The United States of America is kind of divided on the whole homosexuality issue.

A new study produced by the University of Chicago surveyed public opinion across the country to find out which regions are more accepting to gay people. The country averages show that overall opinion is fractionated. While 44% of people surveyed said that homosexuality is “always wrong,” a close 41% said it’s “not wrong at all.” The opinions of the unaccounted for 15% weren’t made available, though Jezebel speculates that it could be those who are okay with acts of homosexuality if the two individuals are hot (*cough*most guys when girls make out*cough*)

Having an outside (Canadian) perspective the results aren’t all that surprising. The worst tolerance was found in the South Central states, with a whopping 73.7% of adults saying it’s always wrong in Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee. This is followed closely by 68.1% of people in the Western South Central Regions.

The most accepting regions start with New England (27% saying it’s always wrong), which is not surprising since Massachusetts legalized same sex marriage in 2004. The region with the second lowest intolerance rate is the Pacific (37.5%), which counts Alaska, California, Hawaii and Oregon.

There are so many factors in how people choose which side of the fence they sit on when it comes to homosexuality. Some people will cite biblical passages to condone certain sexual orientations, while I know people who will say that under the New Testament people should simply “love all of God’s creations.”

But whatever the reasons you believe what you do, one thing that has been on the rise (in the media, at least) is the number of LGBTQ-indentifying young adults, which is something you should think about before you open your mouth to make a derogatory comment.

October is National Bullying Prevention Month, so let’s be a little less snarky or critical of our classmates and start setting a good example for our younger sibs. Okay?

[It's pretty obvious that the average CollegeCandy reader has some very strong opinions. Opinions that she likes to share with everyone on the site. Sometimes with mean words. We love a strong woman (unless she happens to be charging at us with her fists raised), so we thought we'd give her a real forum to discuss her thoughts, feelings, and perspectives. Every Friday I'll be featuring a hot topic (like flat rate tuition!) and leaving it up to you, the readers, to duke it out. So, read it and get your debate on in the comments section below!]

Last week, the Senate voted not to repeal the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy – a policy that’s essentially a band-aid for the absence of gay rights in the military. The policy, which was introduced in 1993, has essentially stood all of this time as a way of saying ‘you can be gay in the military, as long as nobody knows about it’. It looked close for a while there, but ultimately the policy stands – even though Obama actually campaigned on changing the policy and his administration is openly opposed to it – and I think it’s time we had OUR say.

As I’ve said before, I’m not unbiased on this issue, but regardless of my own personal moral compass being pro-gay rights, there are also some compelling reasons why the policy should be repealed. For starters, under this policy anyone who comes out or is outed in the military is given a dishonorable discharge, no matter how well they were actually doing their job. That means that we’re actively spending military budget on getting rid of military personnel regardless of the quality of their work or the necessity of their position, which, considering how much trouble there already is with military budgeting, seems like a massive waste. There’s also the very obvious fact that this is the AMERICAN military and if it were any other position, say, at an American business perhaps, a person could sue for being fired over their sexuality – because it’s freakin’ illegal!

Suffice to say it’s pretty backassward that our own laws don’t apply the same way to our protective body as they do to the public.

One of the big arguments against repealing the policy is the fact that it’s going to take a lot of work and since the system as it stands functions reasonably effectively, to throw a big restructuring in right now would just mess things up for everybody. Now on the one hand, I see a point in this argument, because yes, the military is doing tough stuff at a tough time and they’re doing the best job they can. Yes, massive restructuring to deal with changing policies and deal with things like housing – where do LGBT soldiers live? With their own gender? The opposite? – as well as overall attitudes and the general social unrest that major changes like this cause, would be a serious burden on the system and would likely make it work less effectively for a time.

But then again, if that’s the rationale, then there’s really never a good time to restructure anything. The military always does tough stuff at tough times and it will always upset the system to have major changes; that didn’t stop the military from desegregating in the ’40s.

OK, what do you have to say? Is ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ a blotch on our historical record? Does it desperately need to be repealed? Or has the policy been working so far so why fix what’s not broken? Should we wait for another, better, time to make a major effort like this?

Duke it out!

After years of fighting off rumors about his sexuality, Latin singer Ricky Martin has finally just posted the following message on his official Web site, coming out and telling the world he is gay.

“Today is my day, this is my time, and this is my moment. These years in silence and reflection made me stronger and reminded me that acceptance has to come from within and that this kind of truth gives me the power to conquer emotions I didn’t even know existed … I am proud to say that I am a fortunate homosexual man. I am very blessed to be who I am,” he wrote.

“What will happen from now on? It doesn’t matter. I can only focus on what’s happening to me in this moment. The word ‘happiness’ takes on a new meaning for me as of today. It has been a very intense process. Every word that I write in this letter is born out of love, acceptance, detachment and real contentment. Writing this is a solid step towards my inner peace and vital part of my evolution,” Marin continues.

Why is Ricky Martin coming out now? Read the rest right here!

It’s back-to-school time, and I’ve been spending some time lately thinking about what college means for our sex lives. College is our time to explore anything that interests us to find out what we really like and what type of people we want to become. We explore different majors, career paths, friendships, relationships, and sexualities. College is the first time in our lives most of us can really embrace our sexuality, explore it, and figure out how to truly enjoy it.

I go to a women’s college, so my first year was filled with questions from friends back home asking if I’d become a lesbian. My answer: so what if I had? And why did they care?

Despite the freedom we gain in college from adults, we are still constrained by our peers’ expectations of us, which can make it difficult to remain true to ourselves and create a healthy personal (and sexual) identity.

Here are some tips I hope you girls (and guys) can keep in mind while exploring sex in college.

It’s OK to be a virgin.
This had to come first because I think a lot of students are under the impression that there aren’t any virgins left in college, or that it’s weird to be a virgin in college. It’s completely normal to be a virgin in college and you should never feel pressured to “lose it” just to fit in.

There are more than three sexualities.
Most people think of sexuality in three categories: gay, straight, or bi. Most people, however, don’t fit neatly into these three categories. I prefer to see sexuality as a spectrum, ranging from completely heterosexual to completely homosexual, with the majority of people falling somewhere in between. Wherever you fall on the spectrum, or even if you don’t know where you fall on the spectrum, you are NORMAL. Don’t ever change yourself to fit someone else’s expectations of you.

Casual sex can be HARD.
Casual sex may seem like the norm in college, but don’t let that trick you into thinking it’s an easy solution to your sexual frustrations. Casual sex can be great if you’re horny and not looking for any type of attachment, but it can also result in a lot of painful feelings if one person cares more than the other. Make sure you know what you’re getting into before you have sex with anyone, be aware that you might get hurt, and USE PROTECTION no matter what.

Monogamy isn’t a golden standard.
Our society tends to regard monogamy as the natural result of romantic relationships, and this isn’t necessarily true. Some people are happy in monogamous relationships, some aren’t. Many college students explore open relationships or multiple relationships. Find out what type of relationship makes you happiest and pursue it.

Every day, thousands of people turn to Yahoo.com’s readers to ask some very…er…interesting questions. Because other people’s stupidity makes us laugh, we spend a good 2/3rds of our online time perusing the questions to make us feel better about ourselves. (Other 1/3 of our time? TFLN, of course.)

And while the questions are often really disturbing, we totally get why people turn to the interwebs to ask them. After all, would you ever want to ask your BFF this question face to face?

But this question – well, this one totally takes the cake. Who knew there were people this dumb out there?

See what the Yahoo community had to say here.

Ok, so a lot of you didn’t like us ripping into California yesterday – we get it. And we’re sorry for being mean and rude and stereotypical, but we were just. so. angry. This whole Prop 8 thing has us really heated up – we can’t sleep, we can’t work, and we can’t stop drowning our anger and tears in whatever food happens to be in our sights (yes, that includes a near frozen waffle).

We are just baffled by some people’s blatant disrespect for others, not to mention their need to control something that has nothing to do with them. We really feel that sexuality is fluid, that anyone (yup, even you) could one day find yourself in love with someone of the same sex…and that there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Because this topic is so near and dear to our hearts right now – and since we don’t have the money to fly out to California and beat those idiots into submission – we thought we’d have a chat with our boys about sexuality. Granted, our boy doesn’t speak for all boys (especially on this topic), but he is always so insightful. And he was the only one awake this morning at 4am when we couldn’t sleep and needed someone to vent to while we shoveled pudding into our mouths to heal our battered hearts…

Got something you want our dude to discuss? Let us know in the comments below and we’ll be sure to get his thoughts!

Marriage isn’t a right; it’s a privilege. Depending on the time, place, and partner, getting married could be harder than getting into Harvard, if not downright impossible. As recently as fifty years ago, miscegenation laws would have forbid me from marrying my boyfriend (or any man not my race) in certain areas of the United States. Before that, the legal and social benefits to getting married were denied to minorities, immigrants, and the poor for centuries. Marriage is, for lack of a better analogy, membership into the biggest country club in the world.

For me, getting married would be a personal endorsement of some of the worst societal norms in existence.

The supposed “right” to marry has never been much of a right at all, and our understanding of marriage as a basic liberty is unique to contemporary times. Thanks to my predisposition for heterosexuality, it’s a liberty I could easily exercise, but I’d much rather march in a rally than down an aisle, because I find it difficult to take part in a practice that is denied to others (plenty of them my friends). Even with the best of intentions, I can’t imagine that my own wedding will serve any purpose but to reinforce existing norms, such as the idea that a relationship is only valuable if recognized by a third-party institution.

It’s ironic, then, that I consider marriage equality an extremely important political issue, and the only one to which I’ve devoted significant time and money. Why should a feminist support the inclusion of queer people in what is historically a sexist institution? Besides the “separate but equal” disaster that civil unions would create, I think same-sex marriage might just be the only way to save marriage as an institution.

Critics of marriage equality often claim that it will lead to the demise of traditional marriage, while supporters insist that nothing will change by allowing queer people to marry. Though I share little else in common with them, I agree with the former group. It’s disingenuous, or at the very least, naive, to suggest that legalizing same-sex marriage won’t threaten traditional marriage. It absolutely will, and I hope it does. Traditional marriage is an institution that has historically treated women as property and men as property owners. It has fueled our culture’s obsession with virginity and female purity, while justifying the rape of child brides and the battering of women who dare to not serve their husbands. A half-century’s worth of gender equality under Western law neither creates equality in practice nor does it negate thousands of years of subjugation.

Recognizing same-sex relationships may very well be the only thing that can keep marriage a relevant social institution. Same-sex marriage subverts the gender roles that have dominated marriage — and by extension, society — for the great majority of human history. Every gay marriage is a statement against antiquated roles and practices we’ve come to take for granted. (Who, for example, walks down the aisle in a gay wedding ceremony?) Marriage is far more appealing a notion when I think of queer couples getting hitched without white dresses and gendered proposals. Accepting gay marriage also means rejecting one of the most enduring aspects of traditional marriage: its exclusivity. No longer would marriage be a privilege of the appropriately heterosexual.

I’m not holding my breath, but if this long-suffering institution changes, then perhaps my opinion of it will too. Because frankly, I wish I could get married. I wish I could don a white wedding gown without having to think about its sexually repressive implications as much as I wish I lived in a society without prerequisites for legal recognition of romantic relationships. Unfortunately, that isn’t this society, at least not yet. Perhaps we’ll never get there in my lifetime, but if that’s the case, then to paraphrase Groucho Marx, I wouldn’t want to join a club that would have me as a member anyway.

I know what you’re thinking: Neil Patrick Harris is a looker and all, but uh, doesn’t he bat for the other team? You would be right about that, but for this week’s GWWE (or would that be, GGWWE- Gay Guy We Wanna Eff?) I’m longing for that boy-he’s-so-awesome-maybe-I-can-score-a-conversion-eff.

Can you blame me? I’ve had a hard time keeping my temperature down since Neil was sporting lab coats in Doogie Howser, MD. He had everything my teenage heart desired: good looks, great smarts, and a stethoscope (what better way to hear my pulse beating, “eff-me, eff-me, eff-me”?).

And Mr. Harris beat the child-star stereotypes to become a successful (and sexy) entertainer. He has been seen most recently in the hit series How I Met Your Mother, but is also well known for his hilarious portrayal of—well, himself—in Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle. But best of all, he starred in the web-based mini-movie Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, as a mad scientist in love with pretty Penny from the laundromat. Was it absolutely hysterical? Yes. Did I superimpose my own image over Penny’s to imagine Dr. Eff Me singing and pleading for my affections? Maybe.

So what has our hunk been up to lately? Just this past weekend, Neil hosted Saturday Night Live to rave reviews (don’t worry, you can catch all the effable clips online). And, yeah, he’s been out in the open about his committed relationship with fellow actor David Burtka. I’m very glad to know the two are happy, but as a memo to perennial physician NPH, if you ever want to learn about the female anatomy, you can come play doctor with me anytime.

So for those of you who have been faithfully watching this season of Grey’s Anatomy, I’m sure you are equally as stunned, fascinated, and intrigued by Calli’s decision to play for both teams. Her relationship with heart surgeon, Dr. Erica Hahn, has been heating up our T.V. sets the last few weeks and has definitely created some OMG moments. But it looks like ABC isn’t feeling this girl-on-girl action, or the character in general.In a sudden turn of events, Erica Hahn, played by Brooke Smith, has been written off the show. Writer Shonda Rhimes had no part in the decision making, but rather was taking orders from the network, citing they had issues with the level of inappropriateness of Calli’s thoughts about Erica (ventures south of the border, playing with the girls, etc.), as well as issues with Dr. Hahn’s overall character.

After last week’s revelation of her homosexuality, Dr. Hahn will be making her last appearence at Seattle Grace in this weeks episode.

(WARNING: SPOILER!!)

Enter new intern, Sadie…aka Meredith’s best friend… aka Meredith’s bisexual best friend.

On November 13, Melissa George will be joining the Grey’s cast playing a new intern who also goes both ways.

What the eff?!

So many questions!!

Why kick Hahn off in the first place?

Did this Sadie character do some experimenting with BFF Meredith?!

Will Sadie be a new interset for Dr. Torres?!?!

Guess we will just have to tune in to find out…but either way, this Thursday is Hahn’s last day in Seattle Grace and will she be missed?

a) a crazy, graphic display of plastic surgery

b) kinky sex

c) Dr. Troy being a creepy and naked

d) Dr. Troy having kinky sex, and of course

e) that one moment in the show where I’m like, “holy sh%$ that is messed up!”

But last night’s episode caught me totally off guard when it became quite obvious that Julia, MacNamara’s ex wife, was playing for “the other team.” Huh? And with the hot and beautiful girlfriend of Ellen Degeneres, Portia de Rossi, no less! I seriously never saw this one coming. I mean, think about it: Julia had been married to a hot plastic surgeon for years, she’s a mom and she’s even sexed it up kinky style with Troy a few times. Is this not hetero behavior?

Yet when Julia went to LA to introduce/explain her current lady love affair to the boys, she didn’t come out and say, yeah I’ve been into chicks all of this time. She explained to MacNamara that it was all about the “connection” and the fact that the communication and sex were easier.

Hmmm … First I thought, how in god’s name is the sex easier? But then, I began to wonder, is sexual preference really about the connection? Can the actual person, despite gender really be what seals the deal?

I believe that there’s a something I’d like to call a “sexual spectrum.” Some people take the status quo – “I’m a girl so obviously I like boys” ; some go full fledged homosexual – “I knew I was ‘different’ when I developed a crush on Sally in middle school” ; and some just sit in that gray area – “I’m into guys, but I like kissing girls.” You can’t really pigeon hole those in-betweeners because they swing both ways, and well, that just makes a lot of us uncomfortable. We all fall into one of these areas and I think where we are (or where we’ve been) really depends on how open we are to experience the taboo. Because yes, there was that one night in college …

It’s safe to say that Julia falls into the latter of the categories. We’ll just have to wait and see if she continues on with her lady friend with others following (despite her obvious future rendez-vous with Troy as blatantly displayed in the previews for the next episode) or if she eventually chalks it all up to some “phase.”