A New Queer TV Series, A Lesbian Cleans House, and Manson . . . More Popular Than Gays?

NYC’s queer club culture gets a series from the folks behind Gaycation, A Senate leader is out and proud, and Manson gets a sweet sendoff from homophobes.

Whose House?

The queer ballroom scene has been around for decades, but only surfaces in the mainstream when a hit like “Vogue” or Paris Is Burning rolls around. Now Viceland — the network that brought you Gaycation, is debuting My House, billed as “an insider’s guide to New York City’s hyper-competitive underground queer ballroom scene.” According to promoters, the show revolves around the lives of six “inimitable and fierce voguers — Tati 007, Alex Mugler, Jelani Mizrahi, Lolita Balenciaga and Relish Milan — while the ultimate expert, Precious Ebony, a bold and brazen commentator on the scene, lays out the rules, the rivalries and all the dramas in between.”

The show intends to use its first season to track its cast and their respective “houses” according to press reports, as they follow “each voguer’s intensely personal familial team, as they prepare to compete while still facing personal challenges and striving to take their art to a higher level.”

Cleaning House — and Senate

The California Senate has a lesbian in charge now, as Sen. Toni Atkins was elected the first LGBT person and first woman to lead the Senate on a promise of changing the culture in Sacramento awash in sexual misconduct allegations.

The San Diego Democrat was formally elected Senate pro tempore Wedesday and took the oath of office administered by Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye in the Capitol Rotunda surrounded by the flags of the United States, the state of California — and the rainbow flag.

As Atkins declared triumphantly, “It’s the first time. And it’s about time,” But, she added, “I came to the Senate to make progress, not history.”

There’s much work to be done in the Golden state, which is mired in conflict over budget negotiations, the upcoming midterm elections and its own grappling with sexual misconduct issues.

And Finally: God’s House

There’s nothing quite like being considered less desirable than a cult leading mass murderer, is there?

The deeply homophobic Porterville Church of the Nazarene in California held a touching service for convict Charles Manson over the weekend. Manson, of course, was one of the most infamous figures of the last half century, and was held legally responsible for the murders of seven people in 1969, including the eight-months pregnant actress Sharon Tate, coffee heiress Abigail Folger, Jay Sebring (who had several successful hair-related enterprises), and four others. As if that wasn’t enough, another of the so-called Manson “family,” Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme showed up in Sacramento one day in 1975 to try to assassinate then-President Gerald Ford.

Manson died this past November in prison while serving a life sentence. A legal battle over his remains followed in the wake of his death, which Manson’s grandson Jason Freeman recently “won.” (What was second prize?)

How did Porterville pastor Mark Pitcher eulogize Manson in his sermon? Well, according to the rev, Manson “was born into an unhealthy environment to a 16-year-old girl who was not prepared for motherhood. He was a product of his environment, and that unhealthy environment followed him.”

This, mind you, is the same pastor who has vociferously opposed same-sex marriage and has preached that gay people can become heterosexual — if they’d just pray hard enough.

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