lgbtq+ acceptance in the ‘burbs can’t begin and end with pride month.
lgbtq+ acceptance in the ‘burbs can’t begin and end with pride month.
I spoke with two of the organizers behind Geneva Pride about the significance of Pride in the western Chicago suburbs.
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This summer will mark my fifth anniversary of moving to Chicago’s western suburbs — and I can say, without a doubt, that this summer marks by far the gayest year of them all in terms of both visibility and palpable, public celebration of queerness.
I’ve felt it all month as my partner and I have drove past countless local businesses displaying Pride flags in their windows. I felt it on Monday, when I watched the Batavia City Council issue its Pride month proclamation (more on that to come in a special mid-week Queering the Burbs later this week). I felt it this past Friday, as I played a Pride-themed DJ set at the Batavia Boardwalk Shops to a crowd that seemed to be vibing with a selection of bops I was a bit concerned going in could be construed as not particularly family-friendly. And I also feel it as I marvel at the explosion of queer events taking place in the Tri-Cities area all month long. It’s beautiful, a little surreal and (frankly) a little unexpected.
One of the groups responsible for this surge in LGBTQ+ visibility out here this month is the Geneva Pride organization. Comprised of a group of activists and residents who largely came together this year, they have been prolific in their organizing, putting together not one or two, but three events to celebrate the month.
Two of those events — Fox Valley Family Pride at the Park and Being LGBTQIA+ in Geneva: A Panel — will have already taken place by the time you’re reading this, but the third and final one — the Fox Valley Pride Showcase at Water Street Studios in Batavia — is taking place Sunday, June 27, at 6 p.m. (and is still taking submissions from artists) through this Friday.
Ahead of the group’s event at Water Street Studios, I interviewed two of Geneva Pride’s organizers — Kylie Peters and Amanda Littauer — via email about their organizing this month. Peters is an advocate for youth, has lived in the area since 2016 and identifies as gray-asexual and gray-aromantic. Littauer is a faculty member in NIU’s Center for the Study of Women, Gender, and Sexuality where she teaches LGBTQ Studies and History. She identifies as a lesbian/queer woman and has lived in the area since 2009. Our conversations have been edited for length and clarity.
How did the Geneva Pride group initially come together? How long have you both been involved? How long have you been involved in LGBTQ+ activism/organizing work in general?
KP: Geneva Pride is a whirlwind of activism that began just this May. I had just hit a stumbling block in some efforts to foster queer representation elsewhere in my life. I spoke about wanting to celebrate Pride in Geneva with Paula Merrington, a local activist who I befriended a few years ago on our frequent visits at the dog park. I also spoke to Terri Helfers, a local teacher and gay-straight alliance sponsor who I knew through my work with youth. We brought local activist and political candidate Martha Paschke, my wonderful friend Ali Lanthrum, and Amanda on board. It started with a Facebook chat and a Zoom call, and we were off.
This is my first time taking a leadership role in activism of any sort, so I am very grateful to have passionate and experienced community members to show me how it’s done.
AL: I have been involved in LGBTQ activism since college (at Cornell University), where I came out originally and eventually became co-chair of Cornell’s LGBT student organization (both the B and the T were added while I was there in the mid-late 1990s). While I was a student, I helped to organize one of the first academic conferences on the legal politics of same-sex marriage and also one of the earliest Trans Studies conferences in the country. I am so lucky to have learned from excellent scholars, teachers, and student leaders while I was an undergraduate. My former partner and I had the first same-sex commitment ceremony (long before civil unions or same-sex marriage) on Cornell’s campus in 1998.
As a graduate student at UC Berkeley, I was a member of an LGBT Synagogue in San Francisco and lightly involved in LGBT activism and community building on campus, and I completed a graduate certificate in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (along with my PhD in History).
At my first job at a small Catholic college, my activism involved advocating for the basic rights of my family, including my partner’s need for health insurance (which she couldn’t get, because we weren’t legally married). I wanted to have a second child but couldn’t, because assisted reproductive healthcare providers in the area only worked with heterosexually married couples. It was a challenging time for our family, and I was grateful to get the job at NIU.
I joined the Geneva Pride group when a few local women I knew from local political campaigns invited me! They are far more organized than I am, but I really appreciate the chance to contribute and to have these events happening in the town where I live with my kids.
You’ve organized three different Pride events for this year. How did these events come together? What were your goals for them?
KP: Fox Valley Pride at the Park was an outdoor event with music, crafts, games, and drag queen storytime. This event targeted families with a focus on the youngest kids. There often aren’t a lot of Pride-related activities for them, yet they are the most open-minded of any of us. Plus, I love books and I just really wanted to have a drag queen storytime (haha).
Being LGBTQIA+ in Geneva: A Panel was born of the fact that the idea of speaking about their experiences really sparked the interest of students in the Geneva High School Straight and Gay Alliance (SAGA). We wanted to honor those students’ desire to make their voices heard. The idea was to keep it extremely local and youth-focused. The panelists are all from Geneva and are middle school, high school, or college-aged.
Fox Valley Showcase began as a simple film-showing idea, but as community members started offering different ways they wanted to contribute to our activities, it grew into a sort of catch-all event for self-expression. We’ll have visual art, community-submitted video viewing, an open mic, speakers, vendors, and an open bar. We’re collecting artwork and media submissions by LGBTQIA+ folks and/or about Pride at this link. Please submit!
AL: We want to help Geneva be more welcoming toward its LGBTQ+ residents. We all belong here, and queer and trans people often don’t really feel that way. This helps.
How did the Pride at the Park event go? It looks like both were successful based on the photos!
AL: The event was delightful! We had around 150 people, which was amazing! Kids and adults of all ages enjoyed the crafts, activities, art, performance, company, and most of all, the chance to spend part of a beautiful day honoring the gender and sexual diversity of our community. Personally, I felt wonderful at and after the event—a little more at home here, after 12 years!
KP: It was amazing. People kept saying how meaningful it was to them to have this right here in the Tri-Cities. It was such a joyful event.
Beyond Pride, what do you think still needs to happen in this area to make it a better place for LGBTQ+ people to call home?
KP: I think being a safe and welcoming place for LGBTQIA+ people is something we need to keep in the community consciousness all year round, not just in June. Living in Geneva, it can seem like everyone is living a cis-hetero-normative lifestyle. I’d like to see more events, social and educational opportunities, and visibility throughout the year affirming that there are other ways to be, and you don’t have to move to Chicago to be them and feel like you belong.
AL: This is a tough one. We have a very long way to go, and also, there are different answers depending on which parts of “the” LGBTQ community you mean. Geneva is an extremely homogenous place, and that makes it difficult to be “different” in a wide range of ways. In general, the more serious we can get about economic, racial, and gender justice (broadly speaking), the more welcoming Geneva will become to LGBTQ+ people.
Some of the room for improvement resides in the schools. We are grateful to have people like Terri (in this group) supporting student groups like the high school GSA, but we still have a lot of work to do to make our schools safer and more inclusive of queer and trans youth.
As my kids moved through the public school system, their other mom and I have had to advocate for them many times—everything from suggesting picture books in kindergarten that represented same sex-parented families to calling the principal of the middle school when my kid overheard homophobic jokes at school. As it turns out, both of my kids (9 and 19) identify as part of the LGBTQ community, as well, and we’ve had to work hard to help teachers and school administrators understand the importance of respecting my younger child’s pronouns (they/them). We have encountered lots of good intentions and care but less familiarity and confidence about how to handle what may seem like “sensitive” issues to many people in the community.
I think that fear of “offending” people who hold conservative views about gender and sexual identity and expression impedes progress on important issues and initiatives, such as LGBTQ+ inclusive sex ed; open discussion of gender and sexual diversity in schools, libraries, park district programs, etc. For instance, my younger child wrote a letter to the park district several years ago asking why there are father/daughter and mother/son dances, but no parent/child dances (which would be inclusive of same-sex parented families and also nonbinary and trans parents and children), and they never got a response. This kind of thing seems minor, but it sends a message that children like them don’t really matter as much as other kids, or that their needs aren’t worth changing the ways that things already are. Amplifying the voices of queer and trans young people is so important, which is why we are having the panel at GHS.
There are economic justice issues that negatively impact LGBTQ+ populations, too. In general, LGBTQ+ people earn less on average than heterosexual people do. This [is] especially true for queer and trans women (and their families), and within that group, even especially people of color. It may not seem obvious, but having more affordable housing in Geneva would make the city more inclusive of LGBTQ+ people of all races and ethnicities.
In short, visible symbols like the flag matter, but under the surface, Geneva is still deeply invested in normative family models (two white parents, kids, and pets in a lovely suburban home) that just don’t leave room for the rest of us to feel seen and valued for who we are and what we bring. Events like the ones happening this month help to shift that, and I’m grateful to play a small part in that. I’m especially thankful that women like Terri, Martha, Paula, Ali, and Kylie devoted their time, resources, and attention to making these events happen this year.
Is there anything else you want people to know that wasn’t already addressed above?
AL: The one thing I’d add is that I’ve been amazed at the organizational effectiveness of this group! These are citizens and residents who care enough to invest some time and energy, and the result is a really meaningful series of events. They have inspired me to become more involved in local groups and initiatives that I care about, and I’d encourage others to do the same.
KP: I hope all the LGBTQIA+ folks in our community know that good things are happening and they all are part of it. I am so honored to join those who came before us in playing my own small role in that. Support for Pride make me feel that I have a place here, just as I am, in this exact moment. That is an immeasurable gift.
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Learn more about the Fox Valley Pride Showcase at Water Street Studios, and submit your work for the exhibit, here. Additionally, the org is offering “Love & Pride” yard signs in exchange for a $20 donation to help support their organizing. Learn more about the Geneva Pride organization and how you can get involved here.
For more recent coverage of queer folks in the burbs, read my previous interviews with Batavia artist Annie Hex and Aurora organizer Javi. As always, comment, share and subscribe if you like what you read.
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Read on for this week’s quick links! It’s a short list this week, but here’s the deal: In exchange, I’ll be filing a special mid-week edition of QTB this Wednesday. After that, I’ll be taking a two-week hiatus for.. something exciting I’ll also share here later.
Yesterday marked the five-year anniversary of the massacre of 49 people inside Pulse Nightclub, an LGBT bar in Orlando, during its Latinx night. The site of the killings is about to be officially established as a national memorial site, and the anniversary was commemorated with a remembrance ceremony. Watch below as the victims’ names are read aloud as a bell tolls in their honor.
Todd Haynes is directing Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore in a new psychodrama (titled May December) starting filming later this year? Sign me up!
Lorde (finally!) released a new song called “Solar Power” and it’s delightful, and (visually) feels very much like a TV ad for an arthritis treatment. The memes are immaculate.
I’ve previously discussed my love of figure skating, which (surprisingly) has a reputation as a pretty homophobic sport, in this space. Maybe that’s changing. On Friday, which should henceforth be known as International Figure Skating Coming Out Day, three prominent athletes in the sport all came out as queer. They included Canadian ice dancer Kaitlyn Weaver (who competed at the 2018 Olympics with partner Andrew Poje and has since turned professional), fellow Canadian ice dancer Paul Poirier (who just won third place at the World Figure Skating Championships with partner Piper Gilles) and American figure skater Jason Brown (who placed seventh at Worlds in March skating brilliantly to Nina Simone’s “Sinnerman”).
All of these stories are incredibly touching and significant for the sport, but Weaver’s is especially so given that less than a handful of other queer women figure skaters have previously come out. Happy Pride Month, indeed!
British artist Jessie Ware is responsible for one of my favorite albums of 2020 — What’s Your Pleasure? — and on Friday she released a deluxe edition of the album with seven new songs, all of which are somehow just as good as the original album itself. Listen to one of them, “Please,” below, and if you also are a fan of delightful conversation about food, life and everything in between, I also can’t recommend the podcast Ware records with her mother — Table Manners — enough. Recent interviews have included St. Vincent, will.i.am, Paul McCartney and Dan Levy. This woman truly does it all.