“Same-sex couple Frank Capley-Alfano, left, and Joe Capley-Alfano kiss as they celebrate outside San Francisco City Hall Feb. 7, 2012, in San Francisco.”

Proposition 8 was ruled unconstitutional on Tuesday by a federal appeals court in San Francisco.

(Photo: Getty Images via CBS News via Peter Galazka)

Uganda’s “Kill The Gays” Bill reintroduced without death penalty

Uganda’s highly controversial Anti-Homosexuality Bill has been reintroduced by its author, David Bahati, according to the BBC.

The original bill was introduced in 2009 and resulted in international media cry before being shelved in 2011.

Homosexual acts are already illegal in Uganda, but the bill aims to increase the penalty to life in prison.

Originally, the legislation proposed the death penalty for those who engage in gay sex where one participant is under the age of 18, disabled, or HIV-positive. The death penalty has been removed from the revised version of this bill.

Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill is not only a threat to gays, but to anyone who is aware of individuals participating in homosexual acts and doesn’t report them to authorities.

Ever since the bill was introduced, gay people in Uganda are increasingly facing harassment and threats.

(Photo: AP)

MyAcceptance.org tells stories of LGBT people, two photos at a time

MyAcceptance.org, a new photo essay project, is documenting members of the LGBT community — two photos at a time. The one on the left representing how they’ve felt in the past and the one on the right representing how they feel now.

Much like the It Gets Better campaign, the goal of the project is “to give hope to those out there that are struggling in their lives, those who feel like they’re alone and that there’s no one to turn to.”

The project also invites people to participate by submitting their own photos.

Learn more about the project and view the photos at MyAcceptance.org.

(Photo: Parker Austin)

LGBTQ Tumblr blog highlight: homohelp

Equalitopia sits down with homohelp, a Tumblr blog whose concept is quite simple: brightly colored images featuring tips about everything LGBTQ-related. These tips range from inspirational to sarcastic to witty.

Homohelp started less than three months ago and now its posts are receiving hundreds and even thousands of reblogs. Recently, homohelp was added to Tumblr’s new LGBTQ section of the “Spotlight” directory.

Equalitopia: What was your initial inspiration for starting homohelp?

Homohelp: Honestly? It was just boredom and an attempt to get a cheap laugh just to see who was reading. The first handful of posts really weren’t very good, in my opinion. They were very cringe-worthy, and some were downright offensive. (Some people will argue that homohelp is still offensive, but I don’t think any of our posts now are as bad as some of our very first posts.)

Equalitopia: What are you aiming to accomplish with the blog?

Homohelp: At this point, we’re trying to encourage people to realize that just because people are not-straight doesn’t mean that they’re totally different people from those who are. The comment I see more than any other one (Which happens to be my least favourite, actually.) is something along the lines of “Uh… Why is this called homohelp? Straight people do this, too.” I always get really frustrated reading that, because I never wanted to make a blog that excluded anyone, including straight people. I’ll be the first to admit that homohelp is essentially a ripoff of a certain other “tips” blog about male siblings. I could never personally connect with that one, because I don’t think I have much swagg, but you don’t need to be a “bro” to appreciate that blog, and you don’t need to be a homo to appreciate homohelp.

Equalitopia: You started homohelp less than three months ago and now your posts are receiving hundreds and even thousands of reblogs. How did you establish that audience?

Homohelp: I have no idea, actually. I’m still surprised everyday to see how many people are supporting this blog. I never really bothered with trying to get more people to follow the blog. I’ve never asked anyone to do promotions for it and I use the same handful of tags for every post. Really, all I do is write the posts and hope somebody is reading them. Any success we’ve had with the readers is thanks to our readers themselves. They’ve been the ones spreading the word about homohelp, and we’ve received some really nice messages. It’s kind words from our readers that really keep motivation up for this. There have been a few times where I’m totally stumped for posts and think about just taking a break for a while, or giving up all together, but I can’t do that at this point. I feel like I’d be letting people down, which is the last thing I want to do.

Equalitopia: How many people are behind homohelp? Who are they?

Homohelp: I always feel really silly answering this, because I’ve always referred to homohelp as a “we.” Technically, I’m the only person behind homohelp at this point, but I still refer to it as a “we.” The blog encourages readers to submit their ideas for posts to us, so I would feel really silly referring to homohelp as just me, because it’s not. Even a good chunk of the posts I write are inspired by comments on past posts or messages from readers, and I feel like I would take credit away from them if I just referred to myself when talking about the blog. homohelp is more than just me, it’s everyone writing into us and reading our posts and sharing our words. 

Equalitopia: What’s your personal favourite homohelp?

Homohelp: I think I have to go with #32. (never act out of spite. it is always wrong, no matter what the cause. even if you’re being bullied or teased, remember that you are above petty actions, and that you are a better person than anyone who’s ever tried to hurt you.) It definitely doesn’t represent the tone of the blog now, and it’s not worded quite as well as it should be, but it’s my biggest moral guideline. If there is any one message I could get out to the entire world, it would be that. I see so many people saying that things will get better and you can get even with the bullies from high school, and tons of bullshit that never made any sense to me. The minute you stoop down to the level of bullies and try to get even, you ARE a bully, and everyone should aspire to be better than that. I always thought one of the things our community was pushing for was an end to hate, and when you fight hate with more hate, you don’t get rid of it, you just make more.

Equalitopia: What are your favorite LGBTQ-related Tumblr blogs?

Homohelp: I don’t actually follow very many blogs. (I don’t think I’ve been fully swept into the Tumblr craze yet.) I do enjoy reading gaywrites, I think they do a good job at finding which news stories deserve highlighting, and lgbtlaughs, because they make me giggle every day.

Equalitopia: Anything else you’d like to add?

homohelp: Thank you so much to everyone who’s been reading this blog. (And also to you, Equalitopia!) So many of you have been so supportive of this, and it really does mean so much to know that we’ve been able to help people in any way at all.

Also, somebody also wrote into us once and accused homohelp of being “a bunch of gay-hating, condescending lesbians,” which to my knowledge is not the case, so I just want to clear that up.

Oh! And I don’t know if this is tacky or not, but our merchandise store is opening this week! We’ll be selling four different t-shirts for now, and 25% of all proceeds will be donated right to GLSEN, so I hope people check that out, because it’s all for a good cause.

• Visit homohelp
• Follow homohelp
• Know an interesting LGBTQ Tumblr blog that should be interviewed? Suggest it!