Then Came July! June, Pride Month, and the Rest of the Year

June was Pride Month in the US and other parts of the world. It is held in June because that was the month that the Stonewall riots occurred in New York City in 1969.  

You couldn't really miss the fact that this was Pride month, even without all the Pride parades, festivals, cocktail hours at LGBTQIA+ bars, tea dances, and sporting events. President Biden celebrated it, with the White House lit up in rainbow colors again (missed that for the previous four years). The former Pulse Nightclub in Florida, site of a horrible mass shooting, is now a national heritage site. Multi-national corporations are in on it as well, with Walmart and Target and Capitol One and Ikea selling us t-shirts and Pride-themed love seats. And of course, pastors and churches got in the act, too, with pastors posting the words, "This Pastor Loves You!" on a rainbow background, others had an out LGBTQIA+ person preach or show up on Zoom for a video interview, while many church websites were festooned with rainbow backgrounds. 

Yeah! Woohoo! Right on! Queers matter! 

Then came July 1. And silence. Back to the normal, status quo-ness of life. Republican state legislators are back to passing bills that hurt transgender athletes, signed by Republican governors like Gov. DeSantis of Florida. More transgender individuals will be killed this year than last year, if we continue on the same trajectory we've been on. And more LGBTQIA+ people will be refused the opportunity to adopt children or foster children who need a home by religious-based adoption services.  No pastors are posting, "This Pastor Loves You" on Facebook. LGBTQIA+ guest preachers aren't preaching in July through May. And rainbow bunting on many church websites have vanished. 

But Pride month...

On a recent PBS Newshour, aired on June 30th, the last day of Pride month, interviewer Lisa Desjardins interviewed Professor Karen Tongson of Univ. of Southern California about what happens all the other months of the year after Pride month. Professor Tongson said this about the Pride symbols in June: I think we must understand that it's a gesture of support, but gestures of support, nice words, visible images of solidarity aren't always enough... There are endless memes and Twitter accounts devoted to corporations in the month of June showing an image of a happy LGBT couple or person and then corporations on July 1 (revert) back to exactly the same iconography of straight couples and business as usual. And all we hope is for sustained attention and commitment from these corporations, organizations and anybody who expresses allyship beyond the month of June into perpetuity on our behalf. 

I think many of us in the LGBT community are interested in a larger series of systemic changes, policy changes at every level. 

And some money towards maybe popular cause here and there, sometimes, like marriage equality was a kind of mainstream popular cause for a period of time. (But that) isn't enough to address the deeper systemic issues that often perpetuate the oppression of LGBT peoples, especially of color, those who are unhoused, trans people who are--have violence committed against them, all of the things that actually many Americans are fighting for around systemic equality, the end of white supremacy, etc. And I think LGBT folks see that they're part of a broader movement and that we need to make deeper changes to our system, to our culture in order to have a more just world."

Professor Tongson said one surprising thing: "I think that we have to consider whether or not certain groups who've attained certain privileges within that LGBT acronym have to maybe consider abdicating some of their agenda in order to incorporate what would benefit the most folks under that LGBTQ+ acronym, and whether or not there's true inclusion, acceptance, and understanding for transgender, non-binary folks, and others in the community, those especially who don't share the same privileges and wealth, so that we can achieve and attain a truly transformative change from our perspective." That would especially mean those of us, like myself, who are white, cisgender, able-bodied, working gay men, especially in cities like Portland and Seattle, who have more power and privileges than others in the LBTQIA+ community. 

Friends: we have work to do, 24/7, 12 months of a year. Those of us in the LGBTQIA+ community are aware that progress is often incremental, with often one or two steps forward, and now and then a step or two back. For example, the Supreme Court of the US refused to hear the case of the flower designer from Washington state who wanted to discriminate against LGBTQIA+ people. Straight cake bakers are also not having much sway either in the courts or the court of public opinion. As for churches, we have even more work to do in our various, respective communities of faith and denominational structures and constitutions. 

Let's roll up our sleeves, allies and LGBTQIA+ people. We have work to do. Let's turn on our computers, write letters to editors, get jobs in high places in which we can effect change, get married in our couple and throuple relationships, dance, sing, play dodgeball, go to our respective places of faith, practice yoga, visit the world in this post-COVID 19 time and know what other LGBTQIA+ people face daily, elect LGBTQIA+ from dog catcher to Senator to President, practice economic boycotts where need be, and, yes, fly the rainbow flag and wear the rainbow button 24/7, 12 months of the year, including June. 

Happy Pride Year!