Standing in the way of control!

BBC’s ad for the Olympics. Does it make sense? Is it aimed at people on LSD?

Popularity: 20% [?]

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 Lifehacker reports:

Search engine Facesaerch displays photos of people’s faces related to your search term in a CoverFlow-like interface. Built using Google’s image search—and using its little-known imgtype=face search parameter—Facesaerch is better at finding celebrity photos than your regular Joe or Jane. However, an image search for a gender-ambiguous name you’ve never heard before—like Priti—is great way to figure out if it’s more commonly used for men or women, and Facesaerch is the perfect application for that.

LINK

Popularity: 18% [?]

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War crime tribunals aren’t necessarily gay stomping grounds, but not in the case of Bosnian Serb militant leader Radovan Karadzic, who’s currently on trial for genocide at The Hague.Karadzic has been on the run since 1995, when he was accused of organizing massacres to ethnically cleanse Serbua went on the run following the fall of the Serbian government in 1995 and was captured last month in Belgrade. Following the arrest, Karadzic pointed a finger at Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, who helped broker peace under the Clinton Administration.Karadzic claims Holbrooke cut him a deal: he wouldn’t face charges if he got out of the political game and went into hiding. Holbrooke continually denies those claims.

Regardless, conspiracy theories abound that the CIA spoke with Karadzic directly before his arrest to ensure his silence.

[Agents asked] him not to reveal the deal with Holbrooke. In return, they offered him a 40-year sentence in a luxury Swedish prison, Serbian Press Online writes.
….
They also told him that if he does not agree, he would serve his sentence in the worst British prison, together with serial killers, drug dealers and rapists. They threatened him that he would be completely compromised in the Serbian public when they published edited homosexual porn footage, apart from continuing with severe pressure on his family to keep the deal a secret and went to extreme measures to ensure the Serb’s silence.

Hmm, that seems a bit far fetched. We know the CIA’s hardcore and all, but how many agents can stomach editing Karadzic into a skin flick. They’d need robots for such an endeavor.

(QUEERTY)

Popularity: 21% [?]

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Some of Britain’s Olympians strip for a new Powerade advertising campaign:

Read the full article here…

Popularity: 18% [?]

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Gay and lesbian refugee claimants struggling to shed old-world views of their sexuality are turning to new-age technology to make their case.

Facebook, the online social network, is being used as a tool by some claimants to help prove their sexual orientation to immigration officials in Canada.

“Sexuality has always been very complicated and when you have to prove it as a matter of life and death you will use any resource you have available to you,” Diego Macias of Among Friends, a Toronto-based gay and lesbian refugee support group, told The Canadian Press.

Those seeking refuge after 1992 were permitted to claim status based on their sexual orientation and required to prove their claim to the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB).

Wearing their sexuality on their sleeve was never an option for many back in their home countries and finding suitable evidence to support their claims can be difficult.

Macias tells his members to use technology to their advantage and feels facebook can help demonstrate involvement in the gay and lesbian community.

“During Pride we took hundreds of pictures and we have a facebook group and when people sign up to that group we encourage them to show their membership to the IRB member.”

In more than 75 countries people face jail, or worse, for having gay sex.

Acts of homosexuality are punishable by death in several countries, including Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Sudan.

In many other Muslim countries homosexuality carries prison sentences, fines, or corporal punishment.

Last week in Winnipeg a federal court judge upheld a decision to ship a Nigerian man back to his native country because the IRB ruled his claim of being gay was a hoax.

He says his life is in danger if he goes home.

Experts say it can take different components to paint a convincing picture of one’s sexual orientation for the Immigration and Refugee Board.

“I have used facebook (because) people put stuff on there about themselves and who they are, and in a relationship with,” immigration lawyer El-Farouk Khaki, who specialises in representing gay and lesbian refugee claimants, told The Canadian Press.

Khaki explains how many in this situation have spent years - even decades - trying to hide their sexuality back in their country of origin, so any glimpse into a claimant’s new life can help.

“Basically it’s like a jigsaw puzzle and you just try and take the little pieces here and there and you try and construct a larger picture of a person’s life,” he explained.

Khaki says he often provides his clients with a list of items that can help prove their sexual orientation to the immigration board - and there is very little off-limits.

Claimants can use letters from family and friends, pictures at Pride festivities and memberships on gay chat rooms.

Incorporating one of the most-used web-based networks in the world (facebook has 90 million members) is just the next logical step says Khaki.

“Before there was facebook, I was using other profiles,” says Khaki, giving examples of Gaydar.com and adam4adam.

Evidence can come in many forms, agrees Charles Hawkins, spokesman for the Immigration and Refugee Board.

“A refugee claimant may not have (typical) documentation to support their claim and individuals may have to be more resourceful in their submissions.

“A member of the board can accept any relevant evidence and then assign an appropriate value to that evidence.” Hawkins told The Canadian Press.

With Macias’ support group at more than 45 members and more coming through the doors every week, he says he will continue to use facebook to support refugee claims.

“I do foresee the IRB saying this is not an acceptable form of evidence,” says Macias.

“But until then I am going to keep on using it.”

(Pink News)

Popularity: 22% [?]

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 Eva Mendes shed her top in a new commercial for Calvin Klein’s “Secret Obession” perfume. Which, we guess, smells like morning-after hair and mascara clumps. Eva’s commercial was banned in the United States because women’s nipples are evil and belong to Satan and, thus, cannot be shown on TV alongside more important things like knife fights and teenagers having sex under bleachers. We don’t really see this ad as being particularly racy, especially since it appears that Eva is in the throes of a febrile seizure throughout.

(Gaunabee)

Popularity: 22% [?]

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It’s no secret that the websites of traditional news outlets are hunting for pageviews as desperately as, say, gossip blogs. Which explains why CNN.com — normally where we find Anderson Cooper’s transcripts so we can perform our nightly dramatic readings before sleepy time — isn’t so much a gatekeeper of hard news as it is a wet toilet paper magnet of sensational headlines. “Out of a possible 20 ‘news’ items on CNN.com, a full 15 focus on death (usually violent death), crime, weather, religion, or celebrity,” says an author who has an interest in reporting these things. “Of the remaining 5 items, 2 are related to politics, 1 is related to business / entertainment, 1 is science, and 1 is random. In other words, about 80% of news is simply death, weather, or fame.

From: JOSSIP

Popularity: 13% [?]

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From Jezebel:

Michael Grove, the shadow education secretary and a prominent Conservative in England, gave a speech today at a meeting organized by the think tank IPPR condemning lad mags (like Nuts, Zoo, and Maxim) for promoting “instant-hit hedonism” and presenting women as “permanently, lasciviously, uncomplicatedly available.” The result, according to Grove, is that the magazines promote a deterioration of responsibility in young men towards women, leaving British communities with apparently the worst social situation that could ever occur: single-parent families. Yes, lad mags may present a sexist image of women, but is focusing on the importance of “male responsibility” towards women reinforcing sexist and misogynist attitudes towards women or destroying them? (A poll on the website of the Guardian reveals that, as of this morning, 54% of respondents think that lad mags do not “make men feckless”.)Probably the former. Yes, families where both parents are present in the children’s lives are more stable and ultimately create a better environment for children, but Grove is implying that parents need to not only be married for children to thrive, but the man needs to be working and providing (”responsibility”) for his young while the woman stays home and cares for them. Why not promote a society where single mothers can provide for their children on their own? Grove says that the Conservative government will provide a maternity nurse service for families who need help during the first days after childbirth, but there is no mention of this service being available to single mothers (or fathers) who have a newborn. An emphasis is placed on the relationship between the father and mother, implying that they are together.

And what does Grove think of women’s magazines? While he condemns lad mags’ presentation of a “narrow conception of beauty and a shallow approach towards women,” he praises women’s magazines (and their publishers) for addressing their readers “in a mature and responsible fashion.” So, being obsessed with materialism, being fearful of any beauty “imperfection,” and constantly being reminded that the attention of men is necessary to live a happy lifestyle is “mature”? Has this dude ever looked at a women’s magazine?

Lad Mags Linked To ‘Social Ills’ [BBC]
‘Lads Mags’ Condemned Over Images Of Women [Telegraph]
Poll” Do Lad Mags Make Men Feckless? [Guardian]

Popularity: 19% [?]

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