This has to do with the LGBTQ+ content in this.’ And when I said that, they froze up. And for me to have that pushed through, I had to use my own identity as a way to move it forward, like, ‘OK, I need you to tell me one more time why this isn’t working. “It’s not only LGBTQ+ content, it’s Native American content. “They were like, ‘Yeah, we’re not airing this, our advertisers wouldn’t approve of this content,’” she says. At a previous job in Bismarck, North Dakota, Mitchell says a reported piece on two-spirit Native Americans was initially turned down. While Mitchell is very happy at her current workplace, and is thrilled that her coworkers are as excited as she is about making LGBTQ content for TikTok, she says that there’s a long way for news to go in terms of accepting and embracing her community. Another features her dad embracing Mitchell’s girlfriend. One TikTok shows them throwing her and her younger brother (who came out after Mitchell did) a rainbow-filled party for Pride. She’s been candid about how her parents have now fully embraced who she is, after initially being unsupportive of her after she came out at 19. Much of what she films is from behind the scenes at the news desk, but her account also features plenty of TikTok dances and trending sounds - and she gets personal, too. She could be the openly queer broadcaster she didn’t initially see when she was looking towards her future career path. It was for that reason that Mitchell - who started her TikTok account in 2020 - chose to use her social media platform to set an example. The post, set to “You Might Not Like Her” by Maddie Zahm, shows Mitchell struggling to come to terms with being queer - from not understanding why she “freaked out” after kissing a girl to realizing that the feelings she thought were romantic towards her gay male best friend were about being “attracted to femininity.” She captioned the post, “Comp het made it so hard for me to realize," referring to “compulsory heterosexuality,” or “comp het,” the idea that because heterosexuality is the cultural norm, it can be challenging for people who don’t fall into that label to realize, or be willing to recognize, that they are queer. She recently went viral for a video she made chronicling her journey to accept her sexuality. Mitchell has more than 1.8 million followers on TikTok, and uses the platform to share her experiences as an out lesbian working in news. The 29-year-old Connecticut native is an anchor and reporter at WLWT News 5 in Cincinnati, but her reach goes far beyond Ohio, thanks to her successful social media platform. Local news broadcaster Megan Mitchell is using her TikTok to remind other members of the LGBTQ community that they don’t have to hide who they are. And now it’s kind of morphed into one.Megan Mitchell talks about her journey to broadcasting. When I got to Cincinnati, I was like, What’s a way I can really bend the rules? And I to get an undercut, because you can see my anchor bob on the desk, but when I’m not there, I gotta be myself. It’s been really mind-blowing quite honestly. It’s been really nice to see that so many people either relate to it or have said, Hey, you’ve given me the courage to wear a pantsuit to the dance, or a lot of people say, You’ve give me the courage to get an undercut. so I thought, Maybe it would be fun to showcase that there’s someone in your own city, where we don’t necessarily have the resources or the role models of LGBTQ representation that the coasts have. When I was growing up, there were queer role models, but they all lived in L.A. What inspired you to make TikToks about being a queer newscaster? I started wearing suits about a year ago, and it’s funny because sometimes I’ll get mean comments about it, but once I posted it to TikTok, it’s all been really great feedback. The thing about local news is it’s pretty rigid in terms of gender roles you always see the female and the male sitting next to each other, and one of them is wearing a dress, and the other is wearing a suit, and you don’t see that mixed up a lot. So, in the beginning it was a lot of typical dresses. Obviously, it’s in the public eye, and they were very much like, You should probably be quiet about, just so you don’t lose out on jobs. One of the things my parents were concerned about was my career. I came out in college, I was going to school for broadcast journalism. How has your style evolved throughout your career? Occupation: Megan Mitchell, anchor and reporter, WLWT-TV TikTok star, Fresh, clean, tomboy
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