Multimillionaire scum gay real estate developers Ian Reisner and Mati Weiderpass are at it once once again defending their “terrible mistake” to host a reception for vehnemently anti-gay GOP crazy Ted Cruz in a new interview with The New York Times. And if you think their previous comments were shocking, you ain’t seen anything yet.
“I’m not going to use arrogant words, but I think our level of prominence in the gay community and our proven track record and success, we’re the ideal people to sit with our harshest critics,” said Reisner. “It’s being labeled as a crime, but I think what we did was ultimately very good.” Reisner and Weiderpass, have repeatedly alternated between defending their decision, attacking the “cheap amd entitled” gay community, to apologizing for it. Reisener also addressed making headlines last October after 23-year-old Hell’s Kitchen gay bar manager Sean Verdi was found dead of a reported drug overdose in a bathtub at the two hoteliers’ Manhattan penthouse. “I am an extremely generous host to thousands of people,” Reisner said. “And with that openness comes risk that somebody might get harmed.” “Harm is the wrong word. Accidents can happen,” added Weiderpass.
Reisner and Weiderpass have recently hired Omar Sharif Jr to be their gay community liaison?
Stay out of the bathroom Omar.
If you can stomach it you can read the rest of the NYT article here.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said on Thursday that she thought it was “great” that Vladimir Putin included a line in his controversial New York Times op-ed about all people being created equal under God.
But also gave Putin a verbal slap on in the face when she added that “I hope it applies to gays and lesbians in Russia as well,” during a Capitol Hill press conference.
To double down on the statement Pelosi (or her staff) took the comment to Twitter for all the world to see.
Great sound bite and you have to give it to her for actually saying something.
On Tuesday New York Times writer Frank Bruni wrote a lengthy piece on the ongoing Russian Vodka boycott and the calls from LGBT activist to move or boycott 2014 Sochi Olympic Games.
[Harvey] Fierstein has floated a boycott of the Olympics. There’s precedent. Meantime, gay bars in the United States and other countries have heeded a plea from L.G.B.T. rights advocates to remove Russian vodka from their shelves, in the hope that economic pain will equal legislative pressure on Russia to repeal its anti-gay laws. Advocates have trained their ire on Stolichnaya vodka, or Stoli, in particular.
But that focus exposes a flaw in the vodka boycott, well intentioned but imprecise. “While Stoli’s ingredients — wheat, rye and raw alcohol — are Russian, the vodka itself is distilled in Latvia and distributed in the U.S. by William Grant & Sons USA, an American subsidiary of a Scottish corporation,” a recent post on Time magazine’s Web site noted.
As for an American boycott of the Olympics, it would punish athletes who’ve been training and dreaming and sacrificing for years. It might redirect the conversation from how Russia treats gays to whether the United States overreacted. And it would close off the kind of statement that American athletes have a thrilling opportunity to orchestrate. Maybe that statement isn’t a flag but “a visible pin, an armband, a bracelet,” as Greg Louganis, an openly gay diver who won medals for the United States in three Olympics, recently suggested. Maybe it’s something small stitched into the uniforms.
Well that did not sit well with longtime LGBT activist Cleve Jones who posted about Bruni commentary on his Facebook page:
“This is quite possibly the dumbest commentary I’ve yet read on this issue. Even if Bruni’s fairy tale choreography were permitted by the IOC, it would not be broadcast in Russia. Bruni also lies when he states that Stolichnaya is distilled in Latvia and distributed in the US by William Grant and Sons.
Wrong. Just flat out not true, Frank.
Russia is descending into fascism. Gay people, immigrants and Jews are being subjected to increasingly violent attacks. Freedoms of speech and assembly are restricted. The parallels with Germany in the 1930s are obvious and chilling.
Bruni’s response: Let’s wave little rainbow flags, but “not ostentatiously high.”
Seventy-seven years ago the IOC and the international community allowed the Games to go forward in Berlin. US corporations like Sochi sponsor Coke continued to do business with the Nazi regime. The Games burnished Hitler’s reputation at home and abroad and set the stage for what was to follow.
Seventy-seven years ago, Jesse Owens did strike Olympic Gold in the Nazi Olympics. It was a great moment for him and athletes of all races. And then what happened?
Owens went home, ignored by his own government. And, two years later in Germany, the exterminations began.
The situation in Russia is beyond dire. The world’s response surely must be greater than wearing “a visible pin, an armband, a bracelet” or “something small stitched into the uniforms.”
It’s well past time that the IOC and others learn that “sport” does not supercede “human rights”. They made that mistake in Berlin and after they left 6 million Jews and 4 million Poles, Gypsies and Homosexuals were killed.
In what has to be one of the most badly researched, written and most bizarre editorials ever to grace the page New York Times opinion page. New York Times Editorial Board member Juliet Lapidos accuses the LGBT community and specifically the organization Geeks Out of “blacklisting” anti-gay National Organization for marriage board-member and virulent homophobe Orson Scott Card.
Geeks Out wants to sink the film to punish Orson Scott Card, who wrote the 1985 novel “Ender’s Game” and was one of several producers for the screen adaptation. In 1990, Mr. Card argued in the magazine Sunstone that “laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books” and “be used when necessary to send a clear message that those who flagrantly violate society’s regulation of sexual behavior cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society.” He was on the board of the National Organization for Marriage, which opposes same-sex unions, from 2009 until this year.
Both Mr. Card and Lionsgate have issued statements in response to the boycott movement, emphasizing that “Ender’s Game” has nothing to do with gay rights or really any contemporary debate. Lionsgate said that while it does not “agree with the personal views of Orson Scott Card,” his opinions “are completely irrelevant to a discussion of ‘Ender’s Game.’ ” The studio’s response, though self-serving, is exactly right.
Generally, boycotts are used to pressure companies or governments to end objectionable activities; consider the boycott of Chick-fil-A to protest the chain’s financial support of anti-gay organizations. What Geeks Out has in mind is closer to blacklisting. The group wants to “send a clear and serious message to Card and those that do business with his brand of antigay activism — whatever he’s selling, we’re not buying.” This isn’t about stopping the dissemination of anti gay sentiments; it’s about isolating Mr. Card and shaming his business partners, thus cutting into their profits.
If Mr. Card belongs in quarantine, who’s next? His views were fairly mainstream when the Sunstone article appeared and, unfortunately, are not unusual today. Just 10 years ago, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in his inflammatory Lawrence v. Texas dissent that Americans have every right to enforce “the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct” in order to protect themselves “from a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and destructive.”
Lapidos makes many mistakes in her “so called” editorial. The first being the fact that, as a writer and producer of Ender’s Game, we put directly money into Orson Scott Cards pocket, which money has been used for actions — not opinions, action — that have harmed the lives of thousands of gay Americans this she seems to simply overlook or just ignore.
The “Sunstone” article written by Card in 1990 which Ms. Lapidos mentions, and should actually read is more of a manifesto against homosexuality rather than an article and if I remember correctly at the time it was not mainstream to promote the idea that homosexuality should be criminalized to let people know that they would never be accepted by society. Also it is not now mainstream to sit on the board of a hate group like the National of Marriage, call for the overthrow of the government if gay marriage becomes legal, and it’s certainly not mainstream to donate million’s upon million’s of dollars for the sole purpose of denying fellow citizens equal rights.
And perhaps whats most bothersome part Lapidos piece is that she herself purposely fear-mongers by inaccurately using the term “blacklist” which brings back to memories of the of the 1940’s and denying employment to Jewish Hollywood screenwriters, actors, directors, musicians in the 1940’s which is incredibly moronic repugnant. The fact that a New York Times editorial staffer does not know the difference between “boycotting” and “blacklisting” is shameful and unacceptable.
The New York Times does not allow comments on its editorial pages and there is no email listed for Ms. Lapidos but she can be reached via her Twitter account @jlapidos
Last night a scathing editorial in the New York Times argued that President Obama’s MUST follow through on his Inaugural address, in which he put gay rights in line with civil rights(which it is) and must get involved in the marriage cases before the Supreme Court
By including gay rights in the arc of the struggle for civil rights — the road “through Seneca Falls and Selma and Stonewall” — President Obama linked his presidency to ending antigay discrimination and underscored the legal wrong of denying gay people the freedom to marry.
“Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law,” Mr. Obama famously said in his second Inaugural Address, “for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.”
Now that Mr. Obama has declared that he believes denying gay people the right to wed is not only unfair and morally wrong but also legally unsupportable, the urgent question is how he will translate his words into action. To start, he should have his solicitor general file a brief in the Proposition 8 case being argued before the Supreme Court in March, saying that California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional.
The outcome of the Proposition 8 case is likely to affect the lives of gay, lesbian and bisexual Americans for years to come, even if the final disposition is not sweeping enough to wipe out all state laws currently banning same-sex marriage. A strong filing by the Justice Department, forthrightly declaring that denying the freedom to marry violates the Constitution, would put the full weight of the federal government on the side of justice and could influence the shape of the ruling.
For the administration to be missing in action in this showdown risks conveying a message to the justices that it lacks confidence in the constitutional claims for ending gay people’s exclusion from marriage or that it believes Americans are not ready for a high court ruling making marriage equality the law of the land — impressions strikingly contradicted by legal precedent, the lessons of history and by the president’s own very powerful words.
Mr. Obama’s Inaugural Address appeared to reflect a deepened understanding that the right to marry the person of one’s choice is a fundamental right “under the law.” He needs to make sure his solicitor general conveys that sound legal view loud and clear in the Proposition 8 case.
We must push into President Obama doing the right thing. With all the “pretty words” must now come some REAL ACTION. No skirting the issues and no work arounds of DOMA as we have seen in the past. It is time for Obama to stand up and FORCEFULLY take a stand where it counts. As we saw in Prop 8, there is no defense against taking away rights already granted. And DOMA is a clear violation of the 14th Amendment.
Its is both insulting and shameful That President Obama, who says he’s supportive of same-sex marriage in a speech, can’t quite summon up enough courage or the balls to completely support it in his actions.
Be a man. Be a leader. Be the President of the United States. Stand up for what’s right dammit and file the briefs with SCOTUS and prove once and for all that your “words” have actual meaning.
“The Mayans were right, as it turns out, when they predicted the world would end in 2012. It was just a select world: the G.O.P. universe of arrogant, uptight, entitled, bossy, retrogressive white guys. Just another vanishing tribe that fought the cultural and demographic tides of history. Someday, it will be the subject of a National Geographic special, or a Mel Gibson movie, where archaeologists piece together who the lost tribe was, where it came from, and what happened to it.
The experts will sift through the ruins of the Reagan Presidential Library, Dick Cheney’s shotgun casings, Orca poll monitoring hieroglyphics, remnants of triumphal rants by Dick Morris on Fox News, faded photos of Clint Eastwood and an empty chair, and scraps of ancient tape in which a tall, stiff man, his name long forgotten, gnashes his teeth about the 47 percent of moochers and the ‘gifts’ they got. Instead of smallpox, plagues, drought and Conquistadors, the Republican decline will be traced to a stubborn refusal to adapt to a world where poor people and sick people and black people and brown people and female people and gay people count.” – Maureen Dowd, in the New York Times.
After this weeks election Nate Silver has become our favorite self-described gay geek and political math nerd stud.
Nate, the founder of FiveThirtyEight, which is now part of the New York Times. correctly predicted the popular vote in 2008 within one percentage point, correctly predicted the outcome in 49 out of 50 states (except Indiana) and this year Grand Slammed it with a 100% correct prediction.
Richard Lawson wrote in an Out essay that Silver “sets many gay (and straight, probably) hearts aflutter with his eerie prescience and rumpled-yet-sharp geeky aesthetic.”
And he does. And his intellegence and wit is also a huge geeky turn on.
ALL HAIL NATE SILVER! The gay geek who made math sexy again!
After what has seem like an eternity of waiting for Brian Brown (shirt) of the National Organization for Marriage to accept the venue that Dan Savage put forward for a debate. Brian Brown has FINALLY accepted! And the Debate of the Century is ON!
For those of you who don’t remember earlier in the month, Brian Brown feigned mock outrage at Dan Savage after Dan “supposedly” upset some “christian student journalist” at a journalism conventions who walked out (set-up) after Dan made some comments about the Bible.
Well Brown threw down the gauntlet at Savage stating:
Let me lay down a public challenge to Dan Savage right here and now: You want to savage the Bible? Christian morality? Traditional marriage? Pope Benedict? I’m here, you name the time and the place and let’s see what a big man you are in a debate with someone who can talk back. It’s easy to make high-school girls cry by picking on them. Let’s pick on someone our own size!
I’m here, any time, any place you name, Dan Savage. You will find out how venal and ridiculous your views of these things are if you dare to accept a challenge.
Well Dan, picked up the gauntlet and did indeed name a place for a debate,
““So, what I’d like to do is invite you to dinner. Bring the wife. My husband will be there. I will hire a video crew and we will video sort of an after dinner debate. You have to acknowledge my humanity by accepting my hospitality, and I have to acknowledge yours by extending my hospitality to you.” Dan said
Brian Brown who has been silent about the debate since he issued the initial challenge (and thought by many to have chickened out) has finally accepted Dan’s debate venue writing:
Dan — I accept and will look forward to debating you at your dining room table. As I said in my challenge to you, anytime, any place.
While I appreciate the invitation that you have extended to my wife, she will not be able to attend. She is a full-time mom with seven beautiful children and an eighth on the way.
I have no objection to Mark Oppenheimer from the New York Times covering the discussion, nor to you hiring your own video crew to film the event, provided that I am able to hire my own video crew to be sure there is no creative editing of the discussion.
Not that a New York Times reporter would slant the news, mind you!
This will be fun!
Oh yes Brian. It is going to be so much fun watching Dan intellectually eviscerate you in front of millions of soon to be viewers and prove you to be the bigoted homophobic pig we all know and hate.
