LGBT Civil Rights and Activism

But do weigh carefully, frankly if it's even worth it... and welcome to your new "family", the LGBT community. My parents were not very religious, just sort of idiotically redneck. But my extended family on my mother's side tend towards the fundamentalist idiocy, I found out the hard way that with the exception of one world-travelled uncle, attempts to rekindle any relations with them were futile. Once it was known I was "different", holy shit did they treat me as a pariah (one of my cousins even saw to it his children were visiting elsewhere and actually said something to the effect he didn't want them to catch my disease) even on a visit I rode my motorcycle thousands of miles to make.
Can I make a suggestion using to worn out old adages? 1. Absence makes the heart grow fonder 2. Curiosity kills the cat. Just cutting them off communication can sometimes make them wonder enough to attempt rekindling ties if you're close with them.
The funny part is that each LGBT "coming out" does more favor for the LGBT community at large than often for the one that does it. It certainly cuts the bullshit about who really cares about you vs. going overboard about their selfish heavenly award awaiting if they just maintain their hateful bigotry despite the language they attempt to mask that with.
PFLAG can help. Some gay folks who just couldn't face the coming out alone just brought their bigots to a PFLAG meeting. Nothing like the power of groups, meeting others who have LGBT family that gets them out of their bigotry enforcement comfort zone... to a new accepting comfort zone that can be supportive to you and them as well.