On June 2, the New York City Council converted its chamber (the room where laws are written, budgets are passed, and the public’s business is conducted) into a ballroom runway. Voguing. Performances. A competition. Awards handed out by government officials on taxpayer time, in a taxpayer building, in honor of Pride Month.
You were not asked. You were not consulted. You were simply expected to applaud.
This is where we are. The separation of church and state is invoked with thunderclap urgency the moment a high school football coach bows his head at midfield. But when the New York City Council hosts a voguing competition in government chambers to celebrate a sexual ideology, that is not a church-state problem. That is progress. That is inclusion. That is government doing exactly what it should be doing.
The standard applies in one direction only. Always.
Take a step back and ask an honest question. How did we get here? The movement that produced the Pride Ball in City Hall did not start here. It started with a genuinely sympathetic argument: gay couples who love each other should be able to get married. That was the pitch. That was the ask. Many Americans, including many conservatives, quietly arrived at a live-and-let-live position on that question. Fine. Love who you love. It’s a free country.
But live and let live was never the destination. It was a rest stop.
Marriage equality passed in 2015. Within years, the demands escalated. Now it was the curriculum. Now it was the library shelves. Now it was the corporate boardroom. Now it was the flag flying above government buildings. Now it was a Pride Ball in City Hall. And somewhere along the way, the implicit contract changed. It was no longer enough to tolerate. It was no longer enough to leave people alone. You were required to celebrate. Enthusiastically. Publicly. Or else.
Blake Treinen found out exactly what “or else” looks like.
On June 5, Treinen took the mound in the 9th inning of the Dodgers’ annual Pride Night game. He was the winning pitcher. Freddie Freeman walked it off with a home run. And the story that lit the internet on fire was not the game; it was Treinen’s hat. He wore his regular cap; not the rainbow one. That was it. That was the offense.
He said nothing. He hurt no one. He simply declined to wear a logo he did not believe in, for reasons rooted in a faith he has never hidden. And the response was exactly what you would expect. Online commentators said he must “hate gay people.” That he was “not a team player.” That his quiet refusal to wear a hat constituted an act of aggression.
This is the false choice the movement now enforces without apology. Either wear the hat or hate gay people. Either host the ball or be a bigot. Either celebrate, loudly and publicly, or confess your hatred. There is no middle ground permitted. There is no quiet disagreement allowed. There is no live and let live left in the building.
Nobody, not Treinen, not the millions of Americans who share his convictions, ever said they hated anyone. That word, hatred, is not a description. It is a weapon. It is deployed to shut down debate before it begins, to make the cost of dissent so high that most people simply go quiet and comply.
The question the movement will not answer is simpler than it looks. According to the latest Gallup data, 9% of American adults identify as LGBTQ+. Gay adults specifically represent about 1.6% of the population. That 91% of the country is expected to hand over an entire month, the flagpole above every government building, the council chambers of the largest city in America, and now our explicit personal approval. This is no longer a civil rights demand; it is a cultural conquest.
Memorial Day gets one day. Veterans Day gets one day. The men and women who bled and died to build the country that hosts these Pride Balls in its government buildings get twenty-four hours each. The 9% get thirty-one days and a voguing competition in City Hall, and the expectation that you will cheer for it or be called a hater.
Target learned what happens when a corporation tries to step back even slightly. The retail giant, which spent years front-loading its stores with Pride merchandise every June, pulled back its in-store displays this year and replaced prominent pride aisles with USA-themed summer merchandise. It did not ban Pride products. They are still sold online. It simply chose to lead with America instead of the rainbow flag. The backlash was immediate. Angry shoppers filmed themselves in stores. Activists declared the chain “embarrassing.” One person said Target should be ashamed.
For selling American flag merchandise in June… one month before out nation’s 250th birthday.
That is the tell. The movement does not want space alongside everyone else. It wants the front of the store. It wants the center of the chamber. It wants the hat on every player. And anyone who declines to provide any of those things on demand becomes the enemy.
Blake Treinen pitched a winning inning, said nothing offensive, and hurt nobody. The City Council of New York turned legislative chambers into a performance stage on the public dime. One of these things generated mass outrage. It was not the one held in your government building.
Normal Americans are not hateful—they’re tired. Tired of being told that declining to celebrate is the same as attacking. Tired of watching the chambers where their laws are made turned into a runway. Tired of the word hatred being plastered over any person who simply wants to be left alone with their faith and their convictions.
You can respect a person and decline to celebrate their choices. That used to be called tolerance. Now it is called bigotry. The movement changed the definition, and it did so on purpose.
The hat was just a hat. The Ball was just a ball. The month is just a month. But the demand underneath all of it is not small. It is total.
And that is why more and more Americans are quietly refusing to play along.
