Will Corey Johnson’s charm and energy make him the next mayor of New York City?

Name: Corey Johnson, 37

Who He Is: Speaker of the New York City Council, potential mayoral candidate

How He’s Contributed: Johnson takes politics seriously but has fun doing it. An activist since high school when he came out as a football player, he has overcome addiction to become a popular and powerful political force in the Big Apple, well positioned to become city’s next mayor.

Why We’re Proud: For twenty years, Johnson has been something of a one-man pride parade. He grew up in a blue-collar household in Massachusetts that was less than idyllic. His father left when he was a baby, and his mother’s second husband struggled with alcohol. “We always had problems with money,” Johnson later recalled.

Johnson found an outlet in football, becoming the captain of his high school football team. To the surprise of the team, which ultimately supported his decision, Johnson came out as gay.

His decision to come out was a brave one, and catnip for the mainstream media enchanted by the idea of a gay high school football captain. As a result, Johnson first taste of media attention came in 2000 when he was 18, with a story in The New York Times and a segment on 20/20.

Johnson found himself the center of attention, and after just a month at George Washington University in D.C., he moved to New York City. He became immersed in politics and started working for local politicians.

In sharp contrast to his rising political star, his personal life was full of turmoil. He was diagnosed as HIV positive in 2004, at the age of 22. “In the moment and for the days and months and even years following my doctor giving me that news I lived with shame and fear and anxiety,” he later said.

Not long after seroconverting, Johnson lost his job and health insurance. “My drinking and drug use took off after this,” he said. “After waking up one day in 2009 with a hangover, as he often did, Johnson confided to a friend that he had a problem. Johnson has now sober for nine years.

Johnson came through the dark period of his life with his charm and energy undiminished. The New York Times has described him as “possessed with a preternatural talent for getting to know everyone and the energy to call and call again, making him something of a ubiquitous presence for nearly everyone in the upper echelons of New York’s public life in recent years.”

In 2005 Johnson joined the district Community Board that includes the heavily gay Chelsea neighborhood, a perfect way to establish a political case. When out lesbian Christine Quinn decided in 2013 to vacate her City Council seat to run for mayor, Johnson threw his hat in the ring. He wasn’t considered the frontrunner, but as one political observer noted, “he just outworked everybody” and won.

On the Council, Johnson distinguished himself as an advocate for equality. He authored a bill that eliminated the need for transgender people to have surgery before they could change their birth certificates. Earlier this month, he demanded that the New York Police Department apologize for its behavior during the Stonewall Riots; the police commissioner made the apology the following day.

But Johnson also distinguished himself by his ambition. Early in his first term, he was already lobbying to become the Council President. Late in 2017, Johnson achieved his goal, becoming the first gay man to hold the position.

Along the way, Johnson earned a reputation as a happy political warrior. He knows how to ingratiate himself with voters (and the media) by having fun. For example, in 2018, he turned a cameo in a weather report on a local TV station into a chance to dance to Lady Gaga’s “The Cure.” The gig was so successful it became a regular feature on Tuesdays.

Johnson has also learned how to work the legislative machinery to appeal to New Yorkers disdain for hysterical homeboy Donald Trump. In 2017, he proposed a bill that would have required Trump to disclose his taxes. (The bill didn’t go anywhere, but the state legislature passed similar legislation this year.)

Between his charm and his drive, Johnson has become the most popular politician in New York City–far more so than Mayor Bill de Blasio. De Blasio is running for president, but a poll of city residents found that he is their last choice among the candidates.

That leaves Johnson well positioned to run for mayor in 2021. He’s already broadly hinted that he’s planning on doing so. Meantime, expect Johnson to keep having fun. All you have to do is look at his dance performance at the Pride Parade in Brooklyn on Sunday.

That is clearly a man who takes pride in his work–and in Pride.

www.queerty.com/will-corey-johnsons-charm-energy-make-next-major-new-york-city-20190612?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+queerty2+%28Queerty%29

9 Pics of U.S. Women’s Soccer Team Celebrating a Record-Breaking Win

www.advocate.com/sports/2019/6/12/9-pics-us-womens-soccer-team-celebrating-record-breaking-win

EXCLUSIVE: Check out the trailer for the gay wrestling doc ‘Cassandro the Exotico’

Wrestling is about as homoerotic as sports get.

So why has it taken so long to have a few out-queer wrestlers? Meet Saul Armendariz, better known by his stage name Cassandro, Mexico’s out-gay wrestling superstar. As a competitor in the Luca Libra wrestling circuit, Cassandro has earned the nickname the “Liberace of Luca Libre” courtesy of his outrageous, drag-inspired costumes.

Related: Meet Cassandro, Mexico’s Lucha Libre Drag Queen Superstar

Now Cassandro opens up about his life in the new documentary Cassandro the Exotico from director Marie Losier. The film details Cassandro’s rise as an out-gay sports superstar, and his final year in wrestling before retirement.

Cassandro the Exotico opens in New York July 19 before beginning a national rollout.

www.queerty.com/exclusive-check-trailer-gay-wrestling-doc-cassandro-exotico-20190612?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+queerty2+%28Queerty%29

What Orwell’s ‘1984’ Tells Us About Today’s World, 70 Years After It Was Published

Stephen Groening, University of Washington

Seventy years ago, Eric Blair, writing under a pseudonym George Orwell, published “1984,” now generally considered a classic of dystopian fiction.

The novel tells the story of Winston Smith, a hapless middle-aged bureaucrat who lives in Oceania, where he is governed by constant surveillance. Even though there are no laws, there is a police force, the “Thought Police,” and the constant reminders, on posters, that “Big Brother Is Watching You.”

Smith works at the Ministry of Truth, and his job is to rewrite the reports in newspapers of the past to conform with the present reality. Smith lives in a constant state of uncertainty; he is not sure the year is in fact 1984.

Although the official account is that Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia, Smith is quite sure he remembers that just a few years ago they had been at war with Eastasia, who has now been proclaimed their constant and loyal ally. The society portrayed in “1984” is one in which social control is exercised through disinformation and surveillance.

As a scholar of television and screen culture, I argue that the techniques and technologies described in the novel are very much present in today’s world.

‘1984’ as history

One of the key technologies of surveillance in the novel is the “telescreen,” a device very much like our own television.

The telescreen displays a single channel of news, propaganda and wellness programming. It differs from our own television in two crucial respects: It is impossible to turn off and the screen also watches its viewers.

The telescreen is television and surveillance camera in one. In the novel, the character Smith is never sure if he is being actively monitored through the telescreen.

Orwell’s telescreen was based in the technologies of television pioneered prior to World War II and could hardly be seen as science fiction. In the 1930s Germany had a working videophone system in place, and television programs were already being broadcast in parts of the United States, Great Britain and France.

Past, present and future

The dominant reading of “1984” has been that it was a dire prediction of what could be. In the words of Italian essayist Umberto Eco, “at least three-quarters of what Orwell narrates is not negative utopia, but history.”

Additionally, scholars have also remarked how clearly “1984” describes the present.

In 1949, when the novel was written, Americans watched on average four and a half hours of television a day; in 2009, almost twice that. In 2017, television watching was slightly down, to eight hours, more time than we spent asleep.

In the U.S. the information transmitted over television screens came to constitute a dominant portion of people’s social and psychological lives.

‘1984’ as present day

In the year 1984, however, there was much self-congratulatory coverage in the U.S. that the dystopia of the novel had not been realized. But media studies scholar Mark Miller argued how the famous slogan from the book, “Big Brother Is Watching You” had been turned to “Big Brother is you, watching” television.

Miller argued that television in the United States teaches a different kind of conformity than that portrayed in the novel. In the novel, the telescreen is used to produce conformity to the Party. In Miller’s argument, television produces conformity to a system of rapacious consumption – through advertising as well as a focus on the rich and famous. It also promotes endless productivity, through messages regarding the meaning of success and the virtues of hard work.

Many viewers conform by measuring themselves against what they see on television, such as dress, relationships and conduct. In Miller’s words, television has “set the standard of habitual self-scrutiny.”

The kind of paranoid worry possessed by Smith in the novel – that any false move or false thought will bring the thought police – instead manifests in television viewers that Miller describes as an “inert watchfulness.” In other words, viewers watch themselves to make sure they conform to those others they see on the screen.

This inert watchfulness can exist because television allows viewers to watch strangers without being seen. Scholar Joshua Meyrowitz has shown that the kinds of programming which dominate U.S television – news, sitcoms, dramas – have normalized looking into the private lives of others.

Controlling behavior

Alongside the steady rise of “reality TV,” beginning in the ‘60s with “Candid Camera,” “An American Family,” “Real People,” “Cops” and “The Real World,” television has also contributed to the acceptance of a kind of video surveillance.

For example, it might seem just clever marketing that one of the longest-running and most popular reality television shows in the world is entitled “Big Brother.” The show’s nod to the novel invokes the kind of benevolent surveillance that “Big Brother” was meant to signify: “We are watching you and we will take care of you.”

But Big Brother, as a reality show, is also an experiment in controlling and modifying behavior. By asking participants to put their private lives on display, shows such as “Big Brother” encourage self-scrutiny and behaving according to perceived social norms or roles that challenge those perceived norms.

The stress of performing 24/7 on “Big Brother” has led the show to employ a team of psychologists.

Television scholar Anna McCarthy and others have shown that the origins of reality television can be traced back to social psychology and behavioral experiments in the aftermath of World War II, which were designed to better control people.

Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, for example, was influenced by “Candid Camera.”

In the “Candid Camera” show, cameras were concealed in places where they could film people in unusual situations. Milgram was fascinated with “Candid Camera,” and he used a similar model for his experiments – his participants were not aware that they were being watched or that it was part of an experiment.

Like many others in the aftermath of World War II, Milgram was interested in what could compel large numbers of people to “follow orders” and participate in genocidal acts. His “obedience experiments” found that a high proportion of participants obeyed instructions from an established authority figure to harm another person, even if reluctantly.

While contemporary reality TV shows do not order participants to directly harm each other, they are often set up as a small-scale social experiment that often involves intense competition or even cruelty.

Surveillance in daily life

And, just like in the novel, ubiquitous video surveillance is already here.

Closed-circuit television exist in virtually every area of American life, from transportation hubs and networks, to schools, supermarkets, hospitals and public sidewalks, not to mention law enforcement officers and their vehicles.

Surveillance footage from these cameras is repurposed as the raw material of television, mostly in the news but also in shows like “America’s Most Wanted,” “Right This Minute” and others. Many viewers unquestioningly accept this practice as legitimate.

The friendly face of surveillance

Reality television is the friendly face of surveillance. It helps viewers think that surveillance happens only to those who choose it or to those who are criminals. In fact, it is part of a culture of widespread television use, which has brought about what Norwegian criminologist Thomas Mathiesen called the “viewer society” – in which the many watch the few.

For Mathiesen, the viewer society is merely the other side of the surveillance society – described so aptly in Orwell’s novel – where a few watch the many.

Stephen Groening, Assistant Professor of Cinema and Media Studies, University of Washington

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The post What Orwell’s ‘1984’ Tells Us About Today’s World, 70 Years After It Was Published appeared first on Towleroad Gay News.

What Orwell’s ‘1984’ Tells Us About Today’s World, 70 Years After It Was Published

Denver Zoo’s Male Flamingos Lance Bass & Freddie Mercury Are a Couple

In a Pride Month post, the Denver Zoo announced that Freddie and Lance have been together for five years. 

www.advocate.com/news/2019/6/12/denver-zoos-male-flamingos-lance-bass-freddie-mercury-are-couple

Sandra Bernhard is done talking about her relationship with Madonna, so stop asking about it!

Sandra Bernhard recently sat down with Tim Teeman over at the Daily Beast for a wide ranging interview about everything from Donald Trump to #MeToo to her appearance on Season 2 of Pose.

Of course, no Bernhard interview would be complete without a question or two about her former BFF Madonna, whose new album Madame X comes out on Friday.

Back in the late ’80s and early ’90s, the duo were often spotted running around New York City together, making joint appearances on The David Letterman Show, and, at one point, even rumored to be lesbian lovers.

“She came to my show in 1988, came backstage, and then we started hanging out,” Bernhard told Wendy Williams back in 2010. “We would go out, we would have a genuinely great time, and I think we were a really good example of two women being friends.”

Then one day, that all abruptly ended.

“I like to maintain my friendships,” Bernhard said. “But, you know, certain people can’t handle those kinds of friendships.”

But apparently Bernhard is officially over being asked about that time in her life because the moment Teeman brought it up, she looked back at him and said curtly, “I haven’t been in touch with her for years. This is a very overly examined relationship at this point.”

Shut down.

When Teeman asked if the lesbian romance rumors were true, Bernhard simply stated, “No.”

Next question.

Here are some other highlights from the Daily Beast interview…

On Pete Buttigieg:

I don’t give a sh*t what anybody’s sexual orientation is, or their color or religion. All I’m interested in right now is someone who is committed to changing the narrative in this country, and reaching people who are afraid of change.

On Donald Trump:

He’s an idiot, a thoughtless, narcissistic jackass.

On coming out:

I never really came out, honestly. I was always someone who said, ‘Be who you are. I am who I am.’ I was talking more about sexual fluidity than coming out. I never wanted to make big statements like that because I am more interested in being who I want to be with and comfortable, and expecting everyone to do the same.

On being labeled bisexual:

I guess, if we have to get into these didactic conversations, yeah, I’ve been with my girlfriend for 20 years, so it’s really not even up for discussion. But for my own feelings and emotions, I mean I find find certain men, like certain women, attractive. But I’m with my partner. And we have been together for a long time and we’re happy, and that’s where that’s at.

On marriage:

 don’t really care about marriage. If it was about something important for our civil liberties, maybe we would. Right now, we’re good the way it is.

On life:

I’m anti-bitter. I love life, new experiences, meeting people, and new friends. I’m incredibly open. I love everything that has happened in my career. I feel the same way now as I did when I was 20. I’m always ready for a new, wonderful experience to come my way.

Related: Andy Cohen And Sandra Bernhard Hilariously Narrate Madonna’s Apocalyptic Musical Fantasy

www.queerty.com/sandra-bernhard-done-talking-relationship-madonna-stop-asking-20190612?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+queerty2+%28Queerty%29

Stephanie J. Block, Census Materials, Greg Pence, Pete Buttigieg, Tennessee, Pride Books, David Hockney: HOT LINKS

QUINNIPIAC. Top Dems lead Trump in head-to-head matchups: “The head-to-head matchups give this heads up to President Donald Trump’s team: Former Vice President Joseph Biden and other Democratic contenders would beat the president if the election were held today. Leads range from Biden’s 13 percentage points to thin five-point leads by Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Cory Booker.”

RADIOACTIVE. Influencers asked to stop taking photos at Chernobyl.

EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE. Trump asserts EP over census materials: ‘House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings has accused both the DOJ and Commerce Department of stonewalling his investigation by withholding documents and preventing witnesses requested by the committee from testifying on the issue. But in a letter on Tuesday, Assistant Attorney General Stephen Boyd said that the committeehas refused to engage with the department over a “limited subset” of the requested documents that might be privileged information.’

OVATION. Cher shares video of The Cher Show‘s Stephanie J. Block after her Tony Awards win.

GREG PENCE. Brother of VP spent $7,600 in campaign funds on lodging at Trump Hotel: ‘After USA TODAY asked about the expenses included on his Federal Election Commission disclosure reports, Pence’s spokesman, Kyle Robertson, declined to say whether the Indiana Republican stayed at the hotel before getting an apartment in Washington. Hours after USA TODAY pressed for more detail on the nature of the lodging expenses, the campaign filed an amended FEC report that changed the designation of the expenses to “fundraising event costs.”‘

RIP. James Bryson: “James H. Bryson, 84, a businessman who became an advocate for gay rights and a philanthropist who helped LGBTQ youth in the Philadelphia area, died Monday, June 10, of Alzheimer’s disease at Artis Senior Living of Huntingdon Valley.”

BUTTIGIEG. I’ll cut off some aid if Israel annexes West Bank: “If Prime Minister Netanyahu makes good on his threat to annex Israeli settlements in the West Bank, a President Buttigieg would take steps to ensure that American taxpayers won’t help foot the bill.”

STEPHEN COLBERT. Another homophobic Trump joke.

TENNESSEE. District Attorney under investigation for remarks about not enforcing domestic violence laws for gay couples: ‘Northcott’s anti-gay comments were filmed at a town hall-style meeting back in 2018 but have only recently come to light. During the meeting, Northcott faced a question from a constituent who sarcastically asked about a “hypothetical” situation in which the federal government were to do something “ridiculous” and legalize same-sex marriage: “How as Christians do you think we should deal with all those situations?”’

PEACE AT LAST. Katy Perry and Taylor Swift have ended a years-long feud with a cookie treaty.

NEW JERSEY. School where an LGBTQ mural touched off controversy will be first to pilot LGBTQ curriculum: “Bergen County Arts & Science Charter School, a public school that rents space from Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church in Hackensack, was forced in May to paint over Keith Haring-inspired interlocking male symbols that were on a wall in a common area also used by church parishioners.”

READING IS LGBTQ. New books for your Pride month list.

A BIGGER SPLASH. David Hockney documentary remastered. Will screen at NYC’s Metrograph on June 21.

FILM REVIEW OF THE DAY. Breaking Banter on Rocketman.

HUMP DAY HOTTIE. Upal Wazed.

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The post Stephanie J. Block, Census Materials, Greg Pence, Pete Buttigieg, Tennessee, Pride Books, David Hockney: HOT LINKS appeared first on Towleroad Gay News.

Stephanie J. Block, Census Materials, Greg Pence, Pete Buttigieg, Tennessee, Pride Books, David Hockney: HOT LINKS

One Pulse. One Heart. One Love. NOH8.
Dear NOH 8 Supporters, On this day 3 years ago 49 people were killed at Pulse Nightclub in Orlando. Today we remember the Pulse victims, support the survivors and take action for the future.   For a limited time we have re-released the NOH 8 Pulse shirt. It will be available for 3 more days.   See available colors, styles and sizes at: represent.com/pride    

www.noh8campaign.com/newsletter/one-pulse-one-heart-one-love-noh8