Barack Obama gay marriage billboards censored throughout the US
31 Jul, 2012, 06:17 BST
- BeautifulPeople.com Launches Exclusive Gay Website
LONDON, July 31, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Billboards featuring Barack Obama presiding over gay marriages between leading Republican politicians have been banned across America.
The images were created using lookalikes to announce the gay and lesbian versions of BeautifulPeople.com, the dating community exclusively for good-looking people.
As the ban came too late to change the campaign, the billboards were put up with the images obscured and the words "censored" written across them.
The censored billboards provoked a flurry of online speculation as to the identities of the couples.
The BeautifulPeopleGay.com billboard shows a loving embrace between the Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and Donald Trump, the billionaire businessman and TV personality.
The BeautifulWomenOnly.com billboard features former presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann kissing Sarah Palin, the gun-toting former Alaska governor and darling of the American Right.
The ban happened across the country, even though one of them was to be put up right in the middle of the West Hollywood gay district.
The only place in America that would take the uncensored billboards was on the side of a truck.
The billboard truck was driven all around New York before parking up outside Trump Towers – the imposing home of Mr. Trump's business empire.
The light-hearted campaign was conceived in response to the heated political debate about same-sex unions in the US.
The Supreme Court is due to hear several challenges to a 1996 law which defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
In May, President Obama came out in support of gay marriage, setting him apart from Mr. Romney and the vast majority of Republicans.
Greg Hodge, BeautifulPeople's managing director said: "BeautifulPeople.com is a big supporter of gay marriage. We wanted to poke fun at the politicians that are stuck way back in the middle of the last century.
"We created the images using lookalikes. I am confident Barack Obama would have been happy to take part in the campaign himself, but we didn't want to trouble the President as he is very busy. I'm sure Sarah Palin has a bit of time on her hands, but I don't think she would have been quite so willing to take part."
Determined to play an active role in the national effort to legislate equal rights for the LGBT community, BeautifulPeople.com is giving 15% from every same-sex membership to nonprofit organisations championing marriage equality.
BeautifulPeopleGay.com and BeautifulWomenOnly.com are now live globally. Like BeautifulPeople.com, acceptance to the site is a democratic process with existing members voting beautiful hopefuls in or out. All members must pass through a strict rating process to make sure they are up to standard. Potential members submit a picture of themselves and existing members then vote. If successful they have exclusive access to a dating site where the one thing they can guarantee is that everyone is good looking.
BeautifulPeople.com is the largest community of attractive people in the world. Since its conception in 2002, the site has launched in 120 countries with over 750,000 members worldwide. Over 6.5 million people have been rejected from the site over the same period. There have been hundreds of marriages through unions found on the site and thousands of beautiful babies born.
Images: The following are links to the uncensored billboard campaign, and the wedding album photos from the photo shoot. Images of the uncensored billboard truck will be available the afternoon of July 30th.
Banned Billboards: http://www.beautifulpeople.com/microsites/billboards/
Wedding album: http://www.beautifulpeople.com/microsites/WeddingAlbum/
BeautifulPeople.com is located at www.BeautifulPeople.com
SOURCE BeautifulPeople.com
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