Now you see it, now you don’t, now you do

I don’t know what it says about attitudes that a school in Michigan in the USA edited the word “gay” out of a Christmas song.

Well, it was the music teacher, according to this story. Then the school put the word back again.

It comes in a line in “Deck the Halls”, which reads “Don we now our gay apparel.” Your humble blogger makes use of the line in a Christmas article in the new Pink Humanist

The teacher took the word “gay” out and substituted “bright”, not necessary because she was homophobic, but because the pesky kids giggled every time they sang it.

Even allowing that kids will be kids, it says something about the way the word is still used as a minor insult, or that homosexuality is somehow funny (well, it can be funny, but we’re not talking Alan Carr here).

Sir Cliff and gay marriage (and other things about being gay)

We’ve often wondered about the . . . you know, the sexuality of Cliff Richard. But it’s something he doesn’t like to talk about.

However, he’s come out this week. I mean, come out in favour of gay marriage, not come out.

He’s also come out in favour of assisted suicide, it seems, because he’s been talking about a pact he has with his sister about not wanting to be allowed to linger in this life if he should ever suffer from dementia.

As for gay marriage, he reckons other people should have the same rights as his gay friends.

As for his own sexuality, Digital Journal has this to say:

Richard (71) – who became Sir Cliff in 1995 when he was knighted – has always avoided talking about his own sexuality. He currently lives with a former Catholic priest, John McElynn, whom he describes as his property manager.

When asked about his sexuality, he has said it’s the commitment that counts. “[L]et’s face it, homosexuality has been legal for more than thirty years,” he says in his autobiography, My Life, My Way (written with Penny Junor). “I’ll leave the judging to God.”

Keanu Reeves

OK, we don’t exactly go along with the God stuff here on PT, and, if he is . . . you know, gay, it might be an idea to be honest about it, and that might just go a long way to helping others to come to terms with their own sexuality.

But, really, I suppose it shouldn’t matter – just shouldn’t matter what a person’s sexuality is. I recall some years ago that the Hollywood actor Keanu Reeves refused to talk about his own sexuality because he thought that to do so might suggest that homosexuality was somehow wrong.

You may be interested in this 1996 article, reproduced here from USA Today, in which says (among other things about Reeves):

Still, rumors of his ambiguous sexuality flourish. To the suggestion that his refusal to set the record, er, straight only feeds the rumors: “I don’t know why anyone cares, and I don’t know if it matters or not. I just, uh, I don’t—”

Silence, shrugs.

“It’s, you know, the whole aspect of coming out. I mean there is a whole, people, you know, who are gay [who] have decided that it can be – that whole thing about calling people out – and you have to share that, because there needs to be an equality and a lack of prejudice, and you need to have a voice, so I mean, it’s important, but I’m not involved in those dynamics and I have no point of view on it.”

Well, I’m not sure he ever has set the record straight, but, really, should it matter? You may argue that it does, because people who are – for whatever reason – looked up to could set an example and show they have no problem with their own homosexuality.

Perhaps coming out is more important at this cusp moment in our history when there are plenty of people in public and celeb life who are OK with being openly gay and turning up to functions with their boy/girlfriends on their arms, but there are still so many frightened people trying to come to terms with their sexuality and not daring to tell anyone.

The former might do the latter a big favour.

Doctor Who’s Sarah Jane is dead

Elizabeth Sladen: 1948–2011

Those who aren’t Doctor Who fans can look away if they wish, but there are many gay people who are fans (a disproportionate number, some have said), so it’s sad news that Doctor Who companion Elisabeth Sladen, who played Sarah Jane Smith, has died of cancer.

She was one of the early companions when she was young, but a spin-off series called The Sarah Jane Adventures came about only a few years ago and was shown on the BBC kids’ channel, CBBC. Although an adult approaching my prime (ahem!), I watched it, because I loved her character (and it was part of my longstanding loyalty to the Who franchise). As well as being, for me, a wonderful actress in this role, she was very attractive, and didn’t look her 63 years (probably 59 or 60 when she began in The Sarah Jane Adventures).

Sometimes, the death of one person you didn’t know affects you more than that of another person you didn’t know. It’s subjective, but there it is.

One scene sticks in my mind. When the older Sarah Jane met the Doctor again for the first time in years (it was the David Tennant Doctor, the tenth), there was a kind of electricity between the two actors’ faces. She knew who he was, of course (probably his having just stepped out of the TARDIS was a bit of a giveaway), but that brief moment displayed in a few facial expressions something of her power as an actor – something maybe not as easy to achieve in the clinical, stop-go environment of a studio as on a stage, where an actor is very much immersed in the character from 7.30 to 9.30.

I suspect the Doctor Who fan sites are lit up with tributes. You can make a start, if you’re interested, by going to this one, which gives a roundup of the press reaction to Sladen’s death, and links to obits and tributes galore.

Nifty nuptials

If you really feel you must mark the wedding of two people you don’t know, who are tying their knot later this month in London, where traffic will no doubt be held up for the duration and taxpayer money will be spent on the lavishness of it all, then watch this video instead. OK, it’s an ad for T-Mobile, but you don’t have to rush out and buy one. Just enjoy.

I suspect most will have seen it, anyway, because it’s just about gone viral. However, I’m impressed by the lookalikes they’ve found. Often, not even comedy programmes on the telly get things as close as some of those dancing down the isle of Westminster Cathedral, er, Abbey, er Parish Church, whatever.

Meanwhile, it seems Britons are more sensible than many give them credit for, if this report is anything to go by. There won't be many of us celebrating, it seems.

Gay is a choice, says jackass Justin

Teen heartthrob Justin Bieber . . .

Oh, such journalese!

Anyway, teen heartthrob Justin Bieber has shown that he's as naïve as he is cute by saying that being gay is a matter of choice – a decision.

Just to show what a silly little boy he is, he has added that abortion is wrong, even if the mother-to-be has been raped.

Oh, Justin, you've got a bit of growing up to do. Sorry if that sounds patronising, coming from an old git, but, Jesus, there are times when you just gotta tell a kid he's a dumbass motherfucker.

Pink News says: "When asked [by Rolling Stone mag] what his views on homosexuality are, Bieber responded: 'It’s everyone’s own decision to do that. It doesn’t affect me and shouldn’t affect anyone else.'

"It is not clear whether he intended to label homosexuality as a lifestyle choice."

Sounds like it to this humble blogger. Either his views will mature and he'll regret his childish outburst, or he'll reach adulthood thinking like this – and then sensible people can really have a go at him.

Mind you, this is the young man who told the Guardian in November last year: "I pray all the time. I pray two to three times a day. When I wake up I thank him for my blessings. I thank him for putting me in this position. And at the end of the day I get out my Bible. At home-school my tutor is Christian, so we go over Bible verses. It's something that keeps me grounded."

Pass the sick bucket, somebody.

How the BBC ‘offended’ Christians

Yeah, but where’s the halo?

I’ve been watching The Nativity on BBC1. Not bad as these things go. I like TV drama, and I don’t really care – when a drama is based on myth – which myth the said drama is depicting.

Note the word “myth”. Were it about, say, the ancient Greek pantheon or the stories in the Bhagavad Gita I’d probably still enjoy it – if it were well enough written and performed. The Nativity is OK – not brilliant, but watchable. So I committed four half-hours to watching it.

Now it seems that some Christians don’t like it. That may surprise you, until you learn that it’s because the so-called Virgin Mary is “portrayed” as a whore.

I happened on a Christian website called The Way the other day, and on an undated page one Amanda Hopkins writes a short post beginning: “Christians have reacted angrily to a BBC production which portrayed the Virgin Mary as a prostitute.”

She cites the Daily Express. Whether that was her only source, I can’t say, but just hang onto the word “portrayed” for a moment.

Now see what the Daily Express said on 19 December: “The BBC has angered Christians with a TV drama in which the Virgin Mary is branded a prostitute and sex cheat” (emphasis mine).

I fly no flag for abominable rags such as the Express, but it got it right – in that regard anyway, since we’ll for the moment put aside the notion that the BBC angered Christians, when it was they who chose to be angered (and then it was only Stephen Green and his nutcase Christian Voice outfit).

So you see the sleight of phraseology here. The Way says the production “portrayed” Mary as a whore; the Express says that, within the drama, she was “branded” such. And that’s the way it was: characters branded her a whore and spat on her and threw stones at her.

But such is the myopia of so many Christians and others of the Bewildered Herd that they can’t separate the doings of characters from the intentions of a television network. I left a comment pointing out the misleading nature of the intro, but, predictably, up to the time of writing this it had not been used, yet some that came after had been used.

Chances are that, if there was such a girl who gave birth to the guy who was eventually portrayed as the Messiah, she’d have been bonked by a Roman soldier or passing goatherd. One pundit a few years ago put forward a similar theory, anyway, in a docudrama on TV about Mary.

But it does raise an interesting question: what if she had had a bit of nookie on the side and then found she had a bun in the oven? She would lie about it, probably say she was raped.

And then the entire Christian world would turn out to have been based on one teenage girl’s lame and pathetic excuse for not having kept her hand on her ha’penny when some hunk in a tunic happened by and gave her the wink.

“It was the Archangel Gabriel, Joe, honest. He says I’m carrying the Light of the World in my womb.”

“Oh, all right, then.”

The alpha and the omega

This may surprise you, but I’ve already selected next week’s four-part BBC drama The Nativity on my DVR. I watched that Passion thing, too, the other year – the one with Joseph Mawle as JC.

I like dramas. Whether they’re based on facts or myths or entirely made up from scratch, it doesn’t matter. The Passion – JC’s personal omega, if you like – was not challenging and, like the curate’s egg, good in places. Mawle was good.

I suspect The Nativity – his alpha – won’t challenge me, either, although it is written by Tony Jordan of Ashes to Ashes and Hustle fame. So good form.

But will it be mawkish and Christmas-card-ish, or will there be something new brought to it? Who knows? Suck it and see.

I suspect I’ll end up preferring this video below, which is amusing. Not sure whether it’s sincere or a piss-take, but it’s a hoot, and tells the story of the supposed Nativity in emails, social networking and other forms of online communication – including trying to book tickets to Bethlehem.

Enjoy.

Author of Springer has become a creationist!

Stewart Lee has converted to creationism. I kid you not. This creator of Jerry Springer: The Opera, this stand-up comedian and writer who had ridiculed religion for as long as I’ve been aware of him, believes in God. And he’s praising “militant atheist” Richard Dawkins for it (oh, the quote marks there are not quoting Lee, but the usual suspects for whom anyone who questions religionists’ claims or demands facts is a militant, rabid atheist, out to get them).

Anyway, take a look at this very short video below. It will explain all!

British ad watchdog cosies up to Catholic Church

If ever you needed proof that those in any kind of authority are only too pleased to accommodate those of odd persuasions, you need look no further than Britain’s Advertising Standards Authority.

On the strength of just half a dozen complaints it has banned an ad showing two male priests about to kiss.

You couldn’t make it up.

Left-wing atheists spitting venom? Oh, dear!

The Daily Mail never ceases to amaze me. In this story about Pope Ratzinger’s visit to the UK – which began yesterday in Scotland and continues in London today – it talks of how the 50-odd notable scientists, writers and entertainers who signed a letter critical of the visit were “spitting venom”.

As well as the “spitting venom” accusation (you need to scroll down to the second story to see this, or search on “Pope hit by a celebrity vendetta”, for there are two on the same page), the article adds that those who signed the letter were a “parade of celebrities – many of them Left-wing atheists”.

I suppose they needed to add “left-wing” to make the atheists sound a bit worse, and needed “atheists” (which I don’t think all the signatories are, incidentally) to make the left-wingers sound worse. A “parade of atheist left-wingers” would have done the trick equally well.

Believe it or not, these pieces come in the news section. No reporting of the news in the Mail, no down-the-middle straight reportage, telling it like it is. No, left-wing atheists have to be spitting venom.

It’s not what I’d call journalism. Put it in the opinion section, by all means. Everyone’s entitled to his/her opinion, after all, and you’d expect this sort of opinion in the Mail (the Daily Hate, as it’s often been called).

The piece – by Steve Doughty – goes on to examine one by one some of the signatories, and picks out the excellent fantasy author Terry Pratchett, an Alzheimer’s sufferer who has “claimed the right to assisted suicide”. The implication is, of course, that this is somehow a venomous, left-wing, atheist, and therefore bad, thing to do.

Journalism? You decide.

Tick-tock-tick-tock

Tick-Tock Muhammad: something
else to get Muslims jumping

We’ve all seen the “Turbomb” picture – the one that was published (among others) a few years ago by the Danish paper Jyllands-Posten and upset Muslims so much that they started killing people. Now there’s a new take on it.

The ESHE streetware clothing company in Australia has produced a series of images, including the T-shirt you see here (called “Tick-Tock Muhammad”), one called “Pedo Pope” and some wallpaper of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

The Great Divide

A talented chap called Chris Jones of the band the Great Divide has sent us this:

I manage a Liverpool-based guitar band who are planning to release a single to coincide with the Pope’s visit to the UK.

The song is a comment on religion in the 21st century and all profits from UK sales will be donated to a secular based charity that works with victims of child abuse (for example NAPAC).

As I’m sure you are aware, the medium of music can be a very powerful influence, especially on young ears, and we feel this is a real opportunity to reach out to a generation and promote the secular message. The young people of today are tomorrow’s decision makers and if we can persuade individuals to start to question the role of religion within society, then perhaps, within the not too distant future, we could see the influence it exerts start to diminish.

The recording has already taken place. You can, however, listen to a rough mix of the song @ www.soundcloud.com/thegreatdivide.

Whilst I appreciate the genre may not be to everyone’s taste we feel the song has the ability to cross over in to the mainstream of popular music and is an ideal platform to promote the secular message, stimulate debate and engage young people.

I’ve listened to it. It sounds good. Give it a try.

I can’t say how long it’ll remain on this site, so, if you’re coming to this post some weeks down the line and it’s not there, you’ll know why.

Stampede deaths are God’s punishment? Yeah, right!

Enjoying a music festival is sinful, and God punishes participants by killing some of them and injuring hundreds of others. Hmm. Sounds like something right out of the Old Testament – think plagues of boils, deaths of firstborn, that kind of thing.

But it’s hardly surprising, really, because this idea comes from the pen of Bishop Andreas Laun of Salzburg, commenting on a Love Parade held in Duisburg on 24 July, and he’s a Catholic, and Catholics believe in all kinds of . . . But I needn’t go on.

Twenty-one people died in this “sinful event”, which, says this man of questionable sanity, is “a rebellion against creation and against God’s order, [which] are sins and an invitation to sin”.

More than 500 people were injured, too, when a bottleneck formed as revellers tried to get into the festival.

“Writing on the German-language website Kath.net,” says the story linked to above, “Mr Laun warned against judging the dead. At the same time, he indirectly linked the deaths to God’s right to punish apostates – those who turn their back on the true faith.

“The provocative comments are expected to draw outrage from victims’ families and survivors. The remarks from such a senior member of the clergy are also feared to draw the embattled church hierarchy into further criticism of its rigid attitude to modern society.

“In recent months the church has tried to weather storms over successive child abuse claims, a lack of sympathy to predator priests’ victims and a crisis of legitimacy.

“A memorial service was attended by the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, amid assertions that the parade would never be held again.”

Homophobic – er, ex-homophobic – rapper says gay marriage is OK

Eminem has come out in favour of gay marriage? Really? Is this the guy who rapped in the, er, rap called “Criminal”, “Hate fags? The answer’s ‘yes’”?

Oh well, we must be thankful, I suppose. Some people change, and that’s to be applauded.

For the record, he’s quoted as saying, “I think if two people love each other, then what the hell? I think that everyone should have the chance to be equally miserable, if they want.”

So in favour of gay marriage, but not too hot on marriage per se.

The realities of self-censorship

So Rory Bremner, the excellent comedian and satirist, feels he can’t do Islam jokes. Surprise, surprise!

No doubt a whole host of others – comedians, artists, writers, musicians – feel the same.

And what an indictment on the state we find ourselves in when people who are doing genuinely creative work have to self-censor because of people who run their lives according to superstition and imaginary friends and sky fairies.

I don’t object if people feel they can organise their lives according to religious principles, but they shouldn’t expect the rest of us to believe in the same things.

Religion on the sidelines? We hope so!

A poll for the BBC reckons we in the UK are shunning religion. Good thing, too!

It’s commissioned a poll for a programme that’s going out on BBC1 tomorrow, Easter Sunday.

Forty-four per cent of people surveyed thought Britons were becoming less tolerant of religion. It’s hardly surprising, considering the business of pervy priests and the fact that religion likes to bleat and moan so much now that secularists are finding a potent voice.

Polly Toynbee will be the token secularist – great representative though she is – in the programme, Are Christians Being Persecuted?, which will go out on BBC1 television, although Shami Chakrabarti from Liberty will be on it, too.

The other voices seem to be religious: Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Westminster; Jonathan Sacks, the Chief Rabbi; and Michael Nazir Ali, the former Bishop of Rochester.

Playing into the hands of racists

Bloody nannies in authority again, thinking they know better than the rest of us.

Nitwits in Dudley in the English West Midlands have banned an acclaimed play that features homophobia and racism because – well, because it features homophobia and racism.

So it seems such matters can’t be discussed now, because oversensitive prats think they know better. The issues raised by the play are not “suitable for a school and community setting for the venue”, say the nannies, even though the play seeks to show up these things.

Chances are they’re philistines who know bugger all about theatre. But who am I to say? Maybe they’re not philistines – but are acting like idiots. Whatever. It just seems to be so much more of the nanny state we’re living in, where those in authority would rather do a national group hug than tackle issues, lest some sensitive souls be offended.

The fact is that it’s designed to show up the very concerns it raises. How do you do that with drama without depicting what it is you’re highlighting? Do you have a play about the KKK without a pointy hood, or a play about gangsters without gangsters?

The play is Moonfleece. It’s the latest offering from the controversial Philip Ridley and was scheduled to be staged in the town last night, two days before a rally by the right-wing group the English Defence League was due to take place in the same town.

The Independent tells us:

Last week, the producer, Will Young, received a message from the theatre informing him that, after lengthy discussions, it had decided not to stage the play for fear of offending the local community. Yesterday, Dudley council said: “The booking was cancelled as the school did not feel some of the issues raised within the play were suitable for a school and community setting.”

Moonfleece is about a young, right-wing activist who finds himself reassessing his beliefs as the brutality of the new-look British National Party (BNP) is exposed. It has a multicultural cast. It’s not a racist play. It's a play about racism. They are two different things.

The play’s director, David Mercatali, said he was “extremely disappointed” by the decision, especially since the play had sparked interesting reactions in the areas it had already shown, which include Bradford and the Aston area of Birmingham.

Will Young, says the Indie, said they had deliberately planned a tour that took in areas where the BNP was popular – Bradford, Leicester, Birmingham, Doncaster and Dudley – before returning to London in April for stints at the Riverside Studios and Greenwich Theatre. “Some residents in Dudley recently began a protest aimed at the building of a mosque, which was finally refused planning permission,” says the paper.

The point being? So some anti-Islam people get twitchy about a mosque, and that’s reason, it seems, for banning a play about racism (not that being anti-Islamic is racist, even if some racist thugs do use it as an excuse to be racist, but we can’t legislate for such attitudes).

Banning this performance just plays into the hands of the monsters it's trying to show up.

Young is further quoted as saying, “It’s about homophobia and racism and he [Ridley] didn’t want it to play in a theatre made up of your usual theatregoers, who are relatively removed from the issues to which the play relates. So we went looking for areas with people who are not big theatre audiences.”

Yup. Sounds sound to me.

Try to look on the bright side of life

I always thought most people's ideas of Jesus – assuming he existed – were a bit of a joke, but get this.

A poster at a church in New Zealand depicting a jokey Jesus on the cross – due to be put up tomorrow – is likely to get Christian twitching.

The cartoon Jesus, is to be erected by St Matthew’s in Aukland. The figure on the cross is saying, “Well this sucks. I wonder if they will remember anything I said . . .”

Perhaps they should have him singing that song from Month Python’s Life of Brian, "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life".

“Tomorrow, which is also April Fools’ Day [and also Maundy Thursday in the Christian calendar], St Matthew’s in Auckland will put up its first billboard of the year, designed to use humour to encourage debate and discussion,” reports the UK Christian think tank Ekklesia. “The poster also draws attention to the tendency of some in the churches to focus exclusively on Jesus’s death as the expense of his teachings.

“Christians who believe that Jesus’s words and example of love and forgiveness should be central to their faith have frequently expressed concern about the actions of some churches who they feel do not take their Bibles seriously, particularly with regard to issues of justice.”

Ekklesia quotes Glynn Cardy, vicar of St Matthew’s, as saying: “There is a great tradition in the Eastern Church of cracking jokes at Easter. Laughing proclaims that despite the realities of suffering and death, the power of life, love and liberty is stronger. The tenacity of the human spirit is God given, and will not be overcome by the forces of oppression.”

On screen and online – the movies and the magazine

The British Film Institute (BFI) has quite a line-up for this year’s annual Lesbian & Gay Film Festival, the 24th, which begins in London on Wednesday – and it includes a world premiere: The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, which will be screened at the Odeon in the West End.

There are several set pieces, including I Killed My Mother, written, produced, directed by and starring 20-year-old Xavier Dolan. The festival ends on 31 March with Children of God, Kareem J Mortimer’s “gorgeously photographed” (according to the BFI) first feature, which tells the classic tale of love unfolding against a backdrop of violent homophobia and social unease in the Bahamas.

The festival will present 75 feature-length films and documentaries, many of which have won awards at other international events, including Brotherhood, Nicolo Donatto’s story of gays in the neo-Nazi movement, and Ander, Roberto Castón’s portrayal of gay rural life in the Basque country.

One of Britain’s oldest gay-campaigning groups, the Campaign for Homosexual Equality, is at the festival for a second year, presenting the CHE Film Prize, which offers a £2,000 prize to the film that best reflects the values and objectives of CHE in its fight for social justice.

FIT FOR PURPOSE

Talking of films, although this has nothing to do with the festival, have a look at Stephen Blake’s article in the latest Gay & Lesbian Humanist magazine on a film called FIT, which looks at homophobia.

Homophobic bullying is rife in Britain’s schools, and it affects gay and straight children alike. This new film by Rikki Beadle-Blair aims to tackle it head on.

Of his own early years, Blake says in the article, “Any young person in this situation [being gay] knows how lonely, debilitating a desperate life can become. It can affect how well a person succeeds at school, and in later life, their self-esteem and how well they get on with their family or friends.”

So it’s a film that’s FIT for purpose, you might say.



AND SO IS G&LH

Have a look at the other stuff in the magazine, too (just click on any of the logos you see throughout this post). Not surprisingly, the Pope comes in for some fierce criticism, and is compared to Adolf Hitler.

He’s due to come to Britain in September, and the magazine’s writers are not too pleased about it. How, G&LH asks, can Britain reconcile what it would claim is a much-needed increase in value-added tax – or VAT – with a costly visit from the Vatican (the other Vat in the magazine’s theme this time)?

“British taxpayers woke up on 1 January to a New Year present from their New Labour government – a massive tax increase in the shape of a whopping 2.5% rise in VAT,” writes editor Mike Foxwell.

“Of course, in fairness to the government, this followed a temporary reduction last year, allegedly to help the economy, and now the party was over. Back to reality. Great Britain PLC is in a financial mess and can no longer afford such indulgent largesse. ‘Tough decisions’ needed to be made if Britain were to get back on its financial feet.

“One’s mind can only boggle, then,” Foxwell continues, “at the toughness of the government’s decision to pledge an estimated £20 million of hard-pressed public resources to a state-sponsored jamboree for Catholics by inviting the Pope over for a state visit later this year. Of course, the real cost is going to be much higher and the government has indicated its preparedness to sign a blank cheque. Probably quite a big one, as the 2008 Australian papal visit cost nearly six times the £20 million estimate for Britain.

“I wonder why the word ‘hypocrisy’ comes into my head.

“It might just about be possible to stomach such public-spending caprice if the Pope were a force for national unity, be it political or social. But, of course, he is quite the opposite. The Pope has recently single-handedly scuppered the Equality Bill that would have given protection to those gay people unfortunate enough to be employed, or seek to be employed, by religious organisations. I have often wondered about the Orwellian connotation of the ‘New’ in ‘New Labour’ – under their administration, everyone is to be equal, but some will be more equal than others.”

Foxwell continues: “Not content with this, His Hatefulness now wants to ensure that pupils of ‘faith’ schools are kept in the dark about essential sexual-health information, which doesn't accord with the strictures of the fantasy world that is organised religion. And this is exactly what will happen if the pernicious amendment to the Children, Schools and Families Bill now going through Parliament is not scraped.

“I seem to remember that Geert Wilders, a democratically elected European politician, was denied entry to Britain because he was said, rightly or wrongly, by the government to be socially divisive.

“Again, why does the word hypocrisy come to mind?”



Pope likened to Hitler

In the mag’s keynote feature this time, therefore, your humble blogger (er, that’s me, folks) reports on the opposition to the official visit of a man who has shielded child-abusing priests, been responsible for countless deaths in Africa and elsewhere of people who could have been saved from disease and pregnancy through the use of condoms, and created a living hell on earth for gay people, many of whom end up as suicide statistics.

Many gay people who end up taking their own lives are young – often very young – and homophobic bullying at school is a significant factor in many of these tragedies.

The Pope is a monster, he says, but, since most heinous things are carried out in total sincerity, how does Joseph Ratzinger differ in this regard from Adolf Hitler?



Young freethinkers

It is a significant shame that children and young people have so little opportunity to have their voices heard, and are, thereby, under-represented in all debates – even ones that affect them directly! Sadly, this is also the case within the mainstream freethought movement. In our “Blogwatch” feature, Michael Campbell explains how submitting work to the big names in the rationalist press can be daunting for young freethinkers like himself, which is why he set up Young Freethought. This new blog has created a lot of interest and has received a message of support from Richard Dawkins.



Coercive religion

That religion is essentially coercive, judgemental and self-serving is hardly news to most readers of G&LH, but is it necessarily so? Mike Foxwell says: “I have always taken the view that I have no problem with what someone chooses to believe in so long as they don’t expect special privileges because of it, or coerce or harm others with it.”

In a very personal story of his early experience of this phenomenon as a child (in his article “Religious abuse”), Neil Richardson expounds a similar view. Richardson, an ordained Anglican priest, believes that abusive religion follows on naturally from false claims to understand the mind of God, to the exclusion of other interpretations, and the desperate need to build a membership of following that will shelter and sustain their own interpretation and maintain a purity of doctrine. This description applies perfectly to the Catholic Church and its “infallible” Pope, as well as the happy-clappy evangelicals.



Gay Jesus?

Groucho Marx famously said he would refuse to join any club that would have him as a member. Although he didn’t say whether he would join one that didn’t want him, which is exactly what gay Christians seem intent on doing! Many of them reconcile the irreconcilable by dint of denial: they pretend that the Church isn’t really homophobic at all. Others, such as Elton John, who has claimed recently that Jesus was gay, resort to plain delusion. As George Broadhead reveals in his article, “Right to lie”, there simply is no evidence that Jesus was gay or even gay-friendly, but plenty of evidence to the contrary.



Gays in sport

Somewhere else where gay people are not particularly welcome is sport. Particularly the brutal macho-man varieties such as rugby. How ironic that the ancient Athenian games, the forerunner of modern sport and athletics, were essentially a homosexual celebration of maleness – all women were excluded from the precinct of Olympia on pain of death!

It’s hardly much of a surprise, really, that this all had to change following Emperor Theodosius’s statute of 390, which punished gay male sex with death. He followed this act of barbarism a year later by ordering Bishop Theophilus to destroy the Great Library of Alexandria. The destruction of this, the greatest storehouse of knowledge and scholarship in the world, marked the beginning of the Roman Church’s Dark Ages, the greatest intellectual and cultural catastrophe to befall humankind, from which the world has not yet recovered.

For sure, sport has certainly not yet emerged from the Dark Ages, and homophobia is rife in all sport today. So, it takes a brave sportsman or -woman to come out and challenge this anti-gay orthodoxy. Such a man is Gareth Thomas: the most capped Welsh rugby player of all time, currently playing for Cardiff Blues, has come out as gay. In my feature, “Out in touch”, your humble blogger (again) tell the full story of how Thomas has become the patron of UK LGBT History Month and his hope that being visible as an openly gay man will help younger players.

Things looked to be improving in the world of soccer, too, with a much anticipated anti-homophobia film, which was due to be launched by the Football Association (FA) at Wembley Stadium on Thursday, 11 February. Unfortunately, the film was not shown. In “FAgs”, Peter Tatchell tells of the consternation caused by this “postponement” among both football and gay groups, and the controversy over claims that the film itself is actually homophobic.



Manly mag

While on the subject of male bastions, even if you are a bio-male (or not!), are you a “real man”? Are you even sure what “being a man” actually means? The more you try to answer this question, the more confusing it all becomes. But worry not: there’s a new magazine called Spunk!

Spunk is troubled that so few bio-men in our communities are openly questioning, (re)interpreting or disrupting their own and others’ privileged positions and practices. We are inheritors of a range of traditions; from sissy-boys and radical effeminacy, to “straight-acting”, gay hyper-masculinity, butch and dominant straight-male gender roles. Spunk wants to question how we relate to our masculinities. Read more in “Spunk”.



Paul Cadmus

Male nudes were a favourite subject of the artist Paul Cadmus, who died ten years ago. Cadmus is featured in our “Out of print” article by Warren Allen Smith, which first appeared in G&LH, Spring 2000. Smith tells us of Cadmus’s life and work and of how the two of them became friends.



To the woods!

Woodland burial is a subject G&LH has touched on in the past. As green awareness and more enlightened religion-free spirituality grows, it is becoming a far more popular funeral option. Regular contributor Neil Richardson attended the opening of the Chiltern Woodland Burial Park, situated at Potkiln Lane, Jordans, in Buckinghamshire. In “Dead wood”, he presents some beautiful photographs of the facility and tells how the park’s policy is one of respect for people of all origins, cultures, faiths and beliefs.



Iran

The plight of gay people in Iran is well known, where many live in fear of homophobic attacks and even death. Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees (IRQR) works tirelessly to find asylum in the West for gay Iranian refugees. In “Railroad’s journey”, Arsham Parsi, IRQR’s executive director, tells of the organisation’s work, its desperate need for funding and how people can become an IRQR supporter for less that the cost of a cup of coffee.



Pole polishing

Finally, even Steven Dean has been driven up the pole by news of the pontiff’s visit to Britain. Find out why he’s no lover of Polish Catholics but has had more kiełbasa than a delicatessen!

Meanwhile, you can catch up on what’s been happening in the news in our regular “News Watch”, “World Watch” and “On the blog” columns.

Once you’ve entered the magazine, just click on the links down the left-hand side to get to these features.

Straight and gay in Tinseltown

There’s an interesting article in the Independent today about gay actors, straight actors and actors who play gay characters.

They seem to make a bigger thing about it in Hollywood than over here in the UK, it seems. Here, we’ve seen, for instance, Russell Tovey in the highly successful TV series Being Human playing George, heterosexual and in love with a woman. But Tovey the actor is gay.

This kind of thing doesn’t play well in America. In the Indie article, British actor Colin Firth talks about how he’s unwittingly complicit in all of this.

“There might be risks for a gay actor coming out [in Hollywood],” he said. “The politics of that are quite complex, it seems to me. If you’re known as a straight guy, playing a gay role, you get rewarded for that. If you’re a gay man and you want to play a straight role, you don’t get cast – and if a gay man wants to play a gay role now, you don’t get cast. I think it needs to be addressed and I feel complicit in the problem. I don’t mean to be. I think we should all be allowed to play whoever – but I think there are still some invisible boundaries which are still uncrossable.”

Glenn Ficarra, the co-writer/director of I Love You Phillip Morris, starring Ewan McGregor and Jim Carrey, said, “People have asked us, ‘Why didn’t you hire gay actors to play these roles?’ Well, there are no gay actors in Hollywood! None of them are out of the closet. With the exception of Ian McKellen, who is too old for the part, it’s exceedingly rare to see that. And it sucks because they’re actors. If a straight guy can play gay, why can’t a gay guy play straight? It’s just as convincing. But there’s this perception in marketing, somehow the public can’t overcome this idea of, ‘There’s a gay guy kissing that straight woman – my God!’ I don’t understand that.”

So what’s the difference between British audiences and American? Why can Russell Tovey, a gay man, play a straight man (well, werewolf) and be seen kissing a woman passionately and not ruffle feathers over here?

I for one find no problem with that, any more than I find a problem with a straight actor playing a gay guy. And that’s the way it should be. Acting is a job. You do your job well, you get the plaudits (and the money), and it shouldn’t matter whether you’re gay or straight.

I wouldn’t wish to see some sort of positive discrimination whereby only gays are chosen to play gay and straights to play straight.