Miscarriages of justice

I’m seeing a whole lot of unfairness this weekend:

Boy George may be guilty of many things but I can’t help but think that a year-and-a-half in prison is too much. He’s just not built for it and yes, they’ll really want to hurt him. Can’t he go and pick up more trash or something?

Dan Savage is enlisting his loyal army of readers to give Rick Warren the “santorum” treatment. It borders on cruel — the poor homophobe won’t know what hit him!

Now, since I don’t know who Gregory D. Lee is, I suppose I’m being unfair when I call him an ignorant hillbilly jackass bigot but then, he is the guy who writes:

“homosexuals predominantly
want to serve in the military in order to have access to people their
own age with whom to engage in sex. It’s just that simple. It’s all
about sex, and not about serving the nation.”

Oh wait, Lee is in the US Army Reserve — that makes him Major Ignorant Hillbilly Jackass Bigot!

And then there’s the unfair horror of this clown getting federal funding from the US government to tell kids that sex will ruin their lives. And when I say “clown,” I mean it:

Oh George W. Bush, you just can’t get out fast enough! With all eyes on Washington this weekend, waiting for Obama to ride in on his unicorn, it was perhaps an unfortunate bit of timing for the Mid-Atlantic Leather Maneuvers to host their “pig orgy” at a local hotel. The right-wingers got wind of it, freaked out and managed to get the event shut down. Great, now the only thing being flogged in Washington is the Bible.

And of course, Obama’s inauguration concert kickoff was the big story yesterday, where it seemed that the gay men were treated like children — seen and not heard. Anglican bishop Gene Robinson delivered the opening speech but the Obama team scheduled him as the part of the “pre-show” so his remarks weren’t televised! Fortunately, we have camcorders and YouTube as a consolation prize:

 

Then there was the lovely spectacle of the Washington DC Gay Men’s Chorus backing up Josh Groban and Heather Headley. Too bad the chorus wasn’t actually identified onscreen like some of the others but hopefully their red ribbons got the message out:

I guess this is what counts as progress in America: gay men are now everywhere, a vital part of the fabric of the country, but they’ll have to keep it down lest they upstage Josh Groban.

Once again, this is why I love living in Canada — a country with fairness imbedded in its DNA, no matter how hard Steven Harper tries to root it out. This weekend, the first-ever drag show was held in Medicine Hat, Alberta and it sounds like everyone had a good time. Oh Canada, we stand on guard in heels for thee!

A former editor of the late, lamented fab magazine, Scott has been writing for Xtra since 2007 on a variety of topics in news pieces, interviews, blogs, reviews and humour pieces. He lives on the Danforth with his boyfriend of 12 years, a manic Jack Russell Terrier, a well-stocked mini-bar and a shelf of toy Daleks.

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