More gay drama in Latvia. With just four weeks until the small nation's gay pride - an event the government once banned - Catholic Cardinal Jānis Pujāts wants his queer countrymen to know exactly what he thinks of them: they're prostitutes.

Imploring the government to curb the forthcoming celebration, Pujāts (pictured, looking grainy) likened homosexuality to a total corruption in the sexual arena” and went on to call it an "unnatural form of prostitution". In a letter to Rītdiena, Pujāts, who stands as Latvia's highest ranking Catholic, claimed that gay pride's just a clever way to spread "sexual corruption".

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Former American footballer and virulent homophobe Ken Hutcherson made a few headlines over the past few days after claiming the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives sent him to Latvia as the "Special Envoy for Adoptions, Family Values, Religious Freedom, and Medical Relief".

As part of his duties, Hutcherson was apparently meant to derail Latvia's gay rights movement. During one meeting, Hutcherson started an investigation into whether the US Embassy had been lending support to gay activists. Now, the FBI may be looking into whether or not Hutcherson nothing more than a liar, liar with hire pants on fire.

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Boy oh boy, those Latvian homophobes sure are go-getters. It's over four months until the small nation celebrates its gay pride, but they're already rounding up their rectum-revolted masses. Via our homo-homies over at UK Gay News comes a literal translation of a manifesto they published in the free daily, Rītdiena in which they take a stand against the so-called homo pederasts, gay friendly politicians and the pro-gay newspaper, Diena. Here's an excerpt:

Ladies and gentlemen – do you have gunpowder in yourselves? Of course you do. [We've] called on activists to help organise a demonstration against pederasts and pederast ideology.

In just one day, more than 250 activists rang us... Thank you to all of you. Enormous, enormous thanks! No investment will be forgotten. No one is unnecessary in the people’s fight against pederasts and pederast ideology.

O, nation, wake up to a new Renaissance!
...
Readers, boycott and call on your fellow citizens to boycott the newspaper Diena, the main source of propaganda for pederasts and pederasty in Latvia! Don’t buy the newspaper Diena! Don’t subscribe to the newspaper Diena! Cancel your subscription to the newspaper Diena!

Forward, reader! Toward a new Renaissance!

Hmm, it's been a while since we opened a history book, but we seem to recall the Renaissance having something to do with a revival of arts, science and other assorted cultural movements. How, then, can boycotting a paper and enforcing social stagnation be like a new Renaissance? Perhaps something got lost in translation.

Also, we know their t-shirts are spreading a message of intolerance, but we'd give anything for one of our very own. Okay, well, maybe not anything, but at least a blow job: our preferred method of payment.

(Oh, yeah, one more thing - we know the ladies pictured are Eastern European and really can't help it, but they sure do look like dykes to us.)

• Speaking of Tennessee Williams, former Queer As Folk twink Randy Harrison's appearing in the Joe Dowling directed rendition of The Glass Menagerie. Celebrating the miracle that is his career, Harrison sat down for a bit of a chat with Lavender Magazine.

• Latvian gay activists recently came came together to set some ambitious goals for 2007.

• Chilean gay activists, meanwhile, just got a new HQ: The Ministry of National Property gave them an abandoned government building.

• John Polly and his Logo cats are all about covering Sundance and all the happenings at Q Lounge.

&bulL; Nigeria's proposed anti-gay laws are a few steps closer to becoming official. We're sure Peter Akinola's thrilled.

• Here in the states, New Mexican Republican Representative Gloria Vaughn's looking to amend the state's constitution to ban gay marriage. We have a feeling it won't fly.

• If there's one thing November's election taught us, it's that sexual panic's alive and well. What, however, does that mean for gay people? Julie Enszer investigates. [SOVO]

• We know Mitt Romney's not swell on the gays, but his 1994 letter to the Log Cabin Republicans says otherwise. [The Boston Globe]

• Nicole Richie's a wild child. That's a given. But her most recent arrest raises questions about her race. [Mollygood]

• It's an established fact that Latvia's got loads of homophobic politicians. Iain MacWhirter wonders what that means for Scotland. [The Guardian]

• Everyone knows Dreamgirls is being tossed around for an Oscar nod, but can you imagine Borat getting a statue? [The Huffington Post]

• Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies the holocaust. Do you know who's furious about it? Peter Tatchell, that's who. [Pink News UK]

Angelic tampons are fun and all, but let's check in on the real world, shall we?

Conservative Member of the EU Parliament John Bowis delivered the keynote address for the 20th annual International Gay and Lesbian Youth Organisation conference, stressing the dangers LGBT discrimination pose to European cohesion.

Speaking to an intimate group in Riga, Latvia, Bowis declared:

Stigmas like the ones an LGBT person faces are prejudice; prejudice may be the origin of numerous mental health problems in the LGBT community...

In many parts of the European Union, LGBT people are not included completely, this is anti-Christian, this is anti-European.

Sexual preference and gender identity should be discussed on the same level as other differences, such as ethnicity and religion.

The ‘Church’, in a broader sense, questions absolute equality of LGBT people, yet they need to go back to the Bible and follow Jesus’ call to love the sinners.

We're totally down with Bowis' message, but we take issue with a few aspects of his speech. First and foremost, Europe owes much of its history to discrimination. Hello, colonialism? Further, we're not sure applying the Church to the whole of the EU's the best way to make that point if trying to bring people together. But that's just us.

Also, are they being ironic by holding the conference in Latvia, where homophobe Janis Smits recently took over the country's human rights commission?

Oh well, it's the thought that counts.

If there's one thing we look for in a human rights official, it's support for...well, the rights of all humans. Not so in Latvia. You may have heard that the Latvian government recently appointed Janis Smits as head of their human rights commission. You may have also heard the legends of Smits' not-so-humanist stance on gays, i.e. he's not down.

In the wake of protests, Smits insisted he would strike a balance between his personal Christian beliefs and his duty to protect his fellow man. By that, of course, he's going to perpetuate discrimination and spread a little bit of righteously inhuman hate. Insisting that gay men and women should keep their sexual practices private, he says:

The only thing I can do is call on these people to return from their sins, be healed by God and recover normal sexual orientation. I am consistent. I do not call for any activities against homosexual people. God loves all his creatures, also those who have sinned, and all the people need the grace and forgiveness of God.

Wait, so you have to be healed by "God" to "recover normal sexual orientation"? But if God hates fags, as so many people would like us to believe, why would he want to help? Doesn't it make more sense to "recover normal sexual orientation" and then talk to God? Is there some sort of guide book to all this, because it's making our head hurt....The Bible? Oh, yeah, we've heard of that - there were too many different versions, we didn't know where to start.

Not surprisingly, people are up in arms over Smits' use of Christian rhetoric. In response, Smits railed:

If I were a Muslim, nobody would dare protest my right to voice my belief publicly in Europe. There is tolerance against representatives of other religions. But there is discrimination against Christianity.

Yes, there's discrimination against Christians. There's discrimination against everyone, silly. It's your job to stop it.

When gay marriage turns ugly: fight breaks out at lesbian reception. [365 Gay]

Hot Morehouse: Alleged Discriminatory Firing at School. [Southern Voice]

"Cancelled" Conference Never Planned: Ghanaian Activists. [Pink News UK]

"Ex-Gay" Television: Now they can get into your house. Sick. [The Advocate]

GOP Cat Fight: Trouble for Reppies in Colorado. [365 Gay]

No Gay Cover-Up: Latvia Rejects Ban on "Gay Propaganda." [The Advocate]

The violent reaction Latvia's gay pride parade efforts perhaps pale in comparison to the government's official reaction: It's the gays' fault as much as the homophobic protesters. Not only is Interior Minister Dzintars Jaundzeikars saying the melee – instigated by a sanctioned neo-Nazi presence – is is partly the fault of the gay men and women, but now he's saying neither side are the true victims. That superlative goes to the police.

The minister said he was satisfied with the work of the police during July 22 events, as policemen had to endure intense psychological pressure. "In fact, they were the ones who suffered most. They were pelted with eggs and excrements. The pressure was enormous, and it was hard to resist taking sides," the minister said.

So hard to resist, in fact, that the police decided not to take any side — and instead watched the violence take place.

Interior Minister defends handling of gay pride incidents [Baltic Times]
Earlier: Neo-Nazis Corner Gay Activists In Latvia

We're starting to think that the European Union's much-touted Charter of Fundamental Human Rights is a bunch of unenforceable bunk after what happened in Latvia's capital city over the weekend. First Poland elects a couple of twin fascists that are openly disdainful of gay rights, and now police in Riga, Latvia allow neo-Nazis to trap a group of gay activists inside a church on Saturday and do nothing to get them safely out.

The gay group, who was recently barred from holding a Pride parade by Riga's mayor, were having an LGBT rights prayer service (that's a new one for us) when the church was surrounded by neo-Nazis. Rather than disperse, the fascist group grew larger and the gays inside were forced to exit through the protesting mob, dodging bags of poo and having insults screamed in their faces.

The President of Latvia has denounced the incident as "unacceptable," but those words mean little when skinheads are so blatantly allowed to rule the streets. We will wait and see if the EU issues any sanctioned before pronouncing them utterly gutless and ineffectual.

Mob Attacks Gays As Police Look On [365 Gay]

• The finale of My Life On The D-List brings together one gay icon with another as Kathy Griffin joins Johnny Weir on the ice. [Malcontent]

• Following a court order, Missouri removed from its books a regulation automatically banning gay men and women from becoming foster parents. [AP]

• You've got till tomorrow to nominate a friend – or, more likely, yourself – for Cosmo's Media Men contest. [Cosmo]

• Latvia's gay pride celebrations have been banned, just as they were last year. Except last year a court overturned the decision and the gays marched on. Will it be the same this year? [SMH]

• Boston's WRKO radio station suspened talk show host John DePetro yesterday after he called the Turnpike Authority chairman a "fag." Though most news media aren't printing the actual word. [Boston Globe]

• Rape survivors are always the victims of unfortunate circumstances, but in this case, the cirumstances are somehow even more devastating: A woman was raped by a gay man who wanted to prove he could have sex with a woman. [Aust. News Limited]

• The Born Different campaign is getting a huge PR push, but so far we've yet to see anything more than a couple viral video clips and recycled stats. [Born Different]

• Boy George and Anna Nicole Smith are teaming up on a reality show. Makes us we wish we lived in the UK so we can watch what will surely be a coked-up train wreck. [Hello Magazine]

• Latvia has banned same-sex marriage. How do you say "straights only" in Latvian? [Reuters]

• Senator Chris Buttars wants to ban gay-straight alliance clubs in high school. Says the man with the unfortunate surname: "In my mind, if you are in the chess club, what do you talk about? Chess. If you are in the dance club, what do you talk about? Dance. If you are in a gay club, what do you talk about?” Why, fashion of course! [Desert News]

• Jamie Bell, who played a ballerina in Billy Elliot and used to live with the film's much older director, can't possibly understand why people think he might be gay. [Hollywood.com]

• George Michael will be at Elton John’s wedding next week, but not as a hired wedding singer like we had hoped. [Sydney Morning Herald]