Barilla to Gays: Eat Someone Else’s Pasta

Italian pasta-maker Barilla apparently has a distaste for gay families. The company’s chairman told Italian radio show La Zanzara Thursday that the world’s largest pasta producer will never feature gay couples in its advertisements.

“I would never do [a commercial] with a homosexual couple, not for lack of respect but because we don’t agree with them,” said Guido Barilla, according to a Reuters translation. “Ours is a classic family where the woman plays a fundamental role. … If [gays] don’t like it, they can go eat another brand.”

More at Advocate.com.

Editor’s Note: Take action against Barilla now. Check out GLAAD’s call to action here.

Former Chicago City Treasurer Judy Rice Comes Out as Lesbian

Judith C. Rice is an attorney and lifelong Chicagoan with a gold-plated resume. Rice was treasurer for the City of Chicago from 2000 to 2006, was “the first female commissioner of both the Chicago Department of Transportation and the Chicago Department of Water” and was director of the city’s Department of Revenue. She is currently the senior vice president and head of community affairs & economic development for BMO Harris Bank.

Judy Rice has been active in the city’s LGBT community for 30 years and has officially come out as lesbian in an interview with Kate Sosin at Windy City Times. Rice is running for judge in the Cook County Circuit Court 7th Subcircuit. If elected, she would become one of the more high profile openly LGBT elected officials in the city.

Continue reading on Rod 2.0.

DJ Mister Cee Gets Continued Support From Hip Hop Community

“Far too often, hip-hop has often been pegged as the two-step forward, five-step backward sort of culture,” said Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, leader of The Roots, last week. “We’ll be progressive on one thing then … backward about something else. Whatever Mister Cee does with his personal life, more power to him. He shouldn’t be ashamed of that. We got to grow up eventually.”

Continue reading on Huffington Post.

Unfit For Product Placement: Radicalizing the Cartoon Characters Of Our Childhoods

(Intro by Mia McKenzie)

So, a couple of weeks ago, there was this link going around that depicts certain 90s cartoon characters “taking on” New York fashion week in trendy outfits. Among them are Lisa Simpson and Daria. When I saw this, the first thing I thought was, Ugh. Lisa Simpson, proud feminist with so much to say about gender roles, body shaming and capitalism, drawn in this hyper-thin, rich girl way? Why, baby Jesus? Why? My friends had the same question, plus not-so-thrilled reactions to Daria. You know Daria, who once said, …”edgy” occurs when middle-brow, middle-aged profiteers are looking to suck the energy–not to mention spending money–out of the “youth culture”? Yep, that Daria is depicted in overpriced clothes, standing in front of a Mercedes dealership. Yuck.

Well, my friends and I try to be creative while we’re trashing things, so we started thinking about the cartoon characters of our childhoods (and beyond) and the ways in which their almost-always benign political characteristics lend so well to product placement and other corporate fuckery (which is the entire point of them, obvi; Lisa’s feminism is a rarity).

More at Black Girl Dangerous.

New Staff Member Tiq Milan Joins Kye Allums, Laverne Cox and Reina Gossett at GLAAD Trans Visibility Panel

GLAAD hosted an informative panel discussion on transgender people’s experiences interacting with the media. The panel featured Kye Allums, Laverne Cox, and Reina Gossett.

Tiq Milan, a writer and LGBT advocate announced that he has joined GLAAD as a Senior Media Strategist and also served as the panel’s moderator. Tiq has been featured in magazines such as Swerve, Out and Black Enterprise, and contributed to the upcoming anthology, Trans Bodies, Trans Selves. Tiq was also featured on MTV’s reality series, I’m From Rolling Stone and moonlighted as a music journalist.

Continue reading on GLAAD.