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Dear Allies

We

We love you — and it would be wonderful if you could show your faces and raise your voices for us again. We always enjoy seeing you at Pride events, marching in solidarity with us during a beautiful sunny day and hitting the clubs afterward.

It’s always a blast cheering on our favorite drag queens with you at our side and commenting on the outfits, hair and makeup choices to go along with that catchy song. Seeing you bring your kids around us, calling us their “guncle” and bringing them to our sporting events as you play side-by-side with us is always a pleasure.

Holidays just wouldn’t be the same without our annual celebrations and the time we spend in your welcoming homes. We see you as family.

We appreciate that inclusion more than you know.

We get it. We’re a fun community with big personalities who throw fun events. We thoroughly enjoy making you laugh and bringing you along for the ride.

But life is not always fun. In fact, it has gotten very scary, and we need you and your support now more than ever.

Lawmakers across the country are trying to erase us. Religions are vilifying us and politicians with big aspirations are using us to get attention, regardless the cost of our safety and happiness.

Our transgender friends, neighbors and family members are being denied healthcare simply because people in power don’t understand or care what it means to need gender-affirming care. They don’t use science to make their decisions, they use collective fear and hatred.

Those drag performers you love to watch so much on television or in the local bars are now in the direct line of fire of people who are relying on culture wars to win votes and to change the direction of our country toward a dystopian future. These are the people who are responsible for so many protests when these performers simply want to read a book to children at a library or to hold a pageant showcasing their talents. Our community is literally fighting for its life and we need your help. We know you see us, and we know you say you love us. Now is the time to show us you mean it.

When your spouse tweets out an attack over a beer brand they used to enjoy simply because that company has decided to support us, it’s your responsibility to call them out on it.

When a relative complains about hearing too much news about the need for LGBTQ+ equality or laments for the “good old days” when we were less likely to come out of the closet, we need you to stand up and cheer us on.

When you don’t address these attacks — and yes, they are attacks — it tells us there is a part of you that believes that too.

When your child’s school board votes to ban a book about two male penguins who raise a baby chick together because it’s offensive, and you don’t do anything to fight it because you don’t want to get involved, that tells us all we need to know about your concern for LGBTQ+ kids.

When your church labels us groomers or pedophiles and you don’t step in to defend us or choose to walk out the door, that lets us know that there is at least a part of you that believes those hateful terms apply to us, despite of what you say to us in private.

And when your family member shares that graphic on social media promising to “shield” your children from the influence of a rainbow while pretending to respect everyone, and you just simply keep scrolling to avoid conflict, we see you.

Over the past decade or so, we’ve been so grateful for the support of corporations who have sponsored our Pride parades, targeted us with specific marketing politicians who stand for equality and against the hate that is being thrown at us. Tell your company’s CEO to vocally support diversity and inclusion initiatives and programs in your corporate offices, despite what customers may or may not say about and not just on the weekends dancing at the LGBTQ+ bars and clubs we love.

We heard you when you said you loved us and supported us while catching beads along the parade route. Now is the time to physically show us that you meant it. It may sound cliché, but promotions and showed their support with colorful redesigns of their logos in June. It felt so great to be seen and to feel welcome. It’s true, we took that support for granted. But now we need those businesses and corporations to do more. It’s times like these when your vocal support is even more powerful.

Now is truly the time to fund organizations and them on social media. And correct your customers when they bring in their bigoted ideas of what it means to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or queer.

Remind them it’s diversity rather than exclusion that makes a company thrive.

Now is the time to speak up. Today is when we need to hear from you and to gain strength from your support, not just during Pride Month actions speak louder than words. When there’s no action, there’s simply silence. And that silence is what terrifies us the most. Sincerely, your LGBTQ+ friends and family.

Steve Blanchard is the former editor of Watermark. He currently works in public relations, runs the B&B Phantom History House and hosts the paranormal podcast “Phantom History.” Learn more at PhantomHistory.com.

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