Tag Archives: lgbt comedians

Happy Birthday Ellen DeGeneres! Here’s Why We Love Her

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Birthdays are always a time to reflect what a person has accomplished and activist, daytime tv host,  and comedian Ellen DeGeneres is a perfect example of this. HuffPostGay did a nice tribute to the now 55 year old (can you believe it?!0 celebrating her birthday today. Here are some of the reasons why Ellen is a national treasure:

12. She believes that humor should always be kind, and holds herself to a high standard of compassion. She told Good Housekeeping: 

“The most important thing for me is to know that I represent kindness. I’m glad I’m funny. I’m glad I make people happy, because that’s very important. But I’m proud to be known as a kind person. You listen to any monologue on late-night TV or just in general, to people talking, and there’s always a joke at someone’s expense. It’s sarcasm; it’s nasty.
Kids grow up hearing that, and they think that’s what humor is, and they think it’s OK. But that negativity permeates the entire planet.”

15. She tries not to judge others. In an interview with O, The Oprah Magazine, Ellen said: “I am saddened by how people treat one another and how we are so shut off from one another and how we judge one another, when the truth is, we are all one connected thing. We are all from the same exact molecules.”

16. She came out on “Ellen.” Coming out can be a very difficult personal step — emphasis on the personal. We love that Ellen’s announcement was filled with humor and aired publicly on her sitcom. Despite the possibility of a backlash — which followed almost immediately — she chose not to hide.

34. Her wedding to Portia was pretty much the most beautiful thing we’ve ever seen. The pair married in 2008 at their home in L.A., after dating for four years. Ellen told People: What can I say? I’m the luckiest girl in the world.”

I highly recommend checking out the rest of that list. Always lightheaded, always kind, and always funny, we wish Ellen many more years of making our would a better place.

Ellen DeGeneres Says Coming Out Was The Greatest Thing That Ever Happened To Her

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Top notch comedian Ellen DeGeneres recently sat down to give a candid interview discussing how coming out is such a huge achievement:

“I was really successful, but I was really just playing a part. And then I’d go home and I’d let a little bit of me out, you know, and have a girlfriend. But the other part of the life was just trying to please everybody else. ‘Cause God forbid they find out who I really am.”

“I just was carrying around this sadness inside and the shame of the fact that I was gay. When I was like, ‘Why am I ashamed of who I am?’”

“My manager at the time said, ‘Well if you’re going to come out, why don’t we make it really interesting. Why doesn’t your character come out.’ And it was the greatest thing that ever happened to me.”

If you remember,  I wrote about how Sir Ian McKellen expressed the same feelings of how much of his life got better once he came out and made his life better:

“I learned that coming out was crucial to self-esteem. And I accepted the argument that people who thrived in society’s mainstream and had access to the media could, by telling the truth, help others in the backwaters whose views were never sought and whom society either ignored or abused– These days I daily make this point to anyone who will listen because, when I eventually accepted it on the BBC, it changed my life forever for the better.

I love these stories most and that is why whenever I see them, I signal boost, or make sure it’s mentioned because people look up to these public figures. We all do. We draw from their strength, talent, and determination.

Sharing stories like these shows those still in the closet as well as those that demonize us for being gay, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with us. That if and when we’re ready to fully accept ourselves, how much more there is to gain from life.

Wanda Sykes Wants You To Know She Does Not Like Men’s Balls

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In a recent interview funny lady Wanda Sykes expressed how relaxed she is that President Obama won reelection for president, joking that she was nervous of what the alternative outcome could have been:

“I’m very happy he won, Oh my God, I was so nervous. I was on pins and needles. ‘Cause you was hearing, ‘Oh Romney’s son, he owns all the vote machines,’ and all this stuff. I was like, ‘Come on, don’t cheat.’”

If you remember, Sykes did a two part election coverage panel on the LOGO chsnnel promoting LGBT to go out and vote, even joking through the tension filled race:

“If you are lesbian, gay, bi, trans, straight, black, hispanic, white, republican, democrat — yes, Madonna, I’m talking to you — you can’t sit out this race,” Sykes urges on NewNowNext Vote with Wanda Sykes. “Don’t bitch and whine later when a villain in a black mustache is tying you down to an ultrasound table.”

When asked if gay marriage was better for her than straight marriage she said this:

“Oh gay marriage. Gay marriage is way better. Way better,” 

“I mean, that’s what I wanted. Straight marriage; I was just looking at him and looking at the balls all night,” she joked with a sour face. “No thank you. I do not miss balls.”

“Now it’s all beautiful, it’s just all beautiful. Plus I got a white woman, so, you know, my life is good.”

She has to be one of the most underrated comedians of our time. I want her to get a new show so I’m signal boosting, basically.