Pulse nightclub survivor bjoewolf: 'When I close my eyes at night, I can remember the moments when that normal shattered into a million shards on June 12, 2016. I can feel it, hear it, see it'
Wolf is a survivor of the 2016 terror attack at Pulse nightclub in Orlando and a nationally recognized public speaker and advocate for LGBTQ+ civil rights and gun-safety reform. He is the author ofrowing up in rural Oregon, I often dreamt of a world where I could be all of myself. A world where I didn’t feel the nagging societal pressure to be “Black enough” for some spaces and “white enough” for others. A world that saw my queerness not as a dealbreaker, but as a superpower.
When I close my eyes at night, I can remember the moments when that normal shattered into a million shards on June 12, 2016. I can feel it, hear it, see it. The vibrant poster above the urinal. The cup teetering on the edge of the sink, perched precariously as if it might tumble to the tiles below. The first cracks of gunfire from an assault rifle. The stench of blood and smoke wafting into the room.
Hours later, the world woke to our horror: 49 dead; 53 injured. LGBTQ communities across the globe reeled with the jarring reminder that no space is a safe space when your very humanity is perpetually up for debate. The celebrations over marriage equality and surging social acceptance were suddenly cleaved by violence. Overnight, ours was a community under siege, picking up the broken pieces of the nation’s deadliest attack on LGBTQ people in history.
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