Today is a bitter and cold day. Here in Ohio, the temperatures are in the single digits and with windchill, even lower. It is a day where people are meant to be bundled up by a fire, together creating a sense of belonging and community. A time where we uplift one another to ensure our community can thrive and survive, even in the cold dark times of the year. I am reminded of a poem called, “First they came…” by Martin Niemoller, but with some modern updating.
“First they came for the Gays and Lebians
And I did not speak out
Because I was not one of them
Then they came for the Transgender
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Transgender
Then they came for the women
And I did not speak out
Because I was not one of them
Then they came for the government officials
And I did not speak out
Because I was not one of them
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me”
recreated version of “First they came…” by Martin Niemoller
America woke up to a slew of new executive orders being sworn into action, earlier this week. In a few strokes of a pen, all transgender protections were reversed, hate speech and politics has been allowed back into the Meta-verse, and all DEI programs have been terminated in the good ole U.S of A. This isnt even touching the withdrawal from WHO, Paris Accords, the opening up of more American wilderness for the pillaging of fossil fuels, rescinding of renewable power, and trying to annex off land from other countries for American reasons.
Times seem to be challenging going forward. We have to keep one thought in our mind, no matter the windfall, We Are Still Here! We are here for the ones that have no voice, we are here to remind others that we exist, and we will ever be here to continue our fight. So, join me today as I share “Dark Days for Equality: Challenging Injustice and Protecting Vulnerable Communities in 2025”.Today is a bitter and cold day. Here in Ohio, the temperatures are in the single digits and with windchill, even lower. It is a day where people are meant to be bundled up by a fire, together creating a sense of belonging and community. A time where we uplift one another to ensure our community can thrive and survive, even in the cold dark times of the year. I am reminded of a poem called, “First they came…” by Martin Niemoller, but with some modern updating.
“First they came for the Gays and Lebians
And I did not speak out
Because I was not one of them
Then they came for the Transgender
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Transgender
Then they came for the women
And I did not speak out
Because I was not one of them
Then they came for the government officials
And I did not speak out
Because I was not one of them
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me”
recreated version of “First they came…” by Martin Niemoller
America woke up to a slew of new executive orders being sworn into action, earlier this week. In a few strokes of a pen, all transgender protections were reversed, hate speech and politics has been allowed back into the Meta-verse, and all DEI programs have been terminated in the good ole U.S of A. This isnt even touching the withdrawal from WHO, Paris Accords, the opening up of more American wilderness for the pillaging of fossil fuels, rescinding of renewable power, and trying to annex off land from other countries for American reasons.
Times seem to be challenging going forward. We have to keep one thought in our mind, no matter the windfall, We Are Still Here! We are here for the ones that have no voice, we are here to remind others that we exist, and we will ever be here to continue our fight. So, join me today as I share “Dark Days for Equality: Challenging Injustice and Protecting Vulnerable Communities in 2025”.
- Humanity has been decided by Government
- Social media not safer for anyone
- American melting pot doesn’t need diversity
- The alarm is ringing
Humanity has been decided by Government
It wasn’t all that long ago that Roe v. Wade was removed from all Americans. That ruling didn’t just affect people who wanted abortions but a whole cavalcade of sexual health education and services. It was a slap in the face to every woman out there. The government basically said that old white men knew more about what a woman should or should not do with her body than she can ever know.
January 21, 2025, we watched as Trump wasted no time stripping the rights and dignities for another group of American people, simply because he doesn’t feel they exist. This comes on the heels of legislation being passed that will mandate teachers and counselors to out any kid that comes to them stating they are trans or trans questioning. A policy that steals the ability for children to speak openly and honestly about what they are feeling and going through. We have told an entire generation that you can not have any secrets, your life needs to be on display for others to judge its merit.
Today, the audacity of these rulings went tragically further. We watched as the incoming President decided that his office has the categorical right to decide what gender is and who it can be, as of now there are only two recognizable genders by the United States Government – Male and Female. In one signature, he erased an entire group of people from the face of this earth. Poof, just like that.
Social media not safer for anyone
Don’t think that these kinds of changes only come about from old white men who are over compensating for a host of insecurities, it goes much further.
Most of us are probably aware of the existence of the movie The Social Network as it illustrates the vision Mark Zuckerberg had for a platform for people to come together and… well, in short, rate women on a scale of how much each guy would want to sleep with them. Wait, I mean Facebook – a place where people (primarily college students) can come together and share what they do on a daily basis with others. The Facebook of today is vastly different from the original inception. Oh, how the mighty dollar can make your priorities shift.
We are also firmly aware that social media is hardly a conducive place for the safety and welfare of anyone’s mental fortitude. Cyberbullying has cripples children and causes an increase to child suicide rates. It creates violence among users and disproportionately abusive people that often troll the various platforms.
Zuckerberg has stated that he is removing all fact checking from all of its platforms. You are probably sitting there wondering how the removal of fact checking will affect this. Good question, lets look at it. When you post something on Facebook about politics, minorities, hate, or any other flammable topic – let’s face it, anything is flammable on Facebook, an independent third party poured over your post and checked it’s factualness, if it failed it would be flagged for removal. This included things like hate speech. Without these protections, online violence will increase, as we have already started to see. More people will be targeted and attacked and they will have no avenue for fighting it.
Perhaps Zuckerberg removed it because he could not control the independent third parties or was pressured to.
American melting pot doesn’t need diversity
These are bad enough, truly they are, but it is only the very knife’s edge of the tip of what has transpired and about to fall. Since the beginning of this country, the core principle was that this could be a refuge for people who were escaping persecution in their home country. Every colonist came here for that exact reason. The rule of the land was that everyone was supposed to be created equal and have the same rights. That took hundreds of years to accomplish and a few pen strokes to annihilate.
At the federal level, we watched as the Commander in Chief decided that federal agencies did not need to educate their employees on important topics like Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. These programs were meant to ensure that every company, fairly and equally, would hire top talent regardless of color, race, creed, and etc. It was to ensure that all people hired were given the same, unhindered opportunities to job roles and pay, did those systems completely work? No, they didnt but that can be traced to a myriad of reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with the actual program.
Vivek Ramaswamy was recently quoted as saying,
“The reason top tech companies often hire foreign-born & first-generation engineers over “native” Americans isn’t because of an innate American IQ deficit (a lazy & wrong explanation). A key part of it comes down to the c-word: culture… A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian, will not produce the best engineers.”
He, essentially, feels that Americans are lazy and value reputation over education. Granted, you can look at the current Administration and see the truth in that. People backing someone they think is strong enough to affect the kind of change they want to see. It has been seen that when groups try to educate on th injustices that many minorities see on a daily basis, they are meant with skepticism and disbelief because those in power say it isnt true. Systemically, we can see where black men are used in clinical testing, against their will. We still can see on a daily basis that a white male will be given a job at a higher salary and level than an equally qualified woman or other minority status. It is 2025 and the division of people is as bad as the caste systems of old.
Why haven’t we, as people, finally woken up and said enough is enough?
The alarm is ringing
Every day we watch a group of people make decisions that affect each and every one of us. We have elected that group of predominantly rich, white, old men into a place of extreme power. Every day, those same people are strategically seeking new ways to amass more power and control. The executive orders signed today and those that have been teased sound more and more like items that would come from an oligarch, tyrant, dictator, and worse. There are a small few who question and fight against them, most of America follows them blindly, without even giving it more thought than assuming they know what is best. It is as if humanity is devolving more than advancing and the only ones who can pump the brakes are us, we just dont see the wall we are speeding towards at light speed. Who will be there for us, when that happens? It will be too late, because in our tripdation to act and react, we will have lost anyone who could have stood next to us and fought back.
How do you feel today? It is okay to be nervous or scared or simply unsure how to feel. Do you agree with the changes? If so, why? If not, why? Do you feel that we can come back from this? What ways do you think we can fight these changes? Let me know in the comments below. Just remember, they may try to strip us of our rights, but they cannot ever take away that which makes us special, ourselves. Thank you for being a part of GayintheCLE.
Gay in the CLE 