I just posted this on a Taylor Swift thing
But it needed it's own post.
There is nothing wrong with straight allys. It's not pandering if they are actually our allys.
The reason I left the physical queer communities in my area is the attacks they constantly dished out to my straight friends and family. Or how the first time I mention how most of my family is Christian, the queer person I'm talking to will usually roll their eyes and scoff before I can say anything about how they support my pagan, pansexual, demi-romantic, genderfluid ass with a ferocity that has intimidated bullies.
So when I heard the song "you need to calm down", my rainbow self first heard all the queer elements and was singing it loudly because when I first hear a song I don't really go much deeper than "does it slap?" until I randomly decide to do a lyric breakdown. Hence my dislike for Teen Spirit when I got out of middle school. My brother (a bisexual, cis, Christian, Republican) heard the mental health stuff mentioned above and we had a good talk about the message in the lyrics. The song still slaps and I still sing it loudly, though with different feelings.
And y'all need to calm down. Especially the queer community. Because when its members start feeling anxious, are the walls still a safe space?
I haven't felt safe in any in-person queer group in years, immediately wondering if I'm queer enough for this group. There have been cases where that's not been the case. Where I've been called the token straight of the group. That same group forced labels on not only me, but strangers in the street, celebrities, and fictional characters. I hated it, but I needed to be accepted so much that I just put up with it, even though forcing labels is wrong.
My cishet allys told me I didn't deserve that, used my pronouns, and just gave me so much more support than what I was seeing in the queer community. We've really become so twisted as a group that it seems like though we preach love, we spew hate. This isn't what I signed up for when I became a queer rights activist. I signed up to fight for the right of every person to be who they are without fear. Lesbian, Bi, Gay, Straight, Ace, Demi, Trans, Cis, Genderfluid, etc. The full alphabet pasta.
Again, just like there is nothing wrong with being queer, there is nothing wrong with being cishet. Stop turning on our allys.
