Author’s Note: A couple of weeks ago, I drafted this piece as an op-ed submission for the Seattle Times. After a week of silence from traditional media, I realized: why wait for the mainstream press to decide if our lives and rights are “fit to print”? The conversation about our dignity cannot wait on centrist hesitation, so I am delivering it directly to you.
In times of economic anxiety, center-left political strategists frequently retreat into defensive, hyper-pragmatic postures. Faced with mounting pressure from populist opposition, the temptation to make tactical concessions—sacrificing the civil liberties of a vulnerable minority under the guise of “electoral realism”—becomes acute.
We are seeing this play out across our political landscape. As critical election cycles approach, progressive coalitions are grappling with a highly coordinated, existential assault on transgender individuals. To understand the profound danger of this transactional approach, we must synthesize the macro-institutional warnings issued by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, the clear accountability demanded by Representative Pramila Jayapal, and the ground-level tracking of investigative journalist Erin Reed.
In his address at the World Economic Forum in Davos earlier this year, Prime Minister Mark Carney articulated a stern critique of traditional “transactional politics.” He warned that democratic institutions and alliances degrade rapidly when they treat core principles—such as human rights, pluralism, and human dignity—as flexible capital to be bartered away for short-term stability. Carney’s warning against “wishing the world to be what it isn’t” serves as a profound cautionary tale. When progressive coalitions view the defense of a marginalized community as a negotiable luxury rather than a foundational axiom, they compromise their moral authority and structurally weaken the democratic fabric they claim to defend.
This macro-warning aligns precisely with the alarms being raised from within the halls of Congress. Representative Pramila Jayapal, co-chair of the Transgender Equality Task Force—who recently reintroduced the landmark Transgender Bill of Rights—has forcefully called out this emerging hesitation. She has warned her fellow Democrats that transgender rights must never be treated as political leverage or a transactional bargaining chip. Jayapal’s mandate is clear: civil rights are not commodities to be traded away to appease the opposition or soothe centrist nerves.
The necessity for this absolute clarity becomes undeniable when contrasted with the chilling reality documented by Erin Reed. Through exhaustive tracking of anti-trans legislation, Reed has illustrated that the conservative apparatus is actively utilizing state power to systematically eliminate transgender public life via healthcare bans, the weaponization of medical data, and the legal erasure of trans identities.
We saw this playbook manifest at the highest level just weeks ago, with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on trans youth athletes—a decision narrow in legal scope but massive in its potential to be weaponized for further anti-LGBTQ+ efforts. As election deadlines draw closer, right-wing strategists, facing vulnerabilities on economic fronts, inevitably escalate this kind of hateful rhetoric to trigger moral panic. Reed’s reporting uncovers a disturbing trend within this environment: the occasional quiet silence or defection of center-left politicians who cross the aisle to vote for restrictive measures. They operate under the delusion that minor capitulations will satisfy a predatory opposition, failing to realize that weakness only invites further legislative aggression.
Centrist political consultants often justify this silence by pointing to public opinion polling indicating that the broader electorate ranks economic anxiety far higher than issues of gender identity. From this, strategists extrapolate an insidious conclusion: that progressive parties should downplay transgender rights to avoid alienating voters.
This argument is both a moral failure and a profound strategic illusion.
For the transgender community, civil rights are economic rights. The ability to secure employment, access healthcare, retain housing, and navigate public spaces without fear of state-sanctioned discrimination directly dictates material survival. Furthermore, a party that signals it will compromise the basic dignity of its constituents destroys the trust of its most vital asset: the young voters, activists, and organizers who provide the passion and energy required to win tight campaigns.
The LGBTQ+ community and its allies must draw an unyielding line in the sand. Transgender rights must be an explicit, demonstrable, and vigorously defended plank of the progressive platform.
If a party can be bullied into treating its own people as a transactional liability, it lacks the moral fortitude to defend democracy itself.
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I am a trans elder.
There, I said it.
For perhaps the first time in my life, I am fully embracing and owning that fact.
Initially, I struggled to write a message of hope for Pride Month this year. It is hard to find the right words when we are constantly inundated with hateful misinformation and disinformation from those who seek nothing less than the total eradication of the transgender community.
There is an active, coordinated effort to completely erase our existence from the history of the United States and the world.
Living on the tip of the culture war spear is exhausting, and, I might add, something we never asked for (but I digress). So, finding hope in the current landscape can feel nearly impossible. Our community is embattled at every level of government and in every corner of society—not just here in the U.S., but across the globe.
So, where do we find the hope?
I recently caught up with my dear friend and trans icon, Jamison Green, PhD . As we chatted about our lives, our loved ones, and how we are holding up in today’s hostile environment, our conversation turned to legacy. We talked about how we, as elders, are being seen and heard by the younger generations of trans men and trans women.
While most of our interactions have been deeply positive, James shared a troubling trend. A small minority of the younger generation seems to have little to no regard for hearing our stories of becoming our true selves. The dismissals usually sound something like this:
● “You’re irrelevant.”
“That was so long ago, things have changed.”
● “That just doesn’t apply to me and my generation.”
With everything happening to our community right now, there is simply no room for that brand of dismissiveness.
The Connective Tissue Across Generations
I fully recognize that our specific circumstances are different. The world was a completely different place when I came out in 2004, just as it was a different place when James came out in 1988. But different circumstances do not make histories irrelevant.
As James beautifully put it: “Our history is now more important than ever.” Another close friend once reminded me: “We are our history.” We cannot afford to lose sight of that.
If we want to find hope this Pride and beyond, the times call on us, as trans and queer people, to focus entirely on what we have in common. We share powerful, universal experiences that transcend time:
● The Moment of Truth: That profound second where we said to ourselves—and to anyone who could hear us—”This IS who I am. I am no longer going to hide my authentic self from the world.”
Or, as Anai Nin so eloquently put it, “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
● The Daily Practice: The universal notion of “living into yourself” each and every day – in ways that no one else can see.
● The Shared Core: The resilience and fortitude we develop as we walk this path.
This resilience is the connective tissue that spans generations. It is what binds us together as ONE community at a time when unity is our best defense.
The Road Ahead: Buckle Up
We need this unity immediately. The mid-term elections are a mere five months away. Do you think for a second that the despicable rhetoric surrounding the transgender community is going to lessen?
To that, I say: “Buckle up. You ain’t seen nothing yet!”
True hope requires us to create space to learn from one another. Elders must listen to the unique challenges of today’s youth, and the youth must anchor themselves in the roots of those who cleared the path.
This June, let’s reject the generational divide. Let’s protect our collective narrative, honor our survivors, and remember that our visibility is our power.
We. Are. Our. History.
Let’s own it, let’s protect it, write the next chapter of it, and march forward—together.
Happy Pride Everyone!!!
Reading John Casey’s recent piece in The Advocate regarding Barney Frank’s painful, final public interview from hospice care left me deeply conflicted, grieved, and flooded with memories.
For me, and for so many other trans siblings of my generation, reading about Frank’s renewed assertions that Democrats need to “rethink” transgender rights felt like re-living a significant, painful portion of my own authentic life. It brought back the visceral sting of a history that many would rather forget, but which we carry in our bones.
We fought every single day for a seat at a table that told us, on so many occasions, that there simply wasn’t any room for us.
Watching the interview, I couldn’t help but think of the rollercoaster ride that was the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) in the mid-2000s. It took years to get the tire marks off our collective backs after being repeatedly thrown under the bus. Trans people became the sacrificial lamb, left at the side of the road so that “equality” could be won by and for the rest of the broader community.
We were told, “Oh, we’ll come back for you.” But we knew then, and we know now, that it was nothing more than an empty, hollow promise designed to placate us.
Perhaps the hardest part of this journey has been feeling the scorn from within our own broader LGBTQ+ community. There are some who have historically looked at me as if I had horns coming out of my head—as if human rights and equality were a zero-sum game, where granting trans people safety and dignity somehow diminished their own hard-won progress.
But as Casey points out in his article, these outdated, exclusionary views are fundamentally “of a certain generation.” The landscape of politics has moved past the closed-door pragmatism of twenty years ago. The world has changed because trans people refused to stay hidden.
And that is where my hope lies.
I refuse to let the painful echoes of the past cloud the hopeful reality of the present. The younger generations of queer folks give me immense joy and profound hope. They don’t view equality through the lens of incremental political deals or fractional compromises. They don’t see the “T” as an optional add-on or a liability. To them, inclusivity is foundational. They have built a much more welcoming, fiercely protective, and beautifully cohesive community where we all stand together.
Barney Frank’s legislative legacy is historic, and as he faces his final days, he deserves peace. But his final commentary belongs to a bygone era.
The future belongs to the generations who understand that none of us are free until all of us are free.
We survived the days of being pushed aside, and because of that resilience—and the fierce allyship of the youth coming up behind us—we are finally making sure the table has room for everyone.
Are you a Stranger Things fan? Even if you haven’t ventured into the Upside Down, there’s a moment with the character Robin Buckley that perfectly captures the heart of what it means to survive a challenging year. Somewhat surprisingly, she is the compass for the journey I’ve been on this year, and the lesson I finally learned.
This past year, for me and for the community I love and am so fiercely proud to be a part of, it has felt like walking through a minefield. We’ve faced attack after attack, challenge after challenge, on our very right to exist. The sheer volume of the noise—the hate, the bigotry, the legislative assaults—has been relentless. It wasn’t just mental; by the time summer rolled around, I was drained, emotionally and physically. I had nothing left to give.
My wife and I took a trip to Canada to visit friends, seeking a momentary reprieve, a place where the air felt lighter, and admittedly a recon mission of sorts to determine is this a place we could live if things went totally off the rails. And when it was time to leave, I won’t lie: the thought of returning to the country of my birth, where the constant fight was waiting, felt heavy, almost impossible. That pervasive fog, that low-grade malaise, was following me everywhere.
Then, something wonderful happened. I got the call that would change everything: an invitation to speak from the main stage, co-lead a Leadership Lab day, and participate in featured panels in front of nearly 3,000 people at this year’s Out & Equal Summit in Seattle, Washington.
I was still days away from walking on stage, but the moment I stepped into the convention center space, I felt the energy shift. It was a massive, collective exhale. I was instantly surrounded by people who celebrated one another simply for being their authentic selves. This was a place where belonging was the default, where grace was given freely, and where our shared humanity was the only flag we waved. The fog that had clouded my vision for months began to dissolve before my eyes.
The exhaustion didn’t vanish instantly, but the burden did. And that’s where Robin’s story becomes my own.
In that unforgettable scene in the latest episode of season 5, Robin – in a moment of sheer vulnerability – talks to Will about thinking how she needed someone else—“Tone-deaf Tammy”—to be able to be herself, because a part of her self “kind of scared” her. She searched for answers and validation in others. But after a moment of clarity, looking back at her younger, fearless self, she has a profound realization:
“It was never about Tone-deaf Tammy. It was always just about me… I had all the answers. I just needed to stop being so goddamn scared. Scared of… who I really was. Once I did that, whew, I felt so free. It’s like I could fly, you know? Like, I could finally be… Rockin’ Robin.”
That is the feeling that washed over me on that main stage. The applause, the energy, the collective joy—it wasn’t for a performance or a perfected persona. It was formy authentic self, validated by thousands of people who understood what the search for that same vulnerable, yet unbreakable, strength is all about. In that moment, I realized I was more powerful, more fabulous, than I had ever allowed myself to imagine when, for so many years–decades, really – all I could focus on was how the world around me seemed to be working overtime to shrink me down and prevent me from embracing my authentic self.
In these unprecedented times, the simple act of existing authentically is revolutionary. We must hold on tightly to that authenticity—our identities, our truths, our joy—like a rare and brilliant jewel. We must refuse to let anyone, through legislation or rhetoric, take it away from us. Because, as Robin found, and as I found on that stage, your deepest authenticity is not a vulnerability; it is the single greatest source of your strength and your power. It is your right to fly.
From that stage, I made a commitment to everyone there and to our community at large:“I’ve Got Your Back!” And that is a promise I will never retreat from. We are all in this together, and it truly takes a village to lift us all up. If you or someone you know needs a boost —needs to know they are amazing and that they matter —please tell them to reach out to me—my website , is best—and I will connect with them.
We WILL triumph, just like Rockin’ Robin!
As I marched with my church community in the Palm Springs Pride Parade this past Sunday, the air was electric with a kind of communal joy—a vibrant, overwhelming affirmation of love and selfhood. Amidst the music and cheering, my small act was simple: handing miniature Progress Pride flags to the children lining the route. Each time, the interaction followed the same beautiful, hopeful script.
A child would take the flag, offer a polite “thank you,” and then, almost instantly, their eyes would land on my t-shirt. With zero hesitation, they would declare, “I like your shirt!”
The shirt’s message was not subtle, yet it was profound in its clarity: “Trans Rights Are Human Rights.” To an adult, this phrase is a battle cry, a political statement, a subject of endless, often exhausting, debate. But to these young minds, the message was something else entirely. It was an immediate, unfiltered yes. It was a recognition, a simple equation where the variables—trans people and human rights—equaled one obvious, undeniable truth. That unburdened clarity, offered by a generation not yet steeped in social division or political cynicism, was a profound and unexpected gift.
This gift of hope is especially vital now, as we pivot from the celebratory atmosphere of Pride to the solemn and reflective period of Transgender Awareness Week, culminating in the Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR). This week is heavy. It forces us to confront the relentless policy attacks, the systemic discrimination, and the heartbreaking violence that results in lives cut short. TDOR is a necessary, painful ritual of grieving for those we have lost—a catalog of names that should not be a list of martyrs, but rather a list of people who deserved to live fully and fearlessly.
The solemnity of TDOR and the violence it commemorates can feel overwhelming, threatening to drown out the joy I experienced on the street in downtown Palm Springs. Yet, the hope gifted by those children is not naive; it is essential fuel. The spontaneous “I like your shirt!” is a living promise that the future is already wired differently. When a child instinctively affirms that Trans Rights Are Human Rights, they are rejecting the very prejudices that cost lives.
Our act of remembrance, therefore, is not merely about mourning the past; it is about keeping a solemn promise to the future. It is a vow to build the world that those we lost deserved—a world where the dignity and inherent worth of every transgender person is recognized not as a political victory, but as a given fact of existence. The children, with their immediate acceptance, show us that this basic human understanding is achievable. They remind us that the heart’s instinct is acceptance, and it is the responsibility of this generation to clear the noise and politics so that instinct can prevail. The fight for rights is necessary, but the foundational hope is already secured in the hearts of the youngest among us.