The Gay Pride and Prejudice
Living in the Lakeview Chicago neighborhood for pretty much the last 10 years has prepared me for the last weekend in June which is pretty much always the Gay Pride Parade and for that time I have always been within an earshot of viewing it.
As the Gay and Lesbian community has made inroads in becoming more mainstream in our society, my impressions of the parade has gone from being eclectic to being irresponsible.
Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong in my opinion with Gays, or should I say I do not discriminate against them in any way, however, even minorities have their problems or issues that I do think deserve some commentary.
I think at the onset the Gay Pride Parade represented people finally “Coming Out of the Closet” and walking proudly down a street. For many years and years, their secret had to be kept hidden from the mainstream society as it was just not acceptable to be gay.
I think that the first steps have been taken to allow for Gays and Lesbians to not receive outward discrimination in a professional and personal environment. No, I am not saying that it is perfect and every minority will always receive some form of discrimination, however, I do think it is better than it was 10 years ago and in 10 more years it will even be better.
But the image of the homosexuals needs to reflect the idea that they are the same as everyone else and in order to move forward more responsibility among the gay community must be in order for there to be political changes.
I support the idea of gays to be able to marry, but it is not me that you have to convince but the conservative that watches images of the flambouyancy of Gays and this event. America has always been very conservative when it comes to values and thus images need to reflect more of Gays being the suburban neighbor couple rather than the bathhouse buddies.
The Gay Pride Parade has changed over time. While it still flaunts it’s sexuality, political responsibility has begun to take over. One of the areas that was very apparent were the number of religious institutions that marched in this years parade. While I have not been keeping count from previous years it just seemed, “Imagewise” that more churches are making it an important part of their ritual in inviting people of all colors, creeds, orientations and sizes.
Christianity has received a bad rap from those that are not Christian or European in seeing some of the stories that make headlines in America and what needs to be remembered is that some of the more evangelical churches take the teachings of the Old Testament too literally. More liberal churches have mainly relied on the teachings of Jesus and the ideas or thoughts of how Jesus led his life. This might be a blatant overgeneralization on my part, however, I do believe that different sects of Christianity take different aspects of its teachings as well as the vision of God and we see that commentary on news programs, talk shows, blogs, etc.
On top of this we have had the rapid politicization of Religion. Hot topic issues such as abortion and homosexuality have defined the Christian Right and I cannot believe that these are the only two topics Evangelicals discuss.
We fear what we do not understand especially if someone else tells us that we should.
Back to the Gay Pride parade. I think that overall they seem to be getting tamer rather than wilder. And given the current political climate I believe that Gays will one day get that equality. I know that there is a level of impatience by some homosexuals however, public opinion will change as our times change. Our youth are much more willing and open to these ideas than our seniors and that is basically out of knowledge. They are on the right track, just don’t rock the boat too much!