Narnia Dispatches wanted to lift up several young men who are helping to blaze trails and use their celebrity for the good, for empowering and positive. Please share in our learning more about these individuals:
Matt and Blue
Actor Matt Dallas and songwriter/former music executive Johnny Blue Hamilton are a married couple who live in Colorado. They run a You Tube channel, sharing parts of their life experiences such as how they met, Sunday morning routine, leaving their home in California for a new one in Arizona, and adopting their first child. Their You Tube channel has over 294,000 subscribers who enjoy tuning in every week to see their latest experience.
Matt is well known for his role in the ABC Family's Kyle XY television show, but he has also appeared in the series Baby Daddy, various movies, and was in the Katy Perry music video for Thinking of You.
On June 10, 2017, Matt and Blue were the recipients of the "Let Love Define Family" Award at the fifth annual RaiseAChild Honors Event in Hollywood, CA for their commitment to promoting family building through fostering to adopt. Their openness and willingness to share their experiences and thoughts is not only unselfish, but they do it in an entertaining, warm and entertaining fashion.
Here's a look at Matt and Blue on coming out:
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Kevin McHale and Austin P. McKenzie
That young man on the left is Kevin McHale, former star on the television show Glee (as the character Artie Abrams). This was my outdated last mental image of the Plano, TX native:
I think he's grown a bit older since then, lol! Kevin McHale ever so casually and low-key began to come out, using his Instagram account to include his boyfriend Austin in several photos, in addition to several hint-hint pictures:
Austin P. McKenzie began his career working at Lions Camp Tatiyee, a summer camp for children and adults with mental and physical challenges. He studied singing, songwriting and special education at Columbia College Chicago, then moved to Los Angeles to star in a production of "Spring Awakening", which used American sign language as well as vocal. After a year, the production moved to New York City where Austin made his Broadway theatrical debut in 2015. Sounds like things moved quickly, even though Austin is quoted as saying he had never intended to go into acting. He still is very much interested in writing music.
No magazine covers (yet, anyway), no big announcements, just Kevin using his social media effectively and earning numerous supportive comments from fans. And if one were to read this DataLounge thread from last year 2017, it looks as though both Austin and Kevin were glass closeting before coming out. Nice to see an actually organic relationship evolve over time.
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Adam Rippon
Who isn't familiar with Adam Rippon now? The "It Guy" from this past 2018 Winter Olympics, Adam instantly bloomed with his candor, wit and positive demeanor.
A member of the U.S. Olympic Team which went to Pyeongchang, South Korea in February, Adam became the first openly gay athlete to win a medal at the games. Who could ever forget his artistically expressive performance to "O" by Coldplay, one which cannot be found any longer on You Tube or anywhere else, for that matter? [insert grrrr] And who could ever forget his positive, humorous, entertaining interviews during the remainder of the Games broadcasts? What did Adam's openness mean to so many members of the LGBTQ community? From a Vanity Fair article in February:
The
effusive reaction to Rippon shows how very important representation can be,
just as Black Panther will when it arrives in movie theaters this
week. It matters to a child—and to an adult—to, yes, see some reflection of
themselves. But also to have the faraway heroes, the almost impossible ideals.
Maybe those unreachable gods somehow help clarify things here on Earth.
If I,
at eight, or 10, or 14 (oh god, 14), had seen Adam Rippon in all his swanning,
proud splendor, and everyone applauding him for it, it would have destroyed
me—but also remade me. It would have said something to me that I rarely ever
heard said. How much time young queer people spend yearning for that kind of
connection, forever sifting through culture to find the gay stuff. When you
find it, it can speak to you in almost holy tones. On Sunday night, there was
gay stuff, and swishy gay stuff to boot, right there on national TV, for anyone
who wanted it: powerful and accomplished and beautiful. - The Bittersweet Beauty of Adam Rippon
This
author highly recommends that touching article in Vanity Fair. Those two
paragraphs defined the importance and the impact of Adam Rippon's success and
"launch" at the Olympics. Today, he is presently appearing on
Dancing With the Stars and has been visible via the media. He also uses
his Instagram to post expressive, artistic photos. Recently appearing on
ABC's Nightline, Adam spoke about using his recent success as a means to raise
awareness for LGBTQ rights:
He continued: ‘I think that if we aren’t willing to listen to each other and have an open conversation, nothing will change and nothing will get done.
‘But on the flip side of that, the conversation is not for me. It’s a conversation for that trans man or woman that can’t even go to the right bathroom. It’s a conversation for that trans man or woman that can’t join the military. It’s a conversation for the muslim family that got broken up or had a mother or father travel and wasn’t allowed to come back in. And it’s an opportunity for them to have their stories told.
He then added: ‘I’m just using my platform for the best of my ability.’ - "The young people of America are watching and are acting" Gaystarnews.com
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Gus Kenworthy
And speaking of the Winter Olympic games, Adam's buddy Gus Kenworthy also made himself quite a splash. An American freestyle skier born in the UK, Gus is one of the first openly gay athletes to compete in the Olympic Games. His boyfriend Matthew Wilkas, is in American theater, film and television. Gus shared his story of struggle with his sexuality and life in the closet throughout his early career in Time magazine. From the interview:
Gus
Kenworthy was supposed to be happy. The American freestyle skier had just won a
silver medal at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, and now he was being
interviewed by NBC the day after—Valentine’s Day, of all days—and asked to name
his Valentine’s crush. This sort of make-cute gag shouldn’t send an athlete who
earns his living doing twisting flips down a mountain into a stomach-churning
panic. But Kenworthy didn’t know what to say. His boyfriend? Real celebrity
crushes like Zac Efron or Jake Gyllenhaal? None seemed like the best way to
come out to the world.
Kenworthy
settled on Miley Cyrus, which didn’t help. The NBC Olympics Twitter account
broadcast his “crush” to the world. The pop star gushed on social media about a
photo of Kenworthy holding four stray dogs—a rescue effort he had undertaken
with the person he was afraid to identify as his boyfriend. Kenworthy soon
became a celebrity heartthrob in his own right, cool enough to conquer a
death-defying sport while cuddling puppies in his spare time. And it tore him
up inside. “I mean, I love Miley Cyrus, she’s great,” Kenworthy says during a
late-November interview with TIME. “But I just remember feeling very
dishonest.”
Now, Gus is using his platform as a successful Olympic athlete to also speak out on LGBTQ rights as well as human issues, due to the state of the governmental leadership in America. Gus has been in a relationship with Wilkas since November 2015 and his Instagram is an example of how social media can be used in both an entertaining and an influential way.
Gus and his guy:
Gus and Adam sharing their bonded friendship at the 2018 Olympics:
Pretty darn inspiring and encouraging, aren't all of these gentlemen. Narnia salutes all of them and yes, they are all indicative of change - a subtle, big, low key, viral change and a true breath of fresh air.
sources: IMBD, ca.wikipedia.org, downwrite, Time, gaystartimes, Vanity Fair, wikipedia, Tenor, Huffington Post, IMDB
our playlist: Mad World - Adam Lambert
Come To My Window - Melissa Etheridge
Into the Day - Bebo Norman
O "Fly On" - Coldplay
