Uniting LGBT Media: Patrick Yaeger and the Gay Rights Media Collections

As an LGBT rights blogger, one of the things that has made a fundamental difference to the way that I do my job, and to how I stay informed about the world of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights, is the creation of the Gay Rights Media collections, a multi-platform digital entity that combines the best in LGBT media, funneling it into one carefully curated stream.

The man responsible for founding and curating the aforementioned gay rights media resource is Patrick Yaegar, a lifelong LGBT rights activist and media strategist. Patrick witnessed firsthand as more and more LGBT voices emerged online and knew that, in order to ensure that those important stories and powerful opinions were not lost, it would be necessary to collect them together into one easily accessible stream.

Here, Patrick briefly tells us the story of his life, how he came to create the Gay Rights Media channels, and the work that has brought him to the leading edge of LGBT media.

First, a little about the man himself:

“I was raised in an outer suburb of Louisville, Kentucky, in Bullitt County – part of an area known as the Bible Belt where socially conservative Evangelical Protestantism dominates – during the 1970s when the American religious right, with their extremely anti-gay supremacist ideology, was beginning its political ascent. Upon graduating from high school, I fled north to the liberal sanctuary of Oberlin College and graduated in 1995 with a Bachelor in Music. Since then, I’ve lived in New York City and Kentucky, working variously as a public school teacher, office temp, web designer and most recently, an online media curator.

“It was during my first days matriculating to Oberlin in 1989, about 20 years ago, that I first realized what it was to feel safe and welcomed as a gay person. I vividly remember sitting with other freshmen students as we were asked who among us were gay; we were asked not as a sign of derision but as one of respect for diversity.

“I attended meetings of the Oberlin LGBT student group off and on during my college years, and participated in pro-gay chalkings and local mall hand-holding demonstrations. It was at Oberlin that I confronted for the first time my own internalized homophobia (self-hatred) and began to work at healing the fear and shame I hadn’t been able to defend against absorbing (though I had tried mightily) during my youth in Kentucky. Without a doubt, at Oberlin, surrounded by wonderful, progressive people, my consciousness was raised to understand the greater LGBT Civil Rights Movement and my inextricable place in it.”

On how the Gay Rights Media collections came to be:

“In 2001, while living in New York City, I rented some web server space and began experimenting with a personal blog called Queer Visions. It wasn’t anything special, just a place to rant, explore my nerdy side and feature interesting content of no particular focus, but it gave me a taste of what the blogging world was all about and the power of online media.

“And so, over the years, I began seeing that a lot of great media that focused on the fight for LGBT equality was going undiscovered. And when Proposition 8 passed in California, I decided I wanted to play some part in fixing what I considered a disconnect. I wanted to bridge the gap between the fledgling, post Prop. 8 equality activists and the educational, empowering quality of media that I knew was out there. And since other popular LGBT political websites (like Pam’s House Blend, The Bilerico Project and Towleroad) already did commentary so well, I wanted to deemphasize commentary and stick as much as possible to simply showcasing great multimedia. Thus, in 2008 and 2009, I began creating what I now call the Gay Rights Media collections.”

On the building of the Gay Rights Media collections:

“I dedicated my personal blog to my new gay rights media cause and renamed it ‘Gay Rights Media.’ Almost simultaneously, I created The Gay Civil Rights Movement page on Facebook as well as other collections on YouTube, Twitter and Flickr. There are also collections on FriendFeed and VodPod.”

Patrick hasn’t just constrained his LGBT rights work to the mammoth task of creating and curating the Gay Rights Media collections, either. He’s also been on the front-lines in the battle for equality:

“Last year, I took my activism offline and onto the road, joining the Maine ‘No On 1′ campaign to save marriage equality there; I wanted to be more hands on with the incredible movement I knew so much about from curating the Gay Rights Media collections. Volunteering for over a month, I met countless LGBT community organizers, leaders and local allies who thought, like me, that maybe this time we could defeat the fear-based smears of the anti-gay industries.

“Sadly, and to my great shock, the people of Maine vetoed marriage rights for the gay and lesbian minority of their state. I was overwhelmed by the grief all around as Maine couples realized their joyous wedding plans were to be canceled and that all our long, hard-fought efforts had been shunned. But the fight will be fought again, perhaps next time in the courts.”

Unsurprisingly, Patrick’s powerful ability to shape and mold online media into accessible and easily communicable forms means that he is at the forefront of new and unfolding online LGBT rights projects:

“Currently, I’m helping with the effort to bring the federal trial Perry v. Schwarzenegger, which seeks to overturn California’s Proposition 8, to a wider audience. The documentarian and film producer behind the Prop. 8 trial video re-enactments, John Ireland, accepted my offer to redesign their website at MarriageTrial.com. I think that the project compliments nicely my ongoing mission to curate great multimedia from the LGBT Civil Rights Movement.

So, what does the future hold for this trailblazer and his Gay Rights Media collections?

“Harnessing the power of the web in order to get more eyes in front of important media in service of a higher purpose has been a great privilege. Looking ahead, I must find a way to work with more non-profits and orgs, especially LGBT ones. I believe I can help them connect to a wider audience and showcase their content online in more powerful ways.”

Want to access the Gay Rights Media collections? You can do so by going to any of the venues below: