, etc.
And I believe this is Srt. Crowely's problem. I don't believe he's a racist, but I do believe he doesn't understand what it's like to be black in America, even though he "teaches" racism classes.
Only 3.5% of professors at Harvard are black, of which Gates is one. Blacks make up 15% of U.S. population.
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