Happy Pride Month!

It's June 1, the start of a new month. A great time to renew. It also happens to be Pride Month.

Typically I would not be writing about this but in our house we have been having conversations lately about Pride and LBGTQ+. About being a he/him, she/her or they/them. About being straight, gay, bi. About being yourself!

Also, recently the town I live in painted one of their speed humps in Pride colours. Shortly after it was painted someone(s) decided to do a brake stand on it and mark it with black rubber (it has since been fixed). Now while I think this is a destruction of property and in poor taste, the comments I read on a FB feed were even worse (in my opinion) which is what prompted this blog post.

There were comments relating to the fact that Pride was being celebrated and why did these individuals get their own celebration and month, what about straight people, they don't get a celebration for being straight. The reply to this was my favourite, that straight people get celebrated everyday. Did you know that Pride month is in June to commemorate the Stonewall riots that took place in June 1969? While no one died, many were hospitalized and 13 people were arrested over the 2 nights of riots.

We also celebrate many others with days or months such as International Women's Day, Black History Month, Asian Heritage Month, Jewish Heritage Month, National Indigenous History Month, Canadian Multiculturalism Day, Veteran's Week, National Child Day, Canada History Week and National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women and many others. My thought is that this person does not celebrate all of these days/months listed above so why make a big deal of Pride month and not the others? We all live in a country where we are free to choose and we can celebrate people with 6 toes if we wanted to. Yes, everyone is also free to have their own opinions and voice them as well but honestly, if you have nothing nice to say...

The comment that really got me thinking was that "back in our day things like this were kept behind closed doors"! Read that again and think about it. First off, "things like this"? Like it is a crime or shameful for being yourself and loving someone.

This then got me thinking about other things that "were kept behind closed doors", like mental health issues and abuse. If these issues (and many others) had been kept behind closed doors we would still have many of them happening behind closed doors. There would not be women's shelters, we would not have Bell Let's Talk Day, etc.

This also made we start to think about the "shame" that is associated with these issues and being "kept behind closed doors" has greatly lead to this "shame". There is no reason to feel shame for mental health issues, for abuse or for being who you are.

So let's move things from behind closed doors and try to start to accept others for who they are, for the difficulties they may have. To support each other! I truly believe it would make for a better world.

Note: This blog is my opinion only.