living as queerly as possible

I'm seeing so many people throwing around the "I knew this was wrong when I was 17!" and all I can say is good for you. I didn't. I very much grew up being told & thus believing that jokes were fundamentally different than real bigotry cus you didn't mean to hurt anybody. and while I started the process of unlearning the casual and internalized racism I grew up believing in my teens, it's not a blink of an eye thing. depending on how deep in it you are, it's not even a year or two. it takes a long time to understand and accept that all the people around you who you think are normal, kind people, are actually doing something wrong and hurtful, and then finding the courage to break away and call out the people around you knowing full well it's gonna make you the odd one out. just because it's the right thing to do doesn't mean it's easy. and that's where I'm with Hudson - I see so much of my own old shitty behaviour in these call outs he gets. but I know people can change--I did--and judging by Hudson's behaviour in the recent years, I wholeheartedly believe he has too. for the people who had their moral compass squeky clean and straight by the time they were teenagers, good for you. I'm glad. but some of us had shit to unlearn and entire communities excusing and normalizing the shit behaviour and we took a little more time to get it right. if somebody hates me for that and thinks I'm pure garbage person for life because of that, there's nothing I can do about it. that's just how life as a teen + early adulthood went for me. and that's why I'm "excusing" Hudson's shitty past too. cus based on everything we see him do these days, he's clearly not that guy anymore. people do grow and change, and yes, sometimes--very often--that change happens _after_ age 17. often even after 20, 25, or even with people in their 30s. human beings don't all follow the same pattern and timeline. what matters is that they do change and learn to be better, even if it takes longer than what would've been ideal.