Lauren Boebert is Going to HATE This Newsletter. But She Doesn't Run It—I Do.
I mean if Boebert is going to continue to be homophobic and transphobic, I'm simply going to continue to be Boebertphobic
Before we dive into today’s topic, I just have a quick PSA for all of my Georgia-based friends:
Today, we’re unfortunately going to be talking around what happened last month at Club Q in Colorado Springs. As we’ve learned from previous E4P installments, violence against the LGBTQIA+ community is still normalized more often than not: it’s in the media we consume, the laws that are passed and proposed, and Harry Styles’s whole vibe right now maybe???
As I’m writing this, CBS News is reporting that the Supreme Court—which is, for some reason, still obsessed with making sure we get that they believe religion should be protected more than human rights—is likely going to rule that anti-discrimination laws may violate the First Amendment if they force an individual to convey messages that violate their religious beliefs.
The reason anti-discrimination laws are essential is in their name: discrimination leads people to feel comfortable sharing their hatred of others publicly, which inevitably leads to violence. It’s a cycle that calls to mind the refrain from journalist Adam Serwer about Donald Trump’s presidency—the cruelty is the point.
And yet, while this cyclical violence is omnipresent, so is the resilience of the LGBTQIA+ community which is what I wanted to spotlight today.
I intentionally said that we will be talking around what happened in Colorado because I don’t want to spend this piece focused on the trauma of what happened there. Instead, I wanted to hear from four brilliant and incredible individuals about what community means to them, how they have built supportive communities, and what allies in their orbit can do to protect them.
What's your one-line bio?
Skylar, 24, she/her: Future lawyer with a penchant for quiet indie dramas, good interior design, and everything bagels.
Alex, 26, he/him: Diamond-certified fan of your favorite thing.
Mon, 24, they/them: A 0.05% top listener of Charli XCX.
Brady, 25 he/him: Nerdy twink that has been entirely consumed by West Hollywood.
How do you identify within the LGBTQIA+ community?
Skylar: I oscillate between using the term queer and lesbian, and use them interchangeably.
Alex: Trans/queer.
Mon: Genderqueer/genderfluid and queer. (Sometimes, to keep things simple, I use the identifiers non-binary and bisexual/pansexual.)
Brady: Gay.
What does community mean to you?
Skylar: Community, to me, means love, support, and togetherness. It means feeling affirmed by the people around you in the ways that you identify or exist. I’ve always reveled in being involved in many communities, whether it be related to my academics, my identity, or just my hobbies.
There is something incredibly empowering about knowing there’s a whole group of people out there, whether big or small, who can understand how you’re feeling and empathize.
Alex: For queer people, community is everything. As a trans man, one of the most complex emotions I've felt has been caused by or related to loneliness. As a marginalized group, having other trans people to look up to and surround myself with—as well as other queer people in general—has truly been monumental for my development and happiness.
Mon: A place where people are accepted for who they are and encouraged to think openly; a place where people are emotionally (and sometimes mentally and spiritually) nourished and supported.
Brady: Community honestly means everything to me. After graduating from college in 2019, I moved to Australia for a gap year to prioritize soul-searching and recover from burnout. My first 3 months Down Under were blissful. I was making new friends, started a new relationship, and was able to work remotely. But once the pandemic broke out, I realized how fragile that reality really was—and how fragile I really am.
Confronted with the dilemma to wait it out in Australia, where I was safer from both COVID as well as the political unrest during the George Floyd protests, or to return home to my family and support system of friends, I absolutely fell apart. The lockdowns in Melbourne were some of the strictest in the world, so I ended up quarantining with my 2 roommates (a lovely transgender couple in their mid-30s who I met through Facebook) for 6 months straight.
Things devolved into chaos—our mental health was the worst it had ever been, my partner and I naturally broke up, and my new local friends were so preoccupied with their own lockdown-induced problems that they didn't have the bandwidth to support me. Eventually, I made the impossible choice to abandon my gap year plans and return to Denver, my hometown, where my mom hardly recognized me. The loneliness had fundamentally changed my entire worldview and values in life.
I've always considered myself an ambitious, goal-oriented person. But after 2020, I've learned that none of that matters if you don't have a community to lean on. And that's multiplied by ten for queer people.
Have you built different communities (ex. in your hometown, at college, in places where you lived postgrad, online)? If so, how have they differed from one another?
Skylar: I am, as I have dubbed myself, an involvement queen. This means any time I get to a new environment, whether it be work, school, or just a new place, I do my best to find community in any way I can.
When I was in high school, it meant getting involved in clubs with people who shared my political views (in Texas, we had to dodge conservatives left and right). In college, at a heavy football and greek life school, it meant finding people who were interested in the arts and the music I liked, and eventually also a really supportive queer community for the first time in my life.
When I moved to New York and started my first big girl job, for the first time I had to put a lot of effort into forming a community on my own and really forging my own path. That meant, as an entry-level employee, taking the initiative to start both LGBTQ+ and Jewish Employee Resource Groups, which were incredibly important to my working experience. For the first time in an office environment, I felt like I could be open and honest about who I am, which made the job so much better.
Now that I’m back in school as a law student, it has been an exercise in forming a community yet again through all of my identities. I’ve been elected to the executive board of OUTLaw, a chapter of LGBTQ+ law students which seeks to empower each other in our queerness and fight for a better future. It’s been incredible to find community and have it shift over the years from mostly social, to actually doing vital work that makes the world a more accepting place.
Alex: I've built a community throughout my time in New York and as well as online. Having an online community that has my back and is a safe space of support has been huge for me to feel free to express myself regardless of what people might think. Whereas community in real life can feel a bit tougher to always engage with or find.12
Mon: I've been fortunate enough to grow up and live in cities in the Northeast where queer spaces are often easy to be found. In college, I spent time utilizing our school's CSGA, which we were lucky to have in a physical space in the center of campus. During COVID, I've started connecting with art communities on Twitter, Instagram, and Twitch. Almost all of these online communities are made up of both queer people and allies from around the world.
Brady: My parents divorced when I was 2 years old, so I had a relatively unstable childhood. During each chapter of my life, I've made a concerted effort to build a huge support system. People know me as a social butterfly and honestly, my friend groups have served and continue to serve as my lifeline—I am so grateful for every single one of them.
However, I didn't really feel like I was thriving until I moved to Los Angeles and found a predominantly gay/queer friend group (keyword: 'found,' since I was welcomed as a newcomer into a pre-existing group of friends who'd known each other for almost a decade). Prior to this, I had a handful of gay friends scattered throughout high school and college, but most of my core friends were straight women. It's really exhausting being the token gay guy in a group of women. Even though I felt unconditionally loved, I was different and that creates a very shallow definition of community.
Fast forward: I've lived in LA now for exactly 2 years (to the day)! This is the first time in my life that I've ever felt like I truly belonged somewhere. With my "chosen family" group of gay boys in LA, we're all different, but fundamentally we all share one huge flaming identity in common, which allows us to be more authentically ourselves.
What are the hallmarks of a strong and supportive community?
Skylar: I think above all else, a community needs people and progress to thrive. That means rallying around each other when things are hard, and also being able to look at it with a critical eye and make changes as they become necessary.
Alex: The essence of a really good concert—everyone is able to come as their favorite version of themselves without judgment.
Mon: Communication, organization, respect, a sense of welcoming.
Brady: For me, the essence of community ultimately comes down to wherever you feel like you belong, which can be complicated for members of the LGBTQ community since we spend most of our lives feeling like outsiders.
A healthy community reminds you that you are never alone.
How is what happened in Colorado Springs emblematic of larger attacks happening on the LGBTQIA+ community?
Skylar: We’re only 6 years removed from the Pulse shooting in Florida. That’s just not a very long time for something like it to happen yet again—and I certainly don’t think that this will be the last, unfortunately. We’ve already seen an uptick in people terrorizing LGBTQ+ spaces, and what appears to be a pattern of gay men being drugged and assaulted in clubs in New York City. It’s all connected.
Alex: Queer people have been targeted all throughout history it's a continuation of the pattern with an agenda that has only been furthered through acts of violence and harmful rhetoric from leaders of our country.
Mon: I think there's a larger resurgence of people who want to erase queer people and their communities and the Colorado Springs attack solidified that.
Brady: Historically speaking, LGBTQ lifestyles have been a lot more palatable for non-members as long as we remain behind closed doors—out of sight, out of mind.
I think the Pulse shooting and now the Club Q shooting highlight the harsh reality that we're not really safe even when we're out of sight. Hatred can see through walls. It's not new information, but some ignorant individuals (and organizations) in this nation are unwilling to coexist with us. They still see us as morally reprehensible sinners that are better off dead. They don't view us as human beings.
And while these violent attacks make horrific headlines, I think legislative action (let's be real, primarily by members of the GOP) are far more insidious reflections of that same belief.
What do you see as the greatest threat/threats to the LGBTQIA+ community right now?
Skylar: There are so many, but I think most totally it is this massive backslide in acceptance proliferated by right-wing folks. We are seeing, in real-time, Republican congresspeople on Twitter speaking about how drag queens are groomers and then gay bars get shot up. That is not a coincidence.
I’d be remiss, though, to not mention that we are seeing the most egregious policy choices directly affecting trans people—and mostly trans kids—as state after state in the south has outlawed and criminalized gender-affirming care for trans youth. This WILL cause an uptick in suicide for those kids which is already occurring at an alarmingly high rate as compared to their peers.
I hate to say I’m feeling more pessimistic than ever right now, but it’s the truth. There’s so much we have to fix.
Alex: The harmful lawmaking that is actively influencing the public's opinion.
Mon: Laws made against the community, especially trans kids. Any law, bill, school code, etc. put into action by a government or a board becomes a tangible reason for our existence to be ignored, erased, and neglected. The verbiage around these laws is often toxic and demoralizing (ex: Ohio's "Save Adolescents from Experimentation" bill). Additionally, any "alert systems" or ways for homophobic and transphobic people to invade and cause harm in queer spaces.
Like Dan Savage's Twitter thread says, "It's not that they want us to exist out of sight. They don't want us to exist at all."
When any domestic terrorist comes into a place of worship or community space to take lives, they add fuel to the fire of people who want to destroy these places and leave no safe space for these communities to gather.
Brady: The greatest threat to the Alphabet Mafia is the deeply flawed belief that exposing children to non-traditional LGBTQ-centric relationships will corrupt their innocence. I'll never forget when my dad asked me not to tell my half-siblings (who are 12 years younger than me) that I'm gay. When I asked him why, he said, "Because they're too young to understand." I'll also never forget that one of my ex-boyfriends didn't want us to kiss in front of children. When I asked him why, he said, "Because it's inappropriate." Safe to say I don't have a very healthy relationship with my father—shocker, another gay guy with daddy issues. And, spoiler alert, that boyfriend and I didn't last very long either.
Let's get one thing straight: queer love is not pornographic. It is not indoctrination. Countless children's media show heterosexual cis-gendered love stories. In our society, that's the default. But it doesn't have to be.
Thankfully, I had a mother who knew from a very young age that I was probably gay, maybe even trans. She intentionally fostered a relationship between me and our gay neighbors and let me wear high heels to the grocery store. While she allowed me to express my feminine side through dolls and playing dress-up, my dad tried to squash it by force-feeding me sports and other toxically masculine BS.
By the way, if your kid's a homo, they're gonna be a homo no matter what, and no parenting style will change that. The only thing that changes is how soon your child learns to love themself, and potentially another person, or to become supportive allies for their queer classmates, brothers, sisters, etc. Parents can directly influence the trajectory of their child's life by introducing them to the beauty of queer love—the sooner the better.
What are your thoughts on this Twitter thread?
Skylar: I think it hits the nail on the head. Those spaces are meant to be for US, and to have them marred by tragedy and co-opted for political propaganda is so upsetting. We deserve better.
Alex: I think they hit the nail on the head. We have these events and these spaces to feel safe and to be in private amongst ourselves. Infiltrating that space is taking away the safety of those that are in there. It's nice to be somewhere that doesn't bring you fear, and these violent attacks are taking that away.
Mon: See above!
Brady: This thread is spot on. Out of the bars and into the streets. We need to continue showing up as our authentic selves wherever we feel safe to do so—and even though it's scary, push the boundaries in places where it doesn't feel safe. Whenever we do, we need our allies to stand up for us through their words as well as their actions.
What do you wish the allies within your communities would do more to help protect you/ make you feel more safe and secure?
Skylar: I wish people would generally be more vocal about the things happening in the community. I think there is this presumption among straight, cis people that because we have gay marriage, there’s nothing left to fight for. We know that’s not true.
Making people aware of issues like what affects trans youth, directed attacks on queer men, or states wanting to prohibit queer couples from adopting kids, we could really use a hand in talking about in the public forum.
Alex: I think people think allyship for the queer community stops at just putting up with gay people or not caring about someone’s sexuality, but there's so much more to it. It's in the same vein of "not seeing color"—there are differences that need to be talked about and supported on a larger scale.
Mon: Seeing us for who we are as people without questioning, and standing up for us when someone is being homophobic or transphobic. I think one of the most important things that allies can do is fight back for anyone in the queer community regardless of who's watching.
Brady: This might sound crazy but don't hold us to the same standards you do other people. We are born believing that there's something wrong with us—and it's our unique mission to spend the rest of our lives unlearning that lie.
I'm generalizing of course, but the majority of us suffer from far worse imposter syndrome, severe mental health problems, abandonment issues, trust issues, etc. We have all been afraid (in some cases irrationally) that our friends and family will disown us once we come out of the closet. We categorically don't have the same opportunities as our heterosexual and cisgender peers. We are chronically misunderstood.
We need a lot more grace, compassion, and exuberant love to overcome that. Period.
What do you wish allies and those outside of the LGBTQIA+ community would know about what it's like to be queer in America today?
Skylar: I think many people feel that this is the most accepting the world has ever been, which may be true, but most of us are still scared. I live in New York City—arguably a queer haven for the entire world—and I still get nervous holding hands with a partner down the street sometimes. We really need protection and support.
Alex: That despite the confidence, elegance, glitz, and glamour, it wouldn't hurt to do more than the bare minimum to support us, especially during these times.
Mon: There's a lot of beauty and welcoming in queer communities across the country in person and online. I think many queer communities, even internationally, create inviting spaces for people to be themselves regardless if they're queer or not.
Brady: I wish allies and outsiders knew how much fun it is to be queer in America. The rules really don't apply. We can wear too much glitter, do crazy makeup, dance half-naked in the club, date ten people at once...the possibilities are endless. If cisgender and heterosexual Americans took even one page out of our book, like Harry Styles, we'd all have so much more fun.
To you, what would an ideal world look like for the LGBTQIA+ community?
Skylar: My ideal world means that people would not allow their religious or irrelevant moral hang-ups to get in the way of queer joy. Kindly butt out ❤️
Alex: A commune in Bora Bora.
Brady: An ideal world is being able to walk down any street in any city in any country holding my same-sex partner's hand without feeling one ounce of fear.
Is there anything else you'd like to add?
Skylar: Allies—DO SOME RESEARCH!
Mon: Any amount of support (money, time, food, information) to the communities you’re passionate about goes a long way! (My pitch as someone who works in fundraising… it works!)
Brady: Sadly speaking from experience, not all queer people are super inclusive, which is counterintuitive. Since we are all born traumatized, the most damaged members sometimes project that trauma onto other queer people through cliquish behavior and even bullying.
I offer one piece of advice to any queer person reading this: if your friends are tearing you down more than they're building you up, then keep searching for new ones. Your chosen family is out there waiting.
What is your favorite piece of queer art?
Skylar: A tie between Portrait of a Lady on Fire and Robert Mapplethorpe’s “Two Men Dancing.”
Alex: Moonlight (2016)
Mon: "Untitled" (Portrait of Ross in L.A.)
Brady: The Deviant's War by Dr. Eric Cervini. Also every single episode of RuPaul's Drag Race: All Stars Season 2.
Thank you to my four guests for their responses and being willing to be so honest and open with me and now all of you!!! To throw myself back into it all, I met each of them at a different stage or place in my own life and it’s just really heartening to link together amazing people you’ve known for decades with those you’ve only known for a few months.
Y’all Alex is literally Twitter famous. This was such a humble way to say: he is literally famous.
It’s also his birthday today so feel free to leave well-wishes for him in the comments!!!!