Some days that kind of thing works, today it doesn't, so here's an essay about Pride Month, something I've been reading about and thinking on for a bit. This isn't an attack on people outside of the LGBTQIA community, it's a reminder/education of what Pride means to the community and why it's so important, even today when it's easy to miss the issues we still face. When people aren't aware of the gravity of a situation, they may do certain things that are harmful without realizing it, so some respectful reminders of what's at stake seemed in order.
Hope you find it interesting, let me know if there's something here that worries you (It's my first time writing about this kind of thing, so I could be confused on something), and have yourself a lovely day. See you Friday for something else.
Pride Month, and Why It Isn't About Straight People by Mac Clevinger, June 13, 2017
On June 28, 1969, a police raid on a bar called the Stonewall Inn, which served as a haven for members of the LGBTQIA community, caused a series of riots that were later called the Stonewall Riots which lasted for nearly a week and involved thousands of protestors. These riots arose in protest of the legal policies that subjected this community to constant persecution by the law for public (or private, as these raids sought to uncover) displays of their LGBTQIA status.
Amid a social climate that was hostile to members of this community, wherein the suspicion of being a homosexual led to being fired from work, discharged from the military, publicly humiliated, and assaulted; during a time when homosexuality was listed in the DSM as a mental illness, these riots became the tipping point which galvanized the LGBTQIA community to band together and demand they be given the rights that the government denied them because of their sexual or gender identities.
A year later, after hundreds of groups formed across the U.S. and pushed the existence of LGBTQIA people into the spotlight, several Gay Pride marches were held on the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. They took place in New York City where the Stonewall Riot had occurred, as well as in Los Angeles and Chicago; these marches were a monumental step forward for the community.
They put themselves in the public eye, one that a year before would have been trying to imprison them in jail or strip them of their positions in society. The social climate didn’t become friendly in a year, there was still blowback for this public display, but these people no longer had to hide themselves in mafia-owned speak-easies that the cops were prone to raiding for a lark. It was the start of something huge, a movement right alongside the Civil Rights movements for equal-treatment of African Americans
This activism, which fought a biased state to make them acknowledge that they were wrong and must change for the benefit an entire community of people previously thought insane and a danger to the public, is the history upon which modern Pride sits, similar to how modern civilization sits on the back of wars we don’t like to think about. There is pain and sacrifice behind the rainbow, thousands of lives turned towards the causes of equality and respect, and that work is not over.
Life is so much better for the LGBTQIA community now than it once was, with progress still ahead of us, and that is why there is a Pride month about lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals, queers, intersex people, and asexual/aromantic people. There is a unique history behind this community which needs to be respected and understood while we celebrate our identities and relative safety, because the work isn’t done yet.
Major steps have been taken since the Stonewall Riots, but considering how long ago the movements began, the difficulties they have faced is clear. The existence of a Pride Month at all, as declared by the President, only began in June of 2000, which was conspicuously ignored by the two following presidencies until 2009 through 2016 when it was reinstated, only to be ignored again in 2017.
The legalization of same-sex marriage has only existed for two years, being declared a constitutional right on June 26, 2015, which made it impossible for any specific state to not allow any couple to be wed. A positive step, but an incredibly recent one that reflects the unwillingness of the state to not only treat the LGBTQIA community as equals to heterosexual people, but to acknowledge them as being real.
Many politicians in the United States hold very hostile views towards members of the LGBTQIA community, the Vice President of the country himself taking the matter so far as to support converting any youth that is not cissexual (a term meaning someone that identifies with their birth gender and are attracted to members of the opposite sex) to be so through extreme, torturous methods such as electroshock therapy that leaves the children scarred and at risk for suicide.
There are ideologies alive in the U.S. still that are dangerous to members of the LGBTQIA community, and it is still acceptable for politicians to hold these views as if it were some kind of personal choice or belief and not a view that directly, and negatively, impacts the lives of millions of people unfairly. In some respects, these views are even encouraged and rewarded with high-ranking positions such as the Presidency of the United States of America.
Although the struggle is changed in many ways, it is very much still alive for the LGBTQIA community, and the importance of having a prominent display of Pride is a banner to both show support for one another, saying that it is okay to be who you are and that you’re not wrong for being that way, and to tell the people in power that we will not hide ourselves for the convenience or comfort of a country that needs to change to suit the needs of its people, regardless of their identity.
There is a lot of history behind Pride Month, its stories telling of the pain and difficulties that have been faced and will continue to be dealt with until there is a universal acceptance of all peoples. Pride Month is a time for visibility and awareness of an extremely varied community as we take pride in ourselves and one another for bearing the strain of being LGBTQIA in a country that does not treat us fairly.
It is not a time to talk about straight or heterosexual pride. The easy comparison for this argument is Black History Month; it exists because the erasure of black history is a common thing for a white-majority country to do about matters that they’re ashamed of or don’t wish to speak of. However, their comfort does not come before acknowledging the heinous deeds that have shaped a community and educating themselves about what happened lest history repeat itself.
Further, the reason why there is no white history month is because, first of all, all history that is taught in schools is white history, and usually just the bits that make us look good, and secondly: our history isn’t being erased or ignored; in fact, we honor some of the worst bits of it and then wonder why these monuments to oppression offend the descendants of those who were oppressed.
The reason there is no straight pride is because: they don’t need it. There has never been an institutionalized persecution and harassment of a people because they were heterosexual or cisgender. There is no deep history of straight people having to hide their love in illicit, mafia-run bars only to be caught by the police and publicly defaced before having their careers and lives ruined.
Straight people haven’t had to riot for their rights as heterosexuals, or mobilize for decades against the government for them to acknowledge their existence as being their birth gender, or done any of the thousands of things that make up the decades-running Pride movement. They have always been able to marry and adopt, and have never been turned away from a job for not being homosexual. The metaphorical highway is clear and well-paved for straight people, while the LGBTQIA community has had to band together to fix their pothole strewn roads so that they can all move ahead together.
Every month, in a sense, is straight pride because they’re never made to feel ashamed of being who they are, or confused and scared to ask someone why they feel the way they do. Pride Month isn’t about them, which isn’t an attack on straight people but a simple fact, just as Black History Month is about black people, not white people.
Saying that Pride Month is about everyone, not just the LGBTQIA community, or turning the A in LGBTQIA into ally instead of asexual/aromantic is damaging to the movement because it takes attention away from the serious social inequalities and legal issues that we still face today, and it makes it about straight people. In the case of replacing asexual/aromantic to wedge themselves in, that is a crude offense which betrays their self-interest and false sympathy, and it needs to stop immediately.
It makes Pride be not about the mass-shootings that receive many thoughts and prayers but no actual legislation to combat the targeted attack, but about how much a man and a woman are in love and celebrating the rainbows at Pride Marches. Not about the inability for transsexual people to use their preferred bathroom, but about how great Pride is for woman of any sexuality.
It simplifies the message of a very complex matter to serve the immediate needs of someone who does not need the support and power of a movement as large as this one, distracting and confusing the message away from someone who is actually on the receiving end of institutionalized abuse and persecution. There is a place for exultations of love and affection, but it is not at Pride if you’re not a part of the community. It’s like proposing at your friend’s wedding: disrespectful and attention-seeking.
To have a stage as large as the one given to Pride Month is a huge responsibility, and very easy to squander or make counter-productive so that someone who already has the rights and respect that we strive for can have a few minutes in the spotlight, can laugh with a rainbow painted on their cheek, and then leave the social sphere of Pride having contributed nothing and disrupted important work.
There is a place for allies, and it is not in Pride but beside it. Being an ally is not an identity that is fought for and discovered over a lifetime, it is a decision to help a people that don’t have the same privileges that the ally has. It is using their own platform to amplify the voices of the LGBTQIA community, and knowing when they should step aside and let someone else take the stand.
A lot of Pride Month boils down to respect, as a public admission that we will respect ourselves and each other in a society that continues to deny us that same respect. That we expect that same respect be given to us which we are expected to give to our fellow humankind. That we will not respect a society that demeans and persecutes us, instead demanding that it change for our betterment because our betterment is to everyone’s benefit when the change is merely a universal respect for the personal identity of everyone.
When someone tries to change the point of Pride Month into an attack on cissexual people when it is anything but that, when someone declares that Pride Month is about everyone, not just LGBTQIA people showing a clear lack of understanding of the history behind Pride, when, for the sake of marketing, they replace asexual/aromantic with ally or when someone says that LGBTQIA people don’t exist: it shows a lack of respect.
And Pride is about changing that.