GLBTQ news and views from across America and around the world updated throughout the day. Search almost 20,000 LGBT stories in our achieve. Plus you can use the links below to go to the Gay Book Blog, the Gay Opinion Blog, the gay Religion Blog or the Gay Travel Blog.
Public attitudes about gays in the military have shifted dramatically since President Bill Clinton unveiled what became his administration's "don't ask, don't tell" policy 15 years ago today.
Seventy-five percent of Americans in a new Washington Post-ABC News poll said gay people who are open about their sexual orientation should be allowed to serve in the U.S. military, up from 62 percent in early 2001 and 44 percent in 1993.
Majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents alike now believe it is acceptable for openly gay people to serve in the U.S. armed forces. Shortly after he took office in 1993, Clinton faced strong resistance to his campaign pledge to lift the military's ban on allowing gay people to enlist. At that time, 67 percent of Republicans and 75 percent of conservatives opposed the idea. A majority of independents, 56 percent, and 45 percent of Democrats also opposed changing the policy. More of Acceptance of Gay People in Military Grows Dramatically
San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed is being urged by his city's Human Rights Commission to oppose Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment on the fall ballot that would outlaw same-sex marriage.
Reed personally opposes gay marriage but, so far, has remained silent on the controversial ballot measure. Earlier this month when asked by the Bay Area Reporter about the issue, Reed said he would refrain from commenting on Prop 8 until after legal challenges to the measure had been decided.
Since the B.A.R.'s story, the mainstream press has hounded Reed about it and LGBT leaders have threatened to go after him "guns blazing" if he comes out in support of Prop 8.
The Ugandan President has spoken of his country's "rejection" of homosexuality during a speech he gave at the wedding of a former MP's daughter.
Yoweri Museveni said the purpose of life was to create children and that homosexuality was a "negative foreign culture."
Uganda is one of the African countries at the centre of a row in the Anglican Communion over homosexuality and the ordination of gay priests that threatens to rip the Anglican Church to shreds.
260 bishops, many of them African, have declined invitations to the Lambeth conference, (the once a decade meeting of Anglican bishops) on the grounds of ordination of woman and gay bishops is immoral and against the teachings of Christ.
While there is much to admire among the subjects of A Jihad for Love, the film itself is a low-grade production that risks losing the viewer with an unimaginative sequence of talking heads.
Sometimes we don't even get that: the faces of the queer Muslims interviewed in this documentary about homosexuality and Islam are often smudged out, to protect them and their families.
Born and raised in India, gay Muslim director Parvez Sharma is a journalist who has worked for the BBC and The Telegraph. He obtained much of his footage for this film surreptitiously, especially in countries such as Iran where homosexuality is a crime punishable by death.
It would be one thing if the gay men and lesbian women that Sharma interviews were content to lead secular lives, but the sting comes in their devotion to their faith.
As much as they might wish to proclaim the love that dare not speak its name, these Indians, Iranians, Pakistanis and Egyptians more fervently wish to reconcile their love of Allah with same-sex preferences.
Muhsin Hendricks, who lives in Cape Town, is a particularly poignant example. He comes from a long line of Islamic scholars. "I was virtually born in a mosque," he says. Aware of his own nature from an early age, he asks God why he had to be this way.
He goes to Pakistan and marries, has three children, then takes the bold step of coming out. As an openly gay Imam, he engages those in his orthodox Muslim community, urging them to see that the Qu'ran has no injunctions against same-sex love.
In Cairo, Sharma finds Mazen, who was raped and tortured in prison following a raid on a gay club. "God has given me patience," he says, from his refuge in Paris.
A happier story is told about Ferda, a Sufi lesbian in Istanbul, and her girlfriend, Kiymet. The camera follows them on a visit to Ferda's mother, who affectionately embraces her daughter's partner.
Rights of Taxpayers To Challenge Government Funding Of Religion At Stake
The American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed a brief today in a federal appeals court urging the court to allow a discrimination lawsuit to go forward on behalf of a lesbian who was fired from her job at a publicly-funded Baptist group home in Kentucky. The home for vulnerable children required the woman to observe its religious belief that being a lesbian is sinful. The brief also charges that taxpayers should be able to challenge the state of Kentucky's decision to give public funds to a home that imposes its religious beliefs upon the children in its care.
"I put my heart and soul into helping the children who were under the care of Baptist Homes and was making a difference in their lives," said Alicia Pedreira. "It was unfair to be fired for being a lesbian. It's not right that an organization that is funded by state and federal dollars to do work for the state can get away with this."
The ACLU and Americans United filed the lawsuit on April 17, 2000, on behalf of Pedreira charging that it was unlawful for the publicly-funded Kentucky Baptist Homes for Children (since renamed Sunrise Children's Services) to fire Pedreira because she did not observe her employer's religious beliefs about sexual orientation. The complaint also charges that it was unconstitutional for the state to spend taxpayer dollars to fund a religious organization that attempts to indoctrinate children placed under state care with its religious beliefs. After years of litigation, the district court dismissed the case on March 31, 2008. The legal groups appealed that decision to the Federal Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and are urging the court to allow the case to proceed.
"This case illustrates the all-too-real dangers of the government funding religious organizations without adequate safeguards," said Ken Choe, a Senior Staff Lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union's Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project. "The Constitution's promise of religious freedom guarantees that the government won't preference one form of religion over another. Yet that's exactly what happened to Alicia Pedreira, who was fired because she didn't conform to the religious beliefs of her government-funded employer."
The lower court dismissed Pedreira's discrimination claims finding that Pedreira didn't suffer religious discrimination because Baptist Homes did not require her to believe that being a lesbian is sinful, but merely required that she observe its religious belief that being a lesbian is sinful. In the brief filed today, the legal groups note that this interpretation of the law would mean employers are free to discriminate against all employees who fail to conform all aspects of their lives to the religious beliefs of the employer. Workers could be fired for dancing, eating meat, receiving blood transfusions, marrying someone of another faith and for serving in the military.
The brief also charges that the lower court misinterpreted a recent Supreme Court decision by ruling that Pedreira and other taxpayers are barred from bringing a challenge against the state for awarding state funds to Baptist Homes with state funds in violation of constitutional guarantees against government funding of religion.
"Kentucky Baptist Homes is on a mission to evangelize on the taxpayers' dime," said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Executive Director of Americans United. "The Constitution simply does not allow this. Faith-based charities that want to indoctrinate youths should not get public funds."
The brief argues that the taxpayer plaintiffs meet all the long-held qualifications for challenging the state's decision to give state funds to a religious-based organization that has frequently touted its success in converting wards of the state to Christianity. The brief notes that the 2007 Supreme Court decision, Hein v. Freedom from Religion Foundation, that the lower court relies upon to justify dismissing the claims clearly stated that it applied only to discretionary Executive Branch expenditures, not funds authorized by a legislature.
"The trial judge was way off base in dismissing this case on legal technicalities," added Americans United Senior Litigation Counsel Alex J. Luchenitser. "If this wrong-headed ruling is allowed to stand, it will eviscerate the rights of taxpayers to challenge public funding of religion."
The brief cites a report by the Children's Review Program, a private contractor hired by Kentucky officials to monitor programs for children. The report noted numerous instances where young people complained about being forced to attend Baptist services or said they were not permitted to attend services of other faiths.
The brief says, "Baptist Homes uses its public funding to indoctrinate youths – who are wards of the state – in its religious views, coerce them to take part in religious activity, and convert them to its version of Christianity, and does so in part by requiring its employees to reflect its religious beliefs in their behavior."
In addition to Choe and Luchenitser, the legal team representing Pedriera includes Americans United Legal Director Ayesha Khan; ACLU attorneys James Esseks, David Friedman, Daniel Mach and William Sharp; ACLU cooperating attorney Vicki Buba of the Oldfather Law Firm in Louisville, KY, attorneys David Bergman, Joshua Wilson, Elizabeth Leise, Alicia Truman, Lea Johnston, and Alessandro Maggi of the international law firm Arnold & Porter LLP; and Washington, D.C. attorney Murray Garnick.
An international team of AIDS scientists has discovered that a gene variant common in blacks protects against certain types of malaria but increases susceptibility to HIV infection by 40 percent.
Researchers, keen to find some biological clues to explain why people of African descent are bearing a disproportionate share of the world's AIDS cases, suspect this subtle genetic trait - found in 60 percent of American blacks and 90 percent of Africans - might partly explain the difference.
Ten percent of the world's population lives in sub-Saharan Africa, but that region accounts for 70 percent of the men, women and children living with HIV infection. In the United States, African Americans make up 12 percent of the population but account for half of newly diagnosed HIV infections.
"The cause of this imbalance is not necessarily driven by behavior," said Phill Wilson, founder of the Black AIDS Institute in Los Angeles. "Gay black men do not engage in riskier behavior than gay white men, for example. African people with this gene may have a higher vulnerability."
Based on their analysis, the researchers estimated that this gene variant alone may account for 11 percent of the estimated 25 million HIV infections that have occurred in sub-Saharan Africa - roughly 2.7 million cases.
The gene study was led by Dr. Sunil Ahuja, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, and published Wednesday in the journal Cell Host & Microbe.
Lambda Legal represents Joey Ramelli and Megan Donovan - former students at Poway High School - in northern San Diego County. Over the course of their junior year, other students taunted them with antigay slurs, going so far as to vandalize Joey's car and assault him. The two students were forced to drop out of school, and complete their high school education at home as a result of the hostile environment. Despite reporting the incidents to school officials, authorities took minimal or no action. JURY: School district failed to protect lesbian and gay students ... Proud Parenting -
Orlando, Florida) The tidy palm lined streets and affordable homes of the Rybolt Reserve subdivision in suburban Orlando have become popular with middle class homebuyers and speculators but if you are a gay or unmarried opposite-sex couple the Homeowners Association has a message - don't bother to try to rent here according to some property owners.
Several owners say they have been told by the Association they cannot rent their properties in the East Orange County subdivision to couples who are not legally married or to same-sex pairs.
Forget economic stimulus checks. Same-sex marriages may give California just the financial boost it needs.
Wedding planners, bakers and hotels began booking more business almost immediately after the state Supreme Court's May 15 decision overturning a ban on gay marriage. Citing pent-up demand, one UCLA study projects that same-sex unions could provide a $370-million shot in the arm to the state economy over the next three years.
"Being in West Hollywood, we've been inundated," said Tom Rosa, owner of the Cake and Art bakery on Santa Monica Boulevard. "After the ruling, the phone really picked up."
Rosa said couples who had waited for decades to legally marry were splurging on 5-foot tall confections shaped like carousels and cakes featuring handcrafted birds of paradise.
Mike Standifer and Marc Hammer were already planning a commitment ceremony for October, but when the court ruling came out, they decided to throw an even bigger bash and get married.
They plan on spending about $25,000, which includes renovations on their Hollywood home so they can have the party in their backyard. The new price tag includes rings, their suits and those of their wedding party, and the cost of flying in Standifer's pr Gay marriage a gift to California's economy Los Angeles Times, CA
Riding the line between ennergizing conservatives and attracting moderates and independents this election year continues to prove difficult for John McCain.
In its latest email to supporters a leading social conservative group, the Family Research Council, is taking issue with recent, contradictory statements out of the McCain campaign on gay adoption and calling on the GOPer to stand by the "traditional family unit."
In an interview late last week with the New York Times, McCain said he opposed gay adoption, adding that "I think that we've proven that both parents are important in the success of a family, so, no, I don't believe in gay adoption." While the stance may be controversial to gay voters and some liberals, he curries some favor with a larger group social conservatives he needs to energize for November.
But wait.
The campaign then issued a clarifying statement to blogger Andrew Sullivan, stating that McCain believes gay adoption is a state issue but added that "as an adoptive father himself, McCain believes children deserve loving and caring home environments, and he recognizes that there are many abandoned children who have yet to find homes. McCain believes that in those situations that caring parental figures are better for the child than the alternative."
The FRC, led by Tony Perkins, is now alleging the statement "muddies the waters," and warns in an email sent to supporters Tuesday night that the McCain camp "should not fall into this 'lady or the tiger' trap and should emphasize the need to rebuild the natural family."
BOSTON — Massachusetts may have been the first state to legalize same-sex marriage for its residents, but when California last month invited out-of-state gay and lesbian couples to get married, the potential economic benefits did not go unnoticed here. Now Massachusetts wants to extend the same invitation.
On Tuesday, the State Senate voted to repeal a 1913 law that prevents Massachusetts from marrying out-of-state couples if their marriages would not be legal in their home states. The repeal, which passed with no objections on a voice vote, is expected to pass the House later this week. Gov. Deval Patrick, a Democrat and a supporter of same-sex marriage whose 18-year-old daughter recently disclosed publicly that she is a lesbian, has said he will sign the repeal.
The repeal of the out-of-state marriage ban would come more than four years after Massachusetts became the first state to allow gay men and lesbians to marry, and same-sex marriage advocates said the timing was carefully calculated to catch the prevailing political — and economic — winds.
A leading insurance comparison website has caused a storm of debate by claiming gay men have a life expectancy 20 years shorter than heterosexual men.
Insure.com, which provides quotes from more than 200 insurers to people across the US, has posted an article claiming research has shown that gay men do not live as long as heterosexual men.
"The studies did not disagree that gay men were dying younger than most other people. Why? The majority of the morbidity stems from AIDS," he wrote.
"But there is also a significant amount of drug use involved in many parts of gay culture, as well as increased incidence of psychological illness, family instability and suicide."
The Army has joined forces with leading gay rights group Stonewall to promote tolerance within its ranks.
Head of the British Army General Sir Richard Dannatt said discrimination prevented the full contribution that is "vital for our success in operations".
Stonewall said it had yet to set up an action plan, but that it would initially focus on recruitment and retention of military personnel.
Rows and acrimony dominate in the media, but what is it like to actually be a gay priest in the Church of England? Philosopher Mark Vernon, who left his job as a clergyman, gives his view.
One of the paradoxes of the row over homosexuality in the Anglican church is that there have been, are, and always will be gay priests. Many gay priests. I know. I was one.
But that paradox - or better, absurdity - shouldn't detract from the seriousness of the message being championed by Bishop Gene Robinson. He is the first openly gay and "partnered" bishop in the Anglican communion and is in the news because he has been barred from attending the Lambeth Conference as a bishop. 'I was a gay priest' BBC News, UK
San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed, a social conservative in the liberal Bay Area, is trying to walk a careful line on gay marriage: opposed to same-sex marriage but not ready to declare his position on a constitutional amendment that would ban it.
But on Monday the first-term mayor found himself being blasted by gay rights leaders as "out of step" - a turn of events that illustrates just how difficult the issue is proving to be as Californians choose sides in advance of a November ballot measure.
Reed's travails - which led the normally accessible mayor on Monday to refuse to answer questions from the Mercury News - began Friday when the mayor said during a KPIX (Ch. 5) news report: "I don't support changing the definition of marriage."
Gay rights leaders interpreted the report as the mayor's declaration that he would support the constitutional ban and called it "appalling."
The author, " Licensed Psychologist"Trayce L. Hansen, Ph.D. was not based on her own research nor was her work published in a peer reviewed scientific journal. Instead, her analysis of research by other scientists represents another step in the far right#s campaign to blur the distinction between real science and the kind practiced by this self-styled "cultural commentator."
Ms. Hansen has a perfect right to state her views but to suggest her analysis is a valid scientific study is misleading at best and an outright lie at worst. Her repeated efforts to blur the distinction between personal opinion and peer-reviewed science suggest her training at the California School of Professional Psychology in San Diego was somewhat lacking in its instruction of scientific methodology.
Ms. Hansen does not teach at an accredited institution of higher learning nor does she hold any positron at a major research institution. She did not conduct any field work but only misinterpreted existing studies and placed her "findings" on her web site. She has a private practice and claims also to have a forensic practice.
Few of us would be foolish enough to go to a Hospital emergency room which used treatments that had not been tested and assessed by peer review. Yet the far right wants us to believe "Pro-Homosexual Researchers Conceal Findings: Children Raised by Openly Homosexual Parents More Likely to Engage in Homosexuality." Someone ought to revoke her license for deliberately misleading the public. In fact, her conclusions are refuted by the peer reviewed studies she struggles to misinterpret. This is pure pseudo-science. If Ms.only Hansen and her like were willing to go to pseudo-doctors who use pseudo-science in their treatment, we would soon have proof of Drawin's evolutionary theory of survival of the fittest.
The purpose of life is to have a family for propagation of the human race, President Yoweri Museveni has said.
The President made the remarks on Saturday during the giveaway ceremony of Eureka Kyobutungi, daughter of Elly Karuhanga, who was betrothed to Wesley Musinga Nyakabwa.
The ceremony took place at the bride’s home in Kyakabunga, Nyabushozi county, Kiruhura district.
Karuhanga, a former Nyabushozi county MP, is the honorary consul of Seychelles to Uganda.
The groom is son to the late Vincent Nyakabwa and Alex Nyakabwa of Kanyambeho village, Burahya county in Kabarole district.
According to a State House press statement, Museveni commended Ugandans for rejecting homosexuality.
He advised them to distance themselves from negative foreign cultures.
Same-sex marriages are outlawed in Uganda. Recently, the Church of Uganda along with other Anglican provinces in Africa broke ties with Canterbury, the main Anglican seat, over the matter.
The bishops blamed the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, for being lenient to the pro-gay Episcopal Church of the US and the Anglican Church of Canada. Museveni lauds Ugandans on anti-gay stand New Vision, Uganda -
Antonio Ingroia, who has helped bring several bosses to justice, said: "Being gay is still a taboo for Italian society in general, let alone the Mafia, which is an archaic organisation.
"These bosses have to cover their homosexuality; they're afraid because they risk being ridiculed and killed."
Mr Ingroia said that the American Mafia had "a more broad-minded attitude towards gays and so gay bosses can come out."
British actor Sir Ian McKellen said on Sunday he used to receive death threats due to his homosexuality and while these had fallen off in recent years, others were still being subjected to homophobia.
"There are deaths in public places on the grounds that the victim is gay," said McKellen in a BBC interview.
"There is a violence of language which can be related to violence in action," added McKellen a founder member of gay rights group Stonewall.
"My own death threats have declined considerably. I think I've become rather boring now to the public at large on this particular issue so I'm thought to be unremarkable."
Morality, personal liberty, and constitutional law have been the usual battlegrounds in the fight over gay marriage. Now Governor Deval Patrick's administration is injecting something a bit more pedestrian to the debate: economic development.
A study conducted for the state's Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development predicts that an economic boomlet in hotel bookings, banquets, and wedding cakes would result from repealing a 1913 state law that prevents gay and lesbian couples from most other states from marrying in Massachusetts.
Consider these numbers: An estimated 32,200 same-sex couples from elsewhere would travel to the state to get married over the next three years. That would pump $111 million into the economy and yield another $5 million in marriage license fees and sales and occupancy taxes.
Those estimates were produced by the Williams Institute, a nonprofit organization at the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law that studies policies, including economic issues, relating to sexual orientation.
The estimates were touted by advocates yesterday on the eve of an expected vote on a Senate bill that would repeal the 1913 law.
"There will be couples who will throw huge weddings in Massachusetts, and there will be couples who just pop into the state, get their license, and leave," said R. Bradley Spears, executive director of the Williams Institute.
Senator Dianne Wilkerson, who is championing the issue in the state Senate, said she is "extremely optimistic" that the repeal bill will pass today and proceed to the House, where advocates are also optimistic about approval. Wilkerson said she is not expecting a heated debate, despite the volatility of the gay marriage issue on Beacon Hill for the last several years.
One of the paradoxes of the row over homosexuality in the Anglican church is that there have been, are, and always will be gay priests. Many gay priests. I know. I was one. 
