{"id":18,"date":"2019-07-11T13:40:33","date_gmt":"2019-07-11T17:40:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grad.journalism.torontomu.ca\/influencerindustrycanada\/?page_id=18"},"modified":"2019-07-23T08:46:09","modified_gmt":"2019-07-23T12:46:09","slug":"matt-benfield","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/grad.journalism.torontomu.ca\/influencerindustrycanada\/matt-benfield\/","title":{"rendered":"Matt Benfield"},"content":{"rendered":"

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@mr.benfield<\/a>: A little sunshine on ‘gram<\/h2>\n

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ON THE WORD QUEER ?\u2728 For most of my life, I\u2019ve let words have so much of an effect on me. I\u2019ve let them define me, break me down, tell me how to live my life, what to wear, what not to wear, who to love, and all the rest. The pages of most of my life were written by other people\u2019s words & their meanings – and NOT my OWN ? One of those words was QUEER. Queer was a word that was thrown around in high school and uni – a word mainly used for insults more than anything else. \u201clook at that queer over there\u201d, \u201cwho\u2019s that queer\u201d, and on & on. Being queer or identifying with the word queer just wasn\u2019t something I was ever comfortable with. I was fine sticking with my G in LGBTQ+ and calling it a day. But ya know, over the course of this year and ESPECIALLY this month on the 50th anniversary of Stonewall, I\u2019ve been trying to educate myself on our ENTIRE community – the L\u2019s, G\u2019s, B\u2019s, T\u2019s, AND the Q\u2019s. And one of the most important lessons I\u2019ve learned is this… \u2728 WORDS only have power OVER you if you LET them. \u2728 When we RECLAIM the words used AGAINST us, we take their power away to be used by US. Words are just that – WORDS. The same word can be used as an insult, but turn it around & it can be used as a tool of EMPOWERMENT ?? And tbh, I would still say that I identify more with being gay than being queer, but the most important thing I can tell y\u2019all is this…YOU ?? DEFINE ?? YOURSELF ?? HUNTY ?? Lesbian, bisexual, transgender, gay, non-binary, Two-Spirit – HOWEVER you identify – you are worthy as hell and as you go on your journey through life, you can write your OWN story with your OWN words ? What are your thoughts on being queer? Any stories to share? Would love to hear from y\u2019all in the comments ?? LOVE YALL & HAPPY SUNDAY ??\ufe0f\u200d?<\/a><\/p>\n

A post shared by Matt Benfield<\/a> (@mr.benfield) on