50 Queer Musicians With Beards

Gina Vivinetto

www.advocate.com/music/2015/9/25/50-queer-musicians-beards

Listen to Sam Smith’s James Bond theme Writing On The Wall

Sam Smith has revealed his James Bond theme Writing On The Wall.

This is the first time an openly gay man has sung the title theme in the franchise’s 53-year history.

In typical Bond theme form, it’s got plenty of sweeping strings and powerful horns.

‘I am so excited to be a part of this iconic British legacy  and join an incredible line up of some of my biggest musical inspirations,’ Smith previously said. ‘I hope you all enjoy the song as much as I enjoyed making it.’

But will he join Adele in winning the Oscar like she did with Skyfall? Time will tell.

Spectre will be released in the UK on 26 October and in the US on 6 November.

The post Listen to Sam Smith’s James Bond theme Writing On The Wall appeared first on Gay Star News.

Joe Morgan

www.gaystarnews.com/article/listen-to-sam-smiths-james-bond-theme-writing-on-the-wall/

Gay Teen's Catholic School Says He Can't Bring His Date To Homecoming

A gay student at an all-boys Catholic prep school in Memphis, Tennessee, says school administrators are refusing to allow him to bring his date to the homecoming dance.

Lance Sanderson, a senior at Christian Brothers High School, says he had hoped to take a boy from another school to Saturday’s event; however, his request was denied.

Citing school policy, administrators told him that while students “may attend the dance by themselves, with other CBHS students or with a girl from another school,” boys from other schools may not attend “for logistical reasons.”

As WMC-TV notes, the school said that this policy has always been in place. Sanderson insists he was not aware of such a rule, and was given a vastly different message last year when he approached a school official about his homecoming date. 

“[The official] said the school doesn’t discriminate, and I could bring whoever I want,” the 18-year-old told Mic.com.

That particular official left over the summer, and since then, Sanderson says he’s met with “harsh opposition” from the school.

The student told WHBQ-TV that he was given troubling information when he approached administrators about his homecoming date.

“I was given several examples of statistics like they said gay couples have higher divorce rates, and that they’re violent; just different things that didn’t make sense, and I’ve come to find aren’t true,” Sanderson said. “They said specifically as a Catholic school, they couldn’t support that … and that they struggled with the idea of me taking a guy to homecoming or prom.”

The officials stand by the policy, yet insist that homophobia is not tolerated in the school.

“Over the years, we have met with gay graduates who have asked about the school and we have assured them it is a kinder and gentler school and that this generation of students is very welcoming of students from all backgrounds. They are not homophobic and we are proud of their brotherhood,” the school wrote in a statement, per WHBQ-TV.

The statement added that the “the school has never let boys from other schools attend these dances as the mixing of boys from other schools in such an open atmosphere can cause problems.”

Sanderson takes issue with this reasoning. This week, he launched a Change.org petition, urging the school to rethink its policy.

“I’m being told by my school that I may not be able to bring a date that I choose — simply because he is a guy,” Sanderson wrote on the campaign page. “Help me send a message to Christian Brothers High School that there’s no place for discrimination in school. Let them know that LGBT students like me should be allowed to bring a same-sex date.”

Sanderson, who came out during his freshman year, added that he has experienced discrimination at the hands of his fellow students at CBHS. 

“It’s been a tough four years for me [at the school] … and I’ve experienced a lot of homophobia,” he wrote. “But now it’s not classmates causing the issue — it’s administrators. School officials who should be looking out for students like me, not targeting us with discrimination.” 

Thus far, more than 9,000 people have signed the petition.

Many netizens, including students from CBHS, have rallied around the teen on social media, using the hashtag #LetLanceDance:

Sanderson told the Memphis Flyer that he technically could go to homecoming with a male date from his high school, but he believes the administration would “paint it as we’re just friends going together.” 

He’s still unsure if he’s going to attend the event. 

“I just want to bring a date of my choice to homecoming like the rest of my friends and classmates,” Sanderson wrote on Change.org. “I’m not asking for special treatment. I’m just asking for respect, and the chance to make my last homecoming a truly memorable experience.” 

 

Also on HuffPost:

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The Walking Dead reveals who will play its new gay character Jesus

British actor Tom Payne has revealed on Instagram that he is joining the cast of The Walking Dead for season six of the zombie apocalypse his series and will play the long awaited ‘gay badass’ character that fans have been waiting for since the show’s creators began dropping hints last year.

Payne will play Paul ‘Jesus’ Monroe, so nicknamed because of his long hair and beard and for his good and trustworthy reputation.

Jesus was introduced to readers in issue 91 of The Walking Dead comic books as a recruiter of lost survivors for the Alexandria safe zone.

Not much of his backstory has been shared with readers in the comic books but he is known for his skill at unarmed combat and abilities as a tracker and escape artist and it is assumed that he has some form of military background.

Payne had shown fans that he had been growing his beard for some time via social media but nobody knew he was attached to appear in the Walking Dead before this week when he posted a photo of himself next to an image of Jesus from the comic books.

In the comic books Jesus has an on-again-off-again relationship with a doctor named Alex and he and his group are at war with another group of survivors based in Washington DC called the Saviors who are lead by the villainous Negan.

The comic books and television series don’t necessarily follow the same plot points so it is yet to be seen if the show’s creators plan to introduce this rival group any time soon.

The Walking Dead returns to screens for its season six premier on October 11 with a special 90 minute movie length first episode.

Payne is best known for his roles in the drama series Waterloo Road and the Michael Mann directed HBO series Luck.

The post The Walking Dead reveals who will play its new gay character Jesus appeared first on Gay Star News.

Andrew Potts

www.gaystarnews.com/article/the-walking-dead-reveals-who-will-play-its-new-gay-character-jesus/

Cambodia supports same-sex marriage, government spokesperson

Cambodia supports its LGBTI citizens and gay marriage, a government spokesperson has said.

Minister of State Phay Siphan made the comments Wednesday (23 September) in response to Nepal’s new constitution, which expressly bans discrimination against ‘sexual and gender minorities.’

The charter is the first in Asia to enshrine the rights of LGBTI citizens, but Siphan said Cambodia has already gone further than that.

‘Cambodian society does not discriminate against LGBT people. It is only individuals who do so,’ the Khmer Times quoted him as saying.

‘No Cambodian laws discriminate against them, and nothing is banning them from loving each other or getting married.’

However, the Cambodian Center for Human Rights (CCHR) paints a very different picture of life for LGBTI people in the Southeast Asian country.

‘LGBT Cambodians face discrimination and abuse due to their SOGI, both at the hands of the State and within society in general,’ it said in a statement.

‘This is due in large part to the legal framework, which does not specifically protect LGBT people, failing to include SOGI in the list of prohibited grounds for discrimination. This impacts the way in which LGBT Cambodians are seen by society and contributes to fueling discrimination and marginalization.’

The group expressed its delight at Nepal’s new constitution and called on the Cambodia government to pass similar laws.

‘I share my sincere delight with the Nepalese nation and its peoples for adopting a constitution which provides for protection of LGBT rights,’ said CCHR’s Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Project Coordinator Nuon Sidara.

‘Nevertheless, this development also provides a vivid reminder that similar protections are not currently afforded to Cambodian LGBT people and I urge the RGC [Royal Government of Cambodia] to immediately take measures to introduce laws to remedy this and which provide equality for LGBT people and prohibit discrimination on the basis of SOGI.’

The post Cambodia supports same-sex marriage, government spokesperson appeared first on Gay Star News.

Darren Wee

www.gaystarnews.com/article/cambodia-supports-same-sex-marriage-government-spokesperson/

Student Fights Catholic School's Ban on Same-Sex Dates

A student at a Catholic school in Memphis, Tenn., says administrators have reneged on allowing him to bring a same-sex date to the homecoming dance this weekend — and one gave him that message by alluding to a gay man murdered by his partner.

Lance Sanderson (pictured above), a senior at Christian Brothers High School, said that during the previous school year, he asked one administrator if bringing a boy from another school as his homecoming date would be OK, and the administrator said yes, the Memphis Flyer reports. But that official left Christian Brothers over the summer, so Sanderson brought it up with a different administrator.

“I mentioned it, expecting him to say the same thing,” the student told the Flyer. “And he had a very different response. He mentioned a [gay] couple in Texas and said I was a lot like this one person and said that the guy’s boyfriend murdered him. It was a little rough.”

School officials then set up a committee to make a policy on same-sex dates. The policy, they announced, is “CBHS students may attend the dance by themselves, with other CBHS students, or with a girl from another school. For logistical reasons, boys from other schools may not attend.” In a letter to students and parents, the administration elaborated, “The school has never let boys from other schools attend these dances as the mixing of boys from other schools in such an open atmosphere can cause problems.”

Sanderson finds the policy discriminatory. He told the Flyer he believes that under the policy, he’d be able to attend the dance with a boy from Christian Brothers, but administrators would “paint it as we’re just friends going together.” He has set up a Change.org petition calling on the school to change the policy and allow same-sex dates.

He says he’s experienced homophobia at Christian Brothers, noting on the petition, “But now it’s not classmates causing the issue — it’s administrators. School officials who should be looking out for students like me, not targeting us with discrimination.” As of this afternoon, the petition had nearly 8,000 signatures.

 

 

 

 

Trudy Ring

www.advocate.com/youth/2015/9/24/student-fights-catholic-schools-ban-same-sex-dates

PHOTOS: Move Over Top Knot, The Man Braid Has Arrived

There was a time when men’s hair style ranged from crew cut to side part, and not much else.

So no matter how you feel about man buns, pompadours or “angular fringe” (it’s a thing), just be glad there’s some variety out there.

And while mermen might not be your thing, maybe you’ll enjoy the man braid.

Because nothing says “I’m comfortable with my masculinity” like a French braid or a wreath of golden braided locks.

Either that, or the madness has gone too far.

A photo posted by Hair Videos ?? (@hairvideotutorial) on Sep 24, 2015 at 1:47pm PDT

A photo posted by Avant Hair & Cosmetics (@avantmpls) on Sep 24, 2015 at 1:46pm PDT

A photo posted by @corykel on Sep 24, 2015 at 1:33pm PDT

A photo posted by Jeff Chan (@jeffacakesss) on Sep 24, 2015 at 1:00pm PDT

A photo posted by Rainbow Room International EK (@rrieastkilbride) on Sep 24, 2015 at 5:39am PDT

A photo posted by Laura Thorne (@luluthorne) on Sep 23, 2015 at 2:10pm PDT

A photo posted by Clement Le pelley (@clementlepelley) on Sep 23, 2015 at 10:59am PDT

A photo posted by Morgan Charlotte (@morgancharlottenewton) on Sep 21, 2015 at 11:09am PDT

A photo posted by Cody Soviar (@cody_soviar) on Sep 18, 2015 at 10:36pm PDT

Dan Tracer

feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/Ykg0h8p3oAk/photos-move-over-top-knot-the-man-braid-has-arrived-20150924

Movie Review: Roland Emmerich’s ‘Stonewall’

This one’s for Judy!

… so went a legendary scream (along with brick throwing) as the Stonewall riots began. We can’t know exactly what happened that night, but as the famous saying goes, “when legend becomes fact… print the legend.” Judy Garland, The World’s Greatest Entertainer, had died a week earlier on June 22nd, 1969. Her remains were brought to New York City on June 26th where tens of thousands of people lined up to pay respects, and her funeral, which barred the public, took place on June 27th. The theory goes that the gay community, which had always idolized her (as any sentient human with taste should, then or now) was even more on-edge than usual when the police came to raid Stonewall on the night of June 28th, 1969.

Fact: All hell broke loose. The rest is (much argued about) ‘history’.

Judy grief as combustive fuel is one of the legends at any rate. And one that I heard a lot as a baby-gay whenever people brought up Stonewall. Stonewall was not the true beginning of gay liberation (political groups had been forming since the 1940s to pursue our future rights), but it remains a super handy symbolic one. Roland Emmerich’s STONEWALL, opening this weekend in limited release, has the clear distinction of being the only narrative feature film (there are just two of them but still…) about the Stonewall Riots to give a flying (monkey) f**k about Dorothy Gale of Kansas. This might seem a small thing to get hung up on, but it points to much larger problems.

Judy-blindness is not the first sign that this new LGBT drama doesn’t know what it’s doing but the earliest to flash an unmistakable “WARNING” sign at you.

And here’s why: Judy is referenced therein, but from a suspicious place of shoulder-shrugging. Our audience surrogate is an outsider, you see, and therein lies the source of so much of what’s wrong with this movie. To understand the Stonewall riots, which is, at heart, the story of a community, an outsider is the last person to whom you should turn. Our audience surrogate is the straightest of gay twinks, Danny (Jeremy Irvine) who hails from Indiana though the drag queens and hustlers who first befriend him in Greenwich Village are quick to dub him “Kansas”.

Danny, rather shockingly to both the in-movie queers and this queer watching, doesn’t seem to “get” any reference to Wizard of Oz or Judy Garland which makes him the dimmest relic imaginable. For the record The Wizard of Oz (1939), a movie so famous references and quotes from it pop up everyday in real life all-the-time, no gayness required, became an annual television event in 1959. In 1959 there were only 3 channels, no internet, and fictional Danny was 6 or 7 years old. Since the movie takes place in 1969 and all of Danny’s flashbacks involve a nuclear family living in the golden American hues of television commercials, this seems as impossible a blindspot as if he had never tasted apple pie or played baseball. Even Captain America, frozen on ice from World War II until the 21st century, gets Wizard of Oz references (see: Marvel’s The Avengers, 2012)!

Danny’s parents, as it turns out, are awful homophobes who kick him out when he’s caught servicing the town’s high school football hero Joe (Karl Glusman, the extremely naked star of Gaspar Noé’s explicit sex movie Love). But this isn’t a surprise — any parents who’d deny their children The Wizard of Oz are unfit.

So off to New York City Danny runs, heading straight to Christopher Street and into the welcoming arms of a parade of friendly drag queens and hustlers, and even a few predatory gays who would make even the bitter queens of Boys in the Band (1970) look the other way in “this doesn’t represent me!” embarrassment.

To escape the ‘bitter queen’ tag myself — even though I am bitter because the LGBT community deserves a Stonewall movie as good as, say, Selma which understood not to be a biopic about Martin Luther King but the story of a communal effort since that’s what all civil rights triumphs actually are —  let’s note that the movie doesn’t do quite everything wrong. Roland Emmerich, famous out action director, is a lot more at home in the movie-ready cheesiness of Period Piece Americana of Indiana than in the tumultuous New York of 1969. The scenes of middle America homophobia work — including a funny (because it’s so wrong!) educational film about predatory gays that is shown to Danny’s classroom — and Danny’s inarticulate romance with his bisexual friend Joe is semi-touching.

Jonny Beauchamp, who recently romanced and bedded Dorian Gray as the trans prostitute on Showtime’s Penny Dreadful, really goes for it as Ramona who immediately wants to adopt/protect/love Danny. Is he over the top? Maybe. But at least he refuses to play it pathetically as ‘Unloved Drag Queen’ for as long as he can against the screenplay’s forceful attempts to do just that. And though the movie has clearly pre-judged the original members of the Mattachine Society (embodied here by the ever handsome but continually kind of sinister Jonathan Rhys-Meyers as Trevor, a “chicken queen” to use what I believe was the vernacular of the time (?), who everyone but the naive Danny mistrusts) it’s generally good natured enough to make time for redemptive moments or shots of everyone. Yes, even the villains get loving shots in the Pride March finale and the “Whatever Happened To…” text that so many true-ish movie stories use to wrap up.

But occasional moments-that-are-passable aside, Stonewall isn’t gritty or smart or well acted enough to survive the Mean Streets of New York, Christopher or otherwise. Scenes of menace rarely read like menace (save an early beating by two police officers) but like movie concepts of menace. The drag queens and hustlers don’t look like desperate survivors so much as “hipster kids of 1969,” which dilutes the power of seeing them sleeping/squatting in communal huddles in a disreputable hotel, and Irvine remains too pretty-boy blank for the leading roles he keeps winning. When Danny shouts “GAY POWER!!!” after throwing the first brick, he seems more like a pumped up jock who forgot to shower before a pep rally, than a homeless part time hustler at the end of his rope.

About that first brick…

Most damning of all, Stonewall isn’t even well-intentioned enough to make for a respectable LGBT must-see event. When Marsha P Johnson (an actual historical figure played by Otoja Abit) removes the brick from her purse with the intention to throw it on that fateful night (The brick that will begin the historical riot. The brick that will symbolically birth the entire gay rights movement!), Danny balks in a “really?” kind of way, but then he has a change of heart. He takes it from her and he does the famous throwing! If Roland Emmerich were a satirist like, say, Paul Verhoeven (Showgirls), we might declare this last shocking misstep a perversely genius move.

It is the single clearest visual embodiment the movies have arguably ever provided of the way Hollywood whitewashes history, continually robbing minorities, women, people of color gays, gays (you name it) of their own stories by appropriating them for the glory of Straight(ish) White Men. But Emmerich is not a genius satirist so at best this is an Idiot Savant move; may this scene be used forever more in History, Literary, Film and Racial Studies classrooms to demonstrate White Appropriation and ahistorical agendas in storytelling.

Stonewall may have birthed Gay Pride but this Stonewall is a Shame.

Nathaniel Rogers would live in the movie theater but for the lack of wifi, blogs daily at the Film Experience. Follow him on Twitter @nathanielr.

The post Movie Review: Roland Emmerich’s ‘Stonewall’ appeared first on Towleroad.

Nathaniel Rogers

Movie Review: Roland Emmerich’s ‘Stonewall’

White House Hosts Bisexual Advocates for Community Policy Briefing

Leaders from the bisexual community convened at the White House this week to discuss issues of concern to the oft-overlooked B in LGBT, that need to be addressed through public policy changes.

Monday’s meeting was a follow-up to a 2013 Bisexual Leader Roundtable meeting and occurred during the second annual Bisexual Awareness Week.

The meeting was an “off the record” event, meaning participants were not at liberty to say which senior White House officials were in attendance. The Washington Blade was able to secure a quote from a White House official prior to the event, on the promise of anonymity.

“As a follow-up to the first bisexual community issues roundtable in 2013, the White House Office of Public Engagement will convene a bisexual community issues briefing with key policy advocates, health experts, activists, and administration officials, to discuss the unique disparities the bisexual community faces around health, intimate partner violence, and erasure in mainstream LGBT discourse,” the official told the Blade. “The objectives for this briefing are to better shine a light on the issues within the community and explore policy interventions.” 

When The Advocate spoke with attendees, they stressed the proposed public policies that had been prepared for the meeting.

“I was proud to participate in an historic briefing at the White House on how the Obama administration can help address the critical disparities facing bisexual Americans, from more robust suicide prevention and mental health services for bisexual youth to recommendations on data collection to protections for bisexual asylum seekers,” Heron Greenesmith, policy analyst at the Movement Advancement Project, told The Advocate. 

“As part of the group of bisexual policy experts from across the country working to outline these concrete policy changes, I was struck by the volume of data highlighting just how many bisexual people face discrimination, poor mental and physical health, and violence, often at much higher rates than our gay or heterosexual peers.”

The policy briefings addressed bisexual-specific needs in data collection, employment discrimination, HIV prevention and care, immigration and asylum issues, mental and physical health disparities, suicide prevention, and violence. According to the briefings, all of the areas listed are areas of concerns and have unique impacts for bisexual people.

“Perhaps one of the most valuable elements to Monday’s policy briefing was the opportunities for people to share resources – those resources were our experiences, fields of work, and knowledge, all of which varied widely but were strong across the board,” GLAAD media strategist Alexandra Bolles wrote of her experience at the White House gathering.

“When put together, these resources served to move the bi community as a whole towards cultural and political advancement,” she said. “While the bi community must overcome a disproportionally high hurdle in order to access hard resources and to achieve, I felt we were in a space where being ourselves was valuable, productive, and enough.”

Summaries of the policy briefings can be found on the Bisexual Awareness Week website.
 

Eliel Cruz

www.advocate.com/bisexuality/2015/9/23/white-house-hosts-bisexual-advocates-community-policy-briefing

Justice Antonin Scalia clearly still seething over Supreme Court’s ruling on gay marriage

Antonin Scalia remains highly critical of his colleagues on the US Supreme Court who voted 5-4 back in June to make same-sex marriage legal across the US.

Scalia, one of the high court’s most outspoken conservative justices, called the ruling ‘extreme‘ during a speech this week at Rhodes College in Menphis, Tennessee.

‘They’re not interpreting the constitution. They’re writing one, they’re revising one,’ Scalia said of his more liberal colleagues.

Appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1986, Scalia does not believe the US Constitution is a ‘living document’ that evolves. He is an ‘originalist’ who believes the court must adhere to the original text when interpreting the constitution.

‘They’re not adhering to the text, they’re operating as policy makers,’ he said of justices Anthony Kennedy. Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Stephen G. Breyer.

He called the same-sex marriage ruling ‘the furthest imaginable extension of the Supreme Court doing whatever it wants.

‘Saying that the Constitution requires that practice, which is contrary to the religious beliefs of many of our citizens, I don’t know how you can get more extreme than that. I worry about a Court that’s headed in that direction.’

The post Justice Antonin Scalia clearly still seething over Supreme Court’s ruling on gay marriage appeared first on Gay Star News.

Greg Hernandez

www.gaystarnews.com/article/justice-antonin-scalia-clearly-still-seething-over-supreme-courts-ruling-on-gay-marriage/