Hozier: Take Me To Church

Hollywood: Now Even Worse Than Russia!

A survey by the Screen Actors' Guild has concluded that significant discrimination against LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) performers persists in the entertainment industry. A third of respondents felt that the entertainment industry was biased against LGBT performers, while on-set prejudice appears to be rife: over half the LGB actors who responded said they had heard directors and actors make "anti-gay comments".

The Guardian et al.

Sorry?!!

Some people said they heard someone say "fag"?

Or another "cuss-word" or "anti-gay slur".

Even ironically?

How exactly am I meant to give a fuck?

PS Hollywood hates LGBT actors, new study reveals Could anyone but Gay Star News come up with such a ludicrous, inaccurate, hysterical headline?

Kenneth Halliwell: Erasure

Kenneth Halliwell: lover, killer... artist?

He has always been known as playwright Joe Orton's lover – and killer. But, beyond his celebrated library book jokes, is it time we started taking Kenneth Halliwell seriously as an artist?

Good piece in The Guardian by Philip Hoare.
Ironically illustrated by a photo of Joe, not Ken.

PS Fagburn has been to their flat!
It's tiny.
You can see why Joe kept going out cottaging.
And how Ken ended up - quite literally - driving Joe up the wall.

Mr Laurie Lee: Bona Queen Of Fabularity

Mr Laurie Lee asks "What is a queen?"
Then answers it.
Full of fabularity!

"'Ere! You ain't takin' the piss out of us are ya? Listen, I'll tell you something, I get paid for making people laugh, and I object to you two 'avin' it for nothing, alright?!"

PS Thanks to my close personal showbiz friend, Mr George "Kicks like a mule" O'Dowd.

Fagburn: Where Are They Now?

I am Lawrence of Arabia in Dorset.
I am Lawrence from Felt in Belgravia.
I am Wittgenstein in Norway.
I am Gramsci in prison.
I am Oscar Wilde in Paris.
I am Peter Cook in Hampstead.
I am JD Salinger in New Hampshire.
I am Mark E Smith in Edinburgh.
I am Bobby Fischer in Pasadena, Budapest, the Philippines, Iceland. 
I am Thoreau at Walden.
I am Larry David in Hollywood.
I am Holden Caulfield in hospital.
I am Nietzsche in the nuthouse.
Ted Kaczynski in Montana.
Maybe even Morrissey in Rome.
Unhome alone.

I am nothing and
and I am okay being nothing just for now, thank you,
among all the other disappointed,
disillusioned,
disappeared.

Biding my time.

Coalition: Marriage Wrecker

This story - Cracks In The Coalition Marriage - made the front page of The Sunday Telegraph today.

The start of a party conference is when broadsheets try and do some serious yacht-rocking, often with a serialisation of some "tell-all memoirs" - as with Damian McBride's in the Mail before Labour's last week.*
Happily for Dave in Telegraphland this has been overshadowed by his mortgage stunt, "foreign beggars", and the ghost of Margaret Thatcher.
They still must consider gaymarriage the most damning extract from In It Together; Matthew d'Ancona's "insider's story about the coalition", which "reveals furious rows between ministers threatened to tear it apart – and David Cameron’s support for gay marriage provoked such a backlash he wondered if it was worth the cost."
The Telegraph was the newspaper most virulently opposed to equal marriage, of course [See Fagburn passim ad nauseum].

'What they don’t want is to roll up to a church and find Derek and Clive having their wedding”: thus, in a conversation early in 2013, did the Prime Minister explain to his advisers the resistance of Tory party members to same-sex marriage.
The image of Dudley Moore getting married to Peter Cook – the original, awesomely profane Derek and Clive – was an arresting one, and not quite what Cameron had meant. His point was that Conservative activists were generally opposed to gay marriage only if it meant change in their places of worship.
A secular reform could be managed, he believed. As he would later admit to the same colleagues, he had radically underestimated the scale and depth of the hostility in his party to same-sex unions...

You can read the extract here - I have some things to do, but will collect my doubtless thrilling thoughts, and a bit later Fagburn may finally reveal my big conspiracy theory about how Cameron came to support gay marriage.

It's so exciting I guarantee your knob will drop off.**

[Edit: Now decided to save it for my tell-all memoirs -Dave's said it's all balls, by the way, but he would say that, wouldn't he?].

The cartoon above - drawing a somewhat tenuous link between same-sex unions and the European Union - is from the Telegraph in January - if you want to Google them there's a heck of a lot of cartoons portraying Cameron and Clegg as a gay couple.
HAHAHA! etc.
This one pleased the Coalition For Marriage so much, they put it on their website. 

* Fagburn feels the need to point out once again that McBride's publisher, Iain Dale, is a violent hooligan, who Sussex Police have left free to troll the streets.

** Offer only applies to men. Sorry.

Morrissey: Wolverhampton Civic Hall 1988

The first solo gig, a film by Tim Broad.
Rumoured to have meant to be The Smiths' farewell.
I prefer to think of it as La Mozz's big FU to Johnny, by getting the group back together without him.
Forgotten what a honey Craig Gannon was.
Unhappy days *sigh*...

PS Oh bumders - just realised this was 25 years ago! I'm practically dead, dudes.

• Thanks to Zoot. Bracing myself to write about David Cameron and Teh Gayz And Maridge, otherwise today there is no news. I'm ignoring today's stale guff about the stupid pasta boycott and that sodding Inflatable Gay Best Friend, for the sake of my last shred of sanity.

Thought For The Day: Godfrey Bloom

Daily Express.

No comment.

But... it says a lot that journalists are outraged by Bloom using the word "sluts".
Err, have they not read Ukip's manifesto? It's a bit more offensive that that.

PS I'm sure you'll be thrilled to hear Nigel Farage now has a column in the Express.

Marriage: Families Valued

The Daily Mail are so thrilled by this they've splashed it across the front page.

David Cameron has also written for the Mail on how "Marriage is good for Britain."

Hurrah!

"In effect if you pay the basic rate of tax and your partner doesn't use all of their personal allowance, you'll be able to have some of it. Most couples who benefit will be £200 a year better off."

That's about £2 a week each - wow!
If nothing else will, being able to buy a packet of cornflakes sure should save your marriage.

Ultimate soothing classics.

"And this will be true if you're gay or straight - and in a civil partnership or a marriage. This summer I was proud to make equal marriage the law. Love is love, commitment is commitment."

And eggs is eggs, a duck's a duck and vacuous platitudes are vacuous platitudes.

Fagburn is reminded of the words of some crazed radical and sexual libertine...

"This desire of the Conservative party to hand-pick couples through the tax system who conform to to their image of how you should conduct your life, I don't think it's fair.
"And I certainly don't think it's fair on all those other people who are going to have to pay higher taxes to fund this proposal."

This was said by a certain Nick Clegg - Daily Telegraph, July 2013.
He also called this policy "patronising drivel".
Thankfully, Mr Clegg always stands up to Mr Cameron and never goes back on his word.

PS Chris Bryant MP also isn't keen in his column in today's Independent; "Let’s call it what it really is, the 'unmarried tax', and make sure it follows the pasty tax, the bedroom tax and the charity tax into history."
Mind you he would say that, he's A GAY - oh, and in a civil partnership...

And finally... lots of people are going for the boo-hoo-hoo *sad face* angle, mentioning those poor, lonely widows whose husbands have died.
But what about all the unloveable, unboyfriendable confirmed bachelors (like me)?

The Guardian: Another Good Week For Gay Hysteria

WARNING: I WOULDN'T BOTHER READING THIS, IF I WERE YOU. IT'S FAGBURN BEING BORING ABOUT A RATHER BORING ARTICLE! BUT THAT'S KINDA THE POINT... *

Today the Guardian returns to the Russia/Pasta anti-gay Axis of Evil.
Thank you for fearlessly bringing these two subjects to our attention while so many others have been so silent.
In an online article Nancy Goldstein declares; It's Another Bad Week To Be Gay.
Why's that then, Nancy?
"There's been an unusually high volume of international bigotry and bad news to put up with this week."
Unusually high?
Cripes!
What's happened?
You probably haven't heard anything about this, but apparently the boss of some big Italian pasta company said he wants their TV ads to only feature straight families.
Fascist!
It gets worse.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has said they are "convinced that Russia will respect the Olympic charter, which prohibits discrimination of any kind".
Quislings!
And these demonstrate "an unusually high volume of international bigotry"??? [1]
Where on earth have you been?
Fagburn's surprised Nancy Goldstein didn't go for the hysterics' hat-trick and bring in the "offensive" (!) Inflatable Gay Best Friend, but I guess her story was filed too early to cover that great "outrage."
Frankly, I can think of many far worse weeks for us, but do go on...

Nancy: When not grinning she weeps for the world

She begins with that evil spaghetti monster, Guido Barilla, who said something about The Gays that both she and I disagree with.
How fucking dare he not agree with us?!
There has now been - inevitably - a call for a boycott of Barilla pasta, by people so infected with bourgeois consumerism they confuse (not) shopping with political action.
Welcome to the brave new world of gay "passive-activism"; if it makes you feel good, don't do it.
For the more dedicated LGBT inactivist there's an equally inevitable AllOut petition to get Barilla make an advert featuring a gay family." [2]
As ever, the promise of freedom is just a click away.
Should we now not buy anything that doesn't have a token fag in a TV ad?
How much do you feel your life has been diminished - and the forward march of gay liberation halted - by not seeing a gay dude in a stupid TV commercial today?
On a scale of one to fuck-all?
Do our collective queer dreams now aspire to nothing greater than being sold stuff by someone who looks a bit like us?
What a fortunate, wonderful life you must have had if you think this is what oppression looks like.
It's often stressed that Mr Barilla also said he doesn't agree with gay adoption - I wish he did, I wish everyone did, but they don't. [3]
Some people are bigots, get over it!
Again, should we boycott anything and everything made by a company where the CEO has daft outdated reactionary views we don't like?
I can't imagine finding much political common ground with many multi-millionaire company directors.
And how deluded and naive would someone have to be to get angry when they realise corporations aren't moral agents?
Or that their Capo di tutti capi isn't a saint?

Bit of a scoop here - Russia now hangs gay men

As there has been such an absolute avalanche of anti-gay hate this week, Goldstein swiftly moves onto the IOC statement.
Apparently; "Surpassing even Barilla's unique blend of homophobia and cynicism".
Which, seeing as the former was a relatively mild bad thing to say about The Gays, wouldn't be difficult.
She quotes the Olympic Charter, "Any form of discrimination with regard to a country or a person on grounds of race, religion, politics, gender or otherwise is incompatible with belonging to the Olympic movement".
Adding; "It also compels the IOC to "fight against" and "take action against" what the charter calls "discrimination of any kind" [4].
The IOC seem only to care about discrimination at the actual Olympic games or in sport [5], but could Goldstein give me one example of a host country - future or past - of the Olympic Games or Winter Olympics without "discrimination of any kind" or with a perfect record on human rights?
London 2012 - we didn't have equal marriage, for one boring thing.
Beijing 2008... err, need I go on?
Goldstein also seems blissfully unaware that the Olympic Charter also states;“No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas.”( Section 50:3).
The new Russian law outlawing "gay propaganda" is thus rendered irrelevant by this.
Technically, you can't protest about anything anyway - even if it's something as banal as painting your toenails in the colours of the rainbow.
Remember Mexico 68?
She blames Sochi's commercial sponsors; Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Visa, Procter & Gamble...
Presumably if we ask them, or don't buy their junk, these nice big businesses will save us.
We're here, we're queer, and we're not going shopping for your useless crap unless you sponsor Alburquerque Pride! [6]

Why is The Guardian publishing this shit?

Goldstein knows there are other ways to protest, of course.
Strangely, her sole example is a protest at the Metropolitan Opera in New York this week.
The Met's great crime?

The bastards didn't dedicate a performance of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin to Russian LGBTs.
Don't they care???
Inside, an American man shouted at two Russian performers; "Your silence is killing Russian gays!"
What, literally?
This was cruelly ironic, as many US/UK campaigners never listen to what Russian LGBT campaigners say anyway.
eg All those Americans screaming for boycotts, when almost all Russian campaigners say they're pointless and counterproductive.
They are all but invisible, inaudible to the likes of Queer Nation NY and Goldstein. [7]
Because we in the west know what's best for the likes of them.
Orientalism redux!

Oh look! Some actual LGBT Russians campaigning!

There were two protests in Russia last week - far more important, meaningful, brave and inspiring than shouting in front of some wealthy Americans.

How much coverage did you see in the news?
There was some about a protest by Nikolai Alexseyev - partly because he always press releases the international media - photos of self attached (remind you of anyone?).

The protest in Moscow against homophobia in schools was completely ignored.
But then their aims were communicating with their fellow Russians, making connections with other struggles, and challenging the authorities - not the real heavy-lifting of getting their name and picture in the New York Times.
Goldstein does conclude by mourning the death of the Russian gay campaigner, Aleksei Davydov. [8]
I'm ashamed to say the name hadn't registered with me, probably because he was an unperson in the western media when he was alive.
Yet he is now brought back to life after death by those who have all of a sudden realised Russia does bad things to the gays.
The readers' comments after this article are - as ever - as depressing as fudge.
Backwards bastards! Boycott! Ban! Boo hoo! Squish squish! *sad face* etc.
But if someone has read and believed all the stories about Russia recently, you can't really blame them for unthinking they're building Belsen on the Volga.
Some people dared to ask why either of these two minor stories are thought so very important and so terrible in the general scheme of global gay misery that they warrant such space.
The endless, voluminous, shoddy coverage about gay life in Russia is sinister, and suggestive of another agenda.
The manufactured feigned outrage over Guido Barilla's unremarkable remarks and the silly, unfunny joke that is the Inflatable Gay Best Friend is ludicrous and embarrassing.
Both can only be seen by any rational person as little, localised outbreaks of mass hysteria.
Beware the pink pearl-clutchers and pitchfork-wavers.
Both are frightening phenomena the media should be exposing, not colluding in.
¡Ya basta!

THANKS IF YOU MADE IT TO THE END OF THIS. I DID WARN YOU IT WAS GOING TO BE BORING. BUT THE POINT IS THAT THE ARTICLE REFERRED TO IS POINTLESS. BUT THEY'LL PUBLISH ANYTHING IF IT CONFORMS TO AND FURTHER FEEDS THE CURRENT CLIMATE OF GAY HYSTERIA. FAGBURN HAS FOUND THIS WEEK SO "BAD" HE WILL NOW MAKE A GAY BEST FRIEND DOLL OUT OF BARILLA PASTA AND DEFECT TO RUSSIA. до свидания! ARRIVEDERCI! GOODBYE!

* I politely pointed some of these errors and inconsistencies on The Guardian messageboard - bizarrely a moderator removed them.
Whilst I'd like to say I had really kicked it to The Man, I fear this is what happens when bored interns moderate your forums.
See also 'G*y' on Tesco Direct...

Gay Star News: Tilda SWINDON! Who he?

1. Of course, sexing up a story is standard practice in the mass media. Try pitching an article saying things haven't changed much recently, and nothing really bad has actually happened. Best to make people believe the shock-horror hype.
2. I've been told you're more likely to see the ghost of Mussolini's mistress selling stuff in an Italian ad, than a gay man anyway.
3. She quotes without question professional hysteric, Michael Aravosis of the ever-so patriotic AMERICAblog, source of a translation of the interview, and also, curiously, of endless stories about LGBT Russia. Mike's faith in capital is so fanatical he thinks boycotts are the answer to all #teamgay's problems.
4. I can't find this in the - admittedly very long - charter. Nancy, can you let me know where it is? Ta.
5. South Africa was banned from the Olympics in 1964, not because of the apartheid system, but specifically because they refused to "renounce racial discrimination in sport and opposed the ban in its own country on competition between white and black athletes."
6. See this recent Slate feature by J Bryan Lowder on the gay movement's obsession with consumer boycotts - and corporate endorsements, Barilla Chairman Doesn't Like Gay People: So What?
7. Queer Nation NY is a new group who, tellingly, are making lots of noise/publicity about homophobia in Russia, but not about homophobia in New York.
8. Scott Long has written an obituary of Aleksei Davydov, who he knew, and worked with.
Tris Reid Smith has written movingly for Gay Star News about Davydov - "inspirational" "hero" etc.
Makes you wonder why he never mentioned him when he was alive? 
See also their header about this and Tilda Swindon above.

Gay Billy: Yet Another Gay History Lesson

First they came for the Gay Billy Dolls...

Lighten fucking up!

Adam: Another Gay History Lesson

Oh noes, someone made a joke!!!

Gay Bob: History Lesson

Ban jokes! Ban fun!  Ban gay dolls!

G*y Best Friend: Blow Me!

If SEX in the City and Will & Grace taught us anything, it's that g*y best friends are in this season. We've had the manbag, we've had leg warmers and iPhone fever, now it's time for the new craze. Although not much can be said for his own attire, your Inflatable g*y Best Friend is ready to give you fashion advice, tell you if your bum looks big and b**ch about everyone who doesn't wear Jimmy Choo's. He may be rather quiet, but one look at that smiling, Gary Lineker-esque face and you know what he's thinking..."You go girlfriend!" Ready with an inflatable bunch of roses to cheer you up after any break up or bad day, your new g*y Best Friend will be at your side whenever you need a hug. An ideal gift for Hen Nights, Birthdays and Christmas stocking fillers, inflate your personality and kiss your worries goodbye with the Inflatable g*y Best Friend!

Tesco Direct - now removed from site (Cached page).

Fagburn likes the way the word SEX is put in caps, but the word gay is "censored" with an asterisk.
I know not why, but suspect it's due to one person's stupidity, not some great homophobic conspiracy.

It also says the suggested age range is 3-4 years. 

Modern parenting, eh?

Well, this inflatable "fun" novelty item is definitely naff, crap and patronising - the box lists the usual cliches you see in all those rubbishy articles about GBFs; Loves to shop, great sense of humour, loves to dance, gives great fashion advice, loves rimming etc etc - and I really wouldn't want to be friends with anyone sad enough to want one.

But Pink News report that the doll has just been withdrawn from Tesco's website! *

Excuse me?!

The first line in their story points out this happened; "A day after Tesco was forced to withdraw two Halloween outfits after they were criticised for stigmatising people with mental health issues."

Meaning, presumably, that someone thinks this doll is "stigmatising" of the gaize, and offensive and so they screamed; "THIS IS HOMOPHOBIA!!!"
Err, it was a rubbish joke, presumably ironic, and aimed at homophiles.
How stupid would you have to be to take this seriously?

Oh well, yet another victory for the spaghetti-boycotting gay hysterics.

Could they be any more boring?
To repeat what I wrote about the Barilla pasta boycott balls yesterday; "Fuck knows how anyone who can get angry about this would cope if something really bad happened."
Name one thing that exists in the known universe and I'm sure you could find someone who says they're offended by it.

From cucumbers and beards and Pot Noodles to the very existence of (real) gay men.

I personally find the sound of people eating crisps and the smell of Glade Plugins extremely offensive.

I don't think they should be banned, though.

My advice? "Shut up and grow up and get in the real world, Mr Gaybore."

PS These blow-up dolls are still widely available in several shops in Brighton, often ones run by jolly older gay men - the self-loathing quislings!

* Gay Star News may have reported on this "controversy" (!) first, but the story has no time of filing.

Update: And inevitably it's... SUPERGAYBORE TO THE RESCUE!!!

Cause lots of humour is based on stereotypes - thanks for asking.

At last... 

Tesco ‘very sorry’ for displaying ‘offensive G*y Best Friend’ inflatable doll on website - Pink News.
But why?
Every gay man I've asked thinks this whole thing is ridiculous.

The joyless gay idiots are winning, boys, best be on your guard.

x

Update: FFS! Even The Guardian are writing about this as if it's something anyone cares about except a few loons on Twitter.
IT IS NOT NEWS JUST BECAUSE SOMEONE ON TWITTER SAYS THEY DON'T LIKE SOMETHING!!!

It even made it to Radio 4 news - but in their defence they did put it in the "And finally... a skateboarding duck", it's-a-funny-old-world slot.

Update2: The Daily Mail shares your pain about Tesco selling this inflatable GBF.
But have a look through the Mail Online index and see how many patronising articles they've run about shopping, dancing, witty, sassy etc Gay Best Friends.
Fagburn lost count/interest.
This, of course, also applies to every newspaper in Britain.

Twisted: Unpaid Advertisement

Elefest and DJ Stewart Who? present a one-off screening of Twisted in support of two brilliant charities: The Albert Kennedy Trust and Food Chain.

In 1997 DJ Wayne G and writer Stewart Who? recorded the legendary dance track ‘Twisted’. The Gold-selling, controversial success of this single led to an international tour, taking them to Australia, Rome Pride, White Party Palm Springs, on board a gay Caribbean cruise and to Fire Island NYC.
The film follows their journey through the global gay party scene. Using frank video diaries, it’s a brutally honest and sometimes comedic account of their close friendship & the problems incurred from an excessive life on the road.

Hotel Elephant, London SE1, Saturday October 5th - More blurb and even more detailed details.

Go see - it's basically just two silly old faggots filming themselves taking drugs an absolute hoot!

Crispin Blunt: Some History

Crispin Blunt, the Conservative MP for Reigate, has been told to reapply for his parliamentary seat amid claims that local Tories want to oust him because he came out as a homosexual after the last election.

The former prisons minister has said he will “fight on” after the executive of his local Tory association told him that he would not be automatically selected as the Surrey constituency’s candidate for the 2015 election. He has held the safe Conservative seat since 1997.

Mr Blunt made headlines just months after the 2010 election when he announced that he had separated from his wife so that he could “come to terms with his homosexuality”.

Conservative sources on Thursday night said that his relationships with some local Tories were left “beyond repair” following the disclosures about his sexuality.

“Some people became reconciled to it and were understanding,” a source said. “But some people were not and were unhappy.”

Dr Ben Mearns, a former Tory councillor in Reigate, said: “The reason I believe the association would not reselect him was based on his sexuality.

“That is my clear view. Some members of the association have overtly made comments and some implied that they did not want a gay MP.” Dr Mearns said that making the decision on the basis of sexuality was “unacceptable”...

Daily Telegraph - who probably approve.

Oh dear, this doesn't sound like David Cameron's thoroughly modern gaymarrying Conservative Party, does it?

Though it could also be because some local activists just think Blunt's a lousy constituency MP.
This all has some history.

The Telegraph reported in August 2010; Senior Conservatives in Crispin Blunt's constituency turned on the Tory prisons minister yesterday after he left his wife and declared he was homosexual.

"Tony Collinson, the former association chairman, who was on the selection panel when Mr Blunt was first chosen for the seat in 1997, said he would never have been picked if the truth had been known at the time.
"One of the reasons [he was selected] was because he had a nice, compact, family unit. He made quite a bit of it," said Mr Collinson, who gave up the chairmanship six years ago.
"I'm a little disappointed with the news because I don't think he would necessarily have been chosen had he come out then."
Brian Cowle, a Conservative councillor in Reigate and Banstead borough, added: "It is one of those things which we would have liked to be known before the general election, that it's been a problem for all this time. 
"We all have problems and nuances in our lives; we don't go splashing it over the papers. It could add to a slight discomfort about things."

Though this time the problem may lie higher up.

Only yesterday the Telegraph reported on rumours Blunt was being removed so his safe Tory seat could be given to Boris Johnson.
Hmm...

And lest we forget...

Anthony Blunt - no relation - largin' it at the Hacienda

"I believe it right that our law should discriminate in that limited way between homosexual and heterosexual practice. While I accept that, in law, we should tolerate people's choices to follow a homosexual life style and practice, I maintain that those are not equivalent to heterosexuality - nor should we pretend that they are. It is also clear that there a much greater strand of homosexuality than of heterosexuality which depends for its gratification on the exploitation of youth.
"I am sorry if Labour members do not like the truth, but I do not intend to run away from difficult issues."

Crispin Blunt MP speaking in parliament as a presumed heterosexual in 1998.
Oops!
Perhaps then, Mr Blunt would have backed deselecting an MP who'd come out?
Gay Tories, dontcha just love 'em?

April Ashley: Portrait Of A Lady

Two months after April Ashley entered the world at the age of 25, she lost her virginity – to an American man called Skippy. “It was 14 July 1960, Bastille Day. Afterwards I was crying with happiness. I remember Skippy opening the window and everyone was honking their horns and waving flags and he said, 'Look, the whole of Paris is celebrating the loss of your virginity.’”

I bring up a rumour that she was pretty promiscuous for a while after the sex change. Again she looks at me from under one arched eyebrow. “Wouldn’t you have been?” she says dryly.

Back in London, she began to get modelling work. For a time she wasVogue’s most popular underwear model. But this honeymoon period didn’t last long. A year later she was the subject of an exposé in the Sunday People revealing that she’d once been a man – she was betrayed by a friend for just £5.

“And I never got another modelling job from that day to this. Six months’ worth of booking was cancelled overnight.” She’d already been hired to appear in the film The Road to Hong Kong with Bing Crosby and Bob Hope when the story broke. “But when the film came out only my back was seen and my name didn’t even appear on the credits.”

Elvis, John Prescott  And Me: An interview with April Ashley, Britain's first transsexual, Daily Telegraph.

Fifty years on, the tabloids still think it's good fun to out transsexuals.

An exhibition, April Ashley: Portrait of a lady, opens today at the Museum of Liverpool, it is free.

The Times: TV Times

Few would contest the notion that Britain over the first decade of this millennium changed. By imperceptible degree, entrenched class prejudice and deference fell away.

The election of new Labour in 1997 played a part, as did the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, later that year. This was the first government whose members were first Government born largely since the Second World War, while the other forced a new settlement between a monarch and her subjects.

Yet a third event three years later arguably had just as much societal impact. That was the beginning of the Channel 4 reality series Big Brother.

If the contention sounds absurd, that only goes to show the extent to which something once so abrasively new has bedded down into the national psyche...

The rise of reality television has had many negative effects, chief among them a cult of celebrity far more vacuous than even that which went before. Yet it is too easy to forget the rigidity which existed in public life beforehand. To put it bluntly, normal people didn’t go on telly.

Some might argue that normal people didn’t go on Big Brother either, but at least they could. Yes, every Big Brother contestant was an exhibitionist, but this was a far more diverse bunch of exhibitionists than Britain had previously known. Just over 13 years ago, the last three contestants in the first series were, respectively, Northern, black and gay. If, today, that sounds like a banal observation, well, that’s rather the point.

The Times' leader.

A point often made.

Though there's some truth to it, it's often-simplified and over-stated.
It's like saying TV (or Hollywood etc) is a fairy's magic wand that's made everything a-okay - as if other factors, cultural, political and social (how we little boring ordinary people engage with friends, family, co-workers, neighbours etc etc) are of little consequence.

Mind you, in 2001, John Pilger had a slightly different take on things...

Last Sunday, Michael Jackson, Channel 4's departing chief executive, told Observer readers that he had, no less, helped bring about "the profound social changes that have occurred in British society." He cited Big Brother as representing "a melting pot for a broader, more understanding and inclusive society... an optimistic glimpse at the ease of presence between a group of people with different ethnicity, sexuality, religion, class and education". He related this to Blair's promised "classless society" and declared, Tony-like, that "we have a more prosperous economy than at any time in our past".

That gays and females, blacks and Asians are capable of moronic behaviour in Big Brother is not "an optimistic glimpse" of anything. Like the pathetic cast of Jerry Springer, they merely provide a glimpse of the media elite's vicarious flirtation with low life for the sake of a buck and high ratings. No one denies that Channel 4 transmits some quite brilliant programmes, as it should, given its extraordinary remit and resources and the film-making talent in Britain; but these are fragments of its potential. 

Bit patronising and snobby, John.
Maybe he's still angry about making such a fool of himself with Su Pollard on Celebrity Big Brother.

Sochi: Powerless

After repeated requests for "assurances" that Russia's newly enacted ban on so-called homosexual propaganda won't affect the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, the International Olympic Committee today announced that it is "completely satisfied" with vague promises from Russian diplomats that LGBT athletes and spectators will be safe during the Winter Games. 

"The Olympic Charter states that all segregation is completely prohibited, whether it be on the grounds of race, religion, color, or other, on the Olympic territory," said Jean-Claude Killy, chairman of the IOC Coordination Commission, at a press conference in Sochi today, according to the Associated Press. 

"That will be the case, we are convinced," continued Killy in French, according to a translation from the AP. "Another thing I must add: The IOC doesn't really have the right to discuss the laws in the country where the Olympic Games are organized. As long as the Olympic Charter is respected, we are satisfied, and that is the case."

The Advocate et al.

Erm, but this only applies to the Olympic games and sport, the Olympic Charter already bans all protests.

“No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas.” Section 50:3.

You may recall Tommie Smith and John Carlos being expelled from the Mexico 68 Olympics for giving black power salutes.
Would someone like to make a list of countries that don’t have any discriminatory laws, and would thus be suitable hosts in the future?
I can't imagine it would take very long.

Update - quoted in Pink News, Friday...

On Friday, Sergei Nikitin, Amnesty International’s Moscow Office director, said: “Russia’s law banning propaganda of ‘non-traditional sexual relations’ among minors is clearly discriminatory and in this it violates international law and runs counter to the Olympic Charter. Moreover, the introduction of the law creates an atmosphere in Russia that has already encouraged brutal crimes against people only because of their real or perceived sexual orientation.”
He added: “The fact that the IOC has satisfied itself with Russian officials’ assurances of non-discrimination is not enough. It disregards the fact that Russian law effectively prohibits people from public expression of ‘non-traditional’ sexual orientation.”

This is all utter, utter BALLS - every sentence here can be answered with "No, it doesn't."
Give me (Olympian) strength.

Barilla Pasta Outrage: First They Came For The Lasagna...

The chairman of Barilla Group says his company will not feature gay families in advertisements for his products because he likes the "traditional" family. If someone disagrees, well, they can go "eat another brand of pasta."

Guido Barilla made the anti-gay comments during an interview with La Zanzara on Radio24 Wednesday. The radio host asked him why his company does not have ads with gay families.
"We have a slightly different culture," Barilla said, per a Huffington Post translation of the interview. "For us, the 'sacral family' remains one of the company’s core values. Our family is a traditional family. If gays like our pasta and our advertisings, they will eat our pasta; if they don’t like that, they will eat someone else’s pasta. You can’t always please everyone not to displease anyone. I would not do a commercial with a homosexual family, not for lack of respect toward homosexuals – who have the right to do whatever they want without disturbing others – but because I don’t agree with them*, and I think we want to talk to traditional families. The women are crucial in this." 

Activists are now demanding a boycott against Barilla, which is the world's largest pasta producer, according to Italy's Gazzetta del Sud. The protest became a trending topic on Twitter shortly after Barilla's remarks aired, with the hashtag #boicottabarilla. 

From Huffpost Gay Voices - the online home of boring bourgeois gay hysteria.

SHOCKING!
Naturally the united gay simpletons of Twitter have set it ablaze today.
Fuck knows how anyone who can get angry about something like this would cope if something really bad happened.
So a silly old man has said the sort of silly thing some silly old men sometimes say!
THIS IS EXACTLY HOW MUSSOLINI STARTED!!!
Is there an e-petition yet?
Has Dan Savage ordered us to boycott French red wine in protest?
Can someone knock up a poster of Il Duce Barilla with a Hitler moustache drawn on?
Should we be visiting our delightful Tuscan holiday homes in the near future?
Later this evening Fagburn will be protesting by pouring a tin of spaghetti hoops down the drain and then sending a photo of him doing it to the world's gay media.
Silence anyone you disagree with!
If you don't like what Guido has said buy another brand of pasta, that'll learn him, even though he said that's what he thinks you should do.
In fact, don't buy anything unless you've seen a gay dude in one of their adverts.
It's time to make a stand against these fascists who aren't very keen on having gayers in one of their crappy TV ads.
The revolutionary spirit of the Stonewall riots lives on.
¡No pastarán!

• Commercial Coset - an online compendium of LGBT-themed commercials from around the world. 
* NB This doesn't make sense. No idea if it's him or the translation.

Update: Actual - and non-ironic - Gay Star News' headline; 'Gay Hate Spaghetti'...

Update2: At last someone talking some sense, Barilla Chairman Doesn't Like Gay People: So What? J Bryan Lowder on Slate (though GB didn't actually say he didn't like gay people).
Good on the gay "movement"'s fetishisation of consumer boycotts (and corporate endorsements).

Readers' comments on gay sites are hilariously hysterical, predictably.

My favourite from The Advocate; "I had a few boxes in my pantry this morning. No longer."

Take that, pasta Nazis!

PS Some more brilliant reader comments by les enragés at The Advocate...

Russia: The Empire Strikes Back!

L: Bad but unboring Russian activist holds easily comprehensible sign, Moscow, September 25; R: Good but boring Russian activists hold signs nobody cares about, Moscow, September 24. Police equally unimpressed.

John Aravosis published an article about Nikolai Alekseev’s latest Moscow protest on his blog today. It’s interesting how he excuses doing this. He objects to other media covering Alekseev (“I’ve noticed some top gay ‘news’ sites continuing to go to the anti-Semite Alexeyev for comment”) but not to himself covering Alekseev. He squares the circle by pretending that Alekseev wasn’t behind the demonstration (“it’s unfortunate that the protesters included in their group known anti-Semite, Nikolai Alexeyev“) when of course Alekseev didn’t simply happen along for the ride, he organized the whole thing. It’s all a bit like: I didn’t want to show you Britney Spears’ privates on my blog, people, it’s just that they walked right onto my computer screen.

The truth is, it’s much more sexy and clickworthy, from an American perspective, to run photos of Alekseev holding an catchy English-language sign (no Google Translate needed!) and getting chased by police, than photos of other Russians holding up Russian slogans about substantive things like the fate of Russia that only Russians care about. It would be nice if Aravosis would admit this — and admit there’s a symbiotic relation between the Alekseev lust for controversy and the Aravosis lust for blog hits. It would spare us all the denials...

Bull-fighter Scott Long - the writer and campaigner who's worked together with LGBT Russians for Human Rights Watch - writes perceptively, yet again, on his excellent blog, A Paper Bird, on the strange priorities of the US/UK media in the debate about LGBT Russians, and the hypocrisies of the likes of AmericaBlogGay's Michael Aravosis - brave champion of the far-right, racist and Zionist, Michael Lucas.
In a companion piece yesterday, In Russia They Resist Too, Long asks why a one-man shouty interruption at an opera house in New York "in solidarity with LGBT Russians" got so much media coverage here, while a protest in Moscow against homophobia in schools got next-to zero.

"There was a demonstration in Moscow too yesterday – even if nobody in New York paid much attention. You can demonstrate in Moscow: the LGBT and democracy movements in Russia may be in retreat but are not silent or submissive. This is important to understand, since the tendency now is to paint them as pure victims who can’t say anything for themselves."

Note also how on the day of the #Russia4Love protests earlier this month, an action outside the Russian Embassy in London, and ones in other cities around the world, got massive coverage - while the infinitely more meaningful and important protests in 14 Russian cities by your actual LGBT Russians was ignored.

Scott Long reprints this photo from the NYC Met protest and comments...

"We all know Pastor Niemoller’s moving message. Yet here it isn’t true. They didn’t come for the gays first. Putin came for the Chechens first (actually, Yeltsin did before him); for the journalists; for the odd oligarch and whistleblower; for the punk rock feminists and the environmentalists; for the protest marchers; and then, somewhere down the list, he came for the gays. Where were we when the truth-seekers were slaughtered, when Pussy Riot went to prison, or when Grozny burned? Would things be different now, if some of that emotion had been transmuted into actions back when the right-wing thugs were mainly killing black people; or when the “foreign agents” law was first bruited about; or when cops were beating up Muscovites in the street after a faked election?"

All too often we have seen acts of "It's all about ME!" solipsism masquerading as acts of solidarity.

To complete a stunning, damning quintent* of recent articles, Long writes here about the sudden volte face over fallen idol Nikolai Alekseev, by those who knew of his dodgy political leanings and anti-semitic outbursts, but were silent about them until he began criticising the tactics of US/UK campaigners...

"[who] had all the evidence years ago of the man’s instability and hatred. It’s important to tell the truth. It’s important, because the Alekseev story reveals a lot about the potential pathologies of gay activism: the cult of celebrity, the belief in saviors rather than social movements, the way Westerners project their desires and fantasies onto other countries. Why did Doug [Ireland] and others keep promoting Alekseev, and actively denigrating other Russian activists? They damaged the whole Russian LGBT movement in the process. They shouldn’t get off the hook. And we need to learn lessons from how they went so wrong..."

Quite.

And finally.. Fagburn read today about a fundraising and awareness event, To Russia LGBT With Love, held in London next month - where apparently all money raised is going to the Peter Tatchell Foundation - ie to Peter, who pays himself £29,000 a year from kind donations - and oddly not to LGBT Russian groups, who surely need it more.

If true it would make the whole event look ridiculous and hypocritical, and another example of "The West knows best" gay cultural imperialism we witness above.

I've asked the organisers to confirm this, and will let you know when they reply...

A very nice man from Dalston Superstore told me they haven't decided which charities yet, and they're now working on organising video speakers from Russia.

* "Queer Quislings": Getting Russia Wrong and Top Guns: Last Words On Johnny Weir.

Gay Tory Watch: Poor Richard

Former deputy mayor of London Richard Barnes claimed his Facebook account was hacked after naked self-portraits appeared. The 65-year-old Conservative councillor for Hillingdon said he had not even seen the photos, which show the nude lower body of a naked man clutching an iPhone in front of a bedroom mirror.
The snaps appear to have been uploaded to his personal Facebook page before being swiftly deleted.
Websites including trendingcentral.com speculated the images may have been automatically uploaded using the iPhone’s iOS Facebook app.
But Mr Barnes told Metro: ‘[It was] utterly and totally a mistake. I’ve been hacked into. I’ve no idea [what happened]. I’m annoyed and shaking with anger.’
‘I’m a 65-year-old gay man on his own… It’s not the sort of thing I do. Do you really think I would be that f****** stupid after 30 years in politics?’*
He said he had a ‘lot of friends on Facebook’ and would not be quitting the website.
Mr Barnes, who served as Boris Johnson’s deputy between 2008 and 2012, said he was alerted to the images by a friend in the US and that it had all been ‘sorted out’.

London's Metro.

Another day, another scandal - is there no end to gay Tory misery?
The Daily Mail is tying up itself in knots over what can be said here; are the photos of Barnes, did he upload them by mistake, was his account hacked?
The Daily Star has some - sadly pixilated - "dick pics".
Amusingly, Fagburn understands Richard is known in City Hall as "Dick".

Comment: Even if it is Dicky, it's not illegal, and wanting sex isn't wrong. Basically, who cares?

* Fucking, probably. Hard to be sure.

• Interview with Tony Grew for Pink News in 2008, when Barnes was appointed Deputy Mayor of London.

PS Don't forget to book your tickets for the fun-packed Conservative Party Pride Conference Dinner (Supper, surely?) at Harvey Nicks in Manchester next week!

"Cost: £35 each Evening includes 3 course dinner with wine also enjoy shopping time with 10% discount!

"Guest Speaker: LBC Radio Host, Blogfather and West Ham fanatic, Iain Dale."  

Let's just hope Mrs Dale behaves herself and doesn't start beating up any pensioners again, eh?
Then it's on to G-A-Y - but don't worry, LGBTory have their own private entrance and dancefloor, so you don't have to mingle with the riff-raff.
Or risk getting beaten up by one of them.

Thought For The Day: Ian McKellen

If we were to not hold the [Olympic] games because of the internal politics of the country in question, probably they would never take place.
I mean, people would find enough to argue about in America's foreign policy...

Well said, Sir Ian.
You are now - officially - forgiven for Vicious.
x

Gay wet liberals and Tories brains EXPLODE!!! with confusion as Ian McKellen says he doesn't support boycotting Sochi, and this outrage just after Elton John says he still wants to play some concerts in Russia in December. 
Two of their "gay saints" - respectable knights of the realm, no less - become sinners in the blink of a blinkered eye.
How dare the quisling traitors deviate from the neo-colonialist queer consensus and consider what actions might actually be useful and/or not completely useless??!!
Will we ever be the same again... etc etc.

PS Russian anti-gay groups DON'T want Elton to perform there, just like...

Daniel Radcliffe: Don't Say I Didn't Warn You!

"There is no truth to it at all. It's one of those very, very funny things: it came out of a story in the Daily Star and then you see newspapers like The Guardian using The Star as their source, and it grows and grows [until] it's 'Dan Radcliffe is playing Freddie Mercury!', which I was never going to do."

"Everyone on the internet who I presume is saying I'm totally wrong for that part is correct," he laughed. "I AM completely wrong for that part!"
 
"If I'd seen a rumour about me playing Iggy Pop, I'd think, 'Hey, I'd have a go at that - that'd be fun!', but Freddie Mercury? No. I don't even know who the director is. They seem to be saying it's Stephen Frears and Tom Hooper on the internet."

"This is the kind of thing that happens to me and it happens to Emma (Watson) with multiple 50 Shades Of Grey things. When somebody has column inches to fill, they just sub in one of our names." 

Daniel Radcliffe talking to Empire in a podcast - about the story that he was going to play Freddie Mercury in the new biopic.
A fiction ran as fact in media around the world.
Except for one lone voice crying "This sounds like bollocks!" in the wilderness - the mighty Fagburn!
Journalists would make their lives so much easier - and far less embarrassing - if they just listened to me in the first place.
Hey-ho...

The Guardian online - though there's an embedded link they don't make it explicit how they published this crapola without bothering to check it.
Journalism fuck yeah!

Another way stories appear in the Daily Star (and they are not alone) are when they are simply made up, or based on such scant, dubious evidence as to essentially be untrue. I list in my resignation letter (attached) a number of stories that I wrote via this method, in the full knowledge, and on occasion request, of superiors. Most, but not all, of the fabricated stories featured the Daily Star’s most referenced celebrities – Katie Price, Peter Andre, Kerry Katona etc. These people’s careers are symbiotically linked to tabloid column inches, and therefore they were very unlikely to sue over false stories...

Former Daily Star journalist, Richard Peppiatt, statement to the Leveson Inquiry [Thanks to fillo].

PS UND! here's a video of Ed Miliband auditioning for the part of Queen Freddie at Labour party conference yesterday. ONE VISION!

Update: I'm far too nice to gloat - and moreover there are far too many to list - but there are some hilarious reverse ferrets on this today, in both the gay and straight media, often forgetting to mention how they'd run the Star story as if it was deffo deffo true. Hahaha!