Daily Fail Mail writer Jan Moir’s article, originally titled Why there was nothing ‘natural’ about Stephen Gately’s death, has taken over Twitter, spawned a Facebook group and crashed a website that handles press complaints.

The piece, now titled A strange, lonely and troubling death…, has spawned the Twitter hashtag #thedailymailisgay and angry tweets about the article’s implications are coming at the rate of hundreds a minute. Moir’s conclusions are cringe-worthy, embarrassing to read and brings to mind the feeling one gets when an off-color remark is overheard at a party.

The general tone permeating the piece implies that Gately died, essentially, of his gayness. That homosexuality is somehow an inherent moral disease that eats away at a person, making the sudden death of an otherwise apparently healthy 33-year-old man not necessarily shocking. The fact that Gately was found by a man other than his partner (who stayed the night!!!) and that he’d >gasp< smoked cannabis sometime that evening are held up as proof that his death was not only to be expected, but it’s implicit that it was somehow deserved. What does one expect, hosting strange gay men for sleepovers and puffing the magic dragon? Nevermind that the UK as a whole is booze-soaked and marijuana has no recorded fatalities, he was a pot-smoking homo!

Reaction to the piece was quick and painful across the blogosphere. Twitter big shot Stephen Fry opined, “I gather a repulsive nobody writing in a paper no one of any decency would be seen dead with has written something loathesome and inhumane. . . .” and Brit news parody site satirized Moir’s angle with a similar hateful dismissal of her career:

One Mail reader told us, “All she did was speak the truth about Stephen Gately’s unusual death, because every Daily Mail reader knows that the gays can only die if you drive a wooden stake through their heart.”

“His death is very suspicious, maybe someone should think about interviewing all the immigrants, eh?”

Should you doubt Moir’s homophobia or want to give the woman the benefit of the doubt, pay close attention to this portion. While Moir’s implications are hateful and hurtful, she wraps it all up in a discriminatory bow at the end. Overlooking the much more plentiful instances of straight on straight violence, Moir doesn’t pass up the opportunity to cast aspersions on the many happy gay couples both in the UK and abroad:

Another real sadness about Gately’s death is that it strikes another blow to the happy-ever-after myth of civil partnerships.

Gay activists are always calling for tolerance and understanding about same-sex relationships, arguing that they are just the same as heterosexual marriages. Not everyone, they say, is like George Michael.

Of course, in many cases this may be true. Yet the recent death of Kevin McGee, the former husband of Little Britain star Matt Lucas, and now the dubious events of Gately’s last night raise troubling questions about what happened.

Daily Mail article on Gately’s death sparks social media outrage is a post from: The Inquisitr

As a contrite Kanye West apologized to the nation on Jay Leno’s show last night, President Barack Obama dissed him off the record in an ABC interview.

Obama was just chatting with ABC’s reporters when he let slip his opinion of the rapper’s now infamous MTV VMA awards outburst during Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech. Calling West a “jackass” wasn’t an official part of the interview, but ABC reporter Terry Moran let the comment slip on Twitter. And as we all know, what has been twote cannot be retracted, at least not after it hits all the major political gossip blogs and news aggregators.

ABC said in a statement:

“ABC News employees prematurely tweeted a portion of those remarks that turned out to be from an off-the-record portion of the interview.”

But Obama wasn’t the only one lashing out at Kanye harshly- former American Idol Kelly Clarkson penned a seething missive at the rapper on her blog:

What happened to you as a child?? Did you not get hugged enough?? Something must have happened to make you this way and I think we’re all just curious as to what would make a grown man go on national television and make a talented artist, let alone teenager, feel like sh*t. I mean, I’ve seen you do some pretty sh*tty things, but you just keep amazing me with your tactless, a*****e ways. It’s absolutely fascinating how much I don’t like you. I like everyone. I even like my a*****e ex that cheated on me over you…which is pretty odd since I don’t even personally know you. The best part of this evening is that you weren’t even up for THIS award and yet you still have a problem with the outcome. Is winning a moon man that much of a life goal?? You can have mine if it will shut you up. Is it that important, really??

Clarkson goes on to say that Kanye is “bitter” that Swift “outsold” him.

Obama calls West a jackass, Kelly Clarkson lashes out, too is a post from: The Inquisitr

AT&T has been trending heavily on Twitter of late, and not because of its friendship with the iPhone.

Adam Savage has invoked the wrath of 50,000 Twitter followers in the general direction of telecommunications giant AT&T due to a $11,000 phone bill incurred while Savage was in Canada. Savage says he surfed the web on a mobile modem for “a few hours,” inadvertently cha-chinging up a bill that could keep any sane person in hookers and blow for at least a month.

This series of tweets explains the pricey lappity-toppity session and the ensuing massive bill:

Sorry, bit of explanation: device in question wasn’t my phone, it was the AT&T usb connect Mercury modem.

And I got the “data is charged at .015 cents, or a penny and a half, per kb”. About to try to explain the difference to them. Sigh.

They’re claiming I uploaded/downloaded 9 million kilobytes (9 gigs) while in Canada. Frakking impossible.

@sleepingbri you read it right. $11,000.00

Did I mention they’ve turned off my phone until I pay? #attsucks

Almost forgot: Hey AT&T! I will fight this bullshit.

Text messaging fees are stupid robbery? (they are), AT&T is attempting to charge me 11k for a few hours of web surfing in Canada. Pls RT!

Savage soon updated that AT&T was quick to quash the spurious charges after the fast and furious backlash:

Today the tweeps became twoops. Just got off the phone with AT&T and they’ve taken care of everything to my great satisfaction.#twitterrules

But would any of us have received the same quick and painless resolution? On that, Savage says:

I agree with everyone: it shouldn’t just work for me. The data carriers MUST stop thinking in kilobytes and start thinking in customers.

Adam Savage mobilizes Twitter against AT&T is a post from: The Inquisitr