WATCH: With an uptick in antigay legislation, these queer families fight for their homes in the Midwest
We Live Here: The Midwest is a powerful new documentary film the explores the lives of LGBTQ+ families (of all shapes and sizes) who happen to live in parts of the country frequently—and unfairly—referred to as “flyover states.”“Midwestern culture has an over-all resistance to change,” says one of the doc’s many subjects. “We’re just people living in a community… altering what defines a nuclear family.”In Iowa, we meet a trans/queer family with five children in search of a new community after being expelled from their church.
In Nebraska, a gay Black couple with a young daughter navigates a neighborhood where no one looks like them. In Kansas, a pair of lesbian farmers decides to homeschool their son who’s been bullied in class.
In Ohio, an out, gay teacher tries to create a safe space for LGBTQ+ students in his classroom. And, in Minnesota, and older couple tries to rebuild their family after they’ve both transitioned.Also featured is Minnesota State Representative Heather Keeler, a queer Indigenous woman and mother who faces frequent threats as she works to put human faces to the causes her colleagues are actively fighting against.We Live Here comes at a crucial point when, after years of progress, it feels like anti-queer legislation and sentiment is on the rise, no doubt having on outsized impact on those of us not living in “Blue States” or in cities where our freedoms are protected.“Do we stay and fight, or do we go?,” asks another queer Midwesterner.
