Joanne Vannicola

Joanne "Jo" Vannicola is a Canadian actor. Some of her roles include Dr. Naadiah in Being Erica, Dr. Mia Stone in PSI Factor, Jerri in Love and Human Remains, Sam in Stonewall, Renee in Slasher: Guilty Party, and Amber Ciotti in Slasher: Solstice, as well as voice roles in Crash Canyon and My Dad the Rock Star.

In 2004, she founded the organization Youth Out Loud to raise awareness of child sexual abuse.

Vannicola has been out as a lesbian for many years, and came out as nonbinary in 2018. As of 2020, she describes herself as "lesbian and or butch and or nonbinary".

She wrote about her life's struggles in her 2019 memoir All We Knew But Couldn't Say, which was nominated for the Kobo Emerging Writer Prize 2020.

Quotes
"It was so hard for me my entire life to explain what that was. People would say 'Well just because you're a lesbian doesn't mean that you can't be feminine' [...] I didn't have the language growing up, and if I'd had the word nonbinary, I would have been able to say 'But I'm nonbinary.'"

"I must write about LGBTQ people and I must never stop being authentically me. Hiding, passing, even acting or pretending to be anything other than queer and non-binary, is a road I never want to walk. Be brave lgbtq people. We are reflecting who we are for the next generation who need us to step up and take space, be visible."