VOL. 31 N 10 ~ JANVIER 2015 ~ GRATUIT ~ fugues.com

NEWSMAKERS_NEWS, POLITICS AND POP
Heroes and Zeros of the Year 2014
“Homosexuals have the right to live and
love,” said Keita, while Kuti wrote in an
op-ed, “We have to keep talking about
the issue of gay rights – citizens must
have the right to be who they want to
be.”
HERO South African parliamentarian
Zakhele Mbhele, Africa’s first openlygay
black MP.
HERO Finland, who launched a range
of Tom of Finland stamps to commemorate
the “proud homoeroticism” of the
influential gay artist.
ZEROS Pro-Russian separatists, presumed
to have shot down Malaysia Airlines
flight MH17 over Ukraine, killing
all 283 passengers and 15 crew on
board, including over 100 international
AIDS researchers, activists and health
workers on their way to the 20th International
AIDS Conference in Melbourne,
Australia, setting back the
quest for an AIDS vaccine by several
years.
HEROES Archie Comics and DC
Comics, for pushing the envelope: In a
July issue of Life With Archie, Archie
Andrews takes a bullet and dies to protect
his gay friend Kevin Keller from an
assassination attempt; and in the new
Multiversity comics series, Batman’s
son Damian Wayne –who has taken on
the identity of Batman – is taunted by
Alexis Luthor, the daughter of villain
Lex Luthor. She questions his relationship
with Chris Kent – the son of Superman
– when she asks him, “Is Batman
gay Why don’t you and Chris finally
admit you love one another, Batman”
ZERO Canada Border Services Agency,
for detaining British transgender
woman Avery Edison in an Ontario
male correctional facility after she was
detained at Toronto Pearson International.
HEROES Collectif Carre Rose Montreal,
for reducing assaults and gaybashings
in Montreal’s Gay Village,
after meeting with police and city officials
HERO Montreal activist Ian Salt
Bradley-Perrin, the Concordia University
Community Lecture Series on
HIV/AIDS co-ordinator who made the
POZ Magazine 100, an annual list of
leaders who are taking a stand against
the disease.
HERO Montreal’s Phyliss Lambert,
founder of the Canadian Centre for Architecture,
received the Golden Lion for
Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Biennale
for Architecture.
HERO Corrine Saenze, wife of top
Texas anti-gay crusader Jonathan
Saenz. Corrine divorced her husband to
begin a romantic relationship with another
woman.
ZERO American opera singer Valerian
Ruminski, who was fired by Ottawa’s
Opera Lyra company from their production
of Tosca after he posted homophobic
comments on Facebook.
HEROES Cher and designer Bob
Mackie, who (after a public falling out)
reunited just in time for the second leg
of Cher’s ‘Dressed to Kill’ tour.
HERO Conchita Wurst, the Austrian
recording artist and drag queen who
won the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest
HERO Jamie Lee Curtis, who is producing
a biopic about Glenn Burke, the
first MLB player to come out as gay,
back in 1978 before he was railroaded
out of baseball for refusing to go back
into the closet. On July 15, MLB finally
honoured Burke as a baseball pioneer,
19 years after Burke’s 1995 death from
AIDS-related causes.
HERO Drag impresario and Trannyshack
founder Heklina (Stefan
Grygelko), for changing his18-year-old
club night’s name to T-Shack.
HEROES Jordan Tannahill, Mariko
Tamaki and Raziel Reid, queer winners
of 2014 Governor General’s Literary
Awards.
HERO Dance diva Martha Wash, who’s
iconic hit song It’s Raining Men
recharted in the Top 40 in Britain to
protest conservative politician David
Silvester, who blamed storms and
floods on the passage of same-sex marriage
in the U.K. This past February
Martha told me David Silvester’s antigay
proclamation was un-Christian and
“laughable.” Then she said, “My gay
fans have been my largest supporters
over the years. They have kept me working,
and I thank them for that.”
HEROES Gay Kenyan writer Binyavanga
Wainaina, trans fashion models
Andreja Pejic and Geena Rocero, Apple
CEO Tim Cook, Australian swimmer
and five-time Olympic gold medallist
Ian Thorpe, lesbian Mexican-American
actress Emily Rios and 1990s Brit pop
idol Kavanan, and the world’s first publicly-gay
imam Daayiee Abdullah, all
publicly came out in 2014.
HEROES The Godfather of House
Music Frankie Knuckles, Vancouver
bookstore Little Sister’s co-owner Jim
Deva and trailblazing stand-up comic
Joan Rivers all passed away in 2014.
RIP.
6 RICHARD BURNETT
Read Richard Burnett’s POP TART blog for The
Montreal Gazette at
http://montrealgazette.com/tag/pop-tart
Read Burnett’s national queer-issues column
Three Dollar Bill online at
www.bugsburnett.blogspot.com .
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