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Persistence paid off! CNN working on "Gay in America" special

by Rhonda J Mangus | November 2, 2009 at 02:32 pm

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In August 2009, this author reported on LGBT activitists urge CNN to consider "Gay in America" series. A successful series presented by CNN titled "Black in America", and a series titled "Latino In America", had LGBT activists urging CNN to also consider a series titled "Gay in America". To urge CNN to consider a "Gay in America" series, readers were asked to contact CNN's team, Richard Davis, Anderson Cooper, or Kathy Slobogin, or by requesting a similar documentary for the LGBT Community by signing the petition at gayrights.change.org.

Well, persistence paid off! Anchor Don Lemon let slip that CNN is working on a "Gay in America" special. The question, "Should CNN Have a Homo Host Its "Gay in America" Special? (or, So now that we know the special is a go, who will host the thing?)

A petition launched in August has more than 800 signatures, urging CNN to create a special. And now, it appears CNN is doing just that: Lemon let slip that he's working on programming for the special, and we hear there have been meetings about the special going back at least a few months.

So now that we know the special is a go, who will host the thing?

With "Black In America," you wouldn't have been faulted for thinking CNN chose Soledad O'Brien to host because she is multiracial (her father is Australian-Irish; her mother is Afro-Cuban), though she was met with her fair share of criticism. O'Brien also hosted "Latino In America." But she's shrugging off critics: "The difficult part for me was that there were people who said ‘Is she black enough to do these stories?’ When [CNN chief international correspondent] Christiane Amanpour goes to Bejing, nobody says she’s not Chinese enough to do those stories. That’s an interesting element of our community, but on the other hand they’re valid questions."

So will O'Brien host "Gay In America"? We're not certain, but all signs point to yes. We couldn't find any official release from CNN about the special, though we did reach out to O'Brien and CNN's publicity department to check. (We'll let you know what we hear.)