Photo via news.vice.com
You may or may not have had access to the news in the last few hours. If you have, you’ll know what this article is about immediately. If you haven’t, here’s what’s just gone on:
In Orlando, USA, last night/the early hours of this morning, a person arrived at a gay club called ‘Pulse’ with a gun and reportedly killed 50 people, also injuring 53 people. Little of these people have yet been identified. The parent of the suspected killer also told that his son ‘got angry when he saw two men kissing in Miami’, and that this could have been linked to the hate crime he committed.
You can be further briefed on these events by searching them and reading this article published earlier, which is an opinion article but states more facts than there are here about the events on Orlando.
This article, is not a report article, however.
This is me, a trans and pansexual person, telling LGBTQ people to be brave.
On first glance, the previous sentence seems far-fetched and ridiculous. How can us LGBTQ people ‘be brave’ when being homosexual is legally punishable in some countries; when more than 50% of young trans people are likely to have had at least one suicide attempt by the time they enter adulthood; when someone has, as you have just seen, walked into the only safe place LGBTQ people arguably had, and apparently ‘lined people up and slaughtered them’… LGBTQ people are still deeply discriminated against in society, and this ranges from them being bullied in school to people, indeed, being killed for their sexuality and/or gender. This appears to be something that we are defenceless against, as the majority is overpowering, and the majority is often not on our side. How are we supposed to ‘be brave’ through all that the majority put LGBTQ people through in the world?
Obviously, none of us reading this know what it is like to be killed for being LGBTQ – after all, we are all alive and breathing. Plus, the survivors of this horrific act of hatred will be people that no one can ever fully understand, unless they’ve been through a similar situation. So, when I say that we shouldn’t let this faze us, I am acknowledging the fact that this is from the point of view of someone who has not experienced an act of terrorism due to being LGBTQ (although I have experienced a hate crime when I was with some LGBTQ friends), so I cannot speak as if I can make the ultimate judgement for victims and non-victims in the LGBTQ community.
On top of that, not letting it faze us doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t care. You should be donating blood, helping the local hospital/s to the gay club out in any way we can, contacting elected representatives about US gun laws if you’re a US citizen, researching your presidential candidate’s stance on US gun laws if you’re a US citizen, and doing anything else you can to help. It also doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t let this overcome you for a while, just feel the loss our community and the kin of the deceased is experiencing. What it does mean, though, is that we should not let this kind of act and the backlash it is getting take away our pride, courage, and altruism towards ourselves and others in the community. If you are in a safe situation to be publicly LGBTQ, don’t let this event ‘tone you down’ as an LGBTQ person; don’t let it cause you to retreat into a corner and stop fighting for our rights; don’t let it make you feel less complete and utter pride to be in the community.
I recognise that telling people to ‘be brave’ if they are LGBTQ is a ludicrous statement without an explanation… but I’ve given an explanation. We all deserve to love, to feel loved, to fight… we all deserve to continue being who we are. Mourn the LGBTQ fallen, help the victims who are not deceased, but allow yourself to press on and be who you are.
I can’t speak for them, but it could well be that the victims of the Orlando shooting would want you to press on, too.
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