Final Cut LA editor Zoe Schack and Oglivy Subvert Hateful Narratives For GLAAD

Earlier this year, non-profit LGBTQ advocacy organisation GLAAD came together with Ogilvy to create ‘Protect This Kid’, a campaign that flips the homophobic narrative that children need to be protected from the LGBTQ community, and reminds us that queer kids are those who actually need protection from harm.

By this point in 2024, the misinformation against the transgender community and animosity towards it is rapidly growing, while LGBTQ Americans are set for a “highly consequential” election year, GLAAD finds, and the political right continues to gain speed throughout Europe. ‘Protect This Kid’ (in somewhat direct opposition to the ’70s ‘Save Our Children’ anti-LGBTQ movement) comes in as the organisation’s effort to counter misinformation with positive messaging, and use storytelling to celebrate and elevate queer joy.

The team at Ogilvy explains that when they landed ‘Protect This Kid’, the language seemed so powerful in simplicity, that they knew it would be the perfect way to counter the age-old hateful narrative.

A series of interviews accompanied with childhood photographs of LGBTQ heroes stand at the core of the campaign, including stories from Beanie Feldstein, Chris Mosier, Daniella Carter, Margaret Cho, River Gallo, Ryan “R.K.” Russell, Sherry Cola and Yvie Oddly.

Final Cut LA’s editor Zoe Schack was the one who got to look through the raw footage of these incredible interviews and make the difficult decisions on what goes and what stays. While Zoe cut the main film, editors from Final Cut’s ‘New Blood’ roster of upcoming talent worked on the accompanying films across the campaign – Kaylin Smida, Andre Castiglioni, Megan Marie Cannollu and Alyce Muhammad.

Head to Little Black Book to read the full feature!