Dane Lewis, executive director of the Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays, said Jamaica Labor Party candidates have “unfortunately descended into pulling the sexuality card” in advance of Thursday’s tight vote.

“It’s been disappointing that they’ve chosen this road yet again because it seems to historically be their stance during campaigning,” said Lewis, adding that his group is not endorsing any political party.

Politicians have routinely railed against homosexuals in Jamaica, where a colonial-era sodomy law bans sex between men and many people in the highly Christian nation perceive homosexuality as a sin.

But during a debate last week with Prime Minister Andrew Holness, opposition chief Portia Simpson Miller called for a review of the law. She argued that professional competence, not sexual orientation, will determine who is selected for a Cabinet post if her People’s National Party wins.

Since then, some top Labor candidates have made homophobic comments at political rallies, among them Cabinet minister Daryl Vaz, who said “God created Adam and Eve and not Adam and Steve,” prompting applause and anti-gay slurs from his West Portland constituents.

Labor’s candidate for West Central St. James, Energy Minister Clive Mullings, asserted that easing up on laws against homosexuality would bring God’s wrath down on Jamaica, while West Kingston candidate, Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie, used an epithet at a rally while an anti-gay dancehall song played.

In a Sunday editorial, the Jamaica Gleaner newspaper called the recent developments “not only sad, but dangerous.”

“Some might add cynical and vulgar.”

On Tuesday, the opposition People’s National Party stressed that Simpson Miller’s comments were being distorted by Labor partisans. They said the party is committed to a review of the anti-sodomy law, not its repeal.

Peter Phillips, campaign director for the People’s National Party, rejected allegations by Vaz that the opposition had received funding from any international gay rights groups, asserting that Simpson Miller’s party in no way supported “any gay agenda.”

It is not yet clear if either side’s recent comments about homosexuality and the sodomy law will hurt their chances in Thursday’s election for the island’s 63 seats in Parliament. Recent polls have shown the two main parties in a statistical dead heat.

Despite the easygoing image propagated by the island’s tourist boards, Jamaica is by far the most hostile island toward homosexuals in the already conservative Caribbean, gays and their advocates contend.

Many Jamaicans insist hostility toward gays is blown out of proportion by gay activists. Some say Jamaica tolerates homosexuality as long as it is not openly displayed.

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It depends on who you ask. LGBT advocates have different perspectives on why blacks do not align themselves with gay rights causes. To varying degrees, many LGBT rights advocates say that the church is the singlemost influential factor in black opinion on homosexuality.

Antonio David Garcia, executive director of Affirmations, a Detroit-area LGBT civil rights group, says what’s worse is that those opinions are often homophobic and go unchallenged.

“Everyday we face religious bigotry [from the church],” Garcia says. “They’ve got to start questioning some of the stuff they’re hearing from the pulpit. Dr. King made that very clear in what he talked about as the soft mindedness of sheep being followed by the priest.”

More than 80 percent of African Americans consider themselves to have some religious believes with at least half of them attending church activities on a weekly basis, according to  the Pew Research Center. Additionally, nearly 50 percent of African Americans are against same-sex marriage and have overwhelmingly supported state bans on marriage equality whenever such measures have come before voters.

Almost all of these voters cite their religion as the reason why they cast their ballots in favor of the bans.

That more than half of African Americans in California voted for Barack Obama while overwhelmingly supporting Proposition 8 — a measure that successfully banned gay marriage in the state in 2008 — reveals just how distinct blacks feel the two issues of black progress and gay progress are.

Some LGBT advocates say the black church is so interwoven in the fabric of the African American psyche that convincing black Americans that religion has nothing to do with homosexuality will be a futile endeavor. Black people and the church are “inextricably linked,” says Pastor Joseph Tolton of Rehodoth Temple Christ Conscious Church in Harlem.

“The church still has so much influence and they continue to use influence in a negative way,” Pastor Tolton says. “So that you’ve got people being driven further and further into the closet.

But other activists, like Sharon Lettman-Hicks, Executive Director and CEO of the National Black Justice Coalition in Washington, D.C., prefers taking the emphasis off of religion because, she says, faith has nothing to do with ensuring every American has equal protection under the law.

“At the end of the day, discriminating against LGBT people because of your own social prejudice is just wrong,” says Sharon Lettman-Hicks.

“One thing people have to realize is that LGBT black people are black people too,” says Sharon Lettman-Hicks. “When we look at the conversation of resistance in the African American community, we have to look at in context.”

That context, some LGBT advocates say, encompasses issues that have nothing to with homosexuality at all.

Pastor Tolton mentioned how black women can be manipulable by conservative interpretations of the Bible. For example, many black women in America find it daunting to find black man with whom they they share the “trifecta” of  intellectual, emotional and financial security.

Sixty-seven percent of black women are college graduates as compared to just thirty-seven percent of black men. Additionally, as black women move through graduate school and join the professional ranks, their chances of finding a black man plummets even further.

Add to the mix the perceived fear that more black men will be lost to homosexuality if women do not oppose gay rights in the pews and at the ballot box, a black woman may be less inclined to lend her support to a cause she may feel drains her already dwindling mating pool.

“You’ve got single black women doing very well, who for every one black man with a graduate degree in this country, has five black women,” says Pastor Joseph Tolton. “You’ve got that whole class of 35 and 40-year-old women who are well-educated and cannot find a black man. So you’ve got that population that’s frightened.”

Wilhelmina Perry, a facilitator of Faith Leaders of African Descent, an organization of openly LGBT people of faith and clergy, says she and members of her organization are working to curb that fear in the African American community by simply being openly LGBT. Perry understands that not everyone has the security and self-assurance to reveal their sexuality, but she feels being open about themselves is essential to showing straight blacks that they are just like everyone else.

“If we aren’t visible in our communities, then the issue of human rights or the issue of civil rights just never gets raised because there is nobody there raising them,” Perry says.

“It’s important to become visible with your family and your community and your church community. It is important that they see us.”

Garcia agrees.

“Many African American and Latino men are on the DL and are not out and open,” Garcia says.  “And that is, as Harvey Milk would say, is the most important thing. Once they come out of the closet those families that those people belong to are forced to make a decision. Not an intellectual decision but an emotional decision. Its one thing to say I don’t like gay people. It’s another thing to say I don’t like my son or my uncle Jim.”

Detroit, where eight-two percent of the population is black, gives Garcia a unique perspective on how blacks perceive LGBT issues. He believes that education is one of the major issues that keeps black Amercans from realizing how closely tied they are to LGBT rights.  He mentions Langston Hughes and Alec Baldwin as great African American figures who lead mostly closeted lives. Then he mentions the black gay man who kept the March on Washington “straight.”

“Bayard Rustin was the architect of the March on Washington and a good friend of Dr. King’s,” Garcia said. “Bayard Rustin was a gay, black man. Nobody’s taught that in church and nobody is taught that in their public schools . He’s a Civil Rights icon that nobody knows much about unless you studied this stuff.”

But despite how resistant blacks are to joining LGBT causes, there are signs of hope.

Detroiters elected elected Charles Pugh, an openly gay television reporter, to the Detroit City Council in 2009. It was an unheard of milestone in a city that boasts a robust, black church lobby.

A number of clergymen objected to Pugh’s sexuality in private, but private is how those objections remained.

“People have whispered things about Charles Pugh’s homosexuality that they wouldn’t dare say in public, partly because they don’t want to be singled out,” Mildred Gaddis said during a 2009 interview with Time magazine.

In Washington D.C., another bastion of African American culture and political might, its City Council passed a same-sex marriage bill 11-2. The one of the two bailouts: Marion Barry.

Lettman-Hicks says people should not be surprised by this result and says one consideration many observers of D.C.’s LGBT movement overlook is that the District has a large African American LGBT community.

“[D.C.] is a very evolved city,” Lettman-Hicks says. “We have a very organized movement of self-empowered people within the black and LGBT communities who were got going to be denied their rights.”

“Marriage, in terms of how we pursue marriage equality, is going down to the court house, taking out a license and being able to say that you want to legally bound your life to someone,” Lettman-Hicks says. “Anything else above that the church can do whatever they want. If the church doesn’t agree with it that’s their business.”

Lettman-Hicks has a final word for black folks who interpret the Bible and religion too literally.

“There were people who said that, as black people, we should remain slaves,” she argued. “There were people who said that women should not have a voice or be in the pulpit. And the Bible says that you shouldn’t eat shell fish so, at the end of the day, black people should stop eating crab and shrimp and then I can hear you.”

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Attorney John Paragano saw posts by teacher Viki Knox before they were removed and alerted the Union Township school district, he told The Star-Ledger of Newark.

Paragano, who argued the teacher should be dismissed, told the newspaper that Knox objected to a school display celebrating Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender History Month. Union Chief School Administrator Patrick Martin told The Associated Press Thursday that the district is investigating.

“We’re taking it very seriously and taking all appropriate action,” he said. Martin declined to comment on Knox’s employment status, citing personnel privacy rules.

A message left Thursday for Knox at the main office of Union High School, where she is a teacher, was not returned.

Paragano said he gave school officials a copy of Knox’s Facebook page after he’d been contacted by a parent.

The page was not accessible Thursday. But Knox is alleged, in the copy of the page cited by the Star-Ledger, to have called homosexuality “a perverted spirit that has existed from the beginning of creation” and a “sin” that “breeds like cancer.”

Officials from gay rights groups said that although Knox’s alleged anti-gay views are protected by the Constitution, she has a responsibility as a teacher to be a role model for students.

“Educators have a responsibility to nurture their students as they develop into young adults — and that includes making sure they feel supported and know that there is nothing wrong with being LGBT,” Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese said in a prepared statement. “Her alleged public rant is irresponsible and sends a dangerous message to her students.”

Garden State Equality issued a statement questioning Knox’s ability as a teacher to enforce the state’s new anti-bullying law. The law was signed in January and is considered among the toughest in the country for its requirement that schools have anti-bullying policies.

The law was adopted after the suicide last year of Tyler Clementi, a Rutgers University freshman whose roommate is accused of using a webcam to spy on his intimate encounter with another man.

The American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey defended Knox’s First Amendment right to make the comments but said the school system also has the right to investigate whether she is performing her job in accordance with school policies and anti-bias laws.

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Bert and Ernie are best friends. They were created to teach preschoolers that people can be good friends with those who are very different from themselves. Even though they are identified as male characters and possess many human traits and characteristics (as most Sesame Street Muppets™ do), they remain puppets, and do not have a sexual orientation.

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According to a new report by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Black gay and bisexual men of all ages account for 73 percent of new infections among Black men, while the number of young Black gay and bisexual men under the age of 30 increased by 50 percent in only four years.

When considering all of this information, the challenge before us is clear: we cannot end the Black AIDS epidemic without confronting HIV among Black gay men, and the stigma and homophobia that allows HIV to flourish in our communities.

Read more at The Grio.

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Luminaries of the New Negro movement such as Countee Cullen, Claude McKay, Wallace Thurman, Alain Locke, Richard Bruce Nugent, Angela Weld Grimke, Alice Dunbar Nelson and Langston Hughes, all fell somewhere along the LGBT spectrum.

Though remnants of their sexual identity can be clearly pinpointed in their literary works, few scholars managed to recognize the indisputable relation between the Harlem Renaissance and homosexuality. Some even postulate that scholars deliberately erased such details from biographies and textbooks.

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According to BET, a news report noted a rise in homosexual relationships in the country, which has become a springboard for many arrests of gays and lesbians. Though there is no distinct law against homosexuality in Ghana, there is an apparent precedent for people being arrested for engaging in homosexual encounters.

Such revelations have caused some to question the true openness of Ghana, and its stance on humanity as it relates to one’s sexual identity.

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An article on The Root discusses how Black men like CNN News anchor Don Lemon, and Georgia State Rep. Rashad Taylor have recently come out and announced they are gay.

The article claims that both men point to the overwhelming hostility of homophobic environments as reasons for not having said anything sooner, but yet make no mention of Black women, many of which have been generally supportive of homosexuality.

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Writer and stand-up comedian Wanda Sykes recently appeared on the Piers Morgan Tonight show, where she boldly proclaimed that “it’s harder to be gay than black.”

I’m not talking about the history of black people, of African Americans. I’m talking about at this point right now … I don’t know of organizations and groups like Focus on the Family and such anti-gay organizations who are putting up so much money — millions and millions of dollars — into stopping me from, you know, being black or telling me I can’t exercise my blackness. There’s no equality. There’s no equality for the LGBT community.”

WATCH THE INTERVIEW HERE

Read more at TheRoot.com

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I didn’t tell anyone [in my family] I was a lesbian until December 2009, when I felt sick and tired of my life and wasn’t happy. And I told one of my friends. I said, “Listen, I need you to help me to come out, because If I’m going to be happy, I’ve got to face this thing.” About 98 percent of my friends are in “the lifestyle,” and they knew I was struggling with it.

No, I have not. I am a real-deal, true virgin. Because my mother and my dad had brought us up [to believe] that the greatest gift that I could give to my husband, my soul mate, is to give to them myself that has not been tainted with anybody else or anything else. And I value that highly. And by the grace of God, [the Lord] has helped me and kept me.

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The first comment I came upon while researching Mr. Cee’s arrest for allegedly soliciting oral sex from a 20 year-old man was some dude writing about how most Black men are on the “down-low” because we’re raised by single mothers.

Great, I thought. I’m the product of a divorced single mother and though I’m yet to enjoy any homosexual hi-jinks, I guess it’s just a matter of time.

One thing I can promise you though – is that when I do finally get into guy-on-guy action – it won’t be out in public and it won’t be with an alleged male prostitute as Mr. Cee’s allegedly was. I’d like to think that I’m hot enough to get a guy that would give me some for free.

More seriously, here’s the most troubling thing about Mr. Cee’s arrest. If the incident happened as the police tell it, he felt he had to hide his proclivities by keeping them on darkened streetcorners, all the while engaging in the same “pause” talk that everyone else does. It points to something obvious and quite disturbing about hip hop culture—its rampant homophobia.

Why is hip hop’s homophobia disturbing?

Well, like Shakespeare’s famous quotation from Hamlet, “the lady doth protest too much,”which means literally, if you complain ad nauseam about something, you probably secretly enjoy it, hip hop’s gun-blazing anti-homosexuality makes it seem, well, gay.

Why so much concern over it if it doesn’t affect you, fellas?

Another factor to consider is the hyper-masculinity that rappers, as most Black men, seem to enjoy.

Well, this is a bogus myth that should be obvious from the door.

Would hyper-males have ever been enslaved?

Would hyper-males allow the females of their race to shoulder as much of the burden of carrying the race as Black men have?

Moreover, would hyper-males seem ecstatic to glorify the beauty and wonders of every other female except the females of their own race to the extent that Black men have?

No, no and no.

But I didn’t write all this to attack Black men. I’m a Black man myself and I love me some me.

What I’m saying in essence is that Black men, most specifically Black men in hip hop need to abandon homophobia and if not become homo-friendly, then at least become homo-indifferent because by not doing so, you’re making us all look suspect.

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Immigration Equality, an organisation which works to secure asylum for individuals persecuted in their home country based on their sexual orientation, gender identity or HIV-status, said it won dozens of cases for clients from the Caribbean in 2010.

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Didier Jambart alleges he also became a “compulsive gay sex addict and began exposing himself on the Internet and cross-dressing.” Jambart’s attorney said these antics led his client to be raped.

Jambart stopped taking the drug in 2005, but by that time he had already been demoted from his job and was suffering psychological trauma. He is seeking $610,000 in damages from Glaxo, and his neurologist, whom he says did not accurately warn him about the drug’s potential side effects.

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Crystal Simmons, founding principal of the Academy for Social Action, turned to officials for help after her former lover, Candy Jones, threatened to murder her, according to a report released Friday by the city Education Department.

Jones is accused of threatening to kill Simmons after being asked to resign, telling another school employee that “it was easy to purchase a gun down south” and that her father “had already purchased one,” the report says.
Jones told investigators that she was only joking about an article involving a female corrections officer who gunned down her female lover, comparing her situation to that one.

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His comments sparked outrage from gay rights groups and fueled new calls for him to step down.

Opposition politicians have charged that Berlusconi abused his office by calling Milan police in May when the then-17-year-old runaway nicknamed Ruby was detained for alleged theft. Newspapers have reported that Berlusconi told police that a local party official would take custody of the girl, who had visited Berlusconi’s Milan villa on at least one occasion.

Even center-right commentators in Berlusconi’s family-owned newspapers have criticized him for intervening in a possible criminal case. Berlusconi’s now-estranged ally, Gianfranco Fini, said his antics had embarrassed the country.

But Berlusconi again defended his lifestyle and fondness for young women, telling a trade fair in Milan on Tuesday it was “better to be passionate about a beautiful girl than a gay.”

Gay rights group Arcigay demanded an apology for causing offense to both women and gays.

The premier’s comments “represent a dangerous incitement to prejudice and helps legitimize discrimination, injustice and suffering,” Arcigay president Paolo Pantane wrote in a letter to Berlusconi’s minister for equal opportunity, Mara Carfagna.

In response, Carfagna defended Berlusconi’s record on anti-discrimination measures and said he had just been joking.

“(He) absolutely never intended to offend women or homosexuals,” she said.

Another prominent supporter, Daniela Santanche, a government undersecretary, also rallied to the premier’s defense, saying there was nothing disturbing in his comment.

After noting that she “esteems homosexuals,” Santanche said: “I am sure that all Italian parents hope to have heterosexual children.”

She added that “the hope of every mother is to some day become a grandmother and have their children avoid the problems of a life inherent in the homosexual condition,” the Italian news agency ANSA quoted her as saying.

Berlusconi assured supporters on Tuesday that his government still had a majority and would last the remaining half of its five-year term. He said early elections would be a disaster for a country grappling with economic crisis.

He contended that the Ruby scandal was whipped up by hostile, deceptive newspapers and again defended his decision to intervene in her case. Ruby was let go by police with no charges after Nicole Minetti, a party official who is also Berlusconi’s dental hygienist, took custody of her.

Berlusconi said Tuesday he’d do the same thing again.

“You will see when this is over that there was nothing more than an act of solidarity,” he said.

Ruby, meanwhile, told Libero, a conservative newspaper close to Berlusconi, that she would tell her version of the story Thursday on a popular state-run TV talk show, but her lawyer later said there were no such plans. Ruby’s comments have been inconsistent and prosecutors have reportedly questioned her credibility.

She repeated she never had intimate relations with the premier, though she said she “adored” him. She clarified that while another young woman linked to Berlusconi, Noemi Letizia, referred to him as “papi,” (“daddy”) she called him “premier.”

Berlusconi’s relationship with Letizia, an 18-year-old would-be model from Naples, sparked a scandal last year that prompted Berlusconi’s second wife to file for divorce.

Soon after, a high-end prostitute, Patrizia D’Addario, claimed she had spent a night with the premier and had tape recorded their encounter.

The conservative leader has said he has never paid anyone for sex. Prosecutors have said Berlusconi is not under investigation in the scandals over his dalliances with women.

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Jackson’s family said he recently revealed to them that he was a homosexual, and that they believe he was bullied over his sexual orientation. They think the bullying led him to commit suicide.

“I believe (it happened) because he recently realized he was a homosexual and he was getting pressured at school by his peers because he told his family and nothing changed here,” said grandmother Carolyn Evans. “Corey was the most loving, giving, funny person. He had the most wonderful personality. He had cousins from ages 14 down to 2 and he never said a bad word about anybody. When he went to school and he realized his sexual preference had changed, he changed completely. He withdrew.”

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A jury in London’s Old Bailey criminal court found Prince Saud Abdulaziz bin Nasser al Saud guilty of murdering Bandar Abdullah Abdulaziz at the Landmark Hotel in London on Feb. 15.

The 34-year-old prince, whose grandfather is a brother of the current Saudi king, faces a possible life prison term in prison when he is sentenced on Wednesday.

The jury deliberated 95 minutes before returning its verdict.

Prosecutor Jonathan Laidlaw said the prince had abused his aide in the past, showing jurors video shot in the Landmark’s elevator which appears to show the shaven-headed prince, dressed in white, throwing his 32-year-old servant around and battering him. Photographs of Abdulaziz stored on a mobile phone “plainly proved” that there was a “sexual element” to the abuse, Laidlaw said.

Al Saud originally told police that he and Abdulaziz had been drinking into the early hours of the morning, and that when he awoke at 3 p.m. he could not rouse Abdulaziz.

Jurors rejected a claim by his defence lawyer John Kelsey-Fry that the prince was guilty only of manslaughter.

The prince was convicted of both murder and a second count of grievous bodily harm with intent relating to the attack in the elevator.

“Beneath the surface this was a deeply abusive relationship which the defendant exploited, as the assaults in the lift so graphically demonstrate, for sadistic reasons, for his own personal gratification,” Laidlaw told the jury.

“The abuse extended beyond physical abuse. There was plainly an emotional element and psychological element to it.”

The prosecutor said Abdulaziz surrendered meekly to the fatal assault.

“He was killed without apparently ever having fought back because the defendant was completely unharmed, without any mark at all, when he was examined at the police station. Bandar appears to have let the defendant kill him,” Laidlaw said.

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Suffice it to say, if you’re currently a homosexual, you’re likely to be either “pro-gay” or self-loathing. If you’re not, this doesn’t mean that you’re anti-gay, but like a man’s opinion on abortion, why should anybody even care what you think?

But what is gay?

I read an article on Gawker.com a couple of days ago that suggested that anal sex was up all across the board.

Now, while this fact may comfort some and have absolutely no effect on others, the part that I found totally shocking was that more straight men were admitting to be on the receiving end of anal sex.

And they weren’t talking about contact from a woman’s finger or tongue; they were talking about straight men that allowed other men to penetrate them anally.

NOW WAIT A MINUTE… I screamed in my head. It was already too much for me that some dudes thought that letting other men pleasure them orally still didn’t qualify them as gay.

And, of course, I’ve heard and vetoed the old jail argument that it’s the receiver and not the giver that’s gay when it comes to man-on-man anal sex.

My question became: if a guy that’s on the receiving end of anal sex can qualify himself as straight, then how can anybody be gay?

And it should be considered laughable that any aberration in a man’s behavior is likely to get him labeled “gay”.

If he walks “funny”, if he talks “funny”, if he’s never around girls, if he’s always around girls, the way he acts, the way he dresses, if he’s not “hard” (note that wicked double-entendre).

Personally, I’ve always defined “gay” more by what it isn’t than what it is. I have, in fact, a well-known saying: “anything that you do sexually with a woman is in bounds.”

And this is my enlightened perspective. I had a girlfriend once that told me that her ex-boyfriend was into curious acts with a certain type of sex toy.

At the time, I roasted the dude.

Now I just figure “hey man, whatever floats…”

Uh… I was gonna quote a certain euphemism, but in context, it might have come off as kinda… you know…

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Eminem responded by saying: “I felt like I was being attacked,…. was being singled out. I felt like, ‘Is it because of the color of my skin? Is it because of that that you’re paying more attention?’ There are certain rappers that do and say the same things that I’m saying and I don’t hear no one say anything about that.”

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5. George Rekers

George Rekers is a baptist minister and one of the Christian Right’s most prominent anti-gay activists. He was on the board for the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality, which tries to find ways to “cure” homosexuality and testified as a state witness in favor of Florida’s gay adoption ban trial. Rekers was caught at an airport with a gay prostitute returning from a flight to Bermuda. He had found the prostitute on the site rentboy where the prostitute listed himself as “sensual,” “wild” and “up for anything.”

4. Ted Haggard

Ted Haggard was the pastor of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado and was the president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and would meet with figures such as President George W. Bush. Haggard would campaign against gay marriage and bash homosexuality in Church. In 2006, a gay male prostitute claimed that he had regular sex with Haggard and also used with methamphetamines. Haggard would admit to being gay and having a relationship with a male church member.

3. Bishop Eddie Long

Eddie Long is another minister who would attack homosexuality in public only to be accused of being gay himself. Four separate young men have accused Bishop Eddie Long of coercing them into sex. Eddie Long would preach against homosexuality and ministered “homosexual cures” to gays and lesbians while criticizing gay people. The SPLC would label Eddie Long as “one of the most virulently homophobic black leaders in the religiously based anti-gay movement.”

2. Paul Crouch

Paul Crouch is the founder, President and chairman of the anti-gay Trinity Broadcasting Networking. Crouch was accused of threatening to fire a male employee, Enoch Lonnie Ford if he didn’t have an affair with him. Crouch and TBN would settle out of court with Ford for just under half a million dollars.

1. John Geoghan

John Geoghan is a Catholic priest who worked in the Boston area. Despite the fact that the Catholic Church views homosexuality as an unnatural sin, Geoghan was accused of molesting over 130 young boys. Gegohan would be convicted of grabbing a 10-year-old boy’s buttocks and would be sentenced to 10 years in jail. He was killed in jail by white supremacist who had killed a man for making a pass at him.

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RIVERSIDE, Calif. — A federal judge on Thursday declared the U.S. military’s ban on openly gay service members unconstitutional and said she will issue an order to stop the government from enforcing the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy nationwide.

U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips said the ban violates the First and Fifth Amendment rights of gays and lesbians. “Don’t ask, don’t tell” prohibits the military from asking about the sexual orientation of service members but requires discharge of those who acknowledge being gay or are discovered engaging in homosexual activity, even in the privacy of their own homes off base.

In her ruling, Phillips said the policy doesn’t help military readiness and instead has a “direct and deleterious effect” on the armed services.

The Log Cabin Republicans, a 19,000-member group that includes current and former military members, filed a lawsuit in 2004 seeking an injunction to stop the ban’s enforcement. Phillips will draft the injunction with input from the group within a week, and the federal government will have a week to respond.

After-hours e-mails requesting comment from U.S. Department of Justice attorney Paul G. Freeborne and from the Pentagon were not immediately returned Thursday.

The lawsuit was the biggest legal test of the law in recent years and came amid promises by President Barack Obama that he will work to repeal the policy.

The Log Cabin Republicans said more than 13,500 service members have been fired since 1994.

“This decision will change the lives of many individuals who only wanted to serve their country bravely,” said the group’s attorney, Dan Woods.

Woods argued during the nonjury trial that the policy violates gay military members’ rights to free speech, open association and right to due process as guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment.

He said the ban damages the military by forcing it to reject talented people as the country struggles to find recruits in the midst of a war. Lawyers also submitted remarks by Obama stating “don’t ask, don’t tell” weakens national security.

Freeborne had argued the policy debate was political and that the issue should be decided by Congress rather than in court.

The U.S. House voted in May to repeal the policy, and the Senate is expected to address the issue this year.

Government lawyers also said Phillips lacked the authority to issue a nationwide injunction.

Six military officers who were discharged under the policy testified during the trial. A decorated Air Force officer testified that he was let go after his peers snooped through his personal e-mail in Iraq.

The officers who participated in the trial were “reacting emotionally because they’re so proud that they were able to play a part in making that happened,” Woods said after the ruling.

“It’ll be an interesting decision for our president to decide whether to appeal this case. He’s said that ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ weakens national security, and now it’s been declared unconstitutional,” Woods said. “If he does appeal, we’re going to fight like heck.”

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Given the large amount of homosexual activity in prison and the spread of AIDS and other STD’s, a prison in San Francisco is installing condom machines, The San Francisco Chronicle Reports.

And although sex among inmates technically is illegal, the Sheriff’s Department went ahead and installed the 16 machines anyway – one for each jailhouse pod – paid for by a pair of small grants from UCSF and a Southern California nonprofit.

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The military threw out hundreds of service members in 2009 for violating its “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, including a disproportionate number of women and minorities and dozens of service members in “mission critical” positions, according to a new analysis of military data.

The Pentagon honorably discharged 428 service members for violating the gay ban in 2009, according to statistics reviewed by the Palm Center, a nonpartisan University of California think tank studying the impact of gays in the military. The figure is down from 619 discharged for violating the policy in 2008.

Read more at WashPost

Click here to view photos:

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Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Disproportionately Affects Black Women

Is Ron Artest A Madman?

SandraRose.com recently posted a picture found on Twitter of two Black men on the train. One of the men resting on the others lap, as the other seems to be caressing his hand. Sandra Rose describes these men as down-low thugs, and reasons that the down-low phenomena within the Black community is a result of father-less child rearing and woman being primarily the heads of households.

Rose states, “It’s become nearly impossible to distinguish heterosexual men from down low thugs due to the proliferation of female-led households in the black community”.

The American Psychiatric Association reports “There are no replicated scientific studies supporting any specific biological etiology [cause or origin] for homosexuality.” Additionally the APA further states “No specific psychosocial or family dynamic cause for homosexuality has been identified, including histories of childhood sexual abuse.”

Text continues after Top Pictures of The Week gallery:

While there aren’t any studies which can prove this theory certain, is there any validity to Sandra Rose’s statements? Are her statements an indication of a common conception, or is it simply an indication of a homophobic ideal which she holds?

You be the judge.

SandraRose.com:

Aww, isn’t thug love beautiful?
Hopefully, neither of these men are your husband or baby daddy. I found this homotional photo on Twitter.com last night. The caption under the pic reads: “#noexcuse I DONT GIVE A FUCK HOW SLEEPY YOU ARE…”

The caption writer assumes that the two thugs are just homeboys probably returning home from late night partying. But I beg to differ. The one on the left is lovingly touching the hand of the sleeping thug, which is a dead giveaway.

Over the past 4 decades, black women have decided to go it alone with their kids rather than be subservient to black men like their mothers and aunts were back in the days when black men were the majority head of households.

It’s become nearly impossible to distinguish heterosexual men from down low thugs due to the proliferation of female-led households in the black community.

Read Sandra Rose’s “Thug Love: 2 Thugs On a Train” Post

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DeFarra Gaymon’s weekend was supposed to be fun-filled. The 48-year-old CEO was traveling from Georgia to New Jersey to celebrate his 30th high school reunion with friends and former classmates from Montclair High School.

No one could have predicted the tragic turn his trip would take.

According to the Essex County Sheriff’s Office, Gaymon was shot and killed Friday evening at Newark’s Branch Brook Park during a “tussle” with an undercover police detective

From Gawker

Yesterday, the Essex County prosecutor finally relayed the officer’s statement to the press. The 29 year-old officer was patrolling Branch Brook Park, a well-known gay pickup spot. Somehow, he lost a pair of handcuffs. He went back to look for them, and “Mr. Gaymon approached him while masturbating,” the WSJ reports. The policeman says he pulled out his badge and told Gaymon he was under arrest—then, Gaymon “shoved the officer to the ground and ran, ignored the officer’s demands to stop, and repeatedly threatened to kill the officer if he approached,” according to the NYT. And as the cop was trying to handcuff him: “Mr. Gaymon reached into his pocket and lunged at the officer in an attempt to disarm the officer,” [the prosecutor] said. The officer, “fearing for his life,” the prosecutor said, shot Mr. Gaymon once, and he died at the hospital three hours later.

Click Here For More

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EAST MEADOW, N.Y. — Police say an off-duty jail guard shot and killed her former girlfriend outside a hospital, then went to a nearby house, where she shot and killed her own uncle, wounded her 88-year-old grandfather and took a niece hostage.

Kim Wolfe, a 43-year-old Nassau County correction officer, was apprehended hours later.

Wolfe was scheduled to be arraigned Thursday on unspecified charges. It was not immediately clear whether she had a lawyer.

Wolfe was hospitalized briefly on Wednesday, complaining of difficulty breathing, but was later released back into police custody.

She is suspected of fatally shooting Stacie Williams, a nurse’s aide at the Nassau University Medical Center sometime after 1 a.m. Police say Wolfe and Williams had split up but were discussing a possible reconciliation.

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The 234-194 vote to overturn the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy reflected a view among many in Congress that America was ready for a military in which gays and straights can stand side by side in the trenches.

“I know that our military draws its strength on the integrity of our unified force, and current law challenges this integrity by creating two realities within the ranks,” Democratic Rep. Susan Davis.

Republicans, who voted overwhelmingly against it, cited statements by some military leaders that they need more time to study how a change in the law could affect the lives and readiness of service members.

The House vote came just hours after the Senate Armed Services Committee took the same course and voted 16-12 in favor of repealing the 1993 law. In both cases the measure was offered as an amendment to a defense spending bill.

Obama and leading Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had actively supported the repeal so that gays could serve in the military without fear of being exposed and discharged.

“This is the beginning of the end of a shameful ban on open service by lesbian and gay troops that has weakened our national security,” Joe Solmonese, president of Human Rights Campaign, a leading gay rights organization, said after the Senate panel’s vote.

During an all-day House debate on the bill approving more than $700 billion in spending for defense programs, Republicans repeated statements by military service chiefs that Congress should not act before the Pentagon completes a study on the impact of a repeal.

Congress going first “is the equivalent to turning to our men and women in uniform and their families and saying, ‘Your opinion, your view, do not count,’” said Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon, the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee.

Democratic supporters stressed that the amendment was written so that the repeal would not go into effect until after the Pentagon publishes in December the results of a survey on how service members and their families view the change, and until the president, the defense secretary and the Joint Chiefs of Staff certify that the repeal will not affect the military’s ability to fight.

The chief sponsor of the amendment, Rep. Patrick Murphy, who served in the Iraq War, said that when he was in Baghdad “my teams did not care whether a fellow soldier was straight or gay if they could fire their assault rifle or run a convoy down ambush alley and do their job so everyone would come home safely.”

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said that of the 13,500 members of the military who have been discharged under “don’t ask, don’t tell,” more than 1,000 filled critical occupations, such as engineers and interpreters.

He compared the arguments of the opposition to 1948 speeches in Congress when lawmakers warned that integrating the troops would undermine morale in the military.

The drive to repeal the ban still faces a tough road ahead in the full Senate, where Republicans are likely to filibuster it.

“I think it’s really going to be very harmful to the morale and effectiveness of our military,” said Sen. John McCain, the top Republican on the Armed Services Committee and a leading opponent of the repeal.

The Senate probably will take up the bill next month.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said he supports repeal but would prefer that Congress wait for the December report.

Under “don’t ask, don’t tell,” military leaders don’t investigate a service member’s sexual orientation as long as the person does not disclose that he or she is gay or has a same-sex relationship, which are grounds for dismissal.

Also on Thursday the House rejected an amendment to the defense bill that would have cut $485 million from the bill designated for a second engine for the new F-35 fighter jet.

Gates strongly opposes the extra engine as wasteful and unneeded, and the White House issued a statement Thursday saying the president would be advised to veto the final bill if it includes funds for the engine. But supporters of the engine made by General Electric and Rolls-Royce PLC contended that the competition between engine makers would save money in the 30 to 40-year life cycle of the $100 billion project.

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WASHINGTON – A White House-approved proposal to repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” ban against gays serving openly in the military is expected to face a vote in Congress as early as this week.

Gay rights groups are urging quick congressional approval of the legislation, which would repeal the ban but also allow the Pentagon to continue its review of how to implement the new policy.

Click here to view photos:

The White House had hoped lawmakers would delay action until Pentagon officials had completed their study so fellow Democrats would not face criticism that they moved too quickly or too far ahead ofpublic opinion in this election year. When administration officials recognized they could not stop Congress in its effort to repeal the ban, they invited gay rights activists to the White House to work on a compromise Monday.

RELATED: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Disproportionately Affects Black Women

“Without a repeal vote by Congress this year, the Pentagon’s hands are tied and the armed forces will be forced to continue adhering to the discriminatory ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ law,” says Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign.

Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Pa., an Iraq war veteran, is expected to introduce the legislative proposal Tuesday, with a vote possible as early as Thursday. Republicans say they’ll fight the proposal.

Implementation of new policy on gays serving openly would still require the approval of President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen. How long implementation might take is not known.

The White House budget office supports the proposal as an amendment to the annual defense spending bill. The amendment, said budget chief Peter Orszag in a letter to lawmakers, will allow for “comprehensive review, enable the Department of Defense to assess the results of the review, and ensure that the implementation of the repeal is consistent with standards of military readiness, effectiveness, unit cohesion, recruiting and retention.”

Hours later, top Democratic lawmakers signed off on the final version of the brokered deal. However, the third-ranking House Republican, Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana, promised unified GOP opposition.

“The American people don’t want the American military to be used to advance a liberal political agenda. And House Republicans will stand on that principle,” Pence said. He urged Democrats to wait until the Pentagoncompletes its review.

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Obama called for the repeal during his State of the Union address this year, and Gates and Mullen have echoed his views while cautioning that any action must be paced. Still, gay rights activists have criticized the administration for doing little to push for a repeal during Obama’s first year in office.

A Gallup poll earlier this month found 70 percent of American favor allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly.

One organization dedicated to repealing the law urged supporters to delay celebration. “President Obama’s support and Secretary Gates’ buy-in should ensure a winning vote, but we are not there yet,” said Aubrey Sarvis, an Army veteran and the executive director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. “The votes still need to be worked and counted.”

The military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy came about in 1993 as a compromise between President Bill Clinton, who wanted to lift the ban on gays entirely, and a reluctant Congress and military, which said doing so would threaten order.

Under the policy, the military can’t ask recruits their sexual orientation. In turn, service members can’t say they are gay or bisexual, engage in homosexual activity or marry a member of the same sex.

Between 1997 and 2008, the Defense Department discharged more than 10,500 service members for violating the policy.

RELATED: OPINION: Will Black People Stand Beside Gay Soldiers?

BLANTYRE, Malawi – A judge convicted a gay couple in Malawi Tuesday of unnatural acts and gross indecency after a trial that drew worldwide condemnation of this southern African country’s colonial-era laws on homosexuality.

Steven Monjeza, 26, and Tiwonge Chimbalanga, 20, had been jailed since their arrest Dec. 27, the day they celebrated their engagement with a party that drew crowds of curious, jeering onlookers.

Blantyre Chief Resident Magistrate Nyakwawa Usiwa said the sentencing will take place on Thursday. The couple could be imprisoned for up to 14 years.

RELATED: World Commemorates Fight For Gay Rights

Hearings in the trial also have drawn Malawians who have ridiculed the couple, an indication of views on homosexuality in this traditional society — and elsewhere in Africa.

Click here to view photos:

Homosexuality is illegal in at least 37 countries on the continent. In Uganda, lawmakers are considering a bill that would sentence homosexuals to life in prison and include capital punishment for “repeat offenders.” Even in South Africa, the only African country that recognizes gay rights, gangs have carried out so-called “corrective” rapes on lesbians.

Michaela Clayton of the South Africa-based AIDS & Rights Alliance for Southern Africa said not only were human rights being violated, but the fight against AIDS was being hurt. Gay people forced underground were unlikely to seek counseling and treatment for AIDS, she and other activists said.

Clayton said gays and other minorities in Africa had in recent years become more assertive about their sexual orientation and about claiming their rights, which could have led to the backlash.

RELATED: OPINION: Will Black Americans Stand By Gay Soldiers?

“We have to keep on being strategic about the way we push this agenda forward,” she said.

Priti Patel of the Southern African Litigation Centre, an independent rights group, said Monjeza and Chimbalanga could appeal on the grounds that the laws under which they were prosecuted violate the country’s 1994 constitution. But an earlier attempt by their lawyer to have the case thrown out on those grounds was rejected.

Malawi‘s government has been defiant in the face of international criticism over the prosecution of Monjeza and Chimbalanga. Months before the verdict, Information Minister Leckford Mwanza Thoto said it was clear the two had broken the law.

Malawi church leaders have backed the government, saying homosexuality is “sinful” and the West should not be allowed to use its financial power to force Malawi to accept homosexuality. Malawi relies on donors for 40 percent of its development budget.

The controversy, though, has emboldened some human rights activists in Malawi. The Center for the Development of People was recently formed to fight for the rights of homosexuals and other minorities.

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From TheRoot.com:

Zanele Muholi has a long story of activism. A member of black lesbian organizations during the ’90s, in 2002 the South African photographer co-founded the Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), which is “the only black lesbian organization that has lasted for long in South Africa, if not Africa as a whole.”

Five years later she left FEW to advance her knowledge at Ryerson University in Toronto, where she worked on the thesis “A Visual History of Black Lesbians in Post-Apartheid South Africa.” One thing is for sure: The picture is grim. Lesbians often suffer “curative rape” — an assault that is supposed to change them into heterosexual women — “from gangs, from so-called friends, neighbors, sometimes even family members,” explains Muholi, who fights for lesbian rights through art. “Some of the curative rapes are reported to the police, but many others go unreported.”

Click here to view photos:

Despite its gay-friendly legislation, South Africa continues to struggle with homophobia. The abolition in 1991 of apartheid — a segregationist, racist, sexist and homophobic regime instituted in 1948 by the white minority — did not put an end to violence against gays and lesbians. Nor did the 1996 constitution, which prohibits any kind of discrimination, including on the basis of sexual orientation. As a result, gay people, or those perceived to be gay, continue to experience discrimination, stigmatization, and verbal or physical attacks — sometimes lethal.

Click here to read more.

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From CNN

We just finished up in court here in Jackson, Mississippi. We came here to attend the hearing for Vincent McGee. He’s the 22- year-old African American man accused of murdering 67-year-old Richard Barrett, a well-known white supremacist. Barrett rallied across the country in support of segregation. He believed non-whites, especially African Americans, were inferior. He was the leader of the “Nationalist Movement” and would often invite fellow white supremacists and skin heads to his home for “warrior weekends” during which they would take target practice at photos of Martin Luther King.

In his first statement, Deputy Bailey said McGee told him he went to use his Facebook account at Barrett’s house and Barrett made a sexual advance toward him so he killed him. But in his second statement, the Deputy said McGee told him, “he went to confront Barrett about some money… they got into an argument about the money and Barrett dropped his pants and asked him to perform a sexual act. He hit him with a radio… grabbed a knife, wrapped a belt around his hands, and kept stabbing him until he quit moving.”

Click Here For More

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In Kitty Kelly’s new biography “Oprah,” she claims several things about Oprah’s sex life, yet comes to the conclusions that Oprah is “asexual.” Kelly’s book not only claims that Oprah had lesbian affairs, but that she also spent a good deal of money trying to conceal them. One person they claimed she was romantically involved with was Diane Sawyer. The book also claims that Oprah paid an ex-boyfriend $50,000 to cover up her lesbian affairs and the fact that had a gay brother who died of AIDS.

The book also claims that Oprah made up stories about being molested and about growing up poor. Kelly talked to Oprah’s stepfather who said that Oprah’s friend Gayle King is a “dirt dog” and a “street heifer.”

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JOHANNESBURG – South African police are investigating whether there was a link between homosexual sex and the murder of white supremacist Eugene Terre’blanche, police said on Sunday.

The lawyer for one of the two black farm workers charged with the killing that heightened racial tensions was quoted as saying that Terre’blanche was killed after trying to have sex with at least one of the defendants.

A police spokesman confirmed that was among possibilities being investigated. Police had earlier said a pay dispute had led to the killing of Terre’blanche, on the political margins since his efforts to preserve apartheid in the early 1990s.

“We are not going to focus on one thing,” said Musa Zondi of the Hawks investigative unit, adding that a sexual link was among the many accusations being made over the case.

“We will investigate all pertinent facts that have a bearing on the matter,” he said.

General Jan Mabula, head of the Hawks in the North West Province, told City Press newspaper the suspects’ clothes were to be examined as part of checks into whether there was a sexual link. Zondi did not comment on that.

Hacked, battered to death
Terre’blanche was hacked and battered to death on April 3 and found with his trousers pulled down after a murder that has showed up the racial strains in the “Rainbow Nation”.

“My instructions from my client are that there was some sodomy going on and it sparked the murder of Mr. Terre’blanche,” Puna Moroko, attorney for 28-year-old Chris Mahlangu, told the Sunday Times newspaper. The other accused is 15.

Terre’blanche’s Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB) has rejected any suggestion of a homosexual link to the murder of its leader, who was one of the most vocal proponents of keeping South Africa’s races apart.

Nazi swastika, near-murder
Terre’blanche was a prominent figure during the dying years of white minority rule with his khaki-clad paramilitary followers wearing armbands with the party symbol that resembles the Nazi swastika.

But he had since lived in relative obscurity, particularly since his release in 2004 after serving a prison sentence for beating a black man nearly to death.

Thousands of followers of Terre’blanche in angry mood brandished apartheid-era flags and sang the old South African anthem at his funeral on Friday in his home town of Ventersdorp, 60 miles west of Johannesburg.

Although political analysts do not expect major unrest, the killing showed up the racial strains in South Africa 16 years after apartheid ended.

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From NYTimes.com:

KAMPALA, Uganda — Last March, three American evangelical Christians, whose teachings about “curing” homosexuals have been widely discredited in the United States, arrived here in Uganda’s capital to give a series of talks.

The theme of the event, according to Stephen Langa, its Ugandan organizer, was “the gay agenda — that whole hidden and dark agenda” — and the threat homosexuals posed to Bible-based values and the traditional African family.

For three days, according to participants and audio recordings, thousands of Ugandans, including police officers, teachers and national politicians, listened raptly to the Americans, who were presented as experts on homosexuality. The visitors discussed how to make gay people straight, how gay men often sodomized teenage boys and how “the gay movement is an evil institution” whose goal is “to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity.”

Now the three Americans are finding themselves on the defensive, saying they had no intention of helping stoke the kind of anger that could lead to what came next: a bill to impose a death sentence for homosexual behavior.

Click here to read more.

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HOUSTON – Houston became the largest U.S. city to elect an openly gay mayor, with voters handing a solid victory to City Controller Annise Parker after a hotly contested runoff.

Parker defeated former city attorney Gene Locke with 53.6 percent of the vote Saturday in a race that had a turnout of only 16.5 percent.

“This election has changed the world for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community. Just as it is about transforming the lives of all Houstonians for the better, and that’s what my administration will be about,” Parker told supporters after Locke conceded defeat.

Parker, 53, has never made a secret or an issue of her sexual orientation. But it became the focus of the race after anti-gay activists and conservative religious groups endorsed Locke and sent out mailers condemning Parker’s “homosexual behavior.”

Locke, 61, tried to distance himself from the anti-gay attacks while courting conservative voters who could tip the election in his favor. Meanwhile, gay and lesbian political organizations nationwide rallied to support Parker by raising money for her campaign and making calls urging people to vote.

Several other U.S. cities, including Portland, Ore., Providence, R.I., and Cambridge, Mass., have openly gay mayors, but none as large as Houston.

A little more than 152,000 residents turned out to cast ballots in the nation’s fourth largest city, which has a population of 2.2 million. Of those voters, 81,743 chose Parker — some 11,000 votes more than Locke received.

Although Locke condemned the anti-gay rhetoric, two of his key supporters contributed money to a conservative political action committee that sent out an anti-gay mailer earlier this month, urging voters not to pick Parker because she was endorsed by the “gay and lesbian political caucus.”

Campaign finance reports show Ned Holmes, finance chairman of Locke’s campaign, and James Dannenbaum, a member of the campaign’s finance committee, each gave $20,000.

Late Saturday, Locke offered his congratulations to Parker and urged the city to move on from the bruising campaign fight.

“Here’s what our city needs now: It needs unity. It needs us to come together and heal like we’ve never healed before, and to move forward under a new administration,” he said.

Parker and Locke, both Democrats in the nonpartisan race, advanced to the runoff after garnering more votes than two other candidates on Nov. 3. Parker will succeed Bill White, who is term-limited after serving six years and is seeking the Democratic nomination for governor.

Houston is predominantly Democratic and about 25 percent black and one-third Hispanic. About 60,000 of its residents identify themselves as gay or lesbian.

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From ClickOrlando.com:

The McDonald’s on International Drive and Sand Lake Road issued a statement Monday evening saying, “Sand Lake Road McDonald’s has a strict policy prohibiting any form of discrimination or harassment in hiring, termination, or any other aspect of employment in the organization. The restaurant requires all employees to comply with local, state and federal employment laws.”

The restaurant said it investigated Zikerria Bellamy’s claim that the manager called her and left her a hateful voicemail.

“You will not get hired. We do not hire (expletive). You lied to me. You told me you were a woman,” said the message Bellamy played for Local 6 News

“The behavior of the individual in question is not reflective of the employment policies in the organization. Further, this individual acted outside the scope of his authority and was not responsible for hiring. The individual in question is no longer employed by the restaurant,” the statement said.

Bellamy, 17, said Sunday she was considering filing a lawsuit after the restaurant allegedly refused to interview her for a possible job.

Bellamy said she did not check off a box on the application where it asked whether the applicant is male or female. According to the application, it states near the voluntary gender question that “failure to respond will not subject you to adverse treatment,” D’Onofrio reported.

When she went in for the interview, Bellamy claims a manager forced her to check a box that would indicate her gender.

Click here to read more.

LISTEN to the manager’s voicemail here:

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From The Atlanta Journal Constitution

Clayton County schools are investigating charges a teacher threatened a student after questioning the teen’s sexuality.

Randolph Forde, a teacher at Mundy’s Mill High School, remains on administrative leave with pay, schools spokesman Charles White said Monday.

According to the student’s attorney, Forde pulled the 16-year-old student out of class and asked him if he was gay.

“A child’s sexuality is never a teacher’s business,” said Marcia Killebrew, the student’s mother. “I feel like the man was being extremely inappropriate.”

The next day,  the teacher got into a verbal altercation in an algebra class, said Madden.

“The teacher threatened to hit him in his ‘f-ing mouth,’” Madden said.

A few days later, Forde asked another student to “put a hit” on the teenager, according to a police report.

“The suspect advised to the witness that he would pay him to kill the victim,” the report states.

The teacher wrote the victim’s name on a note and showed it to another student on the school bus, the report says.

Click Here For More

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Kansas City Chiefs running back Larry Johnson was told to stay away from the team Tuesday while the NFL and the Chiefs complete their investigation into his use of a homosexual slur twice this week.

Johnson issued an apology and a national gay rights advocacy organization called on the league and the team to take action against the two-time Pro Bowl back.

The latest chapter in Johnson’s stormy career began Sunday night when he questioned coach Todd Haley’s football credentials on his Twitter account. He used the slur during an exchange with one of his Twitter followers.

On Monday, Johnson used the slur again as he brushed off reporters and told them he would not comment, according to the Kansas City Star, which recorded the comment.

The Chiefs said they have told Johnson he would not be allowed to practice with the team or participate in team activities until the matter was resolved.

Johnson, who needs only 75 yards rushing to become the Chiefs’ all-time leader, apologized to Haley, the team, fans and the league “for the words I used.”

“I regret my actions. The words were used by me in frustration, and they were not appropriate,” he said through a spokesman. “I did not intend to offend anyone, but that is no excuse for what I said.”

Johnson also apologized to “all the kids who view athletes as role models. I was not a good role model yesterday and hopefully I can become a better role model. We all make mistakes, and the challenge is to learn from them.

“I will do my best to learn from this one as I move toward becoming a better person, teammate, and member of the Kansas City Chiefs team and community.”

Jarrett Barrios, president of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, called on the NFL and the Chiefs to take disciplinary action against Johnson and seize a chance to educate “on the dangers of homophobia in sports.”

Such slurs are used to “ridicule and harass young gay and transgender athletes on local sports fields across America,” Barrios said.

“Professional athletes who use this word need to be held accountable for giving a license to youth to bully their peers,” said Barrios.

Johnson, drafted in the first round out of Penn State in 2003, has had an up-and-down career in Kansas City. He was one of the best running backs in the NFL in 2005 and ’06, rushing for more than 1,700 yards in each season. This year, like the Chiefs, he has struggled, averaging only 2.7 yards per carry.

Johnson was benched for three games last year for an unspecified violation of team rules. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell suspended him for the fourth game for violating the league’s player conduct policy in connection with incidents involving two women in bars.

Johnson then was sentenced to two years’ probation after pleading guilty to two counts of disturbing the peace. One woman accused him of throwing a drink on her and another said he had pushed her head at a Kansas City night spot.
Late Sunday, after the Chiefs (1-6) were routed by San Diego, a series of tweets were posted to a Twitter account the Star reported Johnson has said is his.

One read: “My father got more creditentials than most of these pro coaches.” That was followed by: “My father played for the coach from “rememeber the titans”. Our coach played golf. My father played for redskins briefley. Our coach. Nuthn.”

Haley, hired earlier this year to replace the fired Herm Edwards, did not play high school or college football and attended college on a golf scholarship.

The tweets drew responses, including one that referred to one of the nightclub incidents.
Johnson’s response include a three-letter gay slur. The final post read: “Make me regret it. Lmao. U don’t stop my checks. Lmao. So ‘tweet’ away.”