Moderated by KATINA PARKER: GLAAD Media Manager for Communities of African Descent

Ray Daniels

National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC)
Mr. Daniels is the Communications Director for the National Black Justice Coalition. He is an experienced communication and marketing professional who previously served as communications director with the National Association of People with AIDS. Since leaving NAPWA in 2003 Ray has been in private practice. A 1992 graduate of Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, Ray has worked with corporate clients including MCI, Restoration Hradware, GAP and Options Behavioral Heatlh Care. He has also held marketing positions with two of the most prestigious international consulting firms, KPMG and Deloitte & Touche.

Kai Wright:

Black AIDS Institute
Kai Wright is a freelance journalist in Ft. Greene, Brooklyn. His work explores the politics of sex and race, both in the U.S. and abroad, and particularly as it plays out in urban life. Kai contributes regularly to leading indy and community press such as Out, The Progressive and Poz magazines. He has written for publications ranging from the Village Voice to the San Francisco Chronicle, but he says his best work remains the weekly stories he filed for the (pre-Windows Media) Washington Blade newspaper, where he started his reporting career in 1996.

Maurice Jamal

Film/TV Director
Maurice Jamal is a Brooklyn-based actor/writer/director. He made his feature film directing debut with 2004's THE SKI TRIP, which debuts this summer as the first Black gay film on US television on MTV's LOGO. His second film, Dirty Laundry will be the first big budget Black Gay film, which will be released nationwide this holiday season. He sits on a number of boards and includes HIV/AIDS awareness and Sickle Cell Education among his charitable efforts. He is the founder of the UrbanArts Collective which supports emerging cinematic visions by queer youth of color. He is the founder and co-chair of the New York Black GLBTQ Film Festival.

Riley Snorton

Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN)
Riley Snorton is the Media Relations and Trainings Manager at the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network. Working with hundreds of students across the country, Riley brings real stories of LGBT youth to the media. Riley is also a part-time graduate student and serves on the board of the National Center for Transgender Equality. For more information about GLSEN, please visit www.glsen.org.

Samiya Bashir

Freedom to Marry
Samiya Bashir is Communications Director for Freedom to Marry. Previously, she served as Communications Director for The Balm in Gilead, Inc., an international HIV/AIDS organization. Samiya also lent her communications and editorial expertise to a number of arts and community organizations, including Black Pride NYC, and is a founding organizer of Fire & Ink: A Writers Festival for GLBT People of African Descent. She served as an editor for a number of publications, including Ms. Magazine, Black Issues Book Review, and Curve. In 2002 Samiya was awarded the Lesbian Poetry Award from the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice. Her latest book, Where the Apple Falls, a collection of poetry, was recently published by RedBone Press.

Jason Cooper

National Gay & Lesbian Task Force
Over the past two years, Jason has played an integral role in assisting local communities across the country fight anti-LGBT and discriminatory ballot measures. The majority of this time was spent in the state of New Mexico where he helped build and train the statewide campaign to save their Human Rights Ordinance and in Oregon where he served as the Lane County Organizer for the No on Constitutional Amendment 36 Campaign to fight their marriage amendment. Jason has also organized Boston's first citywide door-to-door canvas on marriage equality and served as co-organizer of the Naming Our Destiny Training, a training that focuses on LGBT people of color building electoral power.