What has been your point of view on the increase in inclusivity seen in sport in recent years?
I watch sports, not necessarily religiously, but I grew up playing sports so I still watch sports. One of my favorite bars to go to is Tight End, so they actually play sports on the TVs, which is kind of nice. So and then there's other people that also enjoy watching sports and stuff that go there. So I think it's awesome, just because we've never really had spaces to go that we could honestly watch things like that. And then also having representation also in sports teams, as well, there's a lot more people that are openly queer that play on professional sports teams, so even having that is awesome, too. Back when I was growing up, we didn't really have that. So now it's nice to be able to see it on TV and stuff and be able to have like a community based around it.
How vital is allyship in the community right now, especially with drag performers and transgender rights coming under recent fire in our country?
I feel like representation of everything that entails definitely matters, just because with everything going on in the media, there's not a ton of representation. It's definitely nice, even by having me here, I feel like it's nice to represent the more realistic side of the drag community. And it's just nice to also have other members of different communities being visible. Also, people of color, trans individuals, especially, right now, so that way we have representation for a lot of the younger generations.
There was a direct attack on the community close to home recently with the shooting at Club Q in Colorado Springs last year; how have you seen the Colorado queer community come together after such a tragedy?
I was actually working the night that the Club Q shooting happened. I wasn't working at Club Q, but I was working at a bar up here in Denver. So I had friends that were working at Club Q that night. It was definitely very nerve-wracking to say the least, and it was also kind of surreal, just because you don't really think like stuff like that's really going to happen that close to home. So it's definitely changed quite a bit. But it's also kind of brought the community together in a different way, just because a lot of us talked a lot more, like the Colorado Springs community and the Denver community haven't very been very close in past years, but over the past year we've developed a lot of relationships, and a lot of us talk more frequently. There's a lot more Colorado Springs performers that come up to Denver to perform. And even just the queer community in general, there's a lot more allyship now and a lot more people are just starting to have more camaraderie rather than kind of having divisions in the community. So that's been one benefit of it. Definitely the losses of life were more tragic than anything. But it's definitely nice to see the community flourishing after something like that could happen. So it's been at least one of the things the community has been able to kind of bounce back with.
In the next five years, what is your hope for the queer community and how we're all able to support through everyday things like sports?
I hope that the queer community just has more representation, throughout sports and just in the media in general, and also more accurate representation for people just because I feel like a lot of the representation right now is not necessarily bashing the queer community, but it's kind of putting the queer community in a very bad light for a lot of people that don't know a lot of gay people, or really, any gay people. So I hope that with the media coverage and things like that, it gets a lot better. And then also, just in general, just with the community itself, I just hope that we continue on that road of welcoming each other and accepting each other and helping each other out when we need help. And then also to just making sure that we're all managing our mental health and stuff just because mental health can be crazy for everyone. I just I think everyone just needs to be a little bit more accepting a little bit more loving. And I think in the next five years, if that happens, we'll be able to do great things.
