“Y’all” Does, in Fact, Mean All

I’ll never forget sitting alone on my sofa in my darkened apartment late Tuesday night, November 5, 2024. The map of the United States was projected on my television screen. With every passing minute, it bled more and more red– mirroring my sinking hopes for the future.
A friend of mine called me at some point. He must’ve known exactly what I was doing.
“Turn off the television, Ben,” I remember him saying. “You sitting there watching this happen isn’t going to do any good.”
He was right– what could I possibly accomplish or do to fix the disaster I was witnessing? I lied, and told him I’d turned it off and was going to bed. In reality, I muted it so he wouldn’t hear the occasional reporter popping up to tell me something worse. It all seemed so surreal, so unbelievable– so impossible. Only a few hours earlier, I was filled with immense hope and deep anticipation for the future. Now that had all dissipated, and a sickening, yet not unfamiliar feeling washed over me.
I moved through the next day in a haze, no longer recognizing my surroundings or the people I was surrounded by. At some point, I met a friend for a “we’re grieving, please pass the tequila” type of meeting. Though we found solace in our margaritas, we felt immediately threatened by the groups of men at the tables around us– flaunting their red baseball caps and jeering at passersby. We contemplated leaving, but in true community fashion, we stayed strong and held each other up.
The weeks that followed felt like moving through a dense fog, and as the new administration was sworn in, that fog turned into a storm. DEI initiatives aimed at making a more equitable workplace for all have been cancelled. The transgender community is now public enemy number one. Tariffs threaten to completely upend our economy. The world has collectively recognized that the United States is no longer a friendly place.

Raise your hand if you’re sick and tired of living in unprecedented times.

Sick and tired though you may be– here’s a reflection: you’re still here. Additionally, we’re still here. I’ve emphasized the “we” of it all, because if there’s one thing I believe more than anything, it’s that we’ll never see this through if we don’t stick together.

What prompted this reflection was a hateful cartoon making its rounds online. The graphic portrayed a broken Pride Progress Flag. The triangular corner that housed the transgender colors, the asexual purple circle, and the colors to include our communities of color were all gone– broken off to the side and left to fend for themselves.
It was, of course, a member of the local LGBTQ+ community who shared the illustration to their social media page. This, to me, was the most heartbreaking aspect, given that it comes in the midst of outside forces working tirelessly to tear our community apart piece by piece. I tried to dismiss it as nothing more than some sad soul trying to stir the pot, I couldn’t help but feel a level of anger and frustration over this type of thinking.
Let’s not forget that the reason we have a Pride flag to wave around in the first place is directly because of the efforts of the people represented by that particular corner of the flag. While it’s disputed that bricks were thrown at Stonewall or that Marsha P. Johnson was the one to instigate the riot- we’d be making a grave error in judgement if we turned our back on the contributions of communities and people of color in the fight for the LGBTQ+ community to achieve peace in this country.
Along with that, the transgender community has quickly become one of the main targets of the current administration. Are we really about to stand back and let them fend for themselves in this mess? If I’ve learned anything about the history of our community in times of distress, we survived the storm by standing together and supporting one another. Please don’t tell me that’s only words we chant at parades and festivals, but in our everyday lives we don’t truly behave in accordance.
Any discourse that suggests that we should “part ways,” or that there are too many communities being represented by the flag is in line with the hate speech used by those in power who seek to dismantle every protection we currently have in place.
It’s understandable that times like these take their toll on everyone. We each are being tested in ways we’ve never seen before, and it’s fair to say that we’ll all have our moments. But don’t forget that nobody can do any of this alone. Our community is vibrant and beautiful. We’ve made it this far by refusing to give up on each other– so let’s keep showing the world what true pride looks like– together.

Stay strong.
Stay together.
Stay in the light.

Ben the Blogger