Down in the Trumps: Part 2
A LGBTQ youth mindset on a Trump Presidency
The LGBTQ community has never had an easy run here in the US. Such an emotional rollercoaster with same sex marriage legalization becoming a reality all across the boards as a high, to the tragedy in Orlando, Florida at the Pulse Nightclub, killing 49 people as an all time low. Not only was that a low for the LGBTQ community, but a low for America as well, making it the worst mass shooting in our nation’s history. Speaking of Florida, a state that has always been the embarrassing basement child of the US, they managed to do it again, by giving their electoral to Donald Trump in a nail biting count. How is it possible that a state that went through so much pain and suffering over the LGBTQ community has given its votes to a candidate that seems to care very little for them? Donald Trump’s running mate has confirmed his plan to dismantle President Obama’s protections for LGBTQ people, as an immediate review of executive orders issued by the Obama. There was also talk from Trump of Supreme Court candidates that featured only anti-LGBTQ conservatives, that could possibly lead to an overturn of equal marriage. It goes without saying that am very familiar with this community and the many struggles that hinder it, just when things were looking to go in a positive more accepting direction, recent events have created a political hand that is pushing individuals back into hiding in their closets. So what does a Trump presidency mean for the LGBTQ community here in the U.S. and how do we really create a nation that is truly united with a community that has always felt divided from the rest of the nation?
In part 2 of this journey, I look to my dear friend Sarah, a strong young woman who I’ve always known to speak her mind. She is intelligent, honest, but most of all passionate about who she is and what she believes in and she didn’t hold back in sharing her opinion this time around either.
Sarah, it’s always a pleasure to see you, but let’s get into this! Give me some background about yourself.
I’m a queer, bisexual, biracial (bi bi?) woman who has settled back in my native California after stints on both the east coast (Princeton, NJ, for college) and abroad (Madrid and Barcelona, on a Fulbright teaching fellowship). Since coming back to the States, I have transitioned from working in education, to working in edtech, to now more broadly, in tech. Last night has me considering packing up my bags for foreign lands again, or at least hoping for a California secession…but although it’s tempting to flee, there is work to be done here.
Now, I know you’re not a Trump supporter, so share with me who you do (or did) support.
In the general election? Of fucking course, Hillary. I’m not going to be able to add anything new here, and to be honest, I’m probably too grief-stricken and scattered at the moment to be able to distill all of the appropriate arguments, caveats, and criticisms down to a nice, succinct package, so instead I’ll take the liberty of a lil analogy: to me, Hillary was the Hermione of this election — smart, prepared, poised, determined. Her detractors may say she’s too ambitious, too much of a know-it-all, not demure or docile enough — but holy fuck did she do her homework. She did her homework and she did all of your homework too. She is willing to roll up her sleeves and dive into the dirty work, whether that’s poring over boring, dense papers, or getting a bunch of bickering boys to reconcile and join forces again, or facing down evil men with steely composure. Despite the hatred the Malfoys of the world might level at her, you can at least bet your ass that she’s been studying for this since the day she was born. And if that wasn’t enough, it was either her or a literal dungeon troll.*
*There unfortunately isn’t room in this metaphor to dive into very real and nuanced criticisms of hawkishness, white feminism, the Clinton era policies’ effects on black Americans, accusations of political tacking according to polls vs. principle, etc…and, on the other side, counter-arguments in defense of her guarded demeanor, political ties, and “career politician” status. (Sadly, within the current system, that is the only possible way for a woman to have gotten this far. And does your suspicion over her status as a Washington insider outweigh the decades of policy experience that come with it?)
But this election was not one of nuance, and the crude takeaway here is still Hermione vs. Dungeon Troll.
As the election continued on, what were you thinking as Trump progressed further and did you ever think it would lead up to this?
Like many of us, my thought process went: ridiculous joke → horrifying joke → actual horror → oh good nevermind actually just a joke → ??!!!!!??!!!!? To say we underestimated things…is an understatement.
Do your parents share your same political beliefs?
My parents are self-described right-leaning Democrats. I’m more liberal than them on nearly every front. My dad did not immediately disavow Trump, purely for fiscal reasons, but later saw him as an obviously unfit choice. During the primaries, he considered Christie as an appealing option, since he admired him as a governor. My mom tends to be both fiscally and sometimes socially conservative, but to her, there was not even a question this time around. Trump is an affront to her entire personhood, whereas she saw Hillary as a strong, resilient, upstanding, and highly qualified candidate.
What scares you the most about the next four years?
It’s nearly impossible to single out any one thing. There are so many things, and in the immediate aftermath, it is hard to even organize my thoughts. One things that stands out to me is this: I am horrified at the mental gymnastics that people are capable of. This year has truly undermined my basic faith in humanity’s ability to empathize and reason. I’m afraid that the further siloing of news, the easy dissemination of false information, and the triumph of pure, unthinking fear over compassionate reason will only continue.
I’m afraid of the setbacks in climate change. The ripple effects his presidency will have on the world’s economic and political atmosphere. The implicit and explicit sanctioning of violence against vulnerable groups.
I am scared for the children who are coming of age in this world. Brown and black children. Queer and trans kids. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be a parent raising a child in America. What do we tell the kids of immigrants when they ask whether their parents will be deported? How can we tell young boys that they are not entitled to girls’ bodies when our president-elect brags about grabbing women by the “pussy”? How can we look little girls in the eyes and tell them that they can be anything they want to be if they just work hard enough? What will the queer children of America think when they hear that the vice president of their country advocates for gay conversion therapy, “treatment” that can include exorcism (yes, exorcism), electroshock therapy, and nausea-inducing drugs? What will we tell the trans kids who are harassed for using the “wrong” bathroom, and who are told by their teachers, administrators, and the highest levels of government that they are undeserving of protection — that they are somehow freakish threats to all the other children at their school?
We have sent the youth of America a message that if you are a powerful white male who breaks every law of human decency, you can not only get away with it, but aspire to the highest, most esteemed office in the land. If you are a woman — not even including any other oppressed identities like race and class — but merely a woman — you will be believed untrustworthy until proven trustworthy, incompetent until proven competent. Meanwhile, as Trump himself said, he could “stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody,” and he wouldn’t lose supporters. As someone said on Tuesday, more pithily than me, “The most qualified woman in the world runs for President against the worst man in the world and this is what happens.” (source) I can’t even begin to articulate what that feels likes to me as an adult woman (especially one working in the straight white male-dominated tech world), but I can hardly imagine the effect it must have on our young girls, girls who had to stand by while the adults of the world told them that it’s okay for them to be raped, and that one day, their rapists can grow up to be the President of the United States. Girls who have been told that no matter what they do, no matter how hard they work or how many years of experience they gain or how much shit they put up with or how many times they take the high road instead of throwing their hands in the air and screaming with frustration at the insults and the belittlement and the fragility of the male egos around them, they will still not win. A man — in the loosest, most generous of terms — will still be presumed more competent than her. And she will be expected to smile demurely, to be gracious in defeat, to thank and congratulate the power players who gave her the chance to play at the boys’ table, and to slink back into the kitchen where they claim she belongs.
You can make arguments that this defeat was not strongly motivated by sexism. Yes, there were many, many other factors at play, but you cannot deny that the end result nevertheless sends these messages — and that if Trump were a woman, and/or Hillary were a man, we would not be in this position.
Is there anything at all you can look forward to?
I have already seen conversations happening about what went wrong. One of the biggest mistakes on the left was that we did not take seriously the very people who put this man in office.
This is a somewhat tangential comparison, but my brain has been hanging from a thread since last night, so bear with me here: this reminds me of a time in college when I took an English course on “American Bestsellers,” and in the final week of the semester, our class voted to read…Fifty Shades of Grey. You know the one — the wannabe-BDSM erotica novel whose text is riddled with typos and reads like a Cosmo that’s been put through a paper shredder. Anyway, at first, I was outright dismissive of both the book and its fans. Not only was the writing shitty and incoherent, but it managed to glorify models of abusive relationship dynamics. But eventually I couldn’t deny that it was a powerful force — despite how terrible I thought it was, it had managed to capture the attention of millions of people across the world. I had to take it seriously, if not as a work of literature, then as a cultural phenomenon that tapped into a deep well of human emotion and base instinct. I learned that you can’t dismantle something you dismiss.
I don’t know why I’m talking about Fifty Shades…but this somehow connects to the fact that — yes, there are certainly bigots among Trump’s supporters. There are actively hateful, violent people among his base. But there are well-meaning, well-educated, generally affable people who voted for him, too. I know that there are many, many, many reasons to take issue with these “well-meaning” Trump voters — how could any sort of policy preference possibly justify a guy who’s down with the KKK, hate crimes, and rape? Those of us on the left often decided to write off these people as unempathetic idiots incapable of logical reasoning and simple human decency, rather than engaging in the hard conversations that might lead to incremental change.
I get that it can be exhausting and infuriating to constantly muster the effort to engage with (mostly straight white) folks when they are casually supporting a candidate whose views invalidate your basic humanity. And when people tried to put Trump’s and Clinton’s scandals on par with each other, in an effort to be “balanced,” I often threw up my hands. It felt like hosting a potluck where one friend brings a hearty, no-frills, substantial meal of slow-cooked meat and potatoes, and the second friend brings a steaming pile of shit. Like, actual shit. And dumps it on your kitchen counter. And you’re sitting there trying to be polite and asking your second friend what recipe they used for it. Seriously?
I guess I’m supposed to talk about something I’m looking forward to. At this early stage, the one thing I can say is that this outcome may galvanize people. Myself included. And that it could lead to a reactive movement in which we not only advocate for inclusion and unity, but also do the hard, sometimes exhausting work, of searching for a common humanity, beneath all the layers of fear and prejudice. Turning away might be tempting, and by all accounts we deserve to do it, but turning away won’t help move us forward.
How does this affect your friends and/or family members?
As a brown-skinned woman and an immigrant from an impoverished country, my mom already feels unwelcome in her predominantly white, conservative community. Over her lifetime, she has dealt with poisonous sexism and racism, and as we know, Trump is the embodiment of both these forces.
I’m also worried that my brother, who has just started to emerge into a new sense of hope after years of suffering from mental health issues, will now be faced with a world that undoes this healing and his rediscovered faith in humanity. Not to mention that a Republican-led government will continue to stigmatize mental health and use it as a scapegoat in gun violence debates, all while likely rolling back privacy protection laws for patients.
I am scared for so many of my friends — as women, people of color, queer and trans individuals. The LGBTQ community is in mourning. The feeling of utter despair and brokenness is incomparable. And I say that in the same year as the Orlando massacre. Nearly 60 million Americans have actively voted for a president and vice president who are fundamentally opposed to everything that my friends and I believe in and fight for — men who are dangerous to our very existence.
If we’re talking about specific effects on the queer community: Trump has promised to sanction discrimination against LGBTQ individuals on the basis of religious beliefs; proudly said “I told you so” after the Orlando massacre; and has vowed to nominate Supreme Court justices in the model of Antonin Scalia, who morally equated homosexuality with bestiality and murder. Meanwhile, Pence has specifically racked up a record as one of the most notoriously homophobic politicians in the country — as a governor and Congressman, he signed a bill that would jail same-sex couples who try to apply for marriage licenses; wanted to divert funding from HIV prevention to gay conversion therapy; opposed the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell; and griped about the passage of an anti- hate crimes bill in the wake of the Matthew Shepard murder.
Social media has become the place where you see a persons true beliefs and personality, especially during political seasons. Do you believe that somewhere, somehow, we can become united like Trump hopes?
The siloing of news and social media is something that I think is only going to get worse. And of course I don’t believe that Trump truly wants to unite the country.
But what I can say is this: sadly, many Trump supporters have just voted against their own best interests. It’s tragic, but the silver lining to that is that not every Trump voter is motivated by pure racism, xenophobia, sexism, and homophobia, but by disillusionment with the “establishment.”
People have more in common than they believe. It may sound dystopian to say that many of us are united by fear and hurt and anger at a system that doesn’t seem to be built for us…but maybe there is something to be pulled from amongst all that rubble. If I’d been able to sleep after the election, maybe I’d have the brainpower to connect those thoughts and say something more poignant right now. But all I’m thinking about is that SNL episode of Black Jeopardy starring Tom Hanks as a Trump supporter.
This election has had a lot of terrifying moments, but I’d like to believe that everyone had a good laugh here and there — what were some of your laugh out loud or even “oh my gosh” moments?
Since laughter and terror are two sides of the same coin, yes, I can say that I have laughed during this campaign, especially during the moments of earth-shattering hypocrisy. One of the times when I burst into incredulous mirth was upon hearing that Melania’s platform was cyberbullying.
What message would you send out to your fellow LGBTQ citizens living across the US, what can we learn from this experience?
I would say: you are not alone. We are all grieving together. And we will help each other get up and move forward together. Do what you can, but if you are feeling overwhelmed, take the time that you need to recover and take care of yourself as a human. Seek out community, if it is safe for you to do so, either in person or online. Look out for your LGBTQ friends of color. Look out for your trans brothers and sisters.
It’s hard to know what to say when the wounds are so fresh. At the very least, we can affirm what we’ve always known — that we are a resilient community, and that we’re stronger together.
Resources:
- National Suicide Prevention Hotline
1–800–273–8255 - Trevor Project
1- 866–488–7386 - Trans Lifeline
1–877–565–8860 - GLBT National Hotline
1–888–843–4564
Read Part 1
Read Part 3
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