i’ll be the boy with the pink carnation

I say this with so, so much care: Real queer shit written by real queers can and will sometimes make you uncomfortable. That's one of the defining features of weird, independent queer media. And weird independent media more broadly. Art that comes from true individual passion and authenticity has edges and bite to it that mass market corporate products intentionally do not. Has a rawness that can offend.

Some women are expected to be strong at times when they can't. Her feminism would involve reassuring her that it's okay to not be strong.

Some neurodivergent people are raised to believe that they're too stupid to ever amount to anything. Their disability activism would involve reassuring them that they're capable.

Some neurodivergent people are raised to believe that they're smart and gifted, and are expected to live up to impossible standards. Their disability activism would involve allowing them to fail, make mistakes, be stupid, etc.

Some children are constantly reminded "you're the child, I'm the adult" in order to deny their autonomy. Their youth rights activism would involve treating them like an adult at times when they feel ready for it.

Some children are treated like adults in order to justify increased expectations or to downplay abuse against them. Their youth rights activism would involve allowing them to be a child.

“When my husband died, because he was so famous and known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me – it still sometimes happens – and ask me if Carl changed at the end and converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage and never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don’t ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief and precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive and we were together was miraculous – not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance… That pure chance could be so generous and so kind… That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space and the immensity of time… That we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me and it’s much more meaningful… The way he treated me and the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other and our family, while he lived.

That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday.

Many, many people celebrated Pulse. We were told we deserved it. That it was God’s punishment for our sin of loving the same sex. We are sent messages like these I received in 2018:

We in the community often call the victim count 49+ to include the survivors who couldn’t live with the pain.

The event was never officially declared a hate crime or targeted homophobic attack and is rarely listed as one in databases.

At our vigils for those slaughtered, Extremist Christian groups showed up to protest, holding signs like this:

ID: Me kissing a woman I was casually seeing in front of an angry looking man with a “Sodomy is Sin” sign.

Please understand how much more than just a mass shooting this was. We are still to this day harassed and told we deserved it by some.