Open Letter from a White Gay™

Listen up queers, a White Gay™ is speaking.

First of all, I want to say I’m disappointed. I went tanning twice last week and no one has yet to compliment me on my near-godlike ability to maintain a rotisserie chicken-level golden crispy tan during these somber gray months. Subsequently, I have decided to redouble my efforts in returning to a milky-white complexion, not dissimilar to that of Michelangelo’s David, but mainly like Jason Blossom from Riverdale, I know y’all are into that. You’re welcome.

Now that I have your attention, I’d like to get to the point. Over the past year or so, there has been at least a collective three and three-quarters weeks’ worth of news coverage given to LGBTQ issues, that somehow fails to center around The White Gays™. This is up a full week and a half from the previous cycle, and the madness must cease. We will not be Susan Luccied. We came up with the term “being Susuan Luccied!” I mean, I assume we did. Whatever, that’s not the point.

And that’s not all the activism we did. I literally got a hand cramp writing that “I could be brunching but I’m here!” poster for the protest I said I went to on Facebook.

The point is, Call Me by Your Name only won one Oscar, so now we’re taking matters back into our own hands. What, you think we wrote all of those think pieces about it for nothing? You think it’s easy being me? Think again, Brenda. Let’s start from the beginning.

First of all, let’s talk about coming out. You think it was a cake walk watching all of those YouTubers do it before I did? I had to watch that one skinny blonde one, and then those hot gay twins, and then the one with the darker hair, and then the one with the darker hair and the scruff. It was exhausting having that much to research. And then the starter pack arrived.

Did you assume it was easy for all of us to bleach our hair two months after coming out? No. But we all did it. Every single one of us, like little orange-blonde soldiers. I mean, sure my mom is a hairstylist so it was like, easier for me, but don’t even get me started on what happened to Zack. Or Zach. Or Zac. And the names alone, dear God the names. I got Garrett. Two double consonants. Do you know how difficult it is to trap a daddy with a double double-consonant name? Why couldn’t I just be a Dustin, or honestly a Zak. Dylan number twelve has no idea how lucky he’s got it.

Truly, I am glad that issues affecting other members of the community are being addressed, I’m just disappointed that credit isn’t given where credit is due. I mean we wrote, and directed, and starred in that one movie about Stonewall, and then also that TV show about it. And that’s not all the activism we did. I literally got a hand cramp writing that “I could be brunching but I’m here!” poster for the protest I said I went to on Facebook. I almost lost my voice before my SoulCycle singalong ride because I talked to my dad for like, a full seventeen minutes about why he shouldn’t vote for Tr**p. I think he did anyway, because he’s like, fiscally conservative, but he’s literally so fine with me doing drag once a year, so it’s totally cool.

And speaking of fiscally conservative, do you have any idea how much it costs to be a White Gay™? Didn’t think so. The travel alone is enough to make anyone rethink their Barry’s membership. You’ve got Rehoboth Beach for Memorial Day Weekend and Fire Island for like, the other summer weekends. There’s P-town for the Fourth, and then World Pride after that. Then New York Pride, and DC Pride, all the while dodging protesters who clearly don’t understand what Pride is actually about (spoiler alert, it’s brunch). Then there’s Folsom and Mid Atlantic Leather. Then Aspen Gay Ski Week, which obviously requires a completely different wardrobe. It’s exhausting, but we do it all, and still manage to donate like fifteen dollars to the HRC.

But don’t assume that we do all this travel selfishly, we do it for you. Because, while we’re flying and dancing and swimming and skiing and drinking, do you know what else we’re doing? That’s right. We’re Instagramming. We’re creating quality shirtless content, for you. Sometimes even butt content, because let’s face it, it’s not as easy as it used it be. Do you know the lengths one must go to in order to keep a respectable follower to following ratio nowadays? I mean, all one of us has to do is look sideways at a major political figure and bam: national hero. It’s a lot of pressure.

It seems like every week there’s a whole new crop of rosy-cheeked boys with dark hair and light eyes, or light hair and dark eyes, pairing pictures of themselves shirtlessly laughing into a cup of coffee bathed in natural light with an inspirational caption. They’re relentless, and it takes a toll.

Don’t even get me started on Adam R*pp*on, how are we supposed to keep up?!

Irregardless, I hope you’ll take all of these things into consideration the next time we uplift a national conversation concerning the LGBTQ community, and remember to bring us back into focus. Honestly, just think about this one thing I read from Audre Lorde in my sophomore year humanities class: “I see no essential battle between many gay men and the white male establishment. To be sure, there are gay men who do not view their oppressions as isolated, and who work for a future. But it is a matter of majority politics: many gay white males are being pulled by the same strings as other white men in this society. You do not get people to work against what they have identified as their basic self-interest.”

See? It is not in your self-interest to work against what has been identified as basic, so like, don’t. Thank you for your time.