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LGBT Lessons for Straight People: You Do Know Someone Who is Gay.

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Valentine’s Day Readers’ Stories

Editor’s note: This is one of five stories written by our readers, in honor of Valentine’s Day.

This is the story of my friend Kurt. I was the new kid in high school and I discovered that in a small town, it is difficult to break into social cliques. I was marginalized by the popular kids because my dad worked in a factory and I was from Chicago. One had to be in the right social circles. Somewhat ironic in a town of 8,000 after living in Chicago. One country club does not a social scene make.

The first student to approach me was Vicki, as she muttered in the library that they had no good books. She introduced me to  her brother, who was a living doll, cute butt and very funny. Kurt and I spent the better part of an evening at an “accidental”  date discussing the worlds problems, as teenagers love to do. I discovered that we had nothing in common and we argued for literally hours. He was a Republican, a bigot and, worst of all for this young hippie chick, he littered.

And yet, he was funny, witty, smart and completely charming. We became the best of friends and for many years people  believed that we were dating. It was always difficult to explain to potential boy/girl friends that we were just friends. Very few  got it and most were jealous. Kurt’s life became more troubled. He disappeared from school, starting doing drugs, then harder  drugs. His parents sent him to a psychologist and it got worse. When he returned after disappearing for a week, our circle of  friends discovered that he was doing heroin and had thoughts of suicide. We watched him like a hawk. He had many, many friends.

Not once did the thought cross my mind that he was gay. He chased girls like there was no tomorrow and he called kids queers and faggots. We would argue about that. He had me completely fooled.

After high school, we lost touch and when I looked him up, he was living in San Francisco, in the time of Harvey Milk. It was the only safe place to be out in that time.  He watched the White Night riots from his window as he lived near Civic Center. San Francisco was a place where he could be happy and began to accept himself. Then HIV came and wiped out the gay community. His partner died, his entire circle of friends died. He feel into a very deep depression. This was during the 1980’s when Republicans were doing things like putting bumper stickers on their cars that said “All the right people are dying of AIDS.”

Each day this month brings me closer to the grief that I know that I will feel. Because his birthday is at the end of September and his death was in early October. Outside of my husband, I was closer to him than any other man. He was my friend. We knew each other and loved one another unconditionally. I cannot begin to fathom the fear, the internalized homophobia and shame that he had to overcome. He was so smart and could have achieved anything. Instead, he fought a society that constantly told him that he was sick and a pervert. he loved his friends, was an amazing host, was knowledgeable in so many areas and was always entertaining. He was the epitome of graciousness, with lovely thank you cards and birthday cards. He was always excited when we visited and loved to show us his city. There is a hole in my heart that no one else will ever fill. I keep my memories of him alive on a flash drive, with photos, letters and music, that I store inside a little box from Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, his favorite building. Not a gay bar. A church. An amazing church.

Every person who has lost a loved one, for whatever reason, knows what I mean. Everyone is human. Everyone is vulnerable and has feelings. Everyone can be hurt and struggles to protect themselves from hurt. My friend was as human, as worthy, as amazing as anyone else. Being gay was such a small part of his personality, of his potential. Yet others could see only that, not the real person underneath.

Someone you know IS gay. You may or may not know it. When I hear people say “I have gay friends and they know how I feel”, usually in reference to not supporting same sex marriage, I ask you “Are they really your friends? Have you asked them how your opinion makes them feel? Friend? Really? Or just acquaintances. While I applaud you for not preaching hatred, it is truly naive to believe that gay people don’t fall in love and don’t want stable, legal marriages. They are just like you and me. In the grand scheme of things, don’t each of us deserve the right to marry the person we love? How can love ever be wrong? How can a fight to legalize marriage take so long and so much money? How can love make us more uncomfortable than words of discrimination and marginalization. Do you really want to be the one to say “I won’t give you rights to Social Security, Medicare, tax benefits, the right to visit your partner in the hospital”.

Nothing will convince me that my LGBT friends are less worthy in any way. Not Shirley Phelps Roper, not Maggie Gallagher, not Pastor Steve Andersen, not Ann Coulter, not the Pope, not James Dobson, not the conservative in the cubicle half way down the hall from me, and most importantly, not the Bible. I have way too many LGBT friends. They are diverse, amusing, amazing, and a few are annoying. Because they are human. In the forty years that I have known gay people, and I’ve known a lot, not a one has tried to abduct my son or indoctrinate me with some kind of gay kool-aid. They talk about the same things as everyone else. Work, money, pets, car trouble, grocery shopping, their knee hurts, the kids don’t sleep at night, the cable company screwed up the bill. It’s only a myth that the gay lifestyle is glamorous. Most of them live just like you and me. Except we don’t have to be afraid that someone will kill us for being straight. Love is not a sin.

geekgirl, Jude, is a straight woman, a mom and has been married for 32 years to the same wonderful man. She believes in Buddhism and attends the United Church of Christ. She is a molecular biologist, her best friend is a lesbian, and she believes that every human deserves equal rights, respect and a life free from hate, fear and discrimination. The only thing she hates is pickles. Her science blog can be found at LGBT Latest Science.

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News

Project 2025 Is the Trump Agenda, Republicans Are Gleefully Declaring

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Donald Trump and his presidential campaign have repeatedly denied any connection to Project 2025, a radical blueprint created by the far-right Heritage Foundation to entirely rebuild the executive branch of the federal government on a Christian nationalist foundation. But now that the election is over and Trump has won the White House, several far-right influencers allege that Project 2025 is Trump’s agenda.

Project 2025 is so toxic its creator, Paul Dans, was eliminated from the project. Public opinion gives Project 2025 a single-digit approval rating, according to NBC News:

“It was the least popular of all the subjects tested in the September NBC News poll — a battery that included socialism, capitalism, both presidential and vice presidential candidates, the Republican and Democratic parties, Taylor Swift and Elon Musk.”

The Project 2025 blueprint, a 900-page “manifesto,” according to The Guardian, “describes an America poisoned by ‘wokeness’ and overtaken by lawlessness and chaos, where conservatives need to seize power immediately – and for as long as possible – to right a sinking ship.”

READ MORE: Day One: Trump Planning ‘Largest Mass Deportation Operation’

Project 2025 would effectively make abortion and contraception extremely difficult to obtain, would make pornography illegal, and elevate Christian nationalism throughout the government. It would eliminate the Dept. of Education. It would create a massive forced deportation program, removing possibly millions of undocumented immigrants from the U.S. And it would reduce efforts to improve diversity, while restricting and reducing LGBTQ rights and protections.

“Republicans are now comfortable openly admitting that Project 2025 was the plan all along,” Rolling Stone reports after Trump won the election. “Sure enough, less than 24 hours after the election was called for Trump, his allies, advisers, and prominent supporters were celebrating the now-open road to Project 2025’s implementation.”

Mother Jones notes that after Trump won the White House, some of his “favorite fans finally felt comfortable joking about what the next president has long denied: Project 2025 has always been the plan for a second Trump term.”

READ MORE: The List of Who Donald Trump Has ‘Pledged to Punish,’ According to One of His Targets

Matt Walsh, the far-right podcaster with millions of followers on several platforms, wrote: “Now that the election is over I think we can finally say that yeah actually Project 2025 is the agenda. Lol.”

The New Republic reports, “Project 2025 has begun. And Donald Trump’s allies are now openly celebrating it.”

“Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, who was recently released from prison, responded on his live War Room podcast with one word: ‘Fabulous,'” TNR added. “Later during the livestream, Bannon could be seen holding a hard copy of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 ‘Mandate For Leadership’ up to the camera in celebration. On election night, Bannon had vowed to eliminate Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, MSNBC, and the Justice Department in an unhinged rant.”

“Now, you’re going to pay the price,” Bannon said.

READ MORE: ‘Be the Guardrails of Democracy’: Liz Cheney and Other Never-Trumpers Suggest Path Forward

 

 

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Day One: Trump Planning ‘Largest Mass Deportation Operation’

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Donald Trump has called immigrants “animals,” “monsters,” and “murderers,” and said they are “poisoning the blood of our country.” He falsely claimed they are responsible for a “surge in crime,” because “it’s in their genes,” and claimed they’re “eating the pets.”

Trump, now the president-elect, reportedly plans to conduct a massive deportation operation of undocumented immigrants on his first day in office.

“The American people delivered a resounding victory for President Trump, and it gives him a mandate to govern as he campaigned, to deliver on the promises that he made,” Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s national press secretary, told Fox News Wednesday, Newsweek reports. “Which include, on Day 1, launching the largest mass deportation operation of illegal immigrants that Kamala Harris has allowed into this country.”

Axios reports Leavitt says that “mass deportation operation” includes “millions of undocumented immigrants.”

READ MORE: The List of Who Donald Trump Has ‘Pledged to Punish,’ According to One of His Targets

Back in September, Trump infamously had attacked President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and immigrants.

“What they have done to our country by allowing these millions and millions of people to come into our country,” Trump said. “And look at what’s happening to the towns all over the United States. And a lot of towns don’t want to talk — not going to be Aurora or Springfield. A lot of towns don’t want to talk about it because they’re so embarrassed by it. In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in. They’re eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what’s happening in our country. And it’s a shame.”

That same month Trump called for “remigration,” the forceful deportation of immigrants, including those in the U.S. under lawful and unlawful circumstances. He vowed to “end the migrant invasion of America,” and falsely characterized some programs that allow legal entry to the U.S. under law.

READ MORE: ‘Be the Guardrails of Democracy’: Liz Cheney and Other Never-Trumpers Suggest Path Forward

“We will stop all migrant flights, end all illegal entries, terminate the Kamala phone app for smuggling illegals (CBP One App), revoke deportation immunity, suspend refugee resettlement, and return Kamala’s illegal migrants to their home countries (also known as remigration).”

Remigration, as NCRM reported at the time, is advocated by some in the European far-right, nationalist, and fascist movements.

Marine Le Pen, the French far-right nationalist who promotes anti-immigration and anti-Islam positions, viewed remigration as so extreme she broke with her allies over it. Earlier this year Politico Europe reported Le Pen said “that she was in ‘total disagreement’ with the reported discussions on ‘remigration.’” Those discussions included the forced deportation of some French citizens, who were described as “unassimilated citizens.”

The Washington Post reports Trump “has made 41 distinct promises for his first day in office, including mass deportations and banning transgender women from sports.”

READ MORE: Trump Closes Campaign With Misogynistic Slur, Violent Rhetoric Against Women

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The List of Who Donald Trump Has ‘Pledged to Punish,’ According to One of His Targets

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Vice President Kamala Harris, now the former Democratic presidential nominee, frequently said on the campaign trail: “On day one if elected, Donald Trump would walk into that office with an enemy’s list. When elected, I will walk in with a to do list.”

Donald Trump is now President-elect and, according to Politico, he has “a lengthy inventory of people he’s pledged to punish.”

“For years, Trump has peppered his speeches and social media posts with vengeful calls for his political opponents, his critics and members of the media to be prosecuted, locked up, deported and even executed. In the waning weeks of the 2024 campaign, he escalated those promises of retaliation to a fever pitch,” Politico reports Wednesday. “Now that he’s won, he has both a popular mandate — and the power — to begin implementing his platform of punishment.”

Trump “will be emboldened by a Supreme Court ruling that grants presidents broad immunity from criminal accountability after they leave office. And he is expected to be surrounded by aides more willing to dispense with norms to carry out his wishes.”

READ MORE: ‘Be the Guardrails of Democracy’: Liz Cheney and Other Never-Trumpers Suggest Path Forward

Back in March of 2023, Trump declared, “I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed: I am your retribution.”

Who’s on his list? According to Politico, nearly two dozen individuals, largely in the legal and political spectrum, along with dozens of intelligence specialists, and unnamed journalists:

President Joe Biden
Vice President Kamala Harris
Former President Barack Obama
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi
New York Attorney General Letitia James
Manhattan Justice Arthur Engoron
Former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney
Special Counsel Jack Smith
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg
Former Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley
Former FBI Director James Comey
Hunter Biden and the rest of the Biden family
Former FBI special agent Peter Strzok
Former FBI attorney Lisa Page
Rep. Adam Schiff (Now Senator-elect Schiff)
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg
Former Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Mark Pomerantz
Former Trump attorney Michael Cohen
U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd
Rep. Jamaal Bowman
51 intelligence professionals who signed letter about Hunter Biden laptop
Members of the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack
Unspecified people engaged in election fraud
POLITICO reporters, editors and publisher

It’s not just Politico.

Trump has often called the mainstream media, the “enemy of the people.”

In his victory speech early Wednesday morning, Trump referred to the press as, “the enemy camp,” according to The Guardian.

“Introducing his running mate, the Ohio senator JD Vance, Trump said: “I told JD to go into the enemy camp. He just goes: OK. Which one? CNN? MSNBC? He’s like the only guy who looks forward to going on, and then just absolutely obliterates them.”

READ MORE: Trump Closes Campaign With Misogynistic Slur, Violent Rhetoric Against Women

 

 

 

 

 

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