Politics, pop culture and entertainment news of interest to the LGBTQ community
Out singer/songwriter Trey Pearson dedicated his 2017 music video, “Love Is Love,” to LGBTQ safe spaces.
Pearson made international headlines in 2016 when he came out as gay after years as the lead singer of Christian rock band, Everyday Sunday. Continue reading “Pride Music: Trey Pearson ‘Love Is Love’”
Milo Yiannopoulos (screen capture)Some news items you might have missed:
• The Advocate: Milo Yiannopoulos, right-wing gay troll turned “ex-gay,” is now an unpaid intern in anti-LGBTQ Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s office. Reminder: Yiannopoulos resigned as a tech writer for far-right Breitbart website in 2017 after an interview surfaced in which he defended sex between men and boys, saying it was only pedophilia if the boy hadn’t reached puberty. Continue reading “Pride Music, Milo Yiannopoulos + More News”
‘Dashing in December’ star Juan Pablo Di Pace (image via Facebook)Some news items you might have missed:
• ET Canada: Juan Pablo Di Pace (starring in the holiday rom-com Dashing in December) says all gay roles don’t need to be played by gay actors. “We do what we do because we love experiencing other people’s stories and lives and what would be of the Meryl Streep’s of the world if we all had to do the thing that we are. Actors like playing and playing is inhabiting another human being.”
• Pink News: Switzerland has taken a major step on the path to equality after its parliament voted overwhelmingly in favor of a law to pass same-sex marriage. The council of states – the upper house of Switzerland’s legislature – voted by 22-15 to approve landmark legislation to make same-sex marriage a reality.
• Kenneth-in-the-212: Make sure and check out Kenneth’s weekly round-up of the what’s what in LGBTQ publications like Colombian actor/model Diego Arnary on the cover of DNA Magazine.
Columbian actor/model Diego Arnary covers DNA Magazine• Instinct Magazine: A TikTok user, who was kicked out of his house when his father found out he was gay, discovered his dad secretly had sex with men for pay.
• Gay Star News: Jamaica has been told it is breaching international law and human rights by continuing to persecute LGBT+ people.
• The Advocate: Out singer/songwriter Trey Pearson, who rose to fame in the Christian rock band Everyday Sunday, released his latest single, “We Don’t Want Your War,” in order to remind the world that, even as the pandemic rages, social injustice continues to take root.
DJ Thiago Oliveira (via Instagram)Some news items you might have missed:
• InstaHunks: DJ Thiago Oliveira (above) getting in some straight-up social distancing at the beach in Spain. Follow the ‘Daddy Wolf’ on Instagram here.
• NBC News: The Trump administration submitted a brief to the Supreme Court on Wednesday arguing that a taxpayer-funded organization should be able to refuse to work with same-sex couples and others whom the group considers to be in violation of its religious beliefs.
• Out Music: Trey Pearson, who first found fame fronting the Christian rock band Everyday Sunday, channels LGBTQ Pride’s history of protest in his latest music video, “1984.” Pearson, who came out as gay four years ago, called the song “a love letter sent to us from the LGBT community of the ’80s” to inspire people in a time of crisis and uprising.
• Washington Post: Donald Trump’s former chief of staff John F. Kelly defended former defense secretary Jim Mattis on Thursday over Mattis’s criticism of the president’s handling of nationwide protests. Kelly also dismissed Trump’s assertion that the president fired the retired general in 2018. “The president did not fire him. He did not ask for his resignation. The president has clearly forgotten how it actually happened or is confused.”
• Out: Following fellow gay dating app Grindr, Jack’d and Scruff have announced they will disable their ethnicity filters in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. “We stand in solidarity with the fight against systemic racism and historic oppression of the Black community.”
• Lincoln Project: The conservative anti-Trump PAC drops this new campaign ad writing, “Trump is no longer hiding that he’s a brazen authoritarian, so desiring of control and power that he’s willing to turn our once peaceful cities into #warzones.
Out singer/songwriter Trey Pearson dedicated his 2017 music video, “Love Is Love,” to LGBTQ safe spaces.
Pearson made international headlines in 2016 when he came out after years as the lead singer of Christian rock band, Everyday Sunday.
From The Advocate:
“‘Love Is Love’ has become a mantra in the LGBTQ community that stands up for the right to love and be loved, fully. This love song, and this album, represent that freedom for me,” Pearson told The Advocate.
“I wanted the music video to be a tribute to all LGBTQ sacred spaces. Gay bars and queer spaces have been a refuge for me over this last year, and it is where I have been able rebuild my life after losing so much when I came out. I’m overjoyed to be able to make a video about a gay love song that takes pride in these spaces that mean so much for our community.”
Speaking to Billboard, Pearson described the track as “an anthem celebrating the freedom to love each other, without fear, because all you need is love.”
With a solid pop hook, top shelf production and Pearson’s soaring vocals “Love Is Love” is a worthy solo debut effort.
Listen below and check out the album on iTunes here.
Here’s Pearson’s appearance on The View where he discusses coming out:
A few days ago, I wrote about Christian rocker Trey Pearson of Everyday Sunday who recently made to decision to come out publicly.
Today, Pearson sat down with the ladies of The View to talk on his coming out journey, and the effect it’s had on his life and family.
Text via Towleroad:
• “I grew up in a Christian home and church where I was taught that God hated homosexuality and I could choose to be straight. And I tried for a really long time. And I don’t think I was ever trying to lie to anyone. I was trying to convince myself that I could be something I wasn’t.”
• On his now ex-wife of seven and a half years when he came out to her:“By the time I was able to tell myself and tell her, she just hugged me and cried and told me how proud of me she was for being able to be honest with myself. She’s been my biggest supporter, my biggest advocate.”
• The moment he saw his dad after his story (and he) was finally out: “The day that my story came out, my dad was at work and he read it. And he showed up on my porch while I was curled up on the couch, not sure what people would think, who would be talking about it. And he just knocked on the door – I had no idea he was coming – and he just hugged me for ten minutes and told me how much he loved me.”
• On still being a Christian today: “I feel I’m more in love with Jesus and the scriptures than ever.”
• On the near future: “I’m not dating. I decided to take at least a year to get to know myself as a gay person before starting to get to know who somebody else is in that sort of way,” said Pearson.
Very well-spoken, Trey has a raw honesty in his voice that sounds very freeing for him.
Congrats Trey on living life as who you are!
Watch the segment below:
Trey Pearson, front man for Christian rock band Everyday Sunday, has come out in a heartbreaking open letter to his fans.
Via the Washington Post:
To my fans and friends:
Most of us reach at least one pivotal moment in our lives that better defines who we are.
These last several months have been the hardest — but have also ended up being the most freeing months — of my life.
To make an extremely long story short, I have come to be able to admit to myself, and to my family, that I am gay.
I grew up in a very conservative Christian home where I was taught that my sexual orientation was a matter of choice, and had put all my faith into that. I had never before admitted to myself that I was gay, let alone to anyone else. I never wanted to be gay. I was scared of what God would think and what all of these people I loved would think about me; so it never was an option for me. I have been suppressing these attractions and feelings since adolescence. I’ve tried my whole life to be straight. I married a girl, and I even have two beautiful little kids. My daughter, Liv, is six and my son, Beckham, is two.
I had always romanticized the idea of falling in love with a woman; and having a family had always been my dream. In many ways, that dream has come true. But I have also come to realize a lot of time has passed in my life pushing away, blocking out and not dealing with real feelings going on inside of me. I have tried not to be gay for more than 20 years of my life. I found so much comfort as a teen in 1 Samuel 18-20 and the intimacy of Jonathan and David. I thought and hoped that such male intimacy could fulfill that void I felt in my desire for male companionship. I always thought if I could find these intimate friendships, then that would be enough.
Then I thought everything would come naturally on my wedding night. I honestly had never even made out with a girl before I got married. Of course, it felt anything but natural for me. Trying not to be gay, has only led to a desire for intimacy in friendships which pushed friends away, and it has resulted in a marriage where I couldn’t love or satisfy my wife in a way that she needed. Still, I tried to convince myself that this was what God wanted and that this would work. I thought all of those other feelings would stay away if I could just do this right.
When Lauren and I got married, I committed to loving her to the best of my ability, and I had the full intention of spending the rest of my life with her. Despite our best efforts, however, I have come to accept that there is nothing that is going to change who I am.
I have intensely mixed feelings about the changes that have resulted in my life. While I regret the way I was taught to handle this growing up, how much it has hurt me and the unintentional pain I have brought Lauren, I wouldn’t have the friendship I now have with her, and we wouldn’t have our two amazing, beautiful children. But if I keep trying to push this down it will end up hurting her even more.
I am never going to be able to change how I am, and no matter how healthy our relationship becomes, it’s never going to change what I know deep down: that I am gay. Lauren has been the most supportive, understanding, loving and gracious person I could ever ask for, as I have come to face this. And now I am trying to figure out how to co-parent while being her friend, and how to raise our children.
I have progressed so much in my faith over these last several years. I think I needed to be able to affirm other gay people before I could ever accept it for myself. Likewise, I couldn’t expect others to accept me how I am until I could come to terms with it first.
I know I have a long way to go. But if this honesty with myself about who I am, and who I was made by God to be, doesn’t constitute as the peace that passes all understanding, then I don’t know what does. It is like this weight I have been carrying my whole life has been lifted from me, and I have never felt such freedom.
In sharing this publicly I’m taking another step into health and wholeness by accepting myself, and every part of me. It’s not only an idea for me that I’m gay; It’s my life. This is me being authentic and real with myself and other people. This is a part of who I am.
I hope people will hear my heart, and that I will still be loved. I’m still the same guy, with the same heart, who wants to love God and love people with everything I have. This is a part of me I have come to be able to accept, and now it is a part of me that you know as well. I trust God to help love do the rest.
– Trey
It remains to be seen if this will damage, or possibly end, his music career in the Christian music realm.