A lot of people think that telling people you’re gay is something someone might say just to get attention. Forcing the words out of my mouth, I know how hard that was. It really took me back to standing on the edge of the cliff and forcing myself to jump. MJ: It seems that the MTV special also has value for straight kids, who might otherwise not know how best to handle a friend coming out.ĭS: I hope kids take that away from watching the program. Most of what MTV has done is taking gay people on the ground and showing how gay people get to be gay people. MTV has always included gay stories, like putting gay people on a dating show and treating it like it’s not a big deal. To show people who don’t know people who are LGBT. We’re trying to help humanize lesbian, gay, bi, and trans kids. The people we’ll reach specifically by partnering with MTV are 12 to 18 years old. MJ: What was behind the decision to do this MTV special?ĭS: We’re going to reach more people in an hour on MTV than we’ve reached so far in this campaign. We want to make sure that videos are still being made and that LGBT kids know how to find these videos, how to find us. The goal is to build and maintain these videos and all the support in them for LGBT kids who are growing up right now: 13-, 14-, and 15-year-olds people who are nine years old right now but who will see these videos in five to six years. Mother Jones: Now that the initial buzz surrounding “It Gets Better” has died down, how are you going to keep up the momentum?ĭan Savage: Our goal isn’t to maintain that kind of fever pitch. I got Savage on the line to chat about his efforts to make life better for gay kids-and how he’s feeling about Santorum‘s recent surge in the GOP primaries. Savage also famously turned Rick Santorum’s last name into a sexual neologism/ Google bomb after Santorum compared gay sex to “man on dog” sex.

And starting March 27, Savage-who edits the Seattle weekly newspaper The Stranger and pens the popular syndicated sex column “Savage Love”-will host a new weekly MTV series called Savage U, wherein he dispenses advice on the topic to university students all over America.

everywhere), he and his husband, Terry Miller, narrate an hourlong special of the same name. To help it along, he’s expanded the enterprise with a recent book, It Gets Better, which includes contributions from David Sedaris and Michael Cunningham. Internet memes come and go, but journalist Dan Savage wants the “ It Gets Better Project“- his viral video campaign to reassure distraught gay and lesbian young people-to stick around forever. Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

It Gets Better by Dan Savage