Konrad Juengling

Konrad Juengling is a German-American political activist, gay rights activist, and writer.

Biography
Konrad Juengling was born in Salem, Oregon. He was raised as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Juengling family has been characterized as being very involved in the arts.

Juengling attended North Salem High School. While a student he wrote for the student newspaper The Clarion. After starting at Portland State University, Juengling began writing for their newspaper, the Vanguard. His first article was titled Ender of the Line. Juengling graduated from Portland State with a bachelor's degree in psychology. He previously worked as a mental health associate before attending Boise State University for grad school, where he earned a Master's in Social Work.

Activism

Non-political activism
Juengling has advocated for increased literacy in the overall population, and started a queer men's book club in Portland in 2013 through the Cascade AIDS Project. Also in 2013, Juengling advocated against people watching the movie Ender's Game, citing Orson Scott Card's views on homosexuality and encouraging people to practice queer ethical consumerism. The op-eds he wrote and overall stance "helped to raise GeeksOUT’s profile after their 'Skip Ender’s Game' campaign." Juengling then joined the GeeksOUT team, writing posts about queer-related media for their site.

Citing queer ethical consumerism again, Juengling has taken the position that people should not donate to the Salvation Army based on their policies relating to homosexual people.

Politics

Indiana State House representatives
In March 2015, Indiana passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. In response, Juengling purchased the domain names of six Republican Indiana State House representatives. He linked them to the Human Rights Campaign's Youth Statistics page. He stated the information on the site would educate the lawmakers about a population that  "is already disadvantaged and have less accesses to family, community supports, and healthcare." The domain names he purchased were for representatives Dale Devon, Don Lehe, Donna Schaibley, Douglas Gutwein, Kathy Kreag Richardson, and Martin Carbaugh.

In reference to purchasing the domain names, writer Brian Anderson called Juengling an extortionist. He said he "is holding [the domains] hostage until they bow to his will." Criticism has also come from the LGBT community including PinkNews, In an article by Nick Duffy he stated "We could not possibly condone such a petty move."

The Huffington Post awarded Juengling with their Unicorn of the Week award for his efforts in combating Indiana's RFRA bill and "doing something positive for the LGBTQ community" and his "tech-savvy queer activism."

2016 presidential election
Juengling supports Hilary Clinton for the Democratic nomination for the United States 2016 presidential election. He has made comments why he is against the campaigns of Ted Cruz.

In December 2015, Juengling published Jeb's ABCs, a satirical children's book on presidential contender Jeb Bush.

Personal life
Juengling is married to Robert Juengling. The two married at Silver Falls State Park in Oregon in August 2016. Robert's father Stephen Peterson is an aerospace engineer for Honeywell International, Inc.

References

20th-century births
Living people
American LGBT people
American LGBT rights activists
Gay men
LGBT writers
People from Salem, Oregon
Writers from Oregon
Year of birth missing (living people)