Issue 202: D'Angelo, Diego Lauzen, Le1f, Cuba, voodoo, Baldwin, Beckford, BOYSTOWN, Benjy the bull, Tyson Tyler, and more...


the week's
news
& pop
culture,
with a
gay
bias.


| think, progress |

The eighty most powerful coming outs of 2014.

Five of the biggest lies gay men tell themselves.

Mean gays: What the gay "community" and the North Shore High School cafeteria have in common.


Gay marriage doesn’t equal equality. Here are five things still to fight for.

Talking to Sean Z. Maker about fighting homophobia in nerd culture, one convention at a time.



Black LGBT faith leaders on why black lives matter.

Lane Hudson: We can sift through the minutiae of the killing of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, and John Crawford, or we can seek to understand the ways in which oppression is a shared burden that ignores racial and orientation boundaries.



Terry Franklin: Let’s cure cancer, not homosexuality. "It's 2014. When will Americans get over conversion therapy?"

Forty people who showed 2014 was a year for breaking gender rules.


My misspent youth. "How an author's Manhattan dream turned into a credit-card nightmare."


2014 Year in Pictures: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3. Above: Desperate African migrants attempt to scale border fences to enter the Spanish enclave of Melilla.

2014 was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad year. You probably don't even remember why.

| news from america |

There are around 200,000 homeless LGBT youths in the US. Here's how you can help them.

San Antonio gets a homeless shelter for LGBT youth.

This is Matthew Fenner, a gay Christian who was "kidnapped, attacked by fellow churchgoers to rid him of demons".

Philadelphia gay-bashing suspects to face trial in the new year.

One in five hate crimes committed in the US last year were motivated by anti-gay bias, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

Army veteran Lambert Borgardt dodges jail, gets probation for brutal 2012 attack on gay men in Austin.


Alabama recalls "NoHomo" license plate.

"Gay-friendly" corporations refuse to come out against Texas "license to discriminate" bill.

Hundreds protest "ex-gay" billboard in Richmond...

...And it turns out the man who modeled for the stock image used on the billboard - claiming twins research proves no one is born gay - says he in fact was born gay, and doesn't have a twin.

Crackpot evangelist Pat Robertson has claimed that gay people will go extinct because they cannot reproduce.

And this is the hysterical Texas pastor who wants to kill the "dirty" gays who rape kids.

Pastor Gaylard Williams, whose church preaches gay sex is a sin, arrested for squeezing man's genitals, gay porn later found in his car.

Salvation Army denies anti-gay "myth".

Indiana's First United Methodist Church to close following a mass walkout by members prompted by gay choir director Adam Fraley being forced to resign.

This is Kathy Baldock, the founder and director of Canyon Walker Connections, the straight housewife getting in the face of anti-gay Christians. She used to be a homophobe. Now she’s a hero.

Why gay abstinence is not the answer to the FDA blood ban.


The controversial (and gay) CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch Mike Jeffries has abruptly retired after eleven consecutive quarters of falling sales.

Abercrombie, Delia's, Aeropostale: all your old favorite stores are in big trouble.

Out Apple CEO Tim Cook makes "generous" personal donation to gay equality campaign in the South.


The West Hollywood fight over a portrait of Elizabeth Taylor.

Genderqueer fashion show un(Heeled) ended with a powerful demonstration of support for the Black Lives Matter movement.

New York gay sports bar chain Boxers claims it was hacked after angry tweets to Al Sharpton.


US tabloid makes bizarre claim that One Direction’s Harry Styles and President Obama had a gay affair.

The US may have no queen, but it has more royal families than it knows what to do with. "Be it Jeb Bush or the Clintons or the Kennedys, here are people who consider power their God-given right."


The Feds are suing New York City because Rikers Island is a hellhole.

Five ways race affects every step of death penalty cases.

US executions hit a 20-year low in 2014.

A judge has vacated the conviction of 14-year-old George Stinney, Jr., who was executed seventy years ago.

Le1f reports from Washington, D.C.'s Justice For All March.

 Rob Smith is back with some Real Talk.


Danny Garvin (above left), who was a witness and participant in the Stonewall Riot, is dead. He was 65. Read more about Danny here.

Dominic Di Natale, the veteran gay journalist, is dead. He was 43. The cause is thought to be suicide.

| news from latin america |

Cuba has always been a fantasy. Can it ever be something close to normal?

Nine questions about Cuba you were too embarrassed to ask.

Cuba's human rights record is terrible, no matter what you think of the embargo.


Colombia | "Chopping houses," witchcraft and the trail of dismembered bodies.

| news from africa |

Gambia | Thousands attend anti-gay rally in Banjul.

Uganda | Parliament adjourns for the year without passing anti-homosexuality bill.

Zambia | Talking to human rights defender and LGBT activist Chalwe Charles Mwansa.

Gay in Ghana: A video.



| news from asia |

China | 12-year-old stabs classmate to death for touching his "lower body".

China | Court orders clinic to pay compensation to gay man after it gave him electric shocks to "cure" him.

Taiwan | University tears down poster for coming out talk for fear students will turn gay. So much for higher learning...

Taiwan | Thousands run for marriage equality in Taipei.

Vietnam | Hundreds celebrate sexual and gender diversity in Ho Chi Minh City.

South Korea | Support for marriage equality reaches thirty-five percent.

Philippines | Thousands march in first Quezon City pride.

Philippines | Filipino authorities have charged U.S. Marine Pfc. Joseph Scott Pemberton with the murder of trans woman Jennifer Laude.

Australia | Thomas Zinn, the partner of Sydney siege Tori Johnson, remembers his "soulmate". Johnson has been branded a hero for giving his life trying to save the lives of other hostages taken during a sixteen hour siege.

Australia | The Sydney siege fits the new, confusing global norm: The "lone actor" attack.

Australia | Aboriginal trans men - who refer to themselves as"Brotherboys" - find their voice.

| news from the middle east |

Egypt | Police arrest, humiliate allegedly "gay" men at Cairo bathhouse, march them nude to police vans outside. But if homosexuality isn’t illegal, why is there a gay crackdown?

Islamic State posts photos of alleged "gay" man thrown off building and stoned to death.

| news from europe |

Is Britain's pro-gay foreign policy actually helping the global LGBT community?

United Kingdom | David Cameron's HIV hypocrisy.

United Kingdom | From Africa to Kent: Following in the footsteps of migrants.

United Kingdom | How Nigel Farage and his UKIP apologists are rehabilitating racism.

England | Matthew Ogston, the fiancé of London doctor Nazim Mahmood - who last month committed suicide after coming out to his mother - has set up a foundation in Nazim's honour. The Naz and Matt Foundation will support people struggling with religion and sexuality.

England | Bisexual millionaire Shrien Dewani walks free after murder case is thrown out. Anni Dewani died alone and terrified in one of the bleakest parts of the country - she has been failed by South Africa.

England | Shrien Dewani rent boy: "Anni's family treated me like son and begged me to expose gay relationship".

England | The gay Asian men pressured into marrying women.

England | Gay London police chief arrested on suspicion of dealing drugs. 43-year-old Chief Inspector Paul Cahill was found slumped over the wheel of his car in Lambeth, south London by passing colleagues.

England | 419-pound winner of Mr Gay UK London disqualified on a technicality.


Northern Ireland | Gay life is under threat – time to act. "I was a scared teenager and don’t want a regression in human rights at Stormont to mean LGBT people there feel the same."

Ireland | Referendum on marriage equality to be held in May 2015.

France | Tabloid magazine Closer has outed the far-right leader Florian Philippot as gay.

Spain | Gay teen hospitalised after savage attack by neo-Nazi group in Madrid.

Germany | Welcome to paradise. "When Germany legalised prostitution in 2002 it triggered an apparently unstoppable growth in the country’s sex industry. It’s now worth 15 billion euros a year and embraces everything from 12-storey mega-brothels to outdoor sex boxes. Who won and who lost?"

Finland | Did the art of Touko Laaksonen (Tom of Finland) play a role in the recent passage of marriage equality in his Nordic motherland?

Poland | Lawmakers vote against gay civil unions for a third time.

Poland | Warsaw’s Tolerance Rainbow has been torched again.

Russia | Notoriously anti-gay lawmaker Vitaly Milonov led a raid on a gay club, bringing a film crew and riot police. "We found around 20 teenagers there that were practically having sex on the stage," he claimed. Party pooper.

Russia | State TV claims Americans show gay porn to their children.

Albania | Gay equality groups found Balkan region's first LGBT shelter.

Italy | Davide Zotti, a gay professor of philosophy in the city of Trieste, has been forced to hang a crucifix in his classroom under a fascist Italian law.

| art & design |

Benjamin Fredrickson's Polaroid images document his years as a sex worker in the Midwest and New York City. Showing at New York's Daniel Cooney Fine Art, 8th January - 28th February 2015.


These pictures of LGBT sanctuaries in the mid-20th century.

Walter Pearce Photo Diary Vol. 1, Vol. 2 and Vol. 3.

Talking to Zan Christensen about his Seattle-based company Northwest Press, publisher of queer comic books.

Michael Stokes' Bare Strength - featuring "beautifully shot set-ups of incredibly fit young men in themed settings rich in masculine texture and meaning [and] a large section of amputee Marines" - is out now.

| word! |

Author Jake Biondi on his BOYSTOWN series. "Because BOYSTOWN is written like a TV series, it reads quickly and keeps people on the edges of their seats. And because of people's comments that BOYSTOWN 'needs to be on TV,' I am now working to bring BOYSTOWN to television."

Giving It Raw: Nearly 30 Years with AIDS, the new memoir from celebrated Chilean-Canadian author Francisco Ibáñez-Carrasco, is part of the "contemporary overshare culture in all the best ways. It has the kinds of 'TMI' — too much information — that every reader seeks in a satisfying read: Raw sex, raw sadness, and raw fun."


A look at the Queer Zine Archive Project.

Out now | James Baldwin: The Last Interview: and other Conversations, the never before released “unexpurgated” last interview of author James Baldwin.

John R. Gordon's writer’s diary: Ecstatic fiction/brains light up.

 KAOS favourite Brontez Purnell reads from The Cruising Diaries.

The infuriating reason Americans still get a phonebook delivered every year.

Book review | Love Between Men: Seductive Stories of Afternoon Pleasure, edited by Shane Allison. "The majority of the stories in this collection were cute, easy reads that you could do while sunning yourself and then toss aside, not unlike what I did with the books of the ‘60s and ‘70s, which were available once upon a time on 42nd, or on 8th, or on Christopher..."

Americanize, Anglicise: Why do Brits and Yanks spell words differently?

| shouting in the night |

Bonnie Greer: Janet Suzman says black people aren’t interested in theatre. How ridiculous.

Princess Mary Demands Your Attention, a new play by Aaron Holland, "tells the soulful story of Amari Bolkonski, a gay, black daydreamer seemingly ‘stuck’ in life. A chance meeting throws him into to a decade-long journey to personal acceptance and freedom, guided (and haunted) by an inexplicable and challenging drag queen." It will run 15th January through 21st February 2015, at Chicago’s Victory Gardens Richard Christiansen Theater.

Meet the (cast) members behind The Penis Chronicles.

Broadway revival of LGBT-inclusive Side Show goes interactive with "Show Your Freak," a virtual online photo booth.


Liberace to be resurrected for a full-scale, long-running hologram show in (where else) Vegas.

| at the movies |

Straight characters portraying gay experience: Is Hollywood missing the point?

How Hollywood’s toxic (and worsening) addiction to franchises changed movies forever in 2014.


Director Mark Christopher has restored "lost gay footage" to 54, his 1998 film about the infamous Studio 54 starring Ryan Phillippe.

An oral history of Boogie Nights: The making and near unmaking of Paul Thomas Anderson’s breakout film.

Michael Francis Egan III, who earlier this year accused a group of Hollywood executives - including X-Men director Brian Singer - of molesting him when he was a teenager, has been indicted, and faces forty years in prison.

Joshua Rogers new film Pick Up, a coming of age love story about a gay man telling a potential partner that he's HIV-positive for the first time, needs backing.

Director Robert Zemeckis (Back To The Future) has recreated the World Trade Center in CGI for The Walk, his new picture starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as the French tightrope walker Phillipe Petit, who made history on a high-wire strung across the Twin Towers in 1974.

Talking to Tyson Beckford about his role in forthcoming picture Chocolate City - and raising money and awareness for an HIV cure.

How James Franco ended up in bed with Kim Jong-Un in The Interview.

Pride named 2014's best UK film at the British Independent Film Awards.

Beetlejuice 2 is happening.

Japan is going to start making its own Godzilla movies again.


These early versions - and alternates - of Star Wars movie posters.


The best films set in Los Angeles.

Are these the best LGBT films of 2014?

Cinema review | The Circle. "An absorbing look back at a part of gay history that ought to be far better known than it is. With its mix of documentary and drama it’s a powerful look at being gay in decades past. The Circle publication and club was one of the few successful relatively successful attempts before the 1960s to create a real gay community – encompassing the political, cultural and social – which may have been underground but attempted to stretch beyond both national and social boundaries."

Blu-ray review | The Killers. "A professional and intelligent movie, The Killers is the barometer against which all film noir is held."

| the box |


Why the television industry really is majorly screwed.


Why millions of Americans are binge-watching Korean dramas.

We watched all of Netflix's Marco Polo. You... don't have to.

Four LGBT personalities make the "Rising Stars of Cable News" list.

Russell Tovey on his Looking sex scenes with Jonathan Groff: "You can do anything; your hands go everywhere, and it’s fine. Neither of us at any point feels uncomfortable, and that’s why it’s so good. We just completely trust each other, and we go for it... Either of us could go to the other, 'Hey, you should put your dick in there'."

Thirteen Looking pictures that made us fall in love with San Francisco all over again.

Nick Jonas' boxer character revealed to be gay on season finale of Kingdom.

Out actor Andy Mientus to debut as gay super-villain Pied Piper on TV's The Flash.

20th Century Fox is remastering Buffy the Vampire Slayer in HD — and now there are crew members in shots.

The Simpsons turns 25. Here are the twenty-five best cartoons it inspired.

Why you should binge-watch this funny show about old people dying. Really.


Popular YouTube vlogger Connor Franta comes out at gay.

Stephen Collins tells People magazine that, yes, he was a child toucher, but he isn’t anymore.

Bill Cosby says only black journalists are neutral.

Stephen Fry has said he has used drugs such as cocaine "like pudding after work".

The twenty-nine hottest TV sex scenes of 2014.

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

Watch all 707 episodes Doctor Who (1963-1989) at the same time.

Check out the trailer for Channel 4's three, interconnected new LGBT dramas, Cucumber, Banana and Tofu. Russell T Davies, who created Queer As Folk, is the showrunner; and Pearl of Africa, a new Swedish docuseries following the life of Cleopatra Kambugu, the first transgender woman to openly transition while living in Uganda; Dr. Evil interrupts Sam Smith's Very Somber Christmas on SNL to take a shot at North Korea; and watch the latest episode of Finding Me the Series.

| beats, rhymes & life |

Azealia Banks is right about Iggy Azalea and, more importantly, race in America.

D'Angelo's back. "He was once hailed as the next Marvin Gaye. Then, after his ripped body threatened to overshadow his music, he vanished into addiction. So what the hell was he doing recently singing his heart out in a Pentecostal church in Stockholm? And how are his abs? Amy Wallace witnessed D'Angelo's ecstatic return to the stage—and hung out with the master of the sacred and the profane as he finishes his first album in a dozen years."

D'Angelo | He's back and as good as ever.

D'Angelo | Breaking the Voodoo curse: Black Messiah, and the perils of perfection.

D’Angelo | Black Messiah "released in response to protests".

Album review | D'Angelo - Black Messiah. "This is scarily complex songcraft that approaches sonic sculpture, that merits non-stop repeat listenings more than any album I’ve heard his year" (Rolling Stone); His "first album in 14 years is everything it promised to be, and more" (Slate); "worth waiting 15 years for... Children conceived to his smash Untitled (How Does It Feel) are in high school now" (The Daily Beast); "devastatingly great" (The A.V. Club); "an instant classic that mixes politics, love, and artistic triumph" (Flavorwire); "Grime still clings to the outer edges of these songs, no matter how layered they might be. D’Angelo uses his voice like an orchestra, his wordless harmonies sculpted" (Chicago Tribune); "feels part of a continuum, an urgent missive in a conversation that has resided on the periphery of popular music for decades" (LA Times).

Second coming: A timeline Of D'Angelo's last twenty years.

Tracking D’Angelo’s fifteen year absence.

D'Angelo | Return of the king: Unraveling the myth.

Take Me To Church, by Irish singer Hozier, a protest song against Russia's "gay propaganda" laws, is Spotify's most streamed single in 2014.

Chris Brown will not go to jail for 2013 anti-gay assault.

Sam Smith has become the only artist to sell one million albums in both the US and the UK in 2014. Smith is currently dating an extra from his music video Like I Can.

Union J's Jaymi Hensley says he was forced to come out to his dad as his boyfriend at the time was so camp.

Out country singer Ty Herndon has made his first public appearance with boyfriend Matt Collum.

Lance Bass has married his missus Michael Turchin.

How Young Thug got trapped by a $US15,000 advance from a major label. "Rapper Young Thug could be hip-hop’s next big star, but his career has hit frustrating music-industry roadblocks along the way. How did that happen — and what can labels do for rappers now, anyway?"

Is streaming bad for artists? Yes and no. The future of music, explained.

Videos: D'Angelo performs Charade live at the Brixton Academy; and Perfume Genius - Fool.

| sex |


The booming business of Mormon-themed porn.

Fernando Torres released from exclusive contract with Lucas Entertainment, accuses studio of fraud. Lucas accuses Torres of beating up his boyfriend Tomas Lopez (you know, the guy who killed his whole family...)

Is Brent Everett, Steve Pena, and Jayson Smith's "throuple" a publicity stunt?

Talking to Tyson Tyler about his new website, his hottest fuck of 2014, and what inside his big XXXmas box...

Talking to Pedro Andreas about his porn comeback, shooting bareback porn with Lucas Entertainment, and why he broke up with Daniel Marvin. Longtime KAOS readers might remember the news - from 2009 - of the porn super couple's separation.

Talking to Latino Fan Club founder Dana Bryan about barrio boys, and turning hustlers into models.


Gay porn star Harry Louis says he will sue Starbucks after a barista allegedly told him to "become a man" when he asked for coffee. (No prizes for guessing how he asked for coffee...)

Get ready for Broke Straight Boys, a new "reality-based docu-series" that explores the world of gay for pay.

KAOS favourite Diego Lauzen takes on Nick North with boyfriend Wagner Vittoria.

Ken Ott looking hot as ever on set. More here... And here!

Here's Adrian Hart on the set of Nick Foxx’s Falcon Edge movie.

Angel Cruz looking cute on the CockyBoys set.


Twenty-one gayest Abercrombie & Fitch moments.

The NastyPig ad Time Warner didn't want us to see; and watch Julian Serrano do what he does best.

| arena |

The 109 athletes, coaches, and sports figures who courageously came out this year.

Olympics: Any country with anti-gay laws could now be banned from hosting.

Olympic figure skater Eric Radford has come out as gay.

Olympic hopeful Tom Luchsinger on the forces that kept him in the closet and why he decided to come out.


UFC fighter Anderson Silva: I’m not gay, but I still could be.


The kiss. "Michael Sam got drafted, we all witnessed something special, and then ... what happened?"

Sports Illustrated gives the media a B+ in handling of Michael Sam. Would you?

Michael Sam kissing his boyfriend is easily the sports image of the year.

Michael Sam shares his story for #IAmUnbroken Campaign.

Michael Sam takes on Oprah.

Robbie Rogers splits from TV producer boyfriend Greg Berlanti.

Robbie Rogers slams FIFA's "insane" decision to host World Cups in Russia and Qatar.

Inspired by Robbie Rogers, high school soccer star Michael Martin has come out at his homecoming by dancing with his boyfriend.

The sad saga of Tommy Gaines. "The story of a Georgia basketball legend who lost his dreams to drug addiction, and his quest for redemption."

| betta work! |

Want to get paid the most at work? Be a lesbian. And don't be a gay guy. (Image)

When teaching means going back in the closet.

Police, firefighters, and security guards are the fattest workers in America. (Image)


Tipping perpetuates racism, classism, and poverty — let's get rid of it!

| body, mind & soul |

Why it's so hard to talk about male anorexia.

HIV: Why gay men make great hosts.

Talking to controversial sexpert Dan Savage.

Five new weapons in the war against HIV.

The challenges of a serodiscordant relationship.


Looking for friends in all the wrong places.

Weird tales from my year on gay dating apps.


Are you sitting too much? And gay New Yorkers talk about safe sex, barebacking and PrEP...

How much can you drink before it will kill you?

The black-white health gap: Why black men can expect to live five years fewer than white men.

We make exercise way too complicated. Here's how to get it right.

Why your brain loves procrastination.

| hell's kitchen |

McDonald's is dying in the United States. Thank Chipotle.

Britain's food industry is an unhealthy, unsustainable mess.

Insects are having sex in your coffee beans.

| zoo |

Benjy the gay bull makes it to his new home in time for Christmas - but has he found true love? Benjy was saved from an Irish slaughterhouse after a global outcry, and is settling in at Hillside Animal Sanctuary in Norwich, England.

Are the polar bears vanishing? It depends where you look.



Totally awesome, dude! Check out some real turtle power...

| inside the spaceship |


The complete history of Reddit, the Internet's front page.


Will Facebook ever get a dislike button?


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

The fifteen worst Internet hoaxes of 2014.


Seventeen problems bi guys face.


Really good gay pick up lines!

And finally, Andrew's trying to be happy; Martin talks to his high school sweetheart; Rogue "Marbie" Scott delivers more funk; and Walter takes on Atlanta's black, gay mafia!


Issue 202
08-21 December 2014
On the cover: D'Angelo.

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Read the last edition.


© 2014

Postcript
"You know, we might just as well not have
bothered to come. The whole thing's been ridiculous."
by KAOS on December 22, 2014

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