I got a grant to film a documentary this summer. So I'll be doing that...fun...but when it's finished, I want to screen it both in my hometown in Oregon and at my college in Massachusetts, as well as at a few film festivals. It's about GLBT people with developmental disabilities.
Anyway, my problem centers on my hometown. It's a tiny place -- about 2500 people -- and I'm out there to everyone, but my mom doesn't want me to screen it there. She says that my dad's still deathly afraid that people at his workplace are going to find out about me and that screening my film there would cause him a lot of psychological trauma.
My mom is perfectly supportive with the trans-thing. (Paid for surgery and everything! *Cue completely justified envy*) But she's kind of protective of my dad. He's already going through a lot of anxiety out of the fear that people around him know. A guy at work apparently came up to him and talked to him about a newspaper column that I'd written, and made an offhand comment like, "So how many kids do you have?" or "Which son is this, again?" The guy had probably found out about me from other people and was trying to open up a conversation about it -- maybe even a supportive one! -- but my dad just clammed up and changed the subject. So he's not taking it too well out of public image-type fear, and my mom doesn't want to put him through any more.
I really want to screen the documentary, though. I'm a co-founder of a performing arts group and founder of a ten-minute film festival in my town, so it'd be an awesome way to get my work out there and let my friends see my documentary. And I don't want to hide under the rug and blend in -- being in the closet hurts us all and decreases trans visibility. This might be a great opportunity to increase GLBT visibility in my little town, which is predominantly Christian and conservative. Out of respect for my mom, though, I don't want to go against her wishes. But part of me just thinks that my dad doesn't deserve to be protected from any of this, especially after all he put me through.
