This week has been crazy rough across America, especially as the Supreme Court seems to be losing its goddamn mind.
It’s also the close of Pride Month, that time to celebrate inclusivity and diversity in identity.
Consider: Just forty years ago, Harvey Milk, one of the first openly gay politicians and proud advocate for queerness, was gunned down in his office. Just thirty years ago, the AIDs epidemic swept through the community, killing hundreds of thousands of people while the government did nothing. Just twenty years ago, Matthew Shepard was tortured and crucified in Wyoming. Just this year, the Supreme Court made it okay for religion to discriminate against gay people again. Just this year, the President of the United States tried to ban all trans people from the military before making it so they wouldn’t have access to health care.
But queer people have never been complacent. Colorado’s Amendment 2 was eventually struck down, that law which openly discriminated against queer people. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was repealed, the procedure preventing queer people from openly serving in the military, mostly used to dismiss women who rebuffed the sexual advances from their superior officers. And, in Obergefell v. Hodges same-sex couples were finally granted the right to marry each other and, in turn, have access to all the benefits marriage grants in our society. All of these were hard fought uphill battles, achieved by an enormous outcry of support and demonstration from Americans of all creeds, ethnicities, identities, and backgrounds.
It’s important to see queer people in a wide variety of stories, across genre and medium and whatnot. Not only does it help others empathize with people who may identify differently than themselves, but it also gives queer people a chance to see themselves, to know they’re not alone. Stories help people come to terms with their identity.
The list below is by no means exhaustive. Once you vote here please let us know other characters who have meant a lot to you in the comments. Let us know what our biggest, most egregious misses were.
Gay or straight, trans or non-binary, asexual or just a free ass motherfucker, no matter where we fall on the rainbow, we’re all here together.
And now let’s all go watch the new season of Queer Eye.