Without the controversy of Civil Unions legislation, General Election bickering or the downfall of paedophile religious leaders, 2006 should have been a dream year for glbt folk, right? Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, no. Plenty of candidates eagerly raised their hands to be included in our ten of the foulest things about 2006 list, and they are, in alphabetical order... BOB CLARKSON MP Boorish to the max, Clarkson could not be left off this list after he likened the unacceptability of homosexuality to "picking ones nose in public." It's bad enough that the Tauranga area has been for years represented by the macho posturings of Winston Peters who has made it clear he has no time for gays, but now Clarkson shows he is of the same mold. What is it with Tauranga voters? THE EXCLUSIVE BRETHREN People in windowless compounds shouldn't write cheques, especially when they collude with desperate conservative politicians with leaky email inboxes. Despite not voting and abstaining from social contact with the real world, this bunch of overseas-influenced religious nutters decided New Zealand was careening out of control into an oblivion of godless homosexuality and other social 'evils.' Sadly for them, gladly for us, the Brethren were revealed this year to have funded a massive campaign during the last general election to turn voters away from the more progressive and glbt-friendly parties like the Greens and Labour and Progressives, and into the icy bosom of the BrashNats. KIWIFRUIT We're damned if we have to be abjectly grateful to NZ On Air, TV2 and Cream TV for the funding and airing of a locally made glbt 'lifestyle' TV series. The travesty that was Kiwifruit was meant to reflect our lives and culture but too often disappeared down the gurgler of showoff presenters and camp sophistry, tainted by the sub-agenda of gay folk prancing their egos across the screen for the infotainment of straight viewers. Is there a living soul who can prove the show's much-vaunted lesbian puppets weren't 'scripted' by straight women? Amanda Rees and a good special on 20 years of Law Reform were two of the miserably few highlights of a dismal series which hit rock bottom with 'Cooking with mince' and which NZ on Air and TV2 finally revealed was despised by most glbt people. Our GayNZ.com poll and message board postings revealed that months earlier! ROSEMARY MCLEOD What is it with Rosemary? Has some awful midlife crisis changed the bottle blonde one from the sensible and insightful Listener columist of years ago into the bitter and obsessive Sunday Star Times hag, er, hack of today? Rosemary seems to have decided that gays and lesbians are the root of all social evils and that our visibility in politics and other fields of endeavour shows we're working hard to destroy... well, everything! Memo to Rosemary: gays and lesbians have always been in politics and everywhere, we were just too fearful of the kind of brutality stirred up by sentiments like yours to be visible. PS: Times have changed! NZ CRICKET AND WESTPACTRUST STADIUM In the balmy Napier sun two straight party girls kissed each other for the benefit of the big screen cameras. The lads in the crowd loved it, but not so the security guard who threatened them with ejection from the grounds. Or Cricket NZ who backed him up. Or Wellington's WestpacTrust Stadium manager who made it clear that same-sex kissing would be unacceptable at forthcoming matches in his venue. It just got squirmily more and more depressing, until even a placatory statement by Westpac that they did not endorse such a homophobic stance and a late-run apology by the stadium manager couldn't get rid of the foul stench of homophobia surrounding this debacle. NZ DATING NZ's biggest internet dating website keeps its head in the sand and its R GayNZ.com staff - 1st January 2007