Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 2:33
HEARTS ON FIRE: This is not just another PRIDE month | PLEASE TELL YOUR STORY so people can relate to a human being - not a statistic or headline
It's about a life that might be affected by regulation that's gone awry or by hate or by actions that diminish the right of a person to be a person. These stories that we tell help people realize the human being behind the issue. It's a horrible time to be queer in America. Legislation is showing us the power and the reach of confused hearts, and we need to do everything we can to bring back safety and right the wrongs and make lives more safe
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 3:05
And that's why when I think about people seeing headlines that are hateful and hearing about legislation that's anti queer and anti the rights of anybody to be anything they want to be, I just get fierce and protective because I'm at a place in my life right now where I have more strength and more understanding. But if I was 17 and I heard all these headlines, I would do what a lot of kids are doing right now
Jeremiah Myer
@Jeremiah73 · 3:29
Hi, this is Jeremiah of the Crossing Guard, and I'd like to share my thoughts on this as an older white guy. My demographic of it leans toward being very mean spirited, but there are a lot of us that aren't that way. I believe in the rights for everybody to love whom they choose to love, and I think love, in all of its many, many forms, is a wonderful thing, and we should celebrate it always
I think this is such an importance. Well, and I haven't shared here in part because I had recently shared somewhat vulnerably. And I'm not prepared to do that yet again so quickly, so publicly. But I guess I just wanted to add my voice to the importance of these very human stories. S and as a sort of nod to my contribution, put a link here to my own swell from the other day
Ukulele Curious
@Ukecurious · 3:44
If 70% of people say they're in favor of equal marriage, that means 30% aren't. And if the only reason we're getting access to rights is that we've managed, at least for now, to expand the definition of normal a little bit, we leave a lot of people behind are still living outside of that definition. Now we're in a moment of conservative backlash
Swell Team
@Swell · 0:15
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 1:58
And I hate to think of people kind of climbing back into some kind of sequestered space because they're so afraid of being hurt by society. That's my biggest sadness when I think about the ultimate result of all this is individuals going back and hiding and losing any sense of just joy. Because when things are legislated out of your life, then they take the joy out of your life. It's not a life. You know, I'm just I need us to continue finding language for this
Wren .
@aBirdieOnaWire · 4:58
And so I've been an ally for a long time, but it was about five years ago, I guess you could say I kind of tripped backwards and fell over out of the closet and found myself within the LGBTQIA family. It was actually in about 2015, 2014 that I had started questioning my gender, and I started seeing a therapist. And, I mean, I I struggled. I I fought against it. I got on a couple of different antidepressants
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 1:38
But sometimes we get caught up in some of these culture conversations, these identity wars, and we don't get to be our full selves, ironically. And your ability to sort of want to tell your story in the context of what you love and what makes you happy, I think that's what we need to hear more about, like the things you love, your hobbies, your cats, your dogs, just being able to employ other people, working in partnership with people. These are human experiences