LGBT activists pull Joy Reid’s award over her homophobic remarks
A prominent LGBTQ activist group, PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays), has rescinded a major award, “Straight for Equality in Media” award, they planned to give to MSNBC commentator Joy Ann Reid, honoring her commitment to speaking out in favor of LGBTQ rights.
UPDATED WITH SAMPLES OF TWEETS
The group announced the move in a statement to Mediaite, the organization which broke the story of Reid’s homophobic blog posts, allegedly written by Reid in the early 2000s.
Those remarks were about then-Congressman Charlie Crist, singer Clay Aiken, and fellow journalist Anderson Cooper, and defending an NBC player who made openly homophobic comments.
PFLAG noted that Reid initially apologized and admitted to a change in viewpoint, something PFLAG encourages.
Yesterday, though, Reid began claiming that someone had “hacked” into her blog archives and placed the problematic content there among her posts from 2007 and 2008.
PFLAG decided to move away from Reid:
PFLAG National—the nation’s first and largest organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people, their families, and allies—today has rescinded its Straight for Equality in Media award to political analyst Joy Reid.
Said PFLAG National president Jean Hodges, “When we extended our invitation to Ms. Reid to honor her at our 45th anniversary celebration, we did so knowing about the blog posts from the late 2000s regarding Charlie Crist. We appreciated how she stepped up, took ownership, apologized for them, and did better—this is the behavior and approach we ask of any ally. However, in light of new information, and the ongoing investigation of that information, we must at this time rescind our award to Ms. Reid.”
Some tweets listed below.
In a tweet from June 2010, Reid fat-shamed Rush Limbaugh, suggesting that he was gay, writing: “#Rush Limbaugh’s fourth marriage offers a hopeful message for fat, grimey closet-cases everywhere. Get rich. (Karl Rove, you’re on deck!)”
In a tweet from July 2010, Reid referred to Ann Coulter as a “shim,” writing: “‘@ricksanchezcnn: i’m going to interview ann coulter tonite , what do u want me to ask her?’ /don’t you mean ‘shim?'”
In a tweet from November 2010, Reid said she loved an article about “Barack Obama’s Indonesian Tranny Nanny.”
