Tag Archives: LGBT culture

How To Not Win Friends
And Influence Bears

You may recall the huge brouhaha a few months ago when complaints arose that the bear-themed hookup site Bear411 was routinely refusing membership to men whom the site owner felt did not meet his personal ideal of “bearness”, namely non-hirsute or smaller guys. Asian men in particular seemed to bear the brunt of the rejections, although some were allowed to …

Read More »

Jazz Hands Might Have Been Better

San Francisco club promoters DJ Jeff Johnson and Kurt Cooper have generated some unpleasant attention for their June 1st “Fag Bash” party , with some taking great offense to both the name and ad image used. The ad appeared in two issues of the Bay Area Reporter and on fliers posted around town. The ad also appears on the Folsom …

Read More »

Folsm Street East: This Sunday

Folsom Street East, NYC’s smaller but almost as pervy version of the legendary San Francisco leather fair, takes place this Sunday on Chelsea’s W.28th Street. I’m told this year’s festivities include a “porn star pie eating contest”. Will there be actual pie involved? Inquiring minds, and all that. FSE is put on by GMSMA, the Gay Male S&M Activists. Hey, …

Read More »

Watching The Defectives

Gentle readers, this essay first ran on JMG in 2005, a couple of days after New York City’s Pride Parade. I got so many wonderful emails wishing that I’d made this post before Pride, rather than after it, that last year I ran it again, but on the Friday before the major Pride events around the country began. I do …

Read More »

Queers Of The Piers

The Queer Justice League is staging their first action tonight: Celebrate the “Queer of the Piers” Meeting and Rally at the Christopher St. Piers. TODAY Friday May 25th at 8PM. Our action is to introduce who we are, our mission, gain support and bring visibility to a number of queer related issues occuring at the pier. Please come dance, kiss, …

Read More »

Transmen Controversies

Transmen, female-to-male transexuals, continue to be barred from membership in Chicago’s Hellfire BD/SM club, the largest of some 400 such clubs in the nation. Despite some internal dissent, including the resignation of the club’s newletter editor, the membership recently voted to maintain their 10-year policy that “there must be a penal [sic] attachment.” Hellfire is one of the few BD/SM …

Read More »

Haliburton Junior, Jr.

Yesterday Mary Cheney and Heather Poe gave birth to a baby boy, Samuel David Cheney, seen here with his grandparents, Lynne and Shotgun. I have to agree with Rex Wockner, who says, “I have to hand it to the Cheneys. For more than six years now they have been PFLAG parents to Mary and Heather and also somehow kept the …

Read More »

HomoQuotable – Bob Kohler

“Do we crucify people because they’re a nuisance? Do we go up to them and say, ‘You don’t belong here for being young and loud, and being people of color? It’s life. It changes, and we have to change with it.” – Bob Kohler, 80, a 30-year resident of the West Village, in today’s LA Times article about the continuing …

Read More »

Sieben, Sieben, Ai Lyu-lyu

I remain mystified by Eurovision, the annual camp fest that captivates gay Europeans. Although I’m pleased that The Gays took first and second place, this year’s winner, the song by out lesbian Marija Serifovic, representing Serbia, was complete schlock ripped from the Jim Steinman/Celine Dion songbook. However, I am amused by the second place winner from Ukraine, a drag queen …

Read More »

Dead Daddy Dollars

Did you hear the one about the dead sperm donor being forced to pay child support? In 1999 and 2000 a Pennsylvania lesbian couple created two turkey baster babies using sperm donated by the then-living father, a friend. The couple civil-unioned in Vermont in 2002, but broke up in 2006, with one of the women winning monthly child support payments …

Read More »

Gay Life In Saudi Arabia

This month’s issue of The Atlantic features a fascinating article on gay life in Saudi Arabia. The author, Nadya Labi, investigates and contrasts the historical acceptance of gay behavior in Arabic nations versus the emerging concept of gay identity, and how the two are colliding in the increasingly Westernized Arabic world. In Saudi Arabia, sodomy is punishable by death. Though …

Read More »

China Launches Gay Show

China is launching its first ever gay television program, a weekly internet-only show called Connecting Homosexuals. Gay life has been steadily improving in China, with homosexuality decriminalized in 1997 and no longer considered a mental illness. According to the linked article, the official government stance on gays is called “the three no’s”. No disapproval, no approval, no promotion. I’ve heard …

Read More »