The Boston Red Sox announced Saturday
that they'll record an It Gets Better video, and credited 12-year-old
Sam Maden for the idea.
The move comes a week after the
San Francisco Giants released a video for the campaign and days
after the
Chicago Cubs announced they'll record their own video.
The
It Gets Better Project encourages gay teens to not cave in to
bullies, because life eventually gets better. The video campaign is
helmed by gay activist and Seattle alternative The Stranger
editor Dan Savage.
More
than 9,000 people signed onto Maden's online petition asking the
baseball team to join the campaign. Maden said he started the
petition drive in honor of his late uncle Chris Nutile, who was gay.
“The Red Sox are my favorite team,
and when I saw the Giants were doing it, I really wanted to get them
to do it too,” Maden told The Boston Globe. “I see kids
who are bullies, I see them everyday. I do what I can to get them to
stop, and I thought this might make it better.”
“We are proud of dedicated Red Sox
fans like 12-year-old Sam Maden who have taken the courageous step of
publicly standing up against bullying of LGBT youth,” said Susan
Goodenow, vice president of public affairs and marketing for the Red
Sox, in a statement. “The Red Sox have frequently done PSA videos,
or public service announcement videos, on important social issues. We
are currently producing an 'It Gets Better' video to support the It
Gets Better campaign to stop bullying of LGBT youth and teen
suicides. We hope that when it is released it will both reflect our
continued commitment to be active participants in the community and
help advance the efforts of Sam and others to stop bullying. Our team
stands for respect and inclusion — there is no place for
discrimination or acts of hatred in Red Sox Nation.”
Writing
at the It Gets Better blog, Savage said that he's thrilled by the
attention MLB teams are bringing to the project, but added that the
“most important IGB videos are still the ones created by average,
everyday, ordinary LGBT adults.”