Before My Speech About How Gay People Deserve Compassion, I Should Mention the Array of Lasers Aimed at This Courthouse

Tim Sniffen
3 min readFeb 22, 2022
There they are, right out the window. They’re solar-powered and not going anywhere.

Ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much for allowing me to speak at your public hearing.

When I heard about the newest piece of legislation you’re trying to ram through — forgive me if I don’t have all the details right, the Don’t Say Gay bill, or the Try Not To Dream About Lesbians initiative, or the Frodo And Sam Were Really Good Friends And That’s The End Of It referendum, or whatever the hell you’re calling it this time — well, I knew I had to trot down here, again, to share how we gay people are decent, ordinary folks with parents and internal organs and everything who deserve whatever scraps of compassion you toss our way.

But before I get into that, I wanted to draw your attention to the fleet of laser drones surrounding this courthouse.

Yeah, you can spot a few of them through the window. Like big metal hummingbirds, right? Pretty cool. All those shiny nozzles, pointed right at us — oh, they’re programmed to target anything leaving the building, so you’ll definitely want to sit back down.

Back to that speech. You know, the one where I remind you that I’m just like you, that I bring my recycling to the curb once a week and my spouse and I have hopes and dreams and…

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Tim Sniffen

Writing: Work In Progress on Showtime, The New Yorker, NPR’s Live From Here, Hello From The Magic Tavern, McSweeney’s, Jackbox Games | Twitter @MisterSniffen