Not In Our Name
I’d been back on the omg.lol Discord for a little while of late, flailing around about getting some sort of search solution working here on the blog, only to open it up yesterday and find that it had been put on “pause” for undisclosed reasons clearly of a trust and safety nature. Which is fair; in trust and safety matters you don’t necessarily just broadcast someone’s concerns while you’re hoping to address them.
Either late yesterday or early today, the Discord returned and being oh so very autistically me I spent quite the bit of time scrolling backwards in time through the #venting channel to find out what had precipitated the pause.
It was not at all what I expected, even if I’m not entirely sure just what it was I expected.
Mostly, after all that eye strain, what I have to say is that in 2025—years before the Democratic campaign and nomination—please, my fellow cisgender white guys, don’t just casually throw around support for Newsom or Buttigieg, because of course that’s fucking sus and people rightly will side-eye you. Yes, they might even feel unsafe.
No one anywhere should be saying “well, if it’s one of those guys in 2028…” right now. Anyone who styles themselves an ally (which you don’t get to do in the first place) should be screaming “neither of these guys in my name” right now and nothing else—and be ready to extend that sentiment to anyone else who goes around not just spewing transphobia but jockeying to do so oh so graciously on our behalf.
In an time when Mine Furor literally has since his very first day in office engaged in a literally-Orwellian effort to unperson trans people, right now is not the time for Democrats to suggest what’s a little casual unperson’ing between friends.
People being a broad, deep, and wide phenomena, of course I’m not going to say that all trans people will side-eye you. I’m just saying it shouldn’t come as a surprise if and when any of them do, and really we should have some awareness in advance here when the issue at hand is Democratic politicians insistently if not outright loudly trying to sell out trans people for votes.
Right now, and for the foreseeable future, our job is to tell Democratic hopefuls that they don’t get to throw trans people under the wheels of their campaign bus. Right now, it isn’t about “vote blue no matter who”. Right now, it’s about defining who does—and does not—deserve to be on that blue ticket in the first place.