LGBTQ news and entertainment
Some news items you might have missed: • The Advocate: Prosecutors in San Francisco said they will proceed with a new trial for James Rickleffs after his convictions for the 2012 bondage and poppers murder and robbery of gay hairstylist Steven “Eriq” Escalon were overturned by an appellate court. Continue reading “Bondage/Poppers Murder Case To Get Retrial + More News”
Who’s been on Grindr lately? (stock image via Depositphotos)
Dr. Mohamed A. Hammoud, the lead author of the study, told QNews decades of coping with the HIV epidemic has taught gay and bisexual men how to be adaptive in the face of health threats. “Our community has a long history of creating innovative strategies to reduce risk,” explained Hammoud. “[We’re] seeing this continue with this new health challenge.” Hammoud added, “The results from our study show that an overwhelming majority of gay and bisexual men have adapted their behavior and are adhering to physical distancing guidelines.” There is an upside to the drop in hooking up. The decline in casual sex will likely result in “a reduction in new HIV and STI diagnoses in the short term,” according to Associate Professor Garrett Prestage, one of the co-authors of the study. “Trends in these diagnoses are likely to fluctuate significantly in response to changes in physical distancing restrictions,” said Prestage. The new study was published in the medical journal JAIDS on Friday. (Source: QNews)
DJ Thiago Oliveira (via Instagram)
• Washington Post: Donald Trump’s former chief of staff John F. Kelly defended former defense secretary Jim Mattis on Thursday over Mattis’s criticism of the president’s handling of nationwide protests. Kelly also dismissed Trump’s assertion that the president fired the retired general in 2018. “The president did not fire him. He did not ask for his resignation. The president has clearly forgotten how it actually happened or is confused.” • Out: Following fellow gay dating app Grindr, Jack’d and Scruff have announced they will disable their ethnicity filters in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. “We stand in solidarity with the fight against systemic racism and historic oppression of the Black community.” • Lincoln Project: The conservative anti-Trump PAC drops this new campaign ad writing, “Trump is no longer hiding that he’s a brazen authoritarian, so desiring of control and power that he’s willing to turn our once peaceful cities into #warzones.
Kumail Nanjiani (images via Instagram)
• LGBTQNation: People who booked an Atlantis cruise for next week are getting angry that the company hasn’t canceled the cruise and won’t refund them if they don’t go, even though other major cruise lines are canceling due to coronavirus. • Twitter: You don’t get any more badass than Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) as she adds up the costs for a battery of coronavirus tests, then reads the federal regulations that gives the CDC director the authority to authorize paying for these tests for all Americans. And then gets him to commit to doing so. Watch below.
@RepKatiePorter is a badass here as she does the math for the costs for a battery of #coronavirus testing. She then gets CDC fir to commit to free testing for all Americans. This is worth watching👍👍👍 pic.twitter.com/2852tAJaW2
— The Randy Report (@randyslovacek) March 12, 2020
Trump claims (falsely) all Americans returning to country are being tested:”We have heavily tested. If an American coming back or anybody coming back, we have a tremendous testing set up where people coming in have to be tested … if it shows positive … We have to quarantine.” pic.twitter.com/ndGlKmSFJh
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) March 12, 2020
Earlier this week, users of the popular gay dating app Scruff were greeted by a message from the company of a change in policy regarding profile pictures.
Titled, “Profile photo guidelines are changing,” the alert went on to state, “To comply with platform policies, photos in underwear, jockstraps or bikini style bathing suits are no longer permitted in profile photos.”
In a statement on the site’s support page, Scuff CEO Eric Silverberg wrote, “All gay and queer apps must enforce app store content policies or risk being removed from the app stores altogether, and this happened to SCRUFF earlier this year.”
“Had this removal been permanent, it would have been devastating to our company and our community,” he added.
Silverberg didn’t elaborate which App Store had temporarily removed his app.
“The primary profile photo may not show jockstraps, underwear, or bikini-style swimwear,” explained the CEO.
Also, profile photos that show “sexually suggestive embraces” might not “align with App Store guidelines.”
Additional guidelines include:
• No exposed genitals (not even a small, tiny part)
• No visible erections or visible outline of genitalia in clothes.
• No shower shots
• No shots of genitalia obscured by towels or hands
• No cropping of shots to make the crotch focal point of the photo
• No collages or compositions of multiple photos
The complete list of no-no’s regarding profile photos is posted here.
“Given that Scruff is a community that speaks openly and positively about sex, bodies, and intimacy, some feel that such policies are at odds with those values,” wrote Silverberg in closing. “Such criticism is not unfounded,”
“Scruff respects the concerns voiced by our community on this matter, and we encourage everyone to continue to hold us, and all tech companies, accountable for the content and conduct standards we enforce,” he added.
The CEO told Out that all profile photos will be “graded on a case-by-case basis.” He also noted that the app doesn’t require a public profile photo.
Scruff had apparently received a warning earlier this month by distributors of their app with a warning on the subject following the recent ban of adult content on Tumblr.
Here’s an example (pulled from Scruff’s own Instagram account) of what is NOT allowed as a profile photo now:
Last week, the blog INTO, which is owned by Grindr, wrote that Chen had shared an article on his Facebook regarding Cher Wang, the CEO of HTC, who apparently supported anti-LGBTQ organizations in the recent public referendum on same-sex marriage in Taiwan.
Responding to commenters on the post, Chen apparently wrote, in part, “There are people who believe that marriage is a holy matrimony between a man and a woman.”
Many folks took his comment that “marriage is a holy matrimony between a man and a woman” as being anti-marriage equality.
INTO updated its report when Chen later issued a statement saying, in part, “The words I chose related to marriage between a man and a woman were meant to express my personal feelings about my own marriage to my wife – not to suggest that I am opposed to marriage equality.”
He went on to say that he has long considered himself “an advocate for LGBTQ+ rights.”
“ I support gay marriage and I am proud that I can work for Grindr,” he added. “I apologize that my words did not clearly convey these feelings.”
Now, other gay dating app companies are chiming in on the subject.
CEO and co-founder of SCRUFF, Eric Silverberg, posted a video message expressing his concern that comments from the leaders of gay-centric businesses can have the power to set LGBTQ progress back in terms of equal rights and representation.
He began his message by stating up front that he is “unequivocally in favor of gay marriage.”
“When leaders in the gay community say these things, they disrespect the decades long work of marriage equality activists and give credibility to far-right politicians who are trying to roll back these rights.”
Silverberg also urged tech leaders to understand and further the moral agenda of the communities they serve.
“Let’s move our swipes and ‘likes’ to online communities led by people who stand behind their beliefs and actions, and who have a moral intuition that reflects our community,” he said in closing.
And dating app Jack’d posted a short video response via Instagram which shows Grindr’s recently announced ‘Kindr’ campaign, but it’s quickly overwhelmed by screen shots of the Chen/Grindr story.
Jack’d ends the message with the words “Love is Love.” Watch below.
Popular dating app, Scruff, held it’s own completely unscientific survey to see which Democratic candidate it’s users support.
From NBC:
According to Scruff, the popular dating app for gay and bisexual men, nearly 60 percent of the 1,011 “likely voters” who responded to the survey are throwing their support behind Clinton, compared with 34 percent who support Sanders.
One sub-group Sanders did do particularly well with in the survey was younger gay and bisexual men. Seventy-six percent of 18-24 year olds surveyed said they support the Vermont senator.
Clinton, however, captured more of the “leather,” “daddy” and “bear” support.
Just because I like looking at scruffy Chris Evans… 🙂
“Randy, why do you like comic book super-heroes so much?”
“Umm, I’m not really sure. Kinda hard to explain. I just kinda do :)”
Marvel Comics tweeted out this image of the new, improved “Hercules” – now a scruffy, leather-harnessed, daddy kind of guy.
Yeah, I don’t know why I like this stuff… 🙂