pride month and corporations (clearing the decks)

[solarbird]

Here’s something important about Pride and Pride Month and companies showing up at Pride events and all that, something most people don’t know or remember.

Until the 90s, and to a large degree still in the 90s, being “homosexual” meant being impoverished.

It meant being ruined. Unemployable. Fucking destitute.

This is why groups like GLEAM (trans-inclusive Gays, Lesbians, and Bisexuals at Microsoft) showing up at Seattle Pride was such a big deal, because it showed you did’t have to be destroyed by coming out. You could live an ordinary life. A… dare I say it… mostly normal one.

In short, queer didn’t have to mean desperate, and that mattered. It mattered a whole lot.

At the same time, companies showing officially up at Pride – as companies vs. employee groups, and it was rare for a long time – meant they agreed. It meant they wouldn’t fire your ass on the spot if they found you out – like most companies had done, for a very long time, and many still did.

In short, you could be queer and still have a job.

And at that point in time, in the 1990s, in the AIDS peak, that was fucking revolutionary.

I suppose it doesn’t mean that so much any more, but it’s absolutely what it meant back then. So when you talk disparagingly about “Rainbow Capitalism” and “Corporate Pride” – try to remember this history, because that’s how it used to be. That’s what it meant.

It still means that, to a degree.

Particularly now, now that it’s becoming harder again.

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.

Comments

[rmd]

When I interviewed at msft, I guess maybe January of 1996, I had the interview and then a post-interview wrap-up back at HR with two recruiters. The junior one pinged my gaydar so I made a point of saying that I did like Microsoft's anti-discrimination policy at which point the jr recruiter piped RIGHT up about that with me and effused about it being a good employer. :)

[solarbird]

Sometimes it's hard to believe the tech industry wasn't always a complete and total absolute shitshow. And I was there!

Of course, even then, I kind of had the shitshow version of it. Brian Valentine, I am looking in your direction.