2 days ago, my daughter brought a 13 year old transgender boy (from a girl) with us to Warped Tour.
While I thought nothing of it (people are people to me), I tried to be observate of this kid as the day went on. The kid was beyond excited at Gwar 'killing' Donald Trump, at all the 'Fuck Westboro Baptist Church' signs and shirts and was genuinely excited about being somewhere where he didn't feel 'outcasted'.
On the way home, he started talking about how the Principal at his school hates him and feels like they unjustly punish him for his appearance. I asked him to elaborate and he said 'I had ISS like 20 times this year at school, for getting in fights, cause kids at school threaten me and want to fight me everyday for just being me'.
Not that transgender/gay people being bullied is news to me, but man, that shit bummed me out. Maybe it was hearing it from someone young that it felt different to me, as my empathy well for people my age isn't quite as full as it once was.
I told the kid to just keep being himself, and fuck all those people. Not everyone will agree with your 'choice' but just stay true to yourself. It takes a lot of heart,pride and courage to be who you are/want to be with the world telling you how fucking weird you are constantly.
It just felt great to provide a day of solid excitement and joy to a kid that maybe doesn't get those too often. He made sure to reiterate to us that we 'Must bring him back next year'
Shit, you got it bud.
It was also my daughter's first music festival, as I'd taken her to quite a few concerts already, but this was the first all day, multi bands playing at the same time type of ordeal. She and her friend, Lucas, had a great time. They got to see Andy Black (of Black Veil Brides), who they were both super stoked about. I took them to see Emmure and they loved emulating the death growl/quack vocals of Frankie Palamari. All 3 of us were stoked to see Microwave perform and then went to go meet them afterward. They got to see and meet Hawthorne Heights while I was running around buying merch. Went and saw some young girl band called Tillie, then Hatebreed, Bowling For Soup (who were hilarious), After The Burial, Attila, and Candiria (who they were bored to death during). The Gwar came on, and they had no idea what to expect, except that I had been talking up their performance all day. Gwar came out and chopped off the head of one of their characters and blood starting shooting on us in the crowd and these kids went ape shit. I mean the whole set they sat their and throw up the horns and were rocking their asses off, having never even heard a single Gwar song before. We were covered in blue and red until the very end of their set when the blood we got shot with was mostly water based and washed away most the color. I took a pic of us right after their set. My daughter is the one right next t me, Lucas on the end.
After Gwar, nothing could top that to them. We finished the day watching American Authors, Sick Of It All, Beartooth and I,Preveil. Stopped and ate tacos on the way home and then Skylar and I watched old Simpsons episodes til like 2 AM. All in all, it was a great,memorable, lesson teaching day. My daughter is still asking me if Gwar is coming back to town soon. Haha
