LGBTQ news and entertainment
Queer Nation takes a classic Coca Cola commercial and updates the video to reflect current angst and violence today in Russia due to anti-gay legislation and sentiment.
Coke is an official sponsor of the Sochi Olympic Games.
(h/t JoeMyGod)
Speaking to the BBC yesterday, President Vladimir Putin totally played the “some of my best friends are gays” card in denying he and the Russian government have an anti-gay agenda.
“I myself know some people who are gay. We’re on friendly terms. I’m not prejudiced in any way. If you want my personal attitude, I would tell you that I don’t care about a person’s sexual orientation. I’ve honoured several members of the gay community in this country but for their personal achievements, regardless of their sexual orientation. There’s no danger for individuals of this non-traditional sexual orientation who are planning to come to the games as visitors or participants.”
(h/t JMG)
GOP strategist Mary Matalin makes this odd comment on This Week With George Stephanopoulos Sunday morning regarding Vladimir Putin’s anti-LGBT controversy saying it’s no biggie because Matalin’s gay friends all think Putin’s hot.
“Can I just say, I’m so sick of sports and politics,” Matalin said. “All of my gay friends think he looks so buff when he is shirtless. Why is he even talking about this?”
To be honest, I don’t know what on earth she means. What a strange comment…
Everyone is entitled to an opinion. But One Direction’s Liam Payne confused the Twitterverse with his tweet today sending”huge love” to the Duck Dynasty family.
You’ll recall the Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson recently found himself in hot water due to his anti-gay remarks in a GQ Magazine interview.
It’s impossible to believe that Liam Payne sent his message not thinking it would relate to the anti-gay animus coming from Phil Robertson and company.
Payne later tweeted: “Being a fan of someones show and the way they still hold a family together doesnt mean i am ok with all they say.”
Hmm…..
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| Anti-gay vigilante Maxim Martsinkevich |
Maxim Martsinkevich, Russian anti-gay vigilante and leader of the homophobic group “Occupy Paedophilia”, was arrested in Cuba today.
From Russian news agency RIA Novosti:
Russia was informed by Cuban police of the arrest of Maxim Martsinkevich through Interpol, the Russian Interior Ministry said in a statement.
More widely known under his nickname of Tesak, or machete, Martsinkevich was arrested in absentia by a Russian court last month on extremism charges.
Martsinkevich said during a January 8 interview that the criminal charges against him were orchestrated by Russia’s “pedo-lobby,” and that he did not intend to return to Russia, according to Russian tabloid Life News that has close links to the security services.
The details of Martsinkevich’s extradition were currently being finalized, Russia’s Investigative Committee said in a statement Saturday.
In a January 9 post on his website, Martsinkevich wrote that he had flown to Cuba from the Ukrainian capital of Kiev, via the German city of Frankfurt.
In 2011, Martsinkevich founded the Occupy Pedophile vigilante group, which lured men to abusive meetings with false promises of sex with minors. The encounters were recorded and then posted online. The group was also reported to target gay men, who were subjected to similar abusive treatment.
I shared a CNN report earlier today that features many of Martsinkevich’s attacks on gays in Russia.
(h/t JMG)
President Putin of Russia says gay Olympians have nothing to fear when attending the Sochi Olympics as long as they leave children alone.
“We don’t have a ban on non-traditional sexual relations between people,” Putin told a group of volunteers who will be working at the Games.
“We have a ban on the propaganda of homosexuality and paedophilia,” Putin said in televised comments from host city Sochi, with three weeks to go until the event.
“We don’t ban anything and we won’t arrest anyone,” he said. “Therefore you can feel calm, relaxed. But leave children alone please.”
Ironically, uniforms for volunteers for the Games have been designed with a rainbow theme. When asked by a volunteer if the rainbow might breach the “gay propaganda” law, Putin responded by saying he didn’t design the uniforms.
(source)
From the Advocate: A man in Nigeria was beaten by authorities this week for having had sex with another man seven years ago.
Mubarak Ibrahim, 20, was punished for retroactively violating a law that President Goodluck Jonathan signed earlier this month, which criminalizes homosexuality and bans same-sex marriages. While Ibrahim would have been a minor at the time, the BBC report did not disclose the terms under which he had sexual contact with another male.
In addition to 20 lashes, Ibrahim was also ordered to pay a fine of about $30.
According to the BBC, Ibrahim was whipped in the court with a animal skin smeared in oil. He screamed in pain as the lashes came down on his back in a packed courtroom.
He is one of several men who were arrested in the weeks leading up to the signage of the bill. Eleven men in total are facing death under Islamic law, and a 12th man, who is Christian, would be punished under secular law.
The Advocate is reporting that Republican Oklahoma state Rep. Sally Kern, who is unrelated to the federal judge who struck down the ban, is angry and speaking out about the recent ruling by a federal judge which found the state’s marriage equality ban.
“Homosexuality is not a civil right, it’s a human wrong,” Rep. Kern told KOTV.
One of the state legislature’s most virulent anti-gay members, Kern says that people who say they were born gay have simply told “a lie long enough [that] people begin to believe it.”
See KOTV’s report below.
NewsOn6.com – Tulsa, OK – News, Weather, Video and Sports – KOTV.com |
Former Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe made an appearance on the David Pakman talk show regarding his allegations that his speaking out on behalf of LGBT rights played a part in him being released from the Vikings.
During the interview, Kluwe stated that a lawsuit might be in the cards if the Vikings announced investigation yields no evidence of what he says he experienced in his last season with the team:
“I haven’t ruled out a lawsuit,” Kluwe said Wednesday on the David Pakman Show. “I would really prefer not to have to do a lawsuit, because I loved my time on the Vikings, and I still have a lot of friends on the team and I love the organization. But if that’s what it takes — if that means getting people on the stand with the threat of perjury, then something that will have to happen, because I made very serious claims, and they need to be backed up.”
You can watch the discussion below:
(source)
A&E aired the premiere of the fifth season of DUCK DYNASTY last night, and the ratings saw a significant drop after the controversy over Phil Robertson’s anti-gay remarks, EW reports:
Wednesday night’s Duck Dynasty season 5 premiere had 8.5 million viewers. That’s huge for a cable reality show, but down 28 percent from its record-setting fourth season debut in August (11.8 million). It’s also slightly down from the show’s third season premiere in February last year (8.6 million). A&E notes the number up slightly from the fourth season finale on Oct. 23 (though obviously it’s standard to compare premieres to premieres).
Robertson was placed on a brief suspension after his remarks and received a slap on the wrist from A&E, but didn’t end up losing a single one for his statements in GQ, in which he compared homosexual sinners to terrorists, prostitutes, and drunks.