Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

In a surprise move, the Trump administration on Thursday sided with a Colorado bakery whose owner is arguing to the Supreme Court that he should not need to bake a cake for a same-sex couple when their ceremony violates his religious beliefs.

Colorado's public accommodation law bans discrimination based on sexual orientation, and its courts have ruled that businesses catering to the public cannot discriminate against same-sex couples seeking services for weddings or other commitment ceremonies.

Masterpiece Cakeshop, however, is run by Jack Phillips, a man who incorporates his Christian faith into the way he runs his business. Baking a cake, which he maintains is a form of creative expression, for a same-sex couple would violate his religious beliefs and, as such, he has refused to do so.

The Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruled against Phillips, as did Colorado courts, but the Supreme Court agreed this June to hear his case this fall.

On Thursday, in a filing at the high court, the Justice Department announced that it agrees with Masterpiece Cakeshop, arguing that it would create an "intrusion" on the First Amendment "where a public accommodations law compels someone to create expression for a particular person or entity and to participate, literally or figuratively, in a ceremony or other expressive event."

"Forcing Phillips to create expression for and participate in a ceremony that violates his sincerely held religious beliefs invades his First Amendment rights," the Justice Department lawyers, led by Acting Solicitor General Jeffrey Wall, wrote. Among other lawyers on the brief, Wall was joined by two other acting division heads: Chad Readler, leading the Civil Division, and John Gore, leading the Civil Rights Division.

In the brief, the Justice Department argues that "most applications of a public accommodations statute" are fine and do not raise the First Amendment concerns it discussed in Thursday's filing. However, reviewing the Supreme Court's decisions in cases involving a gay contingent seeking to participate in a group's St. Patrick's Day parade and a gay man who was rejected as a Boy Scouts leader, Justice Department lawyers argue there is an exception: "Heightened scrutiny [by courts] is appropriate at least where a law both compels the creation ... of speech or of a product or performance that is inherently communicative, and compels the creator’s participation in a ceremony or other expressive event."

One such circumstance, the brief goes on, is baking a wedding cake, and "Colorado cannot satisfy [heightened scrutiny] because it lacks a sufficient state interest to justify that intrusion on 'the core principle of speaker’s autonomy.'"

Specifically, the Justice Department argues, this is so because, while the Supreme Court has said that "'eradicating racial discrimination' in the private sphere is the most 'compelling' of interests," the high court "has not similarly held that classifications based on sexual orientation are subject to strict scrutiny."

The current case comes to the Supreme Court more than five years after the circumstances leading to the case took place.

In July 2012, Charlie Craig and David Mullins attempted to order a wedding cake from Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, but owner Jack Phillips declined, saying that it would violate his religious beliefs.

While it remains legal in many parts of the US to turn gay couples away from businesses, 21 states ban discrimination in places of public accommodation on the basis of sexual orientation, including Colorado.

“I’ll make you birthday cakes, shower cakes, sell you cookies and brownies, I just don’t make cakes for same-sex weddings,” court records say Phillips told the men.

Represented by the ACLU, the couple filed a complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, which found in 2014 that the baker ran afoul of a state law banning discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. A Colorado appeals court upheld that decision, saying that if the baker “wishes to operate as a public accommodation and conduct business within the State of Colorado, [the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act] prohibits it from picking and choosing customers based on their sexual orientation.”

The court added that the law “does not impose burdens on religious conduct not imposed on secular conduct.”

Colorado's supreme court declined to take the case, which led to the request for the US Supreme Court to hear the case, which it agreed to do in June.

ACLU deputy director Louise Melling said in a statement on Thursday evening, “this brief was shocking, even for this administration. What the Trump Administration is advocating for is nothing short of a constitutional right to discriminate.”

A Justice Department official told BuzzFeed News the agency chose to file in the case "because the First Amendment protects the right of free expression for all Americans."

“Although public-accommodations laws serve important purposes, they — like other laws — must yield to the individual freedoms that the First Amendment guarantees,” the official continued in a statement. “That includes the freedom not to create expression for ceremonies that violate one’s religious beliefs.”

Gumtree / Via gumtree.com.au

People are trying to sell their forms for the government's same-sex marriage survey on online marketplaces like eBay and Gumtree, the day after the High Court gave the green light for the survey to go ahead.

Zaky Mallah — a former terror suspect who was briefly the subject of national controversy after appearing on Q&A wearing a marijuana leaf hat and accusing politician Steve Ciobo of encouraging young Muslims to go to Syria and fight for ISIS — listed his survey form on Gumtree for $600.

The forms will not be posted out until September 12, and are due back by November 7.

Mallah told BuzzFeed News he was selling the form "out of respect for both sides".

"I love my straight and gay friends equally. So I'm sitting on the fence with this one. Hence, the paper is up for grabs," he said.

Asked if it had occurred to him that some might not regard selling the form as particularly respectful, Mallah said: "I really don't care what people think".

Gumtree / Via gumtree.com.au

Mallah said he planned to use the $600 on taking his gay and straight friends out to lunch.

As for how the sale might play out: "I will fill it out for them. It will only take a pen and a quick tick. Or I can give them the form. Either way, I have no problem."

Mallah told BuzzFeed News he had already had an offer, providing a screenshot of someone asking it it was available.

Earlier on Friday, AAP and the West Australian reported that another survey form had gone up for sale on eBay. The listing has since been removed.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics told BuzzFeed News it has contacted several online marketplaces, including Gumtree, eBay, Facebook, Amazon and Alibaba, asking them to remove ads selling the survey forms.

"To date eBay and Facebook have confirmed listing survey forms or survey responses for sale would not comply with their policies and they will block and remove any such listings," the ABS said.

The ABS also indicated that responding to the postal survey with a form that has been bought or sold would likely be an offence against either the Census and Statistics Act 1905 or the Commonwealth Criminal Code.

Zaky Mallah

Independent MP Andrew Andrew Wilkie (L-R) addresses the media outside the High Court in Melbourne with Felicity Marlowe and Alex Greenwich.

Joe Castro / AAPIMAGE

A couple of minutes before 2.15pm on Thursday, a hush fell over the High Court of Australia.

In a packed courtroom on the top floor of the Commonwealth Law Courts building in Melbourne, people waited for a knock at the door to signal the entry of the seven judges that make up the full bench of the court. Their assistants — young lawyers, known as associates — stood poised behind their bosses' chairs, while in a second courtroom nine stories down, about a hundred people silently watched them on a live feed. Journalists nervously checked their notes, praying they would be able to translate the legal directions soon to be handed down. And federal politicians sitting in parliamentary Question Time, 600km away in Canberra, refreshed their Twitter feeds.

Five minutes later, the country learned that Australia’s same-sex marriage postal survey would go ahead.

Over Tuesday and Wednesday, the court heard arguments from two legal challenges that were a last-ditch effort to stop the country’s two-year dance towards holding a public vote on same-sex marriage.

The first case was brought by independent MP Andrew Wilkie, lesbian mother-of-three Felicity Marlowe and Pflag’s Shelley Argent, and the second by advocacy group Australian Marriage Equality (AME) and Greens senator Janet Rice. They contended that the government had illegally directed $122 million to be spent on the survey, and that the Australian Bureau of Statistics could not carry it out.

Anna Brown, the director of legal advocacy for the Human Rights Law Centre, was one of a handful of people in the courtroom sitting with her back to the judges, as one of the instructing solicitors in the AME case.

“All of the audience, all of the LGBTI people, my friends, our clients — were all looking at our faces to see our reaction to the decision,” she told BuzzFeed News. “I was very conscious of that.”

“In fact, I was worried I would have a brain freeze and not understand what the judge was saying, but obviously it was pretty clear from the outset. The Wilkie proceeding went down and then I thought, do we have any chance?”

Chief Justice Susan Kiefel quickly disposed of the Wilkie case, dismissing it in full and handing costs to the plaintiffs. The orders on the AME case took longer to make, as Kiefel read through each individual question. But the result was, eventually, the same.

“Each question I thought, maybe this question, maybe that question,” Brown continued. “But it was no, no, no, no, no.”

Meanwhile, Jacqui Tomlins was in the packed public gallery, looking to her wife, Sarah Nichols, for confirmation. The Melbourne couple, who have three kids, married in Canada 14 years ago and were central to former prime minister John Howard's decision to change the Marriage Act in 2004. He introduced legislation after Tomlins and Nichols, and another couple, sought to have their overseas marriages recognised in Australia.

Nichols, who is a lawyer, gave Tomlins the thumbs down.

“[After it finished] I just said, we lost? And she said, ‘yep’,” Tomlins told BuzzFeed News. “And I said, what, we just lost everything, completely? And she said, ‘yep’.”

Prime minister Malcolm Turnbull.

AAP

In Canberra, photographers lined up on opposite ends of the press gallery to capture the moment prime minister Malcolm Turnbull and opposition leader Bill Shorten heard the news. They captured Turnbull’s elation, and Shorten’s disappointment: a victory at last, for a government under siege.

Turnbull’s strutting, raucous speech, filled with glee at the prospect of every Australian weighing in on same-sex marriage, was directed squarely at Shorten. But the court decision was less of a blow to the Opposition leader — Labor had distanced itself from a central role in the challenges — than it was to those people in the LGBTI community who are deeply fearful of what the survey has yet to unleash.

Back outside the court, Tomlins told BuzzFeed News she was worried.

“I will fall in a heap for a day or two, and then I will pick myself up and look around,” she said. “I know there’s going to be a massive push for a “yes” vote... But right now, in the raw thick of it, I just worry about our community.”

In the weeks since the survey was announced, there has been intemperate language from people backing both campaigns, much of it on social media. Neither side can lay an exclusive claim to civility, but manners aside, it is undeniable that the bulk of anonymously printed flyers and posters provoked by the survey and amplified by media are aimed squarely at LGBTI people.

BuzzFeed News has spoken to several same-sex parented families who have enforced media blackouts, or taken away letterbox duties from their kids over the course of the survey.

“In my heart I never thought we would actually have to live through this process,” Tomlins said. “You either get it or you don’t, how awful this is.”

Felicity Marlowe.

AAP

The two-day court hearing was a curious departure from the usual emotion that permeates almost every back-and-forth of the same-sex marriage debate.

As expected, the hearing addressed neither the merits of same-sex marriage itself nor the moral wrongs and rights of holding a postal survey on the issue. But one exchange did touch, however formally, on the anguish felt by many same-sex couples.

In an argument about “standing” — whether the plaintiffs have the legal right to bring the case forward — solicitor-general Stephen Donaghue was asked whether Marlowe might be afforded standing on the basis that receiving the survey form would cause offence as it asks others to cast judgment on her sexuality.

Donaghue contended the survey form “does no such thing” — but that Australia’s current marriage law does.

“To the extent that there is any aspersion cast on the legitimacy of the family unit, that is a consequence of the existing law that imposes a distinction between same-sex couples and other couples,” he told the court.

After the decision was handed down on Thursday, a security guard stopped a bunch of people who had been in the live stream courtroom on level eight: “Were you just in the court? That decision, was that on the vote thingy or was that actually gay marriage?”

There was a brief pause, as the gaggle of court watchers registered that people have lives outside of the constitutional validity of the postal survey. Someone explained that it was just to do with the vote. The guard nodded. “Right, right.”

Outside, a wall of cameras waited as the plaintiffs and their lawyers exited the building to applause. (The government lawyers did not hold a press conference.) One by one, they stepped up to the waiting microphones and urged people to vote “yes” in the survey.

The second the decision came down, The Equality Campaign launched an ad campaign, featuring Olympian Ian Thorpe. People were deployed at train stations to hand out flyers. The pivot from hedging bets in the High Court to a full-blown campaign had begun.

But was the pivot too late? We won’t know until November 15, and even then, there will be no definitive metric to belatedly dissect why the result is what it is. Either way, the “yes” campaign is acutely aware of the criticism it has copped for running the legal challenges at all.

Mark Kolbe / Getty Images

People on the “no” side, including prominent conservative backbencher Eric Abetz, have used the challenges as fodder. After the government's victory on Thursday, he said: “Following the High Court case brought by self-appointed elites trying to stifle the Australian people being thrown out, I am pleased that all Australians will have their say on marriage... Democracy is an infinite good and political elites should never seek to stand in the way of the people having their say.”

“It is extraordinary that those pushing to redefine marriage went as far as taking the government to court to stop the Australian people having their say,” said Damian Wyld from the Marriage Alliance.

But Rodney Croome, a long-time LGBTI rights activist who split from Australian Marriage Equality to campaign against an earlier iteration of the government's plebiscite policy in 2016, told BuzzFeed News that, despite the crushing loss, he did not regret “for a second” his efforts to stop a public vote, of any kind, on same-sex marriage. (Croome was a driving force behind the Wilkie case, despite not being a plaintiff himself.)

“That’s because I have seen all this before in Tasmania in the 1990s [during the campaign to decriminalise homosexuality]," he said. "I've seen what hate can do. I’ve seen the damage that is done to individuals by high profile, public hatred."

In that same Tasmanian debate, Abetz argued against decriminalisation.

“Having come through that, I was determined to ensure we wouldn’t see that kind of publicly enabled hatred again,” Croome continued. “That’s why I don’t regret for a second trying to stop this.”

Croome added that he felt the High Court had failed: “Now that the case is over I can say what I honestly feel. I think it’s the role of the High Court to protect us from executive overreach and if it doesn’t do that, it’s not doing its job,” he said.

“I’m doubly disappointed in this decision, not only because it means a postal vote will occur, but because the court has failed to do its core duty in protecting the people from an overreaching and overbearing government.”

Anna Brown hands out pamphlets at a train station near the High Court.

Joe Castro / AAPIMAGE

After the media pack disbanded, the campaigners and lawyers retired to a pub around the corner, where Brown fielded media calls, an Equality Campaign t-shirt pulled over the top of her court attire. She told BuzzFeed News that the campaign had been preparing for a postal survey before the High Court weighed in.

“We’ve been, for the last few weeks, doing both. And now we have some certainty,” she said. “It’s great that the High Court heard it urgently, but having this period of time of uncertainty, I think it has been really difficult for people. Everyone’s felt like they don’t quite know whether they have to be in full campaign mode or not. And now we just at least know one way or another.”

Brown said she is “not too worried” about being saddled with costs, which The Daily Telegraph has reported may amount to $300,000, with the plaintiffs covering up to two thirds of that.

“There’s been a lot of direct emails to try and raise funds and cover costs. GetUp helped with that as well,” she said. “It’s certainly a drop in the ocean compared to $122 million on a plebiscite, so it was worth the financial risk to the campaign.”

At a table in the corner, Marlowe, Tomlins, their partners and a collection of other ordinary lesbian mums — joined by Argent, who they welcomed as an honorary member — were holding court, talking about how their kids were taking the news.

Meanwhile, staff from The Equality Campaign discussed how the new ad was landing as they picked at a bowl of hot chips. Other than a few wry remarks, there was little discussion of the court case: it was all forward, already.

“How are you feeling?” was the first question BuzzFeed News asked Brown after the decision.

Her response: “I’m feeling like we need to win a campaign.”

Let all the ships sail!

Bring it in, we need to talk about non-canon ships.

Twitter: @anothermortian

Admit it — we all love to read in-between the lines of a show or movie, see the subtle clues, reach for the stars, and ship the totally-not-happening ships!

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

And yes, this means you probably love to suffer a little.

*Suffer a lot*

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

View Entire List ›

Paul Miller / AAPIMAGE

Both federal leaders have thrown their support behind the "Yes" campaign, days ahead of ballots for the postal survey on same-sex marriage being delivered to more than 16 million Australian voters.

Despite vowing not to campaign, the prime minister launched 'New South Wales Liberals and Nationals for Yes' in Sydney alongside NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian and former NSW Liberal leaders, Kerry Chikarovski, John Brogden, Barry O'Farrell and Nick Greiner on Sunday.

Turnbull quoted former UK prime minister David Cameron saying he doesn't support gay marriage despite being a Conservative, he supports gay marriage because he is a Conservative.

He told the launch there was no evidence that gay couples pose any threat to marriage.

"I have to say I am utterly unpersuaded by the proposition that my marriage to Lucy, 38-years long next March, or indeed any marriage, is undermined by two gay men or two gay women setting up house down the road whether it is called a marriage or not," Turnbull said.

"Let's be honest with each other, let's be really, really honest with each other, the threat to marriage is not gay couples it is a lack of love and commitment."

"Whether it is found in the form of neglect, indifferent, cruelty or adultery to name just a few manifestations of the loveless desert in which too many marriages come to grief."

"If the threat of marriage today is lack of commitment, then surely other couples making and maintaining a commitment sets a good rather than a bad example."

Turnbull said Australians unsure of how to vote in the postal survey should look to other countries where same-sex marriage has been legalised.

“In any one of those nations has the sky fallen in, has life as we know it ground to a halt, has traditional marriage been undermined? And the answer is plainly no,” he said.

He used the launch to once again call for a respectful debate from both sides of the campaign.

Paul Miller / AAPIMAGE

Opposition leader Bill Shorten meanwhile, told thousands gathered for a Marriage Equality rally in Sydney that the postal survey was about telling LGBTI Australians they don't have to change, the law does.

"Today is about all Australians coming out and saying for 'goodness sake Australia, let's just make marriage equality a reality'," he said.

Shorten said anyone disappointed with the High Court's decision to green light the postal survey should turn their disappointment "into determination to win".

When asked how many Labor politicians would be voting yes, the opposition leader said he was "reasonably sure" that at least 97% would.

Annie Clark was reconfiguring some older material for her upcoming tour when she realized how alien it felt to play it. She could adapt the arrangements to her harsher new sound — the sleazy, acid aesthetic of Masseduction, her upcoming fifth solo record as St. Vincent — but the writing’s proggy complexity was cockblocking the emotion. “In so many ways, I thought I was being completely transparent and brave in every record, only to realize that they are very oblique,” Clark told BuzzFeed News. She cackled and looked delighted. “Who knew! I had no idea.”

Clark is much too self-aware for this to be completely true. But the difference between her polite, guarded Texan past and confrontational present is colossal. When I first interviewed Clark in 2009, she nervously pressed her pendant against her lips and face, leaving a red lipstick pox on her insane cheekbones. By 2014’s St. Vincent, Clark’s public persona would be imperious.

But these days, she’s a playful freak who revels in showing the tightness of her grip, a disposition aided by long, straight eyebrows that dance like Memphis squiggles. In late July, she appeared in the lobby of New York City’s Marlton Hotel, her temporary home during the making of Masseduction. She had come from pilates — which she likes because it makes her sing better and “come a lot harder” — and disappeared to change out of her leopard-print gym shorts. When I mentioned a recent paparazzi photo of her looking like a sexy detective in another skintight leopard-patterned getup, she asked twice, with predatory delight, whether I’d looked at her camel toe. (No! Okay, maybe!) The only time her control slipped was when the hotel's stereo started playing “Who,” a knotty song from the album she made with David Byrne, and she shriveled like a salted snail at hearing her own voice.

"I told you more than I would tell my own mother."

Self-possession like hers is often interpreted as pretentious, or pathological. But over time, the confidence that the younger, anxious Clark had to fake has become bracingly real. You can hear it in Masseduction, a record of pop fluidity and queer possibility. It’s the best thing she’s ever done, and there are no bad St. Vincent records. It’s partly harsh, heady, erotic synth-pop visions steered by her diamond-sharp guitar, and while Clark has written plenty of ballads, there have never been any as brutal and gorgeous as these. Its lurch between apocalypse and ecstasy mirrors how it felt to be kicked in the head by the past couple years.

In a way, Clark was right about the obscurity of her past work, filled with archetypes and distanced observations — emotions through a stained-glass window. If not a clear pane, then Masseduction is at least a peep show on heartache, fucking, addiction, destitution, and suicide. And her relatively new life as a very public figure, thanks to relationships with Cara Delevingne and Kristen Stewart, gives it an extra frisson. Tabloids will rush to find the former, the famed British supermodel, on an album littered with wasted bodies, especially on “Young Lover,” where Clark finds someone overdosed in the bathtub. She recounts the night with terror but also arrestingly ugly indignation. “Oh, so what / Your mother did a number / So I get gloves of rubber / To clean up the spill,” she sneers.

“Scenario has to rhyme, babe,” is all Clark said about its veracity. She was bemused at being asked to explain the lyrics. To her, this record is butt-naked. “I told you everything,” she stressed. “I told you more than I would tell my own mother. It’s right there.”

Annie Clark

Nedda Afsari

Masseduction started out with three tenets: It would feature programmed beats and pedal steel guitar, and examine power and seduction. “What does power look like, who wields it, how do they wield it — emotionally, sexually, financially?” Clark ticked off her fingers.

The album was properly born over a creative first-date dinner with Jack Antonoff, the Bleachers frontman who also recently produced and wrote with Lorde and Taylor Swift. Clark was looking for a teammate; they told each other everything that was going wrong in their lives and decided that total oblivion was the only way out of their heads. “It wasn’t, ‘Hey, let’s make a record together, that’ll be fun,’” Antonoff told me. “It was, ‘Let’s absolutely go all the way and find the absolute best thing that exists here,’ which is really the only way to work on things.”

That grit is Clark’s MO. Until recently, she claimed to have taken approximately 36 hours off in between returning from touring 2011’s Strange Mercy and starting work on 2014’s St. Vincent. The concerts for the latter were bonkers, starting the run as avant-garde, meticulously choreographed deconstructions of a traditional rock show, and ending it with exorcisms that entailed Clark crumpling down a 10-foot pink plywood pyramid like a drunken horse. She often stole objects from the crowd: a pair of crutches, someone’s dinner. The spectacle of her murdering the thing she’d trained for was addictive.

St. Vincent during the 2015 Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival.

Frazer Harrison / Getty Images

“Touring became a blood sport for me. I mean, I was born with a whip anyway, and touring became this self-flagellating exercise,” she said, clenching her jaw and lashing each shoulder with an imaginary strap. “And I was seeking that kind of physical exhaustion; I was seeking the pain.”

She doesn’t know why, and she’s okay not knowing why, though eventually she did accept that her relationship to touring was a form of delirium. On the new album’s “Sugarboy,” a dystopian, post-Moroder disco banger, she describes herself as a “casualty hanging on from the balcony.” (She literally climbed rafters in some theaters, kicking away security guards.) This hysteria is one of the reasons she considers Masseduction her saddest record. “I lost my mind, I lost people, I gained people, I stopped touring,” Clark said of that period between 2014 and 2017. “It was just a lot of a lot, you know.”

After the St. Vincent tour dates ended, Clark had to learn to construct and value life away from the road — she had been on tour since age 16, when she worked as an assistant for her aunt and uncle’s jazz group. “And I still love that,” she said of touring, “but it’s more like a component of my life now rather than…my life.” Back home she indulged in a “period of bacchanalia,” and briefly got into self-medicating, an experience she turned into the lunatic track “Pills”: Imagine the Stepford Wives lost in Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory (Kamasi Washington guests on saxophone; Delevingne sings on the chorus).

She’s transfixed by the forces that can swallow us — “You know, drugs, sex, and rock 'n' roll,” she winked. “So corny. Kill me! Kill me dead!” Though sometimes she uses those themes to dress up more mundane relationship dynamics. “Savior” explores the unhealthiness of mutual projection through a funny S&M parable involving nurses and nuns and our tediously prosaic concepts of kink: “You put me in a teacher’s little denim skirt,” Clark moans on the song. “Ruler and desk so I can make it hurt / But I keep you on your best behavior / Honey, I can’t be your savior.” The album’s self-destructive dynamic comes out on the title track — “I can’t turn off what turns me on,” she wails over twisted guitar — and her protagonists never stop annihilating each other for their own benefit, whether for carnal kicks, or for the mothers who “milk their young” in the song “Los Ageless.”

The album cover for Masseduction.

Loma Vista Recordings

And then there’s the heartbreaking “Happy Birthday Johnny,” which sounds like a snowflake but crushes like an anvil. It calls back to the title track of her 2007 debut Marry Me, about “John” who’s “a rock with a heart like a socket I can plug into at will”; and to “Prince Johnny,” the decadent downtown royal from St. Vincent. She said she feels compassion and hopelessness for his self-destruction, but can’t judge because she’s just like him. Maybe he’s also a cipher for the way humans use each other — Clark flatly refused to talk about him. “One thing I have learned in six records and 10 years is that I’m not obliged to answer any questions — a lesson I more or less only recently learned.” She stared into the bar, fixing a grim expression through her orange aviators. “Next question.”

At any rate, the song is a whole story. Once conspirators, her and Johnny's literal fire-starting days are behind them, and now he lives on the street, calling up Clark at New Year’s for “dough to get something to eat.” She demurs, and he calls her a queenly miser who’s sold out for fame. “But if they only knew the real version of me / Only you know the secrets, the swamp, and the fear,” she pleads. It is deeply tragic, being shamed — perhaps rightly — by the person who once understood your shame.

Antonoff theorized that she’s mourning a past on the record. On the forthcoming Fear the Future Tour (named after a new song, and to resemble a Jenny Holzer maxim), Clark said she probably won’t be flinging herself around stages as much because “I think I’m emotionally throwing myself around a lot more.”

A still from St. Vincent's "New York" music video.

Alex Da Carte

In late July, Tiffany & Co. announced Clark as one of the faces of its fall advertising campaign. Diamonds and waspy Americana are a weirdly prim contrast to the freaky propaganda aesthetic that Clark is calling “manic panic” — the Masseduction album cover is a photo of a nice ass in a leopard-print thong bodysuit. But like any savvy propagandist, Clark’s image will be everywhere this year. Having directed a short film, The Birthday Party, as part of the horror anthology XX, she’s now due to direct a feature-length, female-led adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray. (“The most rich text I have ever read: transgression, modernity, society, repressed queerness.”) There’s also a multimedia performance as part of October’s Red Bull Music Academy in Los Angeles, and an upcoming art exhibition in New York. A coffee table book. Essays. (She calls art “a fountain of youth” that’s given her everything and everyone in her life, hence her urge to make everything.) And that’s just the exposure she has control over.

Celebrities like to pretend that their success is the result of some cosmic fluke, but Clark has said quite openly that the best part of becoming more famous thanks to her love life is “just getting the opportunity to do more work in different fields,” which nobody ever admits! (Though her 2015 Grammy for Best Alternative Album and overwhelming critical acclaim probably helped, too.)

St. Vincent, Zoe Kravitz, and Zosia Mamet at the Tiffany & Co.-presented Whitney Biennial VIP Opening in March 2017 in New York.

Mike Coppola / Getty Images

One of Clark’s best-known songs, 2014’s “Digital Witness,” is about social media voyeurism. “I wonder if, in the future, privacy will be something that only the 1 percent can afford,” she told Rolling Stone that year, which now seems beautifully naive. From the second she and Delevingne were spotted together at the 2015 BRIT Awards, the UK’s pervy yet ever-scandalized tabloid media went nuts that their hottest young model was dating a woman, and pursued them so staunchly that the couple once took revenge by firing water pistols at the paparazzi.

“She really is so famous!” Clark said of Delevingne, feigning hammy disbelief at the attention they received. “That shouldn’t have been shocking to me, but it was shocking to me in the sense that she’s such a sweet, really, deeply kind, unspoiled person. She has more compassion in her little finger than—” She waved her hand around her torso with a grim laugh. (The pair reportedly split last fall, but Clark would only say they were “never not close.”)

Clark’s self-assurance helped her to perceive the tabloid aggression and celebrity weirdness as baffling rather than distorting. She was too classy to run with my suggestion that attending that Taylor Swift 4th of July party must’ve been an interesting anthropological study. “That was, I think, in the midst of a game of Celebrity,” she said of a photo of her wearing the same stars ’n’ stripes onesie as Gigi Hadid, Karlie Kloss, and Ruby Rose. She took a long pause. “I was very bad at it!”

From left: Cara Delevingne and Annie Clark

Schiller Graphics

But she was disturbed by dangerous high-speed car chases from paparazzi in pursuit of photos of the couple; she thinks the gossip industrial complex relates to a wider societal disparity. “The biggest problem was that the value system of it is all based on aspiration,” she said with genuine concern. “It’s wealth aspiration, fame aspiration. But if the government, if the world was just generally a more compassionate, empathetic place, people wouldn’t be aspiring to…that. They would be more fulfilled with their own lives if the wealth gap in general wasn’t so insane.” Admittedly, it was hard not to want to look at them, in matching sharp suits and laser-cut Burberry, queering the archetype of the male rock star dating the young supermodel, watching the context around an established artist mutate in front of you.

There is the kind of halfway-benign personal invasion where paparazzi follow you and your girlfriend around an airport. But then there is the kind where the never-not-creepy Daily Mail doorsteps your older sister at home in Texas and calls up your well-meaning uncle to sandbag him into revealing that your father went to prison in 2010 for participating in multimillion-dollar stock fraud. Although it is grotesque to treat the paper’s muckraking as a puzzle piece, it did illuminate part of the story behind Strange Mercy, which Clark had — understandably — only ever vaguely attributed to an overwhelming period of loss. “Suitcase of cash in the back of my stick shift,” she sang on “Year of the Tiger.” “I had to be the best of the bourgeoisie / Now my kingdom for a cup of coffee.” (She cowrote the song with her mother, Sharon, who split from Clark’s father when she was three.)

"Everybody has their personal tragedies and their crosses to bear."

“Everybody has their personal tragedies and their crosses to bear,” Clark said in a clipped tone. She calls her father’s 12-year prison sentence “a horrible tragedy. On so many different levels. So absolutely heartbreaking.” She — an adult — could handle it. But her younger half- and stepsiblings on her father’s side are still teenagers. “And I specifically would never talk about that or have ever mentioned that in a myriad of questions about Strange Mercy because it seems like an incredible betrayal of my family. But most specifically, my youngest siblings who are innocent children. They were kiddos.”

She described the Daily Mail story as “faux concern,” and reiterated that the paper couldn’t find any dirt on her, no matter how outrageously they tried. “I’m not ashamed of my family,” she said. Then I asked her whether her father going to prison had spun her own moral compass, or made her reconsider any values of right and wrong that he may have instilled in her. She was momentarily confused, and then let rip a massive, absurd, demonstrative laugh. She kept going. “I love my father,” she said eventually, still tickled. “I love my father very much, as any child loves their parent. He’s very intelligent and erudite and a good writer and incredibly well read, and those are all things that I value and I’m glad that he instilled in me.” She paused, and kept on laughing.

st_vincent / Instagram / Via Instagram: @st_vincent

“Voting no? Right in front of my salad!”

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“It’s not contagious Cory!”

Conservative senator Cory Bernardi became an unlikely ally of the "yes" campaign when he accidentally gatecrashed a photoshoot by Labor politicians.

Bernardi accidentally walked through the marriage equality photo of Western Australia Labor politicians wearing rainbow "It's Time" shirts in Parliament House on Monday night.

"You couldn't write this stuff," Labor politician Dr Anne Aly told BuzzFeed News.

"It was one of those moments in life when the timing is so perfect."

Bernardi is firmly against legalising same-sex marriage and is campaigning for the "no" camp in the same-sex marriage postal survey.

He thinks gay marriage as a "rainbow Trojan horse” and could lead to a slippery slope that could lead to bestiality.

Labor invited Bernardi to join them in showing support for the "yes" campaign in the postal survey.

"Somebody yelled at him: 'It's not contagious Cory, you can come join us!'," Aly said.

But Bernardi declined the invitation and instead covered his face.

Bernardi tweeted that he has "always been one to run the gauntlet", adding, "although they kept calling me to come back!".

Supplied

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Lisa Maree Williams / Getty Images

The government will introduce legislation that makes it illegal to vilify, intimidate or threaten harm against people on the basis of them being LGBTI or having religious convictions, as part of its same-sex marriage postal survey.

The law would mean people who engage in such behaviour could be slapped with a $12,600 fine.

The legislation, which was approved by the Coalition party room on Tuesday, will also include elements of the protections in the Electoral Act, which dictate all campaign material must be authorised.

It will protect people from being vilified, intimidated or threatened with harm on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status, or religious conviction, or because of views they hold on the survey.

People wanting to pursue a complaint in the Federal Court must get the approval of attorney-general George Brandis, who will have the final say on whether any actions proceed.

Finance minister Mathias Cormann told the party room meeting that he expected Brandis would approach the task with "a bias towards freedom of speech".

The bill will have a sunset provision, lasting only for the period of the postal survey. The civil sanctions attached to the bill are 60 civil penalty units, which amount to $12,600.

The government plans to pass the bill through the parliament by the end of the week.

The news of the vilification protections come against a backdrop of significant, often ugly, back and forth between the two sides in the same-sex marriage debate.

On Tuesday, 14-year-old Eddie Blewett, who has two mothers, stood up with Labor leader Bill Shorten and deputy Tanya Plibersek to talk about the debate's impact on him.

"People who know my family know that there's nothing wrong with us," the teenager told a large media pack on the front lawns of parliament house.

"We play soccer in the winter, we volunteer at the surf club in the summer. I have two parents. They love me and they love each other. All couples and all families deserve the same respect and value. Twelve months ago I came here. Nothing has changed. Marriage equality is still unresolved. I feel like people aren't going to vote. I feel like they're going to throw their ballot papers in the bin. I also want to thank all those people who tried to keep this in the parliament. People are saying stuff about my family. They are saying that they're not normal. They are saying that they're second rate. Don't listen. Be yourself. Vote yes."

Speaking to Sky News yesterday, former resources minister Matthew Canavan dismissed mental health concerns for the LGBTI community in the marriage debate, advising them to instead "grow a spine".

"Let's stop being delicate little flowers and have a proper debate," he said.

Shorten suggested that Canavan might be dismissing discrimination against LGBTI people because he had not experienced something similar.

"People who might never have felt discrimination seem to be able to dismiss the slights of discrimination on the behalf of others who receive it, just a bit casually," Shorten said.

He said the LGBTI community had been forced into becoming a "talking point" as a result of the survey.

Windsor spent her later years fighting for the marriage between her and her late wife to be recognized, becoming a hero following the landmark civil rights case of United States v. Windsor.

Getty Images

Edith Windsor, the woman synonymous with the fight for LGBT equality in the United States and whose 2013 Supreme Court victory declared the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional, died Tuesday. She was 88 years old.

Her death was confirmed to the New York Times by her wife, Judith Kasen-Windsor, whom she married in 2016. No cause of death was provided.

Windsor's lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, told BuzzFeed News Tuesday she died peacefully.

An extremely successful and career-minded woman, as well as a loving and devoted wife, Windsor would become an unlikely pioneer for LGBT rights late in life. She dedicated those later years to fighting for her own love story to be recognized as equal, bringing the case of United Sates v. Windsor into the history books and setting one of the most influential legal precedents in the fight for marriage equality. Her personal life was inseparable from the cause she fought for so valiantly.

"The idea that I might be a piece of history blows my mind," Windsor told BuzzFeed in 2013.

Jewel Samad / Getty Images

Windsor was born Edith Schlain in 1929, the youngest of three children to Jewish Russian immigrants James and Celia Schlain in Philadelphia. Despite her family losing their home and business during the depression, Windsor graduated from high school and would continue on to earn a degree from Temple University. It was at university where she would first fall in love with another woman.

Despite those feelings, she married a man named Saul Windsor in May of 1951 — later breaking it off as she finally came to terms with her own sexuality. "I wanted to be like everybody else. You marry a man who supports you — it never occurred to me I'd have to earn a living, and nor did I study to earn a living," she said.

Windsor would go one to do much more than simply "earn a living," as she started a new life in New York City. After graduating with a master's degree in mathematics from NYU in 1957, she would join IBM and climb to the highest technical title of senior systems programmer. She was among the first to receive an IBM PC in New York City and would later found and act as president of PC Classics Inc., a software house specializing in consulting.

Her career was taking off, but her social life was virtually nonexistent. Windsor began to explore the lesbian scene in New York City's West Village, begging her friends to take her "where the lesbians go." They readily obliged.

The night she finally met Thea Spyer, a doctor of clinical psychology, in a small bar in the West Village, Windsor recalls that the two danced until she had a hole in her stocking. After this initial meeting, it would be two more years until they started dating, and another 40 before they were legally married. Spyer proposed with a circle pin adorned with diamonds instead of an engagement ring, and Windsor was seen wearing it until her death. Windsor referred to the years before the two were married as "just dancing."

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Let’s see you and your boo.

The only thing more fun than getting dressed up on Halloween is dressing up with your boo (pun intended, sorry).

YouTube / Via youtube.com

And we all know Halloween is just about the queerest holiday there is.

NBC

So we want to see your most creative, spooky, and fun couples costume ideas.

Yes, it's still over a month away — but we know you're already thinking about outdoing yourselves this year.

Submitted to BuzzFeed

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Two of the best shows on television are merging.

Two of the best reality shows on television: RuPaul's Drag Race, a show where drag queens compete for stardom...

Logo TV / VH1 / Via media.tenor.com

...and The Great British Bake Off, full of nice bakers and exceptionally intense innuendos like this one.

There's a possibility that you watch both shows, but you'd never think they'd cross over in any way. They are reality TV polar opposites.

Love Productions / Channel 4

Well, think again. In the latest episode of Bake Off, at the start of Bread Week's technical challenge when Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith left the tent, Bake Off host Sandi Toksvig dropped this Drag Race pun.

Love Productions / Channel 4

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Penny Wong.

Mick Tsikas / AAPIMAGE

As the upper house voted on a bill that will ban vilification and intimidation against LGBTI people during the government's same-sex marriage survey, Labor Senate leader Penny Wong, who is gay, pointed out that although "sometimes prejudice comes in very polite forms" it still causes hurt.

In the same debate, senator Louise Pratt held back tears as she spoke about her "rainbow family" being handed an anti-marriage equality pamphlet at a shopping centre.

The government passed the emergency protections bill through the Senate on Wednesday morning with the support of Labor, the Greens and cross benchers. It will now go to the House of Representatives this week, where it is expected to pass.

The legislation will make it illegal to vilify, intimidate or threaten harm against people on the basis of them being LGBTI, having religious convictions, or for their views on the survey. The bill could see people in violation slapped with a $12,600 fine, and will cease at the end of the survey.

Acting special minister of state Mathias Cormann made a point of rejecting the argument that offensive and objectionable comments mostly come from the "no" campaign, saying it had been ugly on both sides for many years.

"This bill is not about protecting advocates or supporters of 'yes' side from those arguing in favour of the current definition of marriage," Cormann said.

"This is about ensuring this process is fair to both sides."

The survey has begun — with forms posted out yesterday — but the for and against campaigns cranked into gear weeks ago. Australians have already seen acrimonious arguments between "yes" and "no" campaigners play out in the media, as well as countless flyers and posters denigrating LGBTI people pop up in city streets and mailboxes.

Wong told the chamber a story about her Malaysian father, who came to Australia in the 1960s when the White Australia policy was in place, and who was invited to the homes of well-to-do, educated people in the eastern suburbs of Adelaide as a Colombo Plan scholar.

"He said, 'They were very polite to me and gave me cups of tea. But they didn't want me to take their daughter out'," Wong told the Senate.

"I'm often reminded of that in this debate. Sometimes prejudice comes in very polite forms. Sometimes a lack of acceptance and disrespect comes with a great deal of courtesy. But it lands nevertheless."

Wong said she was used to the debate, but the constant barrage of articles and comments saying her family is somehow less good than others was wearing even her down.

"If I feel like that, how do you think it feels for the children in same-sex couple families, or to LGBTI Australians everywhere, to be told, politely and courteously, 'Actually you're not quite normal. Your families aren't as good'."

She also slammed the "no" campaign for discussing everything but same-sex marriage itself: "They want to talk about a whole range of quite odd, bizarre and unconnected things because they don't actually want to say what they mean, which is: 'We don't think gay people should be equal'. That's actually what they think."

Pratt told the Senate the safeguards won't stop LGBT Australians being exposed to hurtful comments, because it hasn't stopped her family from being given anti-LGBT material.

“I was down the local shop with members of my own rainbow family, just doing the shopping for the evening meal, when they were handed an anti-marriage equality pamphlet,” she said.

Pratt co-parents her three-year-son Jasper with her former partner Aram Hosie, a trans man, and his male partner.

“The pamphlet is too hurtful to repeat here.

“But it wasn’t even about marriage, the quality of my relationship with my partner or the quality of my son’s dad’s relationships.

"The ‘no’ side isn’t debating that because they know in the eyes of the community they have already lost that debate.”

Afp Contributor / AFP / Getty Images

The emergency legislation has also prompted advocates to call for permanent, nationwide protections from vilification for LGBTI Australians.

Just.Equal spokesperson and former federal senator Brian Greig called on the government to introduce a national hate speech law protecting LGBTI people, "not simply a temporary one that will be thrown away after the postal survey".

"Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria and the Northern Territory have no state-based laws to prevent or prosecute vilification on the grounds of sexuality or gender identity," he said.

"This means LGBTI people in these states are especially vulnerable to hate speech and look to the Commonwealth for national laws to address this."

But right wing think tank the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) labelled the emergency survey laws an "attack on freedom of speech".

"Vilification laws are used to silence opponents," said Simon Breheny, director of policy at the IPA. "Attempts to limit the scope of public debate are an affront to liberal democratic principles.

"The government is warning Australians against speaking their mind in case their personal views offend others. These laws are a dangerous limitation on individual freedom."

With Labor and the Greens pledging a vote in favour, the bill was always going to pass easily — but that didn't stop a couple of cross bench senators getting up to rail against the legislation.

AAP

Conservative South Australian senator Cory Bernardi took a stance against the bill, acknowledging that it ultimately wouldn't make a difference in the vote.

"People will be trying to use lawfare as a mechanism to silence their opponents," Bernardi said. "The spurious claim will be, my feelings are hurt. I feel vilified and upset."

He also criticised the part of the bill which grants attorney-general George Brandis, who supports same-sex marriage, the power to accept complaints under the bill.

"Do we want a cheerleader, and I don’t mean this disrespectfully, but anyone who is a partisan cheerleader in a campaign, to be reserving any form of judgement about a complaint to one side or the other?" Bernardi asked.

A number of other senators spoke.

Greens senator Janet Rice talked about her marriage to her wife Penny Whetton, who is transgender, and how their lives changed after Whetton transitioned and people around them started to treat them as a same-sex couple.

"We went from being mainstream Australia to being weird," she said. "To being discriminated against."

Labor's Jenny McAllister, who is chairing a Senate inquiry into the postal survey, said she had seen much of the material circulated that "generally seeks to denigrate gay and lesbian people".

She also praised the courage of lesbian, gay and bisexual politicians for "showing great courage as their own choices have been placed under tremendous scrutiny", and for sharing their personal stories.

AAP

On the flipside, One Nation's Malcolm Roberts criticised the politicians, honing in on Wong, Rice and Pratt to claim they had allowed other people's "value judgments" to push them around, and that they should simply choose to ignore anti-LGBTI sentiment.

"People's rights must be put to a vote because non-LGBTIQ people's voices need to be heard," he said.

Meanwhile, Nick Xenophon Team senator Skye Kakoschke-Moore asked the parliament — in which eight out of 226 members are openly gay, lesbian or bisexual — to simply put themselves in the shoes of the LGBTI community during the postal survey.

"Imagine being a same-sex couple whose ability to marry one another is being determined by a mass mail-out by this government," she asked the chamber.

"Imagine it, because for well over the majority of people in this place that is all we can do."

Labor leader Bill Shorten has written to the prime minister asking for urgent funding for LGBT counselling and trauma services to assist in the increased demand during the postal survey campaign.

"Beyondblue has registered a 40 per cent increase in call volume following the announcement of the postal survey," Shorten wrote.

"LGBTIQ phone-counselling service Q Life has recorded a more than 20 per cent increase in the amount of calls since the survey was announced."

The opposition leader says phone counselling services have had to put on additional staff to cope with the influx.

Mick Tsikas / AAPIMAGE

A leading "no" campaigner in Australia's same-sex marriage campaign has claimed homophobia "[doesn't] exist much" in the country, as the first survey forms are returned in the country's national survey on the issue.

Managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby, Lyle Shelton, and vice-president of the Liberal Party, Karina Okotel, put forward the case for voting "no" at the National Press Club on Wednesday.

Referencing the latest Quarterly Essay by writer Benjamin Law about the campaign against the LGBTI anti-bullying program, the Safe Schools Coalition, Shelton said: "Benjamin Law also says that same-sex marriage is far from the last frontier in the battle against homophobia — whatever that is."

Asked by BuzzFeed News what he meant by the "whatever that is" remark, Shelton said he understood the concept of homophobia, but did not believe it was present in Australia.

"I do know what homophobia is, but I don't think it exists much in our country," he said. "Maybe there's some people who have that, but I think the vast majority of people that are engaged in this debate from our side who are concerned don't bear any ill will or animosity towards their fellow Australians because of their sexuality, I certainly don't."

Since the postal survey was announced last month, Australians have seen acrimonious arguments between "yes" and "no" campaigners play out in the media, as well as countless flyers and posters denigrating LGBTI people pop up in city streets and mailboxes.

Shelton claimed that homophobia is a "convenient slur" used to intimidate people into silence.

"If you don't support gay marriage somehow you are a hater, a bigot, you are homophobic," he said. "These words have been used against us in the Australian parliament. We [the ACL] have been called a hate group in the Australian parliament. So I'm quite frankly tired of that sort of rhetoric. I'm happy to engage in a debate, but let's drop the slurs, let's drop the name-calling and let's discuss the issues."

His answer generated lengthy applause from the audience, which included senators Eric Abetz and Matthew Canavan.

Okotel told the room that a few years ago, she was "all for" same-sex marriage.

"I thought if two consenting adults wanted to marry, what business was it of anyone else, and at that time I would have voted yes," she said.

"But the more I've looked into the issue and the more I've observed the experience of other countries which have legalised same-sex marriage, my concerns grew. You cannot, after all, fundamentally shift an institution we've always had that is practiced the world over without there being consequences."

The address came one week after "yes" campaigners Tiernan Brady and Janine Middleton spoke at the NPC.

Brady used the address to argue that the "no" campaign was deliberately muddying the waters to "dehumanise" LGBTI people.

"If you want to discriminate against someone, the first thing you have to do is dehumanise them, you have to stop allowing people to realise this is a 'who', not a 'what' and start pretending it is a strange idea in the corner," he said.

"We have seen that over the last few weeks here in Australia. References to 'political correctness', 'political elites' and 'culture wars'. That's all a very clever strategy because it's all about making us not look like people, to start thinking of it as an alien idea."

Bulimba 4 Marriage Equality / Via Facebook: bulimba4marriageequality

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd has alleged his godson Sean was punched after objecting to a man ripping down rainbow flags and "hurling verbal abuse".

Alongside a picture of a young man bleeding from a cut to his forehead, Rudd wrote on Instagram:

So many warnings to Turnbull about what this postal vote could unleash. Now my godson Sean has been punched while sitting at his bus stop, for objecting when a man began ripping down rainbow banners and hurling verbal abuse. #voteyes #MarriageEquality#bravekid

Queensland Police has confirmed it took a statement from a 19-year-old man regarding an alleged assault in Bulimba, 4km northeast of Brisbane's CBD.

On the "Bulimba 4 Marriage Equality" Facebook page, it is claimed Sean was attacked at a bus stop on Oxford St at 9am on Tuesday.

Shinead Cunningham, who runs the Facebook page, told BuzzFeed News that Sean was allegedly targeted after he confronted a man pulling down rainbow flags and yelling "I hate fucking faggots".

Cunningham claims the man made eye contact with Sean and repeated "I hate fucking faggots", to which Sean replied "That's ok, I don't like you". The man allegedly asked if Sean called him a homophobe and Sean replied yes.

Then the man allegedly punched Sean, Cunningham said.

Rudd's wife Therese Rein tweeted that she was "so grateful to the Brisbane City Council bus driver who stopped, got first aid kit, and looked for perpetrator".

Marriage equality is currently being debated in Australia as the government runs a national postal survey, asking 16 million voters to weigh in on whether same-sex marriage should be legalised.

BuzzFeed News has sought comment from Sean and Kevin Rudd.

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Facebook: bulimba4marriageequality

“Gay culture is your parents awkwardly referring to your significant other as your friend.”

For the past several weeks on Twitter, people within the LGBT community have attempted to answer one simple question: What is gay culture?

@kuntyewest / Twitter

@jusincredible / Twitter / Via Twitter: @jusincredible

One definition in particular resonated with over 63,000 other people.

In the form of "likes," that is.

@introvertgay / Twitter / Via Twitter: @introvertgay

And you better believe that others were quick to open up their personal dictionaries to pull out some possible textbook answers.

Giphy / Via giphy.com

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Brian A. Jackson / Getty Images

NEW YORK — “Sorry, I sound like a catfish,” Kevin (not his real name) told me when we were trying and failing to find a time to meet.

He was kidding, but he understands the reasons for that kind of suspicion better than most. Since November 2015, someone claiming to be a freelance copywriter named Parks Denton was faving and flirting with gay men on Twitter — and for at least part of that time, he used Kevin’s photos to lure them in. The identity of the person who catfished an impressive amount of Gay Twitter remains a mystery; shortly after being called out by Kevin’s friends, they vanished, taking their tweets (and whatever DM'd nudes they’d solicited) with them.

Since seeing his shirtless selfie plastered over several articles about Parks Denton, Kevin has gone back and forth over how to respond to the situation publicly, if at all. He spoke to one outlet, but he has largely avoided saying anything. He is naturally averse to online attention: He uses a fake name on his Facebook and Instagram accounts, doesn’t tweet, and asked me not to use his photo for this article.

“I see social media as a very separate thing from real life,” he told me, seated on a bench at a park near his Midtown office. “I should allow you into my life, and that’s why I don’t even use my real name.”

“I’m just as insecure and self-conscious as anyone else.”

But in the days following the revelation that Parks Denton, who had amassed 2,500 followers, was a catfish, Kevin saw his photo spread and be dissected, with people weighing in on whether or not they themselves would have sent dick pics to the person in the photos. Amid the uncomfortable discussion, Kevin wrestled with the choice to come forward as the real person behind the face of Parks Denton.

“I thought about kind of giving it a little more touch of humanity. Like, 'I’m a real person that lives in New York and I have a life and this affects me,'” he said. “'Try to be nice. Don’t call me a twink.' As much as people say how attractive you are, there’s always the other side, and I don’t want any of it. I’m just as insecure and self-conscious as anyone else.”

Before the Parks Denton revelation came to light, Kevin wasn't aware there was someone using his photos. But there were some clues: He noted that he’d been accused of using fake photos on Grindr by guys who railed against his deception and then blocked him. Eventually, one Grindr user sent him the Parks Denton Twitter account as proof that someone was lying. Kevin told the man on Grindr that he didn’t have a Twitter account but that those were his photos. “Obviously he didn’t believe me,” he recalled.

Kevin reported the account to Twitter, but he wasn’t satisfied by the vague response he got, so he asked a couple close friends to tweet at Parks Denton and demand he stop using Kevin’s photos. Sept. 5 was the night the catfish’s online charade unraveled, as Twitter users started to come forward with their own stories of Parks Denton’s dubious online behavior. Overnight, the account disappeared entirely, apparently deleted by whoever was running it.

As his outrage dissipated, Kevin was left unsettled. The last thing tweeted from the Parks Denton account was a photo Kevin had put up on Instagram that day. “I was kind of creeped out. You must be looking at my shit every day and seeing what I’m doing all the time,” he said. “You’re using a platform that you must realize — does he know I don’t use Twitter?”

“I guess I want to know if half of New York has seen my dick or not.”

It takes a certain kind of audacity to adopt someone else’s identity online, but it’s especially foolhardy to catfish people in New York while using the photos of a real person living in the city. That Parks Denton was able to get away with it for nearly two years suggests that they had some idea about Kevin’s low profile. In addition to steering clear of Twitter, Kevin said that he doesn’t have many gay friends in New York. If he’d had more — especially gay friends who were active on Twitter — someone may have spotted the fake sooner.

It’s possible, of course, that the person using Kevin’s photos is someone Kevin knows or has interacted with. If that’s the case, he’d rather stay in the dark. He’s also avoided reading too much about the DMs between Parks Denton and Twitter users, preferring not to think about what someone using his face was saying. He is a little curious about what dick pics Parks Denton was sending, and if those were his photos too. “I guess I want to know if half of New York has seen my dick or not,” he said.

Kevin knows this story, like most internet stories, has a short shelf life and will eventually fade from people’s memories. He’s hoping that his face will, too. But he remains frustrated by how open-ended the Parks Denton mystery is. He’s also somewhat concerned about the well-being of the person behind the account, especially after reading about one writer’s unusual Parks Denton experience, which suggests that this catfishing was never just about procuring nudes.

“This was a huge part of someone’s life. What if this was their only social contact?” Kevin said. “As much as it is fucked up, [they] need help.”

In reading people’s stories of being catfished, Kevin has been struck by the vulnerability with which people have confessed their online behavior, and how so many men admitted that the need for validation trumped the red flags the Parks Denton profile raise. How else to explain the number of people who sent naked pictures to an internet stranger without so much as verifying a Facebook account?

“I’m sad because I have read quite a few things where people feel so bad about themselves, but also I can [relate],” he said. “It’s so funny they used my picture and I have this many insecurities every day of my life. I would never imagine someone would do that.”

“What the fuck is with our community, and what are we doing to each other?”

Avid viewers of MTV’s Catfish know that the motivation behind catfishing is either deep insecurity or vengeful manipulation — and usually some combination of the two. We may never know why the person calling themselves Parks Denton spent so much time connecting with Gay Twitter, or whether they had any link to the man whose photos they used, but it’s tough for Kevin — and many of the guys whom Parks Denton catfished — to let go.

Kevin has lost sleep since finding out about Parks Denton, but admitted he’s also fascinated by the story. Sure, there’s discovering the identity of the person behind the account, but at this point, Kevin is thinking more deeply about the larger issues at play.

Gay Twitter isn’t an established club; it’s just a self-designated name for a group of gay men on Twitter, many of them living in New York and working in media. And yet, it had enough of a pull for someone to create a fake identity and force themselves in.

“It makes me think about the space we create for ourselves,” Kevin said, wondering whether Gay Twitter would have been unwelcoming to someone who didn’t look like him. “What the fuck is with our community, and what are we doing to each other?”

While he toyed with the idea of stepping into the online world — even creating a Twitter account for half a day — Kevin seems firmly resolved to stay out of it. He said he met with me in part so I’d know he himself wasn’t a catfish.

“I just want people to know I’m a real person, and I’m nice. I think I’m nice. I don’t stand people up if I can help it,” he said. “Seeing so much shit, you want people to sometimes remember it’s somebody’s life. Try to care.”

Lots of people are sharing this tweet about someone claiming to be an Australia Post employee tossing out "no" votes in the same-sex marriage survey. The tweet is not true.

Twitter

As Australia Post were quick to clarify after it starting blowing up online: Twitter user Dan Nolan is not actually an employee of Australia Post and doesn't have access to the mail.

Twitter

That didn't stop the tweet attracting the ire of Liberal National MP George Christensen who used it to accuse the "yes" campaign of stooping to "low tactics".

Twitter

The original picture is from a Facebook post where a user criticised the government for spending $122 million on the postal survey "where a torch can reveal the answer through the reply envelope it came with".

"So any postal worker with a vendetta against the opposing side can go through and remove votes as they see fit," the user wrote.

The Facebook post made its way to Reddit, where Dan Nolan picked it up and posted it to Twitter with the inflammatory caption.

A screenshot of Nolan's tweet has since been shared to Facebook by various pages opposed to same-sex marriage, including far-right nationalist group Reclaim Australia where it has been shared thousands of times.

BuzzFeed News has asked the Australian Federal Police if it received any complaints about Nolan.

But all of this online nonsense aside... the envelope trick in the photo is true.

Supplied

Rigorous testing conducted on a supplied survey form by BuzzFeed News confirmed that, yes, you can see how someone voted if you shine a torch, or even a phone light, through the envelope.

Asked if Australia Post was doing anything to mitigate the risk of mail tampering in the survey, a spokesperson told BuzzFeed News had conducted a review prior to the survey, and additional security measures would be in place as it proceeds.

"We are also working closely with the authorities to maintain the integrity of the mail network," he said.

"It is a criminal offence to tamper with mail and we work closely and on an ongoing basis with authorities to prevent theft."

The spokesperson pointed to provisions in the Crimes Act 1914, the Commonwealth Criminal Code 1995, and the Australian Postal Corporations Act 1989 that make it an offence to interfere with mail.

Australia Post referred a question on whether it was concerned by the see-through envelope specifically to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

A spokesperson for the ABS told BuzzFeed News: "Regarding reports of people shining torches through survey envelopes, the ABS does not consider this to be a security or fraud concern."

"The survey form has no visible identifying information such as a name or address. This ensures that anyone with access to a completed survey form is unable to identify the respondent. The ABS has used envelopes manufactured with a security lining printed on the inside."

The spokesperson reiterated that tampering with mail is a serious offence, and reminded Australians to not include the instruction letter or any other material with personal information in the envelope to ensure their anonymity.

Australian Christian Lobby Managing Director Lyle Shelton.

Mick Tsikas / AAPIMAGE

Leading "no" campaigner in Australia's same-sex marriage survey, Lyle Shelton, says parents should have the option to send their kids to gay conversion therapy.

In an interview with the BuzzFeed News political podcast Is it on? on Thursday, Shelton, who is the managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby (ACL), said that while he did not think adults should be forced into conversion therapy, it was up to parents as to whether their children should be counselled about same-sex attraction.

"I think anyone who wants to seek help for any issue they might be facing in their life should be free to do that," he said.

"Should people be forced to go to conversion therapy? No, absolutely not. Now, children — they are under the care and responsibility of their parents, so I think if someone's a minor, it is up to their parents. And I think parental rights should be respected.

"There's obviously got to be context and care and compassion in all of these situations, but ultimately children are in the care and the legal responsibility of their parents."

In January this year, a submission to a same-sex marriage Senate inquiry from the ACL and the Human Rights Law Alliance said the Labor party platform of protecting young people from conversion therapy is "cause for concern".

"The platform states that Labor will make it unlawful for certain discouragements of homosexual behaviour by parents in their children," the submission reads. "Such
action may be deemed 'serious psychological abuse' and 'domestic violence'."

Due to its underground nature and the various forms it takes, conversion therapy is notoriously difficult to legislate against.

Earlier this year the Andrews government in Victoria introduced a new health complaints commissioner, with expanded powers to crack down on dodgy health practitioners, including gay conversion therapy.

Conversion therapy is opposed by the Australian Psychological Association, the Australian Medical Association, and the United Nations, among numerous other professional health and human rights bodies.

A Columbia Law School project collating conversion therapy research found there was "no credible evidence that sexual orientation can be changed through therapeutic intervention" and that there is "powerful evidence that trying to change a person’s sexual orientation can be extremely harmful".

But Shelton maintained it should be an option for parents with same-sex attracted kids.

"I don't think there should be any diminution of parental rights," he said.

Shelton said he hadn't looked at all the research or statements from medical bodies saying that conversion therapy is harmful. He also criticised "conversion therapy" itself as a "loaded term".

"I don't think anybody should be forced into anything. I can see how forcing somebody in any therapy is not a helpful way to approach anything," he said.

"If a parent wanted to take their child to a counsellor for help, I think that should be up to them. I don't think that's unreasonable."

Shelton criticised the Victorian Labor government for its attempts to crack down on people offering gay conversion therapy.

"The trouble with some of this is that certainly Labor in Victoria was looking at banning even people being able to access any counselling for issues of unwanted sexual attraction," he said. "That's not freedom either."

"There's plenty of people who want to get counselling for a whole range of issues, and there should be no limitations on what people are allowed to get counselling for. The Victorian government was wanting to ban people of their own free will accessing counselling, I mean that's ridiculous."

AFP / Getty Images

Shelton also said the Coalition for Marriage would push for government employees — for instance people working for state Births, Deaths and Marriages registries — to refuse to process the marriage papers of same-sex couples if same-sex marriage is legalised, on both religious and secular grounds.

"Reasonable accommodations should be made for people who have that conscientious objection," he said. "That's something that's become an issue for people in the United Kingdom and the United States.

"If someone is working in a bureaucratic capacity and they're asked to process forms that are going against their conscientiously-held beliefs about marriage, and there's someone else in the department who is able and willing to do that sort of work, I can't see why someone who has that strong belief shouldn't be allowed to be rostered onto other duties, or that case given to someone else."

Asked what would happen if no-one else was available to do the work, Shelton said, "That would be an extremely unlikely situation".

The interview with Lyle Shelton will feature in BuzzFeed Australia’s podcast ‘Is it on?’. You can listen to it this weekend. View it on iTunes and subscribe here.

Intersex activist Sara Kelly Keenan spoke on behalf of the bill to the Senate Judiciary Committee on April 25, 2017.

California State Senate / Via senate.ca.gov

The California legislature passed a bill Thursday that would make the state the first in the US to widely recognize a third, nonbinary gender.

On May 31, the Gender Recognition Act, or Senate Bill 179, passed the California Senate with a 26-12 vote. On Wednesday, more than three months later, it passed the California Assembly with a 57-21 vote. The bill then went back to the Senate for approval of amendments made in the Assembly. On Thursday, SB 179 finally passed the legislature, one day before the deadline for bills to be passed this legislative session.

SB 179 now awaits a decision from Gov. Jerry Brown, who has not yet indicated whether he’ll make it law. As the bill passed the legislature on Thursday, intersex activist Sara Kelly Keenan told BuzzFeed News she’s “guardedly optimistic, because we still need the governor’s signature … until he signs on the dotted line, I’m not doing any jigs.”

BuzzFeed News first reported on the Gender Recognition Act in May. To its supporters, the bill is a leap forward for California at a time when the Trump administration is working to reverse Obama-era strides in LGBT rights nationwide. Activists predict the bill’s success will inspire other progressive states to recognize a third gender, too.

The legislation’s most significant act is adding “nonbinary” as an alternative option to “male” or “female“ on state-issued identity documents. On July 1, the state of Oregon began offering “X” in addition to “M” and “F” on state driver’s licenses and ID cards — the first in the nation to do so. But the California law is broader, applying to birth certificates in addition to licenses and IDs. It also makes it possible to legally change one’s gender to nonbinary in courts statewide.

Sen. Toni Atkins

Rich Pedroncelli / AP

Currently in California, only a handful of county courts have granted gender-change court orders to nonbinary citizens. Sara Kelly Keenan became the first to obtain one almost a year ago, on Sept. 26, 2016.

Beyond adding nonbinary as a gender-marker option, the bill also helps Californians looking to legally change their genders in general, removing requirements to obtain a doctor’s statement or appear in person in court, and streamlining the process for minors seeking to change their gender on their birth certificates.

“SB 179 will make things a lot easier for our transgender, nonbinary and intersex friends and neighbors,” the bill’s author, Democratic Sen. Toni Atkins, said in a statement following the assembly’s Wednesday vote, citing the stress and harassment that comes with showing one’s ID to law enforcement and other officials when it does not match one’s gender presentation.

“We need to make it easier for transgender and gender non-conforming people to live their lives as who they are, not who society says they’re supposed to be,” said her coauthor Sen. Scott Wiener, also a Democrat.

Gov. Brown’s deadline to sign or veto the law is Oct. 15. The governor is known for being progressive, but because SB 179 comes with some state expenses — including at least $500,000 for the DMV to make updates — the bill’s authors, sponsors, and supporters say they don’t know where Brown stands on the legislation.

The bill was announced by Atkins and Wiener, along with Equality California and the Transgender Law Center, in January. As it went through the legislature, the bill only faced opposition from religious organizations. It was widely supported by doctor, lawyer, and teacher groups, in addition to cities like Los Angeles and counties like Santa Clara.

LINK: California Is Ready To Recognize A Third Gender. Is The Rest Of The Country?