Thanksgiving is coming up. Here are some things to keep in mind: Anybody can be kind to anybody else, at any time. That relative who claims (and whose enablers claim) they "just can't change" is full of shit. Anybody can learn to use your name, shake your partner's hand, respect your diet. 9/_

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Offspring, OTOH, can exercise no such boundaries. Boundaries are POWER and power may be exercised only by the few. The Venn Diagram of people ranting about family estrangement and those sympathetic to spanking and Dobson-style parenting is a motherfucking circle. 8/_

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Family estrangement isn't new. The present moral panic is a version of Wilhoit's Law: there are family members whom the family code protects but does not bind and those whom the code binds but does not protect. Elders can denigrate you, police your politics, choose your mate, blackmail you. 7/_

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One of my closest friends from my early 20s was a gay man from a very traditional Greek Orthodox family. He tried to stay close, but it was always a strain to try to make peace with them. He struggled with addiction, and eventually lost the battle when he had no choice but to live with them. 7/_

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At the time it was not common for non-LGBT people to work there, but I felt a kinship with the community as a dissenter from an authoritarian family that policed partnership, sexuality, and family building. I did Friendsgiving before it had a portmanteau. We called it orphans' Thanksgiving. 6/_

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