KAOS: Issue 184: Robin Williams, Lauren Bacall, Harry Aikines-Aryeetey, Gay Games, Lego, Tiger Mandingo, Michael Brown, Baltimore, Westworld, Idris Elba, and more...

the week's

news

& pop

culture,

with a

gay

bias.

| ponder this |

| We need to talk about the word "faggot".

| We're not a 'post-racial' society. We're the 'innocent until proven racist' society. "When you encourage white people to be ‘blind’ to race, white people also become blind to racism."

> Good friends are hard to find – and even harder to keep. If millions of us have no mates it could be because enduring friendships require care and humility."

| When will the west stop clothing itself in Bangladesh's suffering?

< How Lego lost its innocence. "Child’s play is now big business. Lego abused our trust with cynical marketing and toys that limit development – then it did a deal with Shell."

| america |

> The last issue of THE KAOS THEORY, before our summer holiday, looked at the case of Tiger Mandingo (aka 23-year-old Michael Johnson). It turns out Missouri prosecutors are relying on a banned document as their smoking gun in the case against the college wrestler.

< Meet Ritchie Torres. He's the youngest member of the New York City Council, and the first openly gay councilmember from the Bronx...

...And from the sublime to the ridiculous: This (right) is gay gun rights activist Chris Cheng.

< This is 31-year-old Bryan Higgins. He was found unconscious and beaten in San Francisco last Sunday. On Wednesday, he was taken off life support. Police are now investigating his death as a homicide.

> Gay activist Kelly Phillips murdered execution style at Minnesota gas station. Police are seeking his ex-boyfriend Lyle 'Ty' Hoffman. Phillips (right) had been due to marry his fiancé, Nathon Bailey (far right).

< Florida church refuses to hold funeral for gay man. 42-year-old Julion Evan died after battling a rare illness called amyloidosis, which destroys organs in the body. Evan (far left) is pictured here with his husband and partner of 17 years Kendall Capers (left).

> A.J. Betts, who at 16-years-old committed suicide, volunteered to become an organ donor months before his death. But his organs have been rejected because A.J. was gay.

| Six CIA officers on coming out, McCarthy, and gay recruiting.

| Could fallen military personnel be honoured with a permanent monument in Washington DC’s Congressional Cemetery?

< The AIDS Memorial Quilt returns to New York.

| The killing of 18-year-old, black, unarmed Michael Brown.

| The ghost of Mike Brown: why must a dead black child defend his right to life? "The assumption that black people must be guilty of something lies behind the Ferguson shooting, and the police reaction."

| Michael Brown shooting: Help the world hear your police racial profiling story.

| Michael Brown shooting: Ferguson is what happens when white suburban cops get weapons of war.

| Michael Brown shooting: Ferguson police: A stark illustration of newly militarised US law enforcement.

| Michael Brown shooting: A coalition of gay equality organisations, including the Human Rights Campaign, GLAAD, and the Trevor Project, have released a statement expressing their support of Michael Brown and his family.

| Michael Brown shooting: Police brutality must be punished if we want real justice for Michael Brown.

< Michael Brown shooting: Protests, in pictures.

| As the marijuana economy takes off, let's not forget the casualties of the US war on drugs. "Drug laws helped to obstruct black progress. A radical overhaul, not gradual legalisation, would be the best for everyone."

| Tales of the cities: the progressive vision of urban America. "A union leader is being hailed as a possible mayor in Chicago while elsewhere mayors are pursuing policies Obama has been unable to enact on the national stage.

| On 8th August, Baltimore's controversial curfew law took effect. The curfew requires those 13 and younger to be indoors by 9. Those 14 to 16 can stay out until 10 p.m. on school nights and 11 p.m. over the summer and on weekends.

> Canada: Revellers at Montreal's Divers/Cité, North America's "sexiest gay party".

| europe |

< England: Brighton's Bulldog Tavern, which claims to be the “oldest gay bar in Brighton,” has drawn complaints from locals for a sign that reads, “This is a gay venue for gay clientele and their friends only.”

> Wales: Pride Cymru wants you to talk to the Welsh Government about organ donation.

< Spain: This is 20-year-old Alejandro Gala, the president of gay youth group Ola LGTB+ Almería. He has been the victim of an anti-gay campaign in Almería, most recently being attacked with a Molotov cocktail.

| Azerbaijan: When 18-year-old Malik's parents discovered he was gay, they doused him with gasoline and threatened to murder him.

| latin america |

| Jamaica: Protesters in the US, Canada and the UK turn out for the First Annual International Day of Action against Jamaica’s Buggery Law.

| africa |

| Uganda: The Constitutional Court has thrown out the country's Anti-Homosexuality Act on the grounds that it was passed illegally without a quorum of parliament.

< Uganda: More than one hundred people attended the third annual Pride on a beach in Entebbe. In pictures - more images here. Why celebrating Pride matters so much.

| Uganda: The anti-gay bill will return. But how soon?

> Uganda: The infamous Red Pepper newspaper is back to its own tricks again.

| asia |

| Study finds gay Asian youth are subjected to high levels of family violence.

| India: Cabinet votes to ban same sex couples from adopting children.

| Thailand: Bangkok is seeing an epidemic incidence of HIV among young gay men.

| Singapore: Police refuse permission for run in aid of gay equality.

< Hong Kong: Naked hunks are taking over the city's billboards!

| Australia: Prison officer awarded $AU100,000 after a colleague sent a joke email outing him as gay.

| Australia: "Shocking number" of gay students are physically abused by classmates during school sporting activities.

| middle east |

| Israel: Please don’t tell me what I should think about Israel. "To a liberal American Jew in Britain, the Gaza crisis reveals some very unsavoury attitudes among those on the left.

| Lebanon: Twenty-seven men arrested, questioned about their sexual orientation, in raid on Turkish bath.

< Iran: Campaign seeks to end coerced LGBT sex changes.

| Iran: Two hanged in public in the city of Shiraz on charges of sodomy. But the country's top judge has denied reports Iran executions people for being gay.

| inside the spaceship |

| Stop predicting the future. Leave that to the robot who's going to steal your job. "From Asimov’s vision of 2014 to futurist ‘experts’, we have no idea what’s next. Know-it-alls need to stop pretending they do."

> So, when robots take all the work, what will be left for us to do?

| art & design |

< This is 26-year-old Mischa Badasyan. He's going to have sex with someone new everyday for a year, in the name of art.

> Talking to artist Glen Hanson.

| word! |

| John R. Gordon's writer's diary: I love rewriting. "It’s the good bit: the salvation, the rendering-down. It’s also, of course, work."

< "The Homoerotics of Orientalism", and the golden age of denial.

| Amazon slugs it out with publisher Hachette over the price of ebooks.

| As media companies spin newspapers off, it looks like print is down, and out.

> In Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, she emerges not as a figure of turmoil and tragedy, as one might expect.

| shouting in the night |

< Richard Chamberlain returns to the stage in an off-Broadway revival of Sticks & Bones. The gay Dr. Kildare and The Towering Inferno star came out in 2003.

| Middle-class rules deaden too many arts venues. Let's fill them with life and noise. "Artistic institutions are too often forbidding when they should be seductive. It's time to warm things up a bit."

| Watch lesbian comedian Cameron Esposito address anti-gay hecklers.

| at the movies |

| The problem with James Franco and celebrity queerbaiting.

| Credence, a new film project "aiming to challenge the portrayal of LGBT people on film", surges past £6000 funding goal to over £22,000.

< Will gay drama Love Is Strange shatter Hollywood’s glass ceiling?

> Gay film Kasal takes top awards at major Philippines film festival.

< New documentary Golf Alpha Yankee, about Iran's torture of gay people, is seeking funds for completion.

| Neon Trees singer Tyler Glenn has launched a Kickstarter campaign (already funded) for Far Between, a new documentary about gay Mormons.

| Godzilla 2 gets 2018 release date.

> Robin Williams, the comedian and actor, is dead. He was 63.

< Robin Williams left four unreleased films, including Boulevard, in which he plays a married man (Williams) who picks up a gay hustler (Roberto Aguire), and "slowly begins to confront and accept his suppressed identity as a gay man".

| Robin Williams’ divine madness will no longer disrupt the sadness of the world.

| Robin Williams: A performer who wanted to move beyond the default formula.

| Reporting Robin Williams's death - the good, the bad and the ugly.

| Reporting Robin Williams’ suicide: How not to kill your readers. "Mentally ill people are told to seek help, when in reality that help is often unavailable. What we get are front pages that make our illnesses worse."

| "What's right is what's left if you do everything else wrong." Robin Williams's best-loved gags.

| Robin Williams: film reviews from the archive.

> Lauren Bacall, the actress, is dead. She was 89. Obituary.

| Lauren Bacall was the last of the Hollywood greats – but she also transcended them all.

| Lauren Bacall paid a price for her dazzling hauteur. "The tilted gaze and arched brow that became her ‘look’ were products of a studio system that nearly trapped her. Thankfully that era is over."

| Lauren Bacall: 14 of her best quotes.

| telly addicts |

< HBO is making a series based on the 1973 cult classic Westworld. Anthony Hopkins will star, with J.J. Abrams behind the camera.

> Idris Elba flaunts it for GQ.

< Check out Dallas couple TJ Mundell and Timmy Patterson's Doctor Who themed engagement photos.

| Veteran entertainer Lionel Blair "can’t bear gay marriage".

| Gays of our lives: The latest from our favourite gays in soaps, with Anthony D. Langford.

| DVD review: Mork & Mindy. "Full of daft gags involving alien faux pas, the wacky show about the little twerp from the planet Ork was a perfect vehicle for the brilliant comedian's slapstick talents."

| beats, rhymes & life |

> Anti-gay Ugandan rapper Bobi Wine denied entry to the UK.

| Sam Smith to record the next James Bond theme?

THE BIG PICTURE: A fan poses at KCON 2014, a Korean pop culture extravaganza in Los Angeles.

| Out vlogger Troye Sivan - Happy Little Pill:

| arena |

< Gay Games adverts attempt to reclaim the phrase "that's so gay".

| Gay Games 2014, in pictures.

< Gay Games: 104 Instagram pictures.

| Michael Sam makes pre-season debut in St. Louis.

> Speed skater Blake Skjellerup flaunts his new fiancé Saul Carrasco at the Gay Games in Cleveland.

< Britain's James Dasaolu takes 100m gold at European Championships. kaos crush Harry Aikines-Aryeetey wins bronze.

| The ruins of Athens Olympic venues, ten years on. In pictures.

| Joanna Rohrback, the fitness guru who invented Prancercise, is back!

| the human body |

| Boffins invent new "skin-like" condom using hydrogels that could overcome the decrease in sensitivity regular latex condoms cause.

| The "Truvada whore" stigma persists in both the gay and medical communities.

| New HIV integrase inhibitor Tivicay surpresses HIV even in those who are drug resistant.

| Could tobacco actually help prevent HIV in the future?

| We are all living with HIV. "Take it from someone who tested positive a decade ago: hoping for a cure isn’t enough."

| Are people with HIV less likely to develop multiple sclerosis?

| Gay men have sex when drunk. And...?

< There's no pride in alcoholism.

| Blaming technology for self-harm is too easy.

| Is 29 the perfect age?

| Rogue "Marbie" Scott talks to Alex about transitioning from female to male.

| planet earth |

| Hundreds of rhinos to be evacuated from South Africa's Kruger National Park to save them from poachers.

| Dogs react to a levitating wiener...

| and whilst you're thinking about that, think about this... |

| And finally, Rogue "Marbie" Scott, Andrew loses it over sexy bitches, Walter ponders on the "gay agenda" and the "black agenda", and Jacob talks to kaos favourites the Prancing Elites...