Best. Gay. Week. Ever! Let's Talk Safer Sex!

ANNOUNCING THIS YEAR'S VISIBILITY AWARDS HOST ... NEIL PATRICK HARRIS!
Like many businesses, the end of the year gets pretty hectic around here as we balance the books, hide the bodies, and fight over the freebies sent by the networks. (I'm still mad I didn't get the CSI "Do it Yourself Autopsy Kit!")

Not only do we have the Visibility Awards to get all shiny and polished to hand out to this year's winners on Monday, we also had to write up articles looking back at the year in TV, Movies, Music, Coming Out and so forth. All of that is on top of our usual recaps, articles and posts. And then there are the usual unexpected things to cover like John Cameron Mitchell's people calling us at the last minute to attend a screening of Mitchell's new movie Rabbit Hole starring Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart. And then we had to interview Mitchell the next day.

On top of all of that, I have to get ready to head off to the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour right after the holiday break. I swear, all of this is enough to make an editor so nutty he requested another interview with Russell T Davies. (On, no I didn't! Oh, yes, I did!)

The point is, I got soooo busy this week, I almost canceled today's column. But knowing that one or two of you would be deeply disappointed, while others would let out a mighty cheer, I was determined to not let either happen. So may I now present you the second to last BGWE column of 2010!

Oh, and I was kidding about Neil handing out Visibility Awards. The winners can pick up their trophies before 5 PM Monday. Otherwise, I'll just leave them outside the front door.

NOW WHY COULDN'T HAVE RON HOWARD HAVE DONE THAT?
This week XfinityTV.com reported that TNT's Men of a Certain Age dropped the dialogue "Books are gay" from Monday night's episode after XfinityTV asked the show about using that particular phrase. The dialogue, uttered by a teenager, was dubbed over to say "Books are lame" and a source on the show said Mike Royce, the show's executive producer, had the word changed because a future scene showing the same teenager getting admonished for his homophobia didn't make the final cut of that particular episode. The source also added, "We didn't want to look like a bunch of wankers like Vince Vaughn and Ron Howard and risk having AfterElton make fun of us."

THAT MIGHT BE OVERSTATING THINGS A BIT, NO?
Remember that funny Air New Zealand inflight safety video that featured the All Black Rugby team, as well as a gay flight attendant asking one of the players for a kiss, which the player declines? Well, it turns out a professor in New Zealand complained to the airline that the scene could lead to more suicides by gay men and now Air New Zealand has deleted the scene.

I have to confess that I found that moment a bit ... odd, but will it lead to more gay suicides? Um, no. So while I appreciate the airline being so sensitive, I have to say I agree with Will Coxhead, the gay flight attendant in the video, who said, "Obviously there are some people in the gay community that can be a little precious and need to lighten up."

Next page! Let's talk about (safer) sex, baby!