[Seth Says] It's a Matter of Pride

This newsletter proudly supports LGBTQ+ people in living their best lives. (This newsletter has also apparently gained sentience? I guess after the AI, it was just a matter of time.) (Of course, this newsletter is just me.) (However, this newsletter still finds it much more fun to refer to itself as this newsletter. This newsletter made a pretty tasty pineapple fried rice yesterday, and is finally doing some laundry. What a talented newsletter!)
 

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a writer in possession of a good column, must be in want of a readership.

I know, my references are so Austentatious. 

But there's certainly no shortage of prejudice these days. Florida's obviously become especially awful, but as a friend pointed out recently on Facebook, there's no shortage of awful bigotry right here in MA, from vandalism and suspicious fires at LGBTQ-friendly churches, to vandalism and bullying at middle schools where kids turn pride day into a day of intolerance. It does feel like a step backwards after a decade or two where it seemed like society had mostly accepted that LGBTQ+ people were people. (Admittedly even in the past timespan when it seemed like homophobia was fading somewhat, transphobia sadly remained relatively present. But I want to believe if things had continued on that former trajectory, we'd have had general trans acceptance. I'm an optimist prime; that's why I believe in trans former acceptance.) (I know that joke was a stretch, but it was worth the Energon.)

All of which is to say, Pride Month seems extra important these days, which is why I wrote my latest column about it:

     Pride and the Pursuit of Happiness

The above column, while it contains a serious message, also includes what is, in my opinion, one of the funniest things my dad ever said. And I get my sense of humor from him, so that's high praise.

 

Honestly a terrible idea; currency is disgusting and germ-ridden. Filthy lucre is not just a phrase. (Appropriate for pride month, "It's not just a phrase, Mom!"). But while it is a bad idea to eat currency (although weirdly, if you eat currency from the US and the UK at once, it's a quarter-pounder), it is a good idea to put your money where your mouth is when it comes to supporting LGBTQ+ lives.

I mentioned the Trevor Project in my my column, which is a charity focused on helping LGBTQ+ youth, who let's face it, are having a particularly rough go of things these days. They're also rated a full 100% on Charity Navigator, so if you're feeling like the world is terrible and want that cheap dopamine rush of feeling like you're making a tiny difference for the better (because is just writing words actually making a difference?), you can donate to them with confidence.

Of course, if you're a nerd who enjoys video games, you could also pick up the Humble Pride Bundle, which features video games by LGBTQ+ creators and donates a portion of the proceeds to the Trevor Project. (What size portion? You get to decide when you buy it, so be sure to open the breakdown and slide up the Trevor Project's cut. Although leave some for the developers too, because creators deserve to be paid. Basically just minimize Humble's cut.)(Yes, this newsletter is telling you how to spend your money. Buy yourself some tacos too, you're worth it!)
 

As usual, one of the major obstacles standing in the way of LGBTQ+ rights - as is the case for most minority rights - is the complete inability of certain people (e.g., the Republican half of Congress)(Not to generalize; hopefully I haven't offended my Republican reader, obviously I didn't mean you, you're not in Congress.) to have basic empathy for other people. By which I mean, people who are not them or their favorite people. Anyone can show concern for the welfare of themselves and their immediate circle, but it takes a bit of human decency to have concern for other people outside that circle, and as you know if you watch the news or follow politics at all really, a bit of human decency is a lot harder to come by than you might hope.

And then I thought, well, at least I have a bit of human decency. Because my (this newsletter's) support for LGBTQ+ people is not self-interest because it's not me. Although I do have a lot of LGBTQ+ friends. And some family. And then it occurs to me that many of the women I have dated have been bisexual. I just didn't think about it much because it didn't really ever effect our relationships, even if one might have believed it one day would (or as they say in French, a "ménage à crois"). But of course, someone doesn't stop being bisexual just because they are only in a relationship with a person(s) of one gender. We don't want bi erasure in pride month, we want the opposite. (What is the opposite? I'm going to say Bi Scribbleture. I realize the actual opposite of bi erasure is probably something like bi inclusion or bi recognition, but I'm a writer and also scribbleture is a much funnier word.) (Is it a word? Eh, it seems cromulent enough.)  

So yeah, turns out I have plenty of self-interest in supporting LGBTQ+ causes. (although arguably, any person with a bit of human decency always has self-interest in supporting the radical proposition that people are people and deserve equality.) (Also, it's sort of a shame LGBTQ+ got standardized in that order, because when it was just LGBT it was fun to pronounce as "LegButt", but I think when adding the Q they really should have mixed it up so we could have QLTBG+ and pronounce it "QuiltBag", I mean what's the point of an acronym you can't even pronounce?)(And I realize I've been using the + instead of the IA, but if we just add a U to go with the IA we could actually spell QUILTBAG)(Yes, I realize most people believe personal identity should not be dictated by what cool acronyms it can spell.)(Ask me about my failed campaign to get my brother to name his kids things that would lead to their initials spelling something relevant.)

Y'know, just last night I stumbled into a conversation online about people not treating janitors as people -- an issue about which I have previously written -- and one of the posters was talking about how all they did was show a bit of human decency towards a janitor at their office and treat him as a fellow person who did important work in that space, and the janitor's eyes lit up because he was so not used to it. Not that I'm trying to conflate being a janitor with being a persecuted minority, my point is just that as a society, we really need to do better about having that bare minimum of human decency to treat all people as people.

Which reminds me:
 

We can at least end on an up note. A celebration of actual freedom, in a country ostensibly based on freedom! (I was considering an Austensibly callback, but I don't think it would be Bennetficial.) And the government finally even recognized it a couple years ago. Forward progress in that bit of human decency that treats all people as people! It's almost enough to make one an optimist prime.

Thanks for reading, and back in two weeks with another column.


Yours Truly,
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