As a child of the nineties I will readily admit that there is a direct correlation to the American Express advertising campaign with Jerry Seinfeld and the reason I have one today. Fast forward another few years and another great ad cycle in a new format that added even more humor from Mastercard, mint. Add in the fact that I have worked for Discover Card in the past and you’ve got the ABC’s of me, with credit cards at least. Visa is too ubiquitous to merit comment, enjoy your place at the top.

Of course I didn’t understand anything about the comedy of Seinfeld when I saw the ads, most likely from watching golf with my dad on Sundays, but I got the joke. The gas station commercial where he does a, ‘perfect pump’ to $20.00 even, eyes the obsolete, (except in Oregon apparently) gas station attendant and then intentionally pumps more is a masterpiece. As the attendant opens his palm for the change, Jerry reaches into his jacket pocket and pays at the pump with his glowing green Amex.

The value of anything is relative, but that kind of mindshare you cannot buy. I recently found out that I crossed paths with another force in the universe that some could say money cannot buy: Taylor Swift in Cincinnati. I’m sure there’s a Cincinnati post coming, as I have thoughts, but I digress. The Ticketmaster fiasco was horrible, and as a music lover I am compassionate. However, that may not be reflected in my experience with the crown jewel of Appalachia this weekend, and with Taylor also being there.

She sold out the NFL stadium twice, with the lowest priced tickets on the secondary market being over $1700.00 when I looked today. That’s not what has me bothered, it’s that it made everything else in this ill equipped pseudo-metropolis worse for the weekend. Finding a hotel deal was a like pulling teeth from a shark, and even though our events aren’t close to each other, (8.7 Miles) it made it a headache. I just want to be Fearless and express that it was not the Love Story I had planned for our weekend together, although through her lyrics I have come to know I wouldn’t be the first to have that experience.

Anyway, my Mastercard commercial goes like this:

Two nights in an overpriced hotel in a city you loathe: $425
Gas to drive your Prius past the, ‘Hell is Real’ sign and get a belly laugh: $19.52
The beer your girlfriend didn’t want, but, ‘this is your birthday present…so, sure.’: $13
Concert tickets to see your favorite artist play a better show than Taylor Swift is simultaneously: Priceless.

When I started my day, I wasn’t looking for a barometer on homophobia in this country, but I found out anyway. During a lull in the work day I was asked about my weekend plans, to which I had to make a calculated decision: do I tell her I’m going to Pride? I felt almost, ‘closeted’ in my heterosexual support of the movement, but it’s 2023 right?

‘I’m going to Pride with my roommate and his friend.’ When I reflected on the blank stare that followed, I thought, ‘I might as well have told her I was walking on the sun.’ That last part was just to get the Smashmouth clicks, but like the song that has aged over 25 years, so was the viewpoint that followed. At least the song has aged pretty well, the response has not, but it played like classic rock radio to my catholic upbringing.

I said, ‘The LGBTQ festival that’s downtown (Columbus), I think at Goodale Park.’ The very much ‘in the workplace’ response was triggered by the letters and a pretty horrifying diatribe followed. Luckily, my long history of proximity to religious bigotry prepared me for the vibrating bullet points. Do you know how the right keeps saying we are exaggerating and overreacting when we talk about how backward the rural areas of this country can be? We really, really, are not. This story takes place 27 miles West of I-270.

First there was the ceremonial mocking of the letters, ‘LBGTQ…H, R, I…whatever, why do they have a whole month? I mean what about veterans? They only get one day!’ Followed closely by, ‘what people do in their bedrooms, they need to keep it there.’ Eloquently transitioned into how, ‘wrong’ and ‘gross’ They are. A few more tropes were repeated and despite the younger girl in the cubicle next to me trying to reason with her, no avail. I have to give her credit for turning to me at the end and adding, ‘not like, you Justin’ to the end of it.

This kind of overt homophobia with no recourse is something that has bothered me personally for a long time, and this level of stupidity stunned me today. My face was beet red, I could feel it, but I didn’t stop her because it served no purpose and in an unrelated matter she won’t be in that desk by next week. Good riddance, but needless to say I didn’t have the time of my life today.

The thing is I know she’s not the only one, there are so many people who wrongfully conflate this type of speech as, ‘telling it how it is’ or ‘not being politically correct’ It’s not! It’s hateful to an entire group of people who just want to love each other for who they are. It is also a completely unacceptable thing to speak so openly about at work in this day and age, conservatives you aren’t being ‘silenced’ you are being corrected. Wear your colors with pride this month, and every month, whatever the color is, whoever you love, whoever you are.