One of the things I've heard a lot over the past few days, often directed at people, like myself, who have rainbow flags on their Facebook portraits, is that they only want the easy road to pride. That they don't really know what pride is or means. And maybe that's true for some people. But as a bisexual woman, I think I know what pride means to me.
Pride is being able to be who you are, with no filters, no bars, no screens. Pride is being honest with yourself and with others. Pride means no more hiding, no more excuses, no more closets but also, no more safety nets. For some, pride means no more sleepless nights, but for many, the road to pride is full of nothing but. Pride is an adventure, but like any adventure, it is an endeavor. To be honest with others, we must first be honest with ourselves.
Pride means my friends' stepmother is their stepmother in every state, not just the one they were born in, but it also means coming to terms with the lies their mother told both them and herself. It means their mother must also come to terms with those lies. Pride means confronting disappointment, as much as it means confronting joy.
Pride means in many ways acceptance. Pride means that we can walk hand-in-hand with our partners no matter the gender or the race. Pride means that we can hold our heads high, accept ourselves, even when others do not accept us. Pride means suffering slings and arrows on the road to pride. Pride means that I have a wonderful and loving boyfriend, and that there are those even in my own community who will say that I cannot understand them because I can pass for straight. Pride means checking our privilege, acknowledging our prejudices, facing tough choices.
Pride is about truth and the truth can often be harsh, because when we step up to stand in the spotlight all our imperfections and our shadows are revealed.
Pride is a great power - but like all great powers, it comes with great responsibility.
We still have a long way to go before we can truly reach pride. Pride is a movement, not a static thing, and it is ever changing and ever-flowing like the river in a certain Disney movie that I love even though it may be problematic and historically inaccurate. Pride is bittersweet, it is beautiful and terrible like all good things. Pride is nothing more and nothing less than love itself, with both the sweetest, gentlest touches of romance and the harshest, bluntest stings of a mother's tough love.
Pride is not angry, and it does not hate, but it is about dealing with both anger and hatred. Anger and hatred from the outside, and anger and hatred from within. Pride means that my life might have been so different if I had embraced it before now. Pride means that I know things now I didn't know before. Pride means that I can look back and pinpoint a time when I was alone, when I was afraid... when I was bigoted and prejudiced as much as I hate to admit it. Pride is the courage to say, "I have changed" as much as it is the courage to say, "I have not changed." Pride speaks out from every voice differently, and it means we need to see both the beauty and the ugliness of both ourselves and others.
Pride means that maybe I should've asked my best friend out in high school when I realized just how hot she looked in that green summer dress based on some movie I don't remember now and that she never cared for (just the dress). Pride means that I can allow myself that regret without forcing myself to regret the fact that the thought crossed my mind. Pride is about experiencing the whole range of human emotion, not just the happy ones.
Pride is about extending hands to neighbors. It's about friends and family wearing rainbows and about friends supporting you when your family can't. Pride is about standing up for those who can't or won't stand up for themselves. Like God, many people do horrible things in the name of pride, who don't represent it at all. Pride, unlike god, doesn't require that we forgive those people - but maybe we should anyway. Pride is about teaching, and combating ignorance. Pride is about overcoming our own ignorance, in fits and starts and finally leaps and bounds.
Pride is amazing.
But pride also hurts.
Don't tell me I don't know what pride is. Because I do. I know it all too well, in the depths of my heart, in my brightest places and darkest corners.
Pride, like any noble cause or great endeavour, has both scarred and healed me. And it will both scar and heal you. It is a battle as much as it is a relief.
That is pride.
This is pride.
WE are pride.
