Sarah Palin Gives Thumbs Up To Anti-Gay Chick-fil-A

Sarah Palin Gives Thumbs Up To Anti-Gay Chick-fil-A: pSarah Palin is joining a who’s-who of conservative activists — Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum, Rev. Billy Graham, The Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America — in supporting Chick-fil-A, the fast food chain that has donated millions of dollars to anti-gay organizations, including “reparative therapy” groups like Exodus International. “Stopped by Chick-fil-A in The Woodlands [...]/p

More From Anti-Gay Chick-fil-A President: ‘We Have Been Left Victim To The Foolishness Of Our Own Thoughts’

More From Anti-Gay Chick-fil-A President: ‘We Have Been Left Victim To The Foolishness Of Our Own Thoughts’: pChick-fil-A might be pretending to distance itself from president Dan Cathy’s anti-gay remarks condemning marriage equality activists as “prideful” and “arrogant” for “inviting God’s judgment” with the “audacity to define what marriage is about,” but that was not the last of Cathy’s remarks. Today, Jeremy Hooper found a clip of him speaking at Hope Community [...]/p

The AIDS Memorial Quilt is Now Online

The AIDS Memorial Quilt is Now Online

It Could Happen To You

Creve Coeur passes measure to protect gays from discrimination

Creve Coeur passes measure to protect gays from discrimination

CREVE COEUR • The Creve Coeur City Council voted Monday to update a non-discrimination ordinance to include gender identity and sexual orientation.

The amendment, which was passed 7-0, prohibits any discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation in such matters as housing, employment and use of public spaces.

The law will ensure that “the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community can live without fear in (Creve Coeur) that they would be discriminated against,” said Andrew Shaughnessy of PROMO, a Missouri organization advocating for equality gay, lesbian and transsexual individuals.

Beth Kistner, a council member, said she has received numerous letters and emails from residents in support of the ordinance.

Creve Coeur is just the latest on a list of local communities that have recently passed similar legislation, including St. Louis, University City, Olivette, Richmond Heights and Clayton, Shaughnessy said.

Muppets Abandon Chick-fil-A Because Of Its Anti-Gay Policies

Muppets Abandon Chick-fil-A Because Of Its Anti-Gay Policies: Gonzo doesn’t have to worry about Camilla and his other chickens anymore, because the Muppets are officially going to be eating less chicken. In a Facebook note posted Friday evening, The Jim Henson Company, which currently offers toys in Chick-fil-A kids’ meals, announced that will no longer partner with the fast food chain on any [...]/p

Mayor Menino on Chick-fil-A: Stuff it

Mayor Thomas M. Menino is vowing to block Chick-fil-A from bringing its Southern-fried fast-food empire to Boston — possibly to a popular tourist spot just steps from the Freedom Trail — after the family-owned firm’s president suggested gay marriage is “inviting God’s judgment on our nation.” “Chick-fil-A doesn’t belong in Boston. You can’t have a business in the city of Boston that discriminates against a population. We’re an open city, we’re a city that’s at the forefront of inclusion,” Menino told the Herald yesterday. “That’s the Freedom Trail. That’s where it all started right here. And we’re not going to have a company, Chick-fil-A or whatever the hell the name is, on our Freedom Trail.”

Kim Dotcom - Mr President

A Guide To Consumer Brands Helping Bankroll Right-Wing Attack Ads

From ThinkProgress.org: Have you eaten at White Castle recently? Or caught a movie at Regal Cinemas? If so, you may be unwittingly helping finance right-wing attack ads. That’s because many of the country’s most common brands are run by rich conservatives who are using their personal wealth to bankroll outside spending groups that are running attack ads smearing progressives. From Marriott Hotels to Brawny paper towels, and from the Los Angeles Lakers to the Coachella music festival, corporate executives at these organizations have given millions of dollars to groups like Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. Some corporations, like Waffle House, give direct donations to conservative attack ad groups like Karl Rove’s American Crossroads. The following list of consumer brands either have leaders who wrote checks to outside right-wing attack ad groups or gave money directly from the corporation. Only entities that gave $25,000 or more were included in this guide. Hotels Marriott Hotels is a subsidiary of Marriott International, whose chairman J.W. “Bill” Marriott, Jr. has contributed $1,000,000 to Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. [Source] Omni Hotels is a subsidiary of TRT Hodlings, a private corporation whose co-founder Robert Rowling has given more than $1,000,000 in total to American Crossroads and Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. [Source] Palazzo Hotel in Las Vegas is owned by Sheldon Adelson, who along with his wife have pledged $71 million to right-wing attack groups, including Newt Gingrich’s Super PAC Winning Our Future, Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future, Crossroads GPS, a group set up by former Eric Cantor aides named the Young Guns Network, and a group tied to John Boehner named the Congressional Leadership Fund. [Source] Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company is a subsidiary of Marriott International, whose chairman J.W. “Bill” Marriott, Jr. has contributed $1,000,000 to Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. [Source] Venetian Resort Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas is owned by Sheldon Adelson, who along with his wife have pledged $71 million to right-wing attack groups, including Newt Gingrich’s Super PAC Winning Our Future, Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future, Crossroads GPS, a group set up by former Eric Cantor aides named the Young Guns Network, and a group tied to John Boehner named the Congressional Leadership Fund. [Source] Household items Angel Soft toilet paper is a subsidiary of Koch Industries, headed by Charles and David Koch who are planning to funnel approximately $400 million to groups like the National Rifle Association, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, the National Right to Life Committee, Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition, the 60 Plus Association and the American Future Fund. [Source] Brawny paper towels is a subsidiary of Koch Industries, headed by Charles and David Koch who are planning to funnel approximately $400 million to groups like the National Rifle Association, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, the National Right to Life Committee, Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition, the 60 Plus Association and the American Future Fund. [Source] Dixie cups is a subsidiary of Koch Industries, headed by Charles and David Koch who are planning to funnel approximately $400 million to groups like the National Rifle Association, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, the National Right to Life Committee, Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition, the 60 Plus Association and the American Future Fund. [Source] Georgia Pacific is a subsidiary of Koch Industries, headed by Charles and David Koch who are planning to funnel approximately $400 million to groups like the National Rifle Association, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, the National Right to Life Committee, Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition, the 60 Plus Association and the American Future Fund. [Source] Entertainment Coachella Music & Arts Festival is an affiliate of AEG, whose parent company Anschutz Corporation is run by Philip Anschutz. He has made many political donations, including a $50,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Regal Cinemas is an affiliate of AEG, whose parent company Anschutz Corporation is run by Philip Anschutz. He has made many political donations, including a $50,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Food Blue Bell Creameries, the ice cream manufacturer, gave $40,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Waffle House, the 24-hour breakfast food restaurant, gave Karl Rove’s group American Crossroads $100,000 from its corporate fund. [Source] White Castle, the Ohio-based burger chain, gave $25,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Athletics New Balance, the shoe company, is headed by Jim Davis who has donated $1,000,000 to Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. [Source] Gold’s Gym is a subsidiary of TRT Hodlings, a private corporation whose co-founder Robert Rowling has given more than $1,000,000 in total to American Crossroads and Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. [Source] Sports franchises Houston Dynamo, the MLS team, is an affiliate of AEG, whose parent company Anschutz Corporation is run by Philip Anschutz. He has made many political donations, including a $50,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Los Angeles Galaxy the MLS team, is an affiliate of AEG, whose parent company Anschutz Corporation is run by Philip Anschutz. He has made many political donations, including a $50,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Los Angeles Kings, the NHL team, is an affiliate of AEG, whose parent company Anschutz Corporation is run by Philip Anschutz. He has made many political donations, including a $50,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Los Angeles Lakers the NBA team, is an affiliate of AEG, whose parent company Anschutz Corporation is run by Philip Anschutz. He has made many political donations, including a $50,000 to the Boehner-linked Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC. [Source] Orlando Magic, the NBA team, is owned by Richard DeVos, a Michigan billionaire who has given more than $1,000,000 to the Koch Brothers’ 2012 anti-Obama efforts. [Source] Miscellaneous Charles Schwab Corporation, an investment company founded and run by Charles Schwab, who along with his wife has given $250,000 to Mitt Romney’s Super PAC Restore Our Future. [Source] Menards, the Midwestern home improvement chain, whose founder and owner John Menard pledged more than $1,000,000 to the Koch Brothers’ 2012 anti-Obama efforts. [Source] Nina Liss-Schultz and Christina Lewis contributed to this report. UPDATE An earlier version of this post inadvertantly listed Wendy’s instead of White Castle.

Chick-Fil-A President, On Anti-Gay Stance: 'Guilty As Charged'

From HuffingtonPost.com: Though Chick-fil-A has come under considerable fire for its documented support of anti-gay Christian organizations, officials for the fast food chain have remained mostly tight-lipped about the controversy -- until now. In a new interview with the Baptist Press, Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy -- the son of company founder S. Truett Cathy -- addresses what the publication describes as his franchise's "support of the traditional family." Cathy's somewhat glib response: "Well, guilty as charged." He went on to note, "We are very much supportive of the family -- the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that...we know that it might not be popular with everyone, but thank the Lord, we live in a country where we can share our values and operate on biblical principles." Cathy then reiterated his stance during an appearance on "The Ken Coleman Show," Good as You blogger Jeremy Hooper reported. "I think we are inviting God's judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at Him and say 'we know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage' and I pray God's mercy on our generation that has such a prideful, arrogant attitude to think that we have the audacity to define what marriage is about," Cathy said in that interview, which can be heard here. Needless to say, Cathy's remarks quickly sparked the ire of a number of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) advocates and bloggers. "Regardless of where you stand, the placement of LGBT people within our societal picture and within our body of laws is the conversation at hand," wrote Hooper. "That is not the same thing as 'support for the traditional family,' no matter how aggressively the self-appointed values movement attempts to (mis)name reality!" Added David Badash of The New Civil Rights Movement: "Apparently, in the Cathy family’s mind, gay people don’t have families, no one divorces, and everyone must be Christian." The Atlanta-based company's questionable contributions have been both well reported and the subject of a number of high-profile protests. Earlier this month, Equality Matters published a report on a newly-released analysis of Chick-fil-A's charitable work that found that the fast food chain donated nearly $2 million to anti-gay groups over the course of 2010. Among those to reportedly receive donations through Chick-fil-A's WinShape Foundation were the Marriage & Family Foundation ($1,188,380), Exodus International ($1,000) and the Family Research Council (also $1,000). In February, Northeastern University officials reportedly squashed plans for a campus-based franchise of the fast food chain, after "student concerns reflected [Chick-fil-A's] history of donating to anti-gay organizations," according to The Boston Globe. One month earlier, New York University student Hillary Dworkoski launched a petition calling for NYU to close its Chick-fil-A franchise, reportedly the only one in Manhattan. Cathy had previously shrugged off the criticisms in a 2011 interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, calling blogosphere reports on his company's donations "folklore." Cathy also noted, "We're not anti-anybody. Our mission is to create raving fans."

Showtunes Sing-Off: 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'

Showtunes Sing-Off: 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'

Woman reports rape at gay strip club Swinging Richards - CBS Atlanta 46

Woman reports rape at gay strip club Swinging Richards - CBS Atlanta 46

No Latex, No Love: The Bare Side of Gay Pride

From HuffingtonPost.com: Summer is here, and so, after nine months of writing a new novel, and in rather desperate need of a tan, yours truly took his husband to a European beach resort for Gay Pride. Imagine sun, beaches, concerts, drag queens, Lady Gaga and Kylie impersonators, skinny models, gogo boys, and over a thousand men in all shapes and sizes, celebrating their freedom. Being free to express our sexuality is wonderful. Let's remember that in 78 countries in the world, people still get imprisoned, tortured, hanged, stoned, or shot for being gay, lesbian, transgender, etc. We partied for four days straight (or rather anything but straight), met some very interesting and some very loud people, gawked at rock-hard abs and bubble butts, danced to all sorts of music (including Boney M., if you believe it), shouted "I am titanium" and "born this way" a lot, and drooled over the Mr. Gay contestants on the catwalk before heading to a bear bar with some very drunk Australians and Swedes. All perfectly innocent. It's summer, after all. We went to the White Party, the Black Party, the Jungle Party, and the Foam Party, but the real party was always out in the thronged streets. We lamented the loss of our own abdominal definition and vowed to go on a diet starting Monday. At 5 in the morning, we stumbled back to our apartment though alleys littered with vomit, garbage, and used condoms. As the sun rose red and pink, we watched the gorgeous model who never looked at anyone finally get his comeuppance in a side street and gave him a round of applause as he bent over graciously. Drunk with love and sunshine, we fell into bed. It would have been a wonderful day of moderate debauch if we had not then made the mistake of turning on Grindr. Most hotels don't let strangers go up to the rooms until the doors are unlocked again at 6 a.m. That's why the parties last exactly until that very special hour and, as the cocks crow, almost instantly moves online. The apps lit up. The messages came in, two, three at a time. Within 20 minutes we had invitations to group sex, howls and woofs from lonely men clamoring for love, pleas by bottoms in need of tops, and tops in search of hot bottoms. Honestly, I've never been more popular on Grindr! As we chatted to Tim from Croyden, Jan from A'dam, several "Aussie lads" and "Irish boys," and a fair number of Joaos, Jorges, and Jacobs, we quickly realized that many of the gentlemen were in a state of almost unintelligible horniness. Some used Google Translate to bridge the language gap. One Italian invited us to examine his sanitized donkey. Go figure. After another 30 minutes the picture became very dark. Nine out of 10 men invited us to have bareback sex. I first thought "No Latex" was a subtle hint referring to a nonexistent clothing fetish. But "Allergic to Rubber" is not really a medical condition. We were presented with graphic images of orgies "in progress" and almost settled on visiting the "fit, sane, down-to-earth US/UK couple" two doors down the aisle when they also insisted on the absence of protection. So much for "sane." Somewhat shocked, we switched off our phones and went to sleep. That was on the first day. The following night I asked a reasonably priced and very sweet gogo dancer to help me in a little experiment. At 6 in the morning, we posted a photo of his beautiful body on Grindr and invited people to have bareback sex with him. The result: 200 hits, from shy "hi"s to blunt images hurling through cyberspace without a space suit. One single, intrepid soul sent a message of well-meant concern. The rest wanted to do our friend in every imaginable position, as long as there was no latex involved. It wasn't just young guys. We encountered a bear couple in their 50s offering to share their 20-year-old plaything unprotected. There were offers of drugs and booze, invitations to do it on the beach, on the terrace, and in any number of hotel rooms. But almost all either sought bareback or flashed back an "OK" or "sure" when asked. Call me naïve, but I was shocked to the core. I had no idea that this was going on. So what? I am happily married. Why should I be worried about the fate of 20-year-old beautiful things on E? Isn't youth always stupid? Didn't we do the same foolish things? I happen to be of a generation whose coming-out coincided with the climax of the AIDS epidemic. Maybe that has clouded my vision. Really, I should just mind my own business, write my books, and let these men get on with whatever they want to do. But I can't. It bothers me enormously. It bothers me that on the very afternoon when we were reminded at the rally that 78 countries still punish homosexuals, I received my first message by an 18-year-old boy begging me for bareback sex. It bothers me that we saw so many young guys so high on E and booze and their own youth that they actively sought to be infected with a virus that still doesn't have a cure. It bothers me that there was not a single HIV information booth at this event, and that no condoms were handed out. When did all that disappear? Maybe young kids are simply forward-looking and staunchly optimistic. If they get infected now, there'll surely be a cure by the time they fall ill. Scientists have been searching for a cure long enough. Or maybe these beautiful, vulnerable, stupid men simply don't care -- about their own lives or the lives of others. As one barebacker's profile read: "Life is four days long. Today is Now." Not sure about the esoteric meaning, but the implication is clear: Life is absurd, short, and utterly pointless, so we are all heading bareback to carpe diem. In my research for Benedetto, I found that 18th-century men, gay or straight, had much the same attitude toward carnal pleasure even back in the days of rampant, incurable syphilis. We've conquered that disease. Is AIDS a thing of the past, and is this the dawn of the post-condom area? I am still a little hungover, forgive me, so for now I have no answers. You may think me naïve to even write such an article. Probably you all already knew what was going down out there. But I have seen a face of Gay Pride I cannot be proud of at all.

Barebacking in Gay Porn After AIDS

From HuffingtonPost.com: The annual Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco is noted for its unbridled embrace of every star in our sexual constellation. Even the fearless leather community, which founded the event, can sometimes appear tame amidst the outlandish kinks and clothing -- and lack thereof -- on display along the city's tilted streets. In the fall of 2003, in the middle of this rowdy bacchanalia, Paul Morris stood at the booth for Treasure Island Media (TIM), the gay porn outfit he founded that featured unprotected sex (barebacking) between its actors. This particular specialty was the singular driving force behind his smashingly successful and relatively new company. Then, like the legend of Lana Turner fortuitously cozying up to the counter at Schwab's, a beautiful and achingly masculine young man approached the TIM booth. He liked the TIM videos -- he liked them very much indeed -- and he hoped to one day document a few fantasies of his own. TIM star Jesse O'Toole was on hand, and someone snapped a photograph of the two of them together (right). In it, the grinning young man with a leather cap appears to have found his long-lost tribe, and O'Toole looks as if he has found a seven-course meal. The photo was sent to Max Sohl, a sometime porn actor with a theater background whom Morris had commissioned to conceive and direct what would be Sohl's first porn film. Sohl met with the aspiring model and asked him to complete a form that included a simple question: "What is one of your fantasy scenes?" In response, the young man wrote simply, "Me getting nailed and seeded by a gang of hot guys." "The Black Party was coming," Sohl explained in a recent interview, referring to the annual New York City weekend of leather men, parties, and sexual adventures, "and I thought, 'OK, let's see how many men he can take.'" And that is how Dawson's 20 Load Weekend was born. Prior to the onset of AIDS, condom usage in gay pornography was nonexistent -- but that was before bodily fluids became synonymous with death and disease. For well over a decade after the crisis began, gay porn videos not only featured tightly wrapped penises, but their storylines -- indeed, the actors themselves -- suffered from a sort of dramatic malaise, as if sleepwalking through their sexual routine while trying to pay no attention to the man with KS lesions behind the curtain. The videos mirrored our own lack of interest in gallivanting about with the pizza man or diving into an orgy with strangers, with or without condoms. Many viewers simply returned to their stash of pre-AIDS pornography, which was condom-less but "justified." As AIDS deaths subsided with the advent of new medications in 1996, gay male culture responded with a vengeance. Circuit parties were born of celebration (before succumbing to their own excesses), safer sex behaviors relaxed, and there was a palpable longing to escape the horrors of the previous years. Reclaiming a bold sexuality, something many gay men believed had been lost forever, was a tonic for the post-traumatic stress they suffered. Younger gay men, who had listened to stories of an earlier, sexually liberated time as if it were a lost era of paleontology, were more than willing to explore whatever modern version might await them. Unprotected sex since the arrival of HIV is nothing new (it is, after all, the primary reason for new infections that have continued fairly steadily since AIDS began), but in the late 1990s the gay community proved again how comically adept it is at applying a little branding to any phenomenon, and "barebacking" entered the public lexicon. The irony may be that a new word was developed for the oldest sexual activity imaginable: having sex without a barrier. It wasn't the sex that had changed but the meaning and judgment associated with it toward, most specifically, gay men. Or, as AIDS advocate Jim Pickett said at a recent conference for people living with HIV, "When a friend announces they are expecting a child, I feel like screaming, 'You barebacked!'" But while intelligent minds and passionate advocates argued about the reasons and the proper response to barebacking, no one had dared document it on videotape for the erotic pleasure of others. Yet. In 1998 two renegade companies formed to make bareback videos exclusively: Hot Desert Knights and Treasure Island Media. None of the leading gay pornographers would consider producing them (although they were eager to market their highly profitable backlists of videos produced "pre-AIDS" that featured bareback sex). The cheaply made videos by the upstart porn producers brought the sexual choices of an increasing number of men out of the closet and onto DVD players and computer screens. The videos were uniform in their low production values, the older ages of the actors, and the fact that several of them appeared to have the physical manifestations of HIV. It was as if a group of men who had literally lived through AIDS said, "Oh, what the hell," and demonstrated the kind of sex they had been having amongst themselves for some time. Their exploits were perceived as an underground fetish that would never break the surface of more mainstream gay pornography. But then Max Sohl met that ferociously attractive man at the Folsom Street Fair who was so eager to "get seeded" by a string of strangers, and with the sexual zeitgeist now primed for their arrival, they made a film that would forever change the porn industry and quite arguably influence the sexual behavior of countless gay men. Re-christened "Dawson," the budding porn star was served up in a hotel room, over the course of New York City's 2004 Black Party weekend, to an ongoing parade of bareback tops. Their sex was filmed in a documentary fashion, without music, scripted dialogue, or any effort to hide the many cables and cameras crowding the room. Dawson's fantasy had been fulfilled, and Sohl had the footage to prove it. In June 2004 Dawson's 20 Load Weekend was released and was precisely as advertised. It might first strike the viewer that the video was created in an unsettling world in which HIV is utterly absent -- that is, until a revamped sexual choreography is pointedly repeated again and again. While orgasms in gay porn before AIDS typically showed the top withdrawing from his partner and spilling his semen across his partner's backside, the tops servicing Dawson had a different and very deliberate mission: to withdraw only long enough to prove their orgasm, and then re-enter Dawson immediately to show the injection of semen. This was not a film that was made in the absence of HIV but was created because of HIV. You can practically hear a disembodied voice whispering, "Watch closely. This is how gay men have sex now. That is where semen belongs. Fuck AIDS." Depending on your point of view, it is either a transgressive act of eroticism or an incredibly irresponsible act that demonstrates how to become infected with HIV. Or perhaps both. In the center of all this was Dawson himself, and never has bareback porn had such a virile and athletic leading man, much less one who bottomed with such disarming delight. "He was a higher-quality male model that hadn't been seen in that kind of extreme scene," said Sohl. "The movie changed things because of Dawson. He was adorable and actually smiles and laughs. He is joyful in that movie." "Bareback porn companies have blood on their hands," became a common refrain among gay men and health advocates. Gay sex-advice columnist Dan Savage equated the videos to child porn, believing they take advantage of the naïve and the vulnerable. Some accused TIM of making snuff films. The video was wildly successful, ubiquitous wherever porn was shown. Even Sohl was surprised. "Our staff and even my friends would say, 'I go into a porn booth, a sex party, a hookup, and it's playing,'" he said. "It was everywhere." Adult bookstores that had previously shunned TIM videos responded to customer demand and began stocking them, even creating bareback sections on their shelves. Gay porn sites that once refused to feature bareback clips began including them. Dawson and the film became the definitive symbol of a bare, wanton sexuality that eschewed condoms and refused to be denied or intimidated by the virus. Soon, more companies produced bareback porn, and they were able to attract "collegiate jock" types who were younger, more muscular, and the very picture of health and vitality. The faces and bodies in bareback videos had been transformed, erasing all evidence of HIV, much like the invisibility of HIV/AIDS in our broader culture. When considering the legacy of his film, Sohl is more pragmatic than proud. "The concept of taking 20 loads in 2004 was beyond taboo, but to say it in 2012, it doesn't seem as extreme today," he said. "I'm sure someone else would have done it. It just so happened to be us." Neither does Sohl admit to any trepidation about the safety of his actors, then or now. "I've been doing this since 2004, with thousands of men, and have had only one guy claim to get an STD (on my set)," he explained. "Probably 50 percent of my casting job is being an HIV counselor," he adds, without a hint of irony. "I spend a lot of time talking about HIV. My feeling is that people need to be responsible for their own actions and make informed decisions." One of the people making decisions while living with HIV is none other than the actor known as Dawson, who disclosed his HIV-positive status to The Windy City Times in 2005. While his HIV status may surprise no one, something else he said in the interview was sadly revealing. "It was after turning positive that I made the decision to look into doing a movie for Treasure Island Media," he said at the time. "I had seroconverted a few months before..." After an HIV diagnosis, many people use it as an opportunity to re-examine their lives, make different choices, or otherwise take steps to enjoy their life in whatever ways are important to them. For the man who would be Dawson, his seroconversion was followed by the choice to be an unapologetic cum whore in front of video cameras. This may have been his fantasy, but it certainly fuels the stigmatizing belief that people with HIV are irresponsible vectors of disease, spreading infection and abandoning whatever sexual values they may have previously held. Perhaps, then, the film was a treatise on the kind of sexual liberation available to HIV-positive gay men today, demonstrating the "new normal" for those who take their meds, eliminate the viral activity in their blood, and "fuck freely and without fear," as TIM founder Paul Morris once put it. Or did it simply portray "poz" men as sluts, a charge leveled by disgusted (and possibly jealous) HIV-negative men? "What a person is seeing has more to do with them than with us," said Sohl. "The best mode of action is not to confirm or deny anything. I will see a scene online that I directed," he says, referring to the many porn sites that pirate pieces of his work and give them new titles, "and it will be renamed 'Negative Bottom Takes Poz Loads,' as if it were a conversion scene. We never said that. Or people think the bottom is using crystal meth. That says more about the guy watching it than what actually happened." That relationship, between porn and viewer, is something of particular concern to some HIV-prevention advocates who believe bareback porn encourages unsafe sex in real life. This resulted in AIDS Healthcare Foundation's recent campaign to mandate condom use on pornography sets, a move that was popular on a simplistic level but did nothing to address the myriad of factors associated with actual HIV risk and relative safety, such as an undetectable viral load, serosorting, or the precise sexual behaviors involved. While social cognitive theory states that we make behavioral decisions based on watching others, very little research has been conducted on the causal relationship between bareback porn and real behavior. In what little has been studied, researchers can't decide whether barebackers watch a lot of bareback porn or bareback porn makes people barebackers. It is a riddle that Max Sohl is surprisingly happy to solve. "Absolutely," he said. "Of course it is going to influence what people do." When asked, then, what is the responsibility of porn, Sohl would have none of it. "The responsibility of porn," he says impishly, "is to make the guy watching it shoot a load." Dawson is, now and forever, committed to videotape and featured on dozens of online porn sites, happily receiving the prize he so ardently desires. He and his progeny of newer, younger porn actors have crossed a line, and they're never coming back. Their video escapades are available online everywhere and for everyone, including young gay men who are just coming out and surfing the Internet for validation of their sexuality. What those young men will almost certainly see online are depictions of unprotected sex, because bareback videos now outperform scenes of condom usage on every site that carries them -- and most of them now do. It is unquestionable that bareback sex will be viewed as typical to the uninitiated, and anyone crafting safer-sex messages to those young men is going to have a difficult time trumping those images. The use-a-condom-every-time message is officially dead, drowned in buckets of bodily fluids by Dawson and his barebacking brethren. Dawson's 20 Load Weekend redefined bareback porn and the men who appear in such porn. It influenced subsequent videos and expanded the availability of bareback films. It depicted a prevailing truth about gay sexual behavior "post-AIDS" and arguably encouraged risky sexual adventure-seeking. It led to the saturation of bareback porn online, making unprotected sex normative to whomever might be watching. To dismiss this film, to minimize its social and cultural impact, would be to demonstrate a profound misunderstanding of gay sexuality today. "Barebacking is a right," gay anthropologist Eric Rofes once wrote. "After all, practically every straight guy in the world gets to do it without being told they are irresponsible, foolish, or suicidal ... Barebacking is liberation. Barebacking is defiance." How foolish, prescient, liberating, enlightening, or destructive barebacking may ultimately become is something that may only be revealed in the next chapter of our gay community's troubled history. Mark S. King's written and video blog, My Fabulous Disease, chronicles his life as an HIV-positive gay man. He is also the author of A Place Like This, his memoir of Los Angeles during the dawn of AIDS. (Photo of Dawson and Jesse O'Toole courtesy of Max Sohl and edited for content. Other images courtesy of Treasure Island Media.)

STUDY: 40 Percent Of Homeless Youth Are LGBT, Family Rejection Is Leading Cause

STUDY: 40 Percent Of Homeless Youth Are LGBT, Family Rejection Is Leading Cause: pAs many as 40 percent of homeless youth identify as LGBT, and a new Williams Institute study of youth shelters confirms this estimate. Between October 2011 and March 2012, 354 agencies completed surveys about their clients and found that about 40 percent of their homeless and non-homeless clients were LGBT (9 percent of whom identified [...]/p

Washington Avenue upswing brings crime, worries

Washington Avenue upswing brings crime, worries

Editorial: Advice to Washington Avenue worriers: Open the Green Zone

Editorial: Advice to Washington Avenue worriers: Open the Green Zone

Anheuser-Busch InBev buys Grupo Modelo (Corona) for $20 billion

Anheuser-Busch InBev buys Grupo Modelo for $20 billion

The Rise of the Superstar DJ (in Time Magazine)

Beat Boys: The Rise of the Superstar DJ Have we entered a new golden age of electronic dance music — or, as Deadmau5 asserts, are DJs just glorified button-pushers? By MELISSA LOCKER | @woolyknickers | June 26, 2012 | Skrillex performs onstage during Day 3 of Bonnaroo 2012 on June 9, 2012 in Manchester, Tennessee. Name a DJ from the 1980s. Go ahead, we’ll wait. Fast forward to the 2012 Grammy Awards when electronic music and the men (more on that later) who make it were everywhere. Deadmau5 showed up on the red carpet wearing his trademark mouse head with Skrillex’s phone number scrawled across his t-shirt. Producer and DJ Skrillex won not one, but three Grammys. In a special performance superstar DJ David Guetta brought the beats while Lil Wayne and Chris Brown provided vocals. Far from being a niche market, electronic dance music (EDM) is making inroads into almost every aspect of American life. It has fully infiltrated Top 40 radio. French DJ extraordinaire David Guetta hit No. 1 with the Black Eyed Peas on “I Gotta Feeling” and Rihanna worked with Scottish DJ Calvin Harris on her hits “We Found Love” and “Where Have You Been”. Chart-toppers by Gotye and Adele have been endlessly remixed into dance hits. Deadmau5, both the person and his music, are featured in commercials. Atlantic Records recently relaunched Big Beat, its dance-music imprint, with Skrillex as its cornerstone. The Wall Street Journal estimated that Dutch superstar DJ Tiësto — MixMag’s ”Greatest DJ of All Time” — has an annual income of $20 million. Attendance at the Electric Daisy Carnival, one of the premiere electronic music festivals in the U.S., topped 250,000 last year. Forbes considers Skrillex the 92nd most powerful celebrity in the world, making their list right above 30 Rock’s Tina Fey. The rise of the DJ as an artist and the ascension of electronic dance music to the mainstream seems unstoppable. But just as we are all getting used to having DJs making the music scene, a few acts start to signal what could be the beginning of the end of this generation of electronic dance music mavens. Two days ago, Deadmau5, one of the most famous (and intentionally controversial) DJs of the era, posted an article on Tumblr entitled “We All Hit Play.” In the article, Deadmau5 (born Joel Zimmerman) claimed that anyone “given about 1 hour of instruction” can be a DJ, no talent required. He also alleged that when fans pay to see dance music’s top-billed acts (himself included) play “live” it’s little more than watching them hit play on a mix tape. Then, Swedish House Mafia announced that the tour they are about to go on will be their last. Together the Swedes — Axwell, Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso — sometimes referred to as the Holy Trinity of Dance, are one of dance music’s most commercially successful brands and the group was at the front of EDM’s American invasion. While the statement was worded vaguely enough for skeptics to wonder if the powerhouse trio would simply change their name, it was a surprising move for one of EDM’s biggest acts that will headline a show in Milton Keynes Bowl in England next month. The venue holds 65,000 people. So why are they leaving the game now? (MORE: Justin Bieber’s Believe: The Pop Prince Comes of Age) Are we at a tipping point for electronic music? Maybe. But let’s start at the beginning. When did the ascension of EDM in America start? When did it become a phenomenon that would allow a DJ (Deadmau5 again) to close out the Lollapalooza festival or pack a coliseum? Electronic music has been around for awhile. William Orbit was making a name for himself on the dance music scene for more than a decade before becoming known to audiences worldwide for his work on Madonna’s 1998 album Ray Of Light. Dutch DJ Tiësto has been performing since the mid 1980s, spinning prerecorded music and creating mixes in clubs before headlining Ultra Music Festival last year and raking in the estimated $20 million income. The “electronica” boom of the late ’90s produced artists like Moby, Fatboy Slim and the Chemical Brothers. The Prodigy even managed to produce a No. 1 album Fat of the Land in 1997 that became one of the fastest-selling UK albums of all time. But earlier iterations of electronic music followed the well-laid track of rock music. They were short, fast and to the point — as EDM chronicler Phillip Sherburne says, “a dance-music DJ needs hours, not minutes, to get across his or her ideas.” Luckily, dance music grew from those early days. While the rave and dance party scene had always been present in Europe, in the ’80s and ’90s dance music in America was a relatively underground scene. But slowly attendance at festivals like Miami’s Winter Music Conference, which was founded in 1985; the Detroit Electronic Music Festival, which started in 2000; and Montreal’s MUTEK began to grow by the tens of thousands. Indie electronica took off in the new millennium. Acts like Justice from France, Lali Puna from Germany, and Ratatat and The Postal Service from the US paired the soft niceties of indie rock with an foot-pounding electronic beat and helped ignite a new interest in the genre, kickstarting a nostalgia for bands like the Chemical Brothers and, of course, Daft Punk. Daft Punk’s groundbreaking set at the Coachella Music and Arts Festival back in 2006 was the defining moment for the new wave of dance music in America. While the duo’s debut album, Homework, came out in 1997, their turn on the Coachella stage was perfectly timed for American interests. You can watch parts of the performance on YouTube, but the videos only capture the tip of the iceberg, or, more aptly, the tip of the giant light-up pyramid that filled the stage. Daft Punk’s futuristic sound and wild set made waves at Coachella by tapping into a zeitgeist of music that combined a nostalgia for 90s acts with a burgeoning American dance music scene fueled by crossover indie dance bands like LCD Soundsystem and !!! . “That was life-changing for me,” said Steve Goodgold, the dance music specialist at the Windish Agency, a booking agency, speaking to the LA Times. Coachella promoter Goldenvoice’s Senior Vice President Skip Paige agreed. “We built that tent for Madonna, and she phoned it in. Daft Punk used it all and blew us away. I talked to them afterwards and they said it was the best set they’d ever played.” The performance by the robot-costumed Frenchmen brought cynical concert-goers to tears and the notoriously compliment-stingy site Pitchfork called the performance “mindblowing.” (MORE: De La Soul Duo’s First Serve: Hip-hop Made Fun Again) Daft Punk made it cool to dance. While collaborations between dance producers and DJs and rap and R & B artists are common (David Guetta and the Black Eyed Peas; Rihanna and Calvin Harris; Pitbull and Afrojack; Guetta and Akon), before Daft Punk’s performance at Coachella, indie rock dance music was a relatively unknown phenomenon. Post-Daft Punk, indie dance collaborations boomed. Tiësto’s 2009 album, Kaleidoscope, featured indie venerated vocalists like Nelly Furtado, Emily Haines, Jónsi of Sigur Rós and Tegan and Sara. Then bands like Cut Copy and Holy Ghost! came along and helped make EDM palatable to the Starbucks set. As EDM became more popular, it also became more mainstream. In 2004, Tiësto provided the music for the Parade of Nations during the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece, which introduced his music to an audience around the world. EDM continued to grow, and at last year’s Grammy Awards, Sonny Moore a.k.a. Skrillex won big. During his acceptance speech, Skrillex marveled, “I think it’s awesome that we’re all getting recognized this year. There’s a lot of people that have been here before us doing what we’re doing. I think Justice’s Cross should have won a Grammy, I think Daft Punk should have won Grammys, but it’s cool that now this year it’s gonna open doors for everyone.” The Grammys also hosted an all-out dance party featuring Guetta and Deadmau5 appearing on stage with Lil Wayne, Chris Brown and the Foo Fighters. You can watch it here, but the A-list confab on a mainstream dime was a clear sign that we are living in dance music times. (MORE: Survival-of-the-Catchiest: How Music “Evolves”) But there are some omens that the good times are teetering on the brink. For starters there is that Deadmau5 blog post, which outs the industry’s top players as mere pantomimers. Deadmau5 says, “Because this whole big ‘edm’ is taking over fad, im not going to let it go thinking that people assume theres a guy on a laptop up there producing new original tracks on the fly. because none of the ‘top dj’s in the world’ to my knowledge have. myself included.” [Sic, obviously.] Now that the DJs have been outed as performance poseurs, will fans continue to be willing to dole out serious cash to watch them act? Probably. As Stereogum notes in their article “In Defense of Skrillex”, “Listening to Skrillex at home is almost like listening to Gwar at home. The live experience is the thing.” While Deadmau5 may claim that his skills are in the production studio, a dance party in the living room, simply isn’t the same as a throwdown in a packed stadium with a laser light show. The scene (as with most scenes) is filled with tedious in-fighting, mostly started at the hands of Deadmau5, whose interview with Rolling Stone was filled with gems like: “David Guetta has two iPods and a mixer and he just plays tracks — like, ‘Here’s one with Akon, check it out!’”; or dismissing most dance music as formulaic, “Just 120 bpm with a… kick drum on every quarter note”; or trying to get Dave Grohl to remix his record,”because f— dance music, you know?” Deadmau5 even publicly feuded with Madonna, who has not only been very supportive of the electronic music scene throughout her career working with French DJ/producer Martin Solveig on MDNA, but it was her Maverick Records that put out The Prodigy’s Fat of the Land. Despite Madonna’s contributions to the scene, the real issue facing dance music is a serious lack of women. While sketch comedy show Portlandia jokes that everyone is a DJ, the industry seems to think “everyone” doesn’t include women. DJ Mag recently published its annual reader-voted Top 100 DJ list and there were no women featured. Not a single one. In fact, according to the Guardian, between 2007 and 2011 only one woman, Claudia Cazacu, made it on to the list at all. The annual list is considered the “black book” for DJs, producers and promoters in the industry and it’s almost mindboggling that in this day and age not a single woman would be included in the list. Peaches, the Berlin DJ/producer turned to her Facebook page in frustration after the list was published: “DJ MAG! Your Top 100 DJ boy club list can eat a dick! Where the ladies at???” Where the ladies at indeed. If DJ Mag is looking for some inspiration for next year, Flavorwire put together a list of ten women to include in the future.

Students Watch Porn & Masturbate in Class for 'Gay Test'

Students Watch Porn & Masturbate in Class for 'Gay Test'

Nine students have been suspended from Bell Middle School in San Diego after they watched porn on their cell phones and several openly masturbated during an all-male English class. The teacher reportedly refused to intervene.

Supposedly, the 7th grade boys were participating in a "gay test" dreamed up by other students. If the boys became aroused while watching certain videos, they were deemed gay.

In written reports about the incident reviewed by U-T San Diego, witnesses said the boys were wearing gym shorts when they watched porn on their cell phones and several openly masturbated.

Several boys in the 22-student class raised their hands to complain, the students wrote.

But the teacher, Ed Johnson, brushed them off, saying he'd send the offenders to the principal if he caught them, and then went back to reading aloud from a book, U-T San Diego reported.
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Johnson wasn't suspended because the student's claims that he ignored the behavior weren't proven, the teacher's union told NBC San Diego.

I'm curious about how this test was graded. If several of the boys were openly jacking off during class while watching the videos, were they watching gay porn, getting turned on, and - quite literally - letting it all hang out? Or was straight porn put into the mix and these hormonal kids getting off on that in order to prove their heterosexuality, perhaps?

Obviously we'll probably never know what was going through the boys' heads as they brazenly satisfied themselves, but the psychology behind the behavior is fascinating to imagine.

So what do y'all think? This "gay test" seems like it was pass/fail. What marks did the exhibitionists get?