You’re Going to Want to Sit Down for Ellen’s Star-Studded Thank You to Obama From the LGBTQIA Community

Right now, elsewhere on the Internet, the White House’s page on LGBT rights has already been taken down by the new administration, but we can’t forget the progress of the last 8 years if we want to keep things from sliding backwards. This video thank-you message from The Ellen DeGeneres Show is a reminder of how far we’ve come in just under a decade, from a President Obama who originally denied supporting marriage equality (though we were all pretty sure) to where we are now.

It’s hard to believe that just a few years ago, marriage equality did not exist as the law of the land in America, and so many things that have now happened would have seemed impossible back then. Many of us have memories from the past few years of happy events that we once only dreamed would be possible, and it’s hard not to have them all come rushing back while watching this video.

So let them come back, let them bring a few tears to your eyes, and whatever you do, hang onto them. Let those memories motivate you to fight against incoming waves of discrimination and keep things from regressing—we can’t go backwards when we still have so much farther to go.

(image via screengrab)

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