Gay and Straight Brothers Win "Amazing Race"

A brilliant midflight move to first class helped propel brothers Daniel and Jordan Pious to victory in the season finale of “The Amazing Race.”

Although all the contestants were booked in coach, Daniel and Jordan sweet-talked their way into first class during the long flight across the Pacific, which meant they would be able to get off the plane first -- ahead of the coach passengers.

The brothers from Barrington, R.I., stormed off the plane with a lead that they never relinquished and finished easily ahead of Oklahoma cowboy brothers Cord and Jet. Models Brent and Caite finished third.

Daniel and Jordan won the $1 million prize.

Jordan, who is openly gay, is a huge fan of the show and his wealth of knowledge about previous races paid off at the end, especially when he was prepared for the memory game that often stumps contestants. Jordan said several times during the competition how he has often dreamed of winning the race.

"I love my little brother," said Daniel, 24, "and it's so great knowing that I could help him make his No. 1 one dream come true."

Jordan, 22, complimented the bond that he has with his brother, who he called his best friend. "This race just really confirmed for us, the strength of our relationship and the bond that two brothers and best friends can have," Jordan said.

Among the road blocks in the final leg of the race, which was in San Francisco, was that one member of each team had to climb a rope up Coit Tower, the landmark atop Telegraph Hill. And in another high-tech road block, one member had to "direct" the other through a complicated virtual world set up at Industrial Light and Magic, which was filled with "Star Wars" characters.

The finish line was at Candlestick Park, home of the 49ers. It was there that harsh words were exchanged between Caite and the lesbian team of Brandy and Carol. From the beginning of the race around the world, both teams took an extreme disliking of each other. The lesbian team was eliminated in an earlier episode after Brent and Caite forced their rivals to go through a U-turn, which caused them to finish last during an elimination round.

Brandy blasted Caite for the u-turn, saying that she and Brent should have targeted a much stronger team such as the cowboys. Brandy also rejected Caite’s attempt to apologize for the strategic tactic. While the dramatic catfight may have helped TV ratings, it took some of the glamor off the win by Daniel and Jordan.

Bolivian President Says Eating Chicken Turns Men Gay -- Is He for Real?

The president of Bolivia has said that eating chicken turns men gay.

Evo Morales told a conference on climate change: "The chicken we eat is loaded with female hormones. So, when men eat it, they tend to deviate from their manhood." He added that he only eats non-genetically modified chicken to avoid becoming gay or effeminate.

President Morales' remarks angered one of Argentina's gay groups, which questioned his logic.

The president of the Argentina Homosexual Community campaigning organisation, Cesar Cigliutti, told AFP: "It's an absurdity to think that eating hormone-containing chicken can change the sexual orientation of a person.

"By following that reasoning, if we put male hormones in a chicken and we make a homosexual eat it he will transform into a heterosexual."

Morales also argued that eating treated chicken could turn men bald.

He said: "Baldness, which seems normal, is a disease in Europe. Almost everyone is bald and it's related to the food they eat. Among the indigenous people there are no bald men, because we eat different things."

Would America Really Support a Gay President?

According to a new 60 Minutes/Vanity Fair poll at least 50 % of Americans would support an openly gay president, whereas only 44% said they would opposed.

The poll also surveyed on how people feel about having openly gay men and women serve in other public positions such as Supreme Court Justices, Secretary of States, and professional sports commissioners. Of the nearly 1000 adults surveyed, 62 % said they would support an openly gay Superbowl quarterback, which was the question that received the highest approval approval rating.

So are American attitudes changing? Is all the anti-gay rhetoric about how a majority of Americans don’t support LGBT rights and equality simply hyperbole from the religious right?

Read more about the survey on Vanity Fair.

Daniel Radcliff Reach Out to Suicidal Gay Teens

'Harry Potter' star Daniel Radcliffe detests homophobia; the actor says, "I have always hated anybody who is not tolerant of [the gay community]. Now I am in the very fortunate position where I can actually help." The Associated Press reports that Radcliffe has filmed a PSA for The Trevor Project, the leading organization focusing on suicide prevention efforts among gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered youth.

Both of Radcliffe's parents are actors, and he explains, "I grew up knowing a lot of gay men and it was never something that I even thought twice about – that some men were gay and some weren't. And then I went to school and (for) the first time ... I came across homophobia. ... I had never encountered it before. It shocked me."

The Trevor Project was founded by three filmmakers in 1998 after their short film 'Trevor' won an Academy Award. The movie concerned a gay teen who attempts suicide. Radcliffe, 20, says he first became aware of The Trevor Project while he was appearing on Broadway in the 2008 revival of 'Equus.'

"I have described myself as being 'gently eccentric' and slightly different as a person just because I've had a very different set of influences growing up than anybody else in my peer group did," Radcliffe said. "I've always felt very lucky to have the life that I've had. I never had to cope with anything serious about my religion or sexual orientation or anything like that.

"I think it's important for somebody from a big, commercial movie series like 'Harry Potter' and particularly because I am not gay or bisexual or transgendered. ... The fact that I am straight makes not a difference, but it shows that straight people are incredibly interested and care a lot about this as well."

Cuba Performing State-Sponsored Sex Change Surgery

Cuba has begun performing state-sponsored sex-change operations after the government lifted a longtime ban on the procedure in 2007, President Raul Castro's daughter said Tuesday.

A sexologist and gay-rights advocate, Mariela Castro runs the Center for Sex Education, which prepares transsexuals for sex-change operations and identifies Cubans it deems ready for the procedure.

Speaking to reporters during the fifth Cuban Conference on Sexual Education, Orientation and Therapy, Castro said surgeries began in 2008 but would not specify exactly how many have been performed or how much they cost.

She said only that Cuban doctors working with Belgian counterparts have gotten to "less than half" of the 30 islanders approved to undergo the procedure.

Cuba identified 122 people who wanted to have sex changes in 1979 and performed the first successful operation nine years later, but subsequent sex-change procedures were prohibited, Castro added.

The operations are covered by Cuba's universal health care system, even though some have protested the decision to allow them - either because of general opposition to the procedure or due to its high costs for a developing country with economic problems.

"We schedule a certain number per year based on economic circumstances," Castro said, adding that, because of budget constraints, sex changes are not offered to foreigners who travel to Cuba for medical care.

Castro also said Tuesday that she plans to prepare a letter to the leadership of Cuba's Communist Party urging authorities to draft a measure directing that homosexuals not be barred from joining the party.

Such a decree would be similar to one approved in the 1990s expressly allowing Cubans of all religious affiliations to join.

Gays are not technically banned from the Communist Party, but Castro said such a measure would help better cement their role in politics.

Castro also said her center will continue to push the single-party government to rewrite civil codes and recognize same-sex unions, though not full gay marriage.

However, she said the group has stopped pushing for same-sex couples to be allowed to adopt children, saying Cuba's legal code provides no means for such a move.

Idol Judges Ordered to Cut the Gay Jokes

A long-running “inside joke” between American Idol stars Ryan Seacrest and Simon Cowell has come to an end, now that Ellen Degeneres has replaced Paula Abdul on the show. Fans of the show know that there has been a weird, often inappropriate sexual tension between host Seacrest and judge Cowell for years, with Simon constantly cracking gay jokes. But according to sources, that’s about to change, because producers don’t want to offend Ellen.

Don’t expect to hear Simon Cowell needle Ryan Seacrest about being gay on “American Idol” this season, sources say.

“Idol” execs have warned both stars to cut out their usual gay banter when talk-show host Ellen Degeneres, who came out of the closet years ago, joins the series, insiders say.

Simon and Ryan have had their fun poking at each other’s sexuality for eight seasons now, even though neither one of them is gay.

“With an openly gay woman coming on board, an effort is being made to make her feel welcome,” a source divulged.

“Simon’s been told, and to a lesser extent Ryan too, that the act is played out anyway, so no more ribbing each other about being gay. The ‘Idol’ bosses don’t want it.”

Gay Men Can Be Outed by Their Facebook Profiles

Gay men can be outed by looking at their Facebook friends, a study has found.

According to researchers, the information can be found despite discretion and privacy settings.

Although many people set their profiles to private, they usually do not hide their friend lists and researchers say it is their friends' profiles which can reveal personal data such as sexuality.

The small study was carried out by students Carter Jernigan and Behram Mistree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

They developed software which looked at the gender and sexuality of a person's Facebook friends. It then used statistical analysis to make a prediction of someone's sexuality.

Although Jernigan and Mistree could not ascertain the sexuality of all the men they surveyed, the program gave 100 per cent correct results for a small control group.

However, it did not work on lesbians or bisexual people of either gender.

The study has not been published in any academic journal but has raised interesting questions about privacy and discretion on the web.

Kevin Bankston, an attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco nonprofit digital rights group, told the Boston Globe: “Even if you don’t affirmatively post revealing information, simply publishing your friends’ list may reveal sensitive information about you, or it may lead people to make assumptions about you that are incorrect.

“Certainly if most or many of your friends are of a particular religious or political or sexual category, others may conclude you are part of the same category – even if you haven’t said so yourself.”