Recently, supporting “the gays” has become extremely trendy among moderate liberal white kids who want to talk about how accepting they are. It’s super cool to talk about how you want “gay marriage” for “the gays” and how much you would just love to have a gay best friend (because gay men are essentially pets, right?). You’ll call yourself a straight ally and just wait for the back pats, cookies, and medals for how accepting you are. Here’s the thing: LGBTA people are not your pets, victims to be rescued, hypotheticals, or your newest project and if you’re going to be condescending then frankly, we’d rather not have your “help” at all.

A is not for ally, A is for asexual, and this kind of behavior is just the starting point for invasive and boundary-crossing behavior that straight people so often participate in. Heterosexuals who support LGBTA people are not honorary queers and don’t get your own space or your own letter in the acronym. You don’t belong in our clubs, our bars, or our parades, and no, nobody cares if you’re going to cry about how oppressed you are when someone asks you to stop groping your boyfriend in a lesbian bar. Straight people need to back off. A good straight ally attempts to make change within their OWN social sphere, among their own friends, and within their own realm of influence.

Gay men are adorable, but lesbians are icky, right? Straight people are also rampant fetishizers who love to view gay people as objects, either for sexual gratification or for their own cause. This exists in the form of straight girls “shipping” slash pairings (I’m looking at you, johnlock people) for no other reason than they want to see two hot dudes kiss, to men looking at exploitative lesbian pornography. Both objectify, and both villianize the gender/orientation that doesn’t play into their fantasy, i.e. straight girls hating lesbians and straight men hating gay men. My life and my sexual orientation are not a science experiment for you. Treat me like a person, or stay away from me all together.

When your “activism” is just as oppressive and indicative of your privilege as those who actively seek to oppress us, it’s not good activism. Stop invading our spaces, stop turning us into objects, and stop hinging your support of us as people on whether or not you’re accepted as an honorary queer into the GSA or gay bar. Straight people? Educate each other and stay in your lane.