20. Criminalization of herpes signals a turn for the worse

18. Gay couple burned from PEI home

17. Pride Toronto plans to censor the term Israeli apartheid

16. So much for John Baird’s reputation as a gutsy brawler

15. Pride Toronto in hiding after spirited denunciation from queer leaders

14. Zellers pulls ‘egg these transvestites’ shirt from stores

13. Lesbians kicked out of Waterloo café for kissing

12. Grindr tightens restrictions: no underwear, no cock size

11. He has a chauffeur! Rick Mercer’s epic John Baird smackdown

10. Exploring Amman’s gay spaces

9. Facebook reevaluates decision to censor trans man’s post-op chest pics

8. Another bloodbath as Toronto’s Proud FM fires four hosts

7. How the second world war changed gay life

6. Pride Toronto reverses ban on 'Israeli apartheid'

5. Trans guy banned from Facebook after uploading post-op chest pic

4. Fred Phelps’s son gets job promoting atheism, battling homophobia

3. Two lesbian youth found dead in Orangeville

2. Sex TV axed after decade-long shuffle between broadcasters

1. Open secret: John Baird outed

The Westboro Baptist Church lunatics preached their hate outside Twitter's San Francisco headquarters last week. Why? Apparently the anti-gay church loves the social media service, but only when it's used for "God's word to be preached to a doomed nation of God-hating rebels!" Riiiiight.

Some clever counter-protesters crashed the WBC picket, using the opportunity to mock founder Fred Phelps and his followers. Check out some of the hilarious signs, and watch this video of counter-protester Philip Huang, who used humour to mock the WBC:

This kind of counter-protest is a great way to make a statement — exposing homophobic lunatics using parody and humour, without calling on government or the law to shut them down.   

Canada is a regular target of the Westboro Baptist Church. Word spread in August 2008 that Phelps's crew was set to picket a Toronto production of the Laramie Project. Phelps's crew never showed up, but Toronto queers staged a counter-protest anyway. Check out the video below:

As discussed yesterday, we mourned the death of Bea Arthur because she was one of the great comedians and a classy dame!  But what is this "classy?"  Like pornography, do we only know it when we see it?  Well, here's a handy guide:

CLASSY!
Journalist Rex Wockner, who sat down (in a church!) with Miss USA pageant contestant Carrie Prejean to discuss her opposition to gay marriage.  Watch Wockner display the patience of, well, a saint as Prejean blames her blissfully unthinking bigotry on judge Perez Hilton's "hidden agenda."  Umm...have you seen that guy?  There's nothing hidden about him!

NOT CLASSY!
Francis Begbie, the violent thug in "Trainspotting," who actor Robert Carlyle now says he played as a repressed homosexual.  Great -- a movie that features Ewan McGregor and Jonny Lee Miller and the gay character is Begbie?  There really is no justice!

CLASSY! 
Neil Patrick Harris, the hilarious and hot host (literally!) of last Sunday's TV Land Awards.  Let him host the Oscars already!

NOT CLASSY! 
The vaguely creepy but hilarious website Heavypetting, which features amateur porn photos (made colourfully PG-13) that accidentally include the family pet.  Inappropriate!

CLASSY! 
The students and teachers at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, Maryland, who staged a counter-protest against the odious Fred Phelps clan (or is it 'klan?').  Phelps was protesting the school being named after a homosexual. Wow -- Whitman died in 1892. We knew Phelps' people hated the 21st century but we had no idea they still think it's the 19th!

CLASSY/NOT CLASSY/I'M NOT SURE 
Larry Kramer, gay visionary and self-described "famous big deal loudmouth activist" uses an award acceptance speech to deliver a long-deserved "fuck you" to Yale University.

NOT CLASSY! 
Fans of the online 'Star Wars' roleplaying game discovered that the words "homosexual," "lesbian" and "gay" are blocked from any kind of use.  Players argued about this in the game's forum until "community manager" Sean Dahlberg bluntly wrote:

"As I have stated before, these are terms that do not exist in Star Wars. Thread closed." 

Ouch! But no gays in 'Star Wars?'  I've got three letters, one number saying otherwise (figure it out, nerds!) and the lads at 'Robot Chicken' revealed what bounty hunter Boba Fett gets up to when he's alone:

CLASSY! 
The people of Iceland, who elected Johanna Sigurdardottir as the country's first female prime minister and the world first openly gay leader!  Of course, since the country's bankrupt, they may not have been doing her a service but it's still a great thing to see.

But a final NOT CLASSY! for the hideous Tiffany Wellsley, who -- despite her born-to-drag name -- penned the disgusting editorial:

SWINE FLU: GOD’S LATEST PUNISHMENT OF IDOL-WORSHIP

I deliberately left the font big from the 'Republican Faith Chat' website because of its awe-inspiring evil!  You see, when natural disasters strike, gay people don't blame conservative Christians.  We don't say tornados are God's punishment for the priests who raped all those children.  We don't say that people get sick because God disagrees with their pious, cruel and judgmental lifestyle.  We don't say any of that.  It wouldn't be classy!

Still in Margate.  Not my first choice to spend a day but the plan is to decompress a little before the Chunnel to Paris this weekend.  In the meantime, there's been some happy developments across the pond:

The insane Fred Phelps clan went to picket the University of Chicago and didn't quite get the reaction they expected:

I knew there was a reason I love frat boys!  Incidents like this, explains Christian writer Michael Spencer, is why he sees the Evangelical movement collapsing within the next decade.  One can only hope!  I really enjoyed this insightful comment from the Beliefnet blog:

"I'm utterly dismayed by the number of people who have adopted the label "Christian" for its tribal association, and not for any spiritual succor beyond belonging to a power structure."

And the scales shall fall from their eyes!  Speaking of eyes, here's the UK magazine I will definitely be searching for at the WH Smith in the rail station:

Gethin Jones AND the Pet Shop Boys?  Somebody in England loves me!  Let's hope the French feel the same way...

Like Don Henley said, there's just not enough love in the world...

Legendary singer Etta James says, at laaaaaaaaast, she's gonna whoop Beyoncé's ass.  Meow!

Kellogg's has dropped Michael Phelps from endorsing Corn Flakes, thanks to his bong hit last week.  I will therefore be dropping Kellogg's from my shopping list.  Boycotts are tough, though -- Froot Loops are so good when you're stoned!

But then there's new senator Mike Duffy, whose political grandstanding took an erotic turn:

"I was disappointed to see that our dynamic young premier in Prince Edward Island, Robert Ghiz, has climbed into bed with the premier of Newfoundland...You know what happened, what a grotesque scene that is. You know what happens when two politicians climb into bed together. One of them comes out on top and I'm afraid when you're in bed with Danny Williams, he's going to be on top."

This Valentine's Day, think of Mike Duffy, the dreamer, the bottom:

On the other side of the country, the Canadian Human Rights Commission has dismissed a claim by Edmonton gay activist Rob Wells against the Christian Heritage Party's anti-gay writings but you wouldn't know it from all the whining. The CHP's Ron Grey says activists like Wells are "using the power of the state to silence critics."  Uh...Ron?  You won.  And you're not exactly silent, are you?

Time magazine's Claire Sudduth really hates Facebook -- and possibly humanity itself!

The job of saving humanity, however (now there's a segue) belongs to "Torchwood" -- the bisexual alien hunters are back this summer and, if you don't blink during the brand-new trailer, you'll catch a bit of lovin':