Banning LGBT+ content will not make you happy…

According to the UK government petitions site, the petition to remove LGBT content from the school curriculum has reached over 200,000 signatures. The counter petition, to keep it, has less than half of that…

First, two caveats

1. I’m under no illusions that the petition site means anything. The numbers are usually a function of social media popularity campaigns, and I’m not aware of one that has ever made a tangible difference or generated anything but the government fobbing it off by just stating the problem again.
2. The official response is in: LGBT+ education is not required, but is not banned either, and there are no plans to change that optionality. So, either petition cannot really be acted on. This is a little nore complicated than either statement can capture. Go figure.

Still, that’s beside the point. The numbers alone are staggering, and they show immense support for a reactionary political statement against LGBT people across the country, at a time where the media and political parties are rabidly circling people, looking for scapegoats and lightning rods for hate. The UK has never had an excellent track record with LGBT rights, and there’s no reason to believe it can’t possibly regress, and very very quickly, too.

So, an important message to everyone who has signed up to remove LGBT content from schools: this will not make you happy.

Whether you’re a right-wing conservative who thinks it as a matter of course, or a centrist liberal who thinks this will magically stop at trans people only, it doesn’t matter. Banning this content, successfully, will not bring you the happiness you crave. It will not fix your problems.

You can utterly annihilate LGBT+ content from school. You can cut it out of the media forever. You can never see a gay character in fiction again. You can never have to hear the word “pronoun” again. It won’t make you feel better.

From here on, every relationship could be one man in a suit marrying a woman in a pretty A-line dress who does all the cooking. You never need to see two men holding hands again. You never have to worry about your kids seeing two women kiss on TV — that can stay as a secret between you and your internet service provider as God intended.

It will do nothing to protect children.

LGBT+ people have never been the threat, and you know that. Probably not even that deep down, you know that. It could all disappear tomorrow, having never existed, and you still wouldn’t be happy. It can be wiped from the past, present and future, you would still be miserable.

That’s because your actual problem is that you can’t stand the fact that people who are not you can be happy.

Your problem isn’t with the specifics. If it was, your arguments would make coherent sense. You’d have evidence, and you don’t. You’ve made stuff up time and time again, misrepresented things time and time again, and you just trick people into thinking that there’s a danger from a group of people who have never harmed you. All you have to go on is moral panic and lies. Why? Because you just don’t like other people being themselves, being happy, and doing so on their terms.

That implies being a miserable, grouchy, gutless, spiteful piece of shit who hates your fellow humans is your own fault and you might have to take responsibility for that. That’s your ultimate fear: you’re miserable and hate everyone, but you don’t have to be, if only you stepped outside the dull status quo you inherited but lack the imagination to change.

You can say otherwise, but I don’t believe you. Because I’ve read your opinions. I’ve seen what you have to say. The entire media and socio-cultural landscape we live in is based around your views. The very language we must use to discuss things in gives undue deference to your political views. For every backwater blog post like this that exists, a half dozen mainstream newspaper articles will be circulated to tens of thousands of people saying the opposite. You’re very, very transparent with how you feel.

In short: you’re winning, but you’re still fucking miserable.