WATCH: Sam Smith Talks Boyfriend Revenge on Ellen
The out singer basked in the glow of his Grammy landslide.
Neal Broverman
www.advocate.com/arts-entertainment/music/2015/02/10/watch-sam-smith-talks-boyfriend-revenge-ellen
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Super-Cheap Gadget Tests For HIV Using Your Smartphone
Super-Cheap Gadget Tests For HIV Using Your Smartphone
Testing for HIV just got a whole lot easier.
A team led by Samuel K. Sia, associate professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia University, has devised a smartphone accessory that can test for HIV and syphilis in 15 minutes. The dongle plugs into the phone’s headphone jack and uses an app to produce the test results.
Scanning blood from a finger prick, Sia’s device looks for three infectious disease markers: HIV antibodies, which typical tests look for; and treponemal-specific and non-treponemal antibodies for syphilis, which basically distinguish between active and inactive syphilis infections.
A look at the STD-testing smartphone device in action. (Source)
The dongle works with any smartphone and provides a laboratory-quality test. It also costs a remarkably low $34 to manufacture. According to a Columbia press release, that’s far below the thousands of dollars needed for the lab equipment that would normally be needed to run such tests. It’s even pretty close to the $39.99 price tag on certain over-the-counter HIV tests.
Health care workers in Rwanda recently tested Soa’s device on 96 patients. Afterword, nearly every single patient said they’d recommend the device.
“Our work shows that a full laboratory-quality immunoassay can be run on a smartphone accessory,” Sia said in a written statement. “Coupling microfluidics with recent advances in consumer electronics can make certain lab-based diagnostics accessible to almost any population with access to smartphones. This kind of capability can transform how health care services are delivered around the world.”
The only snag: It’s not ready for mass production — yet.
“We are really excited about the next steps in bringing this product to the market in developing countries,” said Sia. “And we are equally excited about exploring how this technology can benefit patients and consumers back home.”
Planned Parenthood told The Huffington Post that 1.1 million people are living with HIV in the United States, and nearly a sixth don’t even know they’re infected.
As More Alabama Probate Judges Start Issuing Marriage Licenses, HRC Urges Others to Follow the Law
As More Alabama Probate Judges Start Issuing Marriage Licenses, HRC Urges Others to Follow the Law
As probate judges in ten counties began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples on Tuesday after failing to do so on Monday, HRC calls on all remaining judges to follow the rule of law and ignore Justice Roy Moore’s attempts at judicial fiat.
HRC.org
Want To Have Safe Sex in Venezuela? It’s Gonna Cost You
Want To Have Safe Sex in Venezuela? It’s Gonna Cost You
If you have any Venezuelans on your gift list this year, you might want to consider shipping them some Trojans.
The Associated Press reports that condoms are the latest casualty of Venezuela’s mounting economic crisis. Though they were once easily accessible, the article states, the beginning of 2015 saw condoms added to the list of harder-to-find items — a list that, sadly, also includes cleaning products and many food items.
Which is a concern to public health workers since the country is already battling large numbers of HIV infection and teen pregnancy.
While condoms are evidently not impossible to find, they’re not cheap. For example, on Monday, a Craigslist-type site was offering a box of 24 Durex for the equivalent of US $317. Other black market sources are said to be selling them for US $10 a pop.
It seems the pro-condom slogan of the 1990s — “I’ll do a lot for love, but I’m not willing to die for it” — has been replaced with “I want to get my rocks off, but I’m not willing to go bankrupt for it.”
Maybe the New York City bomb squad can help by sending some of the condoms they mistook for an explosive device last month.
Winston Gieseke
Wyoming Senate Passes LGBT Anti-Discrimination Bill
Wyoming Senate Passes LGBT Anti-Discrimination Bill
Wyoming’s Senate has passed a bill that would ban discrimination in the workplace on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. The AP reports:
The Senate voted 24-to-6 on Tuesday to send the bill to the House.
The bill would add prohibitions against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity to a range of state laws that now prohibit discrimination based on other factors including race, age, disability and political affiliation.
The bill has exemptions for religious organizations.
Supporters of the bill say some gay and transgender Wyomingites have experienced discrimination, including being fired or physically assaulted.
Bill opponent Sen. Curt Meier, R-LaGrange, said on the Senate floor that he regarded the bill as a problem looking for a solution when one already exists in federal anti-discrimination laws.
La Grange also introduced an amendment that would have provided an additional exemption for businesses with fewer than 15 employees. That amendment failed, as The Casper Star-Tribune reports. Said Meier, “This is a feel-good bill, ‘I’m OK, you’re OK.’”
The bill, which was introduced with bipartisan support back in January, continued to receive support across party lines up until the final vote. Sen. Hank Coe, R-Cody, commented, “Times have changed. It’s 2015. We need to step up and we need to pass this bill.”
The bill now awaits approval in Wyoming’s House of Representatives.
Sean Mandell
www.towleroad.com/2015/02/wyoming-senate-passes-lgbt-anti-discrimination-bill.html
How You Can Tell Justice Scalia What You Think About Marriage Equality
How You Can Tell Justice Scalia What You Think About Marriage Equality
HRC plans to submit a Supreme Court brief signed by as many people as possible.
Matt Baume
'Manning Up' Examines The Lives Of 27 Transgender Men In Their Own Words
'Manning Up' Examines The Lives Of 27 Transgender Men In Their Own Words
A new book takes an inquisitive and inspired look at the journey of 27 “complex, diverse, loving and lovable” transgender men, as told in their own words.
Released by Transgress Press, Manning Up: Transsexual Men on Finding Brotherhood, Family & Themselves will recall stories of falling in love, fatherhood and finding spirituality through the decision to transition. Also included are stories of transgender men of color who have had to face, and ultimately push back against, intense racism.
Mitch Kellaway, who co-edited the independently-published book with Zander Keig, told The Huffington Post that the timing for Manning Up couldn’t have been better.
Take a look at the book cover below: 
“2014 was an incredible year in which American pop culture, through icons like Laverne Cox and Janet Mock, as well as televised stories of trans people on shows like ‘Orange is the New Black‘ and ‘The Fosters,’ began waking up to the fact that trans people have complex life narratives beyond tragedy and beyond medical transition,” Kellaway said, adding that the team hopes the book will prompt “more and more positive reflections for trans men in our culture.”
For mire information on Manning Up and other releases from Transgress Press, head here.
Microsoft Makes the Case for LGBT Equality in the Workplace and Worldwide
Microsoft Makes the Case for LGBT Equality in the Workplace and Worldwide
On Friday, Microsoft’s blog made the case for marriage equality globally and equality in the workplace.
HRC.org
From “Penis Fencing” To “Sperm Transference”: A Look At Homosexuality In The Animal Kingdom
From “Penis Fencing” To “Sperm Transference”: A Look At Homosexuality In The Animal Kingdom
There are plenty of documented examples of same-sex relations in the animal kingdom, but is it fair to call them gay? And if this behavior does reflect a genetic abnormality, what does that mean for Darwin’s Theory of Evolution? If the goal for a species is to mate, why would a gay gene get passed on, lowering the rate of reproduction?
Those are the questions posed by the BBC Earth in a fascinating exploration of homosexual tendencies in species other than humans.
Here’s a look at what they observed:
Japanese macaques
It is common among the females to bump and grind on each other, which scientists understand as a form of pleasure-seeking. The females enjoy more positions than the males — from the “double foot clasp mount” to the “jockey position” — so are they simply seeking out what makes them feel good? They’ll stare into each others eyes, which from our perspective looks rather intimate. Still, they’ll also mate with the males, so it isn’t quite proper to think of them as “lesbian macaques.”
Fruit flies
For the first 30 minutes of a male fruit fly’s life, he will try to mate with any other fruit fly he can find — male or female. Eventually he’ll learn the smell of the female and focus his attention on them. So as far as evolution goes, the trial and error approach favors homosexuality until the males can distinguish the two sexes better.
Flour beetles
Male flour beetles use an even stranger technique that can still be explained with evolution. They’ll go so far as to deposit sperm in other males, but when those receiving males then mate with a female, there is the possibility for sperm transference. So more homosexual mating, more offspring.
Laysan albatross
These birds typically mate for life, and on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, the population includes 31% of pairings of two unrelated females. They’ll still produce offspring — a male albatross will sneak off from his mate and fertilize the egg of one of the other females (which never happens in humans), and the female pair will raise the chick. Even here, researches note a subtle evolutionary advantage for the practice. The male albatrosses that mate outside their pairing are typically the strongest of the males, so their genes get passed down through the female/female pairings. Still, the albatrosses can’t be called “gay.” In populations where the male/female ratio is more even, females don’t choose to pair with other females.
Bonobos
Did you know that our distant cousins, the bonobos, really like sex? Sexual activity between bonobos is referred to as the “bonobo handshake” (we’re pretty sure we’ve heard a similar term — “gay handshake” — thrown around after a few vodka sodas), and they take it any way they can get it: male/female, male/male, female/female. In addition to procreation, sex in bonobo communities is used as a way of fortifying social bonds. After two males fight, it’s common for them to engage in genital-to-genital touching called “penis fencing” (which we think would be a hit in the straight human world). But still, at most they can be described as bisexual.
Domestic sheep
But then there are domestic sheep. Even when there are ample and futile females around, about 8% of domestic sheep prefer the sexual company of other males. Neuroscientists in 1994 concluded that the hypothalamus (the part of the brain the controls the release of sex hormones) was smaller in the homosexual sheep. A 1991 study suggests a similar phenomenon in gay male humans. So how to explain this one in terms of Darwin’s Theory? Well, while it doesn’t benefit the homosexual sheep themselves, the relatives of those sheep may be reaping certain advantages. The same gene that results in a smaller hypothalamus in some males might make their female siblings more fertile. Still, this has only been observed in domestic sheep (not wild), and some scientists argue that because sheep have been intentionally bred to foster the most fertile females, the human intervention may have given rise to the “homosexual sheep.”
Conclusion? Humans seem to be the only wild animal population containing our understanding of “homosexual” members. But these studies show that species across the animal kingdom engage in sexual activity for far more reasons than procreation, be that pleasure or social connection. It’s that nuance that shatters (as if it needed any more shattering) the religious right’s view of sex as solely a means to produce offspring.
Turns out, as always, things are a bit more complicated.
Dan Tracer
3 Years After Mayor Refused To Sign Marriage Pledge, Dallas Drags Feet On Equal Benefits For Gay Employees
3 Years After Mayor Refused To Sign Marriage Pledge, Dallas Drags Feet On Equal Benefits For Gay Employees
Back in 2012, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings declined to join a coalition of mayors who support same-sex marriage.
And in 2013, Rawlings refused to allow a City Council vote on a resolution in support of marriage equality.
All along, Rawlings’ position has been that although he personally supports same-sex marriage, he doesn’t think it should be a city issue.
Now, though, it has clearly become a city issue, and Rawlings’ lack of leadership may be coming back to haunt Dallas’ gay employees.
The Dallas Morning News reports that the city’s pension boards are divided on whether to recognize out-of-state same-sex marriages for the purposes of providing equal retirement benefits:
This week, two Dallas boards — the Police and Fire Pension Board and the Employees’ Retirement Fund board — will consider actions that could put Dallas in line with Fort Worth. But the city officials say they are facing reluctance from lawyers who fear legal consequences from the state law and would rather wait on the Supreme Court to provide more guidance.
City Council member Lee Kleinman, who serves on both boards, called the lack of action in Dallas “extremely frustrating.” He said the pension board “has been resistant and the staff has been resistant.” …
The city’s Employee Retirement Fund has been equally difficult, he said.
“Over there I faced the exact same resistance and the same ‘Let’s wait and see’ and the same B.S. line of ‘Oh, it’s the right thing to do, but let’s not do it now,’” Kleinman said.
The Morning News reports that while the Police and Fire Pension Board would have to put the change to a vote of its members, the Employee Retirement Fund Board, which covers the rest of the city’s workers, could fix the problem by simply changing its interpretation of “spouse” to include married same-sex partners.
Noticeably absent from the story is Rawlings, who’s up for re-election this year.
John Wright
