The White House has just released a video message from Ambassador Susan Rice—U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations—addressing today's International Day Against Homophobia (as they address it, minus transphobia mentions). See the video and read the transcript below.

This morning, marking International Day Against Homphobia and Transphobia, the largest EU survey of hate crime and discrimination targeting members of the LGBT community in the 27-nation bloc and Croatia showed many live in fear and conceal their sexual identity. Details below.

Earlier this week we saw an updated marriage equality map for the U.S., but today ILGA is giving us a glimpse of LGBT rights across Europe—ranging from full equality to gross violations of human rights. Check out the color-coded findings below.

New findings out of Michigan show an impressive swing in support of marriage equality, today standing at 57 percent. That number is great, but the jump in support is even more telling. Check out where voters stood on the issue just last year, after the jump.

Hong Kong's highest court has ruled that a transgender woman has the right to marry her boyfriend. It's a huge step forward in the acknowledgment of the transgender community as being members of the gender with which they identify. 

Though same-sex marriage is not currently legal in the country, this certainly bodes well for its future passage as well.

More after the jump!

If the fast track to state-level marriage equality we've been on so far this year hasn't been enough to excite you about the state of LGBT rights in America, the latest poll from ABC News/WaPo will surely put a smile on that gorgeous face. 

Rep. Brian Sims, one of Pennsylvania's first out lawmakers, praises Philadelphia today for passing an extensive LGBT health bill that may be groundbreaking for a large American city. 

Amanda Brown, daughter of Roger Gorley who was thrown out of his husband's Missouri hospital room last week, has set up a fund for her father's (and his husband's) legal and medical bills. 

More after the jump.

Need a cheat sheet on this week's hottest stories? You can look off our paper! Well, our Flipboard, at least! 

Head here to have the magazine link sent to your email (or simply search Flipboard for "Instinct Magazine") for our weekly "Instinct Magazine Online" publication showcasing the biggest stories from the past seven days on this here blog thingy! 

Inside this week's edition: The Vatican's porn habits, new study on the appeal of penis size, guessing tops and bottoms, Brendon Ayanbadejo's abs for equality, the hospital drama in Kansas City and much, much more! 

The entire reason GLAAD and Jeremy Hooper's Commentator Accountability Project exists was displayed on Fox News today. In a segment about anti-gay pastor Rick Warren that included hate group leader Tony Perkins, dimwitted Fox News spokesmodel Megyn Kelly wanted to know why LGBT activists are so damn intolerant

Good question, Megyn.

Doing his best impression of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Vladimir Putin told a press conference in Amsterdam that gays in Russia are treated equally.

As with celebrities in the past decade, politicians, too, have quietly changed the way they come out (for marriage equality). Politico gets an inside look at the "gay marriage backer's playbook" in a piece today that nicely sums up the past month of falling dominoes.