"I don't want my kid to be gay or trans!" is echoed over and over again as the underlying excuse for the renewed resurgence of LGBTQ+ hate that's infiltrating our laws and society. And I get it. I wouldn't want my kid to be "gay or trans" either. Not because I think there's anything wrong with it... you are who you are... but because this unrelenting toxic bigotry is incredibly dangerous for LGBTQ+ youth.
Except...
Seeing LGBTQ+ representation and diversity doesn't encourage kids to "become gay" or "become trans" any more than seeing somebody who's left-handed encourages them to "become left-handed."
All it does is let them know that it's okay for them to BE gay or trans, if that's who they are, and that they are not alone in the world. That they are accepted.
But entirely too many parents would rather their kids grow up to be miserable adults by denying who they are... assuming they don't unalive themselves first... than to embrace who they are and live their truth. This was made overtly clear to me when I saw the backlash after Pride-inclusive gamer icons were released for the Disney Speedstorm racing game...
The very first response I saw on social media was along the lines of "I don't have anything against the gays but I am sick and tired of Disney cramming this LGBT stuff down my kid's throat." As if seeing a rainbow Speedstorm logo is somehow an assault on kids?
And it's like... hey, if you're kid is straight and doesn't want to acknowledge Pride, then they can ignore the new icon options and pick something else. But if they are a part of the LGBTQ+ community? Then thank God for Disney and Gameloft, because your kid obviously isn't going to get any support from you. They may be too afraid of you to select a Pride icon for themselves, but at least they get to login and play the game where a bunch of other people are sporting the icons and showing their support for who they are.
It's little things that like that can be the difference between life and death for some people. Literally.
Pride is important because some kid somewhere is being raised to believe that they're better off dead than gay.
So good on you, Disney. Keep cramming that "gay agenda" down our throats.
I have friends in the LGBTQ+ Community who mean more to me than taco salad. I cannot imagine my life without them. I cannot imagine our world without them. And I do not suffer bigots gladly who would do them harm with their words or deeds.
Wishing everybody all my best for Pride Month and every month... and hoping that society does better to make you feel welcome, safe, and loved. For all you give to us... for all the lives you enrich with your authentic selves... I will ever be your ally and friend...
Of all the crap that inundates us at the beginning of Pride Month, this amazing retrospective on how the song I'm Coming Out... errr... came out... by the incredible Nile Rodgers himself...
Now I guess we brace for the legions of Christo-facists inserting themselves into LGBTQ+ spaces to tell them that they don't belong along with all the other horrible things they say because they have nothing better to do than persecute people whose lives HAVE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH THEM.
Oh well. Something additional to take pride in I guess, because you must be doing something right to get them so pressed over something that HAS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH THEM.
I've said many, many times that I am a massive, unapologetic Miley Cyrus fan. It started with Hannah Montana and has carried all the way through her music career. Her voice just hits me right every time. I held off watching her Stand By You concert until this last day of Pride because it seemed a great way to close out the month.
It was fantastic.
Miley is a ride-or-die LGBTQ+ ally, and she uses every possible opportunity to back that up in this show. If you haven't seen it, it's on Peacock. If you don't have Peacock, it's worth getting the free trial just to watch it.
Here's my live commentary as I watched, just in case you can't live without my thoughts...
I tell you what... I would have given just about anything to be at this concert. What a fun night with some great performances!
Baby it's hot outside, but the hot lead from my bullets are even hotter... and an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Pride! I could do an entire week of posts on the TikToks of ileavebreadcrumbs. He is a man who married a male soldier during the era of "Don't Ask Don't Tell," and his stories are just... a lot. I cannot even fathom how straight couples would deal with the same obstacle that gay couples have to endure. Just take for instance their wedding...
@ileavebreadcrumbs Reply to @shiloh_highway ##dadt ##militarylife ##militaryfamily ##military ##pridemonth ##lgbtq ##queer ##lgbt ##gay40 ##pride🌈 ##gay ##pride ##equality ##gaymer
♬ Lo-fi hip hop - NAO-K
The fact that he is willing to put himself out there knowing that homophobic bigots are just waiting to tear him apart in the comments is everything that Pride exists for. Love = Love.
• Pride Again! And it doesn't stop there. His husband is not just "fairly famous"... he's famous-famous." His story has been discussed in many, many places. Including, most famously, on The Daily Show...
@ileavebreadcrumbs Reply to @bigchiefla ##dadt ##militarylife ##militaryfamily ##military ##pridemonth ##lgbtq ##queer ##lgbt ##gay40 ##pride🌈 ##gay ##pride ##equality
♬ original sound - Activism & Embroidery 🤷
He was even a part of The Newsroom...
@ileavebreadcrumbs Reply to @htrabucco ##military ##gay40 ##militaryfamily ##militarylife ##pride🌈 ##gay ##lgbt ##queer ##lgbtq ##pridemonth ##pride ##equality ##dadt ##gaymer
♬ original sound - Activism & Embroidery 🤷
That's all kind of crazy how they found out they were on a TV show! But... remarkable too.
• More Pride! But the TikTok that destroyed me was this one...
@ileavebreadcrumbs Reply to @lucthin ##dadt ##militarylife ##militaryfamily ##military ##pridemonth ##lgbtq ##queer ##lgbt ##gay40 ##pride🌈 ##gay ##pride ##equality ##gaymer
♬ original sound - Activism & Embroidery 🤷
Do yourself a favor and go watch his TikToks. This is why we have a Pride Month.
• At The Car Wash, Yeah! A friend shared this video on Facebook and I must have watched it a hundred times by now. It's just that good...
Somebody filmed him doing it again, but this time we get to see him walk off...
I mean, you can see him just patiently waiting for the brush to come down and then walk directly underneath when it gets low enough. Makes ME want to give this a try!
• Salvage! One of my truly joyful distractions on YouTube is Baumgartner Restoration. Julian is an absolute master of his craft, and his latest project... restoring a van Dijk... is him at the absolute top of his game. If you have time to spare (and I highly recommend making time) this is a remarkable mini-documentary. UPDATE: The second part is even better, so I'm posting it instead (you can still catch the first part here, if you're hungry for the whole story)...
Absolutely incredible. UPDATE: and in this second part, be sure to watch an "end credits scene" that follows the blank black frame at the end (because there are no credit!).
• SHARRRRK! And... I've cleared my calendar for Shark Week starting July 11th. Thank heavens I have Discovery+, because I will absolutely be tuning in for Stranger Sharks!...
Oh, who am I kidding. I'll be tuning in for all of the shows!
• Beer Beer! Truck Truck! You may remember when I mentioned that a guy made a song out of somebody (rightly) critiquing Country music...
Well, it finally came out as an actual song. It's good. But a part of me thinks that something got lost in translation from the demo to the finished song...
The additional twang and polish is a bit distracting from what I was used to in the original track. Even so... that's a song that's going to be popping up on my SONOS rotation! And I'm not even a fan of Country music!
Now, if you'll pardon me, I'll go back to watching my air conditioning electricity bill continue to bankrupt me.
Happy Pride Month, everybody!
It would be nice to think that 2021 would keep us moving forward, but there's a frightening amount of anti-LGBTQ legislation that is being introduced... especially on the anti-transgender front. The most troubling of which is targeting transgender kids which, given how vulnerable they already are, is horrific thing to have happen.
I sure hope that voters can find it in their hearts to keep tabs what their representatives are doing and educate themselves on these issues... because, more often than not, I am seeing gross misrepresentation of the facts.
The biggest misrepresentation being that coming out as "something other than straight" is a new trend that's confusing kids and being forced on people like it's some kind of fad.
At which point it may be helpful to look at it in a different context. Because being LGBTQ+ is nothing new... it's just that we're finally getting to the point where people are able to be who they are openly and not have to hide it any more. It used to be that being left-handed was considered evil and left-handed kids were forced to learn to write with their right hand. Naturally, the number of people who claimed to be left-handed during this time period plummeted. But once this nonsense started to fade away, the number of left-handed people increased. Except... they didn't. They had been here all along, it's just that they were not allowed to be who they are. It's the same for LGBTQ+ persons... they've been here all along. It's just that they've been forced to conform to societal "norms" that were forced on them.
It's far past time for that nonsense to stop.
It's a great day to stay inside and surf the internet all day... because Bullet Sunday starts... now...
• Drone! Most of the time I am not a fan of the successor to RC helicopters... RC drones. When they're not making an annoying whine as the scream across the sky, they're blowing stuff up. But every once in a while, somebody finds a good use for drones that makes me forget all about the negatives. This viral video of a drone flying through 4th of July fireworks is one of them...
WARNING: It may not be all fun and games, however, as this link will tell you.
• Evian! Speaking of viral videos... how in the heck did I miss this one?
Guess this is the inevitable next step from stupid talking baby and talking animal commercials?
• Proud! During San Francisco Pride, Burger King sold a "Proud Whopper" in one of their restaurants along the parade route. Not surprisingly, I heard about the outcry before I heard about the burger. People were saying things like "I'M NEVER EATING AT BURGER KING AGAIN!" and "STOP CRAMMING HOMOSEXUALITY DOWN MY THOAT!" (ahem). Which is about as fucking stupid as it gets, because this was not a nation-wide project. It was specifically made for a single event in one restaurant in a localized area where the event took place. The only way you'd have "homosexuality crammed down your throat" would be if your were there for San Francisco Pride... and, even then, you could choose to have a plain-old Whopper if you wanted. Burger King never forced you to eat a "Proud Whopper" at all. Putting the usual homophobic idiocy aside, the idea of it all was actually pretty cool. Especially when people found out what a "Proud Whopper" was...
Exactly. Which is why seeing the insane reaction to a completely innocent publicity stunt (which had a positive message for everybody) just reinforces my disgust at what my LGBT friends have to deal with every day. Which I'm guessing is something like this...
The only thing that gives me hope for the future is that people like this will soon be dead and their absurd bigotry will one day be dead with them. Until then, I guess everybody can just "Be Your Way."
• Horrible! The movie Horrible Bosses was a complete surprise when I saw it... namely because it didn't suck. I actually really liked it. Well-written, well-acted, and funnier than it had a right to be. Largely thanks to one of Jennifer Anniston's best movie roles ever as a truly horrible boss. I had no idea they were making a sequel, but here it is...
Can't wait! I just hope that it doesn't go all The Hangover on us and do a crappy rehash of the first film in the sequel... then shit the bed in the third one.
• Democracy? It will come as no surprise that I'm completely disgusted with the state of government in this country. Politicians are bought and paid for every damn day, which has effectively destroyed any chance of true democracy in this country. It seems an insurmountable problem. But then I saw something that has me intrigued...
Surprisingly, MayDay US reached their $5 million goal. Whether or not it can make any difference against politicians backed by unlimited funds remains to be seen... but it's worth a shot, I suppose.
• Shark! After the idiotic crap that tainted Shark Week last year, I was kind of soured on the idea. Then I see this ad...
SHARK EXTREME! Oh Shark Week, how can I quit you?
And now I get to go to work! How awesome is that?
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