Gay News

Members of the Islamic Defender Front donned masks and threatened to set fire to a venue at the Q! Film Festival in the Indonesian capitol city if screenings continued.

The protesters called the international film festival blasphemy and chanted homophobic war cries. Despite the protests, the festival celebrates its ninth installment with the Jakarta event, opening last week.

The fest shoots to raise awareness and tolerance of gay issues. We're still going to go on, John Badalu, the festival's co-founder and this year's director, told Jakarta Post. Unfortunately, though, some of last night's showings ground to a halt.

Despite permanently ending Q! fest screenings at the French cultural center and the Japan Foundation, screenings at the police-guarded Goethe Institute German Cultural Centre shall continue, the center's program assistant told The Guardian.

India's first gay film, Dunno Y… Na Jaane Kyun, could face serious cuts from censors because of its sex scenes.

Director Sanjay Sharma was asked to remove the sequence featuring leads Sharma and Yuvraaj Parasher, Bollywood Hungama has reported.

In an interview with the site, co-star Karpal said: Why should the censors be scandalised if two men are kissing and making love? The ones in my film are very aesthetic. And so what if it's two men making love? Love is love regardless of gender.

The film is the first Indian movie to feature a sex scene between two men. It has been resubmitted on appeal to the revising committee.

Whilst Christian Voice have reprehensible views when it comes to homophobia, they surely do have a point in this case. They write

Colchester Magistrates are to hear the case of a Christian man accused of a public order offence in two weeks' time.

Paul Shaw was charged by Essex Police with a hate crime after an election address was distributed in Colchester calling - in very moderate language - for a review of whether sodomy and other homosexual acts should remain legal.

Two homosexual men complained to the police after the leaflet dropped through their door in south-east Colchester , leading to a completely over-the-top police search of Paul Shaw's flat and confiscation of his diaries in June.

Mr Shaw was put in the cells, interrogated in what he describes as a hostile and provoking interview, and then charged on 12th June with causing religiously aggravated harassment, alarm or distress by words or writing under Section 31 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.

MAKE HOMOSEXUAL ACTS UNLAWFUL The offending words were in an election address, distributed after Paul Shaw had stood for election as an independent at a time when he thought a new election was imminent. In a leaflet previously approved by the Returning Officer and the Royal Mail, he said:

I believe for example that homosexual and lesbian acts are immoral and that the law should reflect that; by making them unlawful as they once were; and so acting as a deterrent to such behaviour.

The concept of homophobia is nonsense and a play on words; it is not and has never been a phobia! A phobia is an un-natural fear; whereas a rejection of perverse behaviour; is a righteous godly fear; that fears to do wrong because it knows that there are consequences and punishment otherwise! This is the most pronounced example of a nation that has lost its way ..

However, during a preliminary hearing on Thursday 26th August, the Crown Prosecutor applied for an adjournment. This was in order, he said, to consider the implications for freedom of speech raised by the case.

The Magistrate, District Judge David Cooper, readily agreed and the case was adjourned to Thursday 23rd September at 9.15am. Paul

Update: CPS withdraws its case

26th September 2010. Based on article from ccfon.org

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has withdrawn its case against a Christian man charged under public order legislation in relation to offence caused to homosexuals.

Paul Shaw was charged by Essex Police with a hate crime after an election leaflet was distributed in Colchester that called for a review of whether homosexual acts should remain legal.

An extensive investigation followed during which Shaw was arrested, locked in a cell and interrogated, in what he has described as a hostile and provoking interview. His flat was also searched and his diaries confiscated. He was subsequently charged with causing religiously aggravated harassment, alarm or distress by words or writing under Section 31 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.

After considering the case, the CPS decided that that there was insufficient evidence to proceed.

The bishop at the center of allegations of a gay sex plans to step down as the pastor of the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Georgia.

Three men making the allegations – Maurice Robinson, Anthony Flagg and Jamal Parris – have allowed their names to be made public. In documents obtained by ABC News, Parris claimed that the bishop would request he be nude in his presence and would request sexual massages and oral sodomy during trips together in the US and abroad.

As many as 30 young men may now be considering suing Bishop Eddie Long.

Members of the New Birth church, whose membership has grown from 300 to over 25,000 since Bishop Long became pastor in 1987, include politicians, celebrities and the county sheriff. Four years ago, it played host to four US presidents during the funeral of Coretta Scott King, the widow of the Reverend Martin Luther King. Its complex includes a 10,000 seat cathedral, costing $50m [£31.8m].

Bishop Long, who is married with four children, has been a vociferous campaigner against same sex marriage, and in 2004 led a march with Rev King's daughter Bernice to her father's grave in Atlanta in support of a proposed constitutional amendment that defined marriage as between one man and one woman.

Now it has come to light that he told his congregation that gays deserve death during sermons in the 1990s.

Audio of a sermon by Long advocating the death penalty for gays was broadcast by The Michelangelo Signorile Show yesterday, the same day that a fourth person came forward with allegations of sex abuse against the bishop.

According to the Signorile Show, the sermon took place in the mid-1990s, at Long's New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Georgia. Long had published a book entitled I Don't Want Delilah, I Need You!, which preaches traditional gender roles.

In a 2007 report, the Southern Poverty Law Center described Long as One of the most virulently homophobic black leaders in the religiously based anti-gay movement

Three men, described as spiritual sons of the bishop, filed lawsuits against Long and his church this week, alleging that the bishop coerced them into sexual activity. On Friday, a fourth made similar allegations against Long, suing Long's satellite church in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Sports presenter Clare Balding's official complaint over an article in the Sunday Times that mocked her sexuality has been upheld.

In July, she complained to the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) over AA Gill's review of her new TV show, in which he called her a dyke on a bike.

The paper defended its columnist on freedom of expression grounds, saying he was well-known for his acerbic and sometimes tasteless sense of humour.

Balding took exception to Gill's review of her show, Britain By Bike, claiming his comments were irrelevant to the programme.

But the newspaper argued the term dyke had been reclaimed by various groups as an empowering, not an offensive, term. The paper also drew attention to two organisations, which are both called Dykes on Bikes.

The PCC ruled that the use of the word dyke in the article - whatever its intention - was a pejorative synonym relating to the complainant's sexuality. The context was not that the reviewer was seeking positively to 'reclaim' the term, but rather to use it to refer to the complainant's sexuality in a demeaning and gratuitous way. As such, it represented a breach of the Code.

Stephen Abell, director of the PCC, said: Freedom of expression is a key part of an open society and something which the Commission has defended robustly in the past. While the commentator is clearly entitled to his opinion about both the programme and the complainant, there are restraints placed upon him by the terms of the Editors' Code. It said the clause was very clear that newspapers must avoid prejudicial, pejorative or irrelevant reference to an individual's sexual orientation and the reference to Miss Balding plainly breached its terms.

The presenter has also asked for the newspaper to apologise.

PinkNews.co.uk readers have complained that their mobile phone providers block access to gay websites – with five of the major companies implicated.

Last week, PinkNews revealed that T-Mobile blocks gay news, travel and support websites which contain no offensive content, including PinkNews.co.uk.

Since then, Virgin Mobile, 3, O2 and Vodafone have also been flagged by readers as blocking gay websites. Some readers have reported that websites such as Stonewall.org.uk, which offers advice on issues such as homophobic bullying, are also blocked.

The two issues are the blocking of all gay content (including adult content) for those who can prove they are over 18, and the blocking of gay websites which contain no adult content for those under 18.

Sixteen-year-old reader Harriet Bettany told us: I'm with Virgin Mobile and am unable to access most LGBT-related websites. Amongst those I can't access are the Queer Youth Network and Gay Youth Corner, sites meant for under 18s.Other sites I visit frequently and can't access on my mobile are After Ellen and The Lesbian and Gay Foundation, I can however get onto PinkNews.co.uk. I'm 16 and don't see why I should have to lie about my age to access perfectly innocent sites.

An O2 spokeswoman said that contract customers over the age of 18 could view PinkNews.co.uk on their phones but admitted that those under the age of 18 cannot.

The owners of PinkNews.co.uk are considering whether there are grounds for a legal case. Company secretary and solicitor to PinkNews.co.uk, Richard Cohen, said: This might be a breach of the Equality Act and it is damaging to gay young people who need to access information about their sexuality. Clearly, they are not going to call up a customer services advisor to complain.

A leading catholic has blamed abortion and gay rights for turning Britain into a selfish, hedonistic wasteland which has become the geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death.

Edmund Adamus, director of pastoral affairs at the diocese of Westminster and an adviser to Archbishop Vincent Nichols, said Parliament had turned Britain into a country which is more culturally anti-Catholic than nations where Christians are violently persecuted such as Saudi Arabia, China and Pakistan.

His comments, made with only weeks to go before Pope Benedict XVI's historic state visit to Britain, will cause embarrassment between organisers of the visit and government officials, because they reveal how some members of the Church's hierarchy believe that the pontiff is travelling to a hostile and anti-Catholic country.

In an interview with Zenit, a Catholic news agency, Adamus railed against five decades of equality legislation and the availability of abortion services in modern Britain: Whether we like it or not, as British citizens and residents of this country – and whether we are even prepared as Catholics to accept this reality and all it implies – the fact is that historically, and continuing right now, Britain, and in particular London, has been and is the geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death. Our laws and lawmakers for over 50 years have been the most permissively anti-life and progressively anti-family and marriage, in essence one of the most anti-Catholic landscapes, culturally speaking – more than even those places where Catholics suffer open persecution.

The expression culture of death was first coined by John Paul II and is frequently used by Catholic traditionalists as a catch-all phrase covering the practice of abortion, euthanasia and capital punishment.

In the same interview, he spoke at length about marriage and the role of men and women, pleading with Catholics to exhibit counter-cultural signals against the selfish, hedonistic wasteland that is the objectification of women for sexual gratification. Britain in particular, with its ever-increasing commercialisation of sex, not to mention its permissive laws advancing the 'gay' agenda, is such a wasteland.

Adamus's comments, however, drew widespread criticism from gay rights groups and secularists. Peter Tatchell, a leading figure behind the Protest the Pope coalition, said: The suggestion that gay equality laws make Britain a moral wasteland is insulting but not unexpected. The Pope supports legal discrimination against gay people. He says we are not entitled to equal human rights. [But] to claim that Britain is the centre of a culture of death is absurd. We are a world leader in scientific research to develop new medical treatments to save lives and we make a significant contribution to helping combat hunger and poverty in developing countries.

Christian protesters who picketed the Manchester Pride parade could be banned from the streets during next year's event.

Council chiefs are 'outraged' that around 20 placard-waving demonstrators – many from the conservative pressure group Christian Voice – were allowed to disrupt the event.

They gathered outside the John Rylands Library on Deansgate as more than 100 floats – celebrating Greater Manchester's gay, lesbian, bisexual and trangender communities – went past.

Members of the protest were filmed shouting sinful and wicked at people taking part in Saturday's parade.

The group was largely drowned out by the whistle-blowing crowd of thousands – and Lord of the Rings actor Sir Ian McKellen gave them an ironic wave as he led the procession. But town hall bosses believe the protesters overstepped the mark.

They now plan to work with police to see whether anti-hate laws can be used to ban similar scenes at Pride next summer.

Pat Karney, the council's city centre spokesman, said such protests had no place in Manchester. He said: I will be meeting organisers and police to make sure that next year people are not subject to these vile, hate-filled rantings. This is 2010, not 1950, and young gay men and women should not be subjected to this hatred. We have a proud history in Manchester of freedom of speech but there is no place for this. I am a Christian and I believe that these people are a terrible advert for Christianity. There are things we can do using hate laws to make sure they do not come back.

Stephen Green, national director of Christian Voice, said: It is a very sad day for this country when the authorities want to clamp down on the teachings of the Gospel. This is a major assault on freedom of speech.

Employees at Roskilde Town Hall are in uproar over a picture showing two Duplo figures having gay sex and want the work removed from the building.

Administrators at the town hall have received at least three internal complaints over the piece by artist Svend Ahnstrøm, which depicts the characters Kurt and Anders smiling as they enjoy themselves in a public park.

Ahnstrøm's exhibition is being displayed in the building by the local art association, and in addition to the gay sex piece, features Duplo depictions of Hitler, Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden.

But Henrik Kolind, spokeman for Roskilde Council, said the administration would not take the picture down because it is the art association that determines which works are displayed: We have freedom of expression in Denmark, and the association asked for my approval of the exhibition and got it.

As for Ahnstrøm himself, he said he did not expect the works to cause such controversy. He added that he did not think the same objections would be voiced if the piece featured a man and a woman having sex: It's hard to believe that something like this can offend people in today's Denmark.

A group of young Muslim men have been publicly flogged in Sudan after they were convicted of wearing women's clothes and make-up.

The court said the 19 men had broken Sudan's strict public morality codes.

Police arrested them at a party where they were found dancing in a womanly fashion, the judge said.

The men were not represented in court and said nothing in their defence, some hid their faces from the hundreds of people who watched as they were lashed.

The sentence of 30 lashes was carried out as soon as the court in Omdurman, near Khartoum, gave its ruling. They must also pay fines of as much as 1,000 Sudanese pounds ($400, £252).

One lawyer, who did not want to be named, told Reuters news agency the men had not received a fair trial: These people did not get a chance for justice, public opinion and the media prejudged them and lawyers were too scared to come and defend them.

Newspapers had called the party a same sex wedding.

A US federal judge has overturned California's voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage.

The judge found it unconstitutionally discriminated against same-sex couples who sought to wed.

The state measure, known as Proposition 8, was passed by voters in 2008. It banned same-sex marriage, although the state offered same-sex civil unions. The measure was passed in a ballot referendum by a vote of 52% to 48%.

Backers of the ban intend to appeal against the judge's ruling. The case is likely to reach the US Supreme Court.

The ruling does not immediately allow California same-sex couples to marry, as US District Judge Vaughn Walker has delayed final entry of his judgement so he can hear arguments on whether to stay the ruling, pending appeal.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger quickly welcomed the judgement: For the hundreds of thousands of Californians in gay and lesbian households who are managing their day-to-day lives, this decision affirms the full legal protections and safeguards I believe everyone deserves. At the same time, it provides an opportunity for all to consider our history of leading the way to the future, and our growing reputation of treating all people and their relationships with equal respect and dignity.

In his ruling, Judge Walker permanently forbade enforcement of the same-sex marriage ban. Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage licence. Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California constitution the notion that opposite sex couples are superior to same-sex couples. Because California has no interest in discriminating against gay men and lesbians, and because Proposition 8 prevents California from fulfilling its constitutional obligation to provide marriages on an equal basis, the court concludes that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional.

Christian Voice nutter Stephen Green had his moment on Channel 4's 4ThoughtTV. He spouted:

We are seeing a homosexualisation of society, but not reproducing ourselves except in the Muslim population. It's not Muslim mums' fault that they are having five or six children, they are doing what the Lord God designed their bodies to do, but in 30 years our dying civilisation is going to be taken over by a stronger one and the obvious candidate is Islam and the gays aren't going to like it much living under that system.

It was homosexual rights vs. religion last week in Jerusalem as some 3,000 Israelis joined a gay pride parade, marching with colorful balloons and dancing in the streets.

The march infuriated Orthodox Jews. Yonatan Gher, one of the parade organizers, said: The reason the march takes place in Jerusalem is not to upset anyone. We're here because we're Jerusalemites. This is our city as much as anybody else's.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews held counter-demonstrations, carrying signs that read: Sick perverts, get out of Jerusalem. Many agree with this man who says that the Bible describes homosexuality as an abomination.

The promotion of a gay lifestyle in the streets of Jerusalem, which is the holiest city for the Jewish people, [and] for the other religions - for Muslims, for Christians - it's a provocation said one Orthodox Jewish man.

The march ended up at the Knesset, Israel's parliament, with a memorial service for two Israelis who were killed in a shooting at a gay club in Tel Aviv last year. Gay rights activists like Gher say religious leaders should learn from that event.

When you keep talking about abomination and about the way the Bible looks at the issue of homosexuality, there are individuals out there who could turn those words into violence, said Gher.

To prevent violence, about 1,500 Israeli police officers guarded the Gay Pride Parade, which meant about one police officer for every two participants in the event.

An Italian Catholic diocese has denounced homosexual priests for their double life and said they should not be in the priesthood.

The Diocese of Rome was responding to a magazine article on three homosexual priests that gave details of alleged sexual encounters and trips to clubs.

The diocese said the honour of all the others was sullied by their behaviour.

The Church holds that all sexual activity outside marriage is sinful and regards homosexual acts as unnatural. '

The article in the conservative magazine Panorama, entitled Gay Priests' Nights on the Town, carried pictures and interviews with the men. The research was carried out over a month using hidden cameras. It recorded sexual encounters, including one in a church building.

The Australian film censor has banned a film from screening at the Melbourne International Film Festival, a work described as gay zombie porn.

Festival director Richard Moore received a letter yesterday from the Film Classification Board director Donald McDonald, stating that L.A. Zombie, the latest offering from Canadian provocateur Bruce LaBruce, could not be screened as it would in his opinion be refused classification.

The festival is not generally required to submit films for classification, but after reading a synopsis of the plot of L.A. Zombie, which features wound penetration and implied sex with corpses, the Classification Board requested a DVD to watch, and then refused to issue an exemption.

Government efforts to prevent same sex couples from marrying are unlawful and have already failed – but so far, officials and Ministers are staying as quiet as they can on the matter, in the hope that nobody will notice.

That is the conclusion of sexual rights activist and author, Jane Fae, giving her opinion today on the case of Christine Timbrell, a transsexual woman who has been allowed to draw a pension as a woman and to remain married to her female partner.

According to Jane:

Ever since the Government instituted the idea of civil partnerships, they have attempted to hold an absolute line against same sex couples getting married.

To enforce this separation – marriage for man and woman, civil partnership for man and man or woman and woman – they even included provision in the Gender Re-assignment Act 2004 that force a transgendered individual to divorce before their assigned gender can be recognised.

The significance of the Timbrell case is that the courts had already recognised that prior to 2004, the UK's position in respect of transgender was discriminatory. As a consequence, the courts have now allowed Ms Timbrell to draw a pension on the basis that she is – and has been since 2000 – a woman, and to remain married to her female partner, Joy.

This position was made absolutely clear by Lord Justice Aikens. Delivering judgment in this case, he stated that the DWP were wrong to deny her her right to a pension as a woman as from her 60th birthday.

Whilst the Ministry of Justice have claimed that this judgment only applies to pensions, the law does not work that way. The principle of same-sex marriage has been breached. Government policy on this issue is now in tatters.

Five supreme court justices said gay and lesbian asylum seekers should not be expected to exercise discretion in their home countries to avoid persecution. Their ruling met with cheers and applause from campaigners.

Lord Hope, one of the judges, said that for many years some countries had simply insisted homosexuality did not exist, which avoided the evil of persecution.

However, anti-gay sentiment had dramatically worsened in some places, fanned by the rampant homophobic teaching that right-wing evangelical Christian churches indulge in throughout much of sub-Saharan Africa and the ultra-conservative interpretation of Islamic law that prevails in Iran.

The gulf was set grow, he said. More and more gays and lesbians are likely to have to seek protection here as protection is being denied to them by the state in their home countries.

The home secretary, Theresa May, said the ruling was a vindication of the coalition government's decision to halt the deportation of asylum seekers whose sexual orientation had put them at proven risk of imprisonment, torture or execution: I do not believe it is acceptable to send people home and expect them to hide their sexuality to avoid persecution. Asylum decisions will be considered under the new rules.

The Liberal Democrat deputy leader, Simon Hughes, said he hoped the ruling would go some way to restoring Britain's reputation as a human rights haven. He appealed to other countries to follow.

But Sir Andrew Green, chairman of the campaign group Migrationwatch, said the ruling could apply to millions of people around the world. He added: An applicant has now only to show that he or she is homosexual and intends to return and live openly in one of the many countries where it is illegal, to be granted asylum in the UK. The Home Office said this was unlikely, as each individual had to prove they faced a personal threat of persecution or imprisonment.

Grindr brought gay men together via the iPhone. Grindr 2.0 will aim at the straight sex market

The phenomenal success of a phone application that allows cruising gay men to locate one another instantly using GPS technology has led to plans for the release of a straight version by the end of the year.

The app, Grindr, which promises to help users Find gay, bi, curious guys for free near you!, launched in March 2009. It enjoyed a modest uptake in the UK until Stephen Fry showed it to Jeremy Clarkson on Top Gear, prompting 40,000 men to download the free iPhone app in a week.

There are now more than 700,000 men in 162 countries using it, with 2,000 downloading it every day. A Blackberry-friendly version was launched last month.

Users see a grid displaying photos of men and their proximity to them. If you like the look of someone, you can exchange flirty messages before meeting up immediately. One fan of the app told the Observer: I've probably had as much [sex] in the past eight months of Grinding as I have over the 20 years since I came out.

Grindr is the brainchild of Joel Simkhai, a 33-year-old American international relations and economics graduate who worked in finance in his twenties. It took him six months and $5,000 to build Grindr, with the help of a Danish app developer and a friend who was an expert in branding, marketing and design. It's about finding guys. Being among your peers. Socialising, he said.

The rapid success of Grindr is prompting Simkhai to launch a straight version. This notion of: 'Who is around me? Who is in this room now? Who else is like me?' – this is not just a gay thing. Gay men don't have the monopoly on loneliness and isolation.

An Iranian youth in Tabriz has been sentenced to death by hanging for the charge of having homosexual relations.

Mohammad Mostafai, attorney for the accused announced that three other people accused in the case were acquitted of the same crime.

According to Iranian law, homosexual relations are against the law and given the death penalty.

Four were accused of having homosexual relations and were sentenced to death in the preliminary court. Mosatafai adds after appealing to the Supreme Court, three of them were acquitted while Ebrahim Hamidi's death sentence was upheld.

Nutters against a planned lap-dancing club in Newcastle's gay quarter are celebrating victory.

Members of the city's gay community fought Trafalgar Leisure's application to turn an empty warehouse on Marlborough Crescent into a bar and lap-dancing venue.

City council officers granted planning permission for the club, despite receiving 16 letters of objection.

A Save Our Scene group set up on social networking site Facebook attracted more than 150 members and a protest website was also set up. Protesters claimed opening a strip club would damage the reputation of the area, popular with the city's gay community, as a safe place to party.

Now Trafalgar Leisure has said that due to the level of opposition the company will not pursue the idea of a lap-dancing club and will instead apply for a licence to run the premises as a bar.

Westgate councillor Nick Forbes, who campaigned against the plans, said: I'm delighted he has decided to reconsider. It shows he has been willing to listen to the community and think of alternative plans. I'm very grateful to everyone who put forward their views and I think it shows what we can achieve as a community if we work together.