Online Wedding Photo Of Gay Mayoral Candidate Creates Stir

BROCKTON, MASSACHUSETTS — If you weren't invited to mayoral candidate Jass Stewart's nuptials three years ago, you can still get a wedding day photo of Stewart and his spouse, Denzil Paul.
The photo of the couple kissing outside City Hall is one of seven posted on the Web site for Honey Brown Cards, a Boston-based card company.
“A friend took the photo from our wedding,” said Stewart, who is the city's first openly gay mayoral candidate and is making his second run for the post. “He said he would like to use it for his little business.”
The cards, billed by the company as “cards for gay occasions,” sell for $1.50 each and can be customized.
Stewart said he is not making any money off the sales.
But the photo is generating plenty of chatter on the Web site inbrockton.com.
Some folks posted comments praising Stewart's openness and saying being gay has nothing to do with leading the city. Other postings said gossip about the picture is an attempt to smear Stewart to make it harder for him to get elected mayor.
“The fact that my personal wedding photo is becoming an issue in this campaign is frankly a bit disappointing, because there are major issues facing the city,” Stewart said. “I am very proud of my family and, like many families, we want a city that works for all of us.”
Stewart was married in 2004 but said the couple celebrate their anniversary on Sept. 9, 2001, the day they were committed — before gay marriage was legalized in Massachusetts.
from The Enterprise

Porn Maker Michael Lucas Sued Over 'Dolce Vita' Title

NEW YORK - The good name and dignity of the classic 1960s film "La Dolce Vita," directed by Federico Fellini, is being stripped away by two pornographic movies using the same name, according to a lawsuit filed Thursday.
International Media Films Inc. accused New York filmmaker Andrei Treivas Bregman of trademark and copyright infringement for the porn films he made under his business name, Michael Lucas. The lawsuit seeks to stop sales of the movies, "Michael Lucas' La Dolce Vita" Parts 1 and 2, and to collect unspecified damages.
Bregman, who moved to the United States from Moscow in 1997, called the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Manhattan a joke.
"Nobody can be confused and think they're buying Fellini's movie by buying mine," said Bregman, noting the name Michael Lucas was part of his title, which otherwise means "The Sweet Life."
New York-based International Media Films said it believed the gay pornographic films, released last month, will "infringe, tarnish and dilute" its trademark rights to the highly decorated "La Dolce Vita," which won the 1961 Academy Award for costume design and the New York Film Critics Circle Award for best foreign film of that year.
"La Dolce Vita," with its famously sexy scene of Anita Ekberg coaxing Marcello Mastroianni into the Trevi fountain, also won the Golden Palm at Cannes. Fellini won a lifetime achievement award in film in 1993, shortly before his death.
International Media Films said it bought "La Dolce Vita" in 2001. The film introduced the term "paparazzi" as it followed the life of a tabloid journalist who covers the show business life of Rome while yearning to write about more serious subjects.
from The Associated Press

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Audio From The Tim Hardaway Interview

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Hardaway later apologized for the remarks during a telephone interview with Fox affiliate WSVN in Miami.
"Yes, I regret it. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said I hate gay people or anything like that," he said. "That was my mistake."

Hardaway issued a statement to Local 10 News saying:
"There are more important things to worry about than my comments. We should be more concerned about President (George) Bush and all the people dying in Iraq."

Amaechi On Hardaway

How do you deal with a gay teammate?
''First of all, I wouldn't want him on my team,'' former Miami Heat star Tim Hardaway said Wednesday. "Second of all, if he was on my team, I'd really distance myself from him. I don't think he should be in the locker room when we are in the locker room. I wouldn't even be a part of that. . . . I'd ask for him to get traded. Something has to give. The majority of the players would ask for him to be traded, or they would want to get traded. Or just buy him out of his contract and let him go.''
But, Tim, you realize that's bigotry and homophobia?
''I hate gay people,'' Hardaway said in an interview on 790 The Ticket. "I let it be known. I don't like gay people. I don't like to be around gay people. I'm homophobic. I don't like it. There shouldn't be a world for that or [a place] in the United States for it. I don't like it.''
There it is, ignorance and hatred without a filter, coming from one of the most popular players in Heat history. And Hardaway is hardly alone, even though he is the first to voice it so plainly since former player John Amaechi last week became the first former NBA player to come out of the closet.
Amaechi's response?
''I'm actually tempted to laugh,'' Amaechi said Wednesday. "Finally, someone who is honest. It is ridiculous, absurd, petty, bigoted and shows a lack of empathy that is gargantuan and unfathomable. But it is honest. And it illustrates the problem better than any of the fuzzy language other people have used so far.''
SHOCKING WORDS
You've heard the fuzzy language. LeBron James said he'd have trouble trusting a gay teammate. Wide receiver Andre Johnson said he wouldn't want to share a shower with a gay teammate. Philadelphia 76er Shavlik Randolph said he'd be fine as long as said player ''didn't bring your gayness on me.'' Hardaway, always blunt, turned mere discomfort into transparent hate, talking in a way that was shocking to hear. And now you know why Amaechi is the first in the history of his sport -- that's a lot of players, folks -- ever to announce he is gay.
Amaechi is grateful for Hardaway's words, believe it or not. It gets the conversation going, and gets ugly things out in the light. Publicists have been pushing their athletes away from this uncomfortable question, trying to avoid the kind of trouble Hardaway's words cause. The Heat franchise is going to have to apologize for him today, and that's just the start. If he were still on television, he'd be fired.
Amaechi is the smartest athlete I've ever met in two decades in this business. He is uniquely qualified to be an eloquent spokesman for his cause. But he is terrified and exhausted while fighting it during his book tour at least in part because hatred is scary, heavy and awfully unpredictable.
And although Hardaway doesn't speak for everybody, neither does Charles Barkley when he says this is simply a media issue.
''Hey, nobody cares John Amaechi is gay,'' Barkley says. ``I just find it humorous and amazing people think we care if someone is gay or not. It is always fun to hear these reporters say how we'd treat them in the locker room. Trust me, we'd treat reporters a lot worse than we treat a gay guy.''
WHAT IF?
But what would it be like? There's a reason no active player in a male team sport has ever come out. There's a reason that the one who does while active would cross the last uncrossed barrier in sports and become a modern-day Jackie Robinson. Barkley sounds naive.
''You don't think we've all played with gay guys?'' Barkley said. "Of course we have. It has never been an issue. America, the more I live in it, the more I realize how full of it we are. If we're not bombing the wrong country, we're not fixing hurricane-relief areas. America is homophobic. It's so easy for [reporters] to say the other jocks won't like it. America discriminates against gay people, but we've all played with gay people.''
There's no way to know how an entire macho league populated by different personalities would react to an outed gay athlete. There have been Internet rumors for months now that a current NBA player has already come out privately to his family. The reaction if he is outed? It will be somewhere between Hardaway's hate, Barkley's indifference and Mavs owner Mark Cuban's contention that the first gay NBA player will be a rich, pioneering hero. But Hardaway's words give voice to at least one person's truth:
The league isn't quite ready for this.
from The Miami Herald

‘Ex-Gay’ Speaks On Religious Beliefs Of Homosexuality

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA BARBARA - “Ex-gay” speaker Chad Thompson’s lecture at Corwin Pavilion last night was advertised as a way to break down walls between Christians and homosexuals. Several queer students, however, had different thoughts.
Thompson, an evangelical Christian, said that as a teenager he discovered he was gay. During his roughly two hour presentation, he described the process of his overcoming his homosexual desires through the help of a counselor, his faith and other members of the ex-gay community - a claim which angered pro-queer rights activists outside and within the pavilion.
“If you are ex-gay because you think being gay is wrong and you have to be straight, then you are homophobic,” Jenny Beeson, co-chair of the Queer Commission, said while waiting outside the lecture.
Beeson, along with a few other members of the Queer Student Union and the Associated Students Queer Commission, handed out flyers criticizing Thompson’s views before the presentation, which was sponsored by campus Christian organization Real Life.
“I think tonight was the beginning of much-needed dialogue between the Queer community and Christian students,” Real Life Director Chris Comstock said.
Thompson talked about his life as an ex-gay and how it affected his perception of the queer community as well as the hate speech some Christians use to disparage homosexuals. He also discussed how his family situation as a child contributed to his sexual orientation, the way religion has helped him through life and his opinion on the possible existence of a “gay gene.”
“I think it would be cool if a gay gene were discovered. Then God would get more glory when it is treated,” Thompson said.
Thompson, who is in his late 20s, is the author of the book Loving Homosexuals as Jesus Would, the theme of his lecture. He runs a website, www.inqueery.com, and travels throughout the U.S. to give speeches on homosexuality and Christianity.
While Thompson said he believes homosexual actions are sinful, he expressed the need for love and respect of homosexual individuals, and discouraged Christians from using derogatory terms against queers.
“It is about unconditional love,” Thompson said. “We must acknowledge the social and political struggles of gays.”
Thompson said Christians have done an inadequate job of showing their love for queers. For instance, when he worked for the Iowa Family Policy Center he attempted to organize events focusing on love and concern for queers, to which maybe two people would attend. However, when he planned events in opposition to queer activists’ political goals, he would see one hundred show up.
Thompson also pointed out inaccurate media depictions of both Christians and gays, which reinforces distrust between the groups.
“Christian media shows homosexuals as demons … gay media shows Christians as [hateful] people, and both of these lies create tension between the two sides,” Thompson said.
While the presentation itself stuck mostly to Thompson’s personal beliefs, the question-and-answer session after the presentation had queer students asking for Thompson’s opinions on psychological explanations of homosexuality as well as on gay marriage, which Thompson said he opposed.
“Research has shown increased rates of delinquency, teen pregnancy and other problems in children raised by gay parents,” Thompson said.
Thompson later said that this harm is not certain and may not occur in all homosexual families. He also said that he favors protections for ex-gays included in non-discrimination policies along with protection for gays.
“Chad didn’t say anything I hadn’t heard before,” said Chris, a member of the Queer Student Union. “In fact, he was probably more conservative than most of the audience.”
Ken Virzi, event organizer for Real Life, said Thompson addressed controversial questions fairly and respectfully.
“There’s always a possibility you might upset everyone, but I’m pleased that this talk wasn’t one-sided.” Virzi said.
from The Daily Nexus

High School Needs To Think Twice About Gay Club

BARSTOW, CALIFORNIA - For years, Barstow's relative isolation from the moral and political madness that afflicts California's more populous and especially coastal areas has spared us much nonsense, but those days may be over. This week we learn that advocates of homosexuality, under the guise of protecting students with real or imagined inclinations in that direction against school yard bullies and "intolerance" generally, are forming a gay club at Barstow High.
Notwithstanding the purported popularity of these groups on California's high school campuses, it is a mistake to permit those pushing sexual perversion on our state to exploit the innocence of high school students and the misguided "tolerance" of Barstow High School teachers and administrators.
This newspaper published on Monday a piece on the supposedly favorable formation of a "Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA), a student group that brings together gay and straight students to raise awareness of gay, lesbian and transgender issues and encourages tolerance among students of different "lifestyles."
Now if nothing more than "awareness" and "tolerance" were to characterize the discussions and activities of this new student group (apparently deserving of vastly more publicity than any other student club in memory), one could have little objection to it. But that is just the "camel's nose under the tent," so to speak, judging from the direction similar groups have already taken.
Remember, for example, the mock "gay weddings" at Silverado High School in Victorville a couple of years ago, where school administrators and board members showed all the firmness of jello as they wrung their hands and mumbled some nonsense about the students' "constitutional rights"? Many Victorville parents took exception to this and the exercise has not been repeated. One hopes for similar spine in Barstow parents.
The new club's prospective faculty advisor made a remarkable statement that captures the ambiguity - and the dangers - of introducing young persons in the throes of raging hormones to an unnatural way of life.
"They're unformed clay, and they're trying to figure out who they are and how they want to live," she said. "My goal is to provide a safe environment where kids can be social."
Now if these Barstow teenagers are "unformed clay," what sense does it make to encourage them to reject the example and the precepts of their parents and their society, and to experiment with ideas and (inevitably) practices which can confuse them pretty thoroughly? We are constantly told that our teenaged children are "sexually active," whether their parents know or approve or not, so steering them toward same-sex intimacy in theory means encouraging it in practice.
Also noteworthy is the guiding hand of Carolyn Laub, founder and executive director of the Gay-Straight Alliance Network, a California-based nonprofit umbrella group for GSAs around the state. This puts the lie to the claim that the students themselves were somehow the instigators of club formation. Ms. Laub says she has formed 600 clubs at more than 40 percent of California high schools. Barstow finally got "discovered."

We know that advocates or enablers of sexual perversion, which they euphemistically refer to as "diversity," mean for their fellow citizens not merely to "tolerate" it but to "celebrate" it. After all, from their point of view, they have nothing to apologize for. Indeed, critics of their "lifestyle" are the ones who have some explaining to do. Nothing but bigotry or religious fanaticism could possibly explain opposition to our public schools sanctioning "gayness."
It is amazing that Laud and other professional advocates cite the federal Equal Access Act in support of their right to form gay clubs on high school campuses. But we should remind ourselves that the actual origin of that act, signed by President Clinton, was to protect the rights of religious organizations to meet on campus after gay clubs had already formed.
A combination of perverse "religious establishment" doctrine and outright hostility to Christian groups that understandably did not want homosexuals as members if they intended to undermine their moral principles, finally compelled Congressional friends of religious faith on both the right and left of the political spectrum to pass the Equal Access Act.
In plain words, gay clubs are part of a movement which is not only pushing homosexuality on vulnerable teenagers but openly hostile to Christian groups that still follow the Biblical teaching that homosexuality is an "abomination." Their object is not to strike a blow for free speech but to eradicate from public discourse the viewpoint that homosexuality is morally wrong.
That is the "ball game." Just as pro-slavery southerners insisted that the rest of the country must agree with them that slavery is right and freedom is wrong, so today's "uncloseted" homosexual advocates and practitioners will not rest until all of us agree that denying the distinctive sexual wellsprings of our nature is right and maintenance of traditional marriage and family is wrong.
It is too bad that Barstow Unified School District trustees have given sanction to this "gay" club. Parents should register their protests and take advantage of what moral virtue still remains in this community to stop the club in its tracks.
from The Desert Dispatch / Richard Reeb