It's the holiday season once more. Festivities with family members galore, dealing with conservative relatives...galore. Thanksgiving already left most liberal, progressive and minority individuals feeling pretty upset, especially so close after the election from hell. Now it's time for more.

There's nothing like waking up in the morning to a fresh blanket of snow, some hot beverage of choice and your racist family members. Or sexist family members. Or homophobic family members. Or transphobic family members. Or xenophobic family members... and so on and so forth, the point is taken. It feels like a slap in the face. While you're left dealing with those fiscal conservative views, you're also left realizing that those family members aren't even all of your worries this holiday season.

Not everyone can be woke. Unfortunately, it's just not possible. So whether you're going back to your home town or people are coming back to theirs...an abundance of rude comments may or may not be overheard. Bumper stickers of he-who-shall-not-be-named double in number. Less gratitude is given to customer service workers, even though it's the season of giving. Salvation Army goes on annoyingly ringing their homophobic bells. It's a nightmare.

Don't get me wrong I love the holidays! The feelings of magic can't be replaced...except for with anger when a conservative person yells at me for saying happy holidays rather than Merry Christmas...

So we're already arguing over president Moldy Voldy himself at the dinner table, as well as whether or not people who aren't cis, straight, white and male deserve rights...and we're seeing a season that tends to be unkind all happening in the background. Parents are buying their 5 year old children iPads and chicken nuggets while refusing to donate a dollar to the children's charity at Wendy's. Homeless people are still left in the cold regardless of how many pennies you give to that Salvation Army volunteer. Other holiday's are insanely overlooked in favor of Christmas, and in fact, not welcome in many cases. Nativity plays are being set at churches where white people wear the clothing of an ethnicity they want to kick out of the country. LGBTQ+ people such as myself are being told we're going to hell. People become greedy and selfish consumers. The list goes on and on.

So yeah, being socially aware during the holiday season can definitely make everything less merry and bright. Being a minority during the holiday season can definitely make everything less magical. Being less privileged in any way can definitely make the holiday season nearly unbearable. But that's why we all focus on being the kind backbone to each other during this time of the year, so that it can be merry and bright in some ways. The holidays are about kindness, let's not lose sight of that.

Make the right choices this holiday season.