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@LukeVernon my favourite song ever, and its my alarm on phone. Wakes me up in a good mood!1 week ago from Twitter for iPhone
@LukeVernon gimme shelter gives me the urge to watch my favorite film #goodfellas1 week ago from Twitter for Android
Or GLASTONBURY even. Not sure where Galstonbury is, but Im sure it doesn't have the worlds biggest festival. Sounds Texan.1 week ago from txt
In a restaurant in the middle of the US and the song with the best intro ever came on, Gimme Shelter. Which reminded me, in 3 weeks....1 week ago from txt
I shall be seeing one of the greatest live acts of all time, The Rolling Stones, @ THE greatest festival ever, GALSTONBURY! Yes, Im shouting1 week ago from txt
Liberace s ex-lover claims he had six year relationship with Michael Jackson
He said: Liberace introduced me and Michael in the late 1970s. It was right around the time Thriller was coming out and Michael and I became lovers. Our relationship went on for six or seven years.
Michael was very generous too. He treated me well. Liberace and I had both undergone plastic surgery around the same time Michael underwent a nose job because he didn t think he was handsome.
We all healed together at the Liberace compound in Palm Springs. Despite being featured in the Steven Soderbergh-directed film, Thorson was only able to see it after he was bailed out of prison by a brothel owner on Sunday, while he awaits sentencing for burglary charges. Matt Damon did a great job playing me.
And he did a great job in bed with Douglas, too, Thorson joked. I needed to see Jason Bourne on top of Gordon Gekko. Despite joking about the cast, Thorson also said he thought that he was being underpaid for the film.
I didn t make much out of the movie. I own a small percentage of the film, but Hollywood is notorious for padding the bill so its shows no profit, he continued. It has been a big success, all these European companies have picked it up.
So for the filmmakers to say they haven t made a dime would be a big mistake especially with my mouth. Oscar winning film director, Steven Soderbergh, previously said that the film was not scheduled to have a theatrical release because film studios turned it down for being too gay, and it struggled to find funding. Matt Damon recently talked about undertaking an intimate romantic scene with Michael Douglas character in the film, and said that he was a wonderful kisser .
He also said that he never denied rumours of being gay because he didn t want to insult some of his friends.
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Continue readingBrazil: Lawmakers approve bill which would remove ban on gay cure therapy
The measure which was approved on Tuesday would lift a 1999 ban on the treatment of homosexuality, which was established by the Federal Psychology Council. Lawmaker Joao Campos, a member of the evangelical block of the lower house in Brazil defended the legsilation. He said: In practice, the result would be that a person over 18 years of age, responsible for his actions, who is homosexual and wants to reorient his sexuality, can be attended by a psychologist.
Feliciano had attempted to get the bill before the commission, but had failed as opponents had blocked a vote on the issue. The initiative passed on Tuesday. Before the vote, the psychologists council had urged members to vote against it, reports the AP.
Council member Huberto Verona said: Today psychology, as wells as other scientific disciplines, recognize that sexual orientation is not a pathology that should be treated, it is not a perversion nor a disorder nor a behavioral disturbance. Since this is the case, we cannot offer a cure, and that is an ethical principle. The initiative must be debated by other committees, before it would go to the full chamber and Senate for a vote.
Brazil s first openly gay lawmaker Jean Wyllys, said he thought the bill would not make it through the legislative process.
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Continue readingCher to perform at New York Pride s Dance on the Pier party
Her performance will be one of the most memorable in the history of this world-class party , said Chris Frederick, Managing Director of NYC Pride. He added: Now in its 27th year, the Dance on the Pier continues a proud tradition of partnering with all-star talent to create a high-quality event that raises funds to support local LGBT non-profits and New York City s annual Pride festivities. Artists such as Whitney Houston, Jennifer Lopez, Janet Jackson, Jennifer Hudson and Cyndi Lauper have taken part in previous years.
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Continue readingWhat does Pride stand for in 2013?
Now, four decades on, we may be able to get married in the near future. So it s right that we celebrate. Our position as LGBT people has been transformed and for the younger generation, the struggles that won our legal rights and widespread social acceptance are just ancient history.
But if a newly engaged lesbian couple decide to honeymoon afterwards in large parts of the world, they had better be careful: not just of anti-LGB laws (like those recently introduced in Russia), but also of violent social condemnation of same-sex relationships. For trans people it is no better, and we still have to commemorate hundreds of transphobic murders every year. Even in Britain, where recent surveys suggest that three quarters of the population accept homosexuality (incidentally, that leaves us behind Spain, Germany, Canada, the Czech Republic and France), earlier this year we witnessed the appalling press onslaught on a trans primary school teacher.
The reality is that social change does not take place in a vacuum and while you can separate out LGBT rights from what is going on in the rest of the country for a while, it will catch up with us eventually. Our engaged lesbian couple may decide they want to have a big wedding. They still can t do it in church, of course, even if their local vicar would like to officiate.
Maybe they re secular so a registry office is fine. But what if one partner works in the public sector: she hasn t had a pay rise for three years, and has also agreed to work fewer hours in order to keep the job, which means that life is more difficult each year because inflation hasn t stopped in the meantime. And the other is working in the private sector, but she is on a zero hours contract and doesn t know from week to week how much she will bring home that week.
Makes planning for the costs of the wedding a bit tricky. Of course, they are better off than being one of the two and a half million people without a job at all, or the quarter of young people who ve never had one. LGBT people just like everyone else are living through a prolonged period of government-created austerity that is failing to achieve economic recovery in fact, as many experts now accept, is making it worse.
Meanwhile, the public services that we all need particularly the NHS are suffering. When we marched for our liberation in the 1970s, it was to change society for the better. Making a better society the trade unions are campaigning for a future that works for all of us is a challenge to which the LGBT communities should respond when we celebrate Pride in 2013.
Peter Purton , LGBT policy officer at Britain s Trades Union Congress (TUC).
As with all comment pieces, the views expressed may not necessarily reflect those of PinkNews Discuss this Get the latest LGBT headlines in your inbox with our free daily newsletter!
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Continue readingStudy: Most US gay people find the majority of religious organisations to be unfriendly
A large majority, 84%, said that they perceived Islam as unfriendly towards gays, the Mormon church at 83%, the Roman Catholic church with 79%, and evangelical churches at 73%. More of a mixed reaction was had from Judaism and non-evangelical Protestantism, with over 40% considering them either unfriendly or neutral about gay people. Director of news and faith initiatives at GLAAD, said the relationship between the gay and religious communities had improved over recent years, however before the last decade they were pretty painful .
He went on to say that the sense of unfriendliness could come in part from the loudest voices of faith groups speaking out against LGBT rights. Citing a GLAAD study from last year, Murray said that religious groups in support of LGBT rights got far less media attention than those against. The leading anti-gay voices always put it in religious terms, which taints how people view religion, he said.
Despite the Pew research finding that US gay people had begun to feel greater social acceptance, 29% of respondents said they had felt personally unaccepted in a place of worship.
39% said they had been rejected by a close friend or family member, and 21% said they felt they had been treated unfairly by an employer. Almost 50% of the LGBT respondents said they had no religious affiliation, compared to 20% in the general population. A third of LGBT adults said they felt a conflict between their sexuality or gender identity and their faith.
The lower percentage of younger people in the general population to have a religious affiliation is also reflected in the LGBT community, however it is almost double, with 60% of LGBT people aged 18-29 having no religious affiliation, compared to just under a third for the general population.
The Pew survey was based on interviews from April 11-29 with 1,197 self-identified gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender adults and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.
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Continue readingCindy McCain: By next presidential election, both US parties will support equal marriage
By the next presidential election I think this will be an issue that will be very much agreed on by both parties. She was recently honoured with the Trevor Hero Award at an annual fundraiser for the Trevor Project in New York City. Attending the event, she represented the wing of the GOP which believes that support for equal marriage is growing, and that opposing it will soon become untenable to continue to oppose it.
Her husband, John McCain, does not share her stance on equal marriage. Senator McCain said in March that he didn t think he would be following the lead of fellow Republican Senator Rob Portman, who stunned so many last week when he announced his support for equal marriage. Mr Portman said he had changed his views after realising that his 21-year-old son, Will, was gay.
I respect anyone else s decision and we all learn in life and grow and mature, he said recently in an interview with TheHill. I have changed my position on other issues in my life, but on this one, I had not contemplated changing my position. Mrs McCain, however, said she thinks that her husband will eventually change his mind on the issue.
He hears from his own daughters and his own children and from me a little bit about this, she said. But it s also okay to disagree, but do it in a manner that s respectful. We have different views, She continued.
We have raucous dinner table conversations and we encourage that.
In fact you have to be tough to survive at our table.
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Continue readingMBE awarded to gay and lesbian choir leader for services to music
He said: The first thing I thought when I received the letter for the prime minister is what do people wear to these things? I didn t really believe it and I thought it was a joke because it was a very plain letter but then I looked online and found out it was real. I didn t start volunteering because I wanted to win an MBE I did it because I wanted to make a difference and winning it is just a bonus.
Mr Brophy has volunteered for 20 years, and has taken part in events such as the Various Voices Festival in 2009, and the Big Gay Sing in Trafalgar Square, which brought together 65 international choirs as part of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad. He will now attend Buckingham Palace, where he will be presented with a medal and a certificate from the Queen herself or Prince Charles. He said: I m a little apprehensive because this is something that happens to other people and I don t know anyone with an MBE so this is new to me.
This honour validates the work I m doing it s really nice to feel appreciated and by giving me the award it is society s way of saying we value what you do .
This is all very strange to me because when I was born being gay was illegal and now I m getting an MBE so I can t really believe all the changes that have happened in my lifetime.
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Continue readingAustralian Senator Cory Bernardi: I was right to warn that equal marriage could lead to polygamy
Is having three people that love each other should they be able to enter into a permanent union endorsed by society, or four people? he said at the time. There are even some creepy people out there, who say that it s ok to have consensual sexual relations between humans and animals.
Will that be a future step? Speaking to The Age on Monday, Mr Bernardi said: If we go back to what I suggested in the Parliament when the same-sex marriage debate came up, there is actually now a petition being put together for the Parliament by green activists to recognise multi-member unions, he said. Now I said that would happen.
It s happening. We haven t even taken the first step. I think there should be alarm.
If you re going to redefine a word to satisfy demands of a minority then you are going to face continuing demands in that space. The petition he refers to, from the Polyaction Amory Lobby, reportedly has about 25 signatures. Mr Bernardi admitted linking same-sex marriage to bestiality was extreme but said the Greens agenda endorsed the abhorrent and disgusting act.
Whether people agree with it or want to interpret it incorrectly, what I said was correct. It may have offended some people and it wasn t intended to offend people but people drew inferences from it that they should never have done, he said. Australia s Green Party has described Mr Bernardi s remarks as disgusting .
Mr Bernardi also attacked Australia s former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for changing his position on equal marriage, saying he was a conviction politician of convenience who used to deliver doorstep interviews outside a church. The current Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, remains opposed to equal marriage. In April, Australia s Liberal Party leader, Tony Abbott, said he opposed proposals to hold a public vote on equal marriage during September s federal election.
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Continue readingUS: Illinois equal marriage group pledges $500,000 effort to promote same-sex marriage
Equality Illinois also said that an organisation opposed to equal marriage had pledged $250,000 ( 160,000) to oppose lawmakers, in particular Republicans, who supported equal marriage. Earlier this month, opponents to equal marriage in the US state of Illinois celebrated the fact that the bill to legalise same-sex unions never went to a vote a week ago. The bill s sponsor Greg Harris wept as he announced that, due to a lack of support, the bill would not be voted on.
Mr Harris said he planned to lobby for the bill before the next legislative session in the autumn. Opponents to the bill may be calling victory prematurely however, as Mike Madigan, House Speaker extended the deadline for the bill to August 31, allowing it a new potential lease of life, if its advocates can gather support before then. Lawmakers in the US state of Illinois also wrote an open letter apologising to advocates of equal marriage in the state as the bill failed to be called for a vote, despite passing in the Senate on Valentine s Day.
Nine US states, and Washington DC currently allow equal marriage, and it will become law in Rhode Island, Delaware and Minnesota in the summer. The US state of Maryland in November 2012 became the first state to legalise equal marriage by means of a popular vote back in 2012. The law came into effect on 1 January 2013.
Washington and Maine also legalised equal marriage in referendums in those states on the same day.
The US Supreme Court is expected to rule on two cases surround equal marriage, in the next two weeks, potentially making a groundbreaking ruling for equal marriage in the state of California, and the whole of the US.
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Continue readingArchbishop of York: Would the Church of England rather bless sheep and trees than gay couples?
Some took this as a signal that the Church of England may drastically change its stance, once a review it is conducting reports back later in 2013. The legislation ensures that any religious organisations could opt-out of performing same-sex marriages if they so wished, and a quadruple lock is in place, which means the Church of England is exempt from performing them. Dr Sentamu said, however; that the legislation would cause ideological damage , and compared politicians supporting the legislation to ill-prepared midwifes at the birth of a new institution .
He went on to question the Church s attitude against blessing committed gay couples, asking: What do you do with people in same sex relationships that are committed, that are loving, that are Christian? . Would you rather bless a sheep and a tree but not them? That is a big question to which we are going to come and the moment is not now.
We are dealing with legislation as we ve got. The Church of England still officially bans civil partnership ceremonies, as well as priests being banned from performing formal blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples, despite fierce criticism from within its own ranks. The Bishop of Buckingham, the Right Reverend Dr Alan Wilson, earlier this year criticised the Church of England s refusal to allow blessings for civil partnerships, and said that some parishes were ignoring the ban in order to avoid conflict.
He said that dozens of churches across the country were going against the ban on blessing civil unions, however, some churches offered services, but denied they were breaking the rules There is mounting pressure for the church to give its formal approval to civil union blessings, however it would be required to be backed by the General Synod, which meets in York in July. The Church of England said after last week s House of Lords second reading on the equal marriage bill, that it accepts that there is a clear majority in Parliament to introduce same-sex marriage and that it will therefore end its opposition to changing the law. A commission on sexuality, chaired by former civil service mandarin Sir Joseph Pilling, will report to the Church towards the end of this year.
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