Salute to 70 Years of Britain's ITV Network

ShoutOut as a grass roots media organisation for LGBTQIA+ people, would like to extend its greetings to ITV in the UK on the occasion of the network's seventieth anniversary.  In the early 1950s, the government of the UK felt that, whilst the BBC had been an important voice for democracy during the second world war, no media organisation should have sole monopoly on broadcasting and that alternative voices should always be heard.  With this in mind, they established an independent channel - the "i" in ITV.  Launching in the London area initially on 22nd September 1955, ITV was the first competition to the BBC channel (which would be renamed BBC-1 when a second BBC service started in 1964).  Over the years, ITV has championed LGBTQIA+ representation, transmitting debates and discussions during the run up to the Gay Law Reforms of 1967 and subsequent years, and bravely transmitting award winning documentaries and dramas, such as The Naked Civil Servant, a dramatisation of the life of Quentin Crisp, in 1975.  Today, gay stars such as Rylan, the late Paul O'Grady, Sue Perkins and Sandi Toksvig have all been stars of ITV (as well as other commercial channels such as Channel Four and Channel Five).  Through their groundbreaking work, these stars of ITV have broken down barriers and changed attitudes.  Today, LGBTQIA+ people are featured across ITV's five television stations.  (ITV1, ITV2, ITV3, ITV4 and ITV Quiz).  ITV remains a positive employment experience for many LGBTQIA media workers and the channel can be proud of its achievements.  From ShoutOut to ITV - Happy Seventieth Birthday!