man sometimes friendship really is just "I saw this and knew it would give you psychic damage. please respond with agony" and then they do. and it's great
As an older queer, allow me to say: the walls of the closet are load-bearing. It is our job as a community to stand in front of that door and tell everyone who wants to peek inside to fuck off.
There are so many reasons a person may choose not to come out and there is no reason a person would owe the public or a stranger that information. Certainly it's not owed simply because someone is famous.
We have fought for decades to make it safer for people to be open and authentic about themselves, but we are not yet there. And even if we were, the closet would still be something we need to maintain for those who are not ready to reveal that part of themselves.
Please call your representatives: VOTE NO on the FEDERAL BOOK BANNING BILLS HR 2616, HR 8705, and HR 7661!
Transcript below the cut.
Page 1:
There are currently THREE FEDERAL BOOK BAN BILLS aiming to ban all TRANS BOOKS from U.S. public schools! HR 2616, HR 8705, HR 7661
June 2026 / Maia Kobabe (a trans author, for three years in a row the most challenged author in the U.S.)
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HR 2616 threatens to cut federal funding from public schools if they “teach or advance concepts related to gender ideology,” as defined by an Executive Order signed by Trump in Jan 2025. It would also cut funding from schools unless they require “parental consent before changing a minor's gender markers, pronouns, or preferred name on any school form.” HR 2616 HAS ALREADY PASSED IN THE HOUSE! Please call your Senators to say NO ON HR 2616!
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HR 8705 threatens to cut federal funding from public schools which teach “discriminatory equity ideology or gender ideology,” as defined by two Executive Orders aimed at suppressing “critical race theory” and trans representation. This bill is named after the late far-right activist Charlie Kirk, “The Charlie Act.” HR 8705 has passed out of committee, but has not yet been introduced in the House. Please call your House Reps to say NO ON HR 8705!
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HR 7661 threatens to cut federal funding from public schools which offer material deemed “sexually oriented," treating any LGBTQIA+ identity as sexual content. It specifically forbids “gender dysphoria or transgenderism,” and “lascivious dancing” (drag). This bill, titled “Stop the Sexualization of Children Act,” has 22 co-sponsors and has passed out of committee but has not yet been introduced to the House. Please call your House Reps to say NO ON HR 7661!
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CALL SCRIPTS
“My name is [name] and I’m calling from [city, state, zip code]. I’m asking [Senator] to vote no on HR 2616. I oppose HR 2616 because it would restrict student’s access to books and it would specifically harm trans, nonbinary, and intersex students. Please stand against book bans and protect queer students!”
“My name is [name] and I’m calling from [city, state, zip code]. I’m asking [Rep] to vote no on HR 8705 and HR 7661. I oppose these bills because they would restrict student’s access to books and accurate history, and would especially harm BIPOC, trans, nonbinary, and intersex students. Please stand against book bans and support public education funding!”
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Author Maia Kobabe: If HR 2616, HR 8705, or HR 7661 pass, it would be almost impossible for any public school in the U.S. to offer or teach my books, unless they’re willing to risk their federal funding. Students would be even less likely to learn about trans stories or accurate U.S. history.
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Please call your representatives: VOTE NO on the FEDERAL BOOK BANNING BILLS HR 2616, HR 8705, and HR 7661!
Follow AUTHORS AGAINST BOOK BANS on insta & bluesky for updates on these bills!
insta / patreon / portfolio / etsy / my books / print store / bluesky
Maia always makes these actions clear and accessible and I so appreciate eir work.
If you don't know who your Senators or Representatives are, you can use Ballotpedia's Who Represents Me tool! (Note: there's a field for you to input your email address on their page, but it's not necessary to get your results. They just need a mailing address to confirm who your reps are.)
Once you've got names, you can look up and save your Reps' phone numbers in your phone. I find this makes it easier when I'm wavering about feeling brave enough to place a call. Just pressing a button instead of going and looking up the phone number all over again makes it just a liiiiittle easier, and sometimes that makes the difference between calling and not calling!
btw it's so fucking stupid you can be anxious physically in your body even after you've decided mentally you don't care. I'm supposed to be in charge here
Over twenty years ago my big brother got me a job at a Taco Bell in the St. Louis suburbs-West County. He warned me that it was the “gay Taco Bell”, but since I was coming from the “gay Howard Johnson’s” I wasn’t shocked. It turns out it was the black trans women Taco Bell complete with black trans women in management. And they’d worked out an arrangement with the local teen Narcotics Anonymous group so that twice a week we would shut down the drive thru and the dining room and exclusively serve 60+ teens in various stages of recovery. And many of the women I worked with were in various stages of being out or transitioning and they were from all generations from teens to over 50. One woman I worked with had a regular corporate job presenting as a man 9-5 Mon-Fri and then came to Taco Bell and worked 6pm -2am Friday and Saturday night so she could be herself surrounded by other black transwomen in those stolen weekends. And we had customers come from all over the metro area because they knew they could be themselves in the dining room. I only worked there from 1999-2001 but for young me, this was a vital, formative experience. Some of the girls came from north city all the way out to the “gay Taco Bell” on Manchester in west county because they heard it was safe to work there. Like- I know times have changed but they haven’t changed much in 20 years. I’m still convinced that for lgbt youth, finding a job at your city’s version of the “gay Taco Bell” is key to survival.
yeah u freaks up north look and sound exactly like this when u pretend that us southern queers are perfectly complicit in our own eradication - for the heinous crime of not living in a liberal population center.
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