‘Queer Eye’ Host Karamo Brown Calls on Straight Supporters to Speak Up Against Anti-Gay Laws, Queer Community to Unify

I always like to use Pride as a time to reflect on our community because it’s easy for us to present a narrative to those on the outside that everything is great — but we’re often not tending to our own issues at home.

We have homophobia, racism and transphobia right within our very own community. We know that just from looking at our bars and seeing the segregation. We know that with the disparity of health care — when the AIDS crisis happened, white gay men were prioritized over Blacks and Latinos and the trans community. And we don’t sustain progress if we’re not banded together, speaking as a unified voice. I’ve never understood how any marginalized community thinks they’re going to get their rights by stripping away someone else’s.

Anytime there is progress, it happens because we act in lockstep. Of course there’s more that we need to do, but the fact that we’re making sure that trans rights are a priority — or that African Americans, Latinos and Asians are feeling seen and heard — that’s progress. When I turn on the TV and I see Fire Island with a predominantly Asian cast — how beautiful that we’re seeing the Asian gay experience. All around us we are seeing strides suggestive of a greater awareness that we’ve been doing things wrong and maybe we need to be better.

All individuals within the community need to look at their biases and microaggressions, no matter how small, and reflect: How is this joke or how is this shade going to help us propel? Check those comments, check those jokes; we’re hurting ourselves when we should all be in this fight together. Respect our fellow human beings. If we can’t see the power of being together and unified, then how can we expect anyone on the outside to do the same?

But if we can make those changes, I do feel optimistic for our allies and even for those who don’t support LGBTQ+. I do believe that progress will be made. We just need our straight allies, specifically, to speak up. If we learned anything through the hardships of 2020, it’s that those in power must feel uncomfortable. If you’re not part of a marginalized community, it is your duty to be uncomfortable consistently. Put actions to your words.

When we see bills that are clearly affecting children, such as the “Don’t Say Gay” legislation in Florida, that’s where we need allies to be in the room fighting for what’s right. I could scream as loud as I want, but when those legislators see someone like me, a gay Black man, they unfortunately do not hear me as someone who speaks their language. Allies are seen and heard in these rooms.

As for those that stand against progress, these individuals need to grow on their own. Google is everyone’s friend; inform yourself. But for me, with the platform I have, what I’ve realized is that I have to continue to run this race and reach out across the divide with conversations that appeal to feelings: What do you feel, why do you feel? When you ask those feeling questions, you get more to the core of stubborn stereotypes and phobias. It’s not our duty to change minds. But we have to reach their hearts, and then we’ll start seeing their minds change. Pride is a celebration that was born of a battle. So let’s be mindful of that. Then, after we fight, we can party our asses off!

Karamo Brown is a host of Netflix’s Queer Eye and co-author of the children’s book I Am Perfectly Designed.

This story first appeared in the June 8 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.