Free Republic

Alan Gendreau is just another ex-college football player trying to get onto a National Football League roster. Except for one thing: He’s openly gay. Gendreau kicked for Middle Tennessee State from 2008-2011, and he did so exceptionally well. The all-time leading scorer in Sun Belt Conference history, the Apopka, Fla., native amassed 295 points in his career at Murfreesboro. The 23-year-old, who has been openly gay since he was 15 years old, wasn’t drafted last year and never caught on with an organization. He’s not about to let his dream die, however. In fact, the former college star thinks he’s...

Gay Celebrities: Who Is Out? Once it was considered a potentially career-ending acknowledgment, but a growing number of celebrities have come out with relatively little fanfare. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Anderson Cooper, 2012 Until July, Anderson Cooper had never publicly confirmed he was gay, but he'd never denied it, either. Cooper's sexual orientation has long been an open secret, but it took an Entertainment Weekly cover story about gay celebrities to prompt the newsman to finally come out. Daily Beast blogger Andrew Sullivan, another openly gay newsman, wrote to Cooper asking...

A gay Los Angeles artist who's admitted to vandalizing a local Chick-fil-A eatery is being investigated by the police. Artist Manny Castro was so perturbed by CEO Dan Cathy's comment about gay marriage, he decided to take matters into his own hands. Castro Thursday scrawled the words "Tastes Like Hate" in huge lettering on the side of the Torrance restaurant. To his credit, the artist came forward to identify himself as the unknown vandal, but he should at least be forced to pay restitution for the cleanup. Why should the owner foot the bill? This week's Chick-fil-A hoopla has shown...

Navy Senior Chief Dwayne Beebe, center, embraces Jonathan Franqui, right, after proposing to him during the gay pride parade Saturday, July 21, 2012, in San Diego. SAN DIEGO (AP) — Some of the loudest cheers Saturday at San Diego's gay pride parade were for active-duty troops marching in military dress, the first time that U.S. service members participated in such an event while in full uniform. Dozens of soldiers, sailors, and Marines marched alongside an old Army truck decorated with a "Freedom to Serve" banner and a rainbow flag. They were joined by dozens more military personnel in civilian...

U.S. women’s soccer player Megan Rapinoe, a midfielder who helped lead the national team to the finals of last summer’s World Cup and will play in this summer’s London Olympics, confirmed to Out Magazine that she is gay.

As San Francisco and other Bay Area cities prepare for gay pride celebrations this month, Gov. Jerry Brown issued a proclamation Saturday declaring June 2012 Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month. In a statement issued Saturday, the governor called June 28, 1969 a “historic turning point” — a day when LGBT citizens in New York City resisted police harassment stemming from discriminatory laws during the Stonewall Riots. He noted that “California has been a leader in advancing the rights of its LGBT citizens”, including a San Francisco federal appeals court’s February ruling that found Prop 8, California’s ban on...

TORONTO (AP) -- Some of the NHL's biggest stars are featured in a public service announcement promoting equality within the sport, regardless of sexual orientation. Rick Nash, Duncan Keith, Corey Perry, Dion Phaneuf and Henrik Lundqvist are among the players who participated in the spot that debuted on NBC during Sunday afternoon's broadcast of the New York Rangers' 4-3 victory over the Boston Bruins.

The gay marine whose homecoming kiss with his boyfriend went viral yesterday has revealed that their passionate embrace was the couple's first ever. Sgt Brandon Morgan, of Oakdale, California, told Khon2.com how a four year friendship with Windward Oahu artist Dalan Wells turned to long-distance love while he was serving with the US Marines in Afghanistan. He said: 'We couldn't talk, I can barely talk now, his hands went numb, my legs were shaking, our first kiss after just knowing how we felt about each other'

"Five months after the military's ban on openly gay service expired, a photo of a young gay Marine's homecoming kiss has gone viral".

When the Conservative Political Action Conference launches on February 10, the mood will be uncharacteristically flamboyant. Not only because the gay caucus GOProud will be prominently participating, but because the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage, the Family Research Council, and other "values" organizations won't be. Together, they've mounted a CPAC boycott, an effort to strip the newish homosexual element from the conservative coalition and part of a larger bid to forcibly remarry social and fiscal conservatives. The bet was that distaste for gay people themselves—as opposed to lightning rods like gay marriage or adoption, which aren't included in GOProud's platform—is...

It looks increasingly like Steve Jobs' reign at Apple is over. If the CEO doesn't return from his third, indefinite medical leave, COO Tim Cook will succeed him, marking a new era not only for Apple but for gay progress. (snip) Cook, a famously quiet and collected person, will find his backstory, both personal and professional, the topic of increasing interest and discussion in the tech community. That new attention is a good thing for a man with a reputation as fearsomely good as Cook's. Cook's rise to his position—he is one of the most powerful corporate executives in the...

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to take up a case seeking to force the Washington, D.C., government to hold a referendum on the city’s gay marriage law. The high court declined to hear an appeal filed on behalf of opponents of a March 2010 law that made the District of Columbia the sixth jurisdiction in the United States authorizing gay and lesbian couples to marry.

Last week, we noted that the Supreme Court was preparing to release a decision on the petition filed by Bishop Harry Jackson requesting that the District's gay marriage law be suspended pending the completion of a citywide referendum on the issue. The Court ruled today, turning away Jackson yet again. The Court, who conferenced on the case, Jackson v. the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics, last Friday, did not comment on the decision according to the Associated Press. Jackson had filed the petition last October, a reaction to a February ban by the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics...

A Kansas airman accused of disobeying orders requiring him to tell his sexual partners that he is HIV positive faces assault charges at a military hearing following allegations that he indulged in unprotected sex with multiple women at swingers' parties. Court martial proceedings against Tech. Sgt. David Gutierrez begin Tuesday at McConnell Air Force Base in Wichita where he is stationed with the 22nd Maintenance Operations Squadron. He has been under arrest at the base since Aug. 9. The Air Force has charged him with violating military law by having unprotected sex with at least 10 people without telling them...

NORFOLK, Va. — The Navy officer who aired lewd videos for crew of an aircraft carrier was temporarily relieved of his command on Tuesday, NBC News has learned. A Navy announcement was expected during a news conference set for 2 p.m. ET. Capt. Owen Honors commands the USS Enterprise, currently stationed in Norfolk, Va., and hosted the videos while he was second in command aboard the aircraft carrier. Honors was relieved while the Navy investigates the incident. Made in 2006 and 2007, the videos just came to light over the weekend and show the crew got an eyeful on shipboard...

<p>In the Republican Party, the fracture over issues concerning homosexual individuals revealed itself more clearly in the vote for repeal of the 17-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy that prevented gays from serving openly in the military.</p> <p>Of the eight Republican senators who voted for repeal, five are among the youngest in the upper chamber - and they're not all moderates.</p>

snip With the repeal expected to be in effect by late February, Ms. Miller said she is busy filling out her application to transfer back to West Point. If granted readmission, Ms. Miller would rejoin the academy this fall as a junior. "My intention the entire time has been to help the military, not to provide disruption, but to provide an example of why this policy needs to go," said the 2008 Findlay graduate, who wasn't open about her sexuality in high school. "All too often people leave silently, and you don't see the toll that the policy has on...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Months of "inhumane" solitary confinement are taking a toll on the US Army private suspected of passing secret government files to WikiLeaks, one of his supporters said after paying him a visit. "It has become obvious to me that (Bradley) Manning's physical and mental well-being are deteriorating," David House wrote on the blog Firedoglake, recounting a visit to the military brig where the accused soldier is being held. "It's become increasingly clear that the severe, inhumane conditions of his detention are wearing on Manning," he wrote. Held at a military brig in Virginia at the Quantico...

The gay Army lieutenant's heart had been racing all night. Shuffling between meetings at his outpost in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday night, the 27-year-old officer kept popping his head into the main office to catch a glimpse of Fox News's coverage of the Senate debate that led to a vote lifting the ban on gay men and lesbians serving in the military openly. "Don't cry," a 21-year-old specialist, one of the lieutenant's confidants, told his boss jokingly when news broke that 65 senators had voted to repeal "don't ask, don't tell." "I'm completely numb," was all the lieutenant could mutter....

Marine commandant concluded DADT repeal may risk lives By Kevin Baron Stars and Stripes Published: December 14, 2010 ARLINGTON, Va. — The nation’s top Marine Corps officer said he could not endorse a change in the “don’t ask, don’t tell” law that could cause distractions or endanger the lives of Marines in combat. Ultimately, the voices of forward-fighting combat Marines who worried about unit cohesion in the Pentagon’s survey swayed Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos, leading him to recommend that Congress not repeal the law banning openly gay Americans from military service. “Mistakes and inattention or distractions cost Marines...