ESPN has apologized for airing a segment in which a reporter asked members of the St. Louis Rams about showering with Michael Sam, the first openly gay player in the NFL. "ESPN regrets the manner in which we presented our report," the network said in a statement. "Clearly on Tuesday we collectively failed to meet the standards we have set in reporting on LGBT-related topics in sports."

Reporter Josina Anderson was covering the Rams when she asked players about how Sam is integrating with the team. While most players said he was fitting in just fine, one unnamed teammate declared he was "respecting their space" and seemed to suggest Sam was waiting to take showers. Anderson then quizzed other players about Sam's showering schedule. To their credit, they told her "they weren't tracking" his bathroom habits.

ESPN first tried to justify the piece, stating "In response to recent questions about Sam fitting in with the team, the Rams brought up the shower topic and we relayed that information as part of our reporting." But when a flood of critical posts starring flooding the Web, the net changed its tune.

Anderson hasn't issued a statement about the clip or addressed it on social media.

Family Circle magazine is giving itself a makeover next month, matching its new design with a new outlook aimed at making the 82-year-old periodical more relevant inclusive.

Among those changes is a new feature, "Modern Life," which highlights nontraditional families—including gay parents, adoptive families and multi-religious clans.

“I didn’t think we were doing the best job of addressing all the different types of families,” says editor-in-chief Linda Fears tells AdWeek. “We thought shows like Modern Family were actually doing a better job.”

Fears says she expects to get a few complaints, "but this is the way Americans live—for us to be as widely inclusive as possible, we have to reflect real families.”

In a joint statement, Maj. Gen. Gale S. Pollock, former acting Surgeon General of the Army; Brig. Gen. Clara Adams Ender, former chief of the U.S. Army Nurse Corps; and Brig. Gen. Thomas A. Kolditz, a professor emeritus at West Point, said “allowing transgender personnel to serve openly is administratively feasible and will not be burdensome or complicated... Implementation could proceed immediately and will be successful in its execution."

A report for the Palm Center notes that more than 15,000 trans service members are already in the military, although not openly.  “This is a little different than ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the Palm Center's Aaron Belkin said. “With transgender inclusion, you don’t want to just get rid of the ban and do nothing. There are a few steps, but those steps aren’t difficult... It’s not rocket science to have a diverse military.”

More than a dozen countries already allow trans people to service openly including Israel, Germany, the UK and Australia.

In addition to the items the group ordered, the receipt included a line reading "mi raccomando so ricchioni" ("Ricchioni" is an Italian slang word for "faggot.")

One of the men told Brindissi Oggi that the homophobic server has been sacked.

We went to the owner of the restaurant to ask for an explanation. He was speechless and apologized on behalf of the waiter.

The next day he contacted us to apologize again and to say that the waiter had been dismissed. But we will not be back in that place again."

Jennifer Hudson knows there are lesbian rumors about her, and she really doesn't care. The 32-year-old singer-actress told PrideSource there was more gossip after she dusted on "Same Love" with out singer Mary Lambert at the 2013 VMAs.

"People were like, 'Is Jennifer trying to tell us something?'" she recalled. "Hey, I wasn't, but if you wanna think that, it's all right with me."  The performance was a no-brainer for the Oscar winner: "When I got the call [to do that performance], I was like, "Oh my God, I definitely wanna do this. A powerful statement is being made and I wanna be a part of that."