The internet has been freaking out over the possibility of a Justin Bieber sex tape since Bieber revealed that a camera and computer with his "personal footage" had been stolen.

So far, there's no video, but a supposed nude photo of Justin is floating around Twitter and Tumblr. Before you get too excited, the naked guy's head is cropped out of the photo, so there's no way to prove anything. But in case you're interested, a quick Google search will get you there.

OK, let's talk about this. Justin Bieber does have a bird tattoo on his hip. Of course, that's exactly the kind of detail that even a Photoshop novice could add to the pic. Also, closer inspection of the tattoo — hey, I'm just doing my job — reveals that it doesn't quite match. It could be the quality of the nude pic, but it's more likely just not the same tattoo.

Is Justin Bieber uncircumcised? That's tougher to say. According to the quite possibly reliable A Gallery of Famous Intact Men, he is, in fact, uncut. Their source: "My nephew went to school with him." Good enough.

But the most damning evidence against this being an actual photo of Justin's junk is that the same pic apparently existed on Tumblr before anything was stolen. Amelia McDonell-Parry at The Frisky says she saw it in a blog post from 10 months ago.

To conclude, all we really know is that it's a penis, and that Justin Bieber's "personal footage" was stolen. Also, Justin Bieber has a dumb tattoo.

UPDATE: As many commenters have pointed out, the bellybuttons do not match, so we can say conclusively that the naked guy is not Justin Bieber. Because some people were concerned about the age of the person in the nude photo, it has been removed.

[Image via Judy Eddy/WENN.com]

When Wisconsin State Representative Roger Rivard said "some girls, they rape so easy," his words were taken out of context.

First of all, he was relating a quote from his father. Second of all, what his father meant to say was, some girls cry rape so easy. See, it's still reprehensible, but it's a different kind of reprehensible.

In the interest of letting Rivard dig his own grave, here's his statement as related by the Journal Sentinel:

[My father] also told me one thing, "If you do [have premarital sex], just remember, consensual sex can turn into rape in an awful hurry." Because all of a sudden a young lady gets pregnant and the parents are madder than a wet hen and she's not going to say, "Oh, yeah, I was part of the program." All that she has to say or the parents have to say is it was rape because she's underage. And he just said, "Remember, Roger, if you go down that road, some girls," he said, "they rape so easy."

What the whole genesis of it was, it was advice to me, telling me, "If you're going to go down that road, you may have consensual sex that night and then the next morning it may be rape." So the way he said it was, "Just remember, Roger, some girls, they rape so easy. It may be rape the next morning."

Rivard's original remarks were made while discussing the case of a 17-year-old high school senior charged with sexual assault for having sex with an underage girl.

The Wisconsin lawmaker was endorsed by Republican VP candidate Paul Ryan shortly before he was selected as Mitt Romney's running mate.

[Image via Roger Rivard for Assembly]

Critics of Obama are tired of being called racist just because they disapprove of the President. You might say the solution to that would be to not use racist rhetoric and imagery in so many attacks, but then, you would be "pulling the race card."

But no, not all anti-Obama protests are racist.

This window display — which shows Obama as a primitive witch doctor, complete with loincloth and bone through his nose — is a little more difficult to defend.

The image replaces the "C" in "ObamaCare" with a Communist hammer and sickle, because as we all know, there's a logical connection between Communists and witch doctors.

Store owner Bill Skuby insists that his display is not racist: "It always comes down to the race card," he complained. But unlike some of his fellow patriots, Skuby has proof that he's not a racist — his granddaughter is biracial.

My son married a girl that had a biracial kid. She is every bit a part of our family as the other two in this picture. I'm not racist. And as long as my grandchild doesn't think I'm a racist, I'm perfectly fine with all of this.

Other residents of New Jersey's Spring Lake neighborhood aren't as OK with Skuby's display, which has ignited the predictable free speech debate. President of the Spring Lake Chamber of Commerce George D'Amico says that he disagrees with the display, but only from a practical perspective — it's bad for business.

Really, though, what's the harm in using obvious racist imagery? I mean, it's seasonal, as local resident Karen Cameron explains.

It's his right to put what he wants in his window. This does not incite violence, and it's in time for Halloween. This is not the limit. If we lose the right to free speech, America wouldn't be America.

Be sure to use the "it's in time for Halloween" excuse the next time you don blackface.

[Images via AP, Mark J. Bonamo/NJ.com]

Yesterday, Gawker writer Neetzan Zimmerman brought our attention to the dark world of "needlessly sexy" Halloween costumes. Today ABC News has a special report on one particular iteration — the "sassy Big Bird."

"Sassy"? Yeah, OK.

From the ABC story:

A representative from costumecraze.com told ABC News that although its original Big Bird costume sold out before the first presidential debate, it saw a 500 percent increase in sales for the women's "sassy Big Bird adult costume" post-debate. The "sassy" rendition of the beloved "Sesame Street" character is a short, yellow-ruffled dress with orange knee-highs and pink accents. The costume comes complete with a bird headband.

What this costume actually looks like is the gruesome work of someone who murdered Big Bird and fashioned an outfit out of various parts. Why, yes, the top half of Big Bird's head does make a fashionable hat, you monster.

It is, at least, a little less horrifying than the Yandy.com version Neetzan highlighted. The feet read more "weird ankle growths."

But get used to it, because "sassy/sexy/slutty Big Bird" is apparently an actual trend: costumecraze.com and other overpriced online costume suppliers have all noticed an uptick in sales. The "sassy Cookie Monster" and "sassy Elmo" costumes are sadly not seeing the same Romney bump.

If Romney's inadvertent endorsement is the driving force behind the "sexy Big Bird" trend, we can only hope more debate-inspired costumes are on the horizon. "Slutty Jim Lehrer," anyone?

[Image via AP]

Cissy Houston is allegedly withholding her granddaughter Bobbi Kristina Brown's multi-million dollar inheritance, because she's worried that Bobbi Kristina will go off the deep end.

It's been a while since we heard about Bobbi Kristina — there were some concerns about her health after Whitney's death, and then there was the report that she was dating her adopted brother Nick Gordon. (She still is.) But Bobbi Kristina has mostly stayed out of the tabloids, and Cissy Houston wants to keep it that way.

According to TMZ's report, CIssy feels that Bobbi Kristina is impressionable and surrounded by negative influences, including Gordon and her father Bobby Brown. All that aside, it's usually never a good idea for a young person to get that much money, so modifying Whitney's will might just be the safest course of action.

[Image via AP]

Despite good reviews and a classic Tim Burton feel, Frankenweenie underperformed at the box office this weekend.

OK, $11.5 million isn't a total disaster, but it's not good for an opening weekend, especially when the stop-motion animation film cost $39 million to make.

Contrast that with Taken 2, which earned $50 million and cost the studio $42 million. The sequel's opening is the third-best October opening ever, though it may not reach the $145 million heights of the original Taken.

So, yes, once again a sequel — in this case, really just a regurgitation of the first film — bested a more original creation. (Frankenweenie is based on a Tim Burton short, but the point stands.) But there were some pleasant surprised in the Top 5: well-liked musical comedy Pitch Perfect ($14.7 million) and innovative sci-fi thriller Looper ($12.2 million).

Overall a good weekend, especially for October. And a surprisingly well reviewed one. Well, sure, Taken 2 wasn't a hit with critics, but audiences love it.

[Image via AP/20th Century Fox]

Twitter trending topics are often a great cross-section of racism, homophobia, and misogyny, but one of today's most popular hashtags has taken things to a delightful new level.

Swastikas are currently trending on Twitter. Not the word "swastika" but the actual symbol. My guess is that someone figured out how to embed a swastika in a tweet and countless others copy-pasted, because gosh, what a thrill.

As you might expect, tweets using the three-swastika hashtag are terrible — most are too dumb to be offensive, but the cavalier insensitivity and cultural ignorance is at least disheartening. Here's a sampling, for those of you who don't want to trudge through the depths of Twitter idiocy.

Memes (popularized by @DictatorHitler):

Click links for full comedic effect.

Bad jokes:

There are countless iterations of "I did Nazi that coming" and "Anne Frankly it's offensive." You know what's really offensive? Lazy jokes.

Moral outrage:

First, let's note that @FollowMeOBAMA is choosing both outrage and tasteless jokes. Second, it's worth pointing out that the more people tweet a trending topic, the longer it stays trending. Tweeting that you're offended by swastikas while including swastikas in your tweet is one of the dumber things you can do online.

Stupidity:

These are probably the most depressing tweets — whether it's people who don't know the difference between Osama bin Laden and Hitler, or those who actually think swastikas are illegal.

Like all trending topics, this is only temporary, so try not to let it get you down. And make sure to check out Twitter tomorrow, when we'll surely be back to hashtags like #UKnowSheAHo and #WhyDoBlackPeople.

[Image via Twitter]

Mitt Romney has received some backlash for his comments about cutting government funding for PBS, even though he likes Big Bird.

But what's there to like about Big Bird, anyway, wonders National Review columnist Mark Steyn. After all, isn't Sesame Street basically responsible for all that's wrong with the world today? I mean, couldn't you draw a direct link between Sesame Street and the murder of the U.S. ambassador to Libya in Benghazi?

Mark Steyn can.

Unlike Mitt, I loathe Sesame Street. It bears primary responsibility for what the Canadian blogger Binky calls the de-monsterization of childhood — the idea that there are no evil monsters out there at the edges of the map, just shaggy creatures who look a little funny and can sometimes be a bit grouchy about it because people prejudge them until they learn to celebrate diversity and help Cranky the Friendly Monster go recycling. That is not unrelated to the infantilization of our society. Marinate three generations of Americans in that pabulum and it's no surprise you wind up with unprotected diplomats dragged to their deaths from their "safe house" in Benghazi. Or as J. Scott Gration, the president's special envoy to Sudan, said in 2009, in the most explicit Sesamization of American foreign policy: "We've got to think about giving out cookies. Kids, countries — they react to gold stars, smiley faces, handshakes . . . " The butchers of Darfur aren't blood-drenched machete-wielding genocidal killers but just Cookie Monsters whom we haven't given enough cookies. I'm not saying there's a direct line between Bert & Ernie and Barack & Hillary . . . well, actually I am.

Even allowing for the fact that Steyn's tone may be tongue-in-cheek, the point he's trying to make is absurd. Also, he's kind of a garbage-dwelling grouch.

[Image via AP]

Texas 17-year-old Jake Evans still doesn't have an explanation for why he shot and killed his mother and 15-year-old sister.

When he called 911 and confessed to the crime, he said he hadn't even been angry with them at the time of the shooting, but that it's something he had been vaguely planning for some time.

I am pretty, I guess, evil ... whatever. I don't know … it's weird. I wasn't even really angry with them. It just kind of happened. I've been kind of planning on killing for a while now.

While Evans did call himself evil, he didn't express much remorse for his actions. Instead, he wondered if he'd suffer from nightmares after witnessing such brutal violence. He even asked the 911 dispatcher what medications he could take to prevent reliving the murders.

I'm really worried about, like, nightmares and stuff like that. I don't mean to sound like a wimp or anything, but this is, wow, I've never, like, done anything violent in my whole life.

As for a motive, Evans said only that he doesn't like other people's attitudes, because they're "verbally rude to each other and stuff like that." He did not say his mother and sister were fighting when he shot them.

Evans has been charged with capital murder and is being held without bail.

[Image via Parker County Jail]

Maine State Senate candidate Colleen Lachowicz may seem like a sweet social worker, but in her spare time, she's a stab-happy green-skinned monster named Santiaga.

The fact that Santiaga only exists in the online roleplaying game World of Warcraft is of little consequence to the Maine Republican Party, who are attacking Lachowicz for her level-85 orc assassination rogue character, as well as inflammatory remarks she's made on online message boards.

The site ColleensWorld.com — which has to be one of the first of its kind — takes the candidate to task for living in an "online fantasy world."

Colleen Lachowicz, AKA Santiaga, is a gamer in the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft (WoW), which takes place in the make-believe land Azeroth. Today, Colleen/Santiaga is an orc assassination rogue playing at level 85 — the highest level one can attain. She and the members of her "Wreck List Guild" — Colleen/Santiaga's WoW online alliance — post comments to each other on liberal online forums including the Daily Kos, where they discuss politics, military policies, and WoW battle tactics.

Studies have found the average WoW gamer is 28, and spends 22.7 hours a week playing in Azeroth.

On the one hand, this is a completely unfair attack: what Lachowicz does on her computer isn't really anyone's business, especially since it has no bearing on her Senate campaign. On the other hand, anyone who has played World of Warcraft knows how life-consuming the game can be. And Lachowicz making comments about slacking off on work to play aren't helping her case.

Not to mention the fact that many of Lachowicz's message board posts are political. And while she'd likely stand behind the liberal content, the word choice isn't exactly Senate appropriate. What's interesting is the way ColleensWorld.com juxtaposes the politics with the online gaming, even though the link is tenuous at best.

the people in government jobs leftover from the Bush years scare me. I'm sure they are still causing damage.

The undead do not piss.....Don't know why they have to eat actually

There's definitely an element of nerd-shaming here: to fellow MMORPG enthusiasts, Lachowicz's comments and behavior aren't out of the ordinary. She's not leading a "bizarre double life" any more than other World of Warcraft players. To an outsider, though, it sounds bad, and sometimes that's enough to tank a campaign.

So far, Lachowicz hasn't retired Santiaga, but she did release a statement reflecting her thoughts on this line of attack.

What's really weird is that the Republicans are going after my hobbies instead of talking about their record while they've been running Augusta for the last two years. Instead of talking about what they're doing for Maine people, they're making fun of me for playing video games. Did you know that more people over the age of 50 play video games than under the age of 18? As a gamer, I'm in good company with folks Jodie Foster, Vin Diesel, Mike Myers, and Robin Williams. Maybe it's the Republican Party that is out of touch.

Side note: if you're going to talk about the other guy being out of touch, maybe don't cite Mike Myers and Robin Williams as people who are hip.

Regardless of what happens to Lachowicz's campaign, one thing seems clear — Santiaga the orc assassination rogue will never be elected to public office.

Gay divorcee Kim Kardashian is still technically married to Kris Humphries, but that hasn't stopped her from planning her next trip down the aisle.

In an interview with Tatler Magazine, Kim implies that her inevitable wedding to Kanye West won't be televised.

It had always been my dream to have a big wedding, and when people said that I'd made it over the top for [Keeping Up with The Kardashians], that was just me — I am over the top. But the next time, I want to do it on an island with just my friends and family and that's it.

Of course, "friends and family" could include camera crews. They've already been around for so many of the Kardashians' ups and downs.

At the same time, we know that Kim and Kanye both hate attention.

Ever the romantic, Kim believes this relationship is her last.

It's so nice to have a best friend in this game who understands everything you're going through.

Could this marriage make it past the 72-day mark? Let's cross that bridge when we come to it.

[Image via C. Smith/WENN.com]

Is the Mariah Carey-Nicki Minaj back-and-forth a genuine feud or a ratings ploy? Neither, claim American Idol producers.

In a statement to Access Hollywood, producers said everything was going smoothly.

This is one of the best, most passionate, dynamic and invested judging panels we've ever had. We love and support all of the judges and the fantastic work they are doing, and we can't imagine a better group to find the next ‘American Idol.' Despite all the accusations and media speculation — much of which is inaccurate — production is going extremely well today and the judges are focused on finding the best talent here in Baton Rouge.

But it's hard to deny actual footage of the divas sparring, or what Mariah told Barbara Walters. Of course, this could be a clever way of deflecting attention from the network, which is very possibly pushing these rumors for ratings.

It's more than just internet conspiracy theorists who aren't buying the story. When TMZ asked Steven Tyler if he thought Nicki and Mariah were B.S.-ing, he answered, "Of course. Are you kidding?" Cee-Lo had a similar response, saying, "This is Hollywood, California. Hardly anything's legit."

So does the network's denial of the feud make its reality more likely, or is that just what they want us to think? And am I the only one having a hard time keeping up?

[Image via Curtis Sabir/WENN.com]

It shows a shocking lack of compassion to sympathize with the neighbors here. And if you really think an animal deserves to die for harmlessly wandering into your yard, I feel bad for your cat.

If you're the kind of person who cries at animal movies, you don't want to read this.

There are so many awful layers to 8-year-old Rayden Sazama's story of a euthanized cat: the neighbors who trapped his pet and lied about it, the false hope of getting the cat back, and finally the shelter employee who forgot to leave a note sparing the cat's life.

It's a gut-punch of a tale on its own — and that's without the letter Rayden sent to The Herald Journal, in which he recounts the story and his sense of loss.

My name is Rayden. I am 8 years old and I live in Logan. Yesterday grown-ups killed my kitty, my best friend, when they weren't supposed to. Because I really don't know how to write, my PaPa is writing down the things I think and say.

My kitty's name is Toothless. When I got him I had just seen "How to Train a Dragon" at the movies. My kitty looked just like the dragon Toothless with big green eyes and the hair around his head. Toothless, my cat, has long fluffy hair and sleeps on my bed and loved to play with my brother and me. Toothless would let us carry him around all the time. He was our best friend.

When Toothless didn't come home one night, Rayden and his 5-year-old brother Devin went to every house on their block to look for him. No one had seen anything — or so they said — so the boys' father Jason decided to check the animal shelter.

Jason discovered that Toothless was in fact being kept at the shelter, but he wasn't able to take the cat home that night.

My dad wanted to take him home, but they said he had to go to another office building and pay a fee. The lady at the shelter said it would be OK and told him to come back the next day and we could get Toothless. When my dad came home and told my little brother and me he found Toothless we were so happy and we weren't scarred or worried anymore.

You already know where this is going.

My dad went back the next day to get our kitty and they told him they didn't have any long-haired black cats. They only had a white fluffy cat. My dad waited a long time for the lady to come back and talk to him. The same lady that told my dad to come back the next day said she was sorry. She had forgotten to leave a note to tell the people my dad would be there for Toothless and they had just killed my cat that morning. She had just forgotten to write a note to save a member of my family. They killed him and I don't know why.

To make an awful story worse, the Sazama family learned that their animal-hating neighbors had actually trapped the cat and sent him to the shelter. Not only were the neighbors lying when they said they hadn't seen Toothless — they were responsible for his disappearance.

When Devin and I knocked on their door and asked if they had seen Toothless they told us no, and that was a lie. My dad and mom tell me and Devin not to lie and that is right. I didn't think big people lied because they are grown ups and know what is right. Now I don't know what to do. My cat Toothless is dead; the people that killed him didn't even give him to my dad so we could bury him. What do I do now?

The Herald Journal confirmed Rayden Sazama's story through Cache Humane Society Director Brenda Smith, who explained that the worker who forgot to leave a note on Toothless' cage had been busy training a new employee.

Jason Sazama doesn't blame the animal shelter, and he takes responsibility for not going to the shelter sooner. He explained to Rayden that "several adults made mistakes here."

As for why he wrote the letter, Rayden told the AP, "I just wanted to tell people about Toothless — that I loved him. And that people shouldn't lie."

[Image via Shutterstock]

Take everything Claus Hjelmbak says about his "good friend" Lindsay Lohan with a grain of salt.

Hjelmbak, who was in the room when Lohan alleges she was assaulted, is clearly trying to make the most of his brush with celebrity. And as a useless attention whore, he's too dense to appreciate the irony when he tells E! News—

She's not in a good place. But it's not because of health issues. She's not in a good place, because people around her keep throwing her under the bus.

Hjelmbak would never throw his BFF Lindsay under the bus. He's selling his version of the night's events to E! out of the goodness of his heart.

I realize Hjelmbak isn't the focus of this story, but he's worth outing as the worst kind of leech, one who hides behind a facade of good intentions. At least the paparazzi and gossip columnists don't pretend to have Lohan's best interests in mind.

For what it's worth, Hjelmbak recalls that Christian LaBella, the Republican staffer Lohan accused of assault, met Lindsay that night.

Lindsay is a sweet girl and is very open and nice when people come over and talk. In this case, she thought it was somebody her friends know.

He says she became alarmed when she noticed that LaBella had been taking cell phone pictures.

She was visibly shaken already at that point. She was shocked. At that moment, you feel betrayed when you are in a private space and you realize someone has documented the entire night on the phone.

Kind of like how you might feel betrayed if your close personal friend went on TV to talk about how you're not in a good place? Hjelmbak goes on to advise us to, "Stop focusing so much on her private life. That would be a big help to her getting back to a really good place."

I challenge you to find someone less self-aware.

[Image via Diane L. Cohen/WENN.com]

The quality of animation on YouTube is hit or miss, which is why it's always nice to see the work of an accomplished professional.

Lucas Gray, an animator for The Simpsons and Family Guy, made this economy-focused piece using Obama's speech from the 2012 Associated Press Luncheon. "Why Obama Now" seeks to debunk the concept of trickle-down economics, as explained through charts — and yes, animated conservative pundits.

Gray's video also has its own site.