Howdy, lovely people!
In the last five days I’ve been seeing so many great news stories that I feel like singing “Omigod you guys” from the Legally Blonde Musical. There is so much keeping me ridiculously fired up and I wanted to share some pre-election pump up with you all.
ALSO! It’s live event time! Every year around the late fall (LATE FALL?!?!) I host a live event called “Home for the Holidays” on allyship, boundary setting, and mental health at family holiday gatherings. I am going to be majorly revamping the content this year to lean hard into agency, joy, and strategies of persuasion and healing. The event will be held on Monday, November 9th and is open to anyone. Feel free to send it to anyone you think may benefit! Tickets to the event are on a sliding scale, and you never need to justify or prove what level you think you should be at. I will just be happy to have you.
There are LOTS of great wins coming down the pike lately.
Most of these wins have nothing to do with polls or midterms, in fact they’re good news stories that will be true before and after the elections. Next week matters a lot, AND our fight is all the time. Wins and losses come all the time. Do not let Tuesday be the hinge upon which your entire hope rests.
That being said, for my US readers, here are a few election-related resources and reminders.
ELECTION STUFF
Putting this at the top of the article please for the love of God be so discerning with the insane amount of fearmongering online about political or military involvement in the midterms. A video having a million likes does not mean the source is credible, it just means it went viral (which usually happens when a video is particularly extreme or activating).
Remember that the right wing, which is concentrating ownership of local and national news outlets, has a vested interest in you not voting, and the best way to do that is showing constant headlines and debates about how evil trump is and how much it doesn’t matter if you vote. Even polls that feel too-good-to-be-true probably are, and overconfidence is ALSO disempowering. If you know your election is at 70% chance of winning, why would you vote? DO NOT LET ANYONE TRICK YOU INTO NOT VOTING!
If you have concerns or confusion about a voter suppression or intimidation campaign that you hear about or see with your own eyes or ears, PLEASE call the election protection hotline instead of scrolling about it. I’m begging. (866-OUR-VOTE)
If you are trans and worried about voting, look at the A4TE’s “voting while trans” guide.
If you are an immigrant and worried about voting, check out the National Immigration Law Center’s voting rights guides offered in many languages.
(notice that I am sharing information created by lawyers, not random people. Do not amplify social media people playing on fear for “content”)
Feeling angry or tired about yet another “democracy saving election”? Me too! But remember that cynicism and burnout is not an individual moral failure. It’s a systemic success. I found that ringing true in this particularly poignant article shared with me by my lovely friend, Therese: “When people with an agenda can’t win the argument, they work hard to shrink the number of people who show up to hear it. It costs them nothing, and it hands the outcome to the most motivated voters, who are very often the angriest. In a province where a handful of ridings can decide who forms government, the fly staying home is a gift to the wasp.”
Also, I know there’s been a lot of noise about the small group of democratic candidates throwing trans people under the bus. Erin Reed wrote a very thoughtful article about it that I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about.
I’m sharing this article with a number of my own complicated feelings attached to it, not as an endorsement of everything in it. I trust you all as critical thinkers (and you should trust yourself this way, too!) to share what I feel is something important to consider. My worldview is best summarized as “pragmatic utopianism” which balances an unflinching curiosity about the EXACT situation I find myself in and how I can work this to the best possible outcome. Here’s my own opinion, though you’re very welcome to disagree with it:
Voting serves two major purposes, to me:
Harm reduction
Creating the conditions in which we fight for change
Will my vote get someone out of harm’s way? Great. Thinking particularly about the most marginalized people and others most affected by the cruelty of the Trump admin, I want to know who seems likely to protect my immigrant neighbors from ICE terrorism NOW. I want someone who isn’t actively voting or legislating to hurt the trans community. Second, do I think this is a person who I can meet with, or push, or safely protest against? What do I know about how others have worked with them in the past?
Rather than encourage you to develop an opinion on the entire article, if one of these candidates is on your ballot, I encourage you to look into them specifically. Will electing them reduce harm? Are they someone who is able to be pushed? It’s going to feel complicated either way. What matters is that you create the conditions in which you want to fight for change, and then after the election, you do that.
If you decide you don’t want to vote for a particular candidate, that’s fine! Still show up to vote for all the other positions. Anger at one senate candidate doesn’t need to be the reason your school board gets taken over by the moms for liberty. You are allowed to leave a section blank.
If you have particular thoughts, disagreements, or other things you’d like to share, I encourage you to use the comments here to do so!
The Wins!
The iconic and inimitable KB Brookins has put out yet another of their fantastic (and reliably on time) roundups of Trans News that Doesn’t Suck!
Since most of the queers I know live on a planet, I think a healthy dose of good climate news is a win here! Here are my two favorites: this Japanese golf course turned into a solar farm is solarpunk as hell, and 211 different native plants are thriving under the panels without ever having been planted (meaning they naturally spread and thrived there). ALSO for the first time EVER, Gasoline-only vehicles made up 49% of global new-vehicle sales in the first half of 2026, down from 73% in 202. THAT’S HUGE!!!
I have lots of mixed feelings about the US military. I am, however, feeling particularly proud to read about the Navy and Marine Corps courts defying orders and refusing to discharge their transgender peers with otherwise exemplary service records.
The Supreme Court has temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s attempts to ban healthcare and social accommodations for transgender inmates.
In Serbia, a student-led protest movement has unseated the far-right government that’s been in power since 2014.
In Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won the presidential election last week and defeated the far right candidate Flavio Bolsonaro. Many hope this win will stop the recent growth of the far right in Latin America.
People doing Good Queer Stuff (and needing your help!)
Comfrey Films (the awesome Black Trans film festival I wrote about in April) is hiring in Durham, NC for a full time Program Director and a part-time Grant Writer!
Point of Pride, an amazing organization helping fund gender affirming medical care and garments for a LOT of trans people, is a finalist for the Anthem awards! We have until TOMORROW NIGHT to vote for them here (and check out all the other amazing finalists!)
The QT Library is looking for books, funds, and volunteers to help create their dreams of opening a brick and mortar queer library in Boston!
Good Queer News is in the process of growing to be able to sustain multiple regular paid contributors, and any and all paid subscriptions will be put towards helping GQN build as much hope as possible. Thank you for your support!
That’s all I’ve got for today. Take care of yourself. Have a good day on purpose, and go out there and make some good queer news worth celebrating!! No matter how things shake out tomorrow, or Tuesday, or the next day, we’ll all be here fighting the fight.
All my love,
Ben
Thank you!! I'm so grateful to you for all you do.
From the Great Blue Heron (such beautiful and exotic birds!) to the support some trans military members are receiving, and everything in between - thx for spreading g good news!