I think the issue with pride becoming a fetish parade doesn't help. So many lgb people have wanted to merely be treated as normal and not viewed as having sexually extreme behaviour.
Yet 'being free to be yourself' and not hide your sexuality has been taken to that next level where you have people on parade who make a point of showing off their kink even when it's really not appropriate in front of a family audience.
Meanwhile families have been conditioned to think its trendy and the height of being inclusive cos its lgbt and has rainbow colours.
Put those people who do not understand the line of where its inappropriate in a room with vulnerable children and remove the adults who have parental responsibility, and what do you think will happen?
Anyone who questions the wisdom of this is tarred with the brush of homophobia and not being inclusive. That's force teaming that seems to have predated the force teaming of the t with the lgb.
There is a legitimate question here about inappropriate overt sexualised behaviour in a public arena around children. What happens at a pride march, if it happened anywhere else would raise question marks over its adult content. Yet families and children are actively encouraged to attend and support without question.
This isnt being prudish to raise the question of why is it ok to dress and perform for pride in this way and not OK for a bog standard 2nd Sunday in the month where minors are not just present, but encouraged.
Its difficult to challenge and ask questions about appropriate behaviour, because of this angle about being too conservative (small c) and not 'progressive' enough where this seems to mean in practice pushing the boundaries of socially acceptability of sexuality.
It strikes me, that the legitimate push from the lgb movement to push their cause about being socially accepted has long been highjacked by a smaller group who want to see just how far they can push it and are hiding in a trojan horse for their own agendas which perhaps aren't in the best interests of the wider lgb movement and aren't representative of the movement.
It kind of best demonstrated in the idea that you can't have a socially or politically conservative (both small and big c) gay or lesbian. They are regarded as 'belonging' to the left - in a similar fashion to the row about Huq and Kwantang and the superficial Black man. Plurality of thought and self expression is not only shunned but actively not only suppressed but attempts are made to crush.
In this context the attempt of Mermaids to shut down the LGB Alliance, starts to become even more sinister. Its a battle for control of whole movement and force it to continual push sexual boundaries regardless of the consensus of society.
Eventually in such a battle you are going to reach a point where consensus isn't possible through agreement it can only be forced by silencing and coercion. I think more widely this is what we are seeing, with a section of the LBG community actively realising this and being part of the pushback. It isn't purely about the T and the inherent sexism / homophobia / racism of the TRA movement. Its also part of a wider issue over public sexual displays and performance that has tacked onto the LBG movement - and often is lead by heterosexuals.
Unpicking this is getting increasingly difficult because of the trans stuff. That's not transphobic to point any of this out.
It will always come back to the point about 1 or 2 clicks away because it's not an accident unfortunately.
Lots of groups and individuals have got caught up unwittingly in this. They are well intentioned and meaning. They aren't looking for concerns as a result. That doesn't mean the concerns aren't there. It's a state of utter naivety.
Why are women seeing it first? Because women can not afford to be naive or have been naive in the past and have been harmed by it, in far larger numbers. And because women don't tend to gain anything from increased sexualised behaviour. It's a men's rights movement.
The whole thing sucks. There is no nuisance. There are massive elements of the need to control the whole movement and make it a single political identity and cannon where you must fully sign up to the tenants of belief.