THE WEEK ACCORDING TO GARÇON STUPIDE

*Twenty-six-year-old Sergio Lara from Barcelona is Mr. Gay Europe 2009. Far be it from me to bitch, but is he the best they can do? Mind you, the rest of the candidates are a rum bunch. My vote would have gone to Mr Gay Russia, David Baramija (right).

*Radical gay gangsters Bash Back! are profiled in Details magazine. It's a surprising, exciting and inspiring story: "We're not trying to change people's minds, we're not trying to bend straight people to give us freedom—we're fighting back," says Milwaukee member Tristyn Trailer-Trash. "We're going to stop them from preaching hate, stop them from creating an environment that's unfriendly to gay, queer, and trans people. We're not going to be nice about it—they're not being nice about it!"

*...or you can just say it with a T-shirt.

*A U.S. teacher fired for his support of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students is reinstated by Oklahoma County District court.

*Oh dear. Buju Banton's going to lose a lot of money, thanks to his "kill gays" murder music. Concert promoter Live Nation and AEG Live/Goldenvoice have cancelled shows across the U.S. in response to pressure from gay rights groups.

*"On June 22, I sent you a letter signed by 77 Members of Congress urging you to take leadership in working together with Congress to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell and to replace it with a policy of inclusion and non-discrimination. More than two months later, I have yet to receive an official response. I am deeply disappointed that you have not responded to my letter and that we are not addressing Don't Ask, Don't Tell at this time." Congressman Alcee Hastings (left), ain't happy with Obama.

*Art? Censored? Two words that should never be in the same sentence. Drugs, sex and nudity at the shOUT exhibition.

*"Programmes on gay rights by High Commissions abroad could involve financing gay pride marches or financing legal challenges by local campaigners," writes Hackney MP Diane Abbott for the Jamaica Observer. Uh huh, island bigots - Blighty's watchin' ya!

*But who's watching Blighty? Downing Street has issued a predictable response to a petition "calling on the Prime Minister to stop deporting gays and lesbians to countries where they may be imprisoned because of their sexuality has prompted a response from the government".

*Don't be too hard on poor old Gordon though - he's the lesser of two evils. The Tories would have us all in prison. In fact, Bristol City Council's Conservative leader has branded a grant to the Educational Action Challenging Homophobia group as "mistaken, misguided and an outrageous waste of money".

*Thinking of visiting Manchester Pride? Here's a guide to the city's LGBT heritage, in two parts: Out in the Past Trail - part one. Out in the Past Trail - part two.

*Don't look up! Sex on show at the High Line.

*Football and homophobia, familiar bedfellows, are at it again in Italy. Let's just remind ourselves what the Italian football team look like, shall we (left)? Okay then.

*dotGay is seeking statements from stakeholders (I can't believe I just used that word - yuk!) on why the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers should create such a domain. More on that story at TRANSRACIAL.

*Zimbabwean minister John Nkomo, Zanu-PF's current national chairman and a relative of Robert Mugabe, has been accused of sexually assaulting a young man, Mcedisi Twala-Nkomo, and threatening him with death. The ZimDiaspora also reports on the story.

*Gug at GayUganda voices his feelings on the revelation that that country's face of the ex-gay movement, George Oundo, is now ex-ex-gay.

*Ghana: "About two hundred suspected homosexuals have held two separate birthday parties in Sekondi-Takoradi." Sounds like my kinda party.

*China's baby steps onto the international SGL stage.

*A change of government in Japan could also herald a change for our LGBT brothers and sisters, in a country where there is no law that protects people who are being discriminated on the basis of sexual orientation.

*Change is also afoot in the Maldives.

*In Uruguay, lawmakers have approved a bill allowing gay and lesbian couples to adopt.

*Bisexuality - exploding the myths.

*Those advertising geniuses! They probably thought superimposing the head of a white man over that of the black man featured in the U.S. campaign was perfectly sensible idea. After all, there's already one ethnic minority in the advert, and most people in Poland are, er, white. All very straightforward. Except, it just looks really, really bad.

*And courtesy of the Telegraph, here's a gallery of other photoshop disasters.

*Laboratory for Visionary Architecture will design the urban centre of Masdar, a zero-carbon, zero-waste city to be built in the desert near Abu Dhabi.

*Poor Caster Semenya. She just wants to be an athlete. Now, in addition to defending her lady garden, she must contend with being ammunition in South Africa's ANC anti-white canon. Someone should really tell them: look, don't bother, no one likes white South Africans. Everyone hates them (apart from Australians).

*Should Africa be generating much of Europe's power?

*Kenya: an ecological rape scene.

*The U.S. also faces the loss of entire national parks...

*...and by the end of the century, Venice could face daily floods.

*A different sort of disaster is looming at Abercrombie & Fitch. After 10 straight months of double-digit same-store-sales declines, the U.S. retailer stands accused of mismanaging the economic downturn more than any other retailer.

*At Ikea, not a disaster as such - more of a tragedy. The global giant has ditched its famous typeface, a customised version of Futura, in favour of the unloved Verdana. "Words can't describe my disgust," cries one detractor. This is serious stuff.

*People just don't like change. The Samoans are getting hot under the collar about plans to make them drive on the left.

*Still, never mind, it's Ramadan, and thanks to EastEnders, I'm feeling disposed towards the Muslims. Here's 39 stunning photos from the ever-reliable The Big Picture, looking at Ramadan 2009 (above and below).

*In Blighty, we don't have any uptight restrictions about dating outside of one's race (unless your upwards of middle-class). In fact, loose white bitches are often highly prized by black men, and similarly, big black bucks are much sought after by white women. Here, The Independent looks at The complicated side-effects of Britain's mixed-race households...

*What happens when straight people are left to raise children? Nine-year-olds carry out sexual assaults, and seven-year-olds lynch their peers, or dabble in a spot of house burglary. Britain, Britain, Britain!

*Haribo's MAOAM character's in depraved exhibitionist sex acts.

*So, just who is in charge of this great nation of ours? Whilst King David and Queen Victoria are away in L.A. having their bikini lines waxed, it's all left to a huge multinational called Serco, which "inspects schools, trains our armed forces, helps protect our borders, maintains our nuclear weapons, runs our trains and operates our prisons".

*Britain as dangerous as Baltimore, say the Tories. If only the boys were as hot.

*But some people think politicians could do worse than study The Wire's portrayal of broken Baltimore, if they want to understand broken Britain...

*BUT WAIT! There's more! "A man's instinct for violence can never be 'cured'."

*And gay former basketball star John Amaechi's got something to say on the subject too...

*Woman sets transvestite on fire in a row over a Louis Vuitton handbag.

*The Catch Me If You Can conman. Too sexy for jail?

*The Government is to ban the party drug GBL. Because banning drugs has worked like a dream in the past.

*"People who sell DVDs and videos illegally, including pornography to children, cannot be prosecuted because of a legislative blunder dating back 25 years."

*The Equality and Human Rights Commission will take the British National Party to court for breaking the Race Relations Act. The BNP limits its membership to "ethnic groups emanating from the indigenous Caucasian race".

*British Airways is 90!

*The hottest parts of the London Underground network. Avoid the Central line if you want to keep cool!

*Why Murdoch closed thelondonpaper.

*Royal Mail has launched first class postage stamps for the London 2012 Olympic Games.

*The row over plans by Stop the Islamisation of Europe to demonstrate outside Harrow Central Mosque in North London. The group's motto is "Racism is the lowest form of stupidity. Islamophobia is the height of common sense."

*In East London, a Muslim community leader claims he was kidnapped by white racists who "who threatened to kill him unless he stopped running prayer sessions."

*Conrad Ryan, 17, Jamal Campbell, 18 and Craig Charles, 18, were all killed in a car crash last weekend. Their families have spoken of their loss.

*25-year-old Rodrigo Gomes-Benjamin stabbed his civil partner Ewan Brown, 34, after attempting a reconciliation following their separation. He has been jailed for five years and Brown has now said he wants to continue their relationship.

*On that note... The Crown Prosecution Service has been attempting to raise awareness of domestic violence in Soho, central London. "Some members of the LGBT community may be reluctant to come forward if they are a victim of domestic violence or a homophobic crime, but I am meeting people in a bid to encourage them to do so," says community prosecutor Hywel Ebsworth.

*An internal police report has found that "only one crime was solved by each 1,000 CCTV cameras in London last year."

*Don't text and drive. This is why.

*Hmm... would you eat off of this? It's one of the products on show at 100% Design in Earls Court next month, part of the London Design Festival.

*What does the future hold? The mouse will be gone by about 2016, sleep will take over from sex and then there's cyberdildonics...

*You can read this if you want, but when I started to it made my head hurt: Beyond space and time - Fractals, hyperspace and more.

*Upside down lightning!

*Who needs Will Smith when British boffins are hard on the case of saving Earth from an asteroid strike? (Still, I know who I'd rather see naked in the shower.) Introducing the gravity tractor.

*In previous weeks, we've heard about robots that can think for themselves (no, I don't mean Sarah Palin). Now, boffins have invented a robot with bones, and it moves like you do. Yes, you. Not me. You.

*Introducing the Spacebook, a laptop with two screens. To think I could be watching Pedro Andreas and Daniel Marvin have their way with Roman Heart at the exact same time as I'm writing this article. The possibilities are endless. More (sensible) analysis at Gizmodo.

*Less exciting after all that is the Apple Tablet - the world's first touch-screen computer, apparently.

*Can a Mac lover go PC?

*The Top 50 U.S. Web Properties.

*Why has Wikipedia changed editorial policy?

*The Government wants to cut off my... er, I mean peoples, internet connections if they're naughty and illegally share files. But BT and Virgin Media, two of the biggest ISPs in the UK, aren't happy with the Man's plans. (Pictured right, BT and Virgin Media compare biceps with the Man.)

*Changing the subject completely, what would one do if one wanted to send an illegally downloaded copy of, say, the latest Bel Ami movie, to a friend who can't download it themselves (probably because Rapidshare's taken the files down within hours of them going up)? Not that I personally would want to, but just supposing one did? Well, you'd use a new service called S4ve.as. They'll host any file, any size, for up to 24 hours, giving Sean just enough time to get his collection of smut over to his friend Cody!

*The plan to save dying languages by archiving them for future generations.

*Magic ink!

*Laughing gas: no laughing matter.

*Teetotallers suffer higher levels of depression than drinkers: non-drinkers are less happy because they have fewer friends. Still, what they lack in joy they make up for with smugness.

*Sunday's the day on which most people are happiest, with Wednesday being the lowest ebb. What about the rest of the week?

*Need to evacuate people quickly through a narrow opening? Put something in their way. Yes, really.

*You're about to watch porn, via NewScientist. Sadly, it's boy/girl action, but it's boy/girl action inside an MRI scanner. I hope they wiped it down afterwards.

*Ruthless women have extra testosterone. Aha! So that's why Sarah Palin has a huge, swinging-

*Penis. Cut or uncut? We've talked about it previously here at ka-ostheory, and some people got quite excited about the subject. Now boffins are saying circumcision does not help protect gay men from the virus that causes AIDS...

*And since we're on the subject... Boys, throw away your fleshlight! This is the Tenga Flip Hole.

*"Males who smoke marijuana daily are four times more likely to have trouble reaching orgasm than men who don't inhale."

*Does exercise really make you fat...?

*...and does being fat make your brain shrink?

*Hoofed and dangerous: Britain's killer cows. Yes, the British media have found something new to demonise.

*This dog thinks he's a cat. Little does he know, he's going to hell. Poor, confused creature.

*Ofcom declares that the BBC must reveal what it pays its top stars; the Corporation has previously vowed to keep it secret.

*The scale and scope of its current activities and future ambitions is chilling." The words are those of Rupert Murdoch's boy, and he's talking about the BBC. He wants us all to watch adverts instead.

*True Blood's Mehcad Brooks doing what he does best.

*Launching next year is Fruit TV, an internet television and radio programming platform based in Manchester and targeted at the LGBT community. View a trailer here.

*Russell T. Davies on Torchwood: "If the BBC asked for another 13 one-part stories, that's what we'd do. I'm ready for anything, but I think it works well as one continuous story. But if the BBC decide they want 13 one-offs, I'll suddenly decide that¹s the best format in the world!"

*Australia's ABC is set to confirm a follow-up to Summer Heights High.

*Rescue Me (above left) finale to air on 9/11 anniversary.

*Big Brother: A victim of its own success, the reality show has been eclipsed by social networking – a craze it helped create.

*Big Brother: Fans react to show axe.

*Big Brother: Are we now so used to being watched for real as we go about our daily lives among the CCTV cameras that watching others being watched has lost its novelty?

*Big Brother: Davina: 'Compliance Restricts BB'.

*Big Brother: Five, Sky, ITV2 rule out Big Brother bid.

*Big Brother: Channel 4 executives on 'BB' axe.

*Big Brother: Davina speaks out about the end of BB.

*Big Brother: Big Brother rich list revealed.

*Big Brother: Where are they now?

*Gay Porn Blog wants to know, What Was Your First Gay Porn? Mines was Kristen Bjorn's Gangsters At Large, since you're asking.

*Things got a little out of hand on the set of the latest Michael Lucas movie, Revenge: "[Matan] Shalev — a former Israeli soldier who holds a brown belt in karate — reportedly found curbing his training and reflexes to be somewhat of a challenge. With cameras rolling, what was scripted to be a tussle became a real-life brawl, according to Lucas insiders. The action escalated into punches, choking and broken furniture... and everything was captured on film."

*DominicFord.com announces Whorrey Potter and the Sorcerer's Balls.

*The tragedy of Tarantino: he has proved his critics right.

*An animated gay love story for Grizzly Bear music video, Two Weeks. Lovely.

*Michael Jackson's death was homicide...

*...except he's not dead. Apparently.

*The Romanians boo Madonna for supporting gays and gypsies. Er... apart from gay men with no taste, who else goes to see Madonna?

*TLC are planning a comeback.

*Yes, this is for real. It's the Men of Mortuaries calender. The Calendar of Sexy Undertakers. Well, if you've gotta go...

*A sneak peak at the 2010 Dieux Du Stade calender.

*Oraine Barrett is Out Magazine's Model Citizen. See him move! Hear him talk!

*Vote in the TripOut Gay Travel Awards.

*This Is How Brasília Throws A Party (above and below).

*Google Recursion. Did you mean: recursion? Try it!

*And finally...

Issue 24 of The Week According To Garçon Stupide was built from articles collated during the week 23-29 August 2009.

POSTSCRIPT
"You know, we might just as well not have bothered to come. The whole thing's been ridiculous."