Pride Month

And the Lesson Today Is How to Hate

With bigotry and anger on display, a group opposed to LGBTQ+ rights violently protest inclusiveness at a North Hollywood elementary school.

“Some children have two mummies or two daddies.”

– The Great Big Book of Families

This innocuous (and accurate) sentence set off a firestorm culminating in a violent protest outside Saticoy Elementary School last Friday morning. A group claiming to represent parents at the LAUSD school had spent the previous weeks distributing flyers expressing “outrage” that “K-12 [SIC] students [would] be taught about LGBTQ+ during an assembly” including the showing of a video that says “some kids have 2 mommies, some have 2 daddies.”

While the supposed parents claimed that their “protest [was] in no way an attack on the LGBTQ community,” their actions as the protest began quickly proved otherwise. Early in the day, the group’s speaker hurled a slur over the group’s loudspeaker at a counter-protestor who was trying to de-escalate tension. One protestor was told “Go with the queers, bitch,” while another was told, “Get the F*** out of here, you Jew.” Members of the anti-pride group held up signs equating homosexuality with criminal behavior like pedophilia and grooming. I was present when a member of the clergy who was supporting the LGBTQ+ community was told that he “was going to hell.”

The protestors may have professed that they recognized “the importance of promoting equality and acceptance for all individuals,” but there was one important catch; equality was contingent upon LGBTQ+ individuals staying out of sight in their (gender-appropriate) closet. Any public declaration of their queerness is considered “propaganda” and a violation of children’s “innocence.” How else do you explain anger expressed over a child bringing “home rainbow-colored stickers…from school”?