Celebrating Pride Month
Since 1990 we have been celebrating Gay and Lesbian Pride Month in America. President Bill Clinton declared the celebration in honor of the patrons of the Stonewall Inn in New York City who stood up against police harassment in 1969, an event marked in history as the beginning of the gay rights movement.
Like my husband and I say, we’re straight, but not narrow! We love and support all of our gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender friends and want them to have all of the same rights, freedoms and safeties that we enjoy. Celebrating pride month is important to us, too. We even dressed our daughter in a rainbow dress during her first pride month.
We were delighted when President Obama issued a proclamation calling for all Americans to celebrate Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Pride Month—not just because he encouraged the celebration, but also because he included bisexual and transgender people, too. There are a number of events going on in June that you can take part of, including parades in Boston, Austin, Baltimore, Albuquerque, Washington DC, San Francisco and many more cities. If you can’t attend a parade or wish to do something more personal, here are a few ideas to celebrate with:
Write the government and local paper—and call in to a radio show. Anything you can do to publicly support LGBT people can help. Call for gay marriage in every state, for universal acceptance (this means no hurting or killing!) and stand up against public motor mouths who are so homophobic they are too afraid to touch themselves!
Throw your own party. While you celebrate, pass a petition around to stop violence against gays, repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and especially to mandate that gay couples get the same rights and privileges that straight couples do. If you’re brave, go ahead and invite your close-minded uncle or brother-in-law and have him meet your friends, showing him just how human your friends are! (If he is the violent type, however, please lose his invitation.)
Teach your children or other youth about acceptance. I like acceptance much better than tolerance, don’t you? The media, peers at school, and even other relatives are sure to give your child some ideas about what it means to be homosexual. Many kids even use “that’s so gay” as a derogatory phrase about just about anything. It’s up to us to teach them how to accept people just as they are. Maybe a gay friend would be interested in answering your son or daughter’s questions about his lifestyle. Or maybe your daughter could spend the day with your lesbian friend and see how her day is so similar to your own lives.
