Tell the Bees

“The light we see – a rainbow from red to violet – has wavelengths between 380 and 700 nanometres. However, the shorter wavelengths of ultraviolet go undetected by the human eye. The LGBTQIA + community suffers from imperceptible forces darker than the rainbow flag we wave. While Pride Month is finished for another year, we shouldn’t let the issues queer people face fade with it. Instead we should keep bringing overlooked issues out of the ultraviolet and into the rainbow.”

Ultraviolet.

Visibility. Invisible. 

When I started researching ultraviolet, I found out bees can see it. My heart softened – like I needed another reason to love bees. Do you know you’re supposed to tell them your secrets? The news? Something I learnt from Ms. Atwood’s Pilar. It turns out you don’t need to – the bees already know. But please, if there’s any queerness in you, tell the bees. 

Tell someone. Even just the mirror. Expand it from yourself. 

Depending on where you are, or who you are, it can feel like a stain. And others keep inspecting you under fluorescent light. Not even darkness feels safe. No wonder some of us prefer to check out, afraid to be the galaxy we are. Our own incredible nebula of identity, sexuality and expression; that needs no containing. 

Ultraviolent. Ultravictorious. 

The spectrum of our existence is bigger than boxes. And that’s a tough pill to swallow when normality and being palatable is sold to us as moral superiority. 

Ultra. 

We’re too much. Our ways are too much. We have too many colours, we stole the rainbow and now we are coming for the rest. Even when we’re just fighting for existence. A bathroom we feel safe in. The recognition of our families. The liberation of our joy. 

I come from the past. Thankfully. 

The first time I thought I could be gay I swallowed by bodyweight in shame. And I hated, with every drop of my rigid blood, the flamboyant ones. The ones dying with HIV. The loud drag queens and the one-night standers… shameful. What a shame. It took me years to understand what now lives in me rent-free. 

Queer joy is necessary. 

It’s contrary. It’s all-encompassing. It pushes and pulls on a system that tells us we’re only as beautiful as our clothes’ size. Or the amount of body hair we have. A system that prefers art that can be sold quickly and comfortably. And souls that follow suit(s). 

Queer joy. Excuse me, but I’m sold. Maybe even hooked. It drips with self-love and community. When you experience it, nothing can touch you. It’s like a Róisín Murphy concert. You’re immune to fear - both incarnated and cosmic. 

Queerness might not always be visible, but I promise you, queer joy is. You know it once you feel it. You can’t look away. Even if you hate it. Them sitting in the park, with their friends, looking like a reimagined Renaissance painting at sunset. His skin in the morning light. Her jumping into after-hours water, following freedom. 

Ultraviolet. 

Invisible doesn’t mean immaterial. Our waves crash just the same against matter. No one needs to see it to be it. Contrary to popular belief. Call me spiritual. You are what you are. 

And yes, visibility is confining. That’s why we need a lot more of it. More and more until everyone can be a mirror. Until all of us can find our peers. Until the tribal need in our DNA can feel satisfied. No amount of TikTok dances, Apple watches and mushroom coffee can separate us from the simple beings we are. We are who we are; but we can’t fully stretch our skin until we’re seen by others. Until we see ourselves in them.

Violet.

Regal colours. Being special. Being different. Being a-part. It was needed, back then, to signal. The thumb ring. The handkerchief in the back pocket. Secret codes, hidden in plain sight – we’ve been struggling with visibility forever. Friend or foe? Passable to possible. Fashion and fighting statements. I guess the answer isn’t black and white. 

And what about the ones who don’t want to be visible? Do we make  s  p  a  c  e   for them, as well? How does that show up in the age of quick display?

When I started this piece, I wanted to deconstruct not just visibility but the way I write. As a copywriter in advertising, you get all these restraints… Close the story, tie your knots, end the manifesto with the brand line… 

Make it easy. Make it snappy. Make it metric. 

Dissonance is death. 

How queer.

But visibility is messy, and I stand by the messiness. I stand by the dialogue. I stand by the exploring without a conclusion, a satisfying bow at the end of this braid. If this is a conversation, we just said hello. And you are?

And yet – I can’t stop myself from coming back to the bees. 

When bees find a particularly great pollen spot, they go back to their hive and do a dance, to tell the others about it.

I think there’s a lesson in here somewhere.

This article will also appear in ‘Spot the Difference’ an internal Wunderman Thompson zine dedicated to celebrating diversity across the EMEA region. Run for, and by, the agency’s talent, it reflects their belief that it is our differences, not our similarities, that collectively make us stronger.

Image credit: Melissa Nuhich, experience catalyst at Wunderman Thompson