Raymond Braun is an American

media personality Celebrity is a condition of fame and broad public recognition of a person or group as a result of the attention given to them by mass media. An individual may attain a celebrity status from having great wealth, their participation in sports ...

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

, and LGBTQ advocate.

Early life and education

Braun grew up in

Toledo, Ohio Toledo ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lucas County, Ohio, United States. A major Midwestern United States port city, Toledo is the fourth-most populous city in the state of Ohio, after Columbus, Cleveland, and Cincinnati, and accordin ...

, a city in Northwest

Ohio Ohio () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Of the List of states and territories of the United States, fifty U.S. states, it is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 34th-l ...

. The first time he saw a queer person on TV was

Matthew Shepard Matthew Wayne Shepard (December 1, 1976 – October 12, 1998) was a gay American student at the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tortured, and left to die near Laramie on the night of October 6, 1998. He was taken by rescuers to ...

. He graduated from Stanford University.

Career

In 2013, Braun was an associate product marketing manager for YouTube Entertainment Marketing. He developed and implemented YouTube's first LGBTQ+ marketing campaign, #ProudToLove. The effort generated millions of views and widespread support. Afterwards, he became the LGBT marketing lead for Google and YouTube. In January 2015, Braun took a leave of absence from Google to start a YouTube channel focused on LGBT issues. , he is a contributing editor for ''Seventeen''. Braun is the host of the 2019 documentary, ''

State of Pride ''State of Pride'' is a 2019 American YouTube Originals, YouTube original documentary film directed by Jeffrey Friedman (filmmaker), Jeffrey Friedman and Rob Epstein. YouTuber and LGBTQ activist Raymond Braun explores the LGBT rights movement by ...

''.

Awards and honors

Braun is gay. In 2014, he was recognized on ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also r ...

''' 30 under 30 in marketing and advertising.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Braun, Raymond Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 21st-century American LGBT people 21st-century American male writers American gay writers American LGBT businesspeople American LGBT journalists American LGBT rights activists American marketing businesspeople Gay businessmen Gay journalists Google employees Internet marketing people LGBT people from Ohio LGBT YouTubers Stanford University alumni YouTubers from Ohio