Happy Pride Month to anyone who celebrates it! (Please check local listings for the month in your area.) Because it’s that time of year again, thoughts inevitably turn to the topic of allyship. In the struggle for gay and trans rights, you need all the allies you can get, right?
Wellllllll…that’s a tricky question. On the surface, it’s pretty simple: do you support gay and trans rights, or are you a homophobic/transphobic asshole? (I said it was simple, not necessarily intellectually honest.) And most of us, I think, would agree people should be treated the same regardless of who they sleep with or identify as to the rest of the world. Especially Gen Xers like your humble correspondent. I care less about who you love than I do how you drive during rush hour.
This is the part that gets tricky. Not every ally is a good one, but if you’re not checking credentials at the main door and the bouncer lets you in anyway, you’re going to wind up like the LGBTQIA+ (or whatever it’s being called this week) is now. Namely, there are some people you’ve allowed in the party who should have been turned away at the door. People who are doing your movement direct harm for personal gain.
And I’m not just talking about Lily Tino here.
One of my Immutable Facts of Politics is the worst enemy of any movement is the movement itself. For the terminally Leftist out there, this means there will come a time when a movement will turn in on itself, creating little factions that compete for control of the movement. My fellow humans of a non-cis lifestyle, the LGBTQIA+ movement has not only reached that point, but had it happen more than a couple of times since I’ve been an adult. Physically, not maturity-wise.
And with every new party that enters the LGBTQIA+ Thunderdome, a new message comes out. We’ve gone from gays wanting to live their lives without being oppressed (which I’m totally cool with) to wanting gays and lesbians to get married (still totally cool with it) to protections for gays and lesbians against hatred (kinda cooling on the being cool with it because of the potential for misapplication) to including trans rights (now we’re getting away from the message) to trans rights being the most important part of the LGBTQIA+ movement (now you’ve lost me).
It seems with every iteration of the movement, we’re seeing less and less common ground to the point you’re starting to scare off the normies. That’s not a good thing. The way to gain acceptance is to not scare off the normies so we can see you as people, not as cartoonish villains with great fashion sense. (Kidding! I kid!)
People like the aforementioned Ms. Tino, Dylan Mulvaney, and others are doing more to hurt the cause than help it. Sure, they bring a lot of attention to trans rights, but it’s mostly negative attention. And if you peer behind the veneer a bit, you notice their motivations aren’t on a grand scale; it’s all about them. The movement takes a back seat when they’re in the spotlight, and they don’t seem to understand if normies get the “ick” from their antics, it’s not due to transphobia. It’s because they’re creepy as hell.
And it goes beyond the trans side of the movement, too. Pride parades have long been a source of concern, even with more gay-friendly people like your humble correspondent. There’s a reason the Right paints Pride parades as shameful Kink-apalooza events: it’s because there are members of the community who treat it like that. Whether it’s drag queen story hours or burly men in leather chaps who may or may not be wearing appropriate undergarments, the movement keeps shooting itself in the feet with a Gatling Gun and blaming homophobia/transphobia. Granted, some of it can be traced to that, but for the most part it’s not. It’s just we need more to go on than what gets the most attention because if that’s what most people see, that’s what they’re going to assume is the norm.
Outside of the movement, you have allies from all walks of life. The issue becomes when alliance moves into enabler territory, which brings us to…I don’t want to call them Karens because all of the Karens I personally know are good people…let’s call them Wine Mom-Americans. These are white women of a certain age caught in what I can only describe is Adolescence 2.0 where being catty is always in vogue and they make the NSA look like Boo Radley with their noses in places they have no business being.
Like the LGBTQIA+ movement.
Wine Mom-Americans treat the movement in terms of what they will get by being pro-LGBTQIA+. Read that carefully, kids. They are in it for themselves, not for the betterment of the people they claim to support.
Take Samantha Richardson, also known as Living Richardson online. To put it mildly, she is a classic narcissist. And by classic, I mean overbearing. She is an outspoken supporter of the LGBTQIA+ movement, but her sentiments have an I problem. To save you the click, here is the text of her June 1st Pride message:
HAPPY PRIDE MONTH 🌈
As a mom, advocate, and human being, I want my children to grow up in a world where people are judged by the content of their character and for not who they love, how they identify, or whether they fit into someone else’s idea of “normal.”
Pride is about visibility, belonging, and recognizing that for many people, simply being themselves has never been easy.
This month, and every month, I’ll continue to support a future where everyone has the right to live openly, safely, and authentically.
Be the you you’ve always been. Proudly. ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜
#pride
Sure, she says all the right things to appear to be an ally, but there’s definitely a “look at me being an ally” vibe there. And because it’s not about the movement so much as it is about being the center of attention, people like Ms. Richardson will justify anything so long as she can still be seen as an ally.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is classic enabling behavior.
And, as cool as it sounds to have someone like her let you do what you want without judgment, you kinda need to have someone tell you to stop and think about whether your momentary freedom will result in a harder road later on. Unfortunately, I don’t think there are a lot of people willing to say “Whoa” when the movement is heading for a rhetorical brick wall.
Or, in some cases, lobbying for people who would throw you off a brick wall from a great height.
Seriously? Queers for Palestine? That’s like supporting PETA while working at a kill shelter. But I’m sure PETA would never let that happen…oh, wait…
Looking for struggle buddies who want to kill you isn’t going to help the movement and will (and already has) caused members of your community to meet a gruesome end. But, hey, liberation for a group that wants to kill you won’t totally backfire on you and will only result in those people who want to kill you to take up for your cause, amirite?
Here’s the bottom line. If you want to really see a day when nobody cares who you love, you have to give the normies something to work with here. And that starts with recognizing the difference between allies and enablers, and between people who support the cause for selfless reasons and people who support the cause for selfish reasons.
I volunteer to be the ally you need right now. I don’t care who you love, but I will also be there to keep you from going down a path that will make your lives harder. My goal is simple: I want you to be happy, partially because happy people tend not to shoot up schools, but mostly because I love to see people who aren’t me loving life. There’s enough messed up stuff in the world that we need to all have some joy in our lives, and even though I’m straight (or cis if you prefer) I see you as people, not as labels.
There are a few caveats, like not being a jerk, but I’ll let you do you if you extend me the same courtesy. Oh, and don’t ask me to pay for it. You don’t need my sanction nor my wallet to do you. Besides, the economic prosperity of the LGBTQIA+ community makes me consider switching sides, but then I have to break it to my wife and that’s going to be a thing.
Anyway, I wish you the best this month. If current conditions continue, you’re going to need all the good vibes you can get.
