成人快手

Good morning.

We are now halfway through Pride month. This annual celebration of queer lives and identity may seem a bit frivolous and pointless to some, but there is much more to it than rainbow flags and street parades.

I went to my first Pride exactly 25 years ago. I was at university at the time, and I had no idea what to expect. This was the year that the Soho nail bombing took place, when Brick Lane and Brixton were attacked, and when Southall was next on the list. It was frightening to know that people hated me twice over, for being gay and for being Sikh. But at Pride, I felt that there was a community for me, a tribe that I could belong to when it came to my sexuality, even if my faith wasn鈥檛 at first properly understood there.

Life has changed a lot over the last 25 years for queer people, and things are better than they used to be. Sadly, the news isn鈥檛 all positive. In 2011, according to the advocacy group ILGA the UK was ranked as the most progressive country in Europe when it came to LGBTQ+ rights. It鈥檚 now ranked 15th. And according to GALOP who monitor hate crimes within the community, they have seen a 65% increase in victims of hate crime coming to them for support in the last year alone.

There is also often a perceived tension between religion and sexuality. In the past, I've received death threats for being gay, I've been accused on a TV station of being an infidel and I've even had individuals call me up and threaten to expose me, using photos of me from Pride marches, ironically enough. But those were the actions of a very small element within the Sikh community that made itself loudly heard.

What matters more is what the faith itself professes. As a Sikh, we are taught that there are five thieves constantly preying on human weaknesses to take us away from our spiritual truth, and lust is one of them. Love, on the other hand, is one of the five virtues, something to be celebrated, something which is usually seen from the Divine perspective. We long to be united with the Almighty in the much same way that we would long to be united with someone we love when they鈥檙e away.

Amongst his many teachings, Guru Nanak said 鈥淪urrendering our minds to the Almighty Guru, we find love everywhere鈥�. For me, sexuality doesn鈥檛 come into it at all. If the soul and spirit is genderless, then why should love in the mortal world be defined by gender?

Pride month offers a chance for queer people to be seen and acknowledged, for challenges to be better understood, and for wider society to be shaken out of any complacency about LGBTQ+ rights. It also gives space for allies to come forward in support. And if that means dressing up and celebrating with friends and family, well, that鈥檚 a price I鈥檓 more than happy to pay.

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