One of the three remaining Backstreet Boys, Nick Carter talked to gay newsmagazine The Advocate about the new album the group has just released and the tour they’re about to go on. He was also asked about appearing on and in gay magazines back in the late 90s.

You did an Advocate “Big Gay Following” interview with Brandon Voss a few years ago, and years back, in 1997, you were a cover model for XY, a magazine for gay teens. Not everyone in a boy band would be so involved with gay press, and these have followed you for years, for better or worse. If you did something like XY now and you were the same age and at the same stage in your career, do you think it would be such a big deal?

I don’t think it would be as much of a big deal. I really don’t. Honestly, I have so many gay friends, family members who are gay… it’s not a big deal to me. It may have been a big deal back in the day when I was young, but, you know, whatever. It’s part of our culture now and that’s what’s great about it. People accept it now. I love it.

I remember ‘N Sync doing an interview with the Advocate years ago but I don’t remember reading a Backstreet Boys one, though it’s nice to know they were inclusive of their gay fanbase. From what I remember though, Kevin (who is no longer in the group) was the most gay-friendly of the bunch.

Anyone who is my age (early twenties) and was into teen pop as a kid must remember this Backstreet Boys concert where A.J. sang “Lay Down Beside Me” and humped the floor. I rewound this video so many times I broke the VCR.

Mr. Foxx recently paid a visit to Conan to promote his latest film Law Abiding Citizen (which actually did quite well at the box office this weekend) and during the interview O’Brien brought up that infamous bathroom picture of Jamie naked that surfaced on the internet not too long ago.

Jamie finally confirmed that the picture is indeed him and explained the story behind it. Which then prompted him to talk about how vocal his gay fanbase in Atlanta is.

Chocolate hottie Mehcad Brooks whom you may recognize from HBO’s True Blood or from season two of Desperate Housewives reveals in an interview with Honey Magazine that he refuses to get married until gay people have the same right.

Do you consider yourself the marrying kind? Do you want that?
I haven’t even gotten that far. But yeah, I want a wife, I want kids. The whole thing. But I’m also not even concerned with marrying somebody until it’s legal for everybody to get married. And what I mean by that is the whole Prop 8 thing.

Why is that cause so important to you?
I find it really offensive. I just find it really problematic when you start throwing people’s rights away. Until we get our gay brothers and sisters back into a realm of consciousness that everyone else is in, it’s just not right. A woman who’s getting married — it’s probably going to be a gay man who made her dress, and a gay man who’s doing her hair and makeup, but he can’t get married. How messed up is that?

His next project is a film by X-Files creator Chris Carter called Fencewalkers, which for whatever reason still has no plot description listed.

Now I’m off to finally watch the True Blood finale!

By now I’m sure everyone’s heard the news, beloved actor and 80s dance icon Patrick Swayze has succumbed to pancreatic cancer at the age of 57.

His publicist, Annett Wolf, told The Associated Press in Los Angeles that Mr. Swayze died with family at his side. Mr. Swayze’s cancer was diagnosed in January 2008. Six months after that, he had already outlived his prognosis and was filmed at an airport, smiling at photographers and calling himself, only half-facetiously, “a miracle dude.” He even went through with plans to star in “The Beast,” a new drama series for A&E, and filmed a complete season while undergoing treatment. Mr. Swayze insisted on continuing with the series. “How do you nurture a positive attitude when all the statistics say you’re a dead man?” he said to Bill Carter of The New York Times last October. “You go to work.”

My favorite Swayze films were definitely To Wong Foo, Ghost, and Dirty Dancing.  I had a professor in college who worked as a local news reporter and he said of all the celebrities he’d interviewed Patrick was the absolute nicest one.

We’ll miss you Sam Wheat!

Months ago when reports were swirling of Patrick being near death, Whoopi Goldberg declared on The View that she owed her Oscar to him.

A male reporter embarrassed himself and George Clooney at the Venice Film Festival when he removed his shirt and proclaimed he wanted George to “take him now”.

Matt Damon and Steven Soderbergh talk more about “The Informant”, the film where Damon had to gain 30 lbs to play a man who blows the whistle on his company’s price-fixing scheme.

A gay man in Thunder Bay, Canada was brutally beaten by six to eight men with bricks, and will now require reconstructive surgery to deal with the damage done to his face.

Openly gay Representative Barney Frank is eyeing a position in the Obama cabinet.  I doubt it will happen, but if it did he’d be the first gay person ever in the Presidential cabinet.

Ntozake Shange was slated to write and direct the film adaptation of her play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf, but now Tyler Perry has stolen the entire film from her.

Female UK prison officer wins case against correctional facility she claims treated her unfairly for being young, female, and pretty.

More tour dates have been canceled for homophobic Jamaican singer Buju Banton.  One of his most popular songs talks about shooting gays and burning their bodies.

Proud, admitted homophobe Tim Hardaway is now working hard to save gay lives.  He says “we don’t have to accept the act, but we have to accept them as people.” How generous of you.

Jon Gosselin of Jon & Kate Plus 8 fame did an interview with Good Morning America to set the record straight and let his voice be heard about the saga with his wife Kate post their high profile break-up.  I haven’t read all the details about what ended their relationship but as someone who used to be a loyal viewer of the program I have to say the reason I stopped watching it was because I couldn’t stand how Kate treated Jon in most episodes.

She was a serious control freak and constantly dominating him all the time, and as he says, she verbally abused him and even slapped him on the face on numerous occasions (and actually thought it was cute and funny), as shown by the clip.  I don’t like seeing people being treated unfairly or taken advantage of by their partners regardless of their sex. 

Transgendered activist Melissa Sue Brown runs for Mayor of Nampa, Idaho, but many people aren’t convinced she has a chance in one of the most conservative communities in the nation.

FOXSexpert Dr. Yvonne K. Fulbright debunks 8 sex myths about women, including my favorite “she always needs an emotional connection for sex”.

The infamous pastor Steve Anderson (who admittedly is kind of cute) thinks America is controlled by homosexuals.  He also claims that all homosexuals are pedophiles including Barney Frank.

Desperate Housewives star Dana Delany became co-president of the Creative Coalition.  It’s important to get as many woman as possible in positions dealing with funding for arts and entertainment.

Fall Out Boy’s Pete Wentz has a guy who’s job is specifically to pull up his pants during his shows.  I’m sure there’s plenty of men (and women) who’d do that job for free.

Dan Savage, whom you might know from his famous blog or from his appearances on Real Time With Bill Maher, is taping his own pilot for HBO called “Savage Love”

During a recent sit down with Donald Trump, late night talk show host David Letterman said “anybody who wants to get married ought to be able to get married.”

Conservative organization Focus on the Family has laid off a number of workers again, after already having done so twice earlier this year.