pride 2021
goodbye to june. goodbye to everything that happened in june
for all who celebrate, venus had cozied up to cancer for the majority of the month of june. the planet of loving devotion could not have picked a better time to have a tender moment since june is the month when companies will continue to overcharge you, but while wearing rainbow. slay.
i think pride month means a lot of different things to everyone.
there is the silliness of online debates about respectability at parades. you know, parades? those things where people line up to possibly catch something being thrown from very, very slow moving vehicles. or just wave. very serious business.
there is the race of which companies can change all their social media to rainbows instead of you know…actually using their influence, money, and/or power to help secure the professional and personal rights of lgbtq+ people. or target’s tenth annual small donation to glsen that is an even smaller portion of their profits off their exclusive pride collection of what someone called, “so ugly it stops being gay and swings around to being aggressively heterosexual.”
then there is the Actual pride. where we embrace loving ourselves more than needing to feel loved by others as we proudly embrace our truest selves. where we lift up in love our most vulnerable lgbtq+ members. where we remember and honour those who paved the way for all the good (celebrating with the people you love), the bad (capitalism@pride), and the ugly (target rainbow suits)!
it is easy to forget how bad it truly was and the sacrifices that were made by too many people we lost too soon. as someone who unironically loves entourage, i cannot pretend to be remotely qualified to wax poetic on pride. i am sure caroline calloway is more than happy to share books and articles on her instagram she has yet to read, so i suggest looking there! i also forever love this profile e. alex jung did on gregg araki a couple of years ago, this surprisingly well done 2020 profile of marsha p. johnson by the royal family’s least favourite publication, angelica thee ross for refinery29’s “queerness is” spotlight, and This jamie lee curtis tweet.
to lean in to the Love, here are five things i loved in june:
the most important part of the Free Britney movement finally having a chance to speak when Britney Spears addressed the court during a hearing for her court ordered conservatorships. naturally, nobody felt the need to tell her that her chance to pour out her heart to the court was going to be broadcast globally. for once, the unrelenting exploitation of janet jackson’s oldest daughter seems to have benefitted her as only the truly heartless can turn a blind eye to hearing britney jean spears speak of her court ordered/forced iud and comparing her conservatorship to being sex trafficked, among the other horrifying occurrences over the past 13 years. it is so satisfying after all these years to have people finally pay attention to britney’s conservatorships and conservatorships in general. the fact that britney is under two conservatorships (one is her person; one is her business) seems to get lost in the conversation. the amount of control other people have had over her (remember when she was going to get married and her husband was going to get to be a co-conservator as a wedding gift?) is unimaginable, but she did an excellent job at painting a picture with her impassioned plea to the court. and while it got the attention of many people, the judge still denied the motion to remove her father from the conservatorship days later. so, to quote my mother wendy williams, “DEATH to them all*!” *allegedly james spears, lynn spears, jamie lynn spears, KEVIN FEDERLINE, bryan spears, lou taylor, larry rudolph, judge penny (and her son prentice), jodi montgomery, sam ingham, andrew wallet, sam lutfi, capital storming terrorist jason alexander, justin timberlake, perez hilton (ivo niehe, kendel ehrlich, diane sawyer, sarah silverman, joel mchale, john o’hurley, shawn mendes, kathy griffin, etc)
this episode of las culturistas where my sisters matt rogers and bowen yang spoke about pride, getting older (and that’s ok!), boundaries, the cat killing tesla driver that is related to britney spears, being guests at madonna’s boom boom room Event, the latest releases from doja cat and tyler the creator, and being a bitch to any old acquaintance in your vicinity this pride! bowen got emotional talking about conan’s departure from late night and summed up why you have probably seen so many posts about my favourite harvard alum. conan started his first show the year i was born so legally he and andy richter are my fathers. grateful to my sisters for equally capturing the love & appreciation i will always feel for conan and the anger i feel for anyone that has jamie, lynn, or spears in their name.
elite season 4! la casa de las flores: the movie! raya! bo burnham: inside! fta! luca! lisey’s story! cruella! in the heights! wish dragon! false positive! lady boss: the jackie collins story! sour prom! this is pop! cinema is back, baby! still have not ventured back into the sticky arms of a movie theatre but have no fear marty baby, i watched these on my Large ipad or at home with my baby sister!
trisha paytas video apologising to ethan klein, thus seemingly ending the weeks long feud between besties after the fiery conclusion of the quarantine podcast FRENEMIES. ashamed to acknowledge how many HOURS of videos i have consumed this month from trisha and ethan. (but even trisha’s worst unedited rambling videos are still more entertaining than a single one of the “series” being put forth by her son gabbie hanna regarding anyone that has even looked at gabbie wrong in the past ten years.) ethan and his parents recently made some less than flattering comments about trisha in the latest episode of keeping up with the kleins but hopefully they will be considered bad jokes and not reignite the flames of the five percent feud. i need something more soothing to be background noise while i clean the house, like season 2 of rhoslc.
barbra streisand announcing a new album of unreleased tracks from the vault. two things i love more than life itself: babs and things sneaking out of the vault!!! plus a feature from kermit Thee frog??!?! and willie nelson, one of the greatest songwriters to ever do it? this may have been a great month for new music (twice, jp saxe, tyler the creator, faye webster, rostam, k. flay, jessie ware, chloë, marina, japanese breakfast, lucy dacus, doja cat, slayyyter) but my favourite album of august 2021 is already made. sorry lorde.
( honourable mentions: faye webster’s interview on how long gone where she talked more about her yo-yo brand deal/skills than her excellent new album i know i’m funny haha / sharon stone’s version of toby keith’s i wanna talk about ME regarding the culture around meryl streep / rihanna’s continuous prank on me by still pretending to date/be carried by/not get into clubs with a$ap rocky / this excellent breakdown comparison of cults to the vlog squad / even jake paul saying triller was too trash for him to be associated with him which paved the way david dobrik and co all being sponsored by tiktok’s broke cousin / legendary season 2)
i think we will all be nursing the wounds left from 2020 for a long time to come. but we survived. so this year, whether you chose to wear nothing but your best bandana to galavant around your city or stay home to rewatch the nanny, you are valid! happy pride, whores!