This article was just fascinating. It features two young gay men aged 25, who recently were married in Boston. Joshua and Benjamin are husbands. That was fun to type… husbands not just hugsbands they would be if they were only allowed Civil Marriage.

The New York Times did an elaborate piece on the young couple. It also talked about how MTV did a show on a set of male and female couples from Massachusetts. Good Stuff. Read more about it here.

When most of us just paid our high tax bills we looked around and wondered if we get anything out of our payments to the government. Gay Marriage is a start to getting the benefits in life we deserve and the love that the straights can cherish.

If you are over 18 and have excellent writing skills and enjoy to write or blog we would love to hear from you. We are looking for a GLBT perspective on current events, politics, health, fashion, dating, and money. We are looking for more than just a typical blogger but someone who can write great newsworthy articles with a little research involved (all writings will be at least 250 words).

If you have a passion for writing and getting your voice heard then send us an email via the contact form. Send us your contact information and if you have any online (or print) articles or blogs be sure to include those. Also, please send amount you are looking to be paid per post or article.

Note: You must be a legal resident of the US, UK, or Canada.

It’s up at Pulp Magazine’s site.

I’m working on a submission for Best Lesbian Erotica 2008. I’m currently at 1600 words.

A call for submissions via BeyondMasculinity.com:

Deadline extended until May 31st!

Gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer men’s gender identities often exist somewhere outside the traditional categories of “masculine” and “feminine.” Sissies, drag queens, and leather daddies alike play with gender in a way that cannot be accounted for in traditional understandings of maleness. This collection — part blog, part anthology, part audiobook — aims to shatter traditional understandings of maleness and point towards a new understanding of how queerness and gender intersect.

BEYOND MASCULINITY is looking for contributions in four key areas. Contributors should not feel bound by these categories - they should rather be seen as potential prompts:

• Identity Intersections: How do race, ability, class, and other kinds of identities and experiences intersect with gender and queerness — and how do these intersections complicate our relationship to traditional understandings of “maleness?”

• Feminism, Gender, and Politics: How can feminism inform our understanding of queer male gender? Can queer men be feminists? How can we use our queerness as a political tool? What does male privilege look like for queer men?

• Bodies, Desire, and Pleasure: What kinds of male bodies are desired? Fetishized? Where does sexual desire intersect with queer gender and how are these politics mapped out on our bodies?

• Queer Male Communities: How are our identities produced through our communities? How do the gender norms and politics of gay/bi/trans/queer male communities both liberate and constrain us?

We’re looking for queer male writers to step up and contribute their thoughts to this online project. This is not your typical bookstore anthology. It will be only available online - and it will be completely free of charge to the public. With its unique implementation of media, this anthology aims to change the way queer non-fiction is done.

I love what this anthology is about. And I love the idea of making audio recordings of contributors reading their essays available even more. So much so that audio recordings of Femmethology contributors reading their pieces may appear in the future!

So if you’re a “straight” woman who is reading this queer blog and sleeping with other women you can find out what Rachel wants to talk about here. And don’t worry, you can be anonymous; there’s no danger of losing your “straightness.”

I’m still accepting submissions for my next book, Visible: A Femmethology, an anthology of writing on queer femme identity. You can read my call for submissions here.

And for some femme around the Web, check out:

• Darrah’s words on sluts and virgins in her most recent “Femme in the City” column
• Ethereal’s interview with Go Rainbow Radio, in which she discusses music, the GLBT community, politics, femme identity and her short story that appeared in my first anthology, Queer Shorts
• “Trans, Cyber and Valentine’s Day,”a piece by femme writer who chatted with Allenina, a “former porn star, turned stripper, aspiring actress, and ‘one name’ performance artist,” about some of her online dating experiences:

  One year ago, she met Lon on MySpace. After messaging for a while, they decided to rendezvous.”I wanted to meet where it was bright and safe… Also, as a transwoman, there is an insecurity that someone may be repulsed.”

  Lon wasn’t. Days after their first date, Allenina invited him to her home. The mutual attraction led to a back massage. “Just to make sure he knew I was trans, I asked him if he had read my profile,” Allenina reveals. [He asked] “Why, is there some thing that I should know?” From the look on his face, Allenina sensed there was a problem and told Lon that perhaps he should leave. He agreed saying he would phone later. She never spoke to him again.

  “Sometimes I think people just don’t read cyber profiles. I always put in my profile that I am trans. I do put it at the end, however, as I don’t think that is all I am. I also wonder if my profile on MySpace is too sexy. Maybe people relate transsexual with sex and nothing more,” Allenina says.

  (Send 1ofakindfeminatrix at MySpace a friend request so you can read the rest of “Trans, Cyber and Valentine’s Day” at her blog.)

• I Heart Brooklyn Girls is looking for 12 queer femme Brooklynites for their upcoming 2008 calendar.Send your bio and couple of photos (a close up and a full body shot) to castingcall AT iheartbrooklyngirls DOT com by March 20th.

Transparent: Love, Family, and Living the T with Transgender Teenagers by Cris Beam was released last month by Harcourt. In Transparent Beam introduces four teen trans girls whose lives she found herself deeply involved with when she decided to volunteer at a Los Angeles school for gay and transgender kids.

You’ll find an excerpt after the jump.

I’ll have a review copy of Transparent soon. More after I finish it. And maybe an interview with Cris Beam, too.

Read more »

Hiding in Hip-Hop: Confessions of a Down Low Brother in the Entertainment Industry, a book by former MTV producer Terrance Dean, has been sold to Atria Books, a division Simon & Schuster, and is expected to be published next year.

Pink News reports the book will expose “[t]he author’s life as a closeted homosexual working in the film and music industry and his relationships with other closeted homosexuals—film stars, rap artists, and music producers.” While the book will not name any of the film stars, rap artists or music producers, an Atria spokesperson said those who know the hip hop world will be able to identify the people in Dean’s book.

Already published popular “down low” titles include:

On the Down Low: A Journey into the Lives of ‘Straight’ Black Men Who Sleep with Men

Charlene Cothran, the publisher of Venus Magazine, a magazine that has targeted Black gays and lesbians for 13 years, has announced that she is now an ex-lesbian. She has changed the direction of the magazine to one that will “encourage, educate and assist those who desire to leave a life of homosexuality.”

Back in October, Jasmyne Cannick posted the “10 ways to get out of ‘the life’” Cothran included in an issue of Venus and on the magazine’s website.

I don’t want to go on them or read about them, but if you have any interest: Bad Lesbian Dates.

(Heel click: Lusty Lady)