Emil Wilbekin (born September 16, 1967, in Cincinnati, Ohio) is an American journalist, media executive, stylist, content creator, culture critic, and human rights activist.
[1] He is the founder of Native Son Now, an organization dedicated to empowering and lifting up black gay men through positive representation and business opportunities.
[8][9][10][11] In 1992, while vacationing with four friends in the Hamptons—Jonathan Van Meter, Diane Cardwell, Ricky Lee, and Gilbert Rogin—Wilbekin participated in developing ideas for a magazine dedicated to covering hip-hop music and Black culture.
[citation needed] Throughout the year 2000, he oversaw expansion of readership and the creation of the magazine's supplemental focused solely on women called HomeGirls.
Wilbekin also confronted homophobia in the art form by making sure that Dr. Dre and Eminem addressed their homophobic lyrics when they appeared on the September 2000 cover of Vibe.
In a 2001 interview with New York magazine, Wilbekin emphasized that his job was not to police rappers over their comments about the gay community but "to make sure that homosexuality is dealt with as fairly as anything else.
[19] The following year, Vibe won "The Ellie" for general excellence of magazines circulating between 500,000 and one million readers, beating out competition from The New Yorker, Wired, Gourmet, and Jane for the top prize.
[20][21][22] The win led to his being named to Out magazine's Out 100 list and being profiled by The New York Times, where he addressed his facing no problems as an openly gay man in the hip-hop industry.
[24][25] After 12 years of service, he departed Vibe in July 2004 to join Marc Ecko's brand as vice president of development and to serve on Complex magazine's editorial board.
[28][29][30] Part of his contributions to the publication included a column focused on cultural events and interviews with celebrities such as Viola Davis,[31] Angela Bassett,[32] Puff Daddy,[33] Yolanda Adams,[34] and Anita Baker.
[88] He also weighed in on Kanye West's interruption of Taylor Swift's acceptance speech for the Best Video Award at the 2009 MTV Music Video Awards, saying that it was not West's place to speak for Beyoncé;[89] participated in VH1's Love & Hip Hop: "Out in Hip-Hop" round table discussion on homophobia in the hip-hop community;[90] and chastised the New York Post's comparison of President Barack Obama with a chimpanzee.
In an effort to destigmatize HIV within the Black community, he partnered with ViiV Healthcare on producing an immersive theatre piece that raised awareness about the virus.
[104][105][106][107][108] In 2020, Native Son Now joined forces with Human Rights Campaign and Color Of Change to push for the release of data on COVID-19 in order to address the disproportionate effect that the virus was having on Black communities across the United States.