An investigation is under way in Australia over claims that navy sailors competed with each other to bed their female colleagues for cash prizes.According to Channel Seven news, sailors on board HMAS Success put a cash value on each woman's head. Sleeping with a female officer or a lesbian, or having sex in a strange place, won more money, the report said. The Defence Department confirmed that a number of individuals had been sent back to Australia for interviews. HMAS Success, which has a crew of 220, is currently on exercises in South East Asia. According to the Channel Seven ...

Editor's Note: The Pride-parade image of carefree, middle class youth doesn’t fit the impoverished reality of millions of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) elders of color. Recent findings expose the multiple jeopardies that confront ethnic LGBT people in their later years. CHICAGO – The common image of the Pride Parade is of the middle-class, young, and largely white lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. But there is a growing number of this demographic group that is often ignored: LGBT elders of color.“We talk about persons of color being invisible,” said Syracuse University gerontologist, Alejandro Garcia. “If you add LGBT, ...

Rep. Sally Kern of Oklahoma, who has called being gay a "deadly lifestyle", has released what she calls a "Proclamation for Morality", which reads more like a manifesto against homosexuality. Kern, who apparently is unfamiliar with the fact that the United States was founded on the principle of separation of church and State, consistently uses religion as a basis for her arguments. The New Civil Rights Movement published Kern's "proclamation", in which she says gay marriage is a form of "debauchery" like "abortion, pornography, sex trafficking, divorce, illegitimate births, and child abuse." She blames the bad state ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Rhode Island seems almost certain to remain the only New England state that does not recognize gay marriage after measures legalizing same-sex unions stalled just before the part-time General Assembly ended the bulk of its annual work.None of the bills legalizing same-sex marriage in Rhode Island advanced to a floor vote this session, continuing a trend begun in 1997.The lack of State House action on gay unions means that Rhode Island is unlikely to allow same-sex marriage anytime soon, despite decisions this year by lawmakers in New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont to join Connecticut and Massachusetts in ...

Rumer Willis is going to 90210 to play a lesbian character. Willis, Demi Moore and Bruce Willis' oldest daughter, landed the role of Gia, according to Access Hollywood. Willis' character in the CW's remake of the teen drama 90210 is a gay student at West Beverly Hills High, a fictional school at which the show takes place. While currently only scheduled for a one episode appearance, it is expected that her character may be back for more episodes in the future. A CW spokesman described Gia as a "punky cute lesbian." As Gia, Willis will be working as a member ...

Dover, Delaware--State lawmakers sent a sexual orientation nondiscrimination bill to the governor on June 25, passing it through both houses of the legislature in only an hour. The House passed the measure at 8:30 pm, shortly after the Senate passed an identical bill. In previous legislative sessions, the Senate killed the bill. Rep. Pete Schwartzkopf, one of the bill’s champions, said that Gov. Jack Markell had expressed support for the measure When Markell signs it, Delaware will become the 21st state with such a law. But, unlike seven similar state laws passed since 2002, Delaware’s does not include gender identity.See ...

lthough traditional attitudes towards homosexuality in China's major cities are rapidly changing fueled by the rise of a new generation, in rural China it still remains a taboo topic. Two gay couples kiss, as part of an unofficial marriage ceremony, during celebrations for Chinese mainland's first Gay Pride week at a bar in Shanghai June 13, 2009. [Agencies] The global spotlight on China's culture, people and attitudes first began to shine during the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, which saw the city undergo an immense transformation – modernization on a scale never before experienced.The spotlight remains on China after the ...

A groundbreaking survey about the faith lives of gay Americans that the Barna Group put out last week got surprisingly little attention. In my latest God & Country column for U.S. News Weekly, I tied the Barna survey's fascinating portrait of gay religious life to the gay rights movement's recent efforts to ratchet up outreach and messaging. Much of the work is aimed at reversing the gay-as-Godless stereotype. Here's the top: Though he was raised in the United Methodist Church, Harry Knox knew he couldn't become a minister in his denomination because it doesn't ...

The Green Coalition of Gay Loggers for Jesus will march on Main Street as planned July Fourth, the organizer of the group said Thursday evening. Organizer Brian Leland had set a 5 p.m. deadline Thursday to reach his fundraising goal of $1,100, the amount of money the city of Bozeman estimates it will cost it to shut down the downtown thoroughfare for the morning protest.Leland said Thursday evening that he had raised about $1,500. The $400 difference will be given to the local food bank, he said.The Green Coalition of Gay Loggers for Jesus was formed to protest how the ...

Remarks by President Obama at the LGBT Pride Month White House Reception, June 29, 2009 THE PRESIDENT: Hello, everybody. Hello, hello, hello. (Applause.) Hey! Good to see you. (Applause.) I'm waiting for FLOTUS here. FLOTUS always politics more than POTUS. MRS. OBAMA: No, you move too slow. (Laughter.) THE PRESIDENT: It is great to see everybody here today and they're just -- I've got a lot of friends in the room, but there are some people I want to especially acknowledge. First of all, somebody who helped ensure that we are in the White House, Steve Hildebrand. Please ...

A top court in the Indian capital of New Delhi yesterday overturned a colonial-era law banning gay sex between consenting adults as the world's biggest democracy struggles to balance tradition and modernity. In a strongly worded statement, New Delhi's High Court ruled that the 150-year-old statute prohibiting homosexual acts was discriminatory and therefore a "violation of fundamental rights." "It cannot be forgotten that discrimination is antithesis of equality and that it is the recognition of equality which will foster dignity of every individual," the court said in a 105-page judgment. Quoting India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, ...

While there is justifiable jubilation at the Delhi High Court's historic judgement that effectively decriminalises gay sex among consenting adults, the government of India is still dithering. Dominic Emmanuel, the Director of the Delhi Archdiocese of the Roman Catholic Church, points out in the Indian Express: It is not yet clear whether the difference of opinion that has cropped up within the Congress on the issue is the result of religious minorities raising objections or because they genuinely believe that such a move will be offensive to the “general public”, which in India usually means the ...

South Carolina Lieutenant Governor Andre Bauer has denied rumors he is gay. Bauer recently made headlines as a possible replacement for Govern Mark Sanford should the Republican step down amid a sex scandal that has dominated the media for the last week. “Let's go ahead and dispel that now,” Bauer said in an interview with The State, published Wednesday. Bauer, a Republican, was referring to widely circulated rumors that he is gay. Last month, openly lesbian politician Linda Ketner outed Bauer and two other South Carolina lawmakers in an interview published on the progressive political blog Fire Dog ...

Preferences in the race of sexual partners influenced by subtle racism may perpetuate HIV-related health disparities Black gay men have less choice when it comes to sexual partners than other groups and, as a result, their sexual networks are closely knit. These tightly interconnected networks make the rapid spread of HIV more likely. In a study1) looking at social and sexual mixing between ethnic groups in men who have sex with men, H. Fisher Raymond and Willi McFarland, from the San Francisco Department of Public Health in the US, show that social barriers faced by Black gay men may have ...

When Gov. David A. Paterson accepted an invitation to be a grand marshal in New York City’s gay pride parade this year, he had high expectations that he would march down Fifth Avenue as the first governor in state history to have signed a law allowing gay couples to marry. But the hopes of Mr. Paterson and gay rights advocates who have been pushing for same-sex marriage have collided with a political maelstrom in Albany. Like every other major public-policy issue before the State Legislature — from local sales taxes to control of New York City’s school ...

See New Delhi: The Delhi High Court is likely to pronounce its verdict tomorrow on the controversial penal provision on homosexuality even as the government is grappling with the option to scrap it from the statute.A bench of Chief Justice A P Shah and Justice S Muralidhar had reserved its order on November 7 last year after marathon proceedings in which the government had vociferously opposed scrapping of section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which prescribes punishment upto life imprisonment for indulging in unnatural sexual acts.Before the judgement was reserved, the Ministries concerned with the issue in the previous ...

ast month Texas Lyceum, a non-partisan, business-oriented group, released one of its periodic polls on current issues, and the results for the most part were what one would expect in a conservative state. By margins of about 2-to-1, Texas opposed any further bailouts for automakers or banks. An even bigger margin – including a majority of whites, blacks and Hispanics – supported the concept of a voter ID requirement. But on one issue, the poll did raise some eyebrows. According to the survey, a majority of Texans would permit some form of same-sex union to be recognized: 25 percent ...

The New York Blade, one of the two major gay and lesbian newspapers in New York City, has laid off its editor in chief and suspended publication, the chief executive of its publishing company said on Wednesday. “Everyone was let go, but the people on The Blade know that they may come back if The Blade is coming back,” said the executive, Matthew Bank, of HX Media, which was formed in 2005 by the merger of The Blade and HX Magazine. The moves came on Tuesday after HX was sold to undisclosed buyers. The Blade, a biweekly paper with a ...

Gay and lesbian Mennonites dressed in bright pink have gathered with others outside the church's biannual convention in Columbus to criticize its leaders for trying to push them out. About 100 ministers and lay people prayed, sang hymns and spoke of feeling ostracized from the church at the protest in downtown Columbus on Thursday. The "pink Menno" campaign is an effort to get the church to address the deeply divisive issue of allowing homosexuality within its congregations.See Mennonites in Ohio protest exclusion of gays Washington Post * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news ...

Gay support groups of Vadodara have welcomed the Delhi High Court’s verdict that decriminalised homosexual relations. They said the judgment will help solve health issues such as HIV/AIDS, adding that the abolition of Section 377 for adults shall also solve several ailments among the weaker segments of society. Maya Sharma, Parma’s Founder trustee, said: “This judgment is indicative of the changing values of society and will enable further change. Generally, this movement has been seen as western, but in reality, this change would not have been possible without support and participation of people cutting across the religion, caste and age ...