Frances Cogelja resigned on Tuesday

A NEW Jersey school board member resigned after accidentally broadcasting herself going to bathroom in front of 150 people on a Zoom call, reports say.

Frances Cogelja, a trustee on the Hackensack Board of Education, mistakenly left her laptop camera on while she relieved herself in front of her colleagues and students on Monday.


A Zoom meeting attendee took a photograph of her on the toilet during the meeting

During the virtual meeting, Cogelja was seen sitting on the toilet while her camera was activated during the fraught conference, the Daily Voice reported.

The board recorded the Zoom meeting and the link was posted online but the toilet incident occurred during the public comments portion of the evening and is not featured.

The small thumbnail showing Cogelja was on another screen which wasn't recorded – but one eagle-eyed viewer who saw the live image took a photograph and posted it to a message board.

After her bathroom break, the New Jersey board’s vice president, Scott James-Vickery, told Cogelja: "You need to go."

"We’re here trying to get work done while you’re sitting on the toilet," he raged during the tense meeting.

The board had rejected Cogelja’s attempt to have their election date moved from April of next year to November before her toilet break.


The trustees have until January 29 to fill Cogelja's vacancy

She resigned on Tuesday, effective immediately, and the trustees have until January 29 to fill the vacancy.

Last year, Cogelja told the district’s acting superintendent she was "disgusted and appalled" that LGBTQ history would be added to the syllabus.

In a series of emails, she reportedly told acting Superintendent Rosemary Marks that she didn't agree with the new state law requiring schools to teach about LGBT history by September 2020.

Cogelja said an “alternate lifestyle narrative is being shoved [down] our children's throats” and repeatedly asked how she could opt her child out of learning about this topic, according to North Jersey.

"I have every right as a parent to not have my child participate in something that I do not think is suitable as part of a public school curriculum," Cogelja reportedly said.

"I believe conversations having to do with sexuality should be had at home between parents and their children."

She later apologized for her comments.

New data from the United Kingdom suggests that same-sex female couples are much more like to divorce than same-sex male couples.

According to the Office for National Statistics, almost three-quarters of same-sex divorces in England and Wales in 2019 were between lesbian couples.

Out of 822 divorces in 2019, female couples comprised 589, with male couples the remaining 233.

While same-sex divorces account for less than one percent of divorces in England and Wales, the ONS did say that rates are increasing, reflecting “the increasing size of the same-sex married population since 2014.”

Although the number of divorces has dramatically increased — for instance, only 428 same-sex couples divorced in 2018 — the ratio of divorces has remained similar.

Female couples accounted for 72% of divorces in 2019, 75% in 2018, 74% in 2017, and 78% in 2016.

Same-sex marriage was introduced in March 2014 in England and Wales. Scotland, which reports marriage and divorce data separately, introduced same-sex marriage in December 2014.

The ONS noted that while female couples divorced at much higher rates last year, the median duration of same-sex marriages was similar — 4.3 years for male couples and 4.1 years for female couples.

The most common reason cited for divorce was unreasonable behaviour, with 65% of same-sex couples divorcing for that reason — 70% of male couples, and 63% of female couples.

Kanak Ghosh, a statistician in the ONS Vital Statistics Outputs Branch, said in a statement: “Same-sex couples have been able to marry in England and Wales from March 2014. Since then, we have seen the number of divorces of same-sex couples increase each year from very small numbers in 2015 when the first divorces took place, to more than 800 in 2019, reflecting the increasing size of the same-sex married population in England and Wales.”

Ghosh continued: “While we see that 56 per cent of same-sex marriages were among females, nearly three-quarters of same-sex divorces in 2019 were to female couples. Unreasonable behaviour, which includes adultery, was the most common ground for divorce among same-sex couples this year as almost two-thirds of couples divorced for this reason.”

While ONS offered no explanation for the discrepancy between divorce rates for gay and lesbian couples, data for heterosexual couples show that women are almost twice as likely to petition for divorce than men.

Speaking with The Economist earlier this year, Lisa Power, one of the co-founders of LGBTQ rights charity Stonewall, said that lesbians tend to move into a relationship and onto marriage more quickly than gay men, adding, “We all used to move in with each other at the drop of a hat.”

Ayesha Vardag, president of a divorce lawyer firm, said that women are also less likely to tolerate infidelity and are more likely to have been married before.

She told the Economist that, gay or straight, there are also numerous similarities between her clients: “It’s distress about adultery or domestic violence, not being listened to, the sense of one party slogging away and the other one taking it easy. All the same things crop up.”

The owner of London’s Heaven nightclub says it will serve meals from McDonald’s in order to comply with the guidelines after reopening as a bar.


G-A-Y owner Jeremy Joseph said his nightclub-turned-bar would be partnering with a local McDonald’s to comply with guidelines.

London’s Heaven nightclub, home to G-A-Y, is to offer McDonald’s meals to meet the Government’s coronavirus rules after reopening as a bar.

The current lockdown ends on 2 December and London has been classified as tier two. This means that hospitality venues will be able to open and serve alcohol but only if it is accompanied by “a substantial meal”.

To comply with these rules, Heaven patrons will have to order McDonald’s meals alongside drinks. The food will be supplied by the fast-food chain’s Strand branch – located just 130 metres away.

Announcing the news on social media, G-A-Y owner Jeremy Joseph revealed that the venue would open between 6pm and 11pm on Saturday 5 December with a set from West End performer and former Eurovision contestant Lucie Jones.

‘Team up’
Mr Joseph tweeted that the venue “has teamed up with McDonalds” to offer food, adding: “The Show Must Go On. Even in Tier 2”.

Nightclubs have been banned from opening since the pandemic began in March, but like many venues Heaven has installed table seating on its former dancefloor and is operating under provisions for bars and restaurants. Mr Joseph said previously: “While we can’t be a nightclub, we can become the biggest LGBT bar in the UK.”

Kylie Minogue is the recipient of this year’s GAY TIMES Honour for Allyship supported by GAYTIMES+.
The pop icon has been a long-standing and committed advocate for the LGBTQ+ community, and one of our greatest champions during her 33-year music career.

“I am incredibly honoured to receive this award. Thank you from the bottom of my heart,” Kylie said in a video message.

“As we strive for a more inclusive world, my hope is that we can all support and love and be allies for each other.”

The mark the win, Kylie Minogue is on the cover of the new issue of GAY TIMES Magazine with an exclusive interview feature.

“I naturally just became one,” Kylie tells us when we ask what first made her want to become a vocal ally for the community. “I don’t know how to even explain it because it just was, and it is.

“It lined up with my principles and my views on life that, of course, you should be who you are and who you want to be. It makes perfect sense to me. It felt like the right place for me and the right and natural thing for me to be an ally of the community.”

In the cover story, Kylie reflects on her first GAY TIMES Magazine cover (26 years ago!), as well as speaking about her new album DISCO, why she hasn’t made it to the Drag Race judging panel just yet, and gives us an update on the long-awaited Kylie musical.

We also asked GAYTIMES+ members to submit their favourite memories of Kylie and her music, with the best responses printed in our latest issue.

GAY TIMES Honours 2020 is taking place between 25-26 November across our digital and social channels.

We are celebrating the individuals and organisations who have had a profound effect on the lives of LGBTQ+ people in the past 12 months.

Wilson Cruz revealed he was homeless for three months as a teen after he came out to his father on Christmas Eve. The 2020 Out100 honoree told At Home With The Creative Coalition podcast he lived in his car and slept at the homes of friends before production started on My So-Called Life, where he starred in his breakthrough role of gay teen Rickie Vasquez.

“I think my parents were basically the last people to find out,” Cruz said, going on to specify that has was out to his younger brother and close friends. “So I hadn’t told them, then I got cast in My So-Called Life.”

He did tell his parents he had been cast in the pilot, but “didn’t tell them much” or “go into detail” about the part itself. This wasn’t an issue initially, as the show infamously went another year and a half before getting picked up for production.

“When we finally got the pickup, that’s when I realized I had to tell my family.”

Rather than tell them unprompted, he instead “made a bet with the universe that the next time either one of them would ask” he come out to them.

His mother was the first to ask. Cruz revealed she was perfectly fine and accepting after what he described as “a bit of a Catholic Latina mom breakdown.” His father was a different story, though.

It was Christmas Eve and they were surrounded by family and friends in celebration. His father, who had been drinking, asked why Cruz had brought his best friend for the evening rather than a girl like his younger brother.

“He was drunk and decided that was when he was going to ask,” Cruz recalled. “And like I said, I had made this bet, this agreement with the universe that I would be honest next time, and there, in the bathroom on Christmas Eve, my father asked me and I answered honestly. And he kicked me out of the house.”

While Cruz knew he had a job on the show, production didn’t start on it for another three months. He describes the time before shooting began as “a combination of staying with friends and staying in my car and doing what I had to do in order to survive.”

He and his father reconciled soon thereafter, but it wasn’t easy. Cruz revealed to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 1994 he used his mother’s maiden name as his own last name on My So-Called Life (and by extension in his professional career since) because “like the closeted homosexual I was, I didn't want to embarrass him.”

Cruz’s younger brother Josh also happens to be gay (and just as hot) and uses their mother’s maiden name. The siblings have another brother, Gilbert, a middle child who is three years younger than Wilson.

A young boy has penned a heartbreaking letter to Santa about being gay.

A note written from "Will" in a child's scrawl was posted to a website run by USPS Operation Santa, which collects letters penned to Father Christmas.

"Dear Santa, do you support the LGBTQ community and if you can speak to God, can you tell him I love him, and if he loves me for being gay[?]" Will asked.

"Thank you," he concluded. "Love, Will."

Most letters shared to Operation Santa ask for toys; several include illustrations. Will's letter, an unusual request dealing with LGBTQ+ identity from such a young person, was seen by Nancy Cruz-Garcia, who felt moved to share the letter on Twitter.

Sexual orientation gap for men larger than gap between white and black men, study shows.


Gay men are 12% less likely to have completed a bachelor’s degree in Stem than men in heterosexual relationships, data shows.

From The Guardian...

Men in same-sex relationships are significantly less likely to have a degree in a Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths) subject than their heterosexual male peers, according to research.

Until now, studies have focused largely on the gender gap in Stem, where women are still hugely underrepresented in higher education and make up less than a quarter of the Stem workforce in the UK.

A study by researchers at the University of Exeter and Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, has identified a new Stem gap based on sexual orientation, having discovered that gay men are 12% less likely to have completed a bachelor’s degree in Stem than men in heterosexual relationships.

The study found that the Stem sexual orientation gap for men was larger than the gap between white and black men (4%), but smaller than the gender gap, which is 21%. There was no parallel gap between women in same-sex couples and those in heterosexual relationships.

The study also found that gay male representation in Stem was “systematically and positively associated with female representation” in the same fields.

The study’s authors say they hope their research will help to “start to address the dire need for statistics on sexual and gender minorities in Stem”.

The study says that despite legislative and institutional progress for LGBTQ people, the workplace for LGBTQ scientists is “still far from welcoming”, but it is not just about achieving equity.

“Addressing these gaps could increase efficiency by improving group decision-making, company performance and the quality of scientific work.” said Dr Dario Sansone, a co-author and lecturer in economics at the University of Exeter’s Business School.

The peer-reviewed study, entitled Turing’s Children: representation of sexual minorities in Stem, is published in the Plos One journal. Its findings are based on American Community Surveys for 2009-18, involving more than 140,000 men and women in same-sex relationships and almost 11 million men and women in different-sex couples.

Sansone said: “These patterns are highly suggestive that the mechanisms underlying the very large gender gap in Stem fields such as heteropatriarchy, implicit and explicit bias, sexual harassment, unequal access to funding and fewer speaking invitations are related to the factors driving the gap in Stem fields between gay men and heterosexual men.”

The "Oh no!" guy has been given his own episode.

Family Guy character Bruce has come out as gay and married his boyfriend in the animated show's 19th season.

Until now Bruce, known for his "Oh no!" catchphrase, has always been utilised as a background character or as the butt of a joke – but he's finally been given his own episode.

The sixth instalment of season 19, 'Meg's Wedding', saw Meg struggle to find a date for the school dance. She then started dating Bruce, despite the Griffin family pointing out that he's "obviously gay".

With Bruce's anti-LGBTQ+ family pressuring him to settle down with a woman, he reluctantly agreed to get engaged to Meg. Eventually, Meg called off the wedding, before encouraging Bruce to come out as gay and to reconnect with the love of his life, Jeffrey.



The episode concluded with Bruce and Jeffrey getting married in a Walgreen's carpark, with Peter Griffin officiating the wedding.

While the episode signals a progressive move for the show, it's repeatedly come under criticism in previous years for making jokes about the LGBTQ+ community.

However, in January last year, the show's executive producers Alec Sulkin and Rich Appel confirmed that the animation would be "phasing out" jokes about gay people.



"If you look at a show from 2005 or 2006 and put it side by side with a show from 2018 or 2019, they're going to have a few differences," said Sulkin told TV Line at the time.

"Some of the things we felt comfortable saying and joking about back then, we now understand is not acceptable.

"The climate is different, the culture is different and our views are different. They've been shaped by the reality around us, so I think the show has to shift and evolve in a lot of different ways."

Speaking to Digital Spy in late 2019, Patrick Warburton, who voices Joe Swanson on Family Guy, said: "If there is too much gay humour it becomes bullying and I don't like that, so it probably could do with phasing it out.

“The nature of the show is satire and it does seem to be an equal opportunity of slander across the line. If it is more specifically targeting one group more than others, I find it a bit bullying that way."

Family Guy airs on Fox in the US and ITV2 in the UK.

So, am I the only one who will watch and enjoy the pure cheesiness of a Hallmark Christmas movie?


I would've put these posts in the TV section, but the threads tend to be for TV series, not one shot movies, and these movies have been in the news, so I guess they work here.


This holiday season has 4 LGBT movies being released.  I'm not sure if there are other viewing options besides the network I'm giving in the information, but there may be other ways to see these films.


The Christmas House -  Airing on Hallmark this Sunday, November 22nd.

Working through some difficult decisions, Mitchell family matriarch Phylis and patriarch Bill, have summoned their two grown sons – TV star, Mike Mitchell and Brandon Mitchell – home for the holidays. It is their hope that bringing the family together to recreate the Christmas house, will help them find resolution and make a memorable holiday for the entire family and community. As Brandon and his husband Jake make the trip home, they are anxiously awaiting a call about the adoption of their first child. Meanwhile, Mike reconnects with Andi, his high school sweetheart.

Olivia Colman, inventor of screaming 'gay rights' into a camera, as Queen Elizabeth II

Queen Elizabeth used the phrase “friend of Dorothy” on The Crown and to quote Olivia Colman, “gay rights”.

Simultaneously the campest and most painfully heterosexual of Netflix’ vast catalogue, The Crown takes an unexpected detour in its new, fourth season, imagining the Queen (Colman) speculating on the sexuality of a family friend.

Episode seven sees the Queen listen as her sister, Princess Margaret (Helena Bonham-Carter) mourns a love interest joining the priesthood.

“Well that’s the second reason he was never the right man or you,” the Queen goads, explaining that the man in question, Derek ‘Dazzle’ Jennings (Tom Burke), is a “friend of Dorothy”.