The Jerusalem Magistrate's Court ordered Yishai Schlissel, the suspect in the stabbing attack at the recent Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade, to undergo a psychiatric evaluation in order to see if he is mentally competent to undergo a trial that would likely include murder charges, according to The Jerusalem Post. Schlissel—who was previously imprisoned for 10 years for stabbing three people at the 2005 Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade—was arrested in the midst of a stabbing rampage at this year's parade, just three weeks after being released from jail. He killed 16-year-old Shira Banki and wounded five others.
British singer Samantha Fox—best known for the pop smash "Touch Me ( I Want Your Body )"—has lost her longtime partner and manager Myra Stratton, who has died after battling with cancer, according to Gay Star News. Fox's Twitter page stated that Stratton was her partner and manager for the last 16 years. A former model, Fox was one of the most photographed British women of the 1980s.
Openly gay British diver Tom Daley expressed his "massive relief" at qualifying for the 2016 Olympics by easing into the 10-meter platform final at the World Aquatics Championships in Kazan, The Guardian reported. The Olympic bronze medalist followed his gold-winning effort in the mixed team event by finishing third in the 10-meter platform semifinals in solo competition. China's defending champion, Qiu Bo, and World Cup champion, Yang Jian, claimed the top two berths, but Daley's score of 524.70 secured Great Britain a quota place at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
Chris Hyndman, 49—half of the CBC TV talk-show duo Steven and Chris—has died after police found him without vital signs in an alley just below the Toronto apartment he shared with husband Steven Sabados, TheStar.com reported. In a 2013 interview with the newspaper Xtra, Hyndman spoke about the difficulty of growing up gay, saying, "When I was a little kid living in St John's, Newfoundland, suicide was on my mind a lot because I had nowhere to go when I was 12, 13, 14, to talk about it." Chuck Thompson, head of public affairs at CBC English services, said Steven and Chris has been pulled from the TV schedule.
The first transgender politician to run for popular election in Venezuela registered as a candidate for Congress as part of the opposition bloc, promising to advance gay rights in the South American society, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. Lawyer and gay-rights activist Tamara Adrian had to register under the name assigned to her at birth, Thomas Adrian, despite a 2002 gender-reassignment operation, because Venezuelan law does not allow anyone born male to legally become female or take a woman's name. Adrian is running with the opposition party Voluntad Popular, which includes some of the most outspoken critics of President Nicolas Maduro. The party is also putting up two gay candidates.
An editor at famed British newspaper The Times apologized for claiming that most "VIPs" accused of being pedophiles were either Jewish or gay and should be identified with symbols used by the Nazis to single out Jews, according to The Algemeiner. Dominic Kennedy sparked outrage when he tweeted, "So many of the VIPs accused of being pedophiles are Jewish or gay. Maybe we could have a system to identify these people: triangles, stars…" While some Twitter users defended Kennedy, claiming the tweet was supposed to be taken as satirical, Jewish leaders and other social media users sharply criticized the editor.
A Ugandan school is closed after two male students were reportedly "caught with their pants down," Gay Star News reported. Ntare School, an boarding school once attended by President Yoweri Museveni, told all students to go home after they waged a "strike." The student body refused to study any longer if teachers or the school refused to punish the two gay students.
A man has said he was banned from a food bank in Canada because he supports same-sex marriage, Gay Star News noted. When Richard Friesen voiced his concerns about a clause in Winnipeg Harvest food bank's "lifestyle agreement," he was told he would not be able to volunteer or receive assistance there. The branch of the food bank Friesen went to is sponsored by the Bethlehem Aboriginal Fellowship Church.
In Northern Ireland, there have been calls for a Translink bus driver to be fired after making anti-gay remarks over an open radio network, according to The Belfast Telegraph. The driver told his supervisor he couldn't get his bus through the city centre during the 25th Gay Pride celebrations on Saturday because there were "too many bum-busters" on the road; he then repeated and defended the remark. A Translink spokesperson apologised, saying: "We would like to apologize to our passengers and staff, following an incident ... where a Metro driver used offensive language over Translink's open radio network."
Police in St. Petersburg recently detained several gay activists who have held pickets in defense of gay rights on a Russian military holiday, the Associated Press reported. Yuri Gavrikov, the leader of a gay rights group, was detained by police as he left his home to hold a one-man picket in front of the Hermitage Museum. Veterans of Russian Airborne Forces confronted several other gay activists, who held individual pickets near the Hermitage, and tore up their posters. Police took the gay activists away, even though the law allows one-person pickets without permission from authorities.
In Sweden, a video by the team at social-experiment group STHLM Panda shows two actors, played by Konrad Ydhage and Olle Oberg, interviewing for the same job at a warehouse company, The Local reported. The interview with the more qualified candidate goes well—until he says he has a boyfriend. The interviewer immediately cuts short their chat and refuses to shake the applicant's hand. Meanwhile, the underqualified candidate is offered the job.
A survey has found that young and educated Malaysians overwhelmingly accept of LGBTI people, Gay Star News noted. The results show that 83 perent of Malaysians aged 18 to 30, and 84 percent between the ages of 31 and 45 would accept gay friends or colleagues; however, half of respondents aged 46 to 60, and only 24 percent of those above 60 said they would not. Gay sex is illegal in the primarily Muslim country under a colonial anti-sodomy law, and is punishable by fines, whipping and/or up to 20 years in prison.
Michael Sam became the first openly gay player to appear in a Canadian Football League game, playing sparingly for the Montreal Alouettes in a 26-23 loss to the Ottawa Redblacks, the Associated Press noted. The 25-year-old defensive end, the 2013 Southeastern Conference defensive player of the year at Missouri, failed to record a tackle. Sam agreed to a two-year deal with the Alouettes this summer.
Thousands of people recently took to the streets of Guadalajara, the capital of the western Mexican state of Jalisco, to protest against abortion, gay marriage and adoptions by same-sex couples, Fox News Latino reported. The march was organized by a coalition of 230 groups that calls itself Jalisco Is One for Children and is backed by Cardinal Francisco Robles Ortega, the Catholic archbishop of Guadalajara. In June, the Mexican Supreme Court ruled that state laws prohibiting same-sex marriage were unconstitutional and "broadly discriminatory."
Dozens of Icelandic volunteers turned out to hand-paint a rainbow road through the center of Reykjavik before the city's annual gay Pride festival, NewNowNext.com reported. Reykjavik Pride volunteers began painting the road and were quickly joined by members of the community—including kids—who brought their own brushes to join in the painting. The crowd was quickly joined by Reykjavik Mayor Dagur Eggertsson, who also partook and painted a strip of yellow along the road.
