Its Time to Get LOUD!
This is not the time to shrink who you are.
If you give them an inch, they will take a mile.
This is never truer than with the incoming administration. Their plan (Project 2025) outlines a massive attack on democracy, freedom, and humanity, starting with queers and women. The thing is, they are not going to be in office until January, and they still must implement these potential laws. This takes time, political will, and people willing to promote hate on a national level.
Like a fetus, potential policies ARE NOT YET POLICIES! It is more difficult to remove our rights and to fight to get them back. So NOW (and I mean today, as you read this) is time to dig our heals in and let the country know we will not roll over and let them take our rights away.
The reality is, most of the democratic policies are popular (even in places where our candidates lost). The majority of Americans want women to have the right to an abortion (https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/) , they want people with pre-existing conditions to access healthcare (https://www.kff.org/affordable-care-act/poll-finding/5-charts-about-public-opinion-on-the-affordable-care-act/ ), and they don’t’ their friends and neighbors who are undocumented deported.
Over the past ten days, I have been at a bunch of community events and reading folks online. Too many are feeling intimidated by the increased expressions of hate in their communities and feel a need to become smaller, less visible, less vocal. Many community members here in northern California (I’m in a very red county) have the mistaken belief that becoming smaller, less queer, less “out” will make them safer.
Quiet =/= Safe
I’m here to tell you, being quiet will not make you safe. In fact, trying to hide, to become less yourself, will make you more of a target. Being less out, less vocal, less “in-your-face” sends bigots the message their hate is winning. It is shutting you down. You are afraid. This means you will run and hide, rather than fight.
Anyone who lived through the first wave of AIDS saw the “Silence = Death” signs. Yes, ACTUP make people uncomfortable. BUT it was those activists doing die-ins, breaking into the FDA, and getting loud that resulted in medical breakthroughs. Had we waited for politicians to act, we would not have HIV drugs, let alone PReP and DoxyPep. Queers had to save our lives before and we have to do this again.
I say this a someone who has NEVER been able to pass as straight. Others have feared for me. But what I have found to be consistently true is that by being unapologetically myself has been protective. There are several reasons for that.
I Am Unashamed
The right wing has long tried to shame us into suicide and self-destruction. Pushing a narrative that being queer is wrong and sinful and that we are only lovable if we abandon our identity has led to too many of us killing ourselves. The fear of being outed for who we are has made too many of us turn ourselves inside out to make others comfortable. It has led the queer movement to practice “politics of respectability” abandoning protections for our trans brothers and sisters and led to the current campaign of hate against them.
Because I am comfortable with who I am (a cranky, old, fat, disabled, queer) others cannot use shame about these things to control me. Even more important, by refusing to hide who I am I have been able to address other’s discomfort and bigotry head on rather than let them work in the shadows to discriminate. I have been very open with potential and actual employers about my queerness, my health and other issues. I have demanded respect and gotten it.
Most people will happily say bigoted things and do horrible actions if they do not have to confront the person they hate. Looking someone in the face and claiming they want to harm them makes most (not all) people back down. So, make them confront you.
The times I have been threatened or people have attempted to harm me have been met with legal repercussions from me. Being out about who I am made them defend any action as not being driven by bigotry and hate. It puts them on the defensive. Currently, much of the bigotry we fear is unlawful. Make bigots face the repercussions now and shut it down.
We have laws against job discrimination based on gender and sexual orientation. Use that to your advantage. Make an employer justify their bigotry rather than make yourself smaller to make them comfortable. Show up to city council meetings and make your neighbors say the quiet things out loud and to your face. Many will not be willing to hate publicly.
Conservatives Are Already Quietly Ashamed
Many conservatives know their positions are socially distasteful. There are hundreds of thousands who voted for Republicans while telling friends and family they were “undecided” or “didn’t want to talk politics” because they knew they were supporting hate. Make them justify their position. Remind them when they use their social safety net benefits, access healthcare, or send their kids to public school that they voted to end these services. Remind them that every attack on a queer person, on our healthcare, on our rights, was something they supported and now need to fix.
Finally, book bans and whitewashing history taught in schools is done so our kids don’t see themselves reflected in the world. The goal is to make children feel isolated and ashamed of who they are if they don’t conform to heteronormative, white standards. Fuck that. Let them see you in the street, living happily as you are. This is more powerful than you can imagine!
We Will Not Go Back
Fighting to keep the rights we have and not go backward means:
Getting loud
Being visible
Refusing to live small to make others comfortable.
Go forth. Be queer. Get loud.