Feb 5
When Anti-LGBTQ Haters Cancel Even Elie Wiesel, How Do Queer Folks Cope?
Prism & Pen Weekly —February 5, 2023
by James Finn
When LGBTQ news cycles are full of hate, how can queer people preserve mental health and positive energy? This week in Prism & Pen, three transgender writers explore that question, two as news consumers, one as an advocate who often feels discouraged. Other writers share personal stories and news commentary as always, but if you read between the lines, I think you’ll see many of us struggling with the “coping” question.
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— Editor’s Picks —
PA School Silences LGBTQ Students/Staff, Muzzles Elie Wiesel
Nothing says LGBTQ backlash quite like library purges. When newly elected school board members in Pennsylvania approved a policy to remove/censor library books about transgender, gay and Black people, somebody reported a “suspicious” set of library posters. A school principal ordered them removed. It turned out he had banned the words of celebrated author and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel:
I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. — Elie Wiesel, accepting his 1986 Nobel Peace Prize
We need to talk about this, because even though the school district backed off censoring Wiesel after public outcry, the high school principal who enforced the policy interpreted it as his school board wrote it. He didn’t make a mistake, he was following orders, orders increasingly issued all over the U.S.
Does Writing for Medium Make Any Difference in Trans Lives?
Stories like the one above can feel very discouraging. Stephanie asks if writing about growing anti-trans sentiment can help make life better for trans people. I believe her question is important to most queer people.
The trans community has become the legislative boogieman. The monster in the closet, under the bed, scaring honest god-fearing folks that we are coming for their grandchildren and invading their women folks’ spaces.
To counteract this narrative, I try to speak up, speak out, be visible, and represent the community in a dignified manner to normalize the perception of trans women.
My Guide to Surviving Anti-Transgender Hate
Responding to a discouraged Prism & Pen transgender writer, Emma hands out practical advice for staying healthy in a hostile world, something she has a lot of practice with.
There is no balance. Happy people don’t increase viewership, which is what generates advertising revenue. Humans will always slow down as they pass a car wreck on the highway.
Media organizations and advertiser know this. You need to know this too in order to not sink into the deepest, darkest pit of despair.
Metamorphosis: TRANSformation in a World Turned Against You
Saoirse continues the dialogue, responding to the discouraged writer and to Emma, adding her own insight about coming out and being a role model.
If you are Trans yet still in hiding, this world that only a little while ago seemed to be moving towards acceptance is suddenly shifting into a place of danger and terror. You may be questioning if you can survive, unless you remain deep undercover. You may choose to stay in the safety of your cocoon.
I understand that choice. I made the same choice for 58 years of my life. I know that your fears are justified. I can’t promise you safety if you come out of that cocoon, everyone’s living circumstances are their own. But please do not despair!
— Essays and Creative Nonfiction —
Saying LGBTQ+ People Have Faith is Blasphemy: Christian Post Exec Editor Richard D. Land
It’s interesting how the only sinful behaviour Christians like [Richard Land] will not accept is an LGBTQ+ identity. You can be an unrepentant glutton or liar and continue to lead most churches.
We also see here that when an evangelical pastor dares to move even slightly out of lockstep with the institutional decrees, they are immediately slapped down.
I used to pray for God to change the evangelical church. Now I pray for God to end the evangelical church. Something better can rise from the ashes.
Transitioning as a Twin: A Story of Sisterhood and Chosen Family
As a child, I was connected to my sister. She was my twin, and we barely were apart. We did everything together from playing in the playground at school to even sleeping in the same room. I wanted to be just like her. I enrolled in ballet class with her, and even one day wanted my hair in a ponytail like hers. Little did I know I wanted to be viewed as her sister.
J.K. Rowling and Her Unending Lies About Transgender Women as Rapists
Rowling constantly argues that trans women are a threat to women, that trans women are rapists and violent people who pose a real threat to women’s safety. This is why she doesn’t believe trans women should be allowed in women’s spaces.
For the last few days and broadly speaking the last few months she has been constantly posting that trans women are violent threats …
What’s So Horrible About Trans Hormone Therapy?
I traded all the medical and social risks of living as a male for all the medical and social risks of living as a female. I traded common male benefits such as male privilege for being on the short end of sexism and misogyny. I traded a relatively minimal risk of developing breast cancer for the same risk of developing breast cancer as a cis woman has. I eliminated the risk of testicular cancer in exchange for a risk of cervical cancer. My risk of being the victim of rape jumped to the same risk of any cis woman. I gave up body strength. I gave up status in our patriarchal society.
Larry Tomczak Calls Amy Grant ‘Enemy of God’ over LGBTQ+ Inclusion
Back in December, Larry Tomczak, Christian Post Op-Ed Contributor, wrote a rebuke to Amy Grant for having the gall to host a lesbian wedding on her property. Grant “declined to read it.” I wrote at the time that it was none of Tomczak’s business.
Now, Tomczak is throwing a hissy fit because Grant has given interviews to LGBTQ+-friendly journalists but has “expressed no interest in even reading” Tomczak’s “appeal.”
Good Imbolc, Happy New Year From Two Lesbian Feminists, Cats, and a Comet
The earth is turning and the light is returning, but it’s still dark at 5 AM when I go out to look for the comet called ZTF. I haven’t been able to see it yet, but skies have been clear lately and I keep trying. The comet can be found in the north sky between the north star and the big dipper. It will be closest to Earth on February 2. It’s green! Perhaps a sign? …
Sending wishes for peace in the new year.
Love, Molly and Holly (MoHo)
Their Attempt at Public Shame Became My Freedom from Shame
I don’t sleep much anymore. There was a time when sleep was elusive, a waking dream I would chase every night. I just wanted to rest. Sleep would not come, no matter what I tried, until utterly exhausted, I would drift off for a couple of hours, then the world would restart.
That was a time of self loathing, of guilt, of seeing myself as not good enough because I wanted to love another man. It was the nightly choir of self-recrimination lifting a paean to the sordid Soul of Man, half seeking absolution, half seeking dissolution. All I wanted was to rest in his arms.
Anti-LGBTQ+ Christian Michael Brown Claims to Love Gay Couples. He Doesn’t.
I’ve written about conservative evangelical Christian writer Michael Brown before. He is slightly less vitriolic than other conservative Evangelicals, but he stubbornly clings to the belief that same-sex sexual activity is sinful.
Brown’s ministry is an attempt to reach out to LGBTQ+ people in a “loving” manner and bring them to Christ, and turn them straight, or at the least, make them celibate… Clearly, Brown thinks his denomination of Christianity is the only true one, and he has the only real truth. And, somehow, he thinks this is loving.
It’s not.
After School Satan Clubs Spotlight Christian / Anti-LGBTQ Privilege
Have you heard of the Satanic Temple? Do you know they don’t actually worship Satan? Have you heard about their campaign to partner with U.S. public school students and parents to establish after-school clubs to encourage free inquiry and rationalism? Have you heard the clubs are stirring intense controversy?
Christian parents are up in arms, despite the fact that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2001 that if schools allow after-school clubs, they must allow Christian and any other religious clubs to operate.
The Methodist Church Is Splitting Over Gays But Not Booze or Gold
Last year, hundreds of Methodists left the United Methodist Church to create a new sect known as “Global Methodists.”
Right there — using the word Global — seems blind. While the rest of the world has moved on to more important topics like the war in Ukraine, climate change, and the economy, northwest Methodist Texans are stuck on us gays!
Of the 200 churches in the UMC’s Northwest Texas Conference, 145 chose to disaffiliate from the UMC, primarily over gay marriage and sexuality.
Loveless By Alice Oseman: A Queer & Asexual Masterpiece
When finding out that a book is about a girl’s discovery that she is asexual, people might assume that it would present a very negative view of sex, but that is the total opposite in this case…
As the novel begins, the protagonist Georgia is 18 years old, about to go off to Durham University in England ... At this point Georgia has never had a crush on anyone, never had a relationship, never had sex.
DeSantis Proves Queer Theory… by Railing Against It
Republican Florida Governor and POTUS wanna-be Ron DeSantis originally justified purging an advanced placement Black History course from his state’s public high school curriculum by claiming that such study lacked educational value.
Now, the Sunshine State Mussolini has doubled down on his bigoted rhetoric by tossing another bogeyman into the mix. Yep! You guessed it. Now, the ones who lack educational value are the evil gays, particularly gays of color!
Matt Walsh: Fearmongering, Fallacies, and False Construction
False construction is a term I came up with to describe how reactionaries like Walsh try to create moral panics out of things that are benign and not that controversial. They do this to avoid arguing the actual facts of any particular matter, because reactionaries have already lost on those issues …
The “facts don’t care about your feeling” crowd is totally wrong about the actual facts. They have to lie and create narratives out of thin air, because it’s the only way they can justify their bigotry.
— Fiction Series —
Anastasia the Nonbinary Dragon
Shape-shifting dragons and cows live in symbiotic community in this allegorical fantasy where expectations exist to be overturned. I wrote that about the last chapter, but it’s so true for this one! A blue dragon sneers when he encounters Anastasia in the company of a poor family with a sickly calf-shifter. He seems certain Ana’s dreams of doing good for zir community when ze takes the throne are based on falsehoods. He’s about to set zir straight. Or is he?
Lance curled up his lips with disdain, and his blue eyes were piercing. “You’re so full of brave talk, Ana. So smug that your grandmother chose you to be her successor.”
Smoke puffed out of Ana’s nostrils. Lance was abysmally ignorant and ze shouldn’t have to deal with him. Ana turned towards Vera. The calf-shifter bore almost no resemblance to her cousin Ero. Ero was bright and lively, while Vera was sad and withdrawn.
Read chapter 12: A Strange Warning
— Poetry Picks —
A Poem: “Until Death Do you Part”
I miss him every day, I talk to him every day, I see him in my mind’s eye every day. I will carry my grief for him every day, until the end of my days.
The grief never ends, it just changes. I continue to grow, so the grief becomes easier to carry. Gregory stopped, I did not…
That’s all for Prism & Pen this week. Thanks for reading!
Writers, it’s prompt time again! That goes for readers too. Anyone who’d like to kick in about a writing theme for the next two weeks is welcome to comment under this story. Actually, I urge you to comment with prompt ideas. Coming up with good ones is not one of my strengths!
In the meantime, happy reading and I’ll see you next Sunday.
Jim
