Celebs talk about what "The Advocate" means to them...

Last night's 40th Anniversary gala for The Advocate was very special and it got me to thinking about how much it has done for me as a journalist and a gay man to write for it. I've been assigned stories on same-sex marriage, gay prison rape, transgender violence, same-sex sexual harassment, gays in the military, gay parenting, financial planning for gay couples, profiled Miss Cleo when she came out, wrote cover stories on 'American Idol," post-Katrina gay New Orleans, gay polygamy, and the effort to overturn 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' by former gay military personnel. I've profiled groups like Lambda Legal, Soulforce, The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and written all kinds of other stories that I can't recall right now. It has shaped my consciousness, helped me to not be narrow-minded and less judgmental and it has educated me about so many LGBT issues. it is impossible to measure how much I have learned working on these various stories over the last five years.
Those are my feelings about the 40th anniversary of this wonderful magazine. I asked some of the more well-known folks at last night's bash what they thought about it:
JAMES MARSDEN (actor): "I think it's great. I hope to be here for the 50th, 60th, 70th and whatever. It's a great publication and what it does for the community is terrific and I am here supporting it. It's just great to be here."

ALEC MAPA (actor/comedian): "I'm so excited and I'm so happy and... thrilled that the magazine has the political voice that it does, that it carries the weight that it does. It's a tastemaker, it's an opinion former and that wasn't the predominate case 40 years ago. I think it's a real benchmark of how far we've come."

JANE LYNCH (actress): "It was a personal and professional high point for me to grace the cover of 'The Advocate' last year. I love this magazine and am glad that it's been around. It's fought the battles, it;s hung in there and really put we as gay people into the fabric of our society. I'm so grateful to them for that and I look forward to another 40 years. I hope they're here until I die."

DARRYL STEPHENS (actor): "It's amazing that they've been around for so long. When I was a kid, the first gay magazine I ever saw was 'The Advocate.' I was with my stepfather and my little brother looking at comic books at a magazine stand and noticed 'The Advocate' cover and thought, 'The Advocate. I gotta go find out what the hell that is because there's a dude in his underwear on the cover and I think it has something to do with me. Those are my people."

MARCELLOS REYNOLDS (TV personality) : "It's very exciting to be here. 'The Advocate' is one of the few publication I think that gets it right, that isn't constantly pushing like shirtless, bottomless, sexy overdone boys, and is at least staying political. It's one the front lines of fighting for what's important to us. I'm a big fan because it always covers every spectrum of gay America - white guys, black guys, Latino guys, Asian guys. It's very inclusive and they've always been very nice to me and about me and I like that."

NEIL GIULIANO (GLAAD Executive director): "The generation that is out and proud today grew up with, and matured with, The Advocate over the last 40 years. For a lot of us who are up there now, it was the only publication. It was the publication that we knew, where we got all of our information and we have grown and matured as the publication has gorwn and matured over time. Individually, from a media perspective and as a movement. Everything has happened all together...I saw The Advocate for the first time when I was in high school, in New York City, on a magazine rack and it was kind of like,'Hmmmm. That looks interesting. It was right next to the magazine 'Screw.' I was too afraid to buy it, of course."

MICHELLE PARADISE (actress/writer): "I don't have a subscription but I get it when I go to the newsstand. It's an increbibly important magazine and I can't believe it's been around for 40 years. You just look at some of the covers that they've had and some of the issues that they've covered and it's incredibly important. It's incredible nbot only for existing for 40 years, but that it exists at all given the kind of culture we have where gay people don't have the same rights."

ERIC ALVA (First soldier injured in Iraq War. Later came out of closet): "It was an unbelievable experience [to be on the cover] because I had never imagined that I was going to be any kind of a public figure like that. My mom used to tell me when I was a kid, 'Everything happens for a reason.' Me getting hurt was something not expected but I know that I have a prupose in life and it's to stick up for people's rights. Having 'The Advocate' put me on the cover was an opportunity for people to read my story and for people to know what I sacrificed. People started to learn more about the gay men and women serving in the sacrifices we go through - even losing limbs. My story wasn't the only one in there. There were several gay veterans who had served in Iraq and other wars, you had a father and son who served in the military and both of them were gay."

DOUG SPEARMAN (actor): "Having been a former Advocate cover boy, I think it's amazing. When you're on the cover of 'The Advocate," you're basically out. It has done so much for me just as a man. I was kind of nervous about doing it but I'm glad I did because I look at these walls [where dozens of covers are hanging) and see all the other people who are out and I'm part of history. It's fantastic."