OKLAHOMA CITY – More than a thousand spectators and revelers lined the streets of Northwest Oklahoma City on June 25 for the city’s 30th annual Pride Parade and celebration of the LGBTQ community.
Part celebration of progress and part commemoration of the 1969 Stonewall uprising that kicked off the U.S. gay rights movement, Pride 2017 offered an opportunity for some locals to reflect on the evolution of the LGBTQ movement.
At The University of Oklahoma, some applauded changes that have led to greater equality, pointing to developments such as the opening of the Gender + Equality Center’s LGBTQ Lounge and student trainings designed to foster understanding and sensitivity on campus.
But others said they still don’t feel safe being open about their sexuality in fear of employment, housing and medical discrimination.
“It’s hard to be able to feel comfortable with expressing your sexuality because of the things you have to give up in order to do so,” said one 20-year-old OU junior who asked to remain anonymous. As a transgender man, he said that although expressing his sexuality is very important to him, struggles with family acceptance and homophobia in his workplace make it hard for him to be more openly expressive.
As an illustration, he compared his experience with medical professionals to that of his partner in Massachusetts.
“My partner was hospitalized in Massachusetts but was able to be taken into a facility categorically for the LGBTQ+ community,” he said. In contrast, when he was hospitalized in Oklahoma, he overheard a nurse complain, “I don’t want to come into physical contact with that thing,” he said. He believes he would have gotten more appropriate care in a facility better equipped and trained to serve LGBTQ people.
Jay Tyus, a 20-year-old junior, agreed that discrimination against LGBT individuals is still an issue but said he focuses on self-love and ignores any hate that comes his way.
“It’s all just a matter of loving yourself; don’t fixate on what people think because they can’t transmute you,” he said.
He also pointed out what he sees as continued misunderstanding and discrimination within and among LGBTQ communities and said that while lesbian and gay people are becoming more accepted, other orientations and identities are not automatically feeling the same degree of acceptance.
As associate director of OU’s Gender + Equality Center, Kasey Catlett has witnessed a longer arc of changes in social attitudes about LGBTQ people. As a child, Catlett was picked on and beaten up because his peers and teachers saw him as different.
“I was definitely not the cool kid, lol,” he said.
His teachers made disparaging comments about how gay people were eradicating the world, and his parents were not initially supportive or accepting, he said.
But all that has changed over the years as Catlett, who is now in his 30s, grew into a strong advocate.
“I am as happy as I’ve ever been in my own skin,” he said. “I am confident in myself, and I have no issues advocating and speaking up for myself and others.”
Tiya Mitchell, 15, sat on the curb watching the Pride Parade meander by with her family and said that Pride is an important recognition that everyone should be able to be themselves.
“Not everyone is born the same; we have to accept and appreciate those differences,” she said.
A few blocks away, Joy Brantley, an older lesbian, offered a similar sentiment.
“People are just people no matter their sexuality, race, religion and culture,” she said. “Everyone is the same. We all believe in things, we all have feelings and we are all only human.”
