Compounded Crises

Republican run country, White House, Senate, House, Supreme Court. I want people to understand that it isn't enough for us to say, Oh, Texas should be cut off or Florida should be cut off, because frankly, that would be a great thing. It would be a great thing if we began instead of just going out and marching in showing up that we were actually putting pressure on the performers that go into perform in Texas, on the corporations that

have their headquarters in Texas and Florida. We got a bullshit memo from the head of Disney about how oh, let their contents speak for themselves, but they're not going to offer any statements on the anti gay don't say, gay Bill that is past in Florida. Because cash rules everything around me. They don't want to hurt their own pockets by what standing for what's right. And I'm just wondering these days, what the fuck is it going to take for people to show some show that they have

some values, some fucking morals, right. But again, I don't know why we're looking to corporations and shareholders to do that when all they know how to do and all they want to do is make money. It's why they spread their money around to both the Republican and the Democratic Party, because their allegiance is to their bottom line. But what I also know to be true is that boycott's fucking work, right, and that pressure comes from the people.

The pressure and the boycotts are why Martin Luther King said, you know what, We're not going to do anymore ride the bus for over three hundred and sixty five days, right, We're gonna fucking walk. And I think that we are at a place. We are at a place in this country. We are at a place with the lack of leadership at the top in certain areas for us to say

enough is enough. Right later in the show, I'm going to have an in depth interview with the CEO of Equality Texas, an LGBTQ plus organization that is trying to advance equity in Texas and beat back these anti LGBTQ bills. Ricardo Martinez has been on the job for two and a half years and has never in the entirety of his career seen in escalation an anti LGBTQ sentiment. Then he has in the last year. He will tell us that twenty twenty one was the worst legislative year for

LGBTQ people hardstop, not just in Texas. And so I want us to wrap our minds around the direction that this country is headed in, which is one that is run by a bunch of white evangelical Christians who are going to not only threaten right, not only threatened verbally with the language that they use, but also make it sure, make it certain that we go back inside the closet right, make it certain that trans youth that are part of the highest group of suicide right within the LGBTQ community,

that those numbers increase. I can't think right now what it must be like to be queer youth in this country. You know, a couple of years ago, at the beginning of the two thousands, right around the beginning of the Obama administration, there were a rash of high profile suicides of LGBTQ youth. It was over the course of like

a couple of weeks. There were kids as young as nine years old attempting suicide and some succeeding because of the bullying and the torment that they were receiving at school, and not just from their classmates, but from teachers and administrators that did nothing when they heard the taunts that put the onus on the queer student to quote unquote fit in or to quote unquote assimilate. Right you're making

yourself a target. The isolation that these kids must feel right now and now with Texas on top of everything else, talking about investigating the parents of lgbtquth of trans youth for seeking medical attention, life saving medical treatment, they're not dealing with, you know, the amount of neglect that is happening because of their underfunded departments of Family Services. They're not talking about what has been left on the table by this administration so that they can focus on abusing

trans youth. It is outrageous. What is happening and what I asked Ricardo, I ask him about what faith he has in this current Biden administration. To set the record straight. The Biden administration, by the way, is one of the most diverse administrations, more so than even Obama's was. And those things matter, But also what matters is not just strongly worded statements, but actions that allow those that are the most marginalized among us to know that their president,

their government has their back. And right now, these kids, their families are being left out in the fucking cold. We keep saying, well, we have bigger fish to fry. We got nuclear war, we got climate change, folks, we got all of it. All of it is happening at the same time. So we have to deal with all of it at the same time and not allow our elected officials to tell us that there is a hierarchy

of equity here, that there's a hierarchy of safety. For too long, we have allowed the Republican Party to call themselves the Party of family Values. Why because they care more about a collection of cells inside of a uterus than they do a full grown fucking child outside of the wound. Give me a break. We have seeded ground

to them as it pertains to children and families. Meanwhile, they don't give a fuck about our kids, about any of them, not the queer ones, not the black ones, not the Latin X ones, not the Asian ones, none of them except white kids, straight white kids, straight sis white kids. But we don't have the balls to fucking call them out on their bullshit. Where the Party of Family values you could give a fuck about people's families. And just so that we're all clear, family doesn't just

look like the nuclears heteronormativity. We have an opportunity right to be at a place of expansion. And that is why all of these pieces of legislation or all of these threats are coming down because they are scared to death white Evangelical Christians and these quote unquote the Maga faction.

They are terrified of what a country looks like of people who are authentic right, who can live how they want to live, love how they want to love, who are demanding equity and justice because their assumption right is that when we are in power, that we will treat them the way that they have treated us. But you say, I don't care. You want to be a racist, over zealous like bigot go do you, but do you without

doing harm to me? Right? This is why we're supposed to have a separation of church and state, which we don't. This is why you know, we're supposed to not have religions in school, which we do. Not think about what it will look like down the line when Republicans take over prayer back in school, no diverse education or thought about anyone outside of the white race. And how amazing it is right that they will cherry pick what is told, what is said, not only in your children's curriculum, on

the news, in the papers. They want America to look like Putin's Russia, where LGBTQ people are scared and scarce right in terms of their ability to live open and free, because they are under threat of violence and jail. That's what they want here in America, not just for queer people, but for people of color, for women who decide to have bodily autonomy, for people with uterus is who decide that, you know what, I'm not ready to start a family,

and I get to make that choice. I get to say I need an abortion, not just oh to keep it. Would they say safe legal and rare? No, it's safe legal and whenever the fuck it's necessary. We are in the danger zone, and I know that you all know this, and I just can't understand where the urgency is in this administration. And I'm going to keep saying that, folks.

I'm sorry. I'm not going to be one of those silent Democrats that just fall in line when I know that the line that I'm falling into ain't marching in the direction that we need to be headed. We are having so much goddamn tough talk too putin too NATO about what is happening in the Ukraine, and we are not paying attention to what the fuck is happening in

the United States. We are in the danger zone with eight months left to go, where Texas and Florida are going to be replicated all across the country, first going to red states and then going into squeeze blue states to their will. Folks, I know that we are exhausted. We have dealt with more than I think some generations have dealt with. I'm gonna be honest, and I know there are folks that have gone through World War One,

World War two, the Vietnam War. But I'm telling you this, compounded these compounded crises that seem daily are overwhelming, but they are trying to wear us down. They are trying to wear us out to a place where we just give up and we say that we can't take it anymore. Do what you will. We cannot allow ourselves to get to this place. So whatever it is that's going to allow you to rest and restore, to get back to the front lines of the fight for justice in this country,

you need to do it. We need to do it because we are literally in the fight for our lives. There has never been a time darker than the ones that we are headed in. Pending World War three, climate crisis, voter suppression, anti abortion bills, anti LGBT bills. I mean, it is wild. My head spins most days. But I can't continue to have us pay attention to the threats that are abroad and put no juice and energy into

the threats that we are facing at home. We have to have to have the ability to do both, and to both work to protect democracy abroad or what is left of democracy abroad, and work to secure it here. Because I'm telling you, folks that if America falls democracy around the world, it will be a domino effect like something we have never seen. We've never seen America cross over to the side of authoritarianism and dictatorship, but that is exactly where we are headed if we do not

pay attention. Coming up next, my conversation with Ricardo Martinez, the CEO of Equality Texas. Folks, I am very happy to welcome to WOKA affadaily for the first time the executive director and head of Equality Texas, Ricardo Martinez, who is on the front lines of Texas's entire I don't know what it is. If it's a strategy, if it's a campaign of anti LGBTQ, just horrible bills, one right after the other. It seems that to me, Ricardo, Florida and Texas are trading off on how to be literally

the worst state. Give us a picture of what is transpiring, what you have been feeling and hearing from your folks on the ground in Texas. Yeah, Danielle, number one, thank you for having me. I really appreciate the platform to be able to bring more attention to what has been happening here in Texas for quite a while. People like to point to this moment as the moment where people

woke up, but at the boiling point. Right, But this has been simmering for quite a long time now, and I'd like to begin this conversation usually even context of what happened. In twenty twenty one was the worst legislative year for any state in the country ever in history. We had seventy six anti LGBTQ bills filed here in Texas, seventy six And to give you just a comparison, the last time that we were in session, back in twenty nineteen,

there were fifteen bills that targeted our community. That is an escalation of just unprecedented proportions. We typically only meet once every two years for about one hundred and twenty days. In twenty twenty one, there was a regular session that fulfilled that time. We also had three special sessions, right, so by the end of the regular session, the legislature wasn't done with us, and then subsequently went into special session number one, the second called special session, and the

third call special session. During the third call special session in October was when a bill finally got through the legislature. So we put up a valiant fight. Let me tell you that people in Texas are fighters. There are people here who do not give up their relentless pursuit for the live. The quality of LGBTQ people is steadfast, and it is undying and unwavering. So let's just start with the hope. Right. There are people here that believe that

what seventy percent of Texans believed. What we know to be true is that seventy percent of Texans believed that discrimination against LGBTQ people was wrong. But there were eleven people, and this is really important to underscore, there were eleven people at the Texas Legislature that at the House in the House side that pushed these bills. That is a minority of electeds. Which brings me to my next point,

which is people get out and vote. There are eleven people that are causing all of this, that caused this in twenty twenty one. If they weren't there, if we really paid attention to who cares about our issues and who was willing to represent every Texans instead of just

some Texans, we wouldn't be here. You know, you bring you bring up or caught a couple of major numbers, right, which is the seventy percent, the seventy percent of Texans who believe that anti lgbt you know, discriminatory policies, they're not for them. Right. But then you have these eleven members, right, what is what is their background and makeup and where you know, because I always say on this show and others follow the money, right, who are their biggest donors?

Who are the ones that are saying, oh, we need this kind of legislation? Because I believe and many others who are you know, working in democratic politics, believe that what's happening in Texas in Florida is a preview for what will happen across the country if Abbot or if Desantists decide that Donald Trump isn't going to run in twenty twenty four, and so this is a preview for what we can expect from Republicans. So I'm curious to know about these eleven individuals, where, who and what kind

of donors they're affiliated with? And what you think about Texas being the Petrie Dish for the Republican Party. Yeah, I think you're bringing up excellent points and things that we talk about all the time. Right, this is part of a coordinated effort countrywide. This is not specific to Texas, right, But to your point, people come here and try to perfectings in Texas and then replicated across the country. Because it works in Texas, we have a tremendous amount of

political influence across the country. We do, and that's why we take our job very, very seriously. Here. This is a coordinated effort, right. And if you went and you took a look at all of the bills that tried to stop transgender people from living their lives, from limiting their participation in daily life, they are almost replicas of

each other. They might be different slightly depending on the level of hatred that is available or the threshold of hate of whichever state right, but there are fundamentally the same and they seek to do the same right. And I think what is happening here is that anti LGBTQ legislators they poll test these things, right, and what they have found is that there is a knowledge void, a knowledge gap, a familiarity gap that most Americans have about

transgender people. And so what they have done is exploited that gap and filled it with disinformation about creating this caricature of who trans people are, right, to create this boogeyman, to create people that um that are scary to the everyday American because they don't have the luxury or the blessings of having transgender people in their life, because if they did, they would know that transgender people are doctors, they are teachers, their neighbors, they're sitting next to you

in the pews of worship right there. Transgender people exist everywhere and have existed everywhere for forever, and so I think it's just the Their goal is to erode the support that we have so that we for so hard for more than thirty years, right, And the same thing that was happening with Anita Brian back in the late

seventies post AIDS epidemic. All of these are replicating over and over and over because if you look at the messaging that was used in the seventies, if you look at the messaging that was used in the eighties and even during marriage equality, all of it is being brought back because it has worked before, and now they're finding another way to exploit it and reinforce those messages that have been so successful in the past. So, Ricardo, we know this, right, we know, and we know that Republicans

and conservatives use the same messaging over and over again. Right, It's been the same messaging around Roe v. Wade. It's been the same messaging around voting a voter suppression. It's been the same. And yet we seem on our side to have difficulty in filling in what you said. And I love this the knowledge gap, right. You know, I can remember not too long ago, working on Capitol Hill in way back in the one hundred and thirteenth Congress, when we were trying to fight for a LGBTQ bill

and wanted to take gay people right. Members of the community like me and you wanted decided that we were going to leave trans folks behind, needed to take them out of the legislation because there were more people who were aware of and knew had a lesbian friend or sister, or a gay brother or cousin or bisexual, but did not have any real connection understanding of the trans community. And so even within our own community, we were willing

to leave those folks behind. So I feel like we bear the burden also of the knowledge gap that in that is present, right. I mean, somebody should have told me that woke AF was really woke AF because I'm having a really good time right now, mostly because you know, I want to be able to have this conversation with people that get it right, and I get twenty twenty one was hard, right. We are still experiencing the pandemic. So everyone has this added layer of trauma, whether they

recognize it or not. Everyone has been through a very traumatic moment in our lifetime. Right. And on top of that, Texans went through the freeze last year. People died because we were on The government did not protect us, they did not do anything to help us. On top of that, you add legislative session last year, where every issue was

on the table, right, nobody was off the table. It wasn't just LGBTQ people and people that are at the intersections of LGBTQ and immigration, people who are mostly marginalized in terms of like voting rights or reproductive rights. It was incredibly traumatic last year, right, So you're compounding all of these traumas and trying to do advocacy at the same time. Right. And so let's remember back in twenty twenty one when this all began to pick up steam.

We vaccines were not readily available. People were showing up to the Capitol to testify without any added protection, with just masks, and there were no mass mandates here. So you could walk around the building here at the Capitol with people that weren't necessarily putting your life, putting your life maybe slightly more at risk because they were unwilling

to protect themselves. Right. So like last year, we needed our allies to be there, and we had a really hard time turning out LGBT plus people because mostly as a trans issue that didn't impact us. But guess what,

it is always a means to an end. They are not going to stop at trans people, right, and you should show up because it's the right thing to do, right, Like, we don't play that like I you know, I have always had this mandate in like this this vision for what I want to do with my life, and I want to live it through service, right, And I did buy faith and I walk through faith, and I trust that I am put in a position where I need to be. I want to bring everybody with us. There

is a place for everyone in this fight. You can contribute as little or as much as you can at any given moment. From home, you could do a ton of stuff. Stopping transphobia in conversations with your friends helps. It might not be showing up at the Capital giving testimony,

but it helps. There's a tangible thing that everyone could do to contribute to creating a landscape where trans people are not just simply trying to survive, but are thriving and are living their fullest potential authentically without the fear and anxiety related to their their safety and well being. Ricardo, how do you all, equality Texas, you know, deal with the emotional fatigue that people have. I mean, you just listed out the onslought right of bills that have come

out of your state. I mean you're talking about you know, folks, you know, not showing up in terms of protests because of the pandemic. And wasn't it also in twenty twenty one where the Democrat, the Texas Democrats fled the state to go to Washington, DC to say you need to do something. And even that major courageous act didn't turn out,

like didn't didn't get the results that were needed. And so how do you all knowing that it's our voices, the voices of those within the LGBTQ community, but the voices of our allies that are needed in this moment, and yet we're experiencing COVID fatigue, you know, our democracy, all of these things are just compounded and folks are exhausted. Folks are exhausted. So I'll take this in two ways. People that do this work do it because it's passion work. Right.

They want to do this because they are really passionate about this work, and that comes with a certain amount of risk when it comes to emotional, emotional, and physical health. Right. Yeah, if you're not actively trying to take care of yourself, you're going to be consumed by this work, and that

is unavoidable. You are going to be consumed. So unless you're inserting joy into life, unless you are in tune with the small parts of life that give you that joy, that help refill your cup, you're going to burn out very quickly. So what we try to do is provide that emotional support. We try to provide as many benefits as possible for our staff, but also recognizing that this work is just hard and we have to take care

of ourselves. And in terms of folks on the ground, a constituents, parents advocates to turn out, you know, we try it as best as we can to be mindful of their trauma. So, for instance, fast forward to the

DFPS situation that we're going through now. So the Governor and the Attorney General a couple of weeks ago release both an Attorney General opinion and then a subsequent guidance from the Governor saying that affirming your child's gender identity and giving them access to life saving healthcare is child abuse. It's child abuse. Might swear to God, don't even get me started. And that in itself doesn't have the backing of law. Right, neither the governor nor the Attorney in General.

Can you no latter really say I'm going to change that law doesn't happen that way. That's why the legislature exists. That's why this same bill. They tried this, They tried this effort via a bill that failed in twenty twenty one. So they're trying to do it administratively, but they can't. And so what people don't what people are experiencing right now are the practical applications of confusion. Right, people believes of power are going to tell them and give them

the guidance and the truth that they seek. Right, because they are supposed to be trusted people in positions of power, and so they are putting the full force and power of the office of the governor to investigate loving families instead of actually addressing a Department of Family and Protective Services that has been sanctioned and for over ten years to fix the problems that currently exist. There are kids

that are awaiting placement, sleeping in administrative offices. There are DFPS workers who are not being paid a living wage, they have unmanageable case loads. And you're going to take all of the existing resources to investigate people who love

their children. Is bonkers. I mean, that is just insane, right, Like, I think that the legislative misconduct the lies, right because a lot of what Texas is doing is creating these laws that are trigger laws, right, Like, there's no way to really build up lawsuits, which the ACLU other folks have done Transgender Law Center. You know, people are suing Texas, but they're writing these legislations in such a way that it is the threat of it that forces people to

shut down, Right, it's the threat of being investigated. I think I read something, and I'm certain that you know about a family. A woman, she works for Texas government, her child is transgender. She's now being investigated, and she was being investigated and now put on administrative leave. Pending

the investigation of quote unquote abuse. So my question is like, how do we lift up the things that are not being done by this Republican administration in turn, and things that are being done to target and threaten and cause harm for LGBTQ people. But in doing so, they're leaving the rest of Texans behind. A couple of things here, Number one, these aren't laws, right again, Like this is

just an opinion and a press room. It's just an opinion, okay, and press they're just it's like my mom saying I'm going to change the law because you shouldn't be going out on Friday night at ten o'clock. That has no backing of law, and like it just it is just an opinion. It is nothing that it can be enforced. Right. But the danger there is that you have people in positions of power who are confusing folks who are mandated to report. Right, And so then you have the practical

applications of everyday life. How does this impact and trickle down to the daily lives of trans people? Right? And so parents are kind of going through the asking themselves the questions of like do I pull my kid from public school because they might encounter our teacher, a nurse, a social worker, an administrator who is not supportive of trans identities and report them to CPS. And what does my kid do if a CPS investigator shows up to

school without me knowing? They don't have to call a parent, They can just show up then and talk to your kid at school? What happens if if a CPS investigator shows up to my door and knocks with an anonymous complaint. Right, people don't understand their rights, the totality of their rights. And right now, CPS doesn't have to comply with the governor's demands, but they do because the commissioner is appointed

directly by the governor. So if you get to appoint the people that you know are going to do your dirty work, it makes it a lot easier to manipulating positions of authority and departments that are supposed to protect families and children they're not. How do we lift up the truth? I think oftentimes, you know, we spend a lot of time focus on negation, right, like right, negating their message. Yeah, we state what we believe, right, We know who trans people are, that's what we focus on.

We know what the truth is. That's what we focus on. I don't care to spend my time to figure out why people and positions of power are not doing right by constituents that deserve to be protected, deserve to feel safe. I don't I don't spend time trying to figure it out. I don't negate anything that they say because it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. What do you think that this administration, the Biden administration, could and should be doing in order

to protect LGBTQ youth, particularly trans youth. We had the State of the Unions, you know, a couple of weeks ago, and not a mention, not a mention of any of these bills that have come out, And I have to tell you that I was sorely disappointed right on a number of scales of what was addressed in what wasn't What do you think needs to happen or would happen at the federal level to signal to states, these rogue states like Texas and Florida that this is not going

to be tolerated. You know, I've been in conversations with the Office of Civil Rights and HHS. Right they released a press statement last week about reaffirming the rights that transgender people have and when institutions that provide healthcare are in violation of federal law, which I think is helpful. Right, It's also really helpful to have the highest office in

the country say that they see trans folks right. And so when the President mentioned that last week, I know it might have been in passing, maybe he didn't go in too much into the weeds of what's happening across the country. But to be a kid in Texas, a family in Texas and here the President say positive things about the trans community, I think is affirming in a way that we can't really articulate because the rhetoric that we hear here is completely the opposite. What worries me

the most is that itself right. Like, if you think about it, as adults, we spend a majority of our adult life undoing the harm and the messages that we heard when we were come on right so much, so much. Imagine how hard it's going to be for the kids in Texas to undo the last two and a half years. Every single time that they've had to go into the

Texas capital to defend their humanity is traumatic. Every time that they have to sit in a hearing, hearing from people who don't like them, don't see them, think they don't exist, want to erase their existence. Is traumatic. We were in a hearing having a press conference. People anti LGBTQ folks were screaming at parents and bullying children. These

are adults bullying children in real time. I worry for their long term mental health because if I didn't have such a traumatic childhood and I'm still undoing things that I learned about myself through the experience, my lived experience,

I can't imagine what's awaiting them, you know. I love Yeah, well, I'm so happy that you brought that up, because, you know, for a political party that has gotten away with referring to themselves as like the family first Party, the pro family party, right, it's pro certain people's family, right, it's pro families that look like you, pray like you, love like you. That's that's what it is. But we've allowed them to kind of hijack that and not lift up

the fact that they are trauma traumatizing these kids. They are these are future voting citizens right like this, They are doing harm and yet using that very same language to say what they're loving, caring parents and community are doing for them is what is actually causing harm. And so you know, when you say what we need is love, just with the last few minutes that we have, you know,

what does that look like in your mind? Because there are people right now, whether they are in the LGBTQ plus community or not, that are seeing these seeing what is happening, and they want to do something. They want to be of support. So what are some of the ways that we can you know, envelop these trans kids so that they know that they are not alone, that they are loved. What are some of the ways that we can show our support financially, verbally, and by presence.

You know, I go back to the Golden rule and treating people how you want to be treated. Right, It's simple, it really is. But being able to recognize someone's divinity and knowing that as human beings just really honestly, fundamentally, as human beings, everyone has the right to dignity and respect and that if someone can internalize that message now because I said it or because somebody else repeated, I

think that's important. That's important because if you can recognize a humanity in someone, it becomes exponentially harder to attack them. I think tangibly. What people can do is stop transphobia, stop homophobia, stop in its track. If you know someone who is saying something that you know they shouldn't be saying. I think Maya Angelo's she used to say that words get into into things, right, and then they become things. And that's true. Yea, that is true. They take a

life of their own if you don't interrupt them. So I would say, interrupt the negative language that you're hearing. Do your research, right, Every credible medical association has said that the healthcare that is accessible, that is age appropriate best practice for trans young people is appropriate, right like they are behind it, squarely behind it, and so I would do some research. I would try to meet trans

folks because they will enrich your life, believe that. And then I would just say, get involved in whatever way makes sense for you right now, whether it's sending an email to DFPS they have a hearing on Friday, showing up at the hearing on Friday, just to give public opinion about their strategic plan, you know, supporting organizations like the Transcender Education Network of Texas, the ACOU Human Rights Campaign, Texas Freedom Network, land A Legal Equality Texas Resource Center,

Mantra Center, out Youth, Borderland, Rainbow Center. There are so many organizations across Texas that are doing incredible work right now, incredible work right now. Bt WI, Black Trans Women Inc. They do incredible work. B Tech does incredible work. And then I would just say, you know, hug You're like people who have a transiendent person in their life, hugged them, tell them you love them, because this is not easy. This is not an easy time to be authentically who

you are and then hold that space. Work HARDO. Thank you so much for the work that you are doing, for powering and holding down the front lines of the fight against blatant bigotry and discrimination in Texas. I know that this work, as you said, is not easy, So I hope that you do take good care of yourself and take your own advice about joy and rest and all of those things so that you can continue to

helm equality Texas and continue the fight. So we appreciate you and hope that you'll come back to Woke AF and talk to us more. I will, and for everybody else who's listening, pay attention to your local equality organization because the odds are that they're fighting these bills that could become statute in law, and luckily for us, this can't unless we're an active legislative session. So get involved, find a way, and thank you so much, Dania, thank you.

That is it for me today. Dear friends on Woke a f as always, Power to the people and to all the people power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.