Same-Sex Marriage General Discussion Thread

[MrsSpringsteen]

Uhoh, there's gonna be gay sex on Glee tonight. I guess they already had lesbian type sex before so maybe it won't be as big of a deal.


Chris Colfer talked to TVLine‘s Michael Ausiello about the upcoming Sex-With-Kurt-And-Blaine episode on Glee, but the Golden Globe winner insists that the subject was handled with great care.

“Prior to getting the script Ryan approached Darren and I and told us that they were doing a virginity episode, and Darren and I just kind of looked at each other with wide eyes like, “Huh? What?,’” Colfer explained. “And while we always have faith in the writers, we were a little skeptical. But then we got the script and shot it and everything was fine. What I thought could be raunchy and over-the-top was just very sweet and emotional"

Alas, Colfer was covered up for his big scene with Criss, since request to wear a tank top was denied: “I think having two gay guys having sex on television was enough. They didn’t want to [reveal] a bunch of skin on top of it. I was like, “I want to wear a tank! Let me wear a tank!” [Ultimately], I wore a T-shirt.”

 

[Irvine511]

it's weird -- while i am all for equal depictions of hetero and homo sex, i still find myself slightly uncomfortable with depictions of teenage sex.

 

[Pearl]

Well, as long as the actors are over the age of 18, I don't see the problem. They are portraying what many minors do and that is, explore sexuality.

I do get uneasy about it too for a reason I can't explain. So...

 

[deep]

"Rehearsal is for fags."

Is Brett Ratner out of his Academy Awards producing gig !

 

[Irvine511]

had he used another slur, he'd be out.

 

[deep]

yes, he is out
gay lobby is as strong as Jewish, black, etc., lobby - now
progress

 

[Irvine511]

it *is* the degenerate entertainment industry that shows deviant teenagers committing sodomy during the family hour.

 

[deep]

somebody say 'sodomy'

'you do want a job, don't you?'

 

[Irvine511]

Uhoh, there's gonna be gay sex on Glee tonight.

so, um, i thought this was the best episode of Glee i've ever seen, aside from the Joss Whedon episode from the first season (and a Kristin Chenoweth solo here and there).

sensitive, emotional, thoughtful ... they all behaved like real people with real thoughts and real motivations, and the editing of the "sex scenes" absolutely reinforced the notion of emotional equality between the hetero and the homo couples.

job well done. i wish every high school show handled sex so sensitively as that episode.

also, it was nice to be reminded of how amazing West Side Story is.

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

so, um, i thought this was the best episode of Glee i've ever seen, aside from the Joss Whedon episode from the first season (and a Kristin Chenoweth solo here and there).

sensitive, emotional, thoughtful ... they all behaved like real people with real thoughts and real motivations, and the editing of the "sex scenes" absolutely reinforced the notion of emotional equality between the hetero and the homo couples.

job well done. i wish every high school show handled sex so sensitively as that episode.

also, it was nice to be reminded of how amazing West Side Story is.

I agree. I thought it was so sensitive and sweet. I was imagining all the people who were outraged when they heard there was going to be some sort of gay male sex scene. Haha, joke's on them. It was much more realistic than the other sex related stuff I've seen on that show.

I hope teens watched it with their parents.

And Brett Ratner is a..well I won't say but he fits every Hollywood male stereotype of a feminine hygiene product.

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

Brett Ratner is out as producer of the 84th Academy Awards show.

It's been a tumultuous several days for Ratner, who, amongst several offenses, used a gay slur when asked a question about filmmaking. The director said that "rehearsing is for fags" in a Q&A session following a screening of his new film, "Tower Heist," at L.A.'s Arclight Cinemas. He apologized for the statement after NY Magazine published his remarks and a video of the exchange was posted.

"As a first step, I called Tom Sherak this morning and resigned as a producer of the 84th Academy Awards telecast," Ratner said in a statement (via The Hollywood Reporter). "Being asked to help put on the Oscar show was the proudest moment of my career. But as painful as this may be for me, it would be worse if my association with the show were to be a distraction from the Academy and the high ideals it represents."

Ratner chose Eddie Murphy, the star of "Tower Heist," to host the Oscars.

"He did the right thing for the Academy and for himself," Sherak said in the Academy's official response statement. "Words have meaning, and they have consequences. Brett is a good person, but his comments were unacceptable. We all hope this will be an opportunity to raise awareness about the harm that is caused by reckless and insensitive remarks, regardless of the intent."

Ratner also made headlines in a pair of lewd media appearances. He spoke about his sexual history with actress Olivia Munn on both G4 and Howard Stern's radio programs; he said he "banged" Munn on a G4 talkshow, before admitting that he had never had sex with her in an explicit conversation with Stern. He made several other off-color sexual remarks during the interview with Stern, as well.

 

[corianderstem]

The director said that "rehearsing is for fags"

Christ, what an asshole.

 

[INDY500]

Is it homophobic to split up gay penguins? | Science | The Guardian

When Toronto zoo bought African penguins Pedro and Buddy from Pittsburgh's National Aviary, they expected them to mate with two females. Instead, despite being trailed by lovelorn lady penguins, they only had eyes for each other, engaging in what naturalists call "courtship behaviour". So Tom Mason, the zoo's curator of birds and invertebrates, ended the relationship on the grounds that it was jeopardising the future of the species. Despite the impression given by programmes such as Frozen Planet, which show carpets of penguins as far as the eye can see, the African penguin is on the verge of extinction. Only 60,000 are left in the wild (down from 225,000 two decades ago), and the zoo doesn't feel it can allow a season to go by without Pedro and Buddy's genes being passed on.

Some were outraged at the zoo's decision to separate the pair, with Gawker caustically commenting: "They probably wouldn't have sex with a woman if they were the last penguins on earth anyway." In fact, the sexuality of penguins is rather more fluid than those anthropomorphising them might wish.

Even the previous, much cooed-over pairs of gay penguins to hit the headlines turned out to be more Bloomsbury group than Elton and David. Roy and Silo, the penguins at New York zoo who inspired their own children's book, split up after Silo took up with a female; the same happened to Harry and Popper at San Francisco zoo.

Perhaps Mason was merely preventing heartbreak down the line. Or rather, they're just, you know, penguins.

Regrettably, gay penguin discussions are above my pay grade.

 

[financeguy]

Twitter

 

[yolland]

Is it homophobic to split up gay penguins? | Science | The Guardian

FWIW (considering that birds are birds and humans are, you know, humans), many ornithological studies have found that even among "monogamous" bird species, and regardless of whether a given longterm pair is "straight" or "gay," it's in fact the norm for both partners to frequently mate with other birds on the side throughout their lives, so that "straight" males and "lesbian" females are often helping raise young not their own. It's likewise tempting to anthropomorphize that as "cheating," but that too involves assumptions about how "monogamous" birds might perceive the relationships between pair bonding, libido, reproductive opportunity, and childrearing in the first place.

 

[INDY500]

Twitter

@homophobicornithophobe

 

[corianderstem]

Twitter

Ugh, Bret Easton Ellis is such a knob. I don't know if it was widely known that he was a knob before Twitter, but now he's definitely on the list of Celebrities Exposing Their Knobbishness Via Twitter.

Hey, knobby - freedom of speech does not absolve you from the possible consequences of the things you say.

 

[kramwest1]

Ugh, Bret Easton Ellis is such a knob. I don't know if it was widely known that he was a knob before Twitter, but now he's definitely on the list of Celebrities Exposing Their Knobbishness Via Twitter.

Hey, knobby - freedom of speech does not absolve you from the possible consequences of the things you say.

No, "Christ, what an asshole?"

 

[BoMac]

I came in here to post exactly that!

 

[deep]

I guess Ellis is a gay man that has a different opinion, so what?

yeah, I think Ratner should have lost his Oscar gig.

as for Ellis

BretEastonEllis
I think the American remake of "Let Me In" was FAR better than the Swedish version...

that is unforgivable, he should be drummed out of the film business

 

[deep]

Senate Dems move to repeal DOMA - POLITICO.com

 

[kramwest1]

I came in here to post exactly that!

I'm slightly tempted to find a picture online of a naked Jesus bending over and post it here just to get Cori to use the line in a different context.

 

[corianderstem]

That line just comes in so handy, so often.

 

[Pearl]

This is a touching story. Long, but touching:

Jonas and Wyatt Maines were born identical twins, but from the start each had a distinct personality.
Jonas was all boy. He loved Spiderman, action figures, pirates, and swords.
Wyatt favored pink tutus and beads. At 4, he insisted on a Barbie birthday cake and had a thing for mermaids. On Halloween, Jonas was Buzz Lightyear. Wyatt wanted to be a princess; his mother compromised on a prince costume.
Once, when Wyatt appeared in a sequin shirt and his mother’s heels, his father said: “You don’t want to wear that.’’
“Yes, I do,’’ Wyatt replied.
“Dad, you might as well face it,’’ Wayne recalls Jonas saying. “You have a son and a daughter.’’
That early declaration marked, as much as any one moment could, the beginning of a journey that few have taken, one the Maineses themselves couldn’t have imagined until it was theirs. The process of remaking a family of identical twin boys into a family with one boy and one girl has been heartbreaking and harrowing and, in the end, inspiring — a lesson in the courage of a child, a child who led them, and in the transformational power of love.
Wayne and Kelly Maines have struggled to know whether they are doing the right things for their children, especially for Wyatt, who now goes by the name Nicole. Was he merely expressing a softer side of his personality, or was he really what he kept saying: a girl in a boy’s body? Was he exhibiting early signs that he might be gay? Was it even possible, at such a young age, to determine what exactly was going on?
Until recently, there was little help for children in such situations. But now a groundbreaking clinic at Children’s Hospital in Boston — one of the few of its kind in the world — helps families deal with the issues, both emotional and medical, that arise from having a transgender child — one who doesn’t identify with the gender he or she was born into.

Led by the child who simply knew - Metro - The Boston Globe

 

[deep]

yes, a touching story



but gender reassignment does not have much anything to do with same-sex marriage

 

[Pearl]

Yeah, I know, but I didn't know where else to put the story.

 

[deep]

Sure, I get you.

I guess it is loosely related in that we should have legislation to protect rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people aginst any discrimination.

 

[Irvine511]

this video made my day. here's what happens when 2 gay dads find out they're going to be granddads.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vS9H3vc49kY



this is what the push for SSM is all about. allowing gay people access to the tools to build their own families that really aren't very different from yours.

i admit, i shed a tear.

 

[Pearl]

Marriage equality advocates have another reason to feel dedicated to their cause today, as a revelatory new study has found that the health of gay men living in states with laws allowing same-sex couples to wed actually improves their health, even if they don't get hitched.

According to "Effect of Same-​Sex Marriage Laws on Health Care Use and Expenditures in Sexual Minority Men: A Quasi-​Natural Experiment," which can be found online in the American Journal of Public Health, gay men's visits to local health clinics dropped significantly after Massachusetts began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples in 2004.

Same-Sex Marriage Improves Health Conditions Among Gay Men: Columbia University Study

 

[melon]

Same-Sex Marriage Improves Health Conditions Among Gay Men: Columbia University Study

Oh I'd believe it. Three years in Canada, I'm a much happier person solely because I don't have to worry about this kind of stuff anymore. I really have nothing but contempt for this "debate" that the U.S. insists on raging ad infinitum regarding gay rights and marriage so much so that my old way of writing verbose passages on religion and history in response to reactionary vitriol has now been replaced with two words: "Fuck you."

The discussion is over.