What a world we live in.
Impending Nuclear War. Racism. Lack of access to safe options for abortions and birth control. Assignment of washroom you need to use based on a flimsy piece of paper given to you at birth.
I live in moments of wanting to grow my family, and moments of refusing to expose a perfectly innocent human to the atrocities of this decade (not that many other decades have been that much better.)
As a loud mouthed individual, I try and be really intentional about sharing very little about my political stance on social media (although I did post a handful of think pieces around the election as I navigated my disbelief of that whole situation, and I sometimes "like" things forgetting they will show up on my friends feeds as though I shared it.) I see lots of posts about how as a cis-gender, middle class, white woman, I need to stand up and fight for equality so being silent is complying with the enemy. I see posts condemning people for tiring of activism and demanding action.
Sometimes these things hurt my feelings - as though they might be a personal attack on me for my choice to stay silent on social media as much as possible (but some things are just SO likeable!) even though they probably aren't.
I have to remember that activism doesn't have to look the same for everyone. Anyone who knows me personally knows I am not silent about my political beliefs, or my passion for each human to have an equal chance at being treated as the valuable human they are. I just don't think I'm going to change anyone's mind by posting a scathing article about all of the (what seems to me) blatantly obvious issues with white supremacy in North American culture. I don't think reading a facebook status is going to turn a passionately pro-lifer in my world into an pacifist who wants people to make their own choices about their bodies.
Relationship makes those changes.
I grew up in a very anti LGBTQ+ household. I remember my mom crying in the laundry room when Canada made same sex marriage legal - and I was sad to. I didn't know why - but you follow your parents lead for so much in life, and in my tweens, I didn't have a reason to believe much else.
Then, in high school, I started to meet people who didn't identify as cis gender or heterosexual. Sometimes I was weird and insensitive about it - but over time, realized I really cared about people, and their gender or sexuality had no impact on their value. I learned, through experience, that everyone deserves to feel safe in a school washroom, to fall in love and get married, or to walk down the street without an ounce of fear.
I started talking about this more at home. Sometimes casually over dinner, and sometimes in heated debates. I educated myself in the rhetoric my family had heard before me and challenged those ideas a bit at a time. And over time, a little bit at a time, my family home has become an inclusive place for my friends of any sexuality (working on gender still to be honest - but bid strides have been made). I've often been called a bad influence as I've become more and more vocal about my beliefs, but what my parents might consider a bad influence now, will hopefully, someday, become a school of thought that they understand and support.
For me, this is activism. And I wholeheartedly support whatever form of activism is working for you in your world. It's all about a team approach - because isn't inclusivity what we're really striving for?
- e
