The Gaily News

UK:
Devonshire: A single complaint from a visitor to a Devonshire library has caused one of the UK’s most successful HIV awareness campaigns to be banned. An advert showing a couple holding a sign saying “We’d rather fuck than watch T.V.” It puts an upcoming campaign in jeopardy as this talks about oral sex, blow jobs and fucking. The GMFA are wondering how they are meant to promote safe sex without using these words. Matthew Hodson, from GMFA said he was “shocked at the ruling.” He added “I’d say we’re buggered – but I’m not sure I’m allowed to.”
Source: pinkpaper.com

My take: At least GMFA have a sense of humour about this. I think the person who made the complaint needs to think long and hard about what they have done. Deaths are on your hands because of your prudishness whoever you are!!

USA: Young gay college students were turned down when they attempted to enlist at military recruitment centres in Austin, Chicago, & Oklahoma City. This comes as recruitment drives have fallen short monthly for more than a year. “President” Bush ordered thousands of Marine Corps troops back to active duty in the first involuntary recall since the early days of the Iraq war, even though the number of troops being thrown out of the military continues to grow.
Last week 11 sit-in protestors were arrested at a Philadelphia recruiting centre.
Source: 365day.com

My take: As has been said many times before: We are “allowed to fuck a man but not fight for him,” which is ridiculous. It proves, to me at least, that people like Bush are preventing us from becoming the “acceptable” people that THEY want us to be! They say that we are against god, but aside from sex, we are the same, but just aren’t being allowed to BE the same. I would imagine that patriotic Americans are frustrated that they cannot fight for their country and are being made to feel less American for it. It just doesn’t make sense at all, but that is about normal for the Bush administration.

New York: The venue where it all began, the Stonewall Inn, is to close. Greenwich Village has undergone a slow transformation from dive to desirable, but there is no place for the old Stonewall Inn. The rent of $20000 a month makes it unlikely that the new owners will run it as a bar.
Source: pinkpaper.co.uk

My take: Although I’ve never been there, it seems to me that Stonewall Inn should be preserved. It has a major place in modern gay history. It is the start of “us” becoming a more public and ultimately more accepted part of society who are willing to stick up for our own rights. I would love a gay consortium to buy the property and use it for projects to aid the local community, fund raising and public events. As a symbolic starting place it should, maybe, also be a starting place for other events which aid the gay community and the worldwide community as a result. How about converting it into a chapel for gay marriages, if they ever become legal in the state of New York? Or at least a place for partnership blessings to take place?