As the LGBTQ community collectively reels from and responds to the mass shooting in a Colorado Springs LGBTQ nightclub yesterday, I want to offer a few resources for those of us whose children may have fears or questions about the tragedy.
It is not coincidental that shortly after September 11, 2001, my spouse and I began to talk seriously about having a child. Reposting my 9/11 story today, as I often do on this date.
Actor Anne Heche has died at age 53 after injuries from a car crash. She was also a mother, and so we queer parents mourn one of our own.
Transgender activist Gloria Allen (Mama Gloria), who founded and ran a charm school for homeless trans youth and was the subject of the award-winning documentary “Mama Gloria” and the critically acclaimed play “Charm,” has died at the age of 76.
(Content warning for extreme violence.) A woman and her partner were killed in Norfolk, Virginia, last week, as they sought to defend one woman’s 19-year-old daughter from her boyfriend. One other woman was killed and two others, including the pregnant daughter, were injured.
Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, was shot by a White police officer during a traffic stop in Minnesota this past Sunday. Regardless of whether this was an intentional or accidental shooting, Wright’s is another Black life lost in a country where Black people are three times more likely than White people to be killed by police. My fellow White people—this is yet another tragic reminder that racism remains for us to fix.
Today marks the Transgender Day of Remembrance, a time to honor the lives of those who died because of anti-transgender hatred or prejudice. I wish all of my transgender friends and readers love and support on this day of mourning.
The LGBTQ community has lost a light this week. Monica Roberts, a groundbreaking transgender journalist and blogger, died in Houston at age 58. She started her blog, TransGriot, shortly after I began this one. I had the honor of meeting her at several conferences, and was always struck by her strength, knowledge, and commitment to lifting up trans youth.
Her loss is a loss for our country—yet even as we mourn, we must recommit to the cause of justice that she championed.
Beckett Cypher, son of musician Melissa Etheridge and filmmaker Julie Cypher, has died at age 21.
