If You Prefer Your Gay Magazines without Rainbow Flags or Men With Chiseled Abs: VIDEO

Then Hello Mr., a start-up publication out of Australia for "men who date men" which is seeking funding on Kickstarter might appeal to you.

They write:

What you won't find here are articles tagged with recycled stock imagery of multicolored flags waving in pride, hand-painted demands for equal rights, or idolized midsections of seemingly flawless men. If that's your thing, there is a sea of glossy mags filled with those images readily available at your local newsstand. We believe that Hello Mr. can address the need, felt by the modern majority, to rebrand 'gay' and move beyond any unrepresentative depictions defined by our past.

Check out their video, AFTER THE JUMP...

Help Save Utah-Based Gay Pub 'QSaltLake': VIDEO

Michael Aaron, publisher of the debt-hampered QSaltLake, released this video this week asking readers who appreciate his magazine's indepth, professional reporting to help them raise the dough necessary to pay off $16,000 of a loan taken out when they started.

From the video's description:

QSaltLake was launched in 2004 during the anti-gay marriage Amendment 3 campaign with the publisher's savings and a $55,000 home equity loan against his house. In August of last year, we plead to the community that decreasing ad revenues put us in a financial crisis.

Through frugal living, many overhead cost reductions and increased focus on generating revenue, we have made it these 10 hard months. We recently found out the home equity loan is due and payable in September. Our balance is at $40,000.

We need your help to stay alive and continue our work as the voice for Utah's gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and ally community.

They have this weekend to gather all the dollars and cents possible.

AFTER THE JUMP, Aaron pleads his persuasive case and asks those willing to help to visit Save QSaltLake and make a donation. Watch Aaron's request AFTER THE JUMP.

CNN's 'Reliable Sources' Takes On Anderson Cooper's 'Quiet' Coming Out: VIDEO

Howard Kurtz hosted a roundtable on Reliable Sources this weekend to discuss CNN anchor Anderson Cooper's coming out, the current trend of "coming out quietly" and the international impact of tearing down the closet door.

Watch TV Newser's Gail Shister, Tampa Bay Times journalist Eric Deggans and radio host Michelangelo Signorile offer their thoughts AFTER THE JUMP. Also, Signorile, in his role as editor-at-large for HuffPost's gay voices vertical, penned a piece last week about that aforementioned "coming out quietly" trend. If you missed it, here's the link.

Watch the CNN Reliable Sources chat AFTER THE JUMP.

'The Advocate' Backs President Obama's Re-Election

Saying the 2012 election "presents a choice between starkly opposing futures," the editorial team at long-running LGBT magazine The Advocate today endorsed President Obama's reelection campaign. This is the magazine's first presidential endorsement in "decades," but they felt compelled to back Obama because this year's race "presents a choice between starkly opposing futures."

Mitt Romney, they say, "betrays equality on numerous issues and aligns himself with a faction of the Republican Party that does not include equality among its declared ideals." And while some fear Obama's "radical" policies, The Advocate describes him as a moderate whose policies "only appear particularly progressive in contrast with the policies of his predecessor."

More from the endorsement:

By saying aloud, “I think same-sex couples should be able to get married,” in a televised interview on ABC, [President Obama] has sparked conversation domestically and internationally. While he is our president at home, globally he’s an icon, a symbol of the promise of America, of the promise of equality.

Obama may be the most prominent man on the planet ever, given the pervasiveness of modern media and his anomalous and historic nature as the first black American president; he is surely the single most recognizable head of state on the globe.

By virtue of his unique position, his endorsement of marriage equality is not merely rhetoric. His words constitute action. On the very face of it, his statement is enormous, and has the power to move millions in a way that a statement from no other person could have.

Read more AFTER THE JUMP.

Anderson Cooper Comes Out: 'The Fact Is, I'm Gay'

Finally putting to rest all that speculation, journalist Anderson Cooper has officially and publicly come out as a proud gay man.

"The fact is, I'm gay," Cooper wrote in an email to friend Andrew Sullivan after being asked about an Entertainment Weekly article on public figures who remain in the glass closet:

...I have given some the mistaken impression that I am trying to hide something - something that makes me uncomfortable, ashamed or even afraid. This is distressing because it is simply not true.

...There continue to be far too many incidences of bullying of young people, as well as discrimination and violence against people of all ages, based on their sexual orientation, and I believe there is value in making clear where I stand.

The fact is, I'm gay, always have been, always will be, and I couldn’t be any more happy, comfortable with myself, and proud.

I have always been very open and honest about this part of my life with my friends, my family, and my colleagues. In a perfect world, I don't think it's anyone else's business, but I do think there is value in standing up and being counted. I’m not an activist, but I am a human being and I don't give that up by being a journalist.

As for why he resisted coming out, Cooper said his privacy and travels to dangerous nations both played a part in his staying in the aforementioned glass closet.

Congratulations to you, Anderson. Maybe now the paparazzi can now get a proper shot of you and your boyfriend together?

Journalists Remember Late Gay Reporter Armando Montano

As news broke of gay AP intern Armando Montano's death, his fellow journalist friends put digital pen to paper to remember the 22-year old journalist.

Via Metro Weekly comes this memory from Aaron Edwards, an intern at The New York Times:

About one year ago, when Armando Montano and I went to the Chips Quinn Scholars Program, a journalism training program geared to young journalists of minority backgrounds, he started beaming when he found out that because we were Chips Quinn Scholars we would get free access to the Newseum, an interactive journalism museum in Washington, D.C.

But his excitement stemmed from more than the fact that he could now go and geek out over historic front pages and archival photographs from The New York Times and The Washington Post whenever he wanted. Armando, or “Mando” as many called him for short, was excited because he was adamant and steadfast in the idea that he would marry the love of his life there.

“I’m going to get married in the Newseum, Aaron. I'm going to get married at the freakin' Newseum.” he would tell me.
…
Mando was sure that he would stand on the balcony of that building one day and say “I Do” to a man who loved him enough to understand and cherish a guy whose quirky soul led him to want to get married atop a national journalism museum.   

Marissa Evans, an intern at the Washington Post, also memorialized Montano. The late writer's enthusiasm for his craft — and indeed life — was so contagious that Evans and he formed a deep friendship based solely on online correspondence.

Evans writes, "Looking through my Gmail chats with him, I had only started talking to him on August 1, 2011. Our friendship is built upon 72 hilarious chat sessions plus countless Facebook comments/likes and Twitter mentions and retweets."

"As journalists, we harp so much about using social media to be an extension of our brand but it furrows my brow to think about how we sometimes forget to use it to truly connect with the people we friend and follow."