One year ago, Latania McKenzie sat down at her computer and with a few clicks started putting into action a dream she’d had for years — a blog that caters to masculine-identified women as well as to transgender men.
Named Queer B.O.I.S., the blog espouses the values McKenzie, 30, and her partner and blog co-founder, Taliba, aspire to in their professional and personal lives. While B.O.I.S. is meant to quickly identify its target audience, the letters also have meaning: Business, Opulence, Investment and Style.
McKenzie, 30, moved to Atlanta 12 years ago from Belgium. She likes to shop in the men’s department and has a deep affection for pocket squares and bow ties. She said the blog is meant to bring visibility to a community that is often overlooked in the media. And while her first name is Latania, she prefers to just be called McKenzie.
The GA Voice won two second-place awards in this year's Better Newspaper Contest, sponsored by the National Newspaper Association.
Deputy Editor Dyana Bagby won second place in the category of Best Investigative or In-Depth Story or Series, Non-daily Division, circulation 6,000 - 9,999, for her article "Eddie Long scandal 'blows hinges off church's closet doors'."
"Difficult stories like this can follow many paths. Good coverage such as seen here informs the community while providing an opportunity for growth," the judges noted.
The GA Voice website www.thegavoice.com, spearheaded by Web Manager Ryan Watkins, won second place for Best Newspaper Web Site, Non-daily Division.
Call it a break. Call it time apart. Whatever you want to call it, gay blog Queerty is back.
The popular gay blog that used snarky commentary and featured plenty of mostly naked boys, announced back in April that it was shutting down. Yes, it's really back. Go check it out. I'll wait.
The site's owner, David Hauslaib, sold Queerty to GayCities, an LGBT resource company based in San Francisco, according to an article on the site. GayCities says that many of the original staff, as well as some new faces, including my former co-worker Dan Renzi, are hopping onboard the new incarnation.
Reaction to the initial shuttering was far from mixed. Most of our readers and commenters online felt that Queerty regularly crossed the line in their coverage of closeted celebrities and the tone of the content was unnecessarily “snarky.”
The Centers for Disease Control released results from a survey today citing an alarming trend in HIV testing for young men (ages 18 -24). The survey, conducted using a website where men go to meet other men for sex (the website was not identified in the press release), found that younger sexually active gay and bisexual men were three times less likely to have been tested for HIV in their lifetime. The results were presented at the XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna, Austria.