Fuck Your Heterosexual Pride

Please, go troll this guy.

On Twitter, an ignorant asshat named "Sam" has started calling for a "Heterosexual Pride Day."  This is, of course, nothing new among the ignorant asshats of the world.  During Black History Month and Women's History Month one can often hear idiotic calls for a "White History Month" or a "Men's History Month" (also known as the other 11 months of the year).  When there are marches for Black Pride, Hispanic Pride, or Gay Pride we get similar reactions.  One can easily imagine that when, during The Civil Rights Movement African-Americans declared that "Black is Beautiful," had Twitter existed these idiots would have readily derailed the conversation, asking, "Well, isn't white beautiful too?!?!?! #WhiteIsBeautiful."  We see something very much like that in the absurd rise of the phrase "All Lives Matter" in response to the necessity of "Black Lives Matter."

The problem here is that just because two things sound the same does not mean that they are the same.  It is obvious that statements like, "Gay Pride" sound a lot like statements such as "Heterosexual Pride," and it is equally obvious that "Black Power" sounds a lot like "White Power."  This linguistic similarity is actually a confusion though; they sound the same, but they are not!

One of the many significant differences is their role in democracy.  The Feminist Movements, The Civil Rights Movements, The Gay Rights/Pride Movements, and so on were each efforts on behalf of oppressed peoples to increase their rights and expand the confines of democratic institutions to include more people.  "White Power" groups and others like them systematically work toward the opposite: the exclusion of more people from our institutions, the strengthening of boundaries between peoples, and further limits on who can be included in the public body.  Furthermore, this system was built by and for white, heterosexual men.  Though the poor among white men were once disenfranchised, and thus a Poor People's History is perfectly logical and reasonable, white people and men were never excluded as white people and men (though they may have been excluded based on their class, sexual identity, nationality, etc).  Therefore, a "White Power Movement," a "Men's History Month," or a "Heterosexual Pride Day" is not only completely and obviously unnecessary, but it is also regressive by its very nature, as it seeks to recenter the already dominant group at the exact moments when previously oppressed groups gain greater freedom, liberty, security, and equality.

And it is exactly that which makes these things that sound so much alike actually so different from one another.  Gay Pride, like Black is Beautiful before it and Black Lives Matter today, is a reaction from an oppressed group of people claiming that they do not have to be oppressed; that they do not have to be shamed, that they do not have to live a closeted, secret, or endangered existence for the comfort of the dominant majority.  These movements seek to expand democracy, increase freedoms and security, and make us more equal to one another.  Their opposite, no matter how it sounds, is just that: the opposite.  And as such, it must be fought, not supported.