In this exclusive audio interview Emmy Winner Charlotte Robinson host of OUTTAKE VOICES™ talks with Danielle Jablonski one of the executive directors of the second annual ClexaCon Convention that takes place in Las Vegas April 5th through April 9th at the Tropicana Hotel. ClexaCon is a media and entertainment convention for LGBTQ women and allies that brings together actresses, directors, producers, writers, comic book illustrators, visual artists, academics and fans from over 40 countries and all 50 U.S. states to celebrate the best of LGBTQ+ TV and film and discuss how to improve representation across all media platforms. It also hosts a series of panels on a multitude of topics, workshops, charity events, parties as well as a three-day film festival and a loud message of gender equality, female empowerment, diversity and inclusion. Nothing is more crucial and urgently important today than diversity and inclusion and not just in Hollywood but in all business models and fields. This is where ClexaCon comes in as a leader in an industry-wide conversation to effectively rally together the decision makers and influencers of our community to formulate and put forth real change to counter the lack of representation for LGBTQ+ women in front and behind the camera. With that in mind ClexaCon aims to foster dialogue around various aspects of diversity including gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity and age among others. We talked to Danielle about what she hopes to accomplish at ClexaCon Las Vegas and her spin on our LGBTQ issues.
When asked what her personal commitment is to LGBTQ equality Jablonski stated, “I believe that we all need to stand up and take action in whatever way that we’re able to in our own personal lives. For me LGBTQ equality is something that I’ve always been passionate about. I actually started a nonprofit LGBTQ sports organization years ago which I ran for five years and it’s still going strong. So when the opportunity came up to get involved in something that combines issues around LGBTQ equality and media which is something I’m passionate about it was just a no brainer for me to jump in and do everything I can to talk about this issue, educate around it and on what we can do to make it better.”
ClexaCon was created and is run by Holly Winebarger, Ashley Arnold and Danielle Jablonski with the goal to provide a safe space and a world-wide community of LGBTQ+ women and allies who love TV, film, comics and books and to encourage more LGBTQ+ women to get involved in content creation and to embolden allies to improve representation for LGBTQ+ characters in their creative work. ClexaCon started as a simple meet-up to unite fans of LGBTQ+ pop culture and evolved into a full-blown convention with over 2,000 attendees last year and is expected to welcome over 3,000 attendees in Las Vegas April 5th through April 9th as well as ClexaCon in London, UK from November 2nd to November 4th 2018.
For More Info & Tix: clexacon.com
Danielle has a great outlook and her positivism is contagious and heartening in light of current government attempts to reverse our progress.
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