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Why gay marriage polarised France

Agence France-PresseApril 20, 2013 22:16
Gay marriage may have passed with barely hitch in many countries, but it has kicked up a huge storm in France, a country often seen as the champion of secularism and notoriously relaxed on issues pertaining to private life. Smelling blood after a bruising first year for President Francois Hollande, right-wing leaders have mobilised a fierce campaign. But sociologists argue that France's social fabric and identity crisis also helps explain the ferocity of the debate.

N.Z. lawmaker's 'big gay rainbow' speech goes viral

Agence France-PresseApril 19, 2013 00:16
A New Zealand politician whose humorous speech to parliament backing gay marriage has become an Internet hit said Friday he was staggered at the response to his words. Maurice Williamson, a minister in the conservative National Party government, joked ahead of Wednesday's vote that he had seen "the most enormous big gay rainbow" over his electorate and taken it as a sign to back the change.

US woman on trial for cutting off 'hyper-sexual' husband's penis

Agence France-PresseApril 17, 2013 22:30
A US man whose estranged wife cut off his penis accused her Wednesday of effectively murdering him, recounting his horror as she severed the organ and threw it into a garbage disposal machine. The 60-year-old man said he would never have sex again after his wife -- who said she "wanted him to stop hurting her with his penis" -- drugged him and tied him to a bed, before taking a kitchen knife to his manhood.

New Zealand backs gay marriage

April 17, 2013 06:46
New Zealand became the first country in the Asia-Pacific region to legalise gay marriage Wednesday after a historic parliamentary vote. Lawmakers voted 77 to 44 in favour of the legal change, which allowed gay marriage after a decades-long campaign. "It is about saying these lives matter, our society is big enough for us," gay Green Party MP Kevin Hague told parliament. New Zealand will become the 13th nation globally to allow gay marriage, according to Human Rights Watch.

Gay Chinese see hope in visit by Icelandic PM and wife

April 17, 2013 02:15
By Megha Rajagopalan BEIJING (Reuters) - This week's visit to China by Iceland's prime minister and her same-sex spouse has given rise to tentative hopes among gay Chinese that widespread news coverage could be a first step towards more openness about homosexuality at home. It is not illegal to be gay in China. But it remains a largely taboo subject that baffles many in the world's most populous nation thanks to decades of prudish Communist rule, despite numerous homosexual references in classical Chinese literature.

Churches oppose gay legislation

April 11, 2013 13:50
The country’s powerful church groups are threatening to derail political efforts for new anti-discrimination legislation as they continue to claim that criticizing a person for their sexual orientation is a right. To many politicians and the rest of society, that would be thought of as a manifestation of ridiculousness.

Homophobic assaults surge in France amid gay marriage debate

April 11, 2013 00:15
Wilfred de Bruijn's face is bloated, seeped in blood, his bruised right eye shut tight, his tooth broken -- the victim of a brutal attack in Paris while he was "walking arm in arm" with his boyfriend. His is one of the latest cases of homophobia in France, where activists say reports of verbal and physical assaults on gays have surged amid rabid debate over a bill allowing same-sex marriage, currently being discussed in the Senate.

Court ruling deals blow to gay rights in Singapore

April 10, 2013 05:00
Rights activists reacted with indignation on Wednesday after Singapore's High Court rejected a petition to repeal an archaic law criminalising sex between men. In a ruling issued on Tuesday, the court said it was up to parliament to repeal a controversial provision in the penal code known as Section 377A, whose constitutionality has been questioned by a gay couple.

Canada teenage girls plead not guilty to pimping

April 8, 2013 20:45
Three teenage girls on Monday pleaded not guilty to forcing fellow suburban teens, one as young as 13, into prostitution through intimidation and blackmail in Canada's capital city. Police say the trio, who were 15-16 years old when they were arrested last June, acted on their own without adult guidance in operating a prostitution ring from a home in a middle-class neighborhood of Ottawa. The victims had been lured through social media to the residence, abducted and delivered up to adult clients, authorities allege.

Penis size does matter to women, researchers say

April 8, 2013 15:52
The eternal question of whether penis size matters to women has been probed by a team of international scientists who reported on Monday that yes, ladies do find larger men more attractive. What's more, prehistoric women who could see the sex organs of their scantily clad male counterparts may have helped influence the evolution of larger genitals in men by choosing to mate with partners who were bigger. Researchers said they decided to tackle the topic because past studies had offered conflicting answers, and may have been sullied by asking the women too directly.
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