#QueerLitLoft

It’s June, which means for a majority of the world it’s Pride month, that one month of the year where the streets are over flowing with rainbow colours and everyone and their mother wants in on the action.

Growing up in an area devoid of any queer community or support and no visible queer representation or role models, my first experience of ‘Pride’ were rooted in Pride festivals. I soon found that these were places I could be myself, blend in and still see myself reflected back at me in the thousands.

As a thirty something queer my feelings on Pride and what it means to me personally has changed over the years. I still wholeheartedly value the expression of diversity and vast representation that Pride month allows me to both experience and be a part of, but I’ve also become cynical of the many brands and businesses who pop up for a few weeks of the year and evaporate off the queer radar just as quickly once Pride month is over.

On the one hand, I can see that for those sections of society that still don’t believe we should exist that any positive representation from major brands, paired with the sheer mass of rainbows that litter the streets of the world cannot be a bad thing in terms of visibility and the never ending quest to normalise our existence. and cement our human rights.

But when it comes to spending my hard earned cash, I’m no longer so quick to pick the first pride/rainbow/queer (insert item) off the shelves. Nowadays, I’m more inclined to take the time to see if what I’m looking for can be sourced from a queer owned or operated business. Or if I’m buying something more mainstream (hello Pride Converse), I’ll purposefully check out where the money goes and importantly is that support there all year round, or only in the queerest month of the calendar? Does that support encompass us all or just the more favourable letters of the acronym LGBTQIA?

I’m just back from a long weekend in London and as is par for the course for an introverted book nerd, my wife and I had planned in some ‘quiet’ time for me to escape and reset before tackling more hustle and bustle. This downtime looked like visiting the Queer Britain Museum and Gay’s The Word bookshop. Both were a little bit of balm for the soul. I can never truly convey the inner peace that queer spaces give me, as someone who grew up without them and still to this day has to travel to most events or places their soothing effect on my inner being cannot be underestimated.

And it’s important in these times that we keep those spaces open for our community. Think about where you spend your hard earned money, and in the current economic climate if you can’t financially support queer business or those allied with our community, think instead about what you can do that costs nothing; share a social media post, spread the word, encourage others to do the same.

I’d been wanting to visit Gay’s The Word for a long time, as the oldest queer bookshop in Britain it’s something I hope to see survive and thrive. for many more years to come. For such a tiny shop, it was crammed on a Sunday afternoon and I loved that as well as the new shiny books, there were also shelves full of second hand queer books and a discreet pay it forward board. A brilliant idea that not only supports this queer business but allows individuals to discreetly select a book and an amount to help pay for it or towards it.

How lovely the world can be when we all seek to help each other whenever and wherever we can…