Love & Hip Hop star Milan Christopher is showing it all.
The 33-year-old rapper stripped down to his birthday suit for a NSFW photoshoot with Paper. The star bared his naked body to the camera as he posed against a backdrop of cars, bikes and planes.
When asked why he was willing to get completely naked, the reality star explained his reason was rooted in gender equality.
"I just feel like in our culture it's so taboo for a guy to show their bodies but it's ok for a woman to do it. I just kinda want to break that. I think I have a nice body and I think it's art and I just think that it should be celebrated like they celebrate women's bodies," he said.
"So you know, I could be a guy and be gay and be black and be artistic and be artistic in a nude fashion shoot in the same way that anybody else could."
In fact, Christopher was aiming for this shoot to have as much impact as Burt Reynolds' iconic naked spread in Cosmopolitan. "I want that 'break the internet' moment," he continued to the magazine. "I want people to look at this and be like, 'Oh, wow, it's ok.' This guy is a musician, he's on TV. He's doing this, he's doing that but it's ok."
As an openly gay, African American man, the rapper knows he represents many more as a public figure. "I think it's not that many gay guys who are African American who are out and who are comfortable? Right now, I can probably name about 5. And it's millions, you know what I mean?" he described.
"I do think that I have a huge [responsibility for] representation of the community and I do think that I'm doing pretty well. I'm always being honest and being my authentic self, not really holding back and just putting my best face forward and trying to make things happen."
Even as a famous person, Christopher noted times when felt pushed aside by the business because of his sexual orientation.
"I was on Love and Hip Hop, I had my own Out in Hip Hop television show, I was on the cover of the New York Times, the cover of LA Times twice, on Wendy Williams, Ellen, you know, everywhere. And you know the Hip Hop Awards, the BET awards didn't even invite me to do anything," he recalled. Christopher was the first openly gay man to appear on the VH1 reality show.
"It's like, this is the first time this has ever happened in the history of hip hop music and you didn't make a place for me because I'm gay? I felt very disrespected by that."
Nevertheless, there are still moments when the impact he has catches him by surprise.
"I was just hosting in Detroit. I posted a picture on Instagram and it was this little eight-year-old boy, caucasian boy from Canada, who begged his mom to drive him to Detroit to meet me and he knew all the words to my songs. I was just like this is the weirdest thing. I never knew that I was influencing that age group or that they were even paying attention," he said.
"So, I do think, in a sense, yes, I am a role model. But I also think that at the same time…Im nervous. But this takes a very strong person to go face forward and make it happen and make people accept it."