GLAAD
Innovators
Michael Anderson
Meet one of the artists, disruptors, educators, groundbreakers, innovators, and storytellers who all helped make the world a better place for LGBTQ+ people.
It feels like all our lives changed on November 19, 2022, when an anti-LGBTQ+ shooter took the lives of five people and injured scores more at Colorado Springs’ Club Q. But for Michael Anderson, the nightclub’s only bartender to survive the attack, the mental wounds of that day will never heal. Still, Anderson is rebuilding his life, working to finish his degree in political science and journalism, and sharpening his skills as an activist for gun control and LGBTQ+ equality.
“I am a political advocate,” Anderson says. “However, I never set out to become one. It was through the horror and trauma of surviving the mass shooting attack at Club Q in Colorado Springs, which was my employer, and watching my friends and patrons die, that led me down this path. I knew after the shooting occurred, that I would never allow someone else to tell my story for me. While it has not been easy at times, I have used my voice to advocate for change as I refuse to have such violence have happened in vain.”
Just weeks after the massacre, Anderson gave testimony to the U.S. House Oversight Committee, describing how attacks like Club Q are meant to deter queer people from living our authentic lives. He insists the community needs to go in the opposite direction. “With the increased attacks on our community by politicians and on social media…we must remain confident in who we are, for who we are is exactly who we are meant to be,” Anderson says.
Anderson could never have imagined that months after the shooting, his hero, Christina Aguilera, would ask him to present her with GLAAD’s Advocate for Change Award at the organization’s awards ceremony in Los Angeles. “Christina has been my hero since I was young, it was her music that helped me accept myself,” he says. “It was truly surreal to present her with such a well-deserved honor, and to be able to sit with her during the awards show.”
Anderson is concentrating on finishing college and perhaps starting a political career.
“I remain focused on ensuring that the future of Club Q is one inspired by resilience, strength and persistence,” he says. “I believe it is time the younger generations rise up and take our place in the halls of government. It is the youth that will save our climate, create a safe country through gun reform, and ensure equality for all.” @michaelanders0n
Innovators
Kelley Robinson
Meet one of the artists, disruptors, educators, groundbreakers, innovators, and storytellers who all helped make the world a better place for LGBTQ+ people.
Joy Asiko
When life becomes exacting for Kelley Robinson — the new head of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBTQ+ civil rights organization — she thinks of those whose shoulders we stand on.
The elders of the civil rights and reproductive rights movements “said that the hardest part of our fight is manifesting a world that we’ve never seen before,” she says. “The hardest part, yes. But for me, and I suspect for all of us, it’s the most fulfilling part.”
As a successful and high-profile Black queer mother, Robinson embodies the experience that Audre Lorde and Bayard Rustin were fighting for. “I’m a descendant of the first free Black family in Muscatine, Iowa, and my wife, Becky, is a first-generation daughter of Indian ancestry,” Robinson says. “Together, we have the most beautiful chocolate child. My story — and all our stories — is proof that the story of America is one of progress.”
Even as a beneficiary of past generations’ battles, Robinson is keenly aware of how much further we need to go. Under Robinson’s direction, the former executive director of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund is placing racial and reproductive justice front and center at the 43-year-old HRC, which weathered the forced exit of Robinson’s predecessor, Alphonso David, in 2021.
The organization had no time to ruminate on the past, though. Responding to 550 anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in state legislatures this year, Robinson and HRC declared a state of emergency for queer Americans in June. “Heading into 2024, we’re going to mobilize like never before so we can hold onto the Senate, take back the House, and win the White House,” she says.
As Robinson knows, queer liberation encompasses more than politicians and voters.
“We are fighting for the freedom to dance into the night, without worrying it will be our last, as was the case with O’Shae Sibley,” says Robinson. “We are fighting to wave our Pride flags without the fear of being brutally attacked, like Lauri Carleton was. We are fighting for the freedom to send our kids to school without worrying about what they’re being taught or if they’ll make it home.” @hrcpresident