LGBT parents may already be familiar with the online literary mag and primary publisher of LGBT family fiction in the U.S., Rainbow Rumpus, aimed at younger children. But the company has now expanded to gain the attention of teens and tweens with the recently launched Rainbow Riot, a new web-based magazine featuring topics on and by youth, including art and video. This is hardly Teen Beat. This is from their release:
Rainbow Riot is published by Rainbow Rumpus, a Minnesota-based nonprofit that has been publishing an award winning online magazine for children and grown-ups for over five years. The Riot site is linked to the Rumpus site so young readers can explore the content of both magazines.
“We launched Rainbow Riot in response to feedback from the hundreds of youth that read the online magazine,” said Laura Matanah, Rainbow Rumpus’s executive director. “Teens wanted their own site so we created a whole magazine just for older youth.”
Response to the site has been tremendous. “Ur issues r the best thing i do online,” wrote a 14-year-old reader. Another shared, “I like being able to see my artwork on the site.”
April’s issue of Rainbow Riot features an interview with Avery Klein Cloud, who was raised by two moms and discusses the process of making a documentary about her life during a period when she was searching for her birth mother and going through a “racial identity crisis.” It also includes an interview with a young adult with a gay father who created a video project to explore what it means to “come out” as the child of one or more LGBT parents.
“We’re excited for the Rainbow Riot site to bring our teen fiction to a wider audience,” said Matanah. “The site as a whole will help us achieve our vision of a world where kids and teens with LGBT parents are safe, welcomed, and powerful.”
Teens and young adults are encouraged to submit photos, artwork, writing, and video to Rainbow Riot. Contributions can be emailed to this here.
