Treading Water in a Sea of Anxiety

photo via Keeper's Blog

“We should be celebrating everyone as much as we can. There’s so much darkness that it’s hard to keep your head above water sometimes.” Christian Siriano

I struggle daily with anxiety from the impending Trump presidency. Impending is a word, for me, that is often followed by the word doom. Impending: imminently threatening or menacing. Doom: adverse fate; ruin; death. Impending Doom. Yep. Sounds about right. 

As a gay man who saw his courage grow by leaps and bounds in 2016 alone, the imminent changing of the guard from the Obama administration to the Trump administration is justifiably unnerving. Therefore: fear of impending doom. I’m treading water in a sea of anxiety. I know I’m not alone.

My anxiety derives from the recent past: Mr. Trump’s words, actions, and reactions on the campaign trail. It is nourished daily as I try to digest the information released of those he’s chosen to surround himself with in the White House — a barrage of anti-gay humans, many of whom seem to lack the qualifications necessary to do the job they’ve been appointed to do. It maintains its grip on me every time he takes to Twitter to tweet…about anything. 

I wish I could keep wearing my rose-colored glasses and pretend everything is ok. But I can't ignore what is happening in the world. I need to be informed, but I’m finding it more and more difficult every day to open my reputable news apps. I fear the headlines. I think to myself: What now? What’s next? I have to read the story because otherwise I won’t know what’s going on. Then, more often than not, my heart sinks into a despair that turns to frustration, then anger. The glasses are cracked. I've had to take them off. The resulting imagery is harsh. As the truth often is. 

Have you noticed the photos that often accompany any article about Mr. Trump? They’re photos that often show him with an expression so self-righteous and smug it makes me think he couldn’t really care less about the people of the country he was just elected to represent. I know these photos are chosen on purpose — a manipulation — to show Mr. Trump at his worst. But I watched him on the campaign trail. I watched portions of the debates. And I’ve read his words. Self-righteous, smug, egotistical, self-important, oppressive, and dishonest are just some of the words I’d use to describe how he comes across. He doesn’t seem approachable and doesn’t seem as if he would take to heart any of the concerns of the people, even if he did take a moment to listen to those concerns. The image he has cultivated is not that of a nice person, and I think he likes it that way. 

I, like many others, never thought Mr. Trump had a chance of winning the election. But he did win. I don’t know how and I don’t know why. As TIME states on the cover of their “Person of the Year” issue, he is “President of the Divided States of America.” Remember the motto, “United we stand, divided we fall?” We are divided as a country. So divided. I can’t even imagine what the next four years will bring, and I don’t even want to think about the possibility of eight. I can’t think about it. I fear we’re on the precipice of a fall: momentous, hazardous, deadly. Every minority group in the "United" States of America has the potential to feel a terminating grip on its rights and freedoms during the Trump administration. All the courage must be gathered. All the voices must be raised. We'll all be stronger together.

So many bemoaned the suckocity of the year that was 2016. I concur (even if I did find a great deal more personal courage). There was terrorism at home and on foreign soil. There was shooting after shooting after shooting. There was hacking (Russia anyone?), and too much attention paid to emails that proved nothing. There was contaminated water and a pipeline. There was fake news shared and tweeted as real. Then there was the Presidential campaign and its subsequent election results. All led to anxiety inducing headlines with subsequent stories that did not alleviate the tension. Now 2016 has ended and the new and shiny year 2017 has begun. But I fear we have passed from the bleak into the ominous. The cold, gray, gloomy days of January are apropos. 

The new year hasn’t had a chance to get tarnished or genuinely fucked up yet. However, this new is not a renewal. It’s a continuation. It’s a year that will bring change to be sure. What that change will be no one knows. I’m guessing not even Mr. Trump. 

We’re hovering over an abyss of the unknown. The darkness is foreboding. I keep trying to shine my light but it’s arduous.

Is it any wonder my anxiety continues to flourish?

Marked For Death: A Homosexual's Rant to His Would Be Executioners!

The story and its accompanying video first came to my attention, as so many factoids and headlines do these days, through my Facebook news feed. To say that I was surprised by the content would make me a fool.

It seems Pastor Kevin Swanson of the Reformation Church of Elizabeth, Colorado, went on quite a tear this past weekend at the National Religious Liberties Conference held in Des Moines, Iowa. He said:

"There are instances in which both the Old and New Testament speak to the matter with unbelievable clarity. You know what that sin is--it's the sin of homosexuality. In fact in Romans 1 Paul affirms that this particular sin is worthy of death. The Old and New Testament, I believe both speak with authority and we outta receive it."

Give me a Wow, an Ouch, and an Oh My on that one. I found myself shaking my head in disbelief that yet another pastor--a professed Christian in a leadership position--believes that homosexual people should be put to death. The other (one in a long line of many, I'm sure) is Arizona pastor Steven Anderson who back in December 2014 said the cure for AIDS was right there in the Bible all along. He turned to Leviticus 20:13 and read this cure: "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death. Their blood shall be upon them," He suggested that if people followed God's word and "executed the homos" we could be free of AIDS or at least "90something%" free of AIDS by Christmas 2014.

That's some radical thinking you've got going on there pastors Swanson and Anderson.

Here's where it gets personal. Those two pastors are talking about me. Even though I'm HIV negative I'm still a homosexual that would be executed if either of these men had their way. They're chips off Hitler's block.



You see that picture above this paragraph? That's me. I'm a person. I'm someone's child, someone's brother, someone's uncle. I'm a cousin, a nephew, a friend. I'm a human being. I deserve to live my life to the fullest just like anybody else.

The scary thing about people like these pastors is that, while they individually may not be the voice of the masses, they each have followers who are listening to their hateful words...and agreeing. Maybe you're saying: I don't feel like that but I agree that homosexuality is wrong. Hooray for you! And even if you don't believe in their extremes yet you choose to believe what the Bible says about homosexuality over say, your own homosexual child, that doesn't change the fact that these men are out there in the world spouting this garbage. One bad apple spoils the whole bunch, right? It's hard to get past the stench of those who continue to vomit such disgusting exhortations.

To boil this down in simple terms, they would have ME put to death. ME. The guy in the picture above. They don't even know me and yet because I'm a man who is homosexual they believe I should be put to death.

My existence as a human being--a homosexual, a man--is worthy of life, worthy of breath, worthy of opportunity to live and thrive and create and love and fight back against these men in leadership positions who would take it all away from me because they believe my life--my very existence--is worthy of nothing more than death. And all because the writer Paul says so in the book of Romans in the Bible, which should not be cited for making laws in this country.

When I saw the piece on Mr. Swanson (and the politicians' names connected to it) I couldn't stop myself from taking to Facebook, posting the following status: "As a human being who had the great fortune of being born gay, I find it terribly distressing that there's even a remote possibility that Cruz, Huckabee, or Jindal could be President of my country. #equality #LGBTQ"

This is America. Land of the free. Home of the brave. We are so blessed here with the freedom of speech and the freedom of (or from) religion. Thank goodness. Because you know why? Men have taken it upon themselves to interpret the Bible to fulfill their own discriminatory, fear-inducing needs. I wasn't at the National Religious Liberties Conference, but do you know who was reportedly there? Mike Huckabee, Ted Cruz, and Bobby Jindal. Those stalwart American politicians who want to be President of this great nation called America. (Hence the Facebook status). Again, I shake my head.

I am never more angry when religion and sexuality collide than when self-righteous Christian leaders spout death to the homosexuals from their pulpits to a congregation of blind faith followers who simply choose to agree rather than call them out on their acerbic hate speech!

What can I say that hasn't already been said by me and multitudes of others about the picking and choosing of verses in the Bible--verses which many Christians believe should be law and followed to the letter? Nothing new. What I can do is ask: How can anyone call himself a Christian and be so filled with hate for a minority of human beings? How can he stand in front of people--impressionistic children, for instance--and spew such rhetoric? I was one of those children. I'm still trying to live a life that isn't consumed with the fear of fire and brimstone. It's not an easy lesson to unlearn when it's been drilled into one's head at such an early age. Words that heinous make me very angry.

Not one more child should have to hear words like the above preached from the pulpit in his church. Not one more child should have to grow up with the fear of burning in hell for eternity because of the way he was born. Not one more child should be afraid to be himself. Not one more child should feel less than anyone else. Not one more child should be subjected to this kind of mental abuse. Oh yes, it's definitely harmful, injurious, offensive i.e. abuse.

Here's another question I could pose: Are there instances where homosexuals are standing on platforms in front of people saying that Christians should be put to death? Are there? I haven't witnessed that either in person or in print or via video. Yet I've seen the video proof more than once of professed Christians calling for the death of homosexuals.

Hmm???

"Death doesn't discriminate between the sinners and the saints." So says the brilliant lyric from the song "Wait For It" from the even more brilliant musical Hamilton. (For the record, there's no distinction between the sinners and the saints in this story). There's truth in those nine words. Death doesn't discriminate. But man discriminates. And he discriminates until he feels he's high enough on his pedestal to sit in judgment of anyone who doesn't agree with him; anyone he feels doesn't deserve to breathe the air that for some reason he has deemed only worthy of consumption by the godly, the righteous, the morally superior.

Read your Bible's, pastors. Peter writes in Acts 10:34 that God was no respecter of persons. That means God (unlike man) shows no one favoritism over the other. Even the Declaration of Independence says, "All men are created equal."

Join us in the 21st Century, on the right side of history, ye condemners of death to the homosexuals. If you can't, at least wash the reek of manure off your shoes where you keep digging in your heels.