“All of us who are openly gay are living and writing the history of our movement. We are no more – and no less – heroic than the suffragists and abolitionists of the 19th century; and the labor organizers, Freedom Riders, Stonewall demonstrators, and environmentalists of the 20th century. We are ordinary people, living our lives, and trying as civil-rights activist Dorothy Cotton said, to ‘fix what ain’t right’ in our society.” (Wisconsin, Senator Tammy Baldwin)
The old normal, now that we are filled with hindsight, was never normal at all. To adjust or be asked how we might acclimate to this new normal, almost at first, to me, seems like a joke, a sarcastic comment, or like a dangling participle, which is intended to modify a noun which is not actually present in the text; except as we try to survive these past three and a half years and the year 2020, what is the person, place or thing we are TRULY discussing. Our consciences have an inconvenient truth they must contend with, and no longer can we conveniently pretend who we were or what we once believed was normal!
It is the month of June, and ever since riots broke out in Gay Bars, initiated by Police and so-called VICE-Laws, and culminating with the Stonewall Inn Riot, in Greenwich Village New York, on June 28, 1969, the LGBTQ community said no more and began to decide what their new normal would look and feel like; and via this process as a community we discovered PRIDE! No revolution is easy, and no revolution or movement is quick, but both erupt like the Big Bang of the Universe and toss into space the debris of hope, passion, promise, and purpose. I finally faced my fears, which now seem in human years decades ago, but within my own psyche, only mile-seconds of time, and said no more, silence equals death, and not knowing then but realizing it now, said I can’t breathe…My life was spared, George Floyd’s was not! I take nothing away from the events of this moment. But just as a man who among other attributes in this life was, blessed by nature to be GAY, want to acknowledge, that freedom and prejudice are enemies, that equality and superstitions based on religious dogma are enemies, the morals and values are enemies of hate and fear. That Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness ARE NOT enemies of our UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION. In the midst of this delirium and darkness, and decay, and desire for destruction of fair and just, I will try to keep the norm of wishing all a healthy Pride Month whose purpose is to make be inclusive and end the pure delight of divide and conquer!
