May 30, 2022
Happy Pride! More color – for everyone!
by Lena Severin
June is Pride Month! We think that's a reason to celebrate. We celebrate the diversity that we find in ourselves and in our fellow human beings. We celebrate diversity and being colorful, and self-love.
That's why June is not just a meaningful month for the LGBTQIA+ community, but for all of us. It's about spreading openness, acceptance and appreciation for EVERY person. It's about clearing up prejudices, creating space, questioning our own thought patterns. It's about moving us forward, as a society, but also individually. We want to contribute to that.
Unconscious Bias – Do you know the term?
That's what we're talking about in the first week of June: Unconscious Bias. Many people don't know the term, but most of us are confronted with it in our own heads every day. What does the term mean? I'll give you a simple example:
Imagine a couple. Observe this image carefully in your head.
Was it a man and a woman?
Why aren't there two women or two men? Why isn't there a non-binary couple? Why just two people?
Every day, thousands of associations bombard us. These, in turn, are shaped by everything we experience and absorb. We associate what is shown to us by the media and society - and unfortunately, in most cases, this does not correspond to the diversity of our reality. Because reality is much more colorful, there is much more than just the couple you imagine. So where does our unconscious bias come from? From a lack of representation and normalization. And that is exactly what we need to change.
We want to work for more diversity. We want to portray the wonderful diversity of our world as accurately as possible. And not just now during Pride Month, but always. Because: rethinking starts with us.
Creating space – our campaign to start Pride Month
We want to use this month to wake us all up and get us thinking about our own unconscious bias. It's not a bad thing if you imagined the "classic" image of a woman with a man in my example. It's only bad if this image continues to be seen as the norm, and everything else is perceived as abnormal. Who decides what is normal?
I would describe myself as a very open, enlightened person who is always learning. And yet I still often find myself having my associations turned through the brainwashing machine. Do you sometimes feel like that too? That is no reason to be ashamed or not to admit it. In fact, it is a very important step in the right direction to recognize your own unconscious bias. Because that is the only way we can set the mental dominoes in motion that we use to visualize our reality. And it looks much more colorful when we look at it with an open eye.
Wake up. The content creators with whom we were able to set up a wonderful campaign do this in their own special way. They give insights into their lives as queer people, report on problems and experiences, answer questions and provide information. They do important work by letting us share in their lives and we are very grateful that they are doing this this week via our social media channels.
Pride – because we can all use a little more colour in our lives
But unconscious bias is also an issue for people in the LGBTQIA+ community. In our childhood and adolescence, we absorb everything from our environment like a sponge, including heteronormative role models. For many queers, it is a long process to differentiate themselves from these and the associated unconscious bias. We are taught from an early age what is "normal" and what is expected of us. If parents, the media and our personal environment only model heterosexual cis living conditions, or if sex education classes at school only cover sexual relationships between men and women, then as a queer person you will eventually come to the unpleasant realization that you are not normal and do not belong.
A very sad and exclusionary realization. Many queers therefore develop the desire to be as “normal” as possible and to fly under the radar so as not to draw attention to their own differences. When I, as a gay man, swipe through the profiles on queer dating portals, I always notice a real hatred within the community. There you read statements like “only straight-acting” or “heterolike”, people are looking for “normal” masculine types: “Masc4Masc”, just not anyone who is open and confident about their own sexuality and identity. This hatred against oneself is also called internalized homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, etc. We project our insecurity onto ourselves and others and ask ourselves very situationally: “Is the way I dress, the way I speak, the way I behave too gay or too queer?”
Unfortunately, this restrictive self-reflection has not only internalized but also external reasons. Before I go somewhere, I think very carefully about how authentic I can appear there. Before I kiss my date in public or hold hands with him, the standard shoulder check is already trained. Before I dare to come out of my shell in any situation, the first question that comes to my mind is: "Am I safe here? Is this a safe space? Or do I have to worry about being exposed to homophobic insults or even physical violence?"
Discrimination and hate crime are still part of everyday life for many of us today. You wouldn't think so, considering everything our community has already achieved and the naturalness with which the community now engages in social dialogue. But to give a few examples: I am very hesitant about going to a straight club or walking past groups of rowdy young people on the way home. And when I do go to a straight club or to a festival or something similar, I think twice about what clothes I wear, how I don't draw too much attention to myself or just 'fly under the radar'.
So what is the answer to all these worrying circumstances?
More education and more visibility for queer people in all areas of life. Because with more presence and information, future generations of queers may no longer feel so excluded and different. And that's why it's worth taking to the streets and demonstrating. That's why we need Pride - because we can all use a little more color in our lives!
Your Lena & your Michael