#pridemonth ! Semaine LGBT – Let’s tweet about it !

16 Mai 2022 | Actions diverses, Anglais, Associations, Disciplines, E3D & ECO CVC

Dans le cadre de notre chapitre sur « identity » les élèves de 3e Serengeti et Everglades de M. Pappalardo ont été amenés à analyser deux tweets et un retweet de deux twitterers et d’une twitterati.
Après la lecture de l’oeuvre intégrale SIMON VS. THE HOMOSAPIENS AGENDA de BECKY ALBERTALLI en anglais, les élèves ont travaillé en classe sur la crise d’identité que les adolescents traversent généralement, et qui s’accompagne souvent d’un besoin de visibilité. 
Moi, Simon, 16 ans, Homo Sapienstitre français – est un roman pour adolescents sorti le 25 mars 2015 aux États-Unis et le 15 avril 2015 en France. Le livre raconte la vie d’un jeune garçon de 16 ans nommé Simon Spier qui traverse une crise identitaire. En effet, personne n’est au courant de son secret. Les seuls moments où il est vraiment lui-même, c’est bien à l’abri derrière l’écran de son ordinateur. C’est sur un chat qu’il a « rencontré » Blue. Il ne sait pas grand-chose à son sujet. Simplement : 1/ Ils fréquentent le même lycée. 2/ Blue est irrésistible. 3/ Ils s’apprécient énormément. Simon commet alors une erreur monumentale : il oublie de fermer sa session sur l’ordi du lycée. Résultat ? Martin, un de ses camarades de classe, sait désormais la vérité et lui fait du chantage…
Voici le travail des élèves de 3e LCE : à l’aide des fiches tuto et ressources, ils ont dû analyser les deux tweets et le retweet de deux twitterers et d’une twitterati ci après. Il s’agit de lettres anonymes déposées sur le pas de la porte ou dans la boîte aux lettres de deux maisons sur lesquelles flottait le PRIDE PROGRESS RAINBOW FLAG : deux jeunes enfants ont écrit ces lettres anonymes pour remercier les propriétaires de leur offrir cette visibilité dont ils avaient besoin, tous les jours sur le chemin de l’école.

Throughout this exposé, we will use the pronoun « they », instead of « she » or « he », as the teenagers we are going to mention in this work don’t always identify as males or females . 

Let us present these documents : these documents show two tweets with a picture attached, a retweet and a colorful drawing. They were written by « Hats on wigs », « Meghan Stabler » and « Sal Stow » and were published in June 2019, during pride month, on the famous social media Tweeter. This document thus bears upon three twitterers who post about two anonymous notes left on their doorsteps.

Before we begin, let’s start with why and how the flag came to be. The « rainbow flag » was created in 1978 by Gilbert Baker to represent the LGBT community but it was replaced by the «progress flag» in 2018 by Daniel Quasar. This brand-new flag was created to show more inclusiveness as marginalized people of color, trans individuals, those living with HIV and those who have been lost, were added to the flag. 

Moving on, we suppose the author of the first note is quite young because the handwriting is shaky and there are some spelling mistakes. I guess they must be trans or non-binary. I do believe such a flag is crucial to help people feel a sense of belonging to a community. I think its role is identical to a nation flag. It helps people be patriotic and feel proud of their country. Thus, the rainbow flag is a strong symbol of inclusiveness.

In the second tweet, I think the person who wrote this note is transgender because they drew a teen with two flags in their hands. The two flags are the transgender flag and the progress flag. 

The retweet comes along with a picture. In this picture, we can see three masculine-looking people dressed as women holding the progress flag. The man, on the left, has short brown hair with a mustache, he wears a green top with black shorts. The man, in the middle, has brown hair tied in a ponytail with a pink headband, he has a mustache and he wears a blue shirt with a black floral skirt. The man, on the right, has short black hair, he wears a pink tank top and a pink skirt. We must add this drawing is particularly inclusive as it does not picture a typical and stereotypical representation of masculinity, femininity and body shapes.

To conclude, we both think people who put up the LGBTQIA+ flag in their garden help people who can’t come out like in the second tweet, where the person says they were happy to see the flag in their garden. We also think that having other people come to terms with their sexuality on social media helps people who can’t come to terms with who they are, and who they want to be with. 

Marilou & Pia

Throughout this exposé, I will use the pronoun “they” instead of “she or he” to include people who don’t identify as male or female.
Let me present this document. It is composed of three posts, one of them is a reply of the second one (a retweet) and every post has a picture attached and comes from a very popular social network called Twitter. They were written in June 2019 (pride month) by Twitter users.

In the first tweet, the user Hats on wigs (@90sbaebe) tells us they found a letter from a young LGBTQ+ person, in their mother’s mailbox, the person who sent it wanted to show their appreciation as they were glad to see another LGBTQ+ person in their “little town”. The person that sent this letter is probably very young because they are lot of mistakes and the handwriting is quite shaky.

In the second tweet, a verified tweeter user called Meghan Stabler (@Meghanstabler) tells us that because she flew two rainbows flags  ̶ the first rainbow flag was created in 1978 by Gilbert Baker but in 2018 Daniel Quasar made a new rainbow flag called “progress pride flag” because some people joined the community, it is the flag used to represent the LGBTQ+ community  ̶  at her home, someone left a beautiful note on their doorstep saying that these two flags waving in front of her house gave them the courage to come out to their family and be comfortable with who they are. In the picture we can see a drawing of a young kid (or like a teen) holding two flags, the transgender and the pansexual one.

In the last tweet (the retweet), Sal Stow said that is important to LGBTQ+ community to have visibility because no one can know who needs help. They are proud of who they are, and they will continue to be visible in whatever way they can. In the picture linked, we can see a drawing of three people with normal body types, neither fat nor skinny like models, one is black, two have a moustache, and all proudly hold the progress pride flag. Their gender cannot be made clear by their outfit or their body shape.

In our opinion, we think also that is important to come to terms with who you are, and never to hide your identity to anyone because at every moment, someone can be impressed by how confident you are and decide to do the same. This very document shows us the importance to widen your horizons and to embrace who you truly are. the LGBTQ+ community is also a way to some people to feel like they belong in a group, a community and to feel that they are not alone. Inclusiveness and visibility are the key.

Kyllian & Morgan

Throughout this exposé we will use the pronom « they » instead of « she » or « he » as the teenagers we are going to talk about don’t necessarily identify as males or females.

Let us present these 3 documents : these documents are tweets on Tweeter. Tweeter is one of the most used socials networks, it allows users to tweet (post) and retweet (repost of a tweet from another person) thoughts, pictures, and much more.

These tweets were published on 2019 during pride month. The first two are actual tweets and the third is a retweet. The first and the third are from two twitterers named « hats on wigs !!!!! » and « sal stow » but the second one is from someone named Megan Stabler, a twitterati because she’s verified.

This tweet that you can read online on tweeter bears upon the LGBT community, how visibility matters. It also talks about pride month, equality, how trans lives matter : it explains what young LGBTQ people feel everyday and how just seeing a pride flag gives them the courage and the strength to come out to their family.

Before going any further, we need to talk about the new « progress » pride flag created in 2018 to show more inclusiveness as marginalized people of color, trans individuals, those living white HIV and those who have been lost, are added to the original rainbow flag.

Moving on the circonstances and the reasons behind these tweets. Basically, a twitterer received a letter on his doorstep from a young person because their house had a pride flag and the young LGBTQ teen says that is flag gave them the courage to be themselves and to be more confortable with their family.

The picture of the first and second tweets is a note. The second letter was publish in June 19, 2019. At the bottom there is a a drawing with a child holding a transgender flag and a bisexual flag. The first note is written by a young kid. I guess I can tell is it a young person because the handwriting is quite shaky and there are some spelling mistakes. The third tweet isn’t a note, it is just a retweet. At the top of the retweet, a drawing pictures LGBTQI+ grown-ups holding the « progress » pride flag I mentioned earlier. 

In our opinion hanging a pride flag in front of your house when you support the LGBTQIA+ community is absolutely not ridiculous at all. On the contrary. For the LGBTQIA+ community seeing a pride flag waving, is a sign of inclusiveness and visibility : it clearly states that you are not alone. On top of that, we believe the pictures attached to the tweets are crucial as they depicts normal-looking people with average body types.

Fabio & Chloé B.

First of all, let us present these documents. It is composed of 2 tweets and 1 retweet. They are all accompanied by a picture. They were published in June 2019. The first tweet has 634 comments, 20000 shares and 284000 likes. The second has 65 comments, many shares and 4700 likes. The retweet has 1400 shares, 228 comments and 3100 likes.

In this presentation we will use «  they  » because we will talk about non-binary people and we feel this pronoun encapsulates all genres and show inclusiveness. 

They were tweeted by @90sbaebe, @MeghanStabler and @Stalslow, on tweeter, a frequently used social network.

Before going any further, let us talk about the famous rainbow flag and how it came to be. In 1978, Gilbert Baker, a gay man and a drag queen, designed the first rainbow flag. Baker later revealed that it was urged by Harvey Milk, one of the first openly gay elected officials in the US, to create a symbol of pride for the gay community Baker decided to make that symbol a flag because he saw flags as the most powerful symbols of pride. A flag really fit that mission, because that’s a way of proclaiming your visibility or saying, «this is who I am !»

In the document, we can see two notes, written by LGBT teens who want to remain anonymous. On the second note, we can see a drawing representing a boy who is holding two flags. On the left, there is the transgender flag. On the third note, we can see a picture with three people holding the new progress pride flag, created in 2018 by Daniel Quasar to show more inclusiveness. 

On the first note, we can read that it is a young LGBT kid who thanks someone they don’t know who has hanged the LGBT flag in front of their house. They also say that when they walk past this house, it always makes them happy to see this flag.

In the second post, it is also a young LGTBT teen who thanks another family for hanging the pride flag in front of their house. 

It seems, for both of them, seeing the flag gives them the courage to embrace their identity and sexuality in front of others, as we can read it « gave me the courage to come out in front of my family and to be more comfortable with who I am. »    

In our opinion, all these positions are important and crucial. They are right to embrace themselves as they are. We do believe it is good that people have the courage to post, to show who, how they are. We stand beside the LGBT community.

Juliette & Zoe

Throughout this exposé, we will use the pronoun « they », instead of « she » or « he », as the teenagers we are going to mention don’t identify as males or females 

Well, first, let us present these documents. They were published in summer 2019 on Tweeter. Before going any further, Tweeter is a one of the most popular social networks used today. Theses documents are composed of two tweets with a photograph attached and a retweet with a drawing. The first tweet was written by what is commonly called a tweeterer « Hat on wigs » and the second was written by « Sal Stow » which is actually a retweet of « Meghan Stabler » a tweetterati (as she is certified.)

Obviously, we are going to talk about the first tweet. We can see there is a shaky handwriting and there are many spelling mistakes. This tweet has six hundred and twenty four comments, twenty thousand retweets and two hundred eighty-four thousand likes. The tweeterer « hats on wigs », is not a tweetterati. He found this note in his mother’s mailbox. The young LGBTQ+ person wrote they are glad because when they saw the flag flying in the front yard, he immediately thought this family must be their ally. Indeed, the LGBTQ+ flag is not only a symbol it also helps people find their orientation and understand they’re not alone.

Now we will tell you about the second tweet. It’s retweet from « Stal Stow ». This tweet has three thousand and one hundred likes, two hundred twenty-eight comments and one thousand and four hundred shares, that’s a lot for a retweet ! Our thoughts are it conveys a sense of belonging and inclusiveness.

The drawing on the tweet represents the LGBTQ+ flag and I can see non-binary people holding this flag. By the way, the first flag was created in 1978 by Gilbert Baker. It was created to represent gay, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people. However, in 2018 a new flag was created. It includes new groups of people like non binary, intersexual, pansexual and asexual. On the new « progress » flag there are eleven colours : white, pink, light blue, brown, black and rainbow colors, red, orange, yellow, green, dark blue and purple. That is this very flag the retweet posted. It draws attention on the people holding the flag because we can see manly-looking people wearing « feminine » pieces of clothing and a woman sporting a «masculine » haircut. 

I think this drawing is beautiful and it draws attention to the fact that everyone has the right to have the haircut of their choice or to dress as they want regardless of gender. It is a proof that visibility matters and inclusiveness is crucial for teenagers who often go through an identity crisis.

Chloé G, Maelle, Léa