The Intersectionality of Pride

Celebrating pride in the age of the Black Lives Matter movement

Fabianna Rincon ’21

June of 1999 was the United State’s first designated Pride Month.

21 years later, the country is riddled with black lives matter protests in all 50 states, with citizens everywhere fighting for the civil liberties and protections that people of color around the nation have been denied for years.

The LGBT+ community has been denied things as well – even as recently as days ago our government moved to deny them rights to health care and adoption services. But we don’t see them up in arms about their month, their pride, being ignored by the nation as we face bigger issues. Why?

A little over 50 years ago, the Stonewall riots shook the streets of New York city. Cops launched fights with the Drag Queens of the stonewall inn, resulting in a series of riots that set fire to unprecedented progress in LGBT rights and fighting police brutality.

LGBT pride in this country began with a fight against police brutality. Sound familiar?

These issues have been intertwined for decades. People of color have fought alongside their LGBT siblings for decades. We fight and we fight and we fight so that our voices our heard, our rights are protected, and so that our lives matter. The fight is long from over, for both of these parties. But the most meaningful part of pride is it’s intersectionality.

Happy Pride everyone. BLM.

Prejudice & Judgement

Rohan Lokanadham ’23

As said by the author “Some people think that it is so easy to come out. They say that people care for some time but then forget about it. But that’s not how it is. Every time someone says any one of these things that I have stated in the poem, it shows their homophobia. These are things people in the LGBTQ+ community have to deal with every single day, and not only that, but they hear from their friends and family. I feel like I can’t ever truly be myself, because people will look down upon me for that. I get scared to have a “gay voice”, so I make my voice deeper when talking to strangers. I have to go through all of this just to hide my true self, and sometimes it makes me not want to be myself anymore. My anger and frustration about this, reflects who I am. This is how I feel. I feel that society needs a change, a major one, and it needs to happen soon.”

Why can’t I be myself,
I don’t understand.
Wherever I go, there's the judgement, 
The prejudice of the gay kid. 
That’s all I am, isn't it. 
“Shut up, you like men” 
“You’re gay” 
“You don’t count ‘cause you gay”
Why?
Why am I invalid because of my sexuality? 
These are the questions I ask myself everyday. 
These are the questions that make me wonder if I’m valued. 
I don’t wanna be myself.

()

Yasmine Patel ’23

it might be strange to see a brown girl
in this neighborhood-
sitting on her driveway
bent over in concentration
wiping the sweat off her brow
and replacing it with a layer of colored chalk 
that blanketed her calloused hands. 
the white people pass by in their trucks 
roll down their windows, 
and look out to see what task is so 
alluring 
so fascinating 
where she won’t even look away from the ground
to see the passerby’s. 
they might roll their eyes and keep driving
disgusted by the flag 
that she carefully sketches
on the blacktop. 
the little kids who walk past her
might just see a rainbow, 
and start to excitedly search 
for the pot of gold that follows. 
but she never looks up. 
even after she lays down her chalk, 
claps her hands together and forms
a hazy cloud of color and dust. 
even after she carefully writes in block letters
“happy pride month.” 
she only looks up at the white man before her
who gawks at the letters she scribbled on her driveway. 
she laughed-
obviously amused at his discomfort
and gathered up her box of chalk and walked away
leaving the man staring after her 
in a mixture of awe and confusion.