I went dancing tonight with some friends. We went to the gay bar in town. Both the car I came in and the second car that we took got broken into. Earlier in the summer, when I went with friends to this bar, my car was broken into. It pisses me off, because this bar is in the main club area, and yet it has the highest break in rate. And the reason why is because it's a gay bar, and no one who is broken into at this bar wants to claim it at this place, because it would reflect on a part of their identity. So they take their broken into cars to malls and whatnot, other places, and claim the breakin occurred there, so that they won't have to reveal that they were at a gay bar. It's one of the saddest things in the world, to navigate your life around your sexuality. It doesn't happen everywhere, I know. But this is the midwest, in a particularly conservative working class sector of it. And for those of you who live lives in decent places and think this doesn't occur anymore because it doesn't happen in your town, think again. Listen. Because it does. The world isn't right yet, even if it seems right in your own backyard. Things still need to be fought for, to be changed. One of these is for people to not have to feel like they need to hide part of themselves from the rest of the world, be it their sexuality or their skin color or their ethnic heritage or their religion. Anything. For those of you who think the battle is done and over with, it isn't. I live in a place where the war is still on. The fighting elsewhere has subsided, but it doesn't mean that it's over.

It's disgusting to think a particular group of people will be preyed upon as victims because they will hesitate to reveal some aspect of their identity, this hindering the system which is supposed to support everyone. If we tolerated everyone--No, I hate that word: tolerate. It's not good enough. If we accepted and loved everyone just as they are, then things like this wouldn't have to happen. We would be closer to everyone operating under the same rules that are made for the "normal" people to enjoy.

I'm blathering and pissed off, and wanting to be able to do something about all of this, but I feel so helpless. I hated seeing my gay friends tonight, victims of a crime with a particular angle on it because of who they are. It was one of the saddest things I'd ever witnessed. I don't know if they even know why I was so sad, what I'd seen. It's part of their lives. They're used to its reality.

Which is even worse. No one should be "used" to things of this nature.