Love him or hate him. Billy Porter's star continues to rise while being his authentic self on camera and off. The leading man of the hit FX ballroom drama "POSE" is adding another career milestone achievement to his resume. Porter becomes the first openly gay Black man to cover the July/August issue of Essence Magazine.
Inside, Porter is urging America to have the conversation,that conversation, about the violent way this country was created on the backs of Black and indigenous people, reports Joe Mari-Mckenzie of Essence.
âWhite people are so afraid that we want vengeance that they canât acknowledge the truth, but we donât want vengeance,â Porter continued about Black America. âWe want our rights. We want equality. We want to be treated like human beings. We want to know that we can walk out of our houses and not be under threat of death every single day simply because of the color of our skin.â
Black queer writer Tre'vell Anderson pens Porter's cover story that also delves into his decades-long journey through Hollywood and how the LGBTQ-plus community deserves better.
âBeing first-generation post-civil rights and feeding directly into, as a gay man, the AIDS crisis, activism is in my DNA,â he said. âAnd while I donât fancy myself an organizer, you tell me where to show up, Iâm going to show up. Iâm that kind of activist.â
Porter ruffled quite a few feathers earlier this month with a stern rebuke of the Black communities relationship with homophobia and transphobia. You can read more about that here.
Take a look at a behind the scenes video shot during Porter's Essence cover shoot below.