The Farther Right The headline began, “Fox News Promotes ‘Glory Holes,’” and the mind raced to make sense of it. Who would accuse the news organ of the religious Right of promoting those outlets for public sex? Turns out it came from an even more right-wing source, Matt Walsh of The Daily Wire. The basis for the story was apparently a memo from Fox Corp., in a modest effort at inclusivity, encouraging employees to read a memoir by trans journalist Meredith Talusan titled Fairest. The book includes a description of glory holes, which Walsh turned into an endorsement of their use, a “how to” for public sex. The meme then bounced around the echo chamber until Fox News was practically drilling the holes between the stalls. Charlie Kirk of Turning Point USA wondered: “Why is Fox subsidizing gloryholes for their employees?” In a similar vein, when Chick-fil-A issued a pro forma statement in support of Pride month, calls for a boycott came not from the Left but from the Far Right—indeed from the Farther Right, for which even Fox News isn’t ideologically pure enough.
Hopping Product An investigation by The New York Times revealed that Gilead, one of the world’s largest drug-makers, deliberately “slow-walked” a promising new HIV therapy in order to increase profits. The Times’ deep dive into internal memos revealed that Gilead withheld the new drug—a major improvement over the existing version of Tenofovir—until just before the patent expired on the older version. The strategy was to run out the old patent before the generics hit the market, and then go live with the new version. Apparently this practice is widespread in the industry, where it’s known as “product hopping.” What makes it especially cynical in the case of HIV is the peculiar lethality of AIDS and the severity of the side effects of many antiretrovirals—including Tenofovir. Indeed, some 26,000 patients who took the older version are suing Gilead for exposing them to potential kidney and bone problems. The Times learned that the improved Tenofovir could have been available as early as 2004, but Gilead stopped working on it expressly to prolong its monopoly. It was finally released in 2015, adding over a decade to its patent, which will remain in force until at least 2031. Because that’s how it’s done.
Blue Shift The battle between the “red” and “blue” states took a turn when Massachusetts hired some billboards in Texas and Florida to promote the Commonwealth while subtly criticizing the homophobia of the two host states. The billboards say simply “Massachusetts For us all” and show pictures of happy LGBT couples. Governor Maura Healey (D), an out lesbian, issued a statement explicating the message: “To anyone considering where they want to live … we want you to join us here in Massachusetts.” The fact is, many people are talking about leaving the “Don’t Say Gay” state in search of bluer pastures. So, if this is an early salvo in a demographic war, this Boston-based magazine welcomes you with open arms. On the other hand, if tipping the demographic balance is what’s at stake, why not consider a move to blue-shifting Georgia or Arizona? Massachusetts is already blue enough!
Mr. and Mr. Nobody We need to talk about the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6–3 ruling in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, which held that the state of Colorado could not compel a website designer to create a wedding site for a gay couple. It was a blow to LGBT rights and followed a similar (but narrower) ruling on wedding cakes in 2018. But then a strange thing happened: it was discovered that the gay couple in the case didn’t exist! The lawsuit had been brought by a hate group called Alliance Defending Freedom on behalf of one Lorie Smith, who claimed that making a gay website violated her religious beliefs. Critics of the ruling argued that the gay couple’s nonexistence de-legitimized the ruling. And yet, is it possible that the plaintiffs did us a favor by this ruse? What it underscores is that the case was not about the people requesting the website (or cake, etc.), but instead about the creation of a product with explicitly LGBT content. Presumably the ruling also protects someone from having to make a website or cake promoting, say, a neo-Nazi organization. It could be a slippery slope to a more sinister kind of discrimination in which the people aren’t hypothetical—Samuel Alito may be licking his chops—but for now there’s no actual gay couple being barred at the door.
Ribbit Karl Marx’ dictum about history repeating itself, first as tragedy and then as farce, is playing itself out yet again. If ever there was a tragedy on the political stage, it was the assassination of Robert Kennedy, the great hope of antiwar Democrats, in 1968. And now we have presidential candidate Robert Kennedy Jr., who popped up during the Covid crisis as a strident anti-vaxxer and soon began to promote zany conspiracy theories to rival those of Alex Jones (often the same ones). Of late he’s been talking a lot about frogs, many of which, he claims, are transitioning from male to female due to the presence of the chemical atrazine in their ponds—which also explains a purported rise in transgenderism in humans and a general feminization of American men. Frogs, of course have a longstanding connection with the LGBT community and especially with bisexuals (for whom there are frog pins, frog banners, etc.). The main reason is that frogs are amphibious, which is probably why Kennedy went after them as well. Frogs (like bisexuals) often get a bum rap. In any case, every study has shown that atrazine is not in our water and doesn’t have this effect on humans. Robert Kennedy Sr. is famous for saying: “Some men see things as they are and ask, Why? I dream things that never were and ask, Why not?” And then there are the men who see things that never were.
