I've set a goal for 2019 to become more edcuated about the LGBTQ2 community and their issues. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, but I am not a gay hater like some of the older generation members are. I also didn't grow up with information about anything concerning the community or their issues because between the church and having the disabilities I have, I grew up very sheltered and very bullied by both kids and adults BECAUSE I was so sheltered. My very wise mother raised my brother and I to take in information as we were ready to and not to address things before we were ready to learn about them without becoming overwhelmed, but that pissed a lot of people off. They outright questioned my mother's parenting methods and she had to go to WAR with more than one school board over things.
Now that I am older, though, and able to deal with the world a little bit better, I'd love to become more educated about things I have little to no awareness of. I have tried very hard to ask questions about gender terminology and LGBTQ2 things in the past, but have been told that I don't have the right to ask such questions because I am nothing but a dumb Mormon who will forever be considered 'retarded.' Now, I hate the R word with a passion because I have been called it, but I do feel like it sometimes because I am missing big chunks of information about the world as it now is. I need compassion and people willing to educate me; I need them to help me with my ignorance because I don't want to be stuck with it forever. Just because I have a disability and am religious does not mean I am incapable of learning new things and becoming enlightened. I just need people to be willing to educate me and not flip out when I confess to ignorance.