When the Bryan Fischer tweet crossed my timeline, I did a search to see if there were any related stories, because often when he and similar wingnuts go off on a topic it’s in response to a news story or other event. I didn’t find any obvious inciting incident, but I did uncover a number of memes and posts (many anonymous) from people lamenting the fact that they like rainbows, but since they aren’t gay, they feel a need to only wear rainbows if they can also wear a t-shirt or button or something that identifies them as not gay but also not a homophobe.

Which flabbergasted me. Okay, it didn’t completely bewilder me, but several of them insisted that they didn’t have any problem with gay people at all, no sirree, but they just wanted to make certain no one mistook them for a queer person. And I’m always confused when people exhibit that much self-delusion.

Because here’s the thing: if you didn’t have a problem with queer people, it wouldn’t bother you if some people concluded that you were one of us. And feeling a need to be defensive about your sexuality and lack of bigotry means you are bothered.

People will assume all sorts of things about you no matter what you do. When I was in my thirties, for instance, I went through of phase of wearing unusually colored beach pants, and many of them looked tie-dyed. People who saw me wearing them sometimes assumed that I was a Grateful Dead fan—especially if I was wearing the rainbow-colored pair. Which was mostly just confusing, because I was so much not a Dead fan that I usually didn’t understand for the first several sentences of the conversation when some stranger tried to strike up a conversation. But while I’m not and never have been a Deadhead, it didn’t offend me that people sometimes thought I was. It never occurred to me that I should get a button made that said, “Not a Deadhead” nor did I ever think I should stop wearing my rainbow shirts or tie-dyed clothes.

We’ve probably all met straight men who refuse to wear pink. I’ve seen men get apoplectic if their son or another boy of their acquaintance even picks up a pink object, for goodness sake! Which is really hilarious given that just a bit over a hundred years ago pink was considered a very masculine color—ironically because magenta pigment was newly invented and very expensive to manufacture. It’s also hilarious because colors don’t have gender.

Pink isn’t my favorite color, that would be purple. But I’ve known a few straight men who also shy away from purple. It’s true that many people can’t tell lavendar from pink, and many shades of purple blend into the pinkish, but it’s kind of sad that guys who are most likely to insist that they are absolutely confident in their masculinity are the most likely to fear being caught wearing pink or many shades of purple.

Of course, that is part of the power of the pussy hat as a political symbol regarding women’s rights. Misogynist prigs are exactly the sorts of men who would feel skeeved out wearing pink. While we’re on the subject, can I just say that the jerks who try to make some sort of argument about how women can’t be upset about rape culture if they’re going to go around wearing a “vagina hat” are utter morons? I mean, I understand that the kind of person who thinks that a pink knit hat with cat ears on it (which is where the pussy comes in) is supposed to be a vagina has never actually look at a vagina.

Yes, I include the married politicians who have made those comments in that category. Remember, these are the same kind of guys who think that tampons are sex toys, that menstrual bleeding is somehow voluntary, and that a woman who isn’t enjoying being raped can’t get pregnant from the act. Their understanding of the anatomy of their spouses is clearly lacking. They may have had sex with their spouse (and possibly other women), but they must be the kind of guy who doesn’t like to look at that part of the body.

If you truly do like rainbows, just frikkin’ wear a rainbow. Don’t worry about what other people think. And if you’re actually making the meme or posting the comment on the anonymous site because you’re trying to “four dimensional chess” your way to that give the rainbow back to god argument, stop being a prick. We’re going to wear what we want, whether it is rainbows, pink hats with kitty cat ears, or two-tone purple broad-brimmed hats if we want. And we’re not going to stop doing it because some of you think that we’re making it difficult for you to wear the same colors.

And why do I have a new two-toned purple hat? Because if you’re under doctor’s orders to wear a sun-shading hat all the time so as to reduce the chances of getting another skin cancer, you might as well wear a colorful hat. Life is two short to wear boring browns and muddy greens!

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Ed Sheeran singing Rainbow Connection with Kermit the Frog on Red Nose Day 2015:

(If embedding doesn’t work, click here.)