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MIchael Stokes does our service men proud

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The campaign made $50,000 in an hour.

The campaign made $50,000 in an hour.

People Are Shouting ‘Shut Up And Take My Money’ To This Amputee Veteran Kickstarter

by 7/10/2015One look look at a Michael Stokes’ photographs and you’ll understand why his Kickstarter has been such a success. The campaign, which is for Stokes’ art books “Exhibition” and “Always Loyal,” reached its $48,250 goal in an hour and change. Now think about how much you made in an hour at work today.
It’s not unusual for a Kickstarter to be funded quickly, but for one to make $50,000 this quickly isjust so very impressive. The campaign, which has only been up for two days, has reached over $134K, well ahead of its $48K goal. And there are still 18 days left on the campaign, so who knows how many books he’ll sell.

Stokes’ images (which get potentially NSFW down there) have power. And so do his subjects. One of the two books, “Always Loyal,” features amputee veterans in semi or completely nude photographs that not only show how fit they are, but the sacrifices they made for their country.

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Michael Stokes
Men’s Health Names Double Amputee Vet The ‘Ultimate’ Guy

Michael wasn’t even looking to make a book featuring wounded veterans. “I photographed a wounded veteran named Richard Rocco, who had no visible injuries — that was the first veteran that I photographed,” he told MTV News. “And from that, I start to get a following from people who follow wounded veterans. … Then one of my fans suggested Alex Minsky. He wasn’t really known.”

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After Michael posted the results of his shoot with Minsky, they went viral. Since then Minsky has had a lucrative modeling career, appearing in underwear ads and making appearances on “The View,” “Good Morning America” and late night talk shows.

Michael Stokes

It’s possible the same thing could happen for one these veterans who appear in the book. And, if you’re wondering whether any of the veterans felt self-conscious or anxious, the answer is no.

TJ Adams Of ‘Got Your 6′ Breaks Down Myths About Veterans

“Some people will say to me ’Oh, this is really helpful to their self-esteem,’ or, ’You’re making them feel like men again,’” Stokes said. “And I hear all these types of commentMs and the response I have to that is that these guys have come to me very healed and ready to take the world on. I’m not giving them back their confidence. They already have it.”

Michael Stokes’ Kickstarter runs until July 29, 2015.
 
http://www.mtv.com/news/2209944/amputee-veteran-book-kickstarter-michael-stokes/

When Topless is Good

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And now for some gratuitous topless flesh
 

GT Hunks

Our top topless superheroes

We’re celebrating Ant-Man scuttling into cinemas

Ant-Man is released in cinemas today and we’re already getting pretty swoony over Paul Rudd. But what would a big budget superhero flick like this be without a bit of shirtless action?
Nothing, that’s what. So to celebrate the occasion we’ve rounded up our top topless super-torsos.
Chris Evans does a mighty fine job of protecting the free world… And also looking FINE.

Thor or Phwoar? Both work for us. The oldest Hemsworth sets the hunk benchmark.


Chris Pratt was hot even as a cuddly shoe-shine boy. So now he’s positively irresistible.

Check out this behind the scenes shot of Robert Downey Jr as Iron Man. You’ve still got it RDJ.

We know he’s not Spider-Man anymore, but you have you admit Andrew Garfield is fine.

It’t not a rare occurrence to see Hugh Jackman with his shirt off, but we don’t believe there can be too much of a good thing.

Here’s a shot of Henry Cavill as Superman. We imagine he’s thinking “why do people only see the abs and not the person inside?” Poor lad.

Alan Ritchson’s Aquaman character featured in Smallville. Those muscles ain’t small though. What a hottie.

Last but not least we have the star of today’s show, Paul Rudd. Ant-man may be our new superhero crush. Is he yours?

Antman is in cinemas nationwide and you can read GT’s review right here.
Words Jessica Lindsay, @jesswritesgood

LGBT sex education in schools could lead to lower HIV rates and happier students

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1280px-Whitby_railway_station_MMB_08_156452The National AIDS Trust has released statistics that highlight the weak sex and relationships education in schools – and why better resources would lead to lower HIV rates and happier LGBT youth.
Throughout last year, the National AIDS Trust surveyed more than 1,000 young men in the UK, aged 14 to 19.
The study states: “. . .of those [55 percent] who had ever been bullied or treated unfairly because of their sexual orientation, over a third (39 percent) had experienced bullying or discrimination because of their sexual orientation from a teacher or another adult at school or college.”
68 percent were not educated about HIV testing and 64 percent had no instruction in school on what to do when bullied for being gay.
US statistics from PFLAG NYC state: “Gay teens are 8.4 times more likely to report having attempted suicide and 5.9 times more likely to report high levels of depression compared with peers from families that reported no or low levels of family rejection.”
The National AIDS Trust study divulged that 75 percent of the respondents did not receive any instruction about same-sex relationships or attraction.
However, 73 percent would value more information or support when it came to the topic.
Because LGBT-inclusive education was unavailable in schools, the respondents turned to websites, the “gay community,” pornography, friends and siblings or online forums and chat-rooms.
The results of the largest study of its kind in the UK revealed that bullying can lead to unsatisfactory mental health, which increases HIV risks because of an indifference to sexual health.
52 percent of the respondents would appreciate more education on mental health.
With the HIV rates in the UK rising, different alternatives have to be considered for prevention and the “Boys who like Boys” study reveals just that.
57 percent of those surveyed by the Nationals AIDS Trust expressed that they were unsatisfied or unsure about their satisfaction when it came to their HIV knowledge.
A good portion were unaware that HIV can only be transmitted through semen, vaginal fluid, rectal fluid, blood or breast milk, not saliva.
Additionally, they had no idea about the post-exposure prophylaxis drug, which halts infection if taken within the following 72 hours.
Recently, debate over LGBT inclusive sex education has been sparked.
General Secretary of the National Union of Teachers Christine Blower said: “We need education policy that develops curriculum for children and young people that supports the democratic values of a diverse Britain – including LGBT equality.
“Future governments must tackle the embedded homophobia, biphobia and transphobia that exist in some schools,” she told The Telegraph.
The National AIDS Trust also suggests that education relevant to LGBT youth should exist in schools, like information on consent, safe sex and pornography.
However, religious proponents object to the recommendations, claiming they will “oversexualise” the youngest members of society.
“This kind of policy is dangerous for our children who are being oversexualised at a very young age,” argued Andrea Williams of Christian Concern.
“They are being introduced to concepts and having normalised sex relationships which robs them of their innocence and is not good for their emotional and moral well being.”

DUP’s Jim Wells in bid to clear name over gay remarks

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Former health minister Jim Wells claimed his meaning had been misconstrued

DUP politician Jim Wells has launched a bid to clear his name after he was accused of linking child abuse and gay relationships.

He resigned as health minister after a tape from a hustings event in Downpatrick in April was made public.
In the tape, he said: “You don’t bring a child up in a homosexual relationship. That a child is far more likely to be abused and neglected.”
The minister was then interrupted by uproar from the audience.
In a later statement, he said: “I accept that one line of what I said caused offence and deep concern.”
But he told BBC NI’s Nolan Show on Wednesday that the tape was wrong in that it had been cut short and his meaning had been misconstrued.
“I want to clear my name. I want people to know that I did not say what that tape suggests,” he said.
“This tape totally misrepresented what I said in the live (session).
“The tape links my views on gay adoption and my views as to what happens to children in controversial and angry divorces.
“Had the tape gone on another two minutes we would not be having this discussion.”
Mr Wells told presenter Enda McClafferty that he only realised this when he got a complete transcript of what he had actually said at a later date.
“The tape that went out across the world stopped before I was able to explain what I meant,” he said.
“I did not say that homosexuals abused children.”
“I did say I was opposed to gay marriage, which I am.
“But then I go on to make the argument that when marriages break up – in either a heterosexual or homosexual relationship – if a marriage is in high conflict, this is almost invariably to the detriment of the child.”
Mr Wells said he felt “humiliated” by what had happened.
A police investigation is ongoing.
 

Editorial:  We have previously reported on this story, but now we ask you to make your own mind up – which side of the story do you believe, Mr Wells’ current interpretation or the recording? Comment and let us know.

 

Lawsuit Filed Against Walmart For Refusing Health Care Coverage For Same-Sex Spouses

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Editorial:  In July 1999, Asda became a subsidiary of the American retail company Walmart, and today is the United Kingdom’s second-largest chain by market share.

ASDA Walmart Supercentre
 

polusa-logo-360x86-1by: Keith Brekhus
 Tuesday, July, 14th, 2015, 9:05 pm

A class action lawsuit against Walmart was filed in U.S. District Court in Boston on Tuesday morning. The lawsuit alleges that, prior to 2014, the nation’s largest retailer violated gender discrimination laws by denying health insurance benefits to the spouses of legally married gay employees.

The suit was filed on behalf of Jacqueline Cote, an office manager at a Swansea, Massachusetts store. Cote’s wife, Diana Smithson was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2012, but she was denied health care coverage, because Walmart refused to provide coverage for spouses in same-sex marriages. As a result, the couple has incurred over 150,000 dollars in medical debt, while Smithson continues to fight her cancer.

The class action lawsuit was filed by two advocacy groups – Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD) and the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs (WLC). Peter Romer-Friedman, WLC’s Deputy Director of Litigation, explained the rationale for the lawsuit, arguing:

Walmart broke federal law when it denied vital benefits to workers who have same-sex spouses. In an era where marriage equality is supported by the American people and the U.S. Supreme Court, it is hard to believe that Walmart would treat its LGBTQ workers so poorly. Because Walmart’s discrimination harmed working families across the country, we are filing a national class action to ensure that Walmart finally provides these families the equal benefits federal law guarantees.

Walmart revised their policy to begin covering same-sex spouses on January 1, 2014. However, Cote and Smithson were legally married in Massachusetts in 2004. On January 29, 2014, the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission (EEOC) issued a determination that Walmart’s refusal to provide health care coverage to Jackie’s wife constituted unlawful sex discrimination.

According to Reuters, a Wal-Mart spokesman declined to comment, beyond stating that the company’s policy of denying benefits coverage to same-sex spouses before the 2014 change was legal. Whether the policy was legal will now be up to the courts to decide.

However, legal or not, the nation’s largest retailer chose to deny coverage to a woman with cancer, simply because she was in a same-sex rather than an opposite-sex marriage. That policy was discriminatory. While Walmart has already begun to change the way they treat same-sex spouses, they should also make amends and compensate those couples they discriminated against prior to 2014.

 

HPV Vaccination Is Safe and Effective

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This report was published in VICE News –

By Sydney Lupkin and Hanneke Weitering


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HPV Vaccination Is Safe and Effective — So Why Don’t More States Require It?

 
This story is part of a partnership between MedPage Today and VICE News.
Although many vaccines become mandatory for school-aged children about eight years after the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommends them, vaccines for human papillomavirus (HPV) have fallen far behind, new research shows.
HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection in the United States, with about 14 million new cases every year. But despite being recommended by the CDC in 2007, HPV vaccination is only required in Virginia, Rhode Island, and Washington, DC.
In contrast, a research letter by Princeton University bioethicist Jason Schwartz that was published on Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association notes that the CDC recommended that all children get the chicken pox vaccine in 1996. Eight years later, 39 states required children to be vaccinated against the chickenpox before entering public school, and today all 50 states and Washington, DC, require it.
Schwartz and his team also examined immunization requirements for hepatitis B and meningococcal diseases, and found a similar pattern.

‘Lots of parents were saying this may be appropriate for that child down the street, but not for mine.’

“I think part of this is the fact that this vaccine had a controversial history,” Schwartz told VICE News. “Critics of the vaccine in general were very effective at raising anxiety, raising concern about safety of the vaccine, about the value, about consequences, about adolescent sexual behavior after receiving the vaccine.… That really may have left a bitter taste in the mouths of state legislatures and state health officials.”
 
Shortly after HPV vaccines were licensed, people focused on how the virus was sexually transmitted rather than the fact that the vaccine prevented a virus that caused cervical cancer, according to Dr. William Schaffner, chair of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, who was not involved in Schwartz’s study. Fears of encouraging promiscuity among young people trumped concerns about public health.
“With attention devoted to the mode of acquisition of the virus, that raised all the issues of sex in young people,” Schaffner told VICE News. “Lots of parents were saying this may be appropriate for that child down the street, but not for mine.”
HPV vaccination has been proven to be safe and effective, and several studies have debunked the notion that it fosters sexual promiscuity.
Hepatitis B is also sexually transmitted. Schwartz points out that the hepatitis B vaccine is mandatory in 47 states and Washington, DC, where it is given to newborns.
Schaffner said that when the hepatitis B vaccine was first introduced in the 1980s, it was administered to adolescents and sparked the same fears about influencing sexual behavior. This anxiety faded in time because studies disproved a link between the vaccine and sexual behavior, and it was added to the newborn immunization schedule.
In 2010, the federal Healthy People program announced a goal to have 80 percent of children between 13 and 15 vaccinated for HPV by 2020. But CDC data show that only 37.6 percent of adolescent girls and 13.9 percent of adolescent boys had completed the three-dose series of HPV vaccination in 2013.
“When you think about how this is a vaccine that is remarkably safe and remarkably effective, that’s not a good record,” Schaffner said, referring to the data. “In fact, it’s appalling.”
Although Dr. Kimberly Gecsi, an OB/GYN at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland, Ohio, is unsurprised that HPV vaccination hasn’t been widely administered, she said that Schwartz’s research letter offered a compelling comparison and made her think about why we rely on schools to enforce vaccine coverage in the first place.
“You can argue that schools want to require communicable vaccines like the measles and the chicken pox… but you’re not going to get HPV just by being at the school with somebody with HPV,” she said. “The same thing is true with hepatitis B. With hepatitis B, you’re trying to change the behavior by requiring it.”
Texas became the first US state to require HPV vaccines in 2007, when Gov. Rick Perry issued an executive order mandating that all girls entering the sixth grade be vaccinated against HPV. But Texas legislators quickly passed a bill to override the executive order, which Perry declined to veto.
That same year, Virginia and DC passed HPV immunization requirements for middle school girls that are still in effect today. DC has since extended the requirement to boys. In July 2014, Rhode Island passed a similar bill, and it will go into effect for boys and girls this August.
Some communities have achieved high HPV immunization coverage without mandatory school requirements, a spokesman for the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases told VICE News. Although Rhode Island’s mandate doesn’t go into effect until next month, he noted that 77 percent of adolescent girls in the state have already had at least the first shot in the series.
School requirements mostly help communities that already have high vaccination rates by ensuring that “stragglers” who’ve fallen behind on their immunizations are able to catch up before starting school.
“However, if the community has very low coverage — say, 50 percent — the school requirement may not be as effective since there may be other issues that is keeping coverage down,” he said. “We need to have realistic expectations of what school requirements can do.”
Hanneke Weitering is an intern at MedPage Today.
Photo via Wikimedia Commons
 

Editorial:  All girls aged 12 and 13 in the UK have been offered the vaccine since September 2008.

 
Further reading:

 

The Problem is Not Gays but the Religious Right’s Culture of Repression

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By: Hrafnkell Haraldsson  more from Hrafnkell Haraldsson
Thursday, July, 9th, 2015, 7:57 am
Re-criminalize_sodomy
Bart Barber, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Farmersville, Texas, wrote in Canon and Culture yesterday that Obergfell v Hodges has presented “followers of Christ” with “a changed universe of possibilities.”
He claims that even a “if some modern-day triumvirate rivaling Whitefield, Edwards, and Wesley were to bring upon us a Third Great Awakening, it still would be too late to prevent this nation’s social experimentation by way of the removal of sexual taboos.”
Barber admits he is not a lawyer. He is also, despite his claims to the contrary, not a historian. Like most on the Religious Right, he insists on some monolithic and unchanging reality with regards gender roles that are not, in fact, present in the historical record, even among Christians (even King David says sleeping with his friend Nathan is “better than sleeping with a woman.”)
Like others arguing against Marriage Equality, he makes the Bible into one long anti-gay diatribe, when it is nothing of the sort, and was not recognized as such for most of Christian history.
Barber goes on to claim that “the advocates for the sexual revolution are taking us back to first-century Rome.” But here Barber is appealing to a past that exists only in the imagination:
Socially, the advocates for the sexual revolution are quickly taking us back to first-century Rome. There and then we knew we were a minority, which we’ve always been whether we recognized it or not. Our church rolls contain many unregenerate members. That situation is about to change. A red-hot commitment to Christ is about to become the only reason why anyone would join one of our churches. We are becoming the ultimate “alternative lifestyle,” and the aftermath of today’s decision could be freeing for us if we will allow it to be.
There are a couple of important things to understand about first-century Rome. Barber, the non-historian wants a dichotomy that is not there. Running on the fumes of what have become Hollywood stereotypes, he wants a decadent, moribund Paganism and absence of morality to stand in stark contrast to the vibrant and revolutionizing opposition to moral relativism represented by Christianity.
His message is clear: We have fallen back into the moral abyss from which Christianity emerged.
On the contrary, as Jonathan Hirsch has pointed out, “The ruling class of Rome was, contrary to twenty centuries of Christian moral censure, rather fussy and even puritanical on the subject of sex, especially in outward appearances.”[1]
And Ray Laurence, writing of Roman sexuality, laments that “It is something of a disappointment to discover that the Romans did not have orgies.”[2] As Laurence goes on to explain, “there is no evidence for them. They are yet another example of the fevered imagination of the modern world, which attempts to sexualize all other cultures past and present.”
“Sexuality,” says Lynn LiDonnici, “as we use the term does not appear to have concerned people in the ancient Mediterranean; specific acts drew more attention than choices about lifestyle or sexual identities in the modern sense of identification.” The problem, as she sees it, is our modern inability to think outside of our own context. She stresses the need to “understand symbols from antiquity on their own terms.”
If we separate our own tendency to eroticize all female categories from the categories of antiquity…this…may hinder the understanding of Greco-Roman people on their own terms. It is possible that the tendency to extend erotic category judgments to the art of antiquity makes it difficult for us to perceive a figure who is both unsexualized and at the same time fully gendered.[3]
In fact, as Robert L. Wilken, who actually bothers to examine the social structures and contexts of the first century, points out, “A strong current of libertinism, offensive to the sensibilities of the middle- and upper-class Romans, runs through early Christianity. It is the Romans, not the Christians, who are the puritans.”[4]
This is contrary to what modern-day Christians are brought up to believe, and Wayne Meeks echoes LiDonnici, arguing that, “we cannot claim to understand the morality of a group until we can describe the world of meaning and of relationships, special to that group in its own time and place, with which behavior is evaluated.”[5]
Insisting that Christianity today is like Christianity in the first century, is to fail to make that effort. Christians today move in a different context entirely. When Meeks points out that, “it is Plato as read by Philo and Plutarch…whom we must understand” and not as read by some modern scholar,[6] the same must necessarily be true of the New Testament.
The crux of the matter and this is something ignored by Barber and others is that in the first century, the New Testament did not exist. There were collections of writings and letters, different collections in different areas, giving rise to a multitude of Christianity’s and understandings. There was no monolithic Christianity any more than there was a monolithic Paganism for it to stand in opposition to.
In fact, Christian morality, supposedly so new and revolutionary, was informed by that of the Pagan world we are told it opposed.
The idea of philanthropia was well known by Pagan society – and long before Christianity appeared, and even the idea of loving one’s enemies is well attested in Pagan writings. Diogenes Laertius (8.23) mentions Pythagoras on this score and it is found in Seneca too (De vita beata 20.5). John Whittaker’s findings are impossible to argue with: “We have no choice but to conclude that the pertinent conception was deeply entrenched in the popular morality of the ancient world.”
Whittaker goes on to say, “We may conclude that pagan critics had not been slow to note that the Christian ideal of morality, lofty though it might be, was well anchored in the Hellenistic tradition.” Indeed, “in the Iambi ad Seleucum of Amphilochius of Iconium, friend of the Cappadocians and cousin of Gregory Nazianzen, the exhortation to follow the ethics of the pagans but not their theology.” This amounts to less than a damning condemnation of Pagan ethics and morality.[7]
Pagan critic Celsus, writing at the turn of the second century, went so far as to accuse the Christians of a lack of originality in the area of morality.[8] Origen, in his response, does not even try to contest the point, but settles for asserting that “basic moral principles are by divine disposition universally one and the same.”
Whittaker notes that Christian apologists of the second century “took pains to emphasize the similarities rather than the divergences between their beliefs and the pagan wisdom of the Roman Empire.”[9] Even the bigoted Augustine insisted that philosophers converting to Christianity leave only their false doctrines behind, not their way of life.[10]
Follow the ethics of the Pagans, Pastor Barber. Not their theology. At the time, this was the dividing line between your followers of Christ and Pagans: theology, not morality. You and the rest of the Religious Right conflate the two.
If there is something to be worried about, it is that, as Laurence writes, “a dominant culture of repression can only thrive if a transgressive subculture is seen as a threat.”
It is, in fact, Pastor Barber, as part of that culture of repression, who is the problem, not “the advocates for the sexual revolution” he condemns.
Notes:
[1] Jonathan Hirsch. God Against the Gods: The History of the War Between Monotheism and Polytheism (NY: Viking Compass, 2004), 121.
[2] See Ray Laurence, Roman Passions: A History of Pleasure in Imperial Rome(London: Continuum, 2009).
[3] Lynn R. LiDonnici, “The Images of Artemis Ephesia and Greco-Roman Worship: A Reconstruction,” HTR 85 (1992), 393, 409 n. 81, 411.
[4] Robert L. Wilken, “Toward a Social Interpretation of Early Christian Apologetics” Church History 39 (1970), 442. As Wilken goes on to say, “If some Christians celebrated the liturgy without clothes, it would not take long for the word to get out that Christians as a group were depraved.”
[5] Wayne A. Meeks, “Understanding Early Christian Ethics” JBL 105 (1986), 4.
[6] Meeks (1986), 7.
[7] John Whittaker “Christianity and Morality in the Roman Empire”Vigiliae Christianae 33 (1979) 210.
[8] Origen, Contra Cels. 1.4 (PG 11.661).
[9] Whittaker (1979), 212-213
[10] Augustine, Civ. Dei 19.19.
 

LGBT community has an answer to lack of gay bars in Cheltenham – it’s called GayFriday

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Dan Herbert and Alex Sass - Gloucester Post

Dan Herbert and Alex Sass


Bereft of a dedicated gay bar, Cheltenham’s LGBT community has come up with a solution.

 GayFriday is a monthly bar crawl with its latest event planned for the end of this month.

The event wasn’t stringently organised but emerged naturally, explained one of the organisers Alex Sass.
The catalyst was the closure of Cheltenham’s only gay club, Embassy in 2014.

Alex, a 37-year-old marketing agency director from Lansdown, said: “For people in Cheltenham, it meant that the nearest place they could be sure of a drink or coffee with a new gay friend would be Gloucester.

“For a while, their bar closed too, leaving all of Gloucestershire without any sort of social meeting place.
“So friends gathered and decided that even if we didn’t always need a gay venue, we would value knowing there would be some gay friends on a night out, just to chat about relationships or even difficulties we might face that aren’t always obvious to our straight pals.”
The nights are free to join and different venues are chosen by the members each time.
“What’s really nice is that some members have started to bring their friends too, gay or straight and it just feels like a really fun, safe night out,” said Alex who works at Eagle Tower in Cheltenham.
“The bars have all been very welcoming and lots of the members have gone on to add each other on Facebook making Cheltenham feel less of a lonely place.”
Alex said GayFriday has been a big success so far.
“I’m not sure other people in the venues we visit would even notice us and that’s great, we’re all part of the same town and we should be mixing in the same venues,” he said.
“It’s just nice to know there’s a friendly face on arrival, someone who knows what it’s like to be you.”
Alex would to see a new gay bar or club in Cheltenham however.
He said: “Personally I would love to see another gay pub in town.
“I think gay culture has often been ahead of the curve in terms of nightlife and music and it’s a shame to lose this diversity.
“I can’t speak for the community as a whole because in many ways the community doesn’t exist.
“We have one thing in common but so much else that makes us individual.
“Gay bars can be awesome, for anyone if they are also awesome bars.”
The next GayFriday bar crawl is on July 31 and will take place in Montpellier.
To get involved visit the Facebook page at facebook.com/gayfridaycheltenham.
Alex added: “You know what’s fab – I’ve lived in Cheltenham for ten years and visited each bar that’s opened in that time.
“Yet in the last few months, through GayFriday, I met at least ten people who I’d never known before. That’s a great thing.”
Read more: http://www.gloucestershireecho.co.uk/Cheltenham-s-LGBT-community-answer-gay-bars-town/story-26892217-detail/story.html#ixzz3fr78Nwzw

Manchester Pride explores the hidden history of a rainbow city

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An interactive project called OUT! will use crowdsourced recollections to celebrate Manchester’s LGBT community

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A 1988 Gay Unity parade. Photograph: Manchester Libraries


From the notorious police raid on the Hulme fancy dress ball in 1880, to the pioneering North Western Committee for Homosexual Law Reform set up in 1964, Manchester’s LGBT community has a long and notable past. Now Manchester Pride is celebrating the city’s stories in an interactive project – and you can be part of it.
Launching online next month and called OUT!, the project will draw together documents, data and crowdsourced recollections to create a digital archive, interactive timeline and an evolving map of Manchester tagged with stories and footage.
“The objective is to allow people to explore the hidden archives and hidden histories that Manchester holds regarding Pride and regarding LGBT as a community,” explains Jake Welsh, managing director of e3creative, the design company developing the site.
Building on a heritage trail initiative from 2003, marked by 19 rainbow tiles at historically significant locations around the city, the interactive map allows users to digitally construct their own walking tours based on the geo-tagged stories. What’s more, the project encourages individuals to add their own memories to the map, from text to photographs, audio to video.
“By dropping pins, they can put their own story forward – so it might be their first coffee where they first held hands with their partner,” explains Daniel Jessop, project manager at Manchester Pride. Contributions can be made anonymously and kept private or shared with all.
The project will also see volunteers actively seeking out contributions from the LGBT community – including at Manchester Pride’s Big Weekend next month. “LGBT history in Manchester has often been recorded as a series of events and I think it’s important to record the culture, as well, that surrounds those events,” says Paul Wheatley, one of the project’s “pride pioneers” who will be helping to gather new media and oral histories, as well as collating material from a multitude of organisations and institutions. “Some of my friends have brilliant stories to tell and are real raconteurs about their experiences and their relationship with the history,” he says. “I think that I will be able to capture those experiences in stories whereas if they were approached by other people they might be more reluctant to give that up.” Creating an accurate and thorough record is also a priority, he adds.
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Funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, the project will be open for contributions until next summer. But it isn’t only positive stories that will be recorded – as Wheatley explains: “Manchester’s LGBT community has been uniquely persecuted,” he says.
“In the late 70s, an obscure law was enforced resulting in police in gay bars holding a wooden rod between men who were dancing, to make sure they were far enough apart. Some years later, the police persecuted same-sex couples holding hands on Canal Street resulting in gay men and women lying down on the road to block their police vans.” Raising awareness of such events, he says, is crucial. “Those struggles are poorly documented and I hope this project will address that.”
Ultimately, Jessop hopes OUT! will not only showcase how far civil rights have come, but also challenge perceptions. “It’s Manchester Pride’s mission, but shared with the LGBT community, to make sure respect continues to be given and also respect for the past,” he says. “People are always aware of 1967 and decriminalisation, that is seen as the one date – but there is so much more to tell.”
 

I respect the gay community…

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Belfast Telegraph logoPUBLISHED13/07/2015 | 10:18
 

Adrian Cochrane-Watson: ‘I respect the gay community… they have stayed at my B&B’

The new MLA tells Adrian Rutherford about his plans to revive the Ulster Unionist Party, his views on same-sex marriage and claims that he insulted Travellers.

Adrian Cochrane-Watson
 

Rising star: New Ulster Unionist MLA Adrian Cochrane-Watson hopes to lead a resurgence of his party in South Antrim

Q. You are one of Stormont’s newest MLAs, but how did you get into politics?

A. I’ve been a member of the Ulster Unionist Party for 25 years. I first joined Antrim Borough Council in 1997 and was a member of the Antrim Town electoral area up to the end of last month. My family had always been great supporters of the UUP.

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A former headmaster at primary school, Paddy Marks, was a councillor and we had always been very supportive of him. My uncles worked and campaigned with him. It was a natural progression to vote Ulster Unionist, to identify with the party and, eventually, to stand for them.
Q. You’ve a long record in local government. How different will your role be as an MLA?
A. I’ve always represented Antrim Town. I’ve served as mayor on two occasions and deputy mayor on two occasions. The big challenge for me, in what is a very short period of time before the next Assembly election, is to ensure that what I believe is the best practice that I’ve delivered to the people of Antrim is delivered to the wider audience of the South Antrim constituency.
I’ve only got 10 months to prove myself to them – the people outside the town or borough of Antrim.  It’s a challenge, but it’s one that, working closely with our new MP Danny Kinahan, I feel we can deliver on.

Q. You started at the Assembly on June 29, worked a week, and are now off for nine weeks.
A. No, I’ve a lot of work to do. I’ve already met up with Danny Kinahan and the local council team. Danny only became an MP on May 8.
Together we both have to review the constituency service that we’re offering to see how we can complement each other. We want to look at how we communicate better with the constituency and engage with local community groups.
Q. So it’s not a case of coming along for a few days and going off on holidays for nine weeks?
A. That is definitely not the case. I’ve had the attitude that, even as a local councillor – and I think that role is underestimated – that you’re on call 24/7.
It’s a role I think you have to give a huge commitment to. Certainly I won’t be taking nine weeks’ holidays and I hope the constituency service will reinvent itself over those nine weeks.
Q. Outside politics what are your interests?
A. I’m very family-orientated and my wife and I have four children. I’ve a daughter of 23 and one who is 18. We’re also blessed with a wee boy who is 10 and have long-term fostered another boy who is 13. We’ve just recently taken on a wee boy who is a toddler. He’s been with us for several months. We don’t know what his future will be.
We also have several other kids who come to us for respite. It can be challenging, but it’s rewarding as well to see those children thrive and develop, and for us to make a small difference.
Q. How did you get involved with fostering?
A. We unfortunately lost a child because of a miscarriage. We always had an ambition to have more children, and we thought about it but at the time it wasn’t right for us. We re-engaged with Barnardos, a fantastic organisation, about three-and-a-half years ago and went through the fostering skills programme.
It’s been a great experience for us. The 13-year-old has been with us for about three years and will be with us for life. He’s part of our family. The other wee boy has just joined us, he’s a toddler and a great wee fella. It’s made my wife and I young again, getting up early in the morning and giving him the odd bottle. Every six weeks we’ve a wee boy and a wee girl who continue to come to us.
So every six weeks we have seven kids in the house, but it’s fantastic. They all get on well together. You can do something special for them coming, and they love it. We make as much time as we can for them.
Q. You also have an interest in sport?
A. Yes, I played rugby up until I got too old. I played for the local clubs -Antrim, Randalstown and Ballymena – and represented Ulster Juniors for a short time.
I ended up hurting my cruciate ligament. I did it again messing about playing football, the same one, and the NHS sent me over to a clinic in Liverpool about three years ago.
Steven Gerrard was in the same clinic as me that day – my wife seemed more interested in him.
Q. You were previously threatened with prosecution after confronting an intruder in your home. What happened?
A. I was mayor at the time and my daughter, then 18, was at home with her younger sister and brother, who were about 12 and six respectively.
A man had tried to enter a house on the road where we live about an hour previously. The police had been notified of suspicious activity. We had a wee dog who was ill, and this man discovered the back door had been left open for the dog, and he came in.
It was suggested afterwards he had taken a cocktail of alcohol and drugs. He managed to get inside the house and he tried to engage in some way – he was of ethnic minority – with my daughter. My children were horrified. They barricaded themselves into one of the bedrooms.
My eldest daughter took over, with a hockey stick, to try and defend her brother and sister. Unfortunately the police response wasn’t what was expected. She phoned 999 and mistakes were made by the call centre, which the Assistant Chief Constable was big enough to admit to. She phoned my wife and I, and we made it home from Templepatrick well before the police arrived.
The man was trying to ransack the house, and we held him until police arrived.
Q. Did you assault the culprit?
A. No, there were allegations made but I refuted them at the time. He was 6ft 4, 23 stone. When the police arrived he assaulted the policewoman. Certainly I restrained him until police arrived, but that was it.
This was an individual convicted of assaulting a policewoman, of gaining entry to my home and causing criminal damage to the house. I thought I had every right to restrain him and call the police. Unfortunately, because of the mix-up in the call centre, I was there well before the police did eventually arrive. But I did nothing at all. I was investigated, and I was cleared.
Q. In 2006 you said you would feel uncomfortable having gay couples in the bed and breakfast you ran at the time. Why?
A. This was around the time of civil partnerships being made legal in Northern Ireland. It started after a researcher for the BBC phoned my wife and presented a scenario of a gay couple demanding a double bed.
She made it clear that anyone coming to the house does not demand anything. She clarified her position that she had absolutely no concerns with members of the gay community and I certainly have no concerns. I totally respect members of the gay community.
At that time, with such a young family – it was nine years ago and my daughter was nine, my son was barely two – we just had concerns.
Q. But what concerns?
A. I think the idea of same-sex couples and trying to explain it to a young family, a young family who didn’t have the understanding of two men or two women being together.
If it was a larger facility it wouldn’t have been an issue.
There is no issue today, there has been a huge extension put on and I’m sure members of the gay community have stayed and will continue to stay in the facility, which is now run by my daughter.
Q. Gays are welcome to stay, then?
A. More than welcome.
Q. This had all died down until 2010, when you were not picked as an election candidate because the Conservatives felt you were unsuitable to run in their link-up with the UUP.
A. I was selected by the South Antrim Ulster Unionist Association. Because of the link-up with the Conservatives, both parties had to agree the candidate. They had concerns over myself and the comments I had previously made.
Q. It was obviously very disappointing.
A. It was disappointing at the time. It was more disappointing that the then party leader Sir Reg Empey who came in to stand in South Antrim, and who I fully supported, missed out by about 1,000 votes. That was more disappointing than any personal disappointment I had.
Q. We’ve seen similar incidents such as the Ashers case recently. Is it becoming very difficult for businesses?
A. It’s very disappointing that case ended up in court. I felt it could have been resolved, possibly with a positive outcome for both parties, through dialogue and facilitation.
We’re now in a situation where an appeal has been launched and I can’t say much more.
Q. Do you support the DUP’s idea of a conscience clause?
A. The Ulster Unionist Party view is very mature – it is a matter of conscience. My position is very clear on same-sex marriage. I wouldn’t be supportive of it at present.
However, if there was a debate or discussion in the future, I would enter into it with a very respectful and open mind.
Q. Why are you against gay marriage?
A. I am just slightly uncomfortable with it. I come from a Presbyterian family, from a very Christian household, and within my church and my family I’m just uncomfortable with it.
But, as I said, I’m committed to be respectful. Bear in mind, it was our party which was the creator of Section 75 (which enshrined the rights of every citizen to be treated equally in Northern Ireland) in the Good Friday Agreement.
Q. You previously described Travellers as “scumbags”. Why?
A. It was taken very much out of context. Again, the Travelling community deserve respect and equality. However, they have to adhere to the laws of this country.
We’ve had, unfortunately, in this area illegal encampments, and associated with those encampments has been criminal damage to private property.
Those responsible are a very small minority. As a public representative, I treat everyone the same, and if members of the majority or host community behaved in that manner, they deserve the laws of the country to be imposed on them. I welcome Travellers’ rights, and have worked with Travellers’ groups, and am currently working on a small encampment in the Antrim town area where a family deserves better from the Housing Executive.
But likewise the host community of that area, Rathenraw, deserve better than a Travellers’ encampment being introduced overnight.
Q. “Scumbags” was the wrong word to use then?
A. I certainly wouldn’t use that phrase against the entire Travelling community. No one has anything to fear from me, and certainly not the Travelling community, but the fact of the matter is that all sections of society must adhere to the rules and laws of the country.
Q. Is there a problem with Travellers adhering to the law?
A. No, there’s not, but unfortunately in every social grouping there is a minority – a very small minority – which can get a reputation. The vast majority of the Travelling community is law-abiding and making a positive contribution to the community.
Q. So it doesn’t help when an elected representative refers to them as “scumbags”.
A. I would stress that that was very much taken out of context. It was mis-used by members of Sinn Fein over a specific issue in the town of Antrim.
Q. What are your priorities for South Antrim?
A. As with every constituency, too high a percentage of our unemployed are young people. Between the ages of 16 and 25, we have about 25% of people unemployed.
Young people not actively engaged in employment or training programmes are a target audience which I believe we need to commit more resources to. The main issue, and it has bogged down the Assembly, is welfare reform.
I hope welfare reform will happen and the £600m package which is there, and will support and provide for the most vulnerable in our society, can be implemented.
Q. Can you really achieve much in 10 months?
A. I think you can be judged on two fronts.
The first is how you deliver at the Assembly itself, and sometimes that is dictated by how well the Assembly itself is delivering. Secondly, more importantly, is the constituency service you deliver.
I have had an office in Antrim High Street for 14 years, and have been accessible to the community, dealing with everyday issues. It is about developing a reputation as a hard-working, delivering MLA.
I know I’ve got that reputation in Antrim Town. I want to be sure I’ve got that reputation throughout South Antrim.
We’re a fast-growing association and the past few years have been highly successful.
We ran 12 candidates in the council elections and got 12 elected.
We put up Danny, after 10 years of neglect from Willie McCrea, and won that seat back.
So I think we’re in a very strong position.
Q. Did Willie McCrea really neglect South Antrim?
A. He was possibly the hide and seek champion.
Unfortunately many of us felt he was never around and he wasn’t delivering for the people of South Antrim. It was up to the electorate to decide who was best placed to represent them at Westminster, and by a majority of almost 1,000 they chose Danny Kinahan.
Q. Until now you have been on the outside of the Assembly. Do you think the criticism it gets is justified?
A. There has been a lack of activity from the Assembly. In my very short time there I’ve seen a fantasy budget put forward with a £600m black hole.
I also witnessed an embarrassing episode surrounding Sammy Wilson and the entire DUP Assembly team sitting there trying to defend Sammy. It was quite a pathetic waste of time and public money.
I’ve also seen the problems between the two majority parties, Sinn Fein and the DUP. People must be wondering what is happening, and the answer is not very much.
There has been a lot of inactivity, a lot of indecision, particularly from the Executive and the Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister.