You Won’t Always Be the Perfect Advocate. And That’s Okay.

I thought, as a queer person deep within queer communities, that I knew all there was about homophobes. I thought I knew all the arguments they use against us having basic human rights and how to stand up against that. But when it came to being face-to-face with a homophobe at work, I couldn’t conjure all my planned elegant responses just when I needed to. I learnt that knowing what to do and say in hard situations is very different to actually being in one.

Homophobia, acephobia, transphobia, and other types of anti-LGBT+ rhetoric are all things that I experienced or witnessed. But most of the time they are happening in the background: as a casual comment, or through a post online that’s not aimed at me personally (but hurts all the same). Face-to-face encounters happen to me occasionally, but usually in situations where I can just leave or keep on walking by. A recent experience, however, was at work. I could not leave the room. I also could not argue with them in that professional setting. I look back now and can think of better things I could have said or could have done, but that is my point: in the moment it’s happening that can be hard, and you won’t always get it “right”.

It was during an afternoon at the library celebrating the final day of LGBT+ History Month. I had spent the previous few months planning, preparing, and putting everything in place myself. There were kids and families following the LGBT+ History trail around the Children’s library. They were learning about LGBT+ scientists and innovators, completing worksheets, and having conversations about inclusion and identities. It was wonderful to be a part of.

One of the activities on the trail I’d set up said “Do you know what the LGBT+ acronym stands for? If you get stuck on any of the letters, ask an adult to help you”. So I was delighted when one child – about 10 years-old - came up to me to ask about the acronym. Our conversation included going through what each letter meant (they adorably requested I spelt each term out loud so they could write them down!), and then moved on to how families can have a mum and a dad, but also two mums, or two dads, but that all families should be treated the same. This was as far as my teaching about sexuality and trans identities went: giving them the words without going in-depth about their meaning, and stating that, whoever you love, there is nothing wrong with the family you build.

But then one library user approached me to ask whether I should be teaching young, “impressionable” people that being LGBT+ was okay. They confronted me after overhearing that conversation I had with a child about gay and lesbian couples and treating everyone equally. This person then went on to lecture me for about 20 minutes.

Their arguments included how I shouldn’t be teaching kids something that “not everybody agrees with” and that it’s “dangerous” to tell young people that being LGBT+ is okay when in some countries it is not allowed and can lead to severe punishments. Of course, what this person managed to miss was that those are forms of discrimination and are what make events, like my one, all the more important. They also went on to say that LGBT+ people were wrong to use “God’s symbol” of the rainbow for themselves, and that they were really “disappointed” in the library from moving away from teaching (their) Christian values.

I think I handled it reasonably well. I stayed calm and it didn’t disturb other library users or the children at the event. But I do think I could have been firmer, not only with the fact that this event was more than okay (necessary even!), but also firmer about ending the conversation sooner. I did explain to this person that the event aligns with the primary school curriculum, and everything is being taught in an age-appropriate way. But after stating that for the first time, I shouldn’t have let their rant continue and instead thanked them for their feedback and asked them to let me get back to my job.

Like I’ve already mentioned, it is easy on reflection to think of how I could have handled the situation, but when it comes to being there in the moment, it’s a lot harder.

I was aware that some families that use our library may be hesitant to have their kids participate in such an event, but I hadn’t really considered the fact that someone would come to an LGBT+ event in order to be homophobic, or that they could see a group of children having fun and think that they must express their disapproval right there in the middle of it.

I felt afterwards that I should have been more prepared and could have – there’s that phrase again – thought about that possibility. I blamed myself for not handling it in the exact “right” way, but also for allowing space for comments like that in the first place.

This affected me for days; I am still thinking about it over a week later. I didn’t once doubt that the event was somehow wrong, but I did feel I had failed to be the best advocate for myself and the LGBT+ community as I could have been.

But I came to realise that it is always harder to do that in a heightened moment, and that advocacy is a skill – I would get better the more I practice and the more times I come across this sort of scenario.

I can now look back, though, and see I did actually fight back in perhaps the best way I could: shortly after the homophobe left, I ran an LGBT+ inclusive Storytime that was well received and was a lot of fun!

I will never stop providing the kids at my library positive LGBT+ messages! And this experience has only helped me stand up taller and believe in that message even more.