Some thoughts in light of recent events

I've been rather silent the last several days, just trying to process everything. There's been a lot of anger, confusion, rage, tears, depression, hopelessness, this air of defeat as I've just grieved and processed. But my heads a little clearer now, my heart is getting resilient again and I just wanted to say a few things. (Or well, write anyway)

I've been following along and I've realized how deep my naivety on some things ran. I've been reading books my whole life, but I never read by recommendations. Hyped books were usually overhyped and I rarely ever liked books that came highly recommended, so I usually found my books simply by keywords and reading the blurbs. It wasn't until I decided to try and publish my own stories that I started to get into reader spaces, such as BookTok, Instagram, rec groups on Facebook, etc.

Since this is a relatively new journey for me, I didn't fully comprehend the concept of the fetishizers. I've read and consumed queer material since I was a pre-teen. And I've always known that I was on the queer spectrum myself. I never really knew or understood where until I was much older, I spent most my life trying to fit into places and spaces and trying to find where I fit in only to realize in my late thirties that I'm asexual and always have been.

But the point here, is that I knew I was queer and I consumed queer stories because I resonated with those stories. The lives they told, the struggles of the characters, how the world's perceptions of the characters shaped the way they thought and reacted and lived. I felt less alone in these books, and TV shows, and movies, and art, and music, and dance, and lifestyles. I’ve always loved the different ways people have found to express themselves and their love!

So, in my mind, I thought that reading and resonating with this kind of material meant understanding the characters and their struggles. So the idea that people could consume these beautiful, amazing forms of art and then turn around and vote against the rights of the people this art represents, completely blows my mind.

The fact that queer authors and readers lost the election, are now facing a tyrant that wants to destroy who we are and how we love and how we live and the safety of simply getting to live our lives peacefully, and finding the amount of people who are saying "Ok, stop crying now, lets get back to the art." The dehumanization in that has absolutely floored me, and that's most likely a large part of my own personal naivety to the world we live in, but I've learned the lesson now.

And here's what I have to say: No matter who you are, or what you read, books are, have always been, and will always be political. To have the content of the written word, and the ones who pen those words, under fire right now, is an issue that authors and readers are going to be very angry about and to sit and pretend it's not happening, or to lament about not wanting to hear it and trying to silence us, is exactly how the opposition has always worked to take everything we've worked for away.

So for those who believe that books aren't political and your bookish safe spaces shouldn't be infringed upon, you've got a rude awakening heading your way if that orange clown you voted for gets his way and you don't have books left to consume at all, regardless of whether there's politics in your spaces or not.

And honestly, why are you reading stories based on people you don't care about anyway? Where's the enjoyment in that? I really don't understand how you can consume and love a story based on a demographic of people and turn around and actively work against those same people in real life. The disconnect there is baffling to me, and in this case, baffling isn't even the right word, because the disconnect here is absolutely devastating.

And I know as a baby author, trying to find my way in the world of literature, being so adamantly political in my professional space isn't considered professional. But everything happening right now goes so much deeper than just writing and selling books. It roots deep into who I am as a person, who the people I love are, who the people I write about are, and who the readers I care about are. If my politics make you uncomfortable, then you have no business being in my space anyway.

Moving forward, I plan to dive deeper into my community. To find ways to get more involved. Not just in writing my stories, but in getting my hands into the community here. It's something that terrifies me because I'm a reclusive hermit. But I have to do something.

I will go back to reading and marketing and loving the books and the art that I produce and consume, but I'm also going to step into this extremely red community I live in and find the rainbow that's buried in it, and do everything I can to make that rainbow shine a little more brighter. And while I won’t post about politics here often, this will not be my last political message on my page. We've got a fight coming, a really ugly one, I have no intention of staying silent, so if that makes you uncomfortable, then don't stick around.

For all of us that voted for our basic human rights, for our freedoms and safety. We are not alone, we are not defeated. Keep fighting, don't give up, and don't let anyone silence you. We are here, we are beautiful, and we deserve to live our lives and express ourselves freely.