Gaga performed at Europride in Rome in June 2011, an international LGBT Pride event. She criticized the poor state of gay rights in many European countries and described homosexuals as “love revolutionaries.” [379] Later that year, it was mentioned by teenager Jamey Rodemeyer in the hours before his death, with Rodemeyer tweeting, “@ladygaga bye monster mother, thank you for everything you`ve done, paws up forever.” Rodemeyer`s suicide prompted Gaga to meet with then-President Barack Obama to address the issue of anti-gay bullying in American schools. [380] In 2011, she was also ordained pastor by the convent of the Church of Universal Life so that she could celebrate the marriage of two friends. [381] Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta was born on March 28, 1986, at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan, New York,[1] to an upper-middle-class Catholic family. Her parents both have Italian ancestry and she also has more distant French-Canadian roots. Her parents were Cynthia Louise (née Bissett), a philanthropist and CEO, and Internet entrepreneur Joseph Germanotta,[3] and she had a younger sister named Natali.[2] Growing up on Manhattan`s Upper West Side, Gaga said in an interview that her parents came from lower-class families and worked hard for everything.[4] From the age of eleven, she attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a private Catholic school for girls.[5][6] [7] Gaga described her high school as “very dedicated, very hardworking, very disciplined,” but also “a little insecure.” She considered herself an outsider and was ridiculed for being “too provocative or too eccentric.” [8] Although it is possible that she will later return to her real name, for now it is definitely Gaga. The singer herself has spoken about it, saying the name change came when her boyfriend at the time, producer Rob Fusari, compared her voice to Freddie Mercury. Happy Sunday!😊I send love+ a friendly reminder that your signature on your absentee ballot must match your signature in your state. When I sign legal documents, I repeat Stefani Germanotta on + quietly in my head so as not to accidentally sign as Lady Gaga pic.twitter.com/Qc7ejfzYwo In February 2011, Gaga 🤦 ♀️😂 released “Born This Way”, the first single from her studio album of the same name. The song sold over a million copies in five days, becoming the Guinness World Record for the best-selling single on iTunes. It debuted at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 and became the 1,000th number-one single in chart history.[94] The second single “Judas” followed two months later,[96] and “The Edge of Glory” served as the third single.[95] [97] Both reached the top 10 in the United States and the United Kingdom.
[49] [52] Unlike her previous works, her music video for “The Edge of Glory” shows her dancing on a fire escape and on a secluded street, without complicated choreography or background dancers. [98] While Lady Gaga may not need to be introduced, she once had a very different name. Find out what it was (and why she changed it)! In June 2016, at a vigil in Los Angeles for victims of the attack at the gay nightclub Pulse in Orlando, Gaga read the names of the 49 people killed in the attack and gave a speech. [382] Later that month, Gaga appeared in a Human Rights Campaign video honoring the victims of the attack. [383] She opposed Donald Trump`s presidency and his military ban on transgender people. [384] [385] She endorsed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for president in 2016. [386] In 2018, a leaked memo from Trump`s office revealed that his administration wanted to change the legal definition of sex to exclude transgender Americans. Gaga was one of several celebrities who called her and broadcast the campaign #WontBeErased to her 77 million Twitter followers. [387] [388] In January 2019, during one of her Enigma shows, she criticized Vice President Mike Pence for his wife, Karen Pence, who works at an evangelical Christian school where LGBTQ people are turned away, calling him “the worst representation of what it means to be a Christian.” Gaga also said, “I`m a Christian, and what I know about Christianity is that we have no prejudice and everyone is welcome.” [389] In an early interview with Oprah Winfrey, Gaga attributed the origin of her name to Queen`s 1984 song “Radio Ga Ga.” She went on to describe “Gaga” as “just a nickname that [her] friends had for [her] in New York and [her producer], and it got a little stuck.” At the time, the artist told Oprah to call her “Gaga” because she “felt weird” when people called her “Lady.” Born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta in March 1986, Gaga began her musical experiments with producer Robert Fusari and first began to develop her iconic stage identity. Speaking to Flybe in 2010, she shared that the idea for her stage name began when Robert shared that she reminded him of the classic Queen song “Radio Gaga,” something that immediately made Stefani shine.