‘Gay’ Pride’

Yes it grabs the attention, makes people look but … one question I get asked too often is “which of you is the woman?”

I do not want my sexuality confused as a gender issue.


Thanks to my lovely husband in the foreground.

My own perspective on gay pride and, indeed the so called ‘community’.

Firstly, understand the history of pride. It started when gay people finally took a stand against the homophobia they were subjected to. For many years gay people were unprotected, no laws gave them equal rights not even the laws of the lands they lived in as citizens from birth. They were seen as criminals and generally people with severe mental health issues and deviants.

With slow progress in many countries we got some kind of equality or, at least legal protecting from prejudice to the point many who don’t recall when it wasn’t there really believe we’ve already got there and Pride has become nothing more than an in your face celebration of a job well done!

We are no where near that point yet and to make matters worse, we are diluting the cause and allowing it to be taken over by issues which are not our issues.

Over recent years our fight for equality for those with differing sexuality has had added to it, the fight for gender identity. What real connection do we as gay, lesbian and bisexual men and women do we have with the multitude of current gender identities?

Don’t get me wrong, I support that battle separately just not inclusively. If we follow any natural progression some trans might take we get this scenario and this is merely an example:

Mike is trans. Right now Mike is gay he is part of the LGB community. However, Mike is transitioning to Michelle. ‘She’ is living as a woman who is attracted to men. When she fully transitions she will be and wants to be a woman. At this point, Michelle becomes a straight woman, no longer a part of the LGB community. Of course, it’s way more complex but, we have to call a spade a spade.

Gender identity should have remained an issue in of itself. They will have their supporters and those in the LGB community will have theirs. Sometimes they may be the same people.

Does it help that leading many Pride events (which used to be pre woke, called ‘gay pride’) we have drag queens? I’ll wager that the majority of gay men have no desire at all the wear female clothes and yet, as far as society sees us, we come across as cross dressing weirdos. Not as we are, just the men and women you work with, who you see every day or pass by in the street. Again, don’t misunderstand me, no issue with drag queens, some are great but, would be put the Royal State Coach at the head of an environmentally friendly car parade? It’s overkill and suggests totally the wrong thing.

Beautiful and grand but, not taking us into the future

If you’re selling EV’s you don’t use the State Coach to promote them!

In short, Pride has been taken over by those with heavy egos who don’t even realise this is still a struggle.

How many gay men would feel comfortable walking through the Grosvenor Centre holding hands with their husbands? I see the ladies doing it but, never us men. Is that a rational avoidance or is it justified considering recent attacks on gay men in the town?

Gay men ‘afraid to hold hands in public’, survey finds

We’ve police forces up and down the country recognised for being institutionally homophobic. That on top of how generally ineffective the police are anyway and it matters not what laws are passed if the police and CPS do not enforce those laws.

We still do not have marriage equality, under law religions cannot perform same sex marriages. That was as much a government decision as it was the religions involved.

In many countries around the world our rights range from tolerance to a criminal offence punishable by death. Our government and monarchy still counts those countries amongst our ‘friends’.

I would like us to get back to being the LGB community fighting our own causes.

Marriage and what it means

Marriage Vows

I have strong feelings about this and a reason for why.

My parents got married in the 1950’s I believe. Toward the end of the late 60’s mum developed rheumatoid arthritis and it got worse and worse.

By the 1980’s mum really struggled. Dad wasn’t keen on taking over and mum frankly, wouldn’t have wanted that. However, certain aspects of their marriage had long since ended as mums level of pain rose over time.

On one occasion dad randomly started a conversation about toilet use and during it he made the statement, in front of mum that “to be honest, a good shit has always been better than sex with your mother”. That was his kind of humour but it’s a humour I know mum never got used to and I didn’t also. That comment really upset her.

in Late 1985 mum had to go into hospital. They took her in as much for a complete rest as anything else. However, on this occasion during usual visiting I noticed some weird shit happened with the fuel and mileage of the car I shared with my dad. I would not have noticed had he not begun to complain I wasn’t putting in my fair share. I discovered that each time he visited mum at the hospital and extra 40+ miles got added to the odometer in the car more than the journey actually took. As it kept happening I got out a map and drew a circle covering the additional distance. The conclusion was quite clear, he was meeting someone and not only anyone, he was meeting my aunt, one of mums closest friends.

He just randomly came out with it at Tesco one day when mum was still in hospital. I cannot recall anything relating leading up to him just coming out and saying “So, you know I am seeing Kath, don’t tell your mum”.

I said that if she didn’t ask I would say nothing but, on the contrary, any question she did ask I would answer honestly. Sure enough, within 24 hours she had asked me outright if Dad was seeing Kath. I told her what I knew.

Her heart was broken. She told Dad to go that Christmas of 1985 which he seemed to do willingly moving in with Kath. Some six months after that, after giving up on life, she died at the age of 52.

From that point onwards my life was devastated. Most of my closest family members I lost as they started to take sides. I was deemed to be on Dad’s side just because I had the surname and resembled his appearance. I totally was not on his side so I was just left in limbo right at the start of my own marriage and the birth of my eldest son.

A few years later I did ask Dad outright, why? His response sticks with me and prompts this blog post.

“I gave her the best years of my life, I got nothing out of the relationship after she got ill and I would have got less for murdering someone, I was entitled to a life too.”

Looking at the promise he made to mum, was that right or fair? I can see at least two broken promises and the other was relieved to boast about that she was dead so death had parted them!

Now, we have a friend who is from another country. The man to be her future husband contacted her, was very open with her, gave her all the information of a degenerative condition he had and what it might mean for her but, despite that, she agreed to marry him anyway.

Less than 20 years later she was complaining that he expected too much, wanted her to wash him, sometimes feed him and look after their kids. She left a few times going back and now she has left for good and also washed her hands of her kids neither of which are yet adults but teens. She is proud to boast she called one of them a prostitute for what she was wearing and content that her daughters regularly took over with their dad including bathing when she opted out.

Her parents she says, have turned against her saying she should have stayed and honoured her marriage and, of course, she disagrees, she’s ‘done enough’ which, to me, sounds all too family.

It worries me she has any influence in my own marriage. As my own condition gets worse I am terrified that those like her will persuade my own husband that I expect too much and that the marriage vows do not matter.

Now, to come clean. I used to be married to a lovely lady. I got married because in my life I had been convinced it was my only option. That living a life with respect to my own sexuality was not a choice I was ‘allowed’ to make. I had explained to my wife about my sexuality and I did try really very hard to ignore my dominant side of being gay, indeed, my only side. Eventually we did agree after around a decade to slowly, at our own pace, move away from our marriage. Live together but separate lives. Within 5 years it became apparent that this was not workable and we agreed to divorce. She knows that I remain there for just as I promised. Sadly, this was one of those occasions whereby marriage should not have been an option for us. Glad as I am that it was because of the experiences and the children but, this was not the honest life either of us should have lived and we remain good friends.

Why is it, I have to ask, that people are prepared to spend £10’s of thousands just to say those wedding vows *promises and yet, they mean so very little with them thinking that when the going gets tough, the promises don’t mean anything?

Makes me sad

Marriage and what it means