Phillip Picardi, if not already, will be a publishing legend. After completing his degree from NYU in 2012, Picardi began his career working at Racked and Teen Vogue. Two years later, he became senior beauty editor at Refinery 29 but just seven months into the job, Picardi returned to Teen Vogue as digital editorial director (this is all by the age of 25). He worked closely with editor-in-chief Elaine Welteroth and creative director Marie Suter, transforming the publication’s branding and turning towards politics, social issues, and activism. Condé Nast said that during Picardi’s time at Teen Vogue, “traffic to TeenVogue.com has increased to more than 9.2 million unique visitors, up from 2.7 million unique visitors last year, mobile traffic more than doubled with an increase of 109 percent year on year, and video viewers grew 989 percent”. Continue reading RAZZ Pride Icons: Phillip Picardi

Brenda Howard was a bisexual, polyamorous, LGBTQ+ activist. In a movement that sadly has a tendency to erase bisexual people, Brenda Howard led a fierce fight for bisexual people and helped her LGBTQ+ peers admirably. Most notably, she coordinated a rally to commemorate the first anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, AKA the first ever Pride march. Otherwise known as the “Mother of Pride”,  she helped evolve the march into Pride Day, and then into Pride Month. Continue reading RAZZ Pride Icons: Brenda Howard

Affectionately known by many as the mother and father of the Gay Rights Movement in America, Barbara Gittings and Frank Kameny worked tirelessly, both independently and together, for gay rights. Gittings, in the late 1950s, followed on from Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon (see profile) and started the New York chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis (DOB) and, in 1963, went on to take over as editor of The Ladder, their national gay women’s magazine. Kameny, however, never intended to become an activist until, in the midst of the ‘Lavender Scare,’ he was fired from the Army Map Service (the precursor to NASA) for refusing to answer questions about his sexuality. With a derailed career as a budding astronaut, Kameny appealed to the Supreme Court about his firing and, though it declined to consider his case, it became the first civil rights case based on sexual orientation filed in a U.S. court. Continue reading RAZZ Pride Icons: Barbara Gittings and Frank Kameny