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Divine performing ‘Born To Be Cheap’ live on TV
01.15.2011
01:39 am
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Divine performing her single “Born To Be Cheap” (1979, Wax Trax Records) on a 1984 episode of The Alan Thicke Show.

The Planters Snacks commercial adds the perfect outro for this punky performance by the immortal Divine.

David Johansen eat your heart out.
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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01.15.2011
01:39 am
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Disco goddess Sylvester plays live underground, 1979
12.17.2010
02:00 am
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San Francisco disco diva Sylvester James’s appearance at a dance party in a subterranean SF Muni station in the Castro district in 1979 couldn’t have been more fraught. The neighborhood had just been shaken to the core the previous fall with the shooting death of Harvey Milk, SF’s first openly gay supervisor. Ahead lay the AIDS epidemic, which would eventually take Sylvester himself 22 years ago this week at age 41.

But on that night, Sylvester was at the peak of his success. He was just about to release his 5th album, Stars, the follow-up to 1978’s Step II, which had hit #7 on the American R&B charts and included one of gay America’s legendary anthems, “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real).” After his first taste of mainstream success, and after nine years of the official Gay Pride parade in San Francisco, after coming this far, perhaps it seemed fitting for the community to get back to its roots and and take the party underground again.
 
Thanks to Erica Green for bringing this to my attention…
 

 

Posted by Ron Nachmann
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12.17.2010
02:00 am
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Ever wonder where anti-gay activists get their ‘facts’? Wonder no more!

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Repulsive, repugnant and throughly discredited anti-gay “researcher” (and batshit crazy homophobe), “Dr.” Paul Cameron gave an incredibly distasteful, yet almost (I said almost) laughable interview to the Colorado Springs Gazette recently. Cameron—who once spread the lie that a small child had been castrated by a gay man in a public bathroom and who says DADT repeal would lead to gay rapes in the military—said the fact that his antigay organization, The Family Research Institute, was recently classified as a hate group by Southern Poverty Law Center was merely a “left-wing” smear.

Here’s what the SPLC report had to say about Cameron and his non-profit, donation-supported “institute” which consists of four employees and is run out of his home in Colorado Springs on a budget of $85,000 per year (Wait a minute, who would send this fool money?):

Started in 1987 by psychologist Paul Cameron, the Family Research Institute (FRI) has become the anti-gay movement’s main source for what Cameron claims is “cutting-edge research” — but is, in fact, completely discredited junk science pushed out by a man who has been condemned by three professional organizations.

Over nearly three decades, Cameron has published “research studies” (though almost never in peer-reviewed journals) that suggest that homosexuals are predatory and diseased perverts who victimize children. Among his more recent defamations was an FRI pamphlet asserting the primary activity of the gay rights movement is “seeking to legitimize child-adult homosexual sex.” In another, he claimed that with “the rise of the gay rights movement, homosexual rape of men appears to have increased.” In yet another, he wrote, “Homosexuals were three times more likely to admit to having made an obscene phone call” and “a third more apt to report a traffic ticket or traffic accident in the past 5 years.”

Some of Cameron’s more infamous claims include the idea that homosexuals molest children at far higher rates than heterosexuals and that homosexuals have extremely short lives. Last February, he wrote on FRI’s website that “If homosexuals are allowed to serve in the military, they will be recruiting in showers, having sex in the barracks… . Before long, the U.S. may be defended by the sex-obsessed and those who can tolerate kowtowing to them.” After all, writes Cameron — a man who proposes that parents promote teen heterosexual activity to keep kids straight — “homosexual sex overwhelms rationality [and] overwhelms the desire to serve.”

Cameron’s colleagues have condemned him repeatedly. In 1983, he was thrown out of the American Psychological Association for ethical violations.  In 1984, the Nebraska Psychological Association disassociated itself from Cameron’s statements about sexuality. In 1985, the American Sociological Association adopted a resolution saying Cameron “has consistently misinterpreted and misrepresented sociological research on sexuality” and “repeatedly campaigned for the abrogation of the civil rights of lesbians and gay men”; the following year, the same group formally condemned Cameron for that misrepresentation of research.

Despite all this — and the fact that Cameron’s propaganda is widely known to be false or misleading — many groups have continued to use his claims, though often without citing their source. They include the American Family Association, Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, Concerned Women for America, Coral Ridge Ministries, the Family Research Council and, until recently, the Illinois Family Institute/ (Note: all six were also included in the report)

Yes, that’s right, the VERY SAME assholes you see on Fox News each and every time DADT, hate crime legislation and gay marriage is brought up are quoting this fool’s “research”! People like Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council. Facts? Who cares about the facts when Perkins can just quote a statement from a “think tank” consisting of an old crackpot and a handful of his cronies? A guy who has been ostracized and rebuked by several of the most prestigious professional medical organizations in the country and who publishes his “research” in the official sounding “Psychological Reports,” a journal which will publish pretty much any old thing for the cost of $27.50 per page? Yep, that’s the guy, Paul Cameron. He’s the UR-source for nearly all this stuff when such “fact” and “studies” are cited, even if you’ve never heard of him.

And I’ll say it again, this “research” is what you hear parroted by rightwing Christians on Fox News and talk radio all day long. Paul Cameron is too crazy to be mentioned by name—even anti-gay marriage Christian activists are wary of an association with him—but his ludicrous “research,” as if it were worth anything more than $27.50 per page, has formed the pseudo-science basis of their reality tunnels. If they weren’t hateful assholes, I could feel sorry for them.

Here are a couple of nuggets from the interview:

God’s 11th Commandment is “Thou shalt not corrupt boys,”  Cameron told me. He celebrated the Ugandan anti-gay bill, in which the penalty for gay activity could be death. “Whatever they decide, I’m OK with,” he said. 

Cameron believes homosexuality should be criminalized in America. He proposes heavily taxing single American adults and homosexuals because of their failure to procreate. He would also like to see gays undergo a “public shaming,” though he offered no specifics.

During our 90-minute talk, Cameron expressed his ideas in a calm, professorial manner. He said the SPLC Hate Group list is a “left-wing deal” and he’s unconcerned about the FRI being on it. He said gays “want to shut down Christianity.”

The gay lifestyle, which he says is chosen, will lead to the destruction of the West. “Liberal minds are attracted to societal destructive things like moth to a light,” he told me. “No society can long endure that does such a thing.”

“If God has changed his mind (about homosexuality being an abomination, as written in the Bible), he must want the West to die.”

Cameron has been at this game for thirty years now. Thirty years of his fucking life on earth spent making up shit about gay people because the Bible told him this was a good thing to do! Clearly he’s a lunatic. The older he gets, the crazier he gets.

The next time you hear this kind of nonsense—only slightly watered down—being promoted on or talk radio or television by the likes of Tony Perkins (Note to CNN: STOP inviting this fucking guy on your airwaves, okay?) or oh, I dunno, say, Governor Rick Perry of Texas, remember that the “scientific” root of their belief system (or “BS” as Robert Anton Wilson liked to say) comes from this idiot, “Dr.” Paul Cameron, a man whose ideas deserve contempt and mockery.

The Fabulist: Anti-gay researcher Paul Cameron’s falsehoods are well known. The incredible thing is the people who still cite them (SPLC)

The Holy War on Gays: The Christian Right is on a new mission:  To drive homosexuality back into the closet.  Inside the war rooms of evangelical intolerance (Rolling Stone)

Springs nonprofit leader wants homosexuality criminalized (Colorado Springs Gazette)

Debunked & Disgraced Professional Anti-Gay Paul Cameron: Prop H8 Lawyers “Scared” to Use His Junk “Science” (Lavender Newswire)

Posted by Richard Metzger
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12.10.2010
03:26 pm
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Destroy the music machine: ‘Remixing’ John Cage’s classic 4’33” on the way to a UK Xmas #1
12.10.2010
01:06 pm
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  Cage Against the Machine..‘4.33’ Mr. Scruff Remix! by Mr Scruff

Three silent cheers for Dave and Julie Hilliard! They’re the couple behind Cage Against the Machine, the grassroots Facebook effort to bring a new recording of composer John Cage’s famous “silent” piece 4’33” to #1 in the UK charts this Christmas over whichever bullshit song wins the UK TV pop contest X Factor this year.

The Hilliards named CATM in hat-tip to last year’s successful Facebook campaign to boost Rage Against the Machine’s raw 1992 tune “Killing in the Name” into the Christmas #1 over whatever crappy tune won the ’09 X Factor. This year, indie-ish artists like Imogen Heap, Fyfe Dangerfield, Scroobius Pip, The Kooks and Heaven 17 popped into the studio to not play their instruments, and the single will be released by the Wall of Sound label. And instead of one single charity, the proceeds from sales of the new 4’33” benefits FOUR. Factor that in, Simon Cowell, you tit-head.

The race to #1 starts December 13. Here’s where you can sign up for a reminder and chart-eligible link to download the single.

Here’s an added plus: the wonderful conceptual flexibility behind 4’33” has allowed CATM to solicit remixes from both some innovative producers and you:

So go to it, give us a four minute thirty three second audio snapshot of your life. Record it on your phone, your Mac, PC, recorder, dictaphone, walkperson, whatever and share it here.

Check some out…
 

Latest tracks by RemixAgainstTheMachine

 

Posted by Ron Nachmann
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12.10.2010
01:06 pm
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Uncut version of David Wojnarowiscz’s censored video ‘A Fire In My Belly’
12.09.2010
11:22 pm
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Last week David Wojnarowiscz’s video “A Fire In My Belly” was removed from the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery’s exhibit, ‘Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture.’ The version pulled from the exhibit was actually just an excerpt from the original 21 minute film. Here’s the uncut version of “A Fire In My Belly” courtesy of the estate of David Wojnarowicz and P.P.O.W Gallery, New York.

Unlike the shorter version, the original video does not contain Diamanda Galas’s vocal track. I find the silent version more haunting.
 

 
Via TB
 
Previously on DM: Smithsonian bows to religious and conservative extremists and pulls AIDS video from exhibit.

Posted by Marc Campbell
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12.09.2010
11:22 pm
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A great rock hero died 30 years ago: Darby Crash
12.08.2010
05:51 pm
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May he rest in peace. And somebody get him a beer…
 

Posted by Ron Nachmann
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12.08.2010
05:51 pm
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Smithsonian bows to religious and conservative extremists and pulls AIDS video from exhibit
12.01.2010
12:05 am
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Wojnarowicz censored

The Smithsonian Institution’s National Portrait Gallery has succumbed to pressure from conservative politicians and the Catholic League and have removed David Wojnarowicz’s video ‘A Fire In My Belly’ from their current exhibit ‘Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture’, which is scheduled to run through the Christmas season. The exhibit’s curator David C. Ward describes the video as:

an example of political engagement in artistic form with the AIDS epidemic by an artist deeply concerned with the exploration of our response to that medical and societal calamity. That it is violent, disturbing, and hallucinatory precisely replicates the impact of the disease itself on people and a society that could barely comprehend its magnitude.”

Incoming House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., called the video and exhibit an “Outrageous use of taxpayer money and an obvious attempt to offend Christians during the Christmas season.”

House Republican leader John Boehner, describing the widely praised exhibit a “mistake,” wants it canceled.

Boehner spokesman Kevin Smith said, “Smithsonian officials should either acknowledge the mistake and correct it, or be prepared to face tough scrutiny beginning in January when the new majority in the House moves [in].”

The Smithsonian pulled ‘A Fire In My Belly’  earlier this afternoon, one day before World AIDS Day.

This is the offending video, featuring Diamanda Galas. Watch it while you’re still free to do so.
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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12.01.2010
12:05 am
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Some of Sleazy’s Best: The ecstatic anthropology of Threshold HouseBoys Choir
11.26.2010
12:16 pm
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Peter “Sleazy” Christopherson’s passing yesterday evoked many tributes to the man as a member of influential electronic acts Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV and Coil. But we haven’t heard quite enough about one of his best solo projects, Threshold HouseBoys Choir.

Both live and on the guise’s single proper release, Form Grows Rampant, THBC basically comprised Sleazy backing his own video of various rituals at the Vegetarian Festival in southern Thailand’s Krabi Town (12 hours from his adopted home of Bangkok) with an abstract soundtrack that drew on the many field recordings he made in the city. Christopherson’s infamous fascination with the young active male body is clear in this work. But many of the problematics surrounding the European gaze that typifies exotica seem mitigated somehow by the late composer’s intimate audio-visual treatment. 

Overall, Christopherson’s work helped create a literary, psychotropic aesthetic that synthesized aspects of outside sexuality, technology, and ritual magick, bound by a wry sense of humor. THBC brought that angle to a highly personal level, and will stand as an evocative late moment in the man’s prolific career.
 

 
More from Form Grows Rampant after the jump…

READ ON
Posted by Ron Nachmann
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11.26.2010
12:16 pm
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Dan Savage asks CNN: Why all the bigots and haters in the name of ‘objectivity’?
11.24.2010
02:33 pm
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Commenting on the shocking findings on gay hate crimes from the Southern Poverty Law Center, author, sex advice columnist and co-founder of the “It Gets Better” project, Dan Savage eloquently calls out CNN and the rest of the mainstream news media for giving TV time to hateful assholes like Tony Perkins in the name of some supposed “objectivity.” As if, says Savage, there were two legitimate sides to the issue of gay and lesbian rights.

Bravo! Once again I find myself filled with intense admiration for the numerous ways Dan Savage influences our culture. If he didn’t exist, we’d be forced to invent him.

Via Alternet

Posted by Richard Metzger
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11.24.2010
02:33 pm
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‘Gay Coffins’
11.17.2010
10:05 pm
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These look like they were designed by a crazed interior decorator. Well, I guess you’re going to be in there forever, right?

Funeral directors in Germany are bidding for the pink pound - by launching coffins specially designed for gay customers.

The caskets feature homoerotic artwork on the outside and come with a series of tastefully luxurious plush designer interiors, say makers Mike Konigsfeld and Tom Brandl in Cologne, Germany.

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Gay coffins lift lid on new market

(via Buzzfeed)

Posted by Tara McGinley
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11.17.2010
10:05 pm
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