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BY MELANIE HAIKEN OF CARING.COM She may have started her public career as a fluffy pin-up girl, but Farrah Fawcett couldn’t have ended it with more dignity in her role as a public figure. Diagnosed three years ago with anal cancer, Fawcett talked openly about her battle with a type of cancer that’s particularly embarrassing to talk about. With her mane of beautiful hair, white teeth, and sun-tinged skin, Farrah was the picture of health and the quintessential California girl (though she hailed from Texas), adorning many a teenage boy’s wall in her famous red tank top. Thanks to the...

"Married and Gay Couples Not All that Different," proclaimed the headline of a news article portraying homosexual households as remarkably similar to married couples. "We're the couple next door," claimed one partnered homosexual. "We have a dog and a cat. I drive a Volvo. I'm boring."[1] Such down-home portrayals of homosexual couples are meant to provoke the question: Since gay couples really differ only in that both partners are of the same sex, what rational basis exists for denying them full marriage rights? Are homosexual households, as the article suggests, simply another variant of human relationships that should be considered,...

A bill declaring a Harvey Milk Day in California - to honor the slain gay rights figure - passed the state Senate today 24-14 and now goes to the Assembly. No surprise that all 23 Democrats present voted yes. But Sen. Abel Maldonado, R-Santa Maria, changed his vote from a "no" on the same bill last year to the sole GOP "yes" on the floor Thursday.

The following is a translation of a story from Alarabiya, a UAE-based media network, which was published on its Arabic website a few hours ago. While IGLHRC has not verified all of the allegations, many are consistent with patterns of human rights violations being reported from within the country. As a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), the Iraqi government has an obligation to protect the right to life (Article 6) and the right of all its citizens “to be free from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” (Article 7). On Friday...

Modern science has introduced the world to plenty of strange ideas.

Link only - Frank angry at banks over bailout plans

A lifetime ban on public criticism of homosexuality was upheld against a Catholic activist in Canada by his province's superior court. Bill Whatcott was fined 17,500 Canadian dollars by the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission in a complaint by four homosexuals who charged he "injured" their "feelings" and "self respect" in pamphlets denouncing the "gay lifestyle" as immoral and dangerous, Lifesite News reported. Saskatchewan's Court of Queens Bench, which hears criminal and civil cases, upheld a 2006 decision Tuesday by the provincial Human Rights Commission. "This fine is for telling the truth [that] homosexual sodomites can change their behavior and be...

"THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that language related to the practice and nature of homosexuality be removed from the Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church. THEREFORE BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that such language be replaced with language that is more theologically compatible with United Methodist tradition, utilizing the medical, theological and social science disciplines to reflect a deeper understanding of God’s good gift of human sexuality."

SAN FRANCISCO -- Before he transferred to San Francisco State University, Emo Loredo knew only a few other openly gay students. So he was pleasantly surprised when he discovered his new college offered not only dozens of classes on gay issues, but an undergraduate minor in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender studies. "One of the things I've learned is that homosexuality was around way back in ancient times," said Loredo, 24, who enrolled this semester in a sociology class called Queer Cultures and Society. "Before, I thought homosexuality was started in the early 1970s." Years after creating a smattering of...

After hearing fervent opposition, the San Diego City Council unanimously adopted a resolution introduced by Mayor Jerry Sanders to designate July as "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Pride Month." Previous resolutions have honored the "gay pride" festival held each July in San Diego, but this apparently is city's the first to designate an entire month, according to festival representatives. The council did approve a Lesbian and Gay Archives Month" in 1992. President Clinton declared June 2000 to be "Gay and Lesbian Pride Month" is the U.S.The council allowed open commentary prior to the resolution vote Tuesday, including opposition from James Hartline,...

Psychologist Jonathan Haidt wants to help liberal types like me understand why some people condemn homosexual relationships as immoral... ...But why do so many people think homosexuality is disgusting? I never had any problem with it. University of Pennsylvania psychologist and disgust expert Paul Rozin says it's particularly a guy thing - most heterosexual men are disgusted by the thought of touching other men. Rozin recalls experiments in which researchers asked subjects how disgusted they'd be if a Q-tip that had been in the mouth of either a man or a woman was subsequently touched to their own various orifices....

Jerusalem officially registered its first homosexual couple as married Monday, three months after a ruling by the High Court of Justice paved the way for same-sex couples to be listed in the Interior Ministry's Population Registry. Binyamin and Avi Rose married on June 28 in Toronto, Canada, but immediately returned to Jerusalem to start building their life together. "We did the civil ceremony in the hopes that we would eventually be able to make legal what we felt inside," said Avi, an informal Jewish educator for the Young Judaea youth movement. "We wanted the government of Israel to recognize that...

ALL IN THE same week, Governor Mitt Romney, the US Catholic bishops, the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, and the Presbyterian Church USA drove themselves nuts over homosexuality....

Onscreen king of kvetch Larry David just couldn't contain himself at a Martha's Vineyard parking lot last weekend when an errant shopping cart scratched his beloved BMW 530. According to Page Six, the "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and "Seinfeld" creator and his wife were outside a Vineyard Haven supermarket when a runaway cart made what one eyewitness said was "a little dent" in David's $75,000 car. David proceeded to call the cops and started, says the witness, "in a golf shirt and shorts, flapping away with his arms. It was just like an episode on his show." Vineyard cops confimed that...

THERE were community meetings in Seattle on Wednesday. Some of the couples who had sued to overturn Washington’s ban on same-sex marriage, a case they lost before the state’s Supreme Court earlier that day, were going to appear. Gay and straight elected officials who support “marriage equality” were going to make speeches. I probably should have been there too. But I had a previous engagement. The Seattle Mariners were playing the Toronto Blue Jays at Safeco Field. My 8-year-old son — adopted at birth by my boyfriend and me — loves the M’s almost as much as he hates the...

Time wasted deleting junk e-mail costs American businesses nearly $22 billion a year, according to a new study from the University of Maryland. Related Links • Spam Cost Survey (Univ. of Maryland)   A telephone-based survey of adults who use the Internet found that more than three-quarters receive spam daily. The average spam messages per day is 18.5 and the average time spent per day deleting them is 2.8 minutes. The loss in productivity is equivalent to $21.6 billion per year at average U.S. wages, according to the National Technology Readiness Survey produced by Rockbridge Associates, Inc., and the Center...

If there was ever a "Most Valuable Player" award given for a political campaign, this year it would most definitely go to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth[1]. Because they spoke out against a liberal Democrat, these men are getting a constant anal exam by the Kerry campaign and Kerry's socialist cheerleaders in the major media. Yet, no matter the heavy amount of professional media harassment received, the Swifties continue on, walking point, representing American veterans with courage and honor. And look at that faux war hero, John Kerry, running scared like a little girlie-boy again. With just two little...

Bruce Springsteen, REM, and more tour for political change. SEATTLE, WA.  Friday 8.6.2004  /netmusiccountdown.com/ -- Is political change in the air for the USA? Artists like Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, REM, John Mellencamp, Babyface, John Fogerty, The Dave Matthews Band, Ben Harper, Pearl Jam and the Dixie Chicks hope so. These musicians, along with James Taylor, Bonnie Raitt, Jurassic 5, Keb' Mo', Bright Eyes, Death Cab for Cutie and My Morning Jacket, have formed a coalition of musicians who make up the Vote For Change Tour. Presented by MoveOn PAC, the tour launches October 1, one month before the...

 Internet Use and Early Syphilis Infection Among Men Who Have Sex with Men --- San Francisco, California, 1999--2003 During the summer of 1999, an outbreak of early syphilis among men who have sex with men (MSM) who met their sex partners on the Internet (1) presaged a rapidly expanding syphilis epidemic in San Francisco. By 2002, San Francisco had the highest rates of primary and secondary syphilis of any metropolitan area in the United States (2). During 1998--2002, the number of early syphilis cases increased, from 41 cases in 1998 to 495 cases in 2002 (3). Concomitant with the increase...

    Teresa Heinz Kerry, left, her husband Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry, vice-presidential candidate Sen. John Edwards and his wife Elizabeth Edwards raise their hands at the end of a rally at the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, N.M., Friday, July 9, 2004. (AP Photo/Jake Schoellkopf) NEW YORK -- Bear hugs. Pats on the back. Shoulder squeezes. John Kerry and John Edwards are all over each other.The two Democrats and one-time rivals have shared so much public affection since becoming a team Tuesday that the presidential candidate even joked about it Friday in New York after...