If you were on Twitter at all the past few days (and, by the way, more power to you if you weren’t—it was a long holiday weekend, so hopefully everyone got out and touched some grass), chances are you saw this silly image floating around:
In this kerning stickler’s nightmare, “PRIDE” and “MONTH” are smushed together for some reason as if they were one word. The eye-sore “PRIDEMONTH” is then repeated, line after line, the white “PRI” and “TH” letters fading out as the central letters “DEMON” gradually colorize with a rainbow gradient.
Honestly? It’s so ridiculous that it’s brilliant.
At first blush, this would appear to be the handiwork of yet another too-online queer, playing in the same space as the LGBTQ+ community’s leading troll, Lil Nas X, by leaning into the satanic aspersions often lobbed at us by Christian right-wingers.
UPDATE: After publication, it was brought to our attention that said art was originally created over a year ago by queer artist Art By Veya, who is selling the design in various styles and colors of t-shirts on their website.
But the recent meme-ification of the art begn with none other than Lauren Witzke. “Who?,” you might ask? Exactly!
Witzke is an anti-LGBTQ+ conservative bigot media “personality” (or lack thereof), proud Christian, former host for designated hate group web show TruNews (which, by the way, is neither “tru[e]” nor “news”), and, as her Twitter bio tells us, the GOP’s Delaware nominee for US Senate in 2020 (in other words… she lost.)
Of course, as much as she hates the gays—and, trust us, the feeling is mutual—even we have to admit that Witzke did a bit of a slay when she dropped the “PRIDEMONTH” meme on Twitter this past Friday.
Almost immediately, queer folks began retweeting the graphic ironically, embracing its absolute absurdity and reclaiming the rainbow-fied demon label for themselves. By the end of the weekend, it became a full-blown meme, inspiring jokes, reinterpretations, and art. And just in time for Pride season!
Related*
This anti-LGBTQ+ bigot just inadvertently gave us our first great meme of Pride Month 2023
She thought she was coming for the gays, but this right-winger’s absurd meme is just making us more powerful.
Yes, the unwitting Witzke has accidentally given us the first great meme of Pride Month 2023. We’re almost inclined to say, “thank you,” but…. no thanks!
In a follow-up tweet, she claims, “Christians are DONE taking crap from the LGBTQ Mafia,” warning that they’re “cancelling Pride Month, pouring out your Bud Light, shutting down your Targets, and we’re taking back the rainbow.”
First of all, *eyeroll* and, secondly: If you’re taking back rainbows, where are you using those colors for the “demon” in your post? The logic’s all wrong. But when it comes to bigots, is the logic ever right? (Hint: No.)
— alleged homosexual (@dozygay) May 29, 2023
Anyway! Enough about Witzke. The brilliant, twisted minds of Gay Twitter™ have taken “PRIDEMONTH” and run with it. Scroll town below for a few of our favorite spins on the demonic meme that we’ll surely have us laughing all the way through June.
Many are having fun the wonky wordplay of the original post—some even using Witzke’s own formula to throw it back in her face:
— Nieltown (@nieltown) May 27, 2023
— Iantos (@IantosWolf) May 28, 2023
Similarly, one pop music aficionado used the meme to fashion a tribute to what’s shaping up to be the 2023 Pride anthem: Kylie Minogue’s “Padam Padam”:
Others have a few ideas what this so-called Pride Demon might look like. No one can seem to come to a consensus, though we all can agree that she’s serving, of course:
And, frankly, it’s just getting some of us even more hyped for June!
mikeTigg
I always thought De mon was Jamaican for The Man.
esrosejr
Damn, I just thought of that and, well, first out wins the prize. You de mon, mon.
Bengali
JeSUS Crap = no place in my life. I remain disappointed in the number of LGBTQ- embracing Christians because even though they are presenting a more positive side of religion, religious history and hypocrisy runs rampant even among the LGBTQ members of the faith. While my experience is anecdotal it still appears to represent the majority of lgbtq Christians. My christian friends know almost nothing about the buybull. When I ask them why their god allows such horrific suffering in our world they are dumbfounded and struggle to come up with an answer usually resorting to the stock answer of “we can’t know what’s in gawd’s plan” aka ULTIMATE COPOUT. Kind of a pathetic response to a faith so many base their life on.
and YES I AM AN ATHEIST because i will never believe anything that can’t be proven.
barryaksarben
organized religion is organized crime as we all saw when covid hit and the focus was about them attending the serivces so that the collection plate could be passed for cash. they put their members in danger of their lives and they didnt give e a shit – it was about getting that money. and pushing hate to anyone who wondered at the wisdom of not letting people pray at home. disgusting hypocritical scum
Man About Town
Her Wikipedia page includes these gems:
1.) In May of 2023, Witzke expressed support for Uganda’s Death Penalty for Homosexuality, saying, “Unlike the lawmakers in Texas, the Uganda government recognizes that if you give an inch, the LGBTQ Mafia will take a mile… they stop it before it starts.”
and this:
2.) She is a former drug user who reformed through a Pentecostal faith-based recovery program for which she later became program director. Witzke has stated she believes in the flat Earth theory.
edwardnvirginia
How interesting that you bring up the Uganda legislation
that reveals a startling truth: Black-identified majorities can be deadly for queer people!
Den
The truth here is that the religious orthodoxy which inspired this law in Uganda comes from the history of Imperiaist domination by European nations. And a group of influential white televangelists and megachurch scammer went to Uganda to help them formulate it. This is much the same as the anti-lgbt influences which are still strong in India. They are directly the result of long British domination.
You seem to be trying (rather stupidly) to argue for an intrinsic intellectual weakness or regressive nature among black people. What you betray instead is simple (and simple minded) racism as well as a startling ignorance of history.
Bosch
Omg Edward. That is so tasteless. Racism is just as stupid as homophobia.
Especially since vriginia cops can be deadly for unarmed black teenagers.
edwardnvirginia
There is nothing un-truthful with the observation ‘Black-identified majorities can be deadly … ‘. Does Uganda’s legislature have a ‘Black-identified majority’? … well …
abfab
Edward, get your head out of your vagina.
Den
There is no way to justify your obviously racist view of the world. You just dig yourself in deeper. We know what you are. Their law has much more to do with Uganda being evangelical identified and a non-secular government than with the country being majority black.
barryaksarben
DEN you are so right. This horror in Uganda came right from the good u s of a the most hate filled far right terrorists. exporting there. hate to places that the society hasn’t advanced to the point of understanding the truth of gay brilliance
barryaksarben
Ive met a few ex-drug addicts who change one extreme addiction and focus to another one and many go to religion and become hard line hate filled zealots.
Bosch
Edward, if I’m not mistaken, the biggest murderers east of the Atlantic right now are white Russians. So white-identified majorities are deadly.
Just like the Troubles in Northern Ireland.
Just like the Germans in the late 30s.
Just like white cops in Virginia.
Your racism isn’t smart or edgy.
Manray
Trunews is located in my hometown of Vero Beach FL. Witzke is an unhinged shrieking shrew, another drug addict who replaced her crack addiction with Jesus hard to determine which addiction was more ruinous to her mental health.
Total trash she is. I think she secretly has a shenis!
Kangol2
@edwardnvirginny, of course you’re here spewing your usual racist garbage.
8 of the 12 countries where the death penalty is in place against LGBTQ do not have “Black-identified majorities.” In addition to Uganda, Afghanistan, Brunei, Iran, Mauritania, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. A majority of those countries are in Asia, not Africa. One thing many of these countries (Afghanistan, Brunei, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, UAE, Uganda, and Yemen) do have in common, though, is that they were part of the “White-identified” British Empire and its protectorates), which spread legalized homophobia all over the globe.
On top of which, as racist cowards like you usually do, you cannot bear to acknowledge that this White Christian witch is the one approving of death for LGBTQ people, or that White, conservative Christians, including in Virginia, are the ones pushing anti-LGBTQ laws! Take your White racist and supremacist claptrap and shove it!
Den
I wish I’d seen your response to “Edward” before I wrote mine (I’m a slow typist). These people with no understanding of history are frustrating and always seem to see their ignorance as insight!
nm4047
I thought you were going to tell us they all drive on the left side of the road. 🙂
abfab
This goes out to the racists in the room, and Joni Miitchell never lies………….
Up in a sterilized room
Where they let you be lazy
Knowing your attitude’s all wrong
And you got to change
And that’s not easy
Dragon shining with all values known
Dazzling you, keeping you from your own
Where is the lion in you to defy him
When you’re this weak
And this spacey
barryaksarben
yours is a great response. sick to death of racist sexist anti trans gay s. Usually older men who never came out to their families, never came out at work and never did a positive thing for the gay movement of any kind. but complain about how the gay movement isn’t for drag queens or trans or asexuals. We all must stick together. and demand all of our rights. stand together or fall separately. I have known a few trans people and under more gentler people I have never met and it angers me that gay men who should know better than to punch down.
mildredspierce
Who gives a shit what this brain dead junkie trash thinks!! Cookie cutter zealot clinging to folklore to keep her from relapsing. What is left of her is mere debris.
barryaksarben
but the ignorant will always think these wild manic zealots. know something they dont. They are easily fooled and they do vote and do commit violence
ShiningSex
actually a stupid t-shirt. it caters to their ignorance. we don’t need to take negative things all of the time and make it “our own”. it’s just playing into their stupidity and making us look stupid too.
abfab
Only YOU can make YOU look stupid.
dbmcvey
Who do you mean when you type “we?”
abfab
Don’t trip him up too much about the horned one…..I mean, look at his avatar.
SDR94103
“This anti-LGBTQ+ bigot”
If this is the case, then why put his half naked picture on this site. Why????
barryaksarben
that isn’t the bigot it is a stock photo but you are right it is a bit confusing. The bigot is a woman
abfab
Oh Barry, that ship (trying to explain things to idiots) has sailed, but you get will get a few points for trying.
dbmcvey
Someone is not paying attention.
Kangol2
It’s a woman but you persist in your dingbattery!
Pietro D
I never saw PRIDEMONTH/ DEMON until now as I deleted my Twitter account as soon as Musk the Frump took over. Thanks.
“Clap if you care” – Wendy Williams, the bitch!
JESUSCHRSIT – In French “Je sus Christ”. (I knew Christ)
Kangol2
She’s on Instagram and other social media sites. Are you off Instagram? Facebook?
nm4047
I think the pride month organisation needs to put in a copy right on this, otherwise she will be expecting royalties. We know she won’t have any issue accepting payment if it comes to that.
FreddieW
I’ve never had a Twitter account, and after 4 years of reading Trump’s toilet tweets in mainstream media and after watching Elon Musk make a total ass of himself this last year, I wonder why anybody still spends time on Twitter.
Oh, and Jack Dorsey’s nose ring while appearing before Congress would have put me off Twitter immediately, if I had ever been on it.
TimidTim
They’re always a conservative (goes without saying), tall blonde dits with a variation of the name Laura (Lauren, Lara, Lana, Lori, Lawny etc.) usually having some kind press or correspondence with (OF COURSE) Fox NEWS. I get they have a type but the name thing I always found really head scratching.
Kangol2
Of course Queerty only half reports the story. This Witch Witzke didn’t just post this on Twitter, she posted it on Instagram, Facebook, etc. If you go to her Instagram page, which isn’t private, it’s full of anti-LGBTQ claptrap.
So to all the people virtue-signalling that they’re off Twitter, etc., do know that this hateful, anti-LGBTQ monster is pushing her hate across a range of social media platforms, not just the one that the right. Muskrat has run into the ground (Twitter has lost 2/3rds of its value since Muskrat took over).
abfab
And like MySpace….it will be over. Is Facebook still a thing? Muskrat is a TWAT and so is Twump.
Laryagar
In the end of it all, it is ultimately not something attached a race or single identifying trait that causes this behavior. Organized religions were formed for control. In some cases, there were good intentions behind some of them but for the most part they were designed to control populations. The Judeo-Christian Bible was one of the oldest to survive, but due to politics over the centuries was able to continue in various forms to create many splinter religions. People made those splinter religions to wield their own special brand of control and use parts of established texts such as the Bible to support whatever they wish. Many people do not like to present their own ideas, so like to use such texts to support their arguments.
As for evil countries and vilified cultures, there is an adage where it is said that the “winner writes history”. In some countries they were either clever or lucky enough become advanced enough to dominate another culture to some level. Unlike war this was more of an absorption of the one culture and like a war the winner got to rewrite parts of the other to fit theirs. It has happened throughout the history of the world and continues to this day. There will be mixed results whenever this happens, just like in every culture there can be listed positive and negative traits, based on who is making the comparison.
As for Uganda, like many countries in modern Africa, they were largely conquered by Great Britain. Sadly, Great Britain, at the time, was heavily influenced by a state religion that influenced the development of the country at the time and established laws that were poor by today’s standards of morals. That established predisposition allowed for Evangelical branches of Christianity to influence the country’s population and especially leadership. The real question I would ask is whether the leadership is enacting these new laws in an actual belief of this religion or is it an effort to gain more control, more power, by using a marginalized group as a target. This has also been done frequently over the centuries, most notably during World War II.