But the safe space created by my family — and to some extent, the liberal city I lived in — was the exception, not the rule. I remember marching in a gay pride parade in Jerusalem in 2008 — though it was more a show of solidarity than a pride parade — and smelling the literal shit emanating from the trash barrels that the Haredim had stuffed with dirty diapers and set alight.

I remember seeing conservative Hasidic Jewish men lining the perimeters of the parade route, holding signs that simply said "בושה" (shame, disgrace) in huge letters. I remember going to Shushan Arba, then the only gay bar in all of Jerusalem (it no longer exists), and meeting gay Palestinians for whom this was the only space where they felt safe. Even there, they did not feel that safe, as merely existing as a Palestinian in Israel is inherently precarious. For them, discrimination and danger run rampant, sometimes coming even from their gay Israeli counterparts. Racism is quite likely the most severe and most frequently overlooked issue currently plaguing Israel and Palestine, and it's even more severe for those who are also LGBTQ.

Whether in Jerusalem or Orlando, these spaces are so much more than they appear to be, and attacks like this only underscore that fact. It's something that's easy to lose sight of as a white-passing, privileged gay man living in New York City. But I cannot un-see what I've seen, and we all need to be vigilant and aware of all the work that still needs to be done. We need to remember that just because the queer community is now more visible, we are not necessarily safer. There is not a direct correlation between being visible and being accepted. Attacks like this, and other recent acts of violence underscore the need to not lose sight of the most fundamental part of progress: knowing that you will not be beaten or killed for being who you are.

For that reason, and so many more, gay bars are still important, brave, and sometimes dangerous places to be.