2 trans men prove an important point with a simple photo shoot.

Upworthy   by

Transgender Magazine Recreates Naked Adam Levine Photo

Model, Aydian Dowling shows the sexy side of this equality movement.

BuzzFeed   2/17/2015   by jasonrballard

Trans Man Aydian Dowling posing naked for FTM Magazine photo recreation.

Trans Man Aydian Dowling posing naked for FTM Magazine photo recreation.
Jason Robert Ballard / Via ftmmagazine.com

We’ve all seen the iconic photo of Adam Levine with his wife’s hands over his respective ‘junk’… FTM Magazine publisher, Jason Robert Ballard saw similarities in model Aydian Dowling’s physique and Levine’s and set to making a recreation of the image.

“Some areas of my body used to remind me of everything I’m not. Now they represent everything I am” – Dowling

You can find more about Aydian and FTM Magazine at www.ftmmagazine.com where Aydian is the cover model April 2015. (And a nice big pull out poster!)

 

http://www.buzzfeed.com/jasonrobertb/transgender-magazine-recreates-naked-adam-levine-p-1c4ex

Media Coverage of the IGB Governors Award

BROADCAST
·         KABC Eyewitness News at 4PM (Los Angeles – ABC) (August 29, 2012) – Coverage includes mention of “It Gets Better Project” getting the Television Academy’s Governors Award.
PRINT 
·         Daily Variety (August 30, 2012) – “Emmys Honor ‘Better’” by Jon Weisman. Coverage includes a write-up announcing this year’s recipient of the TV Academy’s Governors Award and includes a brief history of the It Gets Better video campaign.
ONLINE
·         IMDB.com (Deadline.com pick-up) – http://www.imdb.com/news/ni35125515/

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‘It Gets Better’ faces Emmy titans ‘Sesame Street’ and HBO in Children’s Nonfiction Program race

Dan Savage, who writes a sex advice columnist, is one of the more unexpected Emmy nominees this year. He contends for Best Children’s Nonfiction, Reality or Reality-Competition Program for “It Gets Better,” which aired on MTV.

This was the TV offshoot of a project that began in the fall of 2010 when, in response to the suicides of young people being bullied due to their actual or perceived sexual orientation, Savage made a video with his husband,Terry Miller. The pair spoke about their own experiences of being bullied when younger and concluded that it got better as they got older.

Since then, thousands of videos have been uploaded to the project’s website. The contributors include celebrities, organizations and everyday people looking to send out a positive message. Among the highest profile people to participate are President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The other nominees are “Sesame Street: Growing Hope Against Hunger” (PBS) and “The Weight of the Nation for Kids: The Great Cafeteria Takeover” (HBO).

“Sesame Street” won seven primetime Emmys prior to the creation of the Daytime Emmys, including four for Best Children’s Program. At the Daytime kudos, the program has won an impressive 137 honors (including 26 for a series award of some sort) and reaped an additional 206 individual nominations. The show also received the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009. This marks the program’s first return to the primetime kudos since 1976. The special is also nominated in the writing category.

“The Weight of the Nation” (also nominated for Nonfiction Series) is produced by HBO Documentary Films president Sheila Nevins who has won 22 Emmy Awards as a producer with an additional 32 nominations. The other producers (John Hoffman, Shari Cookson and Nick Doob) have also played a part in several other HBO documentaries.

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For Hip-Hop and Gay Rights, A Transformative Moment

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/posts/la-et-ms-hip-hop-gay-rights-20120818,0,6286807.story?page=1

AMARILLO, Texas — It’s well after midnight in a parched corner of Texas known as the buckle of the Bible Belt, down the road from the Jesus Christ is Lord Travel Center, which is just what it sounds like: an evangelical truck stop.

In the back of an empty strip mall, an up-and-coming hip-hop artist with the self-assurance and billowing locks of Samson is shooting a video. His hair is up in a tidy bun and he’s enduring a second hour of makeup transforming him into the likeness of a gender-bending woman, all of which makes more sense once you know that Adair Lion began his career by destroying it.

Hip-hop has been described as the heartbeat of urban America, but for years, it had an open secret — that heart was brimming with hate. Rap was one of the most reliably homophobic arenas in American pop culture. Its stars casually tossed off references to stabbing gays in the head or shooting them in the crotch. Rappers felt compelled to devise a catchphrase to give themselves cover while saying something nice about another man — “no homo,” as in: “That’s a cool shirt. No homo.”

It was not exactly a world where an aspiring star would break in with a song declaring that gays should be out, proud and embraced — while calling out the industry’s biggest names for failing to say the same. Earlier this year, that’s what Lion did. On “Ben,” a single from his upcoming album, he rapped: “The Bible was wrong this time. … Gay is OK — the No. 1 thing a rapper shouldn’t say. I said it anyway.”

Friends told him he was committing career suicide. He feared they were right. Then, a strange thing happened — nothing. Nothing bad, anyway.

Across the board, hip-hop is having a change of heart. Either in song or in interviews, one headliner after another — the mogulJay-Z; Jayceon Taylor, better known as Game — has thrown his support behind the gay community.

Last year, Calvin LeBrun, a noted hip-hop figure known as Mister Cee, pleaded guilty to loitering after he was caught receiving oral sex from another man in a parked car; 50 Cent, who once suggested in a Tweet that gay men should kill themselves, stood publicly by his side.

Most notably, Frank Ocean, a member of hip-hop collective Odd Future, released a letter in July declaring that his first love had been a man. Ocean’s stock soared. Among those who supported him was the rapper and producer Tyler, the Creator — who had, a year earlier, released an album that disparaged gays.

As for “Ben,” the song went viral, racking up tens of thousands of hits on YouTube. Lion’s songs have landed on taste-making radio stations and websites. His calendar of live performances is filling up — and now includes appearances at gay pride festivals in Memphis and his hometown of El Paso.

Lion, who is not gay, believes his song lives up to the finest tradition of rap.

“What hip-hop does is talk for people who don’t get to talk,” he said one recent morning in his studio. “And if you think about it that way, ‘Ben’ is the most hip-hop thing I’ve ever heard.”

MTV Unveils Artist.MTV Pages, Triest to Catch MySpace Napping

http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/industry/digital-and-mobile/mtv-unveils-artist-mtv-pages-tries-to-catch-1007831962.story

If MySpace isn’t going to be the online destination for musicians, maybe MTV is up for the job.

MTV unveiled its long-awaited Artists.MTV platform on Wednesday, launching a public beta for artists, managers and labels to claim pages at MTV.com and populate content. Each page streams music and video, contains video and news and has the capability to sell music and merchandise (via MTV’s partnership with Topspin Media). The platform will be open to all artists on September 6.

Individual artist pages are a clean, uncluttered mix of images and links to media. A row of official, live and other videos – called the music section – lies below the masthead (the masthead can be added once the page is claimed). MTV calls this the “music carousel” and says its content can be either audio or video (in either case, it’s official, license content and not user-generated stuff). “Our audience just wants a play button,” Shannon Connolly, VP of Digital Music Strategy, tells Billboard.biz.

Topspin’s New Partnership With MTV’s Artists.MTV Music Hub Will Expand Company’s Footprint

Further down the page are rows of social media updates, updates from MTV News and other sources, and ecommerce powered by the artist’s Topspin account. Nothing here will remind you of complicated, unattractive layout of MySpace. Some pages also have small badges that basically act as endorsements from music blogs (such as I Guess I’m Floating), record stores (Amoeba) music sites (Pitchfork) and radio stations (KCRW). MTV also adds other tags, such as the Buzzworthy badge seen at the Lady Gaga page.

MTV wants users to browse the site, discover new artists and delve into the music scenes of cities around the world. The site has what MTV calls “pivot points” such as hometown, genre and started (the year the artist or band started) at the top of each artist page. Clicking on that field will allow the user to browse according to those pivot points.

Google Buying Social-Media Startup Wildfire

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_TEC_GOOGLE_WILDFIRE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-07-31-18-15-56

NEW YORK (AP) — Google is buying a company that specializes in social media marketing as it intensifies competition with Facebook for ad dollars and attention.

The company, Redwood City, Calif.-based Wildfire, helps businesses such as Cirque du Soleil and Spotify manage social media efforts across the Internet.

It’s an important area for Google as people spend more time on social networks such as Facebook and as advertisers follow them. Google’s social network, Google Plus, hasn’t had the traction that Facebook Inc. enjoys. Wildfire will let Google play a role whether the ad campaign is on Google Plus, Facebook, Twitter or elsewhere.

Wildfire’s co-founders and other staff will join Google Inc. The deal’s financial details were not disclosed.

In recent months, Oracle Corp. and Salesforce.com Inc. also have reached deals to buy similar startups.

MTV VMAs Are the ‘Biggest and Loudest’ Way for Artists to Make a Statement, Says Exec

The most exciting part of watching the annual MTV Video Music Awards is not the awards themselves but undoubtedly the unscripted moments.

Last year, Beyonce announced to the world that she was expecting her first child by striking a simple pose, holding her baby bump, on the red carpet. Later, she took the stage to perform “Love on Top,” while putting her belly on display for the entire viewing audience. Fans watched in awe as cameras cut from Beyonce to her doting husband, Jay-Z, receiving a congratulatory hug from palKanye West backstage.

 

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/earshot/mtv-video-music-awards-alicia-keys-beyonce-357340

Transgender kids get help navigating a difficult path

Amber, a soft-spoken, feminine 12-year-old who loves Hello Kitty and fashion design, lives with a secret. It is a secret most sixth-graders can’t fathom, one she hides behind pink skirts and makeup. It is a secret that led to all her baby pictures being tucked away as though her childhood had never happened.

Amber was born a boy.

When she was 10, she stopped going by her given name, Aaron, and began dressing as a girl. Last year, she started taking medication to keep her from going through puberty.

“I can be who I am,” Amber said. “I can be a girl.”

 

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-transgender-kids-20120615,0,216229.story

Help for Gay and Lesbian Foster Children

http://www.pe.com/local-news/local-news-headlines/20120525-inland-help-for-gay-and-lesbian-foster-children.ece

Anthony was kicked out of a Beaumont foster home because he’s gay. He endured anti-gay taunts from a roommate at a group foster facility.

Now, the 17-year-old says he is in a better place. He has lived with his new foster parents in Temecula for 15 months, and a gay man appointed by a juvenile-court judge as his advocate has become a confidant and friend who is helping Anthony open up about his problems and about issues involving his sexual orientation.

Riverside County’s Court Appointed Special Advocates program has become a state leader in assisting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered children who have been neglected, abused or abandoned and ended up in the foster care system, said Marissa Guerrero, program manager for California CASA, which provides assistance to the 44 CASA agencies in the state.

Judges appoint special advocate volunteers to represent the interests of some foster children in court and visit with them regularly.