A Trans Artist Turned the Conservative “Pride Demon” Meme Into Shirts
For those of us who are proud to put the "demon" in "Pride month," shirts featuring that meme — which did numbers on queer Twitter over the weekend — are officially available for purchase.
Conservative activist and QAnon supporter Lauren Witzke posted the meme to Twitter on Friday. In a real "s(he) be(lie)ved" moment, it features the words "PRIDEMONTH" in white text. Row by row, letters fade away until there's only a rainbow "DEMON" in the middle.
"Demons can seethe. Christians are DONE taking crap from the LGBTQ Mafia," Witzke tweeted. "We're cancelling Pride Month, pouring out your Bud Light, shutting down your Targets, and we're taking back the rainbow." She added that Christians would be standing up "for our right to criticize your depravity in court," adding a link to a crowdfunding campaign for her legal costs in a case against her by a "famous homosexual man on TikTok" whom she claims is trying to suppress her " right to freedom of speech to criticize the LGBTQ Mafia and the Left's ongoing mission to indoctrinate innocent children." (Witzke was sued for defamation in March for allegedly claiming that a gay couple in Texas having children via surrogacy amounted to human trafficking and pedophilia.)
The "DEMON" meme almost immediately went viral, with over 13,000 quote tweets, the vast majority of them being from LGBTQ+ people clowning on it. In a beautifully ironic moment, however, it turns out that Witzke inadvertently directed attention to the queer creator Veya who originally created the graphic.
Veya, who uses fae/faer pronouns, posted on Sunday to confirm that fae had actually originated the graphic. Self-describing on Twitter as a queer trans artist, fae quote-tweeted a post of faers from April in which fae initially shared the graphic. Veya even posted a meme of faer own to show that it was actually the right wing stealing faer meme, rather than the other way around.
Shirts featuring the graphic are available on Veya's Redbubble for a mere $18.67. In addition to the iconic original featuring the rainbow, fae also made variations featuring the colors of the lesbian, pansexual, genderqueer, bi, trans, and intersex flags. There are even variations for genderfae and genderfaun , which are different flavors of genderfluidity according to the Gender Fandom Wiki.
If you're in the market to show off your demon pride, make sure you support a small queer creator. And shoutout to Witzke, who gave Veya the kind of priceless PR boost that money just can't buy.
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