A Kiss Is Just A Kiss

I saw that photo and instantly thought it was just a copy of that more famous kiss on V-J Day— Victory over Japan Day—when a Navy sailor grabbed and kissed a woman in Times Square. But this was two men kissing and so I found it all the more fun and interesting and kinda kitschy and hot.

On December 21st, after the USS The Sullivans pulled into port, Kenneth Woodington—the winner of the first kiss lottery—locked lips with his husband, sailor Bryan Woodington, just home from seven months in the Gulf.

As they kissed, many in the crowd applauded and cheered, most notably other service family members waiting for their loved ones, but not everyone was cheering.

WJXT, a Jacksonville, Florida television station, aired the kiss and suddenly all the haters came out …

“How sad your station has dropped to such a low as to show a gay couple kissing on your newscast.”

First off, gay or not, it was a couple kept apart for seven months, greeting one another, but, yeah, I guess because it was two men …

“I thought this was a “family-friendly” news channel.”

This one slayed me; just WTF is a ‘family-friendly news channel’? No stories about crime or murder or destruction? Just puppies and kittens and babies?

We are on the precipice of 2019 and people are still shocked, and disgusted, by the sight of gay couples acting like couples? We have been allowed the rights to marry for nearly four years now, so all of you who find the sight of two men, or two women, kissing, for any reason, need to turn off your TVs, discontinue the newspaper, unplug from the internet, and go live in a cave.

We’re here, we’re queer, and we kiss our spouses and partners whenever we f**king want to kiss them.

Monday Fun Day: First Married Kiss Goes Viral

I remember when Carlos and I got married … we’d flown out to Washington state, because that’s where my Dad lived and he wanted to be at the ceremony, and because South Carolina was about a month away from marriage equality.

We were married in a courtroom by a judge, with my Dad and a couple of witnesses; it was all very simple and kinda quick and easy except … I was worried about The Kiss.

My Dad wanted Carlos and I to get married; he wanted to be there. But a small part of me wondered how he would feel watching two men kiss, especially when one of the men was his own son.

Turns out my Dad didn’t watch the kiss; he was too busy photographing the kiss, so it seemed that my reservations were baseless because my Dad saw it through his camera lens and made sure there were plenty of pictures of the kiss.

And that may be why Spc. Shane Adriano and Pfc. Tristian Resz chose the Greene County Courthouse when they were married; they wanted an intimate spot for their small wedding — on February 11th — which was attended by the couple, a few friends and a judge.

But their “first married kiss” photograph took the internet by storm because the internet is neither small not intimate.

Adriano and Resz shared the photo on Facebook, and the American Military Partner Association saw it and they re-posted it; a few hours after that posting the picture was shared over 800 times and had some 4,400 ‘Likes’ and 215 comments.

One of those ‘shares’ was the LGBTQ group, Promoting Equality for all Missourians [PROMO] who shared it the day after the wedding, adding 1,400 ‘Likes’ and hundreds more comments. The Gay and Lesbian of the Ozarks Center [GLO] also found the photo and shared it … more ‘Likes’, more comments.

Shane Adriano says they’ve lost track of how many times the photo has been shared.

“It just keeps getting reshared. We had a little bit of negative comments on there, but I wasn’t even expecting that many people to like it and share it over and over again.”

Love is love; and a first kiss is a great thing to share and share and 'Like'.

LGBTQ Nation

A Kiss Is Just A Kiss ... Or Is It?

I am not a fan of PDAs, Public Displays of Affection. I don’t mind a peck on the cheek or lips as you say goodbye to a loved one, or holding the hand of your husband as you walk down the street; those things seem sweet to me. But when it goes beyond sweet and enters into something more? Well … let me tell you a story.

While living in California, BC — Before Carlos — I’d met this guy, whose name now escapes me because since our date I have always, and only, called him Harvard. He asked me out and we decided to spend the day in San Francisco; he wanted to visit the Museum of Modern Art, so you know, art, museum, art. But while there, and while gazing at a painting, he walks up behind me, wraps his arms around my waist and tries to stick his hands down the front of my pants.

I calmly ask, ‘What are you trying to do?’

‘I’m trying to get into your pants,’ he replied.

‘Well, you’d have better luck getting into Harvard.’

Hence the name.

Now, I was attracted to him, but I really kinda felt that maybe the art museum wasn’t the place to grab my junk; call me crazy. And sure, the hands fondling my package is not the same as a kiss, but there are times when a kiss — especially between two men — makes people uncomfortable, and there are times when it doesn’t …

As happens at sporting events from time to time, when, up on the Jumbotron appears the words ‘Kiss Cam,’ and then a camera operator zooms in on a couple, usually heterosexual, and the couple kisses on camera. For several years the camera operators at these events might focus on two men attending the game, and the men might grimace and pretend to kiss and the crowd would boo and moan because, you know, two men kissing is icky.

But just last week, at an LA Dodgers baseball, the ‘Kiss Cam’ moment came up and after spotting several opposite sex couples in the crowd, all of who gladly kissed for the camera, suddenly two men — Steven and Rick Simone-Friedland — appeared onscreen and, with a slight hesitation, they kissed.

And.The.Crowd.Roared.

Steven says:

"I turned to my husband … and I said 'You know, this could go badly. This could not go well,' but then we did it, because we thought it would be just so fun to do, and then we heard the crowd — and that was really unexpected, and beautiful, and affirming. All we did was kiss. What made everyone's day was the crowd reaction … I don't think anybody was expecting that reaction … I kiss my husband every single day. That's not the big deal. The big deal is what happened immediately after. That's just the most amazing thing."

It’s just a kiss right? And a kiss is just a kiss, even between two men, but apparently it’s so much more in Huntington, West Virginia,  where Zackary Johnson and Casey Williams paused on the street for a quick kiss and ended up being attacked by Marshall University football running back Steward Butler.

The couple was visiting friends and , after a night of dinner and barhopping, had started walking back to their hotel when Casey pulled Zackary in for a kiss. Steward Butler, riding by in a car with friends, leapt from the automobile and being shouting anti-gay slurs at the couple before punching both men in the head.

"I thought it was going to be the normal case of someone rolling their windows down, yelling some words, and just keep on going, I mean that happens a lot." — Zackary Johnson

Butler is claiming the confrontation was in self-defense, though it’s unclear how he was defending himself against two men kissing … unless he wanted to kiss one of them? I mean, maybe he’s a self-loathing closeted homosexual who spotted two men, in love, walking down the street and stopping for a kiss and then decided he couldn’t stand to see them doing that when he couldn’t and so he had to jump out of a moving car to tell them how much he hated them for kissing … with his fists.

Whatever his reasons, and there really aren’t any, Steward Butler is charged with two counts of misdemeanor battery, and was dismissed from the Marshall University football team.

All because he didn’t like the idea of two men kissing, so I’d like to offer him, and others like him who might decide to stop man-on-man kissing with their fists, a little lesson:

If you’re on the street and you come across two men, or two women, kissing, and you find it repugnant … ignore it and just keep moving.

Gay Couple Asked to Leave Mall for Holding Hands, Kissing

Carlos and I aren’t much for the PDA—Public Displays of Affection. I mean, while we lived in Miami, we would often hold hands while walking down Lincoln Road Mall or on the beach, but we weren’t big on kissing in public. I don’t like seeing anyone—straight or gay—doing it, unless it’s a quick peck as maybe a good bye smooch. Save the tongues for when you get home.

So, I was kinda of annoyed to learn about two gay men—Daniel Chesmore and Jose Guzman—who were asked to leave the Westfield Galleria in Roseville, California for doing just that. Not the tongues, but the pecking kind of kisses.

“I kissed him on the cheek. That’s how my boyfriend and I show affection,” said Daniel Chesmore.

And as they kissed—and, well, they say it was just a simple kiss—a security guard confronted them about kissing in public and they started recording the confrontation.

 “If you continue to kiss, you will be asked to leave the mall. Period,” the voice on the recording said. “I counted you guys kissing 25 times. I told you before, we contact any couple [...] about this.”

Chesmore and Guzman’s story caught the attention of Fox40, the local Fox affiliate, who sent their own cameras to the galleria. They filmed dozens of straight couples holding hands and kissing, yet not one was asked to leave. When they tried to speak to mall management, Galleria General Manager Eddie Ollmann would not comment in person, but released this written statement, “Persons that violate the Code of Conduct are asked to leave the property.”

Unfortunately, as FOX40 found, there is nothing in the mall’s code of conduct about public displays of affection.

“It makes me feel like no matter what I do in society, I will always be different.” Chesmore says.

 “I feel like we’re always treated differently because we’re gay. It makes me sad.” Guzman said.

Like I said, I am not big on kissing in public, other than the quick peck, but if you say you have rules against it, then shouldn’t the rules apply to everyone? I do have questions, though, like when the security guard said he counted them kissing twenty-five times; was that an exaggeration or were the two men sitting there kissing and kissing and kissing?

If that even makes a difference.

But then I also wonder how and why, as soon as the guard came over, the men were suddenly audio recording the confrontation. That seemed kind of planned to me, and if so, then the two men weren't just kissing, they were trying to provoke some confrontation.

That said, however, if the mall's Code of conduct says nothing about PDA then these men did nothing wrong. And, as you see on the videotape, the mall manager didn't even want to answer the questions, so, whether or not this was some planned two man kiss-in or not, the mall has some explaining to do.

source

Random Musings

I sometimes wonder if there are any new ideas left in Hollywood. all those old TV shows are being remade, and there are "reboots" of movies that are scarcely older than a toddler.

Now, Marc Cherry, the man behind Desperate Housewives--which is ending it's run this season--has come up with a 'new' idea. or a reboot of some other show. Or, simply, Desperate Housewives 2.0.

Cherry has a new hourlong soap coming to ABC called Devious Maids; hmmm, "desperate" to "devious" and "housewives" to "maids". Sounds like the same thing in a different package.Oh, except that this show, an adaptation of a Mexican telenovela called The Disorderly Maids Of The Neighborhood, will center on a group of Latina women who are maids in Beverly Hills. It seems that these women, all maids at the same residential condo community, where life is very Wisteria-Lane-like, until a body is discovered in a pool, and all the maids find themselves in the middle of it. kind of like how Susan, Bree, Gabby and Lynette, found themselves in "the middle of it" when they neighbor, Mary Alice, killed herself.
Perhaps Cherry should have called it The Real Maids Of Beverly Hills and co-opted another show in the process. [source]

A lot is being made of a kiss between ALLEGEDLY straight actors, Ashton Kutcher and Jon Cryer, on 2.5 Men this week. I didn't see it because, well, I loathe Cryer, and I like Kutcher only scarcely better than I like Charlie Sheen. But what gets me is all the fuss about "The Kiss". Two straight male characters kissed? 
Woo-freakin'-hoo.
I wanna see a show with fully formed gay characters that kiss, and where the kiss isn't used for shock value or to get a laugh, it's just affection shown between two men. Save that phony Ratings Kiss for someone else.

Marco Rubio, GOP and Tea Party darling, lied. I know. Big surprise. i think the bigger surprise will be when a politician doesn't lie, but I digress.
See, Rubio, a Republican senator from Florida, has long loved telling the story of being the “son of exiles,”Cuban Americans forced off their beloved island after “a thug,” Fidel Castro, took power. Oops, except that's not really accurate. 
A review of documents--including naturalization papers and other official records--shows that Rubio has, um, embellished the facts. In fact, those documents show that Rubio’s parents came to the United States and were admitted for permanent residence more than two-and-a-half years before Castro’s forces overthrew the Cuban government and took power on New Year’s Day 1959.
Well, maybe his parents were psychic and they saw it coming? Or maybe Rubio is simply a liar. And someone who has thrown his own parents under the bus, claiming he's just telling the stories his parents told him, and that he knows nothing of those documents. [source]

I love me some Dexter.
Which is kinda weird to say that one loves a show about a serial killer killing serial killers, but it's very well written and acted, and has some fascinating characters.
And now it has a new, very hot character in Mike Anderson, a new detective on the show.
And he's played by the delicious Billy Brown.
Good writing.
Good acting.
Billy Brown.
What's not to love.

Obscenity...Morality...Pornography

Carlos and I had a most interesting discussion over dinner last night [sidenote: dinner was blackened pork chops over lime infused rice with black beans, peppers, onions and tomatoes in a mole sauce....que delicioso].

We were talking about Adam Lambert's AMA performance and all the uproar over it. The discussion of him pulling the guy's face into his crotch....his fondling a female dancer....his big old tongue groping kiss on the guy in the band. All of it; and how people were calling it pornographic.

So, what is pornography, and who gets to be the judge. I mean, the Carrie Prejean tapes are called pornography, but Lambert kept his clothes on and, with the exception of maybe a few hundred Innocent teen boys and girls caught unawares about that tingling...down there....no one got off. So, which is pornography?

Is a photograph of a nude woman pornographic? What if she's lying there spread eagle? How about if her hands, or as Joe.My.God. calls them, her Ladyfingers are visiting her nether region? Which one is pornographic? Not into nude women? Yeah, I get what you're saying. Same thing applies to nude men. Pretty pose? Spread eagle showing the goods? A little bit of chicken choking? Who's to say what's pornographic.

So, then Carlos wanted to talk obscenity, and I noted that the same rules apply. Everyone has a differing view as to what is obscene. I don't find nudity obscene. I don't find pictures of men and women, in any combination, performing sex acts, particularly obscene. That doesn't mean I want to see them on my TV or computer, but, you know, to each his own. For me, war is obscene; violence is pornographic. Murder is immoral.

And yet we see that every night of the week from old Sopranos reruns to any number of CSI or NCIS or Law & Order type shows. And no one raises a fuss. so, why all the hubbub about Adam Lambert's performance?

He's a man, that's why. Oh, and his being openly gay probably added fuel to the fire. See, if it was two women kissing [or three, Madonna, Britney and Christina, I'm talking to you] there would have been little or no uproar. Straight women are not particularly bothered by two women kissing; lord knows the Lesbians don't have a problem with it. Gay men, too, don't care. Madonna's various same-sex liplocks never raised a, um, flag, if you will, in me. And straight men, well, they get downright erect at the thought of girl-on-girl action.

No, it's because Lambert's a guy and gay. It was in-your-face-gay-man-kissing, and it made some crazy. Not straight women, I say; they probably didn't care, unless you count the perpetually uptight types a la Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Gay women weren't bothered either, because it isn't their cup of tea. Gay men, well, we thought Cool. No, it was the straight guys, because they're too macho to admit there's nothing wrong with mano'a'mano spit swapping. See, the straight guys think that if they didn't bitch and moan, we might think they like it and they can't have that.

So, it's mostly straight men who got their boxer briefs in a snit over Adam Lambert's overt sexual, and some say pitchy, performance. And, since it is straight men, for the most part, who control the media and the news in this country, that's why there was such a fuss.

Was it pornographic? Not in my house. Obscene? Nope. Immoral? Hardly. But then, I'm a gay guy, and, to me, who you love, who you kiss, who dives into your crotch, is entirely your business.

Kissed Off In Salt Lake City

You gotta love the gay community.

We dress fabulously. And we act fast; along with some help from our straight allies.

After the 'detention of Derek Jones and Matt Aune for kissing in the Mormon Church's Main Street Plaza, a Kiss-In was held.

I would have called it a Kiss-Off.

Isabelle Warnas smiled, her lips bright red, as she planted a big kiss on her husband's cheek. She said she's done this often on the LDS property and never been bothered by anyone for doing so.

Ah, Isabelle, you're straight,m and the Mormon Church has no problem with you.

Isabelle and her hubby were just one of hundreds of couples, gay and straight, who gathered Monday morning near Main Street Plaza to show support for Derek Jones and Matthew Aune. The two men say they were detained by Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints security guards after one man had kissed the other on the cheek Thursday. They had argued with the guards and were later cited for trespassing.

"My husband and I cannot understand the discrimination," Warnas said. "This is not right."

Several LDS Church security guards goosestepped along the perimeter, watching, and turning away protestors who dared to cross the plaza. You know, you don't want the gays touching your property and all.

"They were asked repeatedly not to come onto the property, and they chose to do so anyway," said LDS church spokeswoman Kim Farah, who also said, in a prepared statement:. "We are glad they come ... . We do ask that certain guidelines be kept on church property, including that no demonstrations are allowed here."

Especially of the gay and gay-friendly variety.

The protest seemed to converge on two p0ints: anger over Mormon support of Prop H8, and the frustration over the city's sale of the plaza to the Mormon church some ten years ago.

"A lot of people feel disrespected, feel less than fully human because of church policies toward gay and lesbian people, and that's got to stop," said Salt Lake City Councilman Luke Garrott, who represents the downtown district. The sale 0of the plaza to the church allowed the church to ban objectionable activities like protesting, sunbathing, two men kissing.

Nice work, people of Salt Lake City.

Stand up against the hate.

El Paso Can Kiss My Grits

Guards [Really? Taco stand guards?] at a Chico's Tacos on the East Side of El Paso ejected a group of gay men from the restaurant because two of the men were kissing.
"It was a simple kiss on the lips," said Carlos Diaz de Leon, who called the police when he feared he and his group were targets of discrimination after two of his male friends kissed in public.

It seems that the two Rent-a-Cops hired by Chico's Tacos were so offended at the sight of the man-on-man liplock that they approached the men and said "they didn't allow that faggot stuff to go on there."

The minimum wage terrorists then made the men leave the restaurant.

When a real police officer arrived at the scene about an hour later [apparently fresh donuts were available en route and that held them up] de Leon tried to tell the officers what happened. The police officers wanted to hear the Rent-a-Cop story first.

Then the real officer informed the group it was illegal for two men or two women to kiss in public, de Leon said. The five were told they could be cited for homosexual conduct--a charge the US Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional in 2003 in Lawrence v. Texas. And, way back in 2003, the city of El Paso passed an ordinance banning discrimination based on sexual orientation by employees of the city and by businesses open to the public.

Still, El Paso Police Detective Carlos Carrillo said a more appropriate charge would probably be criminal trespass; for buying a taco and kissing.

Seriously.