#obvs don't be cavalier with your safety

[eve-ate-the-right-fruit]

Listen, I've been there. I literally walked the streets of Salt Lake City with my girlfriend and thought "are we gonna get hatecrimed if we hold hands?"

But here's a protip from Mormonland: even a fervently homophobic Mormon will never say a word to your face about it. Not to a stranger anyway. Not in person.

You don't understand how deeply Being Nice is ingrained in our culture. Every Mormon who's served a mission has been trained to take any and all discomfort and abuse with a smile. They know about catching flies with honey, and you don't get converts by stirring up "the spirit of contention."

So you can be very openly gay around a homophobic Mormon, and they will smile. They will Be Nice.

Will they complain about you to another homophobe later? Will they vote to take your rights away? Will they write vile things on the internet? Will they do it all under the guise of "I love gay people! Really! I just have some Disagreements?" Probably. And it's shitty.

But you can use Being Nice. The homophobic Mormon will be an accomplice to many a Gay Thing if the alternative is no longer Being Nice. And maybe, somewhere under all the Evil Cult Brainwashing (🙄) the homophobic Mormon will start to rethink their homophobia.

Or you can just make them extremely uncomfortable as you trap them by societal convention. That's fun too.

#this is all to say #if you are gay and in the realspace proximity of a mormon #you are no more likely to get hatecrimed than by anyone else in this homophobic society #obvs don't be cavalier with your safety #but you can probably save yourself so.e anxiety #queerstake #the church of jesus christ of latter day saints