President, VP observe International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia

http://twitter.com/#!/AprilDRyan/status/467416992853405696 http://twitter.com/#!/jbendery/status/467417512565407746

Is it a White House first? An evolved President Obama has issued a formal statement commemorating Saturday’s International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia, or #IDAHOT.

Tomorrow, as we commemorate the 10th annual International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia, we recommit ourselves to the fundamental belief that all people should be treated equally, that they should have the opportunity to reach their fullest potential, and that no one should face violence or discrimination — no matter who they are or whom they love.

At a time when, tragically, we are seeing increased efforts to criminalize or oppress LGBT persons, we call on partners everywhere to join us in defending the equal rights of our LGBT brothers and sisters, and in ensuring they are treated with the dignity and respect they deserve.

Vice President Joe Biden tweeted in observance himself, as did Valerie Jarrett.

http://twitter.com/#!/vj44/status/467422896739352576

In a true show of international effort, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon tweeted as well.

http://twitter.com/#!/UN/status/467077192057643009

President Obama isn’t the only one to have evolved. The organizers of IDAHOT (formerly IDAHO) are considering updating their branding. “We are currently in our communications promoting May 17th as the ‘Global Day to Celebrate sexual and gender diversities,’ which we believe is the most inclusive formulation possible.”

Read more: http://twitchy.com/2014/05/16/president-vp-observe-international-day-against-homophobia-and-transphobia/

People Are Harassing Government MPs With Hilarious Apple iMessages

MPs are linking their work emails to Apple devices. UPDATE: attorney general George Brandis de-links email from work account.

Software engineer Justin Simon discovered that it was possible to send an iMessage to Australia’s attorney general George Brandis on Sunday.

Simon appeared to enter in Brandis’ publicly available work email, ‘senator.brandis@aph.gov.au’, in the iMessage app and discovered he had linked it to his Apple device.

aph.gov.au

It effectively means anyone can send an iMessage to Mr Brandis, who has been leading the government’s controversial mandatory metadata collection efforts.

A group of Twitter users started bombarding Mr Brandis with questions and posting the results.

— bencjenkins (@Ben Jenkins)

— elockwood_ (@Emily Lockwood)

— shoerust (@Wil Southers)

Oh god I could do this all day

— laureningram (@Lauren Ingram)

Harassing senators off the line

— LukeVurens (@Luke Vurens)

Simon even started finding other MPs who have their publicly available emails linked to an Apple device.

brandis isn’t the only one

— wordsonaplatfrm (@justin s)

A list of government MPs that have emails linked to iMessage include, health minister Sussan Ley, environment minister Greg Hunt, industry and science minister Ian Macfarlane, justice minister Michael Keenan, Nationals MP Luke Hartsuyker, Liberal MP Bob Baldwin and the prime minister’s parliamentary secretary Christian Porter.

They all have their work emails linked to Apple’s iMessage app.

BuzzFeed News obtained one message sent to environment minister Greg Hunt, suggesting the government MPs are receiving the messages.

Supplied

BuzzFeed News has called (and iMessaged) Mr Brandis’ office and asked for comment.

UPDATE: Attorney general George Brandis appears to have de-linked his work email from the iMessage App.

Mark Di Stefano/BuzzFeed

Read more: http://www.buzzfeed.com/markdistefano/brandis-trolled