LGBTQ business owners and community members express blessings and hardships

Thursday, June 27, 2024 at 2:30 AM

NOT FINISHED

As colorful rainbows are waved around on flags, shirts, stickers and more during June for the LGBTQ pride month, outside the celebration is a yearning to continue the fight for their right to love who they want.

It hasn't even been an entire decade since same-sex marriage was legalized in all fifty states by the U.S. Supreme Court on June 26, 2015.

Although LGBTQ community members are beginning to feel more accepted and able to start expressing who they are without worry, backlash is still happening to people like Logansport business owner Josh Weber. Weber has owned the Logansport Skate World and Fun Center for the past six years.

Growing up near Columbus, OH, Weber said he it wasn't until moving to rural Indiana that he discovered the disdain groups of people still carried against LGBTQ members.

Although Weber knew of tension between the LGBTQ community and certain religious groups, the contempt finally came to a head when Logansport Skate World and Fun Center hosted a drag show as a Pride fundraiser in May.

The founder of Logansport Pride, Weber says despite the immediate backlash, he continued on with the drag show. In just over one month, Weber said his Logansport Pride page on Facebook soon gained over 1,000 followers, adding momentum to Weber's courage to continue on with the show.

Weber said although a little more than a dozen protestors stood outside the skate rink as the show began, the show was outweighed by love from the almost 200 supporters participating in the event.