A queer woman was sent death and rape threats for shutting down a homophobic troll with ‘OK boomer’
A screenshot of Alyssa’s conversation with a homophobe. (Twitter/@yourholygaymom)
A queer woman exposed the exhausting double standard that comes with being a young LGBT+ person after she tried to shut down a homophobic troll with “OK boomer”.
Alyssa, a 21-year-old Toronto resident and the self-styled “high priestess of gay Twitter”, shared a screenshot of an anonymous man calling her an “ugly d*ke” and telling her “you are going to hell”.
we live in a society pic.twitter.com/fT9LlH7vOU
— alyssa (@yourholygaymom) November 18, 2019
When she wrote back: “OK boomer,” the homophobe, whose profile picture was of a church cross, replied: “How can you call me that?”
He went on to abuse a number of her followers, calling them “ugly ass f*ggots” and telling them: “Never use that word [boomer], it’s wrong.” Alyssa said that she was also sent death and rape threats, all for calling the man a boomer.
Replying to a made up insult with actual hate speech pic.twitter.com/ZcTmJ5Sqto
— Art Ng (@Killa_Bea) November 18, 2019
She told PinkNews that “OK boomer” has become a way to shut down “unnecessary and toxic conversations where the other person is unwilling to see your perspective”.
“I’m fully shook [that he would send death and rape threats] but not surprised. I’ve seen worse.
“I think a lot of boomers are actually really mad at the LGBT+ community, the POC community and the feminist community because they are feeling like they don’t have power anymore,” she explained.
“The ‘common boomers’ who don’t own corporations have fully lost their power, in that the next generation is not listening to them. They can’t manipulate or hate on people anymore without consequences.
“In their day they could simply walk away after saying the N-word or bullying someone for their sexuality. They were the kings of the land. Now it’s like you are taking away their land acre by acre and they are terrified, and in fight or flight become so hateful it’s ugly.”
He seems to be taking this very well pic.twitter.com/8RdDL8cC5b
— ? Ophelia ? @ FE3H Blue Lion run (@MissVespertilio) November 18, 2019
The phrase “OK boomer” has divided the internet into factions. While many younger users delight in using it to dismiss the baby boomer generation, there are those who find it offensive.
“It is not a slur,” said Alyssa. “There is no history of oppression associated with the word boomer, it describes your generation.”
“I kinda understand them because it brings it down to their age and it feels like we are making fun of the for being old, but boomer is not even about age.
“It mores describes a mindset that is still stuck in that whole 50s, 60s white supremacist anti-gay, men are strong, women are weak era.
“But mostly the meaning of ‘OK boomer’ is ‘alright, we heard you, thank you for your opinion but its irrelevant honey’.
“It’s a statement that baby, the world is not yours to oppress anymore. Your time is up.”
Don’t mind me if I don’t want to to engage in a conversation with someone who wants to hurt me or who wants me dead.
Having been kicked out of her family home in Pakistan aged 13 for being gay, Alyssa said that her life has been made more difficult by systems created by the baby boomer generation.
“After I was thrown out a local LBGT+ activist found me on the street and helped be get Canadian refuge. The child services took me from the airport and placed me into the foster system, but three out of four of those families were highly homophobic. One of them sent me to conversion therapy.
“At 18, when I left the foster system, I was broke, emotionally and mentally damaged. I haven’t been to college yet, and now I live in a suburb that’s kind of very homophobic while I save to go.”
“I almost have not had a life, and that’s so true for so many people from my generation. We don’t have the resources and the privileges of the previous generation. It’s harder to get a good job. It’s harder to pay for college. It’s harder to manage your emotional life, your professional life and the trauma the boomers gave us.
“So don’t mind me if I don’t want to to engage in a conversation with someone who wants to hurt me or who wants me dead.”
Earlier this month, a US employment lawyer suggested that using “OK boomer” in the workplace could be considered ageist under anti-discrimination laws. In comparison, there is no specific federal law in the US protecting LGBT+ people from gender or sexuality-based discrimination.
Follow Alyssa at @yourholygaymom.
