SeriousMoonlightOct 6, 2023
Insecurity Princess 🌈💖🔥

When I was 15 years old, a gay man named Matthew Shepard was brutally tortured and murdered. That was 25 years ago, today, October 6, 1998.

This was not called a hate crime at the time, and it was another 10 years before gender, sexual orientation, and disability were included in federal hate crime legislation.

I'd like to say that the world has changed. In some ways, it has. (Hi! I'm gay! — and I'm an engineering manager at a major global corporation, which I couldn't have imagine would be possible in my lifetime.)

But in many ways, the world hasn't changed. The same intensity and depth of stigma is still there in many parts of the world. We've created little channels of tolerance here and there, but bias and the stigma that powers is are still swirling around us, like an airborne virus barely held back by positive pressure.

Keep it up, and don't let your guard down. I can't.
#MatthewShepard #Stigma

Oct 6, 2023 at 4:58pmWeb
Show threadAlexandra Magin 🏳️‍🌈Oct 6, 2023
@saraislet Well said. It's frustrating how often we have to remind apparently well-meaning but straight liberals that these things are not isolated incidents, but more accurately the most serious examples of a broader pattern of oppression.
Show threadJanet Logan (she/her) 🏳️‍⚧️Oct 6, 2023

@saraislet

I was 40, and hadn't yet accepted that I was trans. Things are clearly better for the cis gay and lesbian folks, but they have, just in the last few years, gotten immeasurably worse for #trans people.

Right-wing politicians in the US are trying to legislate #transgender people out of existence. While it's extremely evident in the Southern US, it is pretty much all #GOP politicians, including at the federal level.

#USPol #RightWingHatred #Fascism #ChristoFascists #LGBTQIA #LGBT

Show threadPaul SuttonOct 6, 2023

@saraislet

Change takes time, and it is heading in the right direction

Show threadKRHalleyOct 6, 2023
@saraislet I well recall that terrible day. Rest in POWER and PRIDE, Matthew Shephard.
Show threadOggieOct 6, 2023

@saraislet I remember how rough it was at this time, how many of my straight friends were saying things like 'well what if he hit on them? He might have deserved it'.

It was..something.

Show threadRoAnna Sylver Oct 6, 2023
@Oggie @saraislet ... I hope they're not your friends anymore wow
Show threadInsecurity Princess 🌈💖🔥Oct 6, 2023
@Roannasylver @Oggie or that they had some hard conversations and changed their perspectives
Show threadOggieOct 6, 2023

@saraislet @Roannasylver
I genuinely have no idea what happened to any of those people, I doubt I have had any interaction at all in 23+ years. I suspect that they turned into better people, but I really have no way of verifying it.

It certainly was...an unpleasant thing, but it also wasn't as out of line as some people might think, at the time. Things have certainly come a long way, and I'm happy my younger queer brethren will not see some of the stuff I did.

Show threadInsecurity Princess 🌈💖🔥Oct 7, 2023
@Oggie @Roannasylver we all had to unpack our homophobia at some point
Show threadMr. 30㎝ 🍆💦  🔞 [nsfw.lgbt]Oct 6, 2023
@saraislet Matthew Shepard's death affected a lot of us. It was also a turning point for the Country, too. An innocent man brutally beaten to death for no other reason than for being who and what he was. I still break down crying (even now) when I think of Matthew Shepard.
Show threadPseudo NymOct 6, 2023

@saraislet

Wow, it has been 25 years, hasn't it.

I was twice your age when it happened.

As a cis-het male, it obviously hit differently, but I was sickened.

Celebrate the tolerance where we can, and keep pushing for more.

Nobody should be hated or feared for who they love.

Show threadOrganic gardenerOct 6, 2023
@saraislet The rise of fascism in the US and Europe is going to undo the progress we have made.