Tough people still rise. It's Gay Freedom season

It's a tough year for LGBTQIA+ celebrations. Not so much here in San Francisco where we've had four delicious days of Pride. But around the country and around the world. I liked these events better back in the day when we called the demonstrations  "Gay Freedom parades";  maybe that label will make a comeback in the season of MAGA.

We're tough people. Most of us have had to be tough in order to overcome conformity to normative gender rules. In the early AIDS days, many haters thought we'd all die, and too many of them thought that was just fine. But we survive and even thrive.

These Hungarian queers have shown what it is to survive and fight to thrive. Erin in the Morning reports on Hungarians braving their tough surroundings. 

200,000 March In Budapest Pride, Refusing To Capitulate To Anti-LGBTQ+ Law
The march can teach the world the power of organized solidarity in the wake of a global, anti-LGBTQ+ reactionary movement.

 

While American institutions wrestle with their commitment to the LGBTQ+ community, Budapest has just shown the world how to fight back: led by the city’s mayor, more than 200,000 people defied the ban and marched for Pride anyway.

... Hungary has increasingly restricted the rights of LGBTQ+ people—particularly transgender people—under Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s far-right government. Laws enacted in recent years include a ban on legal gender recognition for transgender individuals, a so-called “LGBTQ+ propaganda” law designed to censor LGBTQ+ content in media and schools, and a prohibition on same-sex couples adopting children. Most recently, the Hungarian parliament passed legislation declaring pride parades illegal. ...

Organizers and Mayor Gergely Karácsony had other plans. The city officially designated Budapest Pride as a city-sponsored event—an action he argued exempted it from the national ban. ... 

... In the face of mounting attacks, it’s easy for LGBTQ+ people in the United States to feel crushed beneath the weight of it all. But moments like Budapest remind us that even under the most repressive regimes, our communities still rise. ... 

Let's keep up the good work against our homegrown haters.