Progression

From here…

Where I am listening to A Tribe Called Red, a mixture of tribal, hip-hop, and electronic music while musing on last week, especially the election. This was not just a mid-term election, but an out of band election. And in those areas voting they saw some of the highest turn out in a while. The night and the morning after were uplifting to say the least. Liberal wins in many places replacing Republican hard line conservatives. And 8 trans people won elections….

No, let’s be specific, eight OUT transgender people won elections. There had been other trans people elected in the past (Althea Garrison). but they were not open about their transgender status (Althea Garrison was outed by a reporter after her election). There had been also a few open trans people elected (Vicky Kolakowski), but it was rare. What makes this special is that eight out trans people were elected in the same day.

That is historic. Even the national press took note. Amazing, wonderful, and some amazing individuals were elected, not because they were trans, but mostly in spite of their being trans. And they were elected from places as varied as liberal Palm Springs California to rural (and generally conservative) Virginia.

And let’s pile on the historic moments: Andrea Jenkins and Phillipe Cunningham who became the first openly transgender black people to be elected to public office.

So ‘YAY!

But what happens next?

This is a big historical moment, but hardly a major shift. The orange faced pussy grabber is still in office, and all hopes to the contrary probably will be for the next 3 years. In Alabama, even facing pedophilia charges, right wing evangelicals look primes to vote Roy Moore into a US Senate seat. The same senate that just approved the current person living in the White House’s choice for a lifetime appointment to the federal bench – a man who has zero trial experience, has never fought a case let alone been a judge anywhere, but is a blogging sycophant for the pussygrabber.

So to say the least we have a hell of a lot of work to do.

We need to keep fired up. To remain angry. To be activists, every day in every way. We need to speak out when we hear racism, sexism, homophobia, transmysogony. We need to show up to support others. We need to keep running for offices in every state at every level. We need to keep the pressure on, because it is very easy to sit back and let the conservative steamroller just rip away any gain made over the last 50 years. And if we aren’t out there, vocal and active that is exactly what will happen.

I ask you to take a look at yourself and ask “What can I do to halt or reverse the hate and bigotry I see every day” and keep working to move our country from where it is now…

….. to there.