slipstreamborne:

All the Pride discourse has me thinking back to the very first Pride event my home town ever had, just over 15 years ago, and how a simple half mile parade of a handful of decorated cars and maybe 200 marchers and supportive spectators was the subject of multiple protests at city council meetings, legal attempts to rescind the parade permit, and someone using heavy equipment to vandalize the home of the parade organizers the morning of the parade.

I was barely a month out of high school. The non-LGBTQ members of the school’s (also controversial) GSA ended up joining the march from the sidewalk to do what they could to swell its numbers for protection. The people screaming vulgarities and prayers along the parade route, waving signs declaring the marchers sodomites and abominations, literally turning their backs on us as we rounded the corner, all said they were doing it out of concern for the safety of children in the community.

It definitely wasn’t the person with a leather pride flag I was scared of.