2010: Out Magazine, “Troy Williams is Changing the Face of Salt Lake City. He Is Not Alone.” by Dustin Lance Black
“Troy Williams, executive producer and host of KRCL’s RadioActive, is pretty much the voice of progressive politics and gay liberation in Salt Lake City. We’d met at a screening of Milk there 18 months earlier, where he’d assured me the city had a thriving gay scene and was on the front line in the fight for equality.
“But ask the blond, all-American Williams if it was hard to come out in Salt Lake, and he responds, “Hell no! Being queer actually saved me. It saved me from Mormonism. Utah is actually incredible. It provides a great opportunity for cutting your teeth as an activist.”
“Which is exactly what Williams has done since coming out, harnessing the energy of the grassroots and becoming the Cleve Jones of Salt Lake in the process. When state senator Chris Buttars made a now infamous statement comparing gays to Muslim terrorists in February 2009, Williams sprang into action.”
2010: Interview Magazine, Stand Up For Your Rights
Troy Williams, Executive Radio Producer and Activist
Growing up Mormon in Eugene, Oregon, Troy Williams led what he calls a “turbo righteous” existence. “I sublimated my sexuality into right-wing politics. I thought that God would somehow straighten me out,” says the 40-year-old Salt Lake City resident. “Thankfully, he ignored every single one of my prayers.” Today, Williams leads an equally active life on the opposite side of the political spectrum. He is the public affair director of station KRCL, which takes a very vocal role in Utah’s LGBT community, particularly the hour-long evening show that Williams executively produces, RadioActive, “which is dedicated to the ideal of ‘full spectrum social justice.’
2009: The Nation, “What’s Right with Utah?” by Lisa Duggan
“I was in Salt Lake City in November when the passage of California’s Proposition 8 generated national outrage against the Mormon Church for its role in sending money and volunteers to help antigay forces take away the right of California’s same-sex couples to marry. A few national LGBT figures, most notably gay pundit Dan Savage, called for a boycott of Utah to punish its majority Mormon population. In Salt Lake City, I joined a furious crowd, including many gay Mormons and ex-Mormons, at a November 7 protest at the LDS Temple. But no one I saw advocated a boycott. Most seemed to agree with KRCL-FM public radio station personality Troy Williams, referred to by some Utahns as their homegrown Harvey Milk, who challenged Savage on his hourlong program, calling for an influx of queer migrants to the state rather than a boycott. Perhaps a New Queer Pioneer movement, modeled on the sanctified Mormon pioneers of the nineteenth century, would do more to shrink the impact of LDS antigay bigotry than any boycott ever could.”
2009: The Gay Times (UK), “The Latter-Day Utah Saint” by Sally Howard
“Most newly-out guys would have fled from America’s most reactionary, homophobic state, but Williams was driven (perhaps by a poetent cocktail of chutzpah and redemption) to remain where “most work needed to be done” – the north-western state that’s become a byword for America’s blustering Far Right. As a homocentric author, website editor and speaker, Williams is now a leading player on Utah’s political stage.”
