I’m awash in anger and sadness today. The murders at Club Q in Colorado Springs are so heartbreaking and shocking but they didn’t just explode out of nowhere. We in the LGBTQ+ community are facing a wave of backlash. In particular, the attacks on trans people, drag queens, and gender variant individuals go well beyond a single warped gunman and point toward a deep toxicity saturating our culture.
I’m painfully aware that Club Q was going to host an all-ages drag brunch today, and that today is Transgender Day of Remembrance, when we bear witness to the victims of anti-trans violence. I’m painfully aware that the escalating murderous rhetoric coming from the once-fringe-now-mainstream voices in the Republican Party has of late become fixated on things like Drag Queen Story Hour and LGBTQ-inclusive school libraries and history books. (A particular middle-finger to Colorado Representative Boebert for using her taxpayer funded office to label these equitable social and educational programs “grooming.”) I’m painfully aware of the specter of presidential wannabe Ron DeSantis self-righteously surrounding himself with “Protect Children” posters while signing the Don’t Say Gay Bill in Florida, fulminating homophobia and transphobia to fuel his political aspirations.
I’m painfully aware too, closer to home, of the conversations with friends who have lately become concerned that trans-specific healthcare for adolescents is un-scientific, concerns bolstered by a steady stream of clickable links everywhere from the fringes of the internet to the most highbrow places like the New York Times. (A middle finger to the Times for its recent targeted investigation of groundbreaking medical care, suggesting that there is something nefarious about life-saving treatments like puberty blockers.) Protecting children from gender expression is the latest version of the same anti-queer rhetoric we’ve seen and heard for decades. It’s a backlash to our progress, and it comes in many forms.
Gun violence is backlash in its most horrifying form – bullets and blood in our sacred social spaces – but make no mistake, it is fueled by opportunistic media pundits who get ratings with their sensationalistic coverage of the trans community; in the fundraising letters and campaign rallies of politicians scaring up votes because they have nothing else to offer in their quest for political power; in courts stacked with reactionary judges undermining the Constitution with antidemocratic arguments about religious liberty. Backlash even happens among our families and friend circles, where folks get upset when marriage is threatened but shake their heads at the expanding inclusivity of the LGBTQIA+ coalition, with all those darn pronouns.
I’ve spent the last month on a book tour, doing six readings in five cities, presenting my new novel Army of Lovers to audiences who want to talk about the book’s content – the queer activist community of the late ’80s and early ’90s. We talk about AIDS and political organizing, about grief and community, about sexuality and violence. In retrospect, so much of the past that I write about in the novel seems clear as day now: the murderous negligence of the Reagan and Bush administrations, the misreporting on HIV treatment by mainstream outlets like the New York Times, the toxic stew of homophobia, racism, and sexism that led to continuous demonization of people at risk. But it’s worth remembering that at the time, those of us who fought to bring forth these truths did it at great cost, often without allies, support or credit. And it’s worth noting that there is a direct continuum from those days to this horrific present moment.
I’m painfully aware that this backlash is not new. When the AIDS activist movement channeled the queer community’s sorrow and rage into political change, we faced backlash on multiple fronts: in the media, among the more assimilationist voices in our own community, and on the streets, where anti-queer violence escalated to deadly levels in the early ’90s. Politicians were hateful then, and they’re hateful now. The media was patronizing toward us then, and they are today. Fundamentalist Christians (and hardliners from other religions, too) were our enemies then, and they are our enemies now. What is new, and alarming, is the surrounding context: deadlier and more plentiful weapons, algorhythmically targeted misinformation, and a speeded-up media landscape that clutters our conversations with so much noise. But the impulse to contain us, demean us, and silence us is not new.
Let this be a moment when we recommit to justice, equity and progress. Let this be a moment when we educate ourselves more fully and listen where we need to learn – especially to trans and gender variant voices. Keep up the fight, not only electorally but in our conversations, our community practices, our everyday advocacy. The backlash is strong, deadly strong. An attack on any of us is an attack on all of us. Take every opportunity to speak up and stand tall.