Boxer comes out after discovery of porn tape
Boxer Yusaf Mack has come out as bisexual, and then again as gay, following the exposure of a gay porn film in which he participated. Mack initially claimed he had been drugged into participating in the film, but now says the excuse was “all a lie.”
Hate wins in Houston
Houston’s proposed civil rights ordinance, which would have protected trans people among 15 other vulnerable groups, was solidly trounced in the polls, following misleading attack ads suggesting it would allow men to walk into women’s washrooms at will. The New York Times condemned the bill’s opponents as “latter-day Jim Crow elders,” while team LGBT wondered what went wrong in the campaign.
Victory and apostasy in Utah
Salt Lake City surprised the country Nov 3 by electing its first lesbian mayor, Jackie Biskupski. Not all is well, however, in the state of Utah. The Mormon Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced Nov 5 it would not only consider same-sex relationships to be apostasy, but also refuse to bless or baptize the children of same-sex relationships.
France loosens blood donation ban
France has announced that men who have sex with men will now be able to donate blood, but only in certain conditions. Gay men can donate whole blood if they have been abstinent for a year, and plasma if they have been abstinent for four months or are in a monogamous relationship. French LGBT groups say the change is still not enough to lift the stigma on gay men.
Read more from Agence France-Presse.
71-year-old gay rights leader attacked
George Zander, a 71-year-old California LGBT activist, was attacked outside a Palm Springs nightclub Nov 1, suffering a broken hip. A man reportedly attacked Zander and his husband unprovoked, and then returned later and knocked Zander unconscious with an object.
Read more at the New Civil Rights Movement.
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