THEGAYUK

Author: Mark Goggin

  • INTERVIEW | Jonny McGovern: “Kiss my motherfu**ing ass, fu** yourselves Dolce & Gabbana”

    INTERVIEW | Jonny McGovern: “Kiss my motherfu**ing ass, fu** yourselves Dolce & Gabbana”

    Taken from Issue 12 of THEGAYUK (June 2015)

    New York native, McGovern is part of LGBT technology history. As each new advancement made it possible for gay voices to be heard he’s been at the forefront of it. From taking advantage of a newly introduced iTunes to Podcasting to Vlogging. We sent MARK GOGGIN to find out what the original gay pimp is doing now.

    Jonny McGovern
    Credit: YouTube/HeyQueen / Supplied

    I caught up with the Gay Pimp Jonny McGovern and he spilt the T about his show Hey Qween, his musical past and what Dolce & Gabbana can kiss…

    MG: First off, congratulations on the success of Hey Qween! Where did the idea originate?
    JMG: The idea for Hey Qween started after I finished shooting Whoa, Dude! which was the first show I did with The Stream studios (co-producers of Hey Qween) that celebrated the best intentionally and unintentionally homoerotic content from around the Internet, kind of like The Soup. They asked me what I wanted to do next, and I had an idea for a talk show. The only thing that I really knew about it was that I wanted to call it Hey Qween, I would sit down with a guest and I would say “Hey Qween,” and they would say “Hey Qween,” back and we would have a conversation. That was it, almost like Charlie Rose a very basic interview show. But when it hit me like a lightening bolt to include Lady Red Couture in the mix, it all came together. I knew that if I had her there she would be like my drag Ed McMahon sidekick and we could kiki at the beginning of every show.

    MG: Your relationship with Lady Red Couture is hilarious. How did you meet?
    JMG: I first saw Lady Red perform at Hamburger Mary’s in West Hollywood where she was part of the Goddess revue hosted by Calpernia Addams and Lady Red stole the show. She did a big gospel number where she wore church robes and started testifying and would run to the back of the club and disappear and then run out of a totally different door. I was in drag love. I asked her to be part of my Dickmatized video where she played around the way banjee girl. Then I wrote the song Rich White Woman for her and I thought she was so fun and so charismatic that when I started Hey Qween I thought she would be the perfect match. Though we didn’t know each other that well when we started Hey Qween we are now best friends and spend all the time together and always have a ton of fun. It’s been like a dream working with her, she is a superstar.

    MG: Is she EVER going to sign up to Drag Race? She’d kill it!
    JMG: Yes! That is our dream. We did work on an incredible audition tape for her for Drag Race season 8 and it has been submitted, so may the best woman win! I know she would kill it.

    MG: Talking of Drag Race, some great contestants have graced your couch. Who was your favourite to interview? Or at least who were you most excited about meeting? 
    MG: RuPaul herself. I’ve been a fan since I was a teenager and though I got to interview him on the phone once for my podcast we had never really gotten a chance to sit down and talk in real life. The show was so fun, and he was so open and inspiring that it was truly a dream come true. As far as the other queens I’ve enjoyed all of them. Our most popular episode was Willam – he’s always a hoot and he bought his own pizza. We also really enjoyed Alaska who came in an amazing garbage bag couture dress. They’re all a lot of fun and come ready to kill. Trixie Mattel was also a highlight for our season premiere because she was so funny and honest.

    MG: Did anyone turn out to be a bit of a letdown?
    JMG: No. I think everyone has always been great. Some interviews are harder to edit than others, some people are more ready to spill the T, other people I need to warm up into being comfortable. That sometimes leads to a harder editing job to make the conversation seem as lively and spontaneous as it needs to be. But most of the Drag Race girls come prepared to have fun and we just have a kiki.

    MG: Hey Qween! Series 3 is currently underway. How’s it going?
    JMG: It premiered two weeks ago with Trixie Mattel and our latest episode is with Latrice Royale. Next week the legendary Coco Peru comes on, followed by Mathu Andersen, followed by more and more amazing guests! We’ve been working with The Stream who is an incredibly supportive studio and they have given us our own channel Hey Qween TV. Season 3 is bigger than ever and we are having a ton of fun.

    MG: You suggested upping the gay ante this series and were helped out by the fans to raise the budget. Did you get enough to support your new ideas?
    JMG: Yes we ended up raising almost $13,000 from the fans, which was incredible! We have been able to use it to not only make Hey Qween better but to expand the brand into a whole bunch of other shows that I know our audience is going to love.

    MG: Have you bagged any celebrities for season 3 that you’ve wanted to interview for ages? Who would your dream guest be?
    JMG: Mathu Andersen was definitely a dream guest since he’s been creating the RuPaul look the last 20 years. He’s such an incredible artist and mysterious elusive enigma that I was excited to chat with him. My dream guest is one of the surviving cast members from Paris Is Burning, Junior Labeija who was the MC in all of the ballroom scenes. We would love to have him on, he is one of the most iconic figures from that film and to get to talk to him about his experiences and his incredible charisma would make for a legendary Hey Qween how. Of course, I would also love to interview Kevin Aviance who is my number one favourite drag queen in the world. Martha Wash who is the voice behind Everybody Dance Now from C+C Music Factory, Black Box and tons of others. I’d also love to interview Miss J from America’s Next Top Model. The list goes on and on.

    MG: I definitely think you should consider bringing Hey Qween! to the UK, make it some sort of club tour! Will the season 3 budget stretch to that – possibly?
    JMG: We would love to come to the UK! I love London, I went as a teenager several times but I have not gotten to come back as a fully-grown homo. We actually would love to see Hey Qween come on real TV in the UK. I feel that the audience over there and the networks might be more open to putting our show on real TV because you have excellent taste and are less scared of drag and stuff like that than American networks. So hopefully someone in the UK, a producer, will read this and you can send us over. If RuPaul’s Drag Race UK happens maybe we could do a simultaneous Hey Qween season at the same time – that would be dreamy honey.

    MG: Outside of Hey Qween you’ve produced some great music and comedy under the persona The Gay Pimp. Are you dropping any new music soon?
    JMG: I had been doing The Gay Pimp stuff for ten years and as much as I love it, I wanted to be able to evolve and do stuff where I wasn’t trying to be the same person I was ten years ago. I am able to reflect who I am and what I do now. So I’ve taken a little break from that but that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped making videos! I have the final video single from my Gayest Of All Time album coming out in the next couple of months. It’s full of sexy guys with Lady Red and some lady back up singers. It’s really fun so that should be coming pretty soon.

    MG: Who inspires you as a musician?
    JMG: When I was a kid I thought I wanted to be a RnB singer, but then I realised I was a 6’4” gay white man so that was probably going to be a difficult path! I kind of put it aside but when I started to do comedy, doing sort of comedy songs and using my musical skills like that, it really made sense. It is something that I have truly enjoyed and has let me play at being a pop star for many years. My biggest musical inspiration is my co-producer Adam Joseph who works with me on all of my records. He is a musical genius and anytime I have a seed of an idea he has such incredible musical knowledge that he is able to listen to my vision and create it seemingly instantaneously. He is incredible and if you’ve never heard him sing before he has many of his own albums, I call him the white soul hummingbird because he sounds exactly like your favourite black diva but he’s a little white man.

    MG: What’s your number one go-to album?
    JMG: I currently listen to lots of club music and trap music because I DJ at a party here called Saturday Night Slut in West Hollywood every week. When I’m just listening myself, old Aretha Franklin records from the late 60s and all through the 70s, Martha Wash’s solo album, DJ sets by Junior Vasquez from the 90s and Prince’s Sign ‘O’ The Times is probably one of my favourite all-time records.

    MG: We heard The Gay Pimp was started because of a homophobic Eminem rant, is there any truth in that?
    JMG: Yes… (the)Eminem (album) had come out and though it seemed at first like he was kind of like a modern guy and maybe wasn’t going to be homophobic, as the album rolled out we saw that he was kind of having a lot of homophobic stuff. He was throwing fag around and I felt that the media was giving him a pass on it. I figured the best way to protest would be to write a musical. When you’re an artist you got to protest with your art. So we wrote a hilarious little show called The Wrong Fag To F**k With The Gay Pimp vs Eminem, which was a parody musical where Gay Pimp was this pop star in an alternate universe who battled Eminem at the MTV Video Music Awards. Needless to say, it ended up with Eminem getting f***** up the butt by Gay Pimp – and hilarity ensued. The show became so popular; people started asking me to perform at nightclubs around town. It was the era of Britney and NSync, so I would go with backup dancers and drag queen cheerleaders and we would go to these tiny bars and perform these Gay Pimp songs as if we were doing a stadium show in these tiny little dive bars.

    MG: With that in mind, do you think it is important as a gay male to stand up for LGBT issues? Do you get involved in LGBT debates – the Dolce & Gabbana debacle or Indiana’s recent outburst for example?
    JMG: Yes I think it is extremely important for all of us to be aware of what is going on as far as civil rights for LGBT people in our countries and around the world. We can’t be ignoring how our brothers and sisters in other countries are being treated and we can’t just be satisfied with sitting around and letting big corporations and the right wing make decisions that affect us. So it’s very important for us all to speak out. As far as the Dolce & Gabbana debacle that makes me think they are completely out of touch and in a self-hating bubble of their own. For them to have any comment about what makes a family real – you can kiss my motherfu**ing ass, fu** yourselves Dolce & Gabbana.

    MG: Thank you so much for your time. Where can we visit to get all of our Gay Pimp needs?
    JMG: Make sure you subscribe to Hey Qween TV on YouTube – the Look At Huh aftershow, Hot T, He’s Fit and Judge Lady Red. Plus you can visit my blog everyday gayestofalltime.com for sexy gent pictures, new podcasts, Hey Qween updates and more dirty gay fun. Plus make sure to support me by buying my music on iTunes. Daddy needs to pay rent.

    Twitter: @GayPimp

  • OP ED: LGBT – Legal, Guns, Ban, Them

    OP ED: LGBT – Legal, Guns, Ban, Them

    It has taken me a while to sit down and write this. To sit down and write anything. In fact, it has taken me a while to want to write anything. Mainly because I’m not entirely sure what it is I want to say. And, if I’m honest, I’m still not entirely sure, so bear with.

    My lack of willingness to put down my thoughts is because my thoughts are fighting with each other. I have no idea what thought it is I should listen to. I have no clue as to which emotion I should let take the forefront of my mind-set. Sadness? Anger? Confusion?

    I am, of course, saddened. Horribly so, down to my gut. I am, of course, just as angry and outraged and mad as I am saddened. I am greatly perplexed. Confused as to the actions of this man, yet just as confused as to the lack of action by the American government. And then I am lead to, in some respects, the most frightening reaction of all, I am unsurprised. Unsurprised that this has happened, yet again. Of course it was going to happen again. America has not changed anything to do with gun law so of course a man – a man known to the FBI – can still purchase a gun and spread his hate and end the lives of those so opposite to him. So different to him.

    I am not just talking sexually here. But in open-mindedness. He hated what he didn’t know. He hated them because they were so unlike him. A man kissing another man, to him, was wrong. Morally wrong. Yet, to him, murdering them was not morally wrong, but acceptable. Falling in love with a man if you are a man is outrageous. Killing them because of that fact, is not. To him murder was more honourable than love. Natural love killed by manmade weaponry.

    Maybe he thought he was freeing them? Curing them of their gay lives. Healing them of their gay wounds. But how can someone be freed from freedom? Two definitions of freedom so horribly different. Their freedom, my freedom, so loving, so celebratory, so real. His freedom, so damaging and demented and vile and unethical.

    Then comes the anger. The anger for him. The anger for American gun law. The anger that a Kinder Egg is banned for consumption in the USA because it is threatening to the American people. A choking hazard. A piece of confectionary is deemed more damaging than a gun. Nice one America.

    The statistics of these mass shootings are ludicrous. In 2016 so far, just this year alone, there have been 133 mass shootings in America. That’s 133 in just 164 days! It took the UK just one mass shooting – the 1996 Dunblane massacre – for our own gun law to change. In Australia the gun law was reworked after the horrific Port Arthur massacre of 1996. Yet in America, 133 in just one year and still nothing.

    How many people have to die?

    In light of the most recent mass shooting, the 133rd shooting of 2016. Where the death of 49 (at present) members of the LGBT community occurred, LGBT is pretty apt, pretty ironic for the occasion. LGBT: Legal Guns, Ban Them.

    I am proud to be LGBT. I am proud of how our community stands tall. Stands together. United. I may feel many things at present. I may feel angry and sad and confused. But thanks to the support of this community, I have never for a second felt threatened.

    Follow Mark Goggin on Twitter

     

    ALSO READ: Nearly one quarter of LGBTS are scared for their safety on the scene after the Orlando shootings

    ALSO READ: Who were the 49 victims of the Orlando shootings

    ALSO READ: How to survive a terrorism attack

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, it’s management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • COMMENT | The Natural Order, Marriage Referendum

    Friday 22nd May sees an important and somewhat historic day for Ireland, as a marriage referendum will be cast to see if same-sex marriage will be legalised.

    If the yes vote wins out, Ireland will be the first country in the world to pass a marriage equality bill by national vote. This is an exciting time, not only for the Irish nation but also for LGBT rights in general.

    Throughout my social media feeds there are pleas for both sides of the argument, which as I read from comment to comment make me happy and frustrated in equal measure. As I scroll through them I can’t help but be reminded of two years ago, when the bill was being rolled through our parliament here in Britain.

     

    Back then in February 2013, I posted an online survey asking the social media flock for their anonymous opinions on the matter at hand. The artist in me decided to delve into it head first to find out whether the people of Great Britain had great pride or great prejudice. I created a photographic series entitled The Natural Order with some of my results. Somewhat unfortunately this piece is still relevant today so in lieu of Friday’s vote I decided to dig into my archives and promote it again.

    I posted one simple thing:

    “Please can you tell me what your honest opinions are about same-sex marriage. Be as negative or as positive as you like, just be honest.”

     

    And honest they were…

    Homosexuals are obviously mentally twisted since they resist what nature has already determined. Their deviant sexual behaviors are proven to be disease ridden and from personal experience I can say that they have been an unusual high percentage of child predators. Gay marriage normalizes their gross ways and will endanger our children.”

    “It’s a sickness on our society in every sense of the word. Homosexuality, to me, is just as bad as incest. Two people of the same family having sex, let alone getting married, is instinctively frowned upon. So why in black thunder does anyone think it should be perfectly acceptable for two members of the same gender to have sex, let alone get married?”

    “They must be deranged in the mind to fight against the natural order of God’s creation. All they see is happy pink not their disgusting truth.”

    I had prepared myself for the odd negative comment, but still found myself completely taken aback by the outrageous opinions festering in these strangers’ minds. Some of the negativity made me want to laugh, some made me angry and some produced a bizarre mixture of both. Being compared to a “child predator“ was one comment in particular that made me laugh at first and then turn red in the face with frustration. The comment about incest is too ridiculous to even comment on.

    A lot of the anonymous writers questioned the mental state of a homosexual person – suggesting we are “deranged in the mind.” These comments empower the belief that a heterosexual couple should be celebrated because they’re committed to one another yet a homosexual couple should be committed for wanting the same celebration.

    “It’s a direct mockery of the natural order of things (i.e God’s creation). While I’ve heard some people argue that it happens in the animal kingdom, I have to remind you that we, as humans, are not dumb animals! God did not intend for members of the same sex to marry each other, otherwise he would’ve created two men and two women, and told them their options…”

    “It’s disgusting and unnatural”

    “Marriage is religious construct, you cannot ask for something that the religion does not believe in.”

    The reasoning behind the majority of this adverse attitude was unsurprisingly linked to religion; something that I’m certain will be the root of the no votes in Ireland on Friday. I received a constant reference to “God’s natural order,” throughout the replies. As an atheist who is standing up for same-sex rights, my view of God’s natural order is obviously biased but the consistent referral to His creation made me just as angry as being called a peadophile.

    I’m not here to list my anti-religious views or argue whether God exists but I cannot justify intelligent human minds in today’s society using God as an excuse. If there is a God, then he created me, and he created me as a homosexual. It is irritating that some people still see homosexuality as a choice, when it is not. It is natural and because that fact is somehow lost in translation between homosexuals and heterosexuals, the anti-crowd turns straight to God as an alibi for their ignorance. Quite a large chunk of my conceptual photographs were created with a religious thought in mind.

    “How is it acceptable for a heterosexual person to marry several times but not for a gay person to marry once?”

    “Currently, 50% of heterosexual marriages end in divorce & those are people who have never had to fight for the marital right. But, like the now infamous image states “Marriage is a human right, not a heterosexual privilege.”

    I am pleased to say that a lot of the survey feedback was positive. The above two answers suggest interesting points about the state of heterosexual marriage – competing with another survey reply,

    “Homosexuals will make marriage a joke.” I am uncertain whether the quoted statistic above of 50% is a fact but it still leads to the same conclusion that many people remarry and remarry and have the right to do so yet a same sex couple cannot have the same privilege even once.

    “Homosexuals will make marriage a joke.” I am uncertain whether the quoted statistic above of 50% is a fact but it still leads to the same conclusion that many people remarry and remarry and have the right to do so yet a same sex couple cannot have the same privilege even once.

    “Unnatural and Immoral. You have to ask yourself what would Jesus do? And know that his answer would be opposed to the ludicrousness.”

    The results I gathered made for interesting reading no matter how absurd or low the answerer sunk. They became the backbone to my personal conceptual art project The Natural Order. For the negative results, I wanted to turn the answers into a “ludicrous” version of themselves through portraiture and tableaus. Whereas the positive results simply inspired me to push further towards equality awareness.

    I was disgusted that the opinions collated through modern social networking sites contradicted the modern means with the old fashioned views. Yet as the same-sex marriage bill still steadily rolls its way through the world, soon the opinions of the anti-party will be voided out by the equal rights decision to allow anyone to get married, no matter their gender. It is only natural after all.

    The series was part of a group exhibition at UCA Rochester Campus in June 2013 and can be seen now online here www.markgoggin.tumblr.com.

    “Love is love, we are born the way we’re born, and it’s literally stupid to think homosexuals shouldn’t be allowed to marry in the same way heterosexuals are. Why is it STILL even up for discussion? Equality for all, one earth.”

     

     

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, its management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • COMMENT: GREEN: A Party For The Common Good

    I’m obviously not here to tell you who to vote for. I’m not even going to try and persuade you into voting Green.

    But I am going to share some important policies the Green party have to offer, and not only from an LGBTIQ stand point. Although, from a gay man’s perspective, The Green Party are standing up for our rights in many amazing ways.

    “For The Common Good,” is their slogan, and it rings true throughout their manifesto. To me this simple statement is somewhat empowering. It doesn’t segregate between social class, gender, religion, sexual orientation, disability – it encompasses everyone together. They are treating us all as equal, as the United Kingdom we are.

    Let us start with an important issue doing the rounds within the debates: immigration. Other parties are stabbing at this issue and the effect it is having on our government, on our own personal taxes. Yes, it is an issue but, in my opinion, it’s down to a flaw in how our benefit system operates, not the immigrants claiming them. I don’t begrudge foreigners seeking solace within our welcoming nation, I don’t want to condemn them to the life they were desperate to flee from. The Green Party agrees.

    They propose a reworking of the benefits system by controlling immigration fairly and respecting every immigrant individually for the contribution they make to our nation. In terms of immigration from an LGBTIQ perspective, the party desperately want to end the detention of LGBTIQ (and other) asylum seekers and the notion of disbelief that often denies asylum seekers refugee status.

    In regards to foreign and national civilians, they seek to double child benefits and raise a pension that people can live on realistically. In the long term, for the common good, the party aim to unite tax and benefit in a Basic Income system. This scheme will cover everyone, again respecting us all as equals.

    The NHS is another huge playing field when it comes to the debating parties, and rightly so. It is an important offering the UK holds and requires a delicate yet stable approach to maintain it’s future. The Green Party wants to end the privatisation that has started to appear and provide it with the proper funding it deserves. They also want to introduce free social care to the elderly and aim to give more time, funding and effort into the tackling of mental health.

    Other parties have ignored such medical issues, by cutting funding to the likes of the mental health services and certain out-reach programmes, which have had some cruel effects on our LGBTIQ community. Additionally the party want to end other NHS cuts, which have undermined HIV services and made it harder for trans people to access gender reassignment assistance. Plus, another bid in our favour concerns giving blood. They want to reduce the current 12-month deferral period and base each case specifically on the individual wanting to donate.

    The Green Party stands to help us elsewhere, and all other equality issues. One amazing bullet point they are prompting calls for mandatory diversity and equality lessons in schools. This will step up to combat all forms of prejudice based bullying and teach important lessons of acceptance to children from primary school ages. They also propose a requirement for the police to employ diversity liaison officers whose main responsibility will cover a prevention action on crimes originating in discrimination of any kind. As well, they seek to tackle the topic of institutional racism within our current justice system.

    In terms of women’s rights, they have suggested a UK wide strategy to tackle violence against women – concerning domestic violence, rape, sexual abuse and trafficking. This is alongside other women’s rights battles they want to challenge including equal pay for both sexes; a reworking of sexism in the media particularly with the likes of “lads mags” and their availability, plus making it illegal to stop nursing mothers feeding their babies in public spaces.

    They strongly invite an end to stigma in the workplace towards any minority, from everything and everyone covering race to disability. This bracket stretches to the teaching profession where the party wants to introduce comprehensive training for all educational staff on diversity and inclusion issues. Elsewhere in the classroom the party propose the teaching of HIV, sex and relationship education with an inclusion of LGBTIQ relationships. Adding a requirement of every school to have an anti-bullying programme explicitly combating homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying.

    I am not telling you to vote for The Green Party, but I invite you to read their manifesto, which offers relief to battles that do concern the LGBTIQ community. They want to take us forward and treat us with the equal rights we deserve. We are no different, we deserve our say, and The Green Party are a good ally. Please read their manifesto and decide for yourself, for the common good.

    by Mark Goggin

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, its management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.

  • SINGLE REVIEW: Will Young – Love Revolution

    Will Young winning the first Pop Idol instalment back in 2002 seems like a bizarre memory. It is hard to remember him emerging into the music industry under the wing of Simon Cowell because he has proven himself better than those means and shaken free of the stigma sometimes associated with the X Factor like shows. The second Pop Idol instalment with Michelle McManus is thankfully much more forgettable. Or regrettable, you can delete accordingly.

    ★★★★

    As an artist Will Young has mastered the art of producing a catchy yet vulnerable pop sound, maturing delicately with every new song. His last release Echoes back in 2011 promoted his growth as a talented singer songwriter with the likes of the breathtaking Come On and the underlining dance tones of I Just Want A Lover – the video for which saw him dancing around a supermarket car park partnered with a shopping trolley, unique to say the least. This intriguing music video history sets him aside from other mainstream pop acts around today. We have seen him moving from Blue Peter spoofs to taking part in dog training competitions, whilst causing a scene at an art gallery or making us cry in an emotional courtroom scene. Not forgetting about his portrayal as a pregnant man, of course. It all claps together in applause to his artistry.

    Enter Love Revolution, the new single and first release from his upcoming album 85% Proof (scheduled for release May 2015). It throws us a funkier sound that we haven’t seen from him in a while, slightly nodding back to the soulful elements of his 2005 album Keep On. If you think the song sounds familiar then you’d be right, as it is a reworking of the 2002 dance anthem Loneliness bought to us by German DJ Tomcraft. Much less Euro-Dance though, I’m afraid, but much more summer soul that will get you dancing around your garden in no time at all.

    The video depicts him as a preaching salesman trying to shift his Love Revolution products onto the apparent lonely singletons. It, albeit cheesy, is an entertaining clip that continues to set him aside from the generic pop routines around at the moment – and who here doesn’t enjoy a bit of cheese every now and then? If you said, ‘I don’t,’ then I have nothing more to say to you.

    The timing of this single could be considered apt against the likes of the recent Dolce & Gabbana debacle, or the risk of Northern Ireland’s anti-gay amendment passing, which could have seen it legal to refuse service to any LGBT person. Not to mention the American ‘gay curers’ who were about to embark on our dear nation to cure us all from being our-wonderfully-natural-selves. Let’s follow Will Young’s lead, start a Love Revolution and dance with whomever we want, yeah?