JKane

I've wondered about this, good reporting NBC 4! http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Hijacking-the-Streets.html

Am I bad son because I don't do a damn thing for V-day? I don't think of it as a mother's holiday...

Just do the American thing: buy a much bigger car!

It's too damn early to be that chipper! ;o) Grumble, coffee, grumble.

Thanks Marc!!! I've always thought Russian boys were sexy as hell and love some of the porn with Russian/eastern block guys the most, and I've always had other interests in seeing Russia too. But it does sound like as a gay tourist it is deeply problematic at best. Good to know St. Petersburg is better, maybe do the gay tourist thing there and just be a regular tourist in Moscow is the best way to go about things. But it sounds like it's getting worse, not better, which is odd.

Of course, and the very worst of it is the guys battling their own sexuality and trying desperately to pass as straight. But the article points out a side of the "No Homo Promo" / "Don't Say Gay" Bachman-type BS which I hadn't considered and which is very important: It deprives these kids of role models in their own lives. Somebody they know who can tell them "It gets better!". Of course kids are shits and gays can be extra mean, but that's the point. With this bs in place there's much less chance of there being an adult in the kids life to show them the good sides. So they kill themselves.

That sounds like another fascinating Wired true-crime type article in the making!

I think it needs a corollary where questions 4 and 6 set gay or straight perv!

This fucking No Homo Promo shit is STILL PASSING!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nm9Nz2zCV5M They like Fishsticks?

Anybody here from there or visit regularly? How bad is it? European Parliament Condemns LGBT Censorship in Russia

Some great stuff in here.

Cool, couple other pictures here. I'd never heard of Wobbegongs, AKA carpet sharks:

Nothing as dramatic as one would expect. Happened here. The big goodbye.

As their husbands tell them to, yes...

Professional Poker Player Jason Somerville Says He's Gay, is First Male Pro Player to Come Out I wonder how many sports are left with no big, publicly out stars?

http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2012/02/primarily-gross.html Sick him, boy!

http://www.dailydot.com/society/gay-soldier-randy-phillips-youtube-profile/ Just stumbled across, realized I was fairly curious...

Pretty surprising really, given how China and Russia seem to act about it... What's Cuba's stance again?

Stumbled across another article on this issue: The Cruel Evangelical War on Gays February 14, 2012 By Alan Litchfield Young students recently demonstrated the cost of hate and indifference in congresswoman Michelle Bachman’s religiously conservative home district, where nine students committed suicide during a two-year period. As this recent article in Rolling Stone painfully details, one student crawled in a bathtub and shot herself, another hanged himself, and others began cutting themselves and engaging in risky behavior. The deaths don’t include students hospitalized for mental illnesses or the 14 more assessed for suicidal thoughts at one middle school alone. The article details how the string of deaths in Minnesota’s Anoka-Hennepin school district revealed an appalling strain of homophobia and abuse toward actual or perceived homosexuals by fellow students and townspeople, fueled by Christian evangelical ignorance, dogma and misinformation. Evangelical churches and groups such as the absurdly named Focus on the Family, founded by James Dobson, played a large part. While tragic deaths can’t be traced directly to these hate groups – suicide is not that easy of an issue – the level of religious-inspired cruelty and meanness is astonishing and certainly played a role. I recommend reading the article if you have a strong constitution. If your stomach can bear more nauseating ideas, consider the absurdity – and the irony – of evangelical hatred on the national level, as evidenced by the religious opposition to gay marriage. In fact, the recent defeat of Proposition 8, the California gay marriage ban, in the 9th Circuit Court of appeals, was most likely due to the fact that its proponents had no good arguments to provide the court. As this article suggests: Perhaps, as many speculated at the time, it reflected the deeper reality that there was no factual or empirical case to be made: The evidence, the data, and the experts overwhelming agree that gay marriage does not harm children. And that leaves opponents of gay marriage to argue a tautology: Gay marriage is wrong because it’s wrong. Indeed, as a Florida court has noted, the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatry Association, the American Pediatric Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Child Welfare League of America and the National Association of Social Workers adopted and ratified conclusions that children raised by same-sex couples are just as well-developed as those raised by heterosexual couples. And, As a result, based on the robust nature of the evidence available in the field, this Court is satisfied that the issue is so far beyond dispute that it would be irrational to hold otherwise; the best interests of children are not preserved by prohibiting homosexual adoption. Evangelicals who argue for the unchanging sanctity of “Christian marriage” are historically misinformed, as well. Marriage as we currently know it is a modern convention, as summarized here and here. Marriage is not a static institution, and has changed drastically in the past. Our current practices bear little resemblance to biblical customs, which held a patriarchal view of family life, treated women as property and allowed concubinage. In the book of Genesis, for instance, we have the story I like to refer to as “Swingin’ with Abe,” in which the childless Sarah gives her servant to her husband Abraham to impregnate. Is this what is meant by “biblical marriage?” The patriarchs seemed to have thought so: King Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines, 1 Kings 11. (Don’t get me started with Lott, who impregnated his daughters, or King David, who planned a murder to be with his woman-of-choice. King David makes Bill Clinton look like Jimmy Carter.) Marriage bestows many positive benefits on individuals. It fosters companionship, legal protection and provides real health benefits (see here). The great irony is, if Christians truly wanted all of humanity to thrive and be happy, they would actually desire homosexuals to marry. Their opposition only illustrates an unfortunate lack of moral vision and intellectual dishonesty. This conservative Christian view of homosexuality is mean, harmful and lacks factual merit. It’s a clear sign of bigotry masquerading as piety. Our children deserve better, and we should seek to provide this future to them or risk their demonstration of our inaction.

Yep, I have worries along those lines, came up in comments over at BIE.

From Barry Goldwater!

Not Constantinople?

Take this, establish a baseline, and re-check yourself periodically--it's the only way to be sure! How fast can you guess these words and fill-in the blanks? 1. _ _NDOM 2. F_ _K 3. P_N_S 4. PU_S_ 5. S_X 6. BOO_S Answers: 1. RANDOM 2. FORK 3. PANTS 4. PULSE 5. SIX 6. BOOKS You got all 6 wrong....didn't you? You do NOT have Alzheimer's... You are a Pervert!

That is a great summary, TY. Romney is a plastic bag blowing in the wind. Modern democrats have been more like a sail, always swinging back and forth, but generally there's a rope that'll stop them from going 180 degrees from their starting point...