Creating a Community That Includes ALL LGBTQ+ Folks
This article was originally published on Medium.com May 21, 2021.
Every year around Pride month, I take some time to reflect on the current state of my second family, the LGBTQ community. Growing up I wasn’t allowed to attend Pride, but these days, as a proud gay man, the day and month have become almost sacred to me. And with Harvey Milk’s birthday being a little more than a week before June, I can’t help but think about our place in society and the direction we are headed as a Movement.
Our community has historically been segregated from other groups. It has been an arduous, revolutionary, and sometimes painful journey, and we have come a long way. But we still have a lot of work to do. Complacency is a privilege we don’t have.
Certain issues affecting society at large are amplified within the LGBTQ community. Arguably one of the biggest is the glorification of white masculinity. Many of my nonqueer friends are shocked that within the queer community it is not uncommon to openly express that you don’t date Black guys, or that you have a fetish for Asians. Sure, last year’s Black Lives Matter movement put a spotlight on these issues for a moment, but as the world begins to open back up, my fear is that our community will forget the lessons we’ve learned and fall back into our old patterns. And this is why I’m calling for institutional change, beginning right here in the Castro.
The culture in the Castro has supported a glorification of whiteness and hyper-masculinity, with many of the businesses catering exclusively to a white male audience. This is also evident through many of the business’s hiring practices, the special events they host, and the advertisements they use. Being a lighter-skinned, racially ambiguous man means that I’ve never felt out of place or unsafe around the Castro. But my privileges give me an obligation to speak out on the perpetuation of these systems of oppression, so let’s call it what it is: the Castro is a shrine to white male supremacy.
In July of 2020, the Bay Area Queer Nightlife Coalition released a survey to individuals in Berkeley, Oakland, and San Francisco, asking how safe and included they felt at 27 different gay bars (25 were in San Francisco, and 12 were in the Castro). The survey received over 300 responses, including 212 testimonials providing more detailed feedback about the responder’s experiences. The testimonials “showed that many participants felt most nightlife spaces prioritized and centered cis gay white men over other patrons” (this came up 37 times) and that “Women and femmes, Black and Indigenous folks, and Trans and Nonbinary folks didn’t feel safe or included in most nightlife spaces” (this came up 45 times).” (you can see the survey results on BAQN’s Instagram page @baqncoalition). The survey results, while heartbreaking, do not surprise me. We must do better.
Many establishments have been closed or are operating at limited capacity. But just because things will be re-opening soon, doesn’t mean we have to go back to the way we did things before.
Here are five ways we can support all members of the San Francisco LGBTQ community:
Display the inclusive Pride flag year-round
Circulate an anti-racism pledge to Castro businesses
Create safe spaces for BIPOC individuals, femmes, trans, and non-binary folks
Stop tolerating divisive (sexist and racist) language about our community members
Go out of your way to form relationships with LGBTQ folks who don’t look like you
Last year would have been the fiftieth anniversary of San Francisco Pride. Between the pandemic and the racial justice marches, I wasn’t sure the City would be observing Pride at all. But on the morning of that last Sunday in June 2020, I witnessed thousands of people gather in Dolores Park for a solidarity march in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. It was a beautiful, life-changing experience that gives me chills to this day.
This is the spirit and energy we must capture and bring forward for the next fifty years and beyond. We don’t need another act of violence to bring us together; what we need is a collective reasoning. We owe an incredible debt to the trans women of color who birthed our Movement back at Stonewall. And they deserve a seat at the very table they fought so hard to create.
It is my hope that this Pride season, the San Francisco LGBTQ+ community can lead a national Movement promoting inclusion and awareness for ALL our members.
Eric Curry is an organizer, writer, San Francisco historian, and former Congressional candidate. Check out his guided tours here or read his first book, A Real San Francisco Story. With Pets. here