It’s Pride month, and, more specifically in LA, it’s Pride weekend. I never really had a specific “coming out” moment—it happened incrementally, over time—but thankfully it has been years since I’ve felt afraid to be open about my sexuality in real life or online. I am not old, but I’m old enough to remember the idea of marriage feeling impossible. And even though I live in California, I am aware that those of us in the queer community still do not have the protections we need in most states, including the right be able to hold a job without hiding ourselves. In that frame of mind, I tire a bit about the yearly, methodical, manufactured controversies surrounding Pride.
If you cannot see that the space is still necessary or worth creating I’d ask you to give us the benefit of the doubt. It is necessary.
No, straight people, you do not need your own party. Every day and every moment and every place is your party. Even during the Pride Parade, it’s still your party and we’re asking permission to temporarily create our own space within it. And we ask for the space in the face of a government that has—at least at the federal level—never been more explicit in its marginalization of virtually all minority groups, the queer community included. If you cannot see that the space is still necessary or worth creating I’d ask you to give us the benefit of the doubt. It is necessary.
I also tire a bit of the “you’re doing Pride wrong” tropes within the queer community. Yes, by all means, let’s keep corporations from turning it into a commerce event of infinite rainbow proportions. But some of the related cynicism bothers me. Growing up in one of the boardroom-planned, mass-manufactured, heavily-franchised suburbs of America—where the most viable hangout spots were the mega-church, the mall, or the movie theater—my closeted self would’ve given anything to know that the brands I encountered every day acknowledged my existence. It would’ve been easy to overlook the crass consumerism embedded in these acts (and it is crass) because it would have been life changing to me. And, I suspect, it still is life changing for some version of me that exists out there in a suburb with a mall and a movie theater and an evangelical mega-church. Let’s call out the crassness and absurdity when we see it. Let’s demand the profit goes somewhere worthwhile. Let’s try to keep the focus on the real reasons Pride events need to exist. Let’s not create a litmus test for each other that starts excluding our own and our allies based on authenticity. It’s a losing game that creates an ever-diminishing number of winners. 🏳️🌈
Growing up in one of the boardroom-planned, mass-manufactured, heavily-franchised suburbs of America—where the most viable hangout spots were the mega-church, the mall, or the movie theater—my closeted self would’ve given anything to know that the brands I encountered every day acknowledged my existence.
This piece was originally a /now update on a previous iteration of this site. It appears here with some minor edits.