09/16/2011 – by Cynthia Wright
On September 2nd, GLAAD announced the recipients of the Amplifier Awards. The yearly celebration occurs every year, in which GLAAD salutes advertising campaigns that promote positive images of LGBT people and issues.
This year featured mainstream advertising campaign’s such as “The Web is What You Make of It: It Gets Better Project,” Dan Savage’s heavily white-washed campaign encouraging LGBT youth not to give up. Kaiser Permanente’sprint campaign “Stick Around: Things Get Interesting,” which involve pictures of an extended family that seems to also include a gay white male couple and their baby. Also, American Airlines poster campaign “Beach Towel” was also forerunner, depicts gay and lesbian vacationing couples.
Kaiser Ad
GLAAD Acting President Mike Thompson told LGBTQ Nation that “the advertising industry is still behind news and entertainment media in terms of including images that reflect the diversity of LGBT people. By highlighting the great work of all of our award recipients with an Amplifier Award, we hope their corporate peers will begin including our community in ads which accurately reflect the fabric of American culture today.”
While it is important that other organizations start to provide a more diverse marketing palate when it comes to advertising to all communities, it is also hard to neglect that even GLAAD is not pushing for a more “racially diverse” LGBT narrative. It is hard not to notice that while certain prominent organizations in the LGBT community always want to shout that our community is considered a minority – they also fail to realize that “diversity” should mean more than just sexual orientation.
There are more facets to the LGBT movement than Caucasian stories and faces – it is time for everyone (LGBT orgs included) to get with the program.
