if there had been or there was a nation of Gaylandia --

[xchrom]

a place where the collective history of oppression, suppresion, violence, discrimination was held -- families passed on from one generation to the next the struggles of lgbtiq people -- then people wouldn't make claims that our struggle is the same -- the history incredibly similar to -- the struggles of other minorities.

but historically our people take their histories, pain, struggles to the grave with them -- telling no one.

and every culture, every country has a deep history anti-lgbtiq behavior.

oh there are romantic sounding exception -- but they are that -- exceptions.

[marmar]

1. People of color, women, LGBTQ - whomever - tend to be very provincial about "their" oppression.....

..... and sadly that prevents them from seeing the many things that bind them together AND acting together. (Harvey Milk, Coretta Scott King and others have noted this).
People have got to realize it's O.K. to acknowledge that someone else has also had their rights come under assault. It doesn't diminish one's group's own struggle, and if anything magnifies it.
I'm African American - the racism and discrimination against us has been extensive and lengthy - but that doesn't make it any more painful or destructive than that against a gay man who goes broke after his partner's death because he's not entitled to full spousal benefits or a lesbian who is legally prohibited from adopting.
Discrimination sucks, regardless of the victim.

[Bluerthanblue]

2. .

:thumbsup: :hi:
well said!

[DKRC]

3. Well said!

:fistbump:

[xchrom]

5. you do have the advantage of having

a lengthy recorded history -- lgbtiq people not so much.

but you are right about strength in numbers.

[Withywindle]

4. You are so right about the history.

GLBT people have been written out of history. The stories have not been told. Many, over millennia, went to their graves with no witnesses to the truth of their lives, feeling alone. There has never been a gay country, but there have always been gay people, in every country, in every era--and extremely rarely have GLBT people ever NOT been living with the fear and the reality of being criminalized, bashed, discriminated against, and killed.

I swear, some people seem to think GLBT people have always been nothing but those upper-class white guys with the chic West Village apartments that are mostly, even now, all you ever see on TV. "What are they whining about?"

[xchrom]

6. we don't even get to have boring stories of uncle gay and aunt lesbian

and how they walked three miles to school up a six mile hill -- in winter and barefoot.

[Withywindle]

7. Oh, I think some people have those. :)

It's a recent thing, though - just in the last few decades have these stories been able to be told with love and pride.


I take great joy in the boring stories - as opposed to the tragic ones. :hi:

[xchrom]

8. indeed -- now -- some do. nt