The Owner Of Coachella Does Not Hate Gays, Okay?
Lance Bass and his husband (seen above at Coachella in 2014) don’t have to permanently retire their Coachella-going fanny packs, jorts and denim pedal pushers just yet, because Philip Anschutz, whose company AEG owns Hipsterpalooza, says that he no longer donates to anti-LGBTQ organizations. Yesterday, I wrote about how The Washington Post named Philip Anschutz an “Enemy of Equality” back in July. They put together a graph of all the richies who have donated to anti-LGBTQ groups, like Alliance Defending Freedom and Focus on the Family. But Anschutz spit at The Washington Post’s graph in a statement. He said that his foundation did donate to certain groups without his knowledge and when he found about it, he immediately put a stop to it.
In a statement to Rolling Stone, Philip Anschutz said that he’s all for gay rights and any news saying otherwise is “fake news.” (Side note: Yesterday, I kept typing his name as “Assshutz,” which is a great last name for a homophobe, something Anschutz is not, apparently.)
“Recent claims published in the media that I am anti-LGBTQ are nothing more than fake news — it is all garbage. I unequivocally support the rights of all people without regard to sexual orientation. We are fortunate to employ a wealth of diverse individuals throughout our family of companies, all of whom are important to us — the only criteria on which they are judged is the quality of their job performance; we do not tolerate discrimination in any form.
“Both The Anschutz Foundation and I contribute to numerous organizations that pursue a wide range of causes. Neither I nor the Foundation fund any organization with the purpose or expectation that it would finance anti-LGBTQ initiatives, and when it has come to my attention or the attention of The Anschutz Foundation that certain organizations either the Foundation or I have funded have been supporting such causes, we have immediately ceased all contributions to such groups.”
Anschutz didn’t say anything about donating to climate science denial groups.
So, there you go, hipsters. You can continue to twirl on molly at Coochella without guilt and sip on your $25 cup of craft beer without thinking that you’re drinking the tears of the gays. Although, who knows if you’re drinking the tears of the polar bears.
Pic: Splash