Hayley Kiyoko Quotes

I decided to host a couple of the 'In The Life' programs. And I did that really as a result of meeting a lot of young gay people in the Midwest who really had nothing to relate to. At least I felt this program is presenting them with some options.

If I had seen 'Pose' in the years I was a kid, it would have probably meant everything to me.

I think that for a lot of us gay people, we do feel that pop is our music. We identify with it and its iconography, and that's been a tradition.

I feel like I've been observed as an individual more than a gay person, or as a filmmaker with a certain point of view rather than a lesbian filmmaker with a gay point of view.

Seeing the road show of 'A Chorus Line' in 1977 at the Orpheum Theater in downtown Memphis was a life-changing event for me: there were gay people, on the stage, and they all lived in New York.

Now I've devoted my life to making sure that I can be a trailblazer for any other African American kids or any other gay kids or any other kids that just feel weird or uncomfortable and have their own issues and don't know how to express themselves. I want to be like a beacon for those kids now.

I'm proud to carry that torch and be like, 'I'm gay! I'm black! Hang your dreams on me. Hang your hopes on me. I'll carry them to the best of my ability.'

I make pop music. I make music that is pretty commercial. But, at the same time, I'm a minority within a minority and it can be challenging. I feel validated about what I'm doing when I meet fellow black gay men or black gay women.

I don't feel like I'm writing music for gay people. I'm a gay man who is writing music about one tiny little experience of what it's like to be a human on this planet.

Even with the beauty stories we put out, we saw there was an opportunity to address issues of representation, identity, self-expression. We created the community that we wanted to have at 'Teen Vogue.' We were willing to lose some to have more.

As a gay black man, it's important to me to show up - that I'm able to show up as my whole self, in every space that I'm in, because that's how I'm able to be the most true to who I am.

As much as I think that in the future we won't need labels, at the moment they're really important. So I'm making myself embrace that. I truly am proud to be queer. Even watching 'Queer Eye' is something that inspired me to say that. So that's the power of representation.

For those of you who are underrepresented in technology, know that you've always been here. Look in photos and see yourself reflecting back.

I grew up never seeing myself on-screen, and it's really important to me to give people who look like me a chance to see themselves. I want to see myself as the hero of any story. I want to see myself save the world from the bomb.

It doesn't annoy me but I think of myself as a presenter who is gay, rather than a gay presenter. It's a subtle distinction, but that's how I view it.

I come as one package deal. An Irish lesbian who wakes up every day and goes to work. And I don't spend a lot of time thinking about being 'the first this' or 'the first that' because it would take up space in my brain.

It's about how you exist as a person in the world, and the idea that your work is more important than you as a person is a horrible, horrible message. I always think about a little gay boy in Wisconsin or a little lesbian in Arkansas seeing someone like me, and if I cannot be open in my life, how on earth can they?

I loved reading when I grew up but did feel totally invisible because I couldn't see myself and my life reflected in the books I was reading.

I want to make films that make a difference. I want to be out and hope that that will make things better for gay people and for myself. I hope one day I can start to make the kind of projects or be involved with kind of projects that can really make a difference.

Nowadays, if somebody in America is feeling alone and wants to find a coming out story, they just search 'coming out,' and they'll find millions of first-person examples of people telling their story.

I thought, 'Oh, this is great,' because maybe someone who does look like me will watch 'Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.' and realize that they can be an actor if they want to be, or they can be a superhero. They can have a hero that looks like them as well.

If I don't get a TV show next year because someone looks up my Wikipedia and it says 'openly gay,' then it's worth the risk because I've had so many years being openly gay and proud of myself as a role model.

Love yourself, whatever makes you different, and use it to make you stand out. Mine is my voice and the fact that I'm gay: well, the fact that I'm flamboyantly gay.

I am not gay, but if I were, I would be the first one running out of the closet.

I know one of the reasons I first started making Youtube videos was because no one looks like me.