With the holiday season comes family holiday gatherings. I see the lamentations of these from some friends and other places that with these family gatherings, they, someone who is progressive and/or LGBT, have to listen to some opinionated uncle rant at the dinner table about those awful queers or liberals. And they have to just grit their teeth and bear it, wishing for it to be over.
Whenever I hear this, I wonder… why is the uncle the only one who gets a say? Assuming it is safe to do so depending on the family environment as a whole, why isn’t the uncle being immediately met with the niece or nephew calling bullshit on all the stupid crap he is spewing? Yeah, the uncle isn’t just going to sit down and shut up if this happens, though he might. But as of now, he’s being given every indication he has a captive and passive audience, one that he has no reason to believe doesn’t agree with him totally. Why not shatter that illusion? Why must the niece or nephew have to grit and bear it rather than argue right back? Will it change the uncle’s mind? Very unlikely, but you feel a lot better getting your word in.
Then maybe he’ll learn to hold his tongue, and he’ll be the one suffering through a family holiday dinner while his enlighted niece or nephew is proudly liberal and gay! 😀
