The Right Wing Long Game - By Andrew Krueger
This is a bad time to be queer. Alaska just gutted their LGBTQ+ Protections, Florida’s Bill SB254 is threatening to kidnap trans kids and tear apart queer families, and states across the country are introducing bills that mitigate gay rights, restrict access to gender affirming care, and expose the queer community as a whole to discrimination and violence. Iowa even attempted a fresh shot at rolling back marriage equality, along with the introduction of multiple anti-queer and anti-trans bills. These are just the tip of the iceberg; the legislation in progress is the opening move of the right wing’s long game to roll back rights, restrict healthcare, and force the queer community back into the closet.
At the end of the day, these bills are not about general restriction and subjugation - at least not on their own merits. While on the surface, bills which seek to euthanize queer cultural expression and gender affirming care - among other things - seem aimed at dragging our existence back into the closet, the reality is these lawmakers see no real long term viability in these restrictions. Drag queens reading stories to children is not dangerous, and they know it. They are banking on these laws being passed by preying on the fear and ignorance of their voting base, but more than that, they are expecting the queer community and our allies to fight back. The laws aren’t just broad by accident, they are intentionally written poorly as a political tactic. The laws exist to be decided in the courts. Some of them will get struck down because they aren’t enforceable. But by the time these first smaller victories for our side play out, the rights and protections that will affect our community the most will again be on the chopping block, methodically carved away, one at a time, much in the way we saw them won. This time, however, the courts do not stand to rule in our favor. 35 states have either amendments, statutes, or both, which ban gay marriage and come into effect if Obergefell is overturned. 27 States do not have non discrimination laws for employment or housing. Should federal protections fail, the queer community will be exposed. Along with our lack of protection, more and more states are introducing legislation to force our culture underground, to come between us and our doctors, to legalize discrimination and hate, and they’re waiting for us to challenge them. If these laws get passed, the people behind them know they will be challenged, which means they get decided in the courts.
And that, my friends, family, and allies, is the long game. We could beat these bills before they become laws, but we will lose if they go to the courts. Our Supreme Court is the most conservative it has been in nearly a century. A court ruling in favor of these ideologies is at this point an eventuality, not a possibility. Roe v Wade was just the beginning. Trans rights and queer expression are under fire, but the next big target these laws have their eyes on Obergefell. The ruling that protects that, known as substantive due process, also protects interracial marriage as well as litany of other rights and protections. The people behind these movements aren’t going to stop with the queer community. If you are a member of any marginalized group, your rights, your freedom, and your personhood will be on the chopping block. That is not a Great America for anyone. Make no mistake, the so-called Great America they’re creating is rooted in bigotry and hate, with all marginalized people as the prime targets.
So what are we to do? As members and allies of the queer community we must continue to make our collective voice heard. We need to get involved in local projects, write to our representatives, and let our leaders know that our voices will not be silenced. We must campaign hard for people who will defeat these bills on the floor. We must vote in our districts and we must vocally support queer-friendly candidates across the country. We have to fight to make sure these laws never exist to be challenged in the first place. We have to encourage our current congressional leaders to take active, visible stands against discrimination, against phobia, and against laws that delegitimize our existence. If our community is to survive - if we don’t want to be forced back into the closet - if we want to exist safely and peacefully - we must fight. We have to show our leaders that hate will not be legislated, that we will not give up our culture, our healthcare, our visibility; we have to show that their phobia will be met with a fight. Their hate will not silence us.
Andrew Krueger is a multifaceted creator who splits his time between a dance studio and his own creative space where he always has at least five projects to work on. An avid composer, pole dancer, and burlesque performer, he seeks to create works that speak to the core of human experience. After receiving his Master’s in Performance Studies from New York University, he relocated to Bend where he drinks fancy beer, wears flannel shirts with pajama pants, and makes constant excuses to avoid cross country skiing.