Photo by Jodi Rives Meier for Kiss4Equality.org

BY Lesbian.com

The Kiss for Equality Campaign celebrates its one-year anniversary with the launching of a new website that features photographic testimonials from all over the USA and the world in support of marriage equality.

Launched on Valentine’s Day 2013, the Kiss for Equality Campaign began as a way to raise awareness about marriage equality in the United States. Following President Barack Obama’s historic inclusion of the LGBT community in his second inaugural address, New York State resident Sarah S. Kilborne got to thinking about what she could do to advance LGBT rights in the USA. An author, musician and commentator on LGBT issues, Kilborne felt a strong need to raise awareness about the cause for marriage equality. With the Supreme Court hearings on the horizon, Kilborne saw that the simple act of kissing another human being could celebrate the love at the heart of the hearings and be a powerful gesture of solidarity for gay rights.

Kissing for equality in Mexico (Photo: Alex Lug)

“Throughout time and across borders,” says Kilborne, “a kiss has been a symbol of support, love, friendship, peace, respect and union. So we invited people to take part in this universal act, capture their kiss in a photograph, and do so with a consciousness that they were supporting equal rights for all.” Kilborne expected the campaign to peak at the time of the Supreme Court hearings but the photos kept coming in, and the Campaign, featured on the “Huffington Post”, “Buzzfeed” and “Queerty”, among others, has grown into a global campaign, showing just how important it is for people everywhere to be able to show their support for equality.

Vanessa and Bianca kiss for equality (Photo via Kiss4Equality.org)

With friends and supporters who all volunteer their time, Kilborne has created a Facebook community that now has more than 38,000 members from more than 45 different countries and produced a music video for the campaign that was picked up and blogged about by well known bloggers such as David Mixner and Towleroad.

Kilborne and the “Kiss for Equality” team continue to be inspired by the photos that come in from all over, of people young and old, gay, straight, bisexual and transgender, sharing their “Kiss for Equality.” Viewed collectively, these photos create a visual tapestry in support of equal rights and become artwork for the cause of democracy. “Each photo is a profoundly moving and courageous act of human expression,” says Kilborne. “What’s more, when you see so many couples giving one another a kiss, it just becomes so visually apparent that love is a normal, natural and human right. The desire to marry whom you love is something that resonates around the world.”

Learn more or share your kiss at Kiss4Equality.org

The post ‘Kiss for Equality’ draws a world of support for marriage equality first appeared on Lesbian.com.

The author and founder of “The Supreme Kiss.”(Photo courtesy of Sarah S. Kilborne)

BY SARAH S. KILBORNE

This is what I want. And I ask: what about you?

I want an international print campaign to support equal rights. I want newspapers, magazines, websites, billboards – you name it – to fill our world with support for equality so that any child, youth, grown-up or elderly person who is lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer, anywhere in the world, will know they are not alone.

I want to counteract the hate, silencing and fear with love. I want love to be the face of the equal rights movement for the LGBTQ community. I want to fill the world with love. Imagine what that could look like.

I want couples, individuals, friends, co-workers and families of all kinds to share the most universally recognized symbol of love. I want photographs of people of all nationalities showing their support for equality with a “Kiss for Equality.”

I want actors, singers, authors, poets, musicians, activists, politicians and leaders from all over the world to kiss someone they love and say, “Let’s Kiss Inequality Good-bye.” It’s time.

It’s time for everyone to experience Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, for everyone to know they are beautiful just the way they are.

It’s time for same-sex couples, same-sex parents, children of same-sex parents, and all LGBTQ persons at home, at school, in the workplace or in retirement to be protected by the laws of their lands.

It’s time to end harassment, bullying, prejudice, discrimination, suppression, correctional rapes, “conversions,” violence, and the use of the Bible as a tool for punishing the innocent.

It’s time to spread love. It’s time to change history.

Are you with me?

Last weekend, thousands of people worldwide gathered near Russian consulates to stage an International Day of Solidarity on September 8th for the LGBTQ community. Entitled “To Russia, With Love,” events included people marching, demonstrating and participating in a Global Kiss-In to protest the recent anti-gay laws in Russia, the chosen host country for the 2014 Winter Olympics. The message was clear: violating anyone’s human rights anywhere in the world will not be tolerated. And for those who are suffering from abuse and have no voice, we will be your voice.

Let’s take advantage of this momentum. Let’s take it further. Let’s establish a campaign that can be seen everywhere, in every state, in every country, on every day of the year. So that a lonely young passenger in an airport in Nairobi might pick up a left-behind magazine one day, flip through its pages and see a photograph of a couple kissing not for fashion but for Equality. And that passenger might think, as she boards her flight, that she never thought she’d see the day when the world was on her side. But yes, the world is on her side.

This is what I want. What about you?

Sarah S. Kilborne is an author, musician and activist. She is the founder of the social media/equal rights campaign, The Supreme Kiss. More information can be found at sarahkilborne.com and at The Supreme Kiss on Facebook.

The post An open letter: Spread love, change history first appeared on Lesbian.com.