#fuck the Texas legislature

[stargazer56]

The Texas Supreme Court and the AG can fuck all the way off with their shitty abortion denying ruling.

[sonicunleash]

It's so funny i leave for like an hour and let one post saying nothing more than "slurs are called slurs because they are words that are used by our oppressors derogatorily and harmfully and you should be considerate when using them around our lgbt siblings" have reblogs on and im getting anon asks calling me a terf and saying im siding with our oppressors. lol we are not making it

[beesbutreal]

i love trying not to cry in front of my coworkers when i see headlines about trans genocide

[agoralgia]

My late New Year’s resolution is to become as libfem as possible because I hate evangelicals and right-wingers more than almost anything else.

[dosesofcommonsense]

The Texas property tax system is a racket! They’ve had ALL year to determine taxes and wait for the last 2.5 months to tell you what they are. Your Escrow’s been collecting based on last year’s value. This year’s numbers are always different, normally higher.

Tax Assessor offices can raise primary residence taxes by as much as 10%. Tell me an office that’s not raising taxes and revenue. “OMG. Who would have thought? Your taxes went up just high/low enough to not be contested. So weird.” Fuck off!

The same offices can raise investment property taxes by as much as 20%!

The Texas Legislature has much to fix. If we’re keeping property taxes the same, why are they going up? Why are we spending more? Why aren’t we doing more with what we have? Why aren’t we paying teachers more? Why do we still have property taxes? We generate plenty of tax through the state tax rate.

On the surface, Dade Phelan (Speaker of Texas House) is running a people’s government more akin to Globalism than real Conservatism that’s by the people and for the people (not his friends, lobbyists, and everyone who’s not a Texan). Tell me how higher taxes and less transparency (#openthebooks, seriously where does the money go?) equal more freedom and prosperity.

Texas is still a conservative state, but we need a leader who’s not a Globalist and traitor.

[fluffypotatey]

i don't know if y'all know just how terrific (said with barely restrained anger) the state of Texas, USA ads campaigns have become :)

like.

i don't think y'all understand how fucking horrible Ted Cruz is and the rest of the state's legislature is. how horribly transphobic and misogynistic they are. how terrifying it will be if this asshole stays in office

i don't think y'all know how important this election is for the state of Texas, USA

so please :) if you live here. check if you're registered :)

[graphicnovelist]

The movie going audience has suddenly been reminded that the Beastie Boys exist and I’m here for it

Gwen and the crew heading out to save Miles

[justinspoliticalcorner]

George Chidi at The Guardian:

Atlanta is, from time to time, the center of the political universe. It is also home to all things evil and villainous, a festering cesspool of lurid crime, a “shooting gallery” in the words of Donald Trump, spoken in the vile confines of a brand new college basketball arena amid the unspeakable horrors of a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood with a microbrewery. Conservatives stoking fear of big cities would be a joke, if not for the damage it does. In May, the FBI arrested Mark Adams Prieto, a 58-year-old gun show dealer from Prescott, Arizona, on firearms trafficking charges. Prieto had been on the way to Atlanta at the time, according to court documents, because he planned to kill as many Black people as he could at a Bad Bunny concert while planting Confederate flags and shouting white power slogans, to provoke a race war ahead of the 2024 election.

“The reason I say Atlanta,” Prieto allegedly told an informant working with the FBI, “Why, why is Georgia such a fucked-up state now? When I was a kid that was one of the most conservative states in the country. Why is it not now? Because as the crime got worse in LA, St Louis and all these other cities, all the n****** moved out of those [places] and moved to Atlanta.” Prieto is a product of decades of Republican fearmongering, not just about Atlanta, but about big cities across the country. This is the message that Tucker Carlson and other conservative pundits have been pushing for years about San Francisco, New York and Detroit – it’s exactly the same way conservatives amped up their rhetorical combat on Chicago in the wake of Barack Obama’s ascension to the White House 16 years ago. It’s not because of crime. Cities in every country have long had more crime than their suburban counterparts, simply because it’s easier to commit a crime in a city, and it has largely trended downward. It’s because Democrats – often Black Democrats – control most big city governments, and they help national politicians win. Joe Biden won 85% of San Francisco’s votes in 2020. He also won 83% of Chicago, 77% of Los Angeles and 76% of New York City.

As a result, conservative state governments are cauterizing upstart municipalities, burning any pretense of respect for small-D democracy at the local level in the process. They fear those blue dots will bleed enough Black political power into red states to turn them purple and cost them the White House, not just in 2024, but permanently. Race is at the center of the fear. “Any mayor, county judge that was dumb-ass enough to come meet with me, I told them with great clarity, my goal is for this to be the worst session in the history of the legislature for cities and counties.” That’s former Texas House speaker Dennis Bonnen, in a conversation recorded with another legislator leaked to the Texas Tribune in 2019. In response to Austin legislation requiring water breaks for construction workers in the punishing Texas heat, the Republican-controlled legislature in 2023 passed what progressives call the “Death Star” bill. The law in effect ends the practice of home rule in Texas governments – a legal principle enshrined in the Texas constitution and that of many states – giving cities broad autonomy to create local laws, as long as those laws do not conflict with state or federal law.

House Bill 2127 takes that power away from cities in a swath of policy areas, from managing climate change to labor law. The law is in legal limbo today. But the damage is already being done to municipal leaders, who are frozen in place waiting for the case to be resolved. This story is playing out across the country, with red state governments seeing big blue cities as launching places for progressive ideas. In the wake of the deadly police beating of Tyre Nichols in Memphis, the city government created a police review board. Tennessee’s conservative legislature promptly passed a law banning such boards. Nashville’s response to the Covenant school shooting led to protesters in and outside the state capitol. The legislature responded with an attempt to cut Nashville’s elected metro council in half and threatened takeovers of the city’s sports and airport authority boards. Florida has blocked its cities from passing LGBTQ+ nondiscrimination ordinances, from regulating pit bulls, from making socially conscious investments, and from passing local zoning laws around “missing middle” housing and building construction. Florida’s famous “don’t say gay” bill mandates local school boards to provide politically vetted instructional materials.

[...]

Why would Trump trash a city like Milwaukee – or Atlanta, for that matter – in a swing state in an election year? Because those cities cost him those states in 2020. On the podium on a fateful 6 January 2021, speaking to a group of supporters who would eventually become a riot storming the Capitol, Trump intoned a litany of grievances with no regard for evidence and repeating debunked claims from these cities. Trump said Fulton county in Georgia was “corrupt” and had stuffed machines with fake votes. Detroit had “139%” turnout – a lie – after canvassers were “re-scanning batches of ballots over and over again” – another lie. The grievance lives on. When Trump was speaking in Atlanta’s Summerhill neighborhood in August, he described Atlanta as “like a killing field”, referencing a recent high-profile murder downtown. When Congressman John Lewis refused to attend Trump’s inauguration in 2017, Trump suggested by tweet that the city was “crime infested” and that Lewis “should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart”.

Trump refused to observe Lewis’s death with dignity as a revered civil rights icon. He instead attacked Lewis’s legacy, telling a reporter he “couldn’t say one way or another” whether Lewis was worthy of praise, complaining again about being snubbed at the inauguration and musing about how the Civil Rights Act had “worked out” for Black voters. Atlantans have not forgotten these insults. Fulton and DeKalb counties – Atlanta’s core – delivered a net gain of about 140,000 votes for Biden in 2020. Overall turnout in Georgia increased by about 20% four years ago; in these counties, Democratic turnout increased by about 32%. Lewis’s name was on their lips as they stood in line to vote. The Trump campaign had been trying to coax Black voters into their camp, with events like the launch of his Black voter coalition group at a historically Black church in Detroit in June. Even then, in an audience packed with almost exclusively white supporters, he once again railed against cities and crime. “Look, the crime is most rampant right here and in African American communities,” Trump said at 180 Church in Detroit. “More people see me and they say, ‘Sir, we want protection. We want police to protect us. We don’t want to get robbed and mugged and beat up or killed.’” Between the rise of Kamala Harris after Biden’s withdrawal and the pratfall of comments about “Black jobs”, in front of a group of Black journalists, Trump has begun abandoning the pretense of cross-racial outreach in favor of railing against “sanctuary cities”. Over the last few weeks, he has made a tour of sundown towns – communities that would terrorize Black people caught within the city limits after sundown – on the campaign trail.

Why are Republicans stoking fears of big cities, especially big cities in red states? It’s because those cities are Black-majority and are heavily Democratic.

[maxbegone]

wip wednesday aka i can't believe i'm actually writing again

working on a thing affectionately titled "rwrb fic or something." i hope you enjoy.

They’re on the road by one, and a little over an hour later, Alex is walking through Austin with Henry at his side. Henry’s in Alex’s Stetson, which, Alex says, is the hottest he’s ever seen him. He notes that he has to get him his own one of these days. At this point, it’s a necessity.

They make a beeline for Franklin Barbecue with one of each of their respective security teams in line with them, and Alex is nearly vibrating out of his skin as he talks about the first time he came here with his family when his mom was in the state legislature and held a fundraising event. He and June both fell asleep in the car on the way home, exhausted from the excitement and the brisket and the pulled pork. They each had to be carried inside.

“I swear I smell this place in my dreams.”

It takes a while, but it’s worth it, just like Alex expected it to be. His fingers are covered in grease and sauce, and there’s a solid mountain of thin paper napkins on the table along with several wipe packs torn open, but none of it stops him from using the heels of his hands to grab Henry’s face and kiss his own sauce-covered lips.

“No, this is the hottest I’ve ever seen you,” he announces into the little space between them.

Henry, whose hands are similar to Alex’s but suspended in mid-air, laughs. “I feel like I need a shower.”

“That can be arranged.” And, because he’s a menace to society, Alex doesn’t break eye contact as he sticks his thumb in his mouth and sucks off the excess sauce.

Henry drops his head, shaking it back and forth. “Oh, that’s not fair.”

“You can be a little messy, Your Majesty, no one gives a shit.”

“You’re a horrible influence on me.”

“You say horrible, I hear wonderful.” Alex goes to do it again, but is stopped this time by the way Henry is batting his hand away and kissing him.

Then he’s saying, “Show me messy,” in a low, sultry voice and Alex immediately makes them wrap up and get out of there.

They end up in a random bar, one that’s starting to get busy now that it’s early evening, and he drags Henry straight to the bathroom which, miraculously, turns out to be a single-person accommodation. Even if it wasn’t, Alex knows Cash is stationed a few feet away outside.

If Henry wants to see messy, then Alex will gladly show him messy. He drops to his knees with a wink, undoing his belt and turning his baseball hat around so the brim isn’t in the way. Thus marks the first Texas dive bar-based blowjob Henry’s received, cheeks flushed a beautiful shade of red and chest heaving.

“Fuck,” Alex hears above him. “I—fuck.”

“Such a way with words, sweetheart.” He stands, giving Henry a proper kiss.

“Why was that so…so mind blowing?” Henry asks. He’s still moderately panting.

Alex leans back against the sink, arms out. “It’s Texas, baby!”

Apparently that’s enough of an answer for Henry, who weakly pushes off the wall that’s covered in stickers and silver Sharpie profanity, slamming into him. He wouldn’t be surprised if his lips were a little bruised later on tonight, but he doesn’t care. Not when Henry’s on him like this.

They go at it until there’s a knock on the door and Cash’s voice carries through, saying, “You got a line forming,” forcing them to make themselves look presentable.

Alex laughs. “Shit.”

“How about you buy me a beer and show me how to line dance?” Henry suggests as they exit, his fingers hooked into one of Alex’s belt loops to keep him close. They’re met with a mostly unfazed short line of bar-goers and Cash.

“I swear if I wasn’t so fucking love with you already,” Alex trails off, guiding Henry toward an already-forming crowd.

It’s ridiculous and lovely in every single way; Henry misses the mark several times, bumps into Alex nearly every other step, barely catching himself in the process. By the time he does get the hang of it, there’s an older woman in a frilly dress and brick red lipstick grabbing Henry by the hand and spinning him around. There’s a permanent smile plastered to his face, and as Alex takes a quick breather and watches as the woman pats Henry’s left leg as a way of telling him to move it back and follow her lead, he finds himself putting this whole day on the list of his favorites when it comes to that man.

The thing is, Texas looks good on Henry; he’s already sunkissed from just two days at the lake, but it’s not only that. He’s more carefree here, more himself. Alex knows not everyone is going to recognize Henry, even if Alex’s own mother is the President and just last year he, a native Texan, was involved in an international scandal with that very Prince of England. But either that doesn’t matter or at the moment, the universe doesn’t care, because Henry is laughing and likely talking freely with more strangers now than he ever has in his life.

Henry can be shy and reserved, a natural introvert from years of Royal protocol, while Alex has a caffeine addiction and is always running a mile a minute. If given the opportunity, they’ll both have their noses in some sort of book or, if prompted, can wax poetic about their greatest passions. They’re two very different external personalities, but so similar deep down. They meld so well. If Henry’s the glue that keeps Alex from truly falling apart on his worst days, he only hopes he can be the same.

Alex is pulled out of his thoughts by Henry himself walking over with outstretched hands, a little breathless.

“Rhoda has demanded I make you join us,” he says cheerily, lacing their fingers together.

“Is she your new dance teacher?” Alex teases, watching as Henry rolls his eyes.

“Yes, she’s much better than you. Now, come on, before the song ends.”

[attorney-anon]

What the Actual Fuck.

(TW: Cussing, homophobia)

So, I am appellate counsel for a case in Bumfuck Nowhere, Texas, and I am spitting mad right now.

The cast:

A: My client. A party to both GD and HBPC.

Awesome: A's trial counsel in GD

Amazing: A's trial counsel in HBPC.

Me: Appellate counsel for A in HBPC.

B: A's good-for-nothing spouse. A party to both GD and HBPC.

Bitch: A's trial counsel in GD and HBPC.

C: the petitioner in HBPC. Not a party to GD.

Cunt: C's trial counsel in GD and HBPC.

Kiddo: A and B's child, who has lived with A and B since birth.

Judge Bigot: The judge for both GD and HBPC.

The case:

Gay Divorce (Cause No. GD). A divorce between A and B.

Homophobic Bullshit Parentage Case (Cause No. HBPC). A parentage action by C, instigated at the insistence of B, with the intent of kicking A out of Kiddo's life.

C's argument is that A and B cannot both be the legal parents of Kiddo (age 12), because A and B are the same sex, and that because C and B are the biological parents of Kiddo, A should have no rights to Kiddo post-divorce. (This is a surprisingly common strategy in same-sex divorces with children in this state, because people are awful).

So a few months ago, Amazing filed (at my direction) a Plea to the Jurisdiction in HBPC alleging that C waited too long to assert parentage of Kiddo (because C did, in fact, wait too long to assert parentage of Kiddo), and therefore C lacks standing to bring the claim. The court therefore lacks jurisdiction to grant C's relief. We have not been able to schedule a hearing on this motion because C's counsel never responds to scheduling emails.

This morning, a temporary orders hearing was held on GD due to some amicus attorney shenanigans. A and B are present with Awesome and Bitch. Inexplicably, C and Cunt also show up to this hearing (🚩). Awesome requests to go on the record. Judge Bigot declines (🚩). At one point during the hearing, Awesome steps out in the hallway to confer with Bitch. A and B remain in the courtroom, as do C and Cunt (🚩). While Awesome and Bitch are in the hallway, Judge Bigot grants C's relief in HBPC (🚩🚩🚩). When Awesome returns to the courtroom and is informed of this fact by a now-panicking A, Awesome attempts to object, and is told to sit down and shut up (🚩) because the legislature, in limiting the time within which C could bring HBPC, clearly didn't mean to deprive children of their God-given right (🚩), to be raised by their traditional, (🚩) normal (🚩) families with one mom and one dad (🚩).

Awesome calls Amazing. Amazing calls me. Amazing is now working on a Motion to Reconsider/Motion for New Trial due to lack of notice, since HBPC was NOT FUCKING SET FOR TODAY (🚩), and because Judge Bigot didn't rule on the PTJ before granting C's relief (🚩). We also suspect ex parte communication, since Cunt and C somehow knew to show up to this hearing where C's input was neither wanted nor needed since C isn't a fucking party to this case (🚩). I am working on getting the notice of appeal and request for findings of fact and conclusions of law out, so that Judge Bigot has to put his reasoning on paper in black and white.

And we'll still probably lose the appeal, because this is Texas.

[somethingusefulfromflorida]

I usually balk at those annoying liberals who blame normal people for red state regression, "this is what you get for voting Republican, this is your fault, I hope you got what you wanted," because 9 times out of 10 it's the politicians who are the problem. They are no longer beholden to a majority (not sure they ever really were), and completely divorced from reality, but sometimes I do have to wonder why normal people love them so much. It's one thing to defend voters in Wisconsin or Texas where things are close to 50-50 and the state legislatures have gerrymandered themselves into a permanent majority regardless of the popular vote, but then you have ethnostates like Idaho and Wyoming that are like >80% Republican and >90% white, and I have to come to terms with the fact that a lot of my countrymen really do want everyone who isn't them to live in squalor. Idaho; no abortions, no traveling out of state for abortions, a lot of hospitals no longer delivering babies because they're afraid of getting sued by the government for imaginary abortions, it's an unlivable hellscape for women, and yet a supermajoroty support the fucking Handmaid's Tale. How can anyone be single issue in today's climate? How can anyone ignore the glaring breaches of freedom just because their representative hates the same people they do? Florida's no better, we're arguably worse, what with the fucking demon we have as a governor, I just don't understand why anyone wants to live like this? How can a party that has controlled the government unopposed for decades shift blame onto the side that has been out of power the whole time? Why is there so much wanton cruelty? Are we really a society of sociopaths who just want to do harm for harm's sake? It's like the people who voted for the Leopards Eating Faces Party have stopped complaining that the leopards are eating their faces and are instead embracing it like it is their civic duty.

"I regret that I have but one face to give for my leopard!"

[mariacallous]

This week, President Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law—an important step toward advancing protections for same-sex marriages. But the legislation comes near the end of a year in which hundreds of anti-L.G.B.T.Q. bills were proposed across the country, queer literature was the target of bans in schools, protests and violence against drag shows rose, a queer night club in Colorado Springs was attacked, and at least thirty-four trans people were killed. As Bryan Washington writes in a new essay, in this “ghoulish year for queer folks,” spaces for gathering have become more essential than ever, serving as “focal points of connection and as portals for sharing information.” Reflecting on his time at gay bars everywhere from Houston to Bangkok throughout 2022, Washington offers snapshots of the connection, support, sadness, joy, and visibility he found in them. “And perhaps this is one function of queer spaces,” Washington writes. “To give what is deemed unworthy—by white supremacy, by stigma, by capitalism—its brightness, even if only for a few hours.” The essay is a wonderful reminder of the gift of having companions to help you process a year’s worth of heartbreaking lows and euphoric highs.

In January, near the queer bars lining Houston’s Montrose Boulevard, some white guy stood with a bullhorn. Wearing a button-down shirt under a tidy jacket, he screamed at foot traffic for hours. Sodomites wrought the end of civilization! We were all going to hell! Vaping on a patio across the street, I asked a buddy whether this was strange, and he confirmed that it was, before we flopped into Crocker to the tune of Toni Braxton.

A week later, around the same spot, a gaggle of folks stood with more microphones. They wore matching T-shirts, blasting fire-and-damnation into the humidity. From time to time, they’d flag down passersby to remind us of our pending eternity in flames. A handful of folks engaged with the homophobes while walking along the busted concrete, but few offered more than a brief, tired Girl.

At Ripcord, a bartender—a bearish ginger draped in leather—told me that the agitators had been more visible lately.

They’re feeling themselves, he said. But it’s fucking gross out there? They should drink some water instead.

Some porn played on the screen behind us. Patti LaBelle sang from the speakers. This was a perfect space, and I ordered more drinks to take to my friends on the patio.

All in all, 2022 has been a ghoulish year for queer folks in the United States. Lawmakers have proposed more than two hundred and fifty anti-L.G.B.T.Q. bills, more than a hundred and eighty of them directed at trans folks. Nearly half of book bannings this year have focussed on queer content. There have been more than a hundred and twenty threats, protests, and attacks against drag shows. At least thirty-four trans folks have been killed, and states across the country have revelled in targeting trans kids.

But queer spaces have been more essential than ever. They’ve served as focal points of connection and as portals for sharing information. Yet another year into the pandemic, they’ve been places to just enjoy others for a fucking minute. Or maybe play bingo. Or catch a drag show, or catch up with friends, or spin the wheel on a date. They’ve offered a way to spend time with people whom you can wear a little less armor around, who might actually be invested in your feeling O.K.

In February, I flew to Los Angeles to pretend to finish a novel, but mostly I ended up drowning myself in seolleongtang. The majority of the queer bars I haunted stood in Silver Lake, sporting a little less sheen than the WeHo circuit farther down Santa Monica Boulevard. One night, I passed through the Eagle, where a Latinx guy working at the hotel I’d been staying in flagged me down by the pool table.

He, too, was from Texas, but he’d recently relocated. He asked how things were back home, and I told him that they were suboptimal.

It’s sad, he said. Because there’s so much potential, you know? The numbers are there. My people are there. But what can you even do? Kids can’t even pull up the fucking Trevor Project at school, he added, referring to a district policy that prevents queer students from accessing resources including the suicide-prevention hotline.

We ordered another round of vodka sodas. A group of gays across the bar began to cheer for their friend, who had either just gotten married or divorced. Eventually, we joined in, too.

I thought of my new friend, in September, when a church just outside Houston hosted a drag bingo night as a fund-raiser for young trans folks, only to be descended upon by a group of neo-Nazis and Proud Boys. Protesters and counter-protesters clashed along a road leading to the house of worship. Local police formed a line on the median. Afterward, despite everything, a pastor at the church deemed the event a success.

At a queer bar that weekend, about thirty miles away, my boyfriend, L, and I watched the usual assortment of karaoke singers cross a stage. Spectating was our tiny ritual. (I can confidently sing only songs by BLACKPINK.) Some familiar faces were perched in their corners. We smiled and nodded and touched one another’s elbows and shoulders. Eventually, a straight couple took the stage. They announced that they’d just gotten engaged, and dedicated their performance to the queer folks in attendance, swearing that “it gets better” before immediately launching into Selena’s mournful “No Me Queda Más.”

Behind us, someone asked, What the fuck?

Back in L.A. a few weeks later, I was sitting with two friends on the curb of Akbar, a gay cocktail bar, when a car swerved toward our intersection. A white guy leaned out of his window, yelling, Go get fucked, faggots.

The car honked as it passed us, nearly running the light. The three of us continued to tap at our phones. Then one friend looked up, sighed, and said, Babe, I wish.

The next month, after the fabulous collapse of a years-long project, I was feeling a little frantic, and L suggested that we take advantage of remote work. We ended up in Bangkok for a month. Our hotel, in the Silom area, sat a short walk from the subway line. A slightly longer walk brought us to a strip of queer bars tucked down an alleyway, beside an all-night American-style diner whose tuna salad made me see God.

On our first night out, we met a bespectacled guy at a drag bar. He was a local engineer, and he’d recently come out. A month beforehand, Bangkok had celebrated its first Pride march in years—which was also his first Pride march ever. So we bought him a drink to celebrate, and when I asked how he liked the city’s queer scene he grinned. If you were just looking to cruise, he said, waving at some older white guys ogling a pair of twinks wrapped in Gucci, then the bars were great. But the pandemic hadn’t been kind to many of the city’s queer establishments.

A lot of folks just hang out at home, he said. Tourist life and local queerness are different.

Another club I frequented underlined this dynamic. Tucked away on the upper floor of a nearby shopping mall, it was basically a local bear bar. The vibe felt worlds away from the evening strip’s sheen. Its clientele lounged in beach chairs. The occasional expat sipped beer from a straw. A dubbed version of the third “Transformers” movie played on a tiny television by a Jacuzzi.

One guy I met came from Indonesia. He asked whether I was Thai-Muslim (I’m not), and, when I told him I lived in the States, he asked how many of them I’d visited. He’d spent the last two years in Jakarta by himself. But he wasn’t out to his family. Indonesia was a tough place to be queer, and Bangkok was a reprieve.

I can let my guard down, he said. I can’t even tell you what that’s like.

By the time we returned to Houston, mpox—the disease often called by the harmful name “monkeypox”—had been declared a global health emergency. The epidemic had spread throughout the country, while testing remained virtually impossible. One buddy picked it up from a hookup. Another’s partner had a brush with it after an orgy. The vaccine requirements were constantly shifting: you could possibly, maybe receive one, but only if you were deemed sufficiently high-risk, and then only if you were “a man who had sex with men,” a wildly inadequate qualifier. The most accurate information I received came not from the government but by way of gay bars, sex clubs, and other queer-forward spaces hastily fortifying informal networks.

L and I spent a long Tuesday on the phone, flailing for an available shot. Two weeks later, pulling up for our appointments, we found that we were the only non-white folks in line at a predominantly Black neighborhood’s community center in South Houston. As it turned out, the government had sat on hundreds of thousands of doses. In the following month, supply strains would exacerbate racial disparities in vaccine access and medical disenfranchisement among queer folks of color.

But, at the end of July, Beyoncé released “Renaissance.” I started the album in my car the morning after its release and simply never stopped playing it. That same weekend, ducking through Houston’s queer circuit, I heard a d.j. in a packed bar start one song from the record (“Heated”) before slipping into another (“Virgo’s Groove”) and then a third (“Pure/Honey”) as the room worked itself into a pulsing huff of steam. When I finally stepped outside for air, I was enfolded into a group of folks still running through the lyrics, clapping each other on our shoulders and backs, nearly tearful, deeply euphoric.

In August, realizing that I’d either have to finish my novel or simply walk into the Gulf of Mexico, I holed up in a Vancouver studio overlooking the downtown skyline. Most mornings, I ambled down to the Vietnamese diner stationed by the building’s garage, until the matron started heading instinctively toward the coffee machine whenever I squeezed through the door. One evening, I passed through a restaurant for katsu curry and noticed that an Indian guy was the only other person eating alone. We exchanged polite smiles. A few hours later, nursing a drink at a queer bar, I spotted the same guy.

He was visiting with his family. He’d been hoping for a fun vacation, but mpox had him wary. He said that he’d just graduated university. I congratulated him, and he asked whether he could have a hug. When I gave him one, I could feel his entire body relax. He said that he’d only recently started going to the bars by himself, because he wasn’t entirely out. I told him it wasn’t a race, and he laughed.

That’s what everyone keeps saying, he added. But first there was COVID? It feels like a raw deal, like it’s all one risk after another.

A few weeks later, back in the Bay Area, I stood vaping with some folks outside a queer bar when a gray S.U.V. settled beside us. Its driver unrolled the window, unstrapped himself from a seatbelt, and yelled that he was fine with a queer bar in his neighborhood, but that we needed to keep our fag shit in the building.

He asked whether we understood. Four other smokers and I blinked at one another. None of us said anything. There were too many uncertain variables. Finally, the oldest person standing among us, a bearded Filipino guy, said, Sure, honey, and the car rolled away.

We stood in silence for another beat, puffing away, a little rattled. Then another person, a Black individual in overalls, the smallest one among us, said, He looked like his breath fucking stank.

In November, sleepwalking toward a manuscript deadline, I visited Amsterdam. The city unfurled in a moody way, guided by canals and folks meandering on bikes along brick-laden roads. Every few streets, a rain-worn building sported the Progress Pride flag.

As far as I know there’s only one gay sauna in Amsterdam. On a weekday, it was hardly populated. I ended up sitting in a hot tub between two guys, one of whom said that he was from Spain, and in the way of queers everywhere we started in on our recent grievances. The Spanish guy said that he was living in London for work. This was the first trip he’d taken since relocating. He grew up in a small town, and adolescence had been tough on him. London had been an education, and now he was furthering it.

The other guy was white and younger than both of us. We’d taken him for a local. But when we asked where he was from, he said Kyiv, and the reality of his situation—the war across the continent—sent a chill through the water.

Holy fuck, we said.

It’s all right, the guy replied. I’d never been to a gay bar. I’ve never been to a place like this, he said. I’m trying new things— hoping for the best, you know?

We nodded. But how could we possibly know?

The week before Thanksgiving, L and I lounged on the patio of our local leather spot, because I’d just finished copy edits on my novel and it was time to celebrate. Then, starting at one end of Montrose, we careened from bar to bar. I managed to stay afloat until two in the morning. A crisp chill hung over the patios. Folks huddled together as they passed, cheering on strangers, imploring them to stay safe. A few hours later, we woke up to news of the Club Q shooting in Colorado Springs. A shooter had killed five people in the queer nightclub and wounded at least nineteen more.

It all felt like—and it all is—entirely too much. A country that prides itself on queer progressiveness on an international stage refuses to provide safety and human rights for its residents. This month, the Respect for Marriage Act has become law, but what is the privilege of marriage to communities without the baseline necessities, who face regular violence in their attempts to secure them?

On Thanksgiving evening, after making the rounds of our assorted found families, we made our way back to the queer bars, settling into JR.’s. The atmosphere was muted. Looks of recognition passed from patron to patron. But, as the evening progressed, the room turned more crowded—never packed, but lively—until it felt like being present for each other was a gift in itself.

On the karaoke stage, a drag queen lamented the shootings. She said that things were taking a turn for the worse. But then she asked whether anyone in the room had something for us to champion. One woman noted that she’d just left a ten-year marriage. Another guy spoke about his new gig. A couple announced that they’d opened up their relationship, drawing a scattering of cheers, because this, too, was touching: to see things normally rendered invisible allowed visibility within this shared space.

And perhaps this is one function of queer spaces: to give what is deemed unworthy—by white supremacy, by stigma, by capitalism—its brightness, even if only for a few hours. Flirting at the bar is holy. Biding time on a hookup app by the pool table is holy. A sleepy evening sipping lukewarm beer with found family is holy. Chatting with the muscle-cub bartender is holy. A midnight drag show on a week night is holy. Sucking dick in a dark room is holy, and so is waiting until you’ve gotten home, and so is opting out of the meat market entirely for a lazy pecan waffle with eggs at the all-you-can-eat diner once the bars have closed. Coming out incessantly is holy. Coming together is holy. A hastily organized orgy is holy. And mundanity is holy—perhaps even the holiest, because it is worth everything to insure that the most disenfranchised among us receive the same ordinary benefit of the doubt.

With the queen’s interlude over, karaoke began again. An older Black dude sang Luther Vandross. Some Latinx folks followed with Selena Gomez. A Black woman sang Jill Scott with her white friend. And then an Asian guy took the stage for an astoundingly beautiful rendition of “Rocket Man,” which felt like the appropriate note to depart on. We finished our beers and slipped out into the rain, taking care not to trip on the concrete.  ♦

[metfell]

because its like. if i go into education specifically high school education i'm going to have to be the teacher that has to try and force people to care about art and there's just a sizeable amount of people in public high schools who Do Not Fucking Care about art. and its like okay well How do you get people to care about something.

i care about it because of really fucking poetic and autistic things like "its what makes us human" "everything around us is art" "anyone can do art and saying you cant even draw a stick figure is self deprecation and you're bullying yourself into never trying" but after going to so many schools because of moving around i can confirm if you tell people that stuff- and they do not want to learn about art or care about it- they will just think you're stupid and refuse to listen to you.

also i'm absolutely going to be that teacher that gets really really annoyed when people talk in class it drives me. fucking crazy. because i start focusing on what they're saying and i completely lose track of whatever i was going to say.

and THEN there's the whole bit of wanting to go into education but also wanting to be openly and visibly nonbinary and it's like oh i may want to consider moving states so i don't have to deal with texas legislature.

SORRY I'M JUST THINKING. AND ALSO PROCRASTINATING MY ESSAYS.

[socialistexan]

I know saying "Republicans and Democrats are exactly the same, there is no difference" is the easy, catchy thing to say. But it's short, quipy, and wrong.

Just look at trans rights. Republicans in my state *right now* are trying reverse sex marker changes (because we don't have gender markers on our state documents) that have been in place for years or even decades. Our legislature will be in session in January, and a full on ban on adults using hrt is already in the works. If that ban fails in the legislature, our state executive

Democrats aren't these hyper-progressive leftist, there is no truly left wing party in America (including the Greens because they're just a giant grift now).

But one party would allow me to have basic human rights, rights that I think queers in blue cities in blue states take for fucking granted.

I might have to flee the one state in I have lived my entire 34 years of life in. The one where nearly all of my family lives in. The one I grew up in and love. Where my holocaust surviving great-grandmother found a home in for her final 70 years of life.

And I would be moving to a state controlled by Democrats. Where my rights are, bare minimum, protected. Do they do more than just enough? No! Is there work to be done even in those states? Yes! Do nasty bigots exist everywhere? Of course! But the legal repression in addition to suppression of protest in this state has made it damn near impossible for me to live my life here.

That's the difference. You need the bare minimum to build towards something better. You don't let shit slide into what Texas has become. In my lifetime we went from having a liberal Democratic governor and a 50/50 legislature to a near conservative theocracy where any form of organizing (not even protesting, I'm talking about registering people to vote or organizing mutual aid) is met with police raids, state lawsuits, arrests, and violence.

[merrikstryfe]

looooool the TX GOP legislature is impeaching Ken Paxton on twenty (20) counts of "bribery, unfitness for office and abuse of public trust" hell yeah get fucked asswipe

@anxiousyetepic this should brighten your day

[morlock-holmes]

Something that I don't think people understand is that while my opinion of mainstream left-wing mass media and cultural influence is incredibly negative, I still tend to prefer the Democrats be in power.

My logic can be summed up like this:

The Democrats are a fuck of a lot less likely to actually pass or defend anti-white policy then the Republicans are to pass anti-trans policy.

Don't take that too specifically; while I think that specific case is true, it also generalizes out. The Democrats are in general far less interested in obeying the demands of their whackest voters and pundits then the Republicans are.

For example, the Texas legislature made it illegal for local jurisdictions to lower their police budgets, because Defund The Police was such a looming threat.

I mean... No left-wing city has done anything except temporary budget cuts (https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2023/feb/01/jim-jordan/us-rep-jim-jordans-list-cities-defunded-police-doe/) but surely they must nearly almost be about to start!

My left-libertarian side intensely dislikes the kind of politicized, centralized budgeting that the Republicans that the Texas legislature imposed with house bill 1900. I also think that, with the possible exception of a couple of outliers like New York and LA, police budgets are generally not excessively large for what they do.

But a lot of those cities on that Politifact list kept a left-wing or Democratic leadership and still increased the police budget; meanwhile Texas, to my knowledge, still bans local government from determining their own budget needs.

Democrats (in the vast majority of cases) are demonstrably more susceptible to pressure from left-wing moderates or even right-wingers on the issues that matter to me then the Republicans are.

My evidence of this is basically everything that has happened in the last fifty years and the fact that people have been telling me that the Democrats are just about to really give into the crazy wing of their party for the last 30.