The AggreGAYtor: August 15

Russia: Not a very nice place right now. (Image via shoutocracy.com)

Celebrities and cities speak up on Russia, trans students step up in California, and anti-gay spokespeople cough up the same old tired lines, as your AggreGAYtor gives a fierce reading session.

The Good

• U.S.A. athlete Nick Symmonds in Moscow dedicates his silver medal to the gays.

• States with better LGBTQ policies are luring talent and prosperity away from anti-gay states.*

• California becomes the first state to legally protect all transgender students from discrimination, as HRC reports a nationwide trend toward trans tolerance for students.

• Churches around the country are starting to get a little bit gay.

• Coming out to the spouse and kids doesn’t have to mean the end of the family.

• Lansing, Michigan breaks up with St. Petersberg; Chicago remains tight-lipped about her sister-city BFF, Moscow.

The Bad

• A gay Russian TV presenter outs himself on-air in protest; is immediately declared a non-person and removed from history by Soviet censors the corporation.

The Fugly

• Governor Tom Corbett of Pennsylvania thinks gay marriage licenses hold the power to unmake the universe.

• Pat Buchanan opines on Russia: gays are the oppressors, Marxism is/was a religion, and Obama is a secret gay muslim.

• Fox News anchors are so angry about trans kids going to the bathroom. Because girls and boys and test scores and children and parents and complicated; arrrrrrgh!

• In U.S.A. gaybashers make news; in neoliberal Russia, news makes gaybashings!

It Came from the Tubes

Homo Arigato, Mme. LaBeija.

*One problem with this article: including comment from the American Family Association (who they call a group that “supports heterosexual marriage,” as if someone is trying to stop that), an SPLC hate group, spouting lies about the cost of providing benefits to same-sex couples.