GLAAD - Page 3

As the fall television season gets underway, there is currently a record number of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) characters on television, according to a media report conducted by advocacy organization GLAAD.

In her lengthy and prodigious career, Mariah Carey has won literally dozens of awards celebrating her musical achievements, but on Saturday night she said that receiving an award from GLAAD as an “ally” of the gay, lesbian and transgender agenda was somehow “more real” than the other tributes she has received.

GLAAD’s fourth annual Studio Responsibility Index (SRI) finds that major Hollywood film studios failed to adequately represent LGBT people in 2015 and also concluded that gay and trans characters for the year were too often used as “punchlines.”

GLAAD, the powerful gay rights advocacy group, will honor two-time Oscar winner Robert de Niro at its May 14 gala in New York with its “Excellence in Media Award” for his positive portrayals of gay characters on the screen.

As Breitbart News has warned would happen after Obama bundler Chris Sacca led a Board of Directors coup last June to oust popular CEO Dick Costolo and muzzle conservative free speech, Twitter announced that their core users declined in late 2015.

A private school, designed primarily for LGBT youth and teachers, is scheduled to open in September in Atlanta, Georgia.

GLAAD’s annual “Where are We on TV” report for the 2015-2016 TV season finds that while LGBT character representation in TV is up, too many new gay and bisexual characters are white, and the transgender community and those living with HIV are underrepresented.

A gay lobbying group is pushing its preferred script for media coverage of Pope Francis’ visit to the United States.

GLAAD’s guide, titled “The Papal Visit: A journalist’s guide to reporting on Pope Francis and the LGBT community,” sets its preferred terms for covering homosexuality. It also suggests a series of story lines and plots to portray the lives of gays, lesbians and transsexuals as happy and positive, except when they’re supposedly victimized by the Catholic church.

ABC Family television series The Fosters – which made TV history earlier this year by airing the youngest-ever same-sex kiss between two 13-year-old boys – took home the award for Outstanding Achievement in Youth Programming at the 31st annual Television Critics Association awards on Saturday night.

GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis argued that “where we start to get into a slippery slope around religion is when we start to deny services that are far-reaching outside of the church or the place of worship” on

Hollywood’s major studios warmed to the idea of demonstrating white lesbian, gay, and bisexual characters on film last year, but completely ignored the transgender community in 2014, according to GLAAD’s third annual Studio Responsibility Index.

Scandal star Kerry Washington was honored with the Vanguard Award at Saturday night’s GLAAD Media Awards in Beverly Hills, and used her acceptance speech to call for the employment of more LGBT people in the entertainment industry.

TLC announced back in December that it would be airing a special in January, titled My Husband’s Not Gay, that would follow married Mormon men who describe themselves as heterosexual despite being attracted to men.