Portland's Gay Mayor Sam Adams Joins Effort To End Anti-Gay Bullying

PUBLISHED: OCTOBER 10, 2010

Portland's openly gay mayor, Sam Adams, has joined the effort to end

 the bullying of gay teens.

Adams, the first openly gay mayor of a top-30 U.S. city, shared his story

 in a video for openly gay author-activist Dan Savage's It Gets Better

 campaign, which benefits The Trevor Project, a national group centered

 on crisis and suicide prevention efforts for gay, lesbian, bisexual and

 tansgender (LGBT) youth.

“It was lonely. It was hard,” Adams says in the video. “Especially when the

 teasing term of the day included 'fag.' And I kept wondering, 'How do they know?'”

“I can tell you that it's not easy, necessarily, to get through those kind of

 tough times, but you must because you have your whole life in front of you.

” (The video is embedded in the right panel of this page.)

Adams fought back demands that he resign in 2009 after admitting that he covered up a sexual affair with an 18-year-old boy during his mayoral

 campaign.

Other openly gay celebrities who have also joined the campaign include

 Project Runway celebrity judge Tim Gunn, talk show host Ellen DeGeneres,

 How I Met Your Mother star Neil Patrick Harris and former 'NSYNCer 

Lance Bass.

BY ON TOP MAGAZINE STAFF