“People are changing their behavior to protect themselves...They don’t wear rainbow pins anymore, they don’t hold hands outside.” This series of mini-profiles of gay people living in anti-gay Russia is essential reading.

"Like anyone I'm afraid of being arrested but also I'm not afraid of being arrested... If it takes me getting arrested for people to pay attention and for people to lobby against this law then I'm willing to take it." — Bad-ass figure skater Johnny Weir on competing in the Sochi Olympics in anti-gay Russia

Dan Savage’s #DUMPRUSSIANVODKA boycott (particularly Stoli) to protest the government-sanctioned oppression of gays in Russia is in full swing. Should you participate? Or keep guzzling the stuff?

When is a man who has sex with men not gay or bisexual? All these times, says a sex therapist.

The following video, widely circulated on social media, shows a Russian teen being tortured by a Neo-Nazi gang that suspects him of being gay. It seems likely that the clip—like the photo above, taken at a St. Petersburg gay-rights rally in June—will become iconic for the same reasons the famous photographs of Emmett Till's corpse did when they were published in Jet in 1955: It's excruciating to endure and potentially galvanizing because of it. Says Spectrum Human Rights Alliance:

Last night's episode of Our America with Lisa Ling explored the damage the just-shuttered gay "reparative therapy" organization Exodus International caused during its decades in business. It was cathartic to watch the grief-stricken face of Exodus president Alan Chambers (an ex-gay himself — his wife sat next to him the entire time) as people shared their stories of how close his organization came to ruining their lives. He deserves all the chiding he gets and then some, and he seems to realize it. Though the apology he read to these recovering ex-gays was basically an early draft of the one he shared with the world earlier this week (at the time of filming, he intended to keep Exodus running with a different agenda) he also welcomed their criticism.

Yesterday, LA Weekly's Patrick Range McDonald created a bit of an e-gay stir with an essay whose headline wondered, "Is L.A. Gay Pride an Outdated, Adolescent Mess?" Los Angeles' Gay Pride weekend kicks off today, hence the question. The answer, according to McDonald? "An unqualified yes."

I was at the barbershop around the corner from my apartment a few Fridays ago, getting my weekly skin fade. When my barber cuts my hair, he generally turns my chair away from the mirror, which is frustrating for someone like me who likes to check the progress of the person who is altering my appearance (I have a feeling that thwarting feedback as he works is precisely why he does this). The shop is a narrow room with four stations arranged in an L; my chair was the short arm of the L.

Writer/incendiary tweeter Bret Easton Ellis has written almost 3,500 words for Out on the media's treatment of gay men and his banning* from last month's GLAAD Awards because of his controversial tweets. These words are angry, self-serving, contradictory, justified, and human beyond gay. Out has agreed to let us to excerpt his essay, which is titled, "In the Reign of the Gay Magical Elves." See below.

Oprah Winfrey's 90-minute interview with newly out NBA center Jason Collins on last night's Oprah's Next Chapter reminded me of a cross between and alien autopsy and the 2011 movie Weekend. Winfrey combed through the minutiae of Collins' gay life like she was studying a different species and/or like they had just hooked up and were swapping coming-out stories.

"You don't sound like the ones on Bravo," says the blondest, hottest girl in the school, Fawcett (Sasha Pieterse), to the guy she is tying to woo, Tanner (Michael J. Willett). Tanner is freshly out of the closet and the coveted accessory of his school's three most popular girls, to whom he compares "warlords in a Third World country." Tanner is the titular G.B.F. – gay best friend — of Jawbreaker director Darren Stein's latest movie of high-school clique absurdity. Tanner is one of the most specific gay teens I've ever seen portrayed on screen.

Camping, crafts, and uniforms have always held a special allure for some kids; too bad the main sponsor of those activities, the Boy Scouts of America, excludes gays, atheists, and girls.

Oh, dreamy South American Pope Francis, restoring hope in a vibrant, evolving Catholic Church. He's just the pontiff we need to root out the perverted scourge that for so long has besmirched the clergy's ranks: ladies with opinions on things.

Yesterday, the incoherent jumble of insinuations, flat-out lies and chiiiiiiiiiiiiiillllleeeees that is MediaTakeOut posted a MTO SUPER DUPER WORLD EXCLUSIVE featuring pictures of NFL free agent Kerry Rhodes "ON VACATION ... With One Of His 'MALE FRIENDS!!'" In its homophobic way that villainizes but stops short of exhibiting direct malice, MTO branded the shots of Rhodes and a much wispier dude seemingly canoodling in a tropical setting as "suspect."

Once again, Apple's Tim Cook has topped Out's annual Power List. Frank Ocean is No. 10; Nick Denton is No. 39.

It's been just over four months since chef Dave Claringbould decided to realize his dream of owning his own restaurant after fifteen years in the restaurant business.

It's hard to imagine a purportedly heterosexual artist who has a more intimate relationship with the word "faggot" than the rapper Tyler, the Creator. His frequent use of word has defined his career to many (especially those who haven't taken the time to listen to his music or are generally hip-hop avoidant), its legend reaching exaggerated proportions – an oft-quoted, erroneous post on NME says he uttered the word and variations of it like "fag" 213 times on his 2011 sophomore album Goblin. Fader, in a more measured post of various Goblin stats, counted only nine.

Endlessly malfunctioning pop cultural disaster Michelle Shocked appeared on last night's Piers Morgan Live to clarify last month's seemingly anti-gay babble that pushed her into the spotlight like never before. She was, in a word, opaque.

Supporting an institution (such as marriage) over actual human lives isn't a very Christian thing to do, but it is a very Catholic thing to do, and so Cardinal Timothy Michael Dolan upheld the Church's interest in protecting marriage from homosexual demons in an interview with George Stephanopoulos that aired Sunday on This Week. This is what a losing battle with a twist of internal conflict sounds like:

Michelle Shocked is still at it — with her mouth taped in protest of a canceled gig, she's more intelligible than ever.