NOM's Indianapolis stop on the "Summer of Marriage" tour took center stage on Bilerico Project this week. First we broke the picture of the NOM supporter's sign that said the "solution" to same-sex marriage is to lynch gay couples, but soon enough local fundie leader Ryan McCann was in the comments section saying that the sign was a plant by pro-gay activists. Add in the coverage of the rally itself, an interview with NOM President Maggie Gallagher, a straight mom's thoughts, and a wager between Ryan and I, and you've got one helluva week's worth of NOM coverage. What else did we talk about? Great stuff like this:

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What do you all think about this Louis CK sketch? Adam Serwer observed that "that fear animates a larger part of American racial politics," and Rose at Feministing argues, "C.K. can't celebrate his whiteness without him celebrating the effects his white privilege has on people of color: racism." I have a few thoughts after the jump.

Continue reading "Louis CK on being white" »

Despite a few progressive steps forward over the past few years, there still aren't that many gay superheroes running around, saving the day.

DC Comics has their lipstick lesbian Batwoman, yes, and the Disney-owned Marvel has young Avengers Wiccan and Hulkling, and their first gay character, Northstar, who came out back in 1992. Of comic book land's handful of homosexuals, however, the most interesting to me are Shatterstar and Rictor, two of the younger members of Marvel's sprawling X-Men family.

Though debuted in the 1990s, the two mutants characters didn't realize their mutual attraction until a few years ago, while still in their ageless twenties, only to be torn apart by some heroic adventure: you know, Shatterstar was left in space after saving the world, and Rictor, who could once create earthquakes, found himself powerless in New York. Standard superhero stuff.

Now, Shatterstar has returned to earth, tracked down his earth-moving lover and the two are embarking on a relationship. But, of course, it's never that easy, especially in comic books, so in the latest issue of X-Factor, the men are tackling a topic so taboo that even real life gay couples don't always address it: open relationships.

Continue reading "Gay X-Men Tackle Open Relationship, and It is Good" »

Editors' Note: Guest blogger Jeff Lutes is a psychotherapist who lives with his husband and their three adopted children in Austin, Texas. He is the principal consultant for ContemporaryCouples.com, where he teaches online dating and relationship workshops to the LGBTQ community.

This morning as I sipped on a second cup of java, my 7-year-old approached wearing his doctor's outfit complete with surgical mask and horn-rimmed glasses. He clutched a prescription pad in his left hand and a medicine bag in his right.

I played along and began to moan about agonizing headaches and intolerable nausea. First, he took my blood pressure. A thorough diagnostic workup followed, with an examination of my heart, lungs, tonsils, pupils, lymph nodes, eardrums and sinuses. I suppressed a four-letter word when he whacked my left knee with his toy reflex mallet. He scribbled something on his notepad, applied two gigantic band-aids to my triceps, and injected an imaginary substance into my right thigh with a green syringe. Mission accomplished. Patient healed. License to practice by Mattel.

Continue reading "A Prescription for Playfulness" »

In the metro-D.C. area, if it isn’t electricity it’s the water. The wind shifts direction or a simple summer storm is all it takes to knock out one or the other -- and, many times, both. But we don’t just have a problem with power. Our biggest challenge is the politics of powerlessness, and the problems it leads us to steadfastly refuse to solve.

Dean Baker, as is often the case, is right.

Continue reading "Our Politics of Powerlessness" »

No cartoon today, guys (please, hold your applause). Instead, a little story.

As some of you know, I moved to Canada in the mid-80s, and the simple act of crossing that border had a profound impact on my view of the world, not the least of which was watching the nightly news on that quaint old-school medium, the television. This was, after all, the mid-80s, long before the Internet was an accepted form of getting information and news about the world around you.

I left the US partly in fulfillment of a promise to someone no longer with us and partly for political reasons. After seeing this country thrown into the wringer by the Reagan, Carter, and Bush I regimes, I decided I'd had it. It didn'tt appear things were going to change all that much, not at the governmental level anyway, so off I went.

Seeing Canada now as a resident on his way to citizenship as opposed to a casual visitor, I was almost immediately struck by one very big shift in attitude. And what made that apparent was the evening news.

(Bear with me. This is all relevant.)

Continue reading "Okay, let's talk" »

I just got Yo Majesty's 2008 album Futuristically Speaking this week, and I've spent a good part of this week listening to that. They're a lesbian, Christian rap duo from Florida. Here's the video for "Don't Let Go":

Continue reading "Queer music Friday - Yo Majesty" »

After a helluva crazy week - Netroots Nation in Vegas with all the stimulation overload, the flight back home complete with jet lag, the NOM rally a few hours after landing, the death of my beloved dog, and now taking Jerame to the airport for a weekend trip to DC - I'm exhausted. I can't write; hell, I can barely keep my eyes open at this point.

So what's a Bilerico blogger to do?

Thanks to Projector Ed, I bring you a boy pic. Two actually. British boy band McFly posed for Attitude magazine and it's no a photo shoot you'll see in an American magazine any time soon! As Ed says in his e-mail, "I feel cheated!"

Mostly naked (probably NSFW) picture of the hottie on the left with the star tattoo on his chest after the jump. Thank Ed. He knows how to motivate me.

Continue reading "McFly: Naked boy band pics" »

Grover Norquist is a conservative hit man who has absolutely no values other than helping the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer. So it was an interesting move last month to put him on the board of GOProud, the newer gay and lesbian Republican org - the message that I got, at least, was that there are famous figures on the right that care more about advancing the conservative agenda of tax breaks and deregulation than they do about social issues. Considering some of Norquist's other activities, that message should not be confused with the idea that he's a famous rightwinger who's actively pro-gay and conservative.

It's the basic division between "tolerance" and "acceptance," and GOProud chooses "tolerance."

Norquist is also an advisor to the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, a group that tries to use abortion and gay rights as wedge issues to get latinos to vote for Republicans, set up by the American Principles Project. This past week, the LPCP announced that they'd be conducting a $1 million independent expenditure (spending money for her without coordinating with the campaign itself) for California Senate candidate Carly Fiorina.

A few wondered where that money's coming from, considering how new the LPCP is, and they announced their two partners: the Susan B. Anthony List (who'll be donating $100K) and the National Organization for Marriage, who'll be donating an unknown amount of money, but I'd guess the bulk of the million dollars will be coming from them.

Continue reading "GOProud, NOM, Grover Norquist: A conservative family photo" »

A video featuring an amazingly well intentioned straight ally from Minnesota has been widely shared this week on social media sites.

She respectfully purchased over $200 worth of merchandise from her local target store, then returned it to customer service while she explained to the store manager why she plans to boycott Target.

At issue, $150,000.00 campaign contribution to a group campaigning for anti-gay Republican Minnesota Governor candidate Tom Emmer. Watch:

Continue reading "Should gays and lesbians boycott Target?" »

At Netroots Nation, a bunch of us got together to talk about why ENDA, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, has fallen to the bottom of the barrel.

One of the points we noticed is that the campaign to put soldier's stories of harassment in the military front and center seemed to be very effective in mobilizing resistance against the discriminatory Don't Ask Don't Tell policy.

We agreed that it was time to start doing the same for stories of workplace discrimination and harassment.

Our political leaders get that it's wrong and something needs to be done about it, but in the face of Republican resistance, they've pretty much folded their hand.

I'd like to put your story of workplace harassment here on Bilerico. It doesn't have to be the most horrific story ever, but I think people need to start hearing about the day-to-day worries of people who have had to put up with harassment or being fired or not getting hired because of sexual orientation or gender expression.

Send me your story at jillian@bilerico.com, and I'll put it up here.

United ENDA is also conducting a "Tell Your Story" campaign to get personal stories out to the media. Please fill out their survey.

One such story after the jump.

Continue reading "Telling Your Story of Workplace Discrimination And Harassment" »

Last week I posted on the fatal police shooting of Dean Gaymon and said that the orgs working on that were asking for a federal investigation. Shortly after Bill Dobbs emailed to correct me - they were asking for the New Jersey attorney general to investigate.

Well, the state attorney general said no:

After meeting with her top officials today afternoon, Dow concluded there was "no indication of a conflict with the Essex County Prosecutor's Office handling this case fairly and impartially," said her spokesman, Paul Loriquet. "That was never called into question."

Afterward, the attorney general called the Acting Essex County Prosecutor Robert Laurino to discuss the decision. The prosecutor's office will present its investigation to a grand jury, which will take several weeks.

Considering the county prosecutor was already acting like the police department's defense attorney last week when the shooting happened, hiding the name of the officer (which was later leaked) and accepted the officer's incredibly suspicious version of the facts before an investigation was conducted, I really doubt that they'll handle the case "impartially." Consider the prosecutor talking to the press:

Continue reading "State will not investigate police shooting of man in cruising area" »