A RALLYING LIE

It’s supposed to be about issues, I keep telling myself. 

 

The man has no platform. He doesn’t want to talk issues. He’d have to defend them. Hell, he’d have to know them.

 

How can anyone disregard Project 2025 when he offers nothing to counter or clarify?

 

Instead of a platform, we get distraction. We get headline-making provocation.

 

And, for the most part, after a day of “outrage,” we shrug it off. There’s always a new provocation to get worked up about. The barrage of distractions should sink the man and his shot at the White House, but instead, he keeps trending, keeps getting the attention he craves.

 

There. That’s my preface. I know all this. You know all this too, right?

 

And yet one provocation that arose again last week—he’s down to re-spinning his greatest hits now—requires that I not shrug it off even though we were pelted with new provocations over the weekend. (Seriously, America, aren’t you exhausted?)

 

It’s Donald Trump’s repeating that schools are aiding and abetting—even actively initiating—gender changing procedures for minors that I cannot let go by with a shrug or a “Oh, that’s just Trump” non-analysis. (You really are exhausted, America.)

 

Speaking with Joe Rogan on Friday, Trump said, “Who would want to have — there’s so many — the transgender operations: where they’re allowed to take your child when he goes to school and turn him into a male — to a female — without parental consent.”

 

Like so many Trump comments these days, I have to reread or replay the quote first. The 78-year-old man has gotten less coherent in his rambles, but this statement is Trump at his clearest. And what he says is utterly preposterous. If anything, the quote should establish that Trump is not of sound mind. A generous take on it would be to say he’s woefully broadened and distorted the ongoing issue of pronoun preferences and whether teachers must have parental consent to address students with non-cisgender corresponding ones.

 

But even that should be damning. How can the presidential candidate for a major political party misstate or misunderstand an issue so badly? But he banks on the fact he’s not fact-checked by his supporters or even by begrudging non-fans in the Republican Party who still attempt to defend or deflect what the man says. 

 

“Oh, that’s just Trump.”

 

Yeah, that’s just the man on the ballot seeking another term as President of the United States. Shake yourselves, America. “That’s just Trump” is not an acceptable reaction. Donald Trump has been interviewing to get his job back for four years and, wow, this is not someone you hire. No, not even to run the fry machine at McDonald’s. 

 

You know this. And your crazy uncle/neighbor/co-worker knows this, too. They go along for the sport of it and, when I say “sport,” I’m talking the fake kind, that staged wrestling which made a household name of performers like Hulk Hogan. Fake sport, fake news, fake facts. (Damn Kellyanne Conway and her “alternative facts.”) 

 

Schools are not helping kids get hormones or operations to change gender. Trump knows this. He openly lies. And that’s deemed acceptable by fifty percent of the voting public. (Really, America? How is this possible? If you distrust politicians so much, why do you give a free pass to the most intentionally distrustful of the lot?)

 

This particular lie rankles me so much because I spent my career as a teacher and school principal. If there were even one case of school officials in some way transporting a student to a healthcare facility or otherwise enabling a gender-changing surgery, it would be all over the news. The teacher would be named. The school would be known. The school district would have to investigate, dismiss the school staff member and go into damage control. I would be horrified of such a case which is the reaction Trump is eliciting…just without such a case. 

 

This nonsense freaks out his base. They don’t understand gender pronouns much less actions to align one’s body with the gender that feels authentic. They have been plenty worked up over boys going into girls’ bathrooms and running against them at track meets. Now this? Surgery?! Without parental consent?! Outrageous! And not happening.

 

Trumped-up outrage causes more negative feelings toward people who identify as trans or nonbinary. It damages the greater LGBTQ+ community. It further tarnishes public education. It creates another dent in the trust and respect that teachers work so hard to gain. (Respect is far from a given anymore.) 

 

Trump doesn’t care. Trump was never a product of the public school system. Mr. Bone Spurs attended the private Kew-Forest School from kindergarten to grade seven, then went to private boarding school at the New York Military Academy. 

 

The disparaged groups are all traditionally Democrat-leaning voters. His allegation is a safe lie. No losses in terms of voters. It’s better than safe. It’s a rallying lie. Vote for Trump or those teachers are going to be out of control! Whole classes are going to have their genitals transformed during math! Fear the Woke. Vote them away.

 

This is gross. It’s pathetic. And…it’s working.

 

It undermines truth in reporting. It feeds conspiracy creators and spreaders. I’m glad CNN reported this yet again. In this article, CNN does an exemplary job debunking any allegation that schools are complicit in gender-changing medical care for children. Read it. Pass it on to your crazy uncle/neighbor/co-worker. They won’t read it, but they will have a clear takedown of Trump’s allegation within reach. Maybe, just maybe, curiosity will tweak them before they double down. It’s indeed a reach but it beats being resigned to not just playing with the facts but playing with all-out fiction.

 

And then look to see where Trump stands on issues. If you find nothing but a shell or a total void, know that's as good as it gets. Know that Trump will improvise presidential leadership just as he has improvised his campaign. Vote to make this circus roadshow go away for good. Let the exhaustion end. 

 

 

 

  

BAYARD RUSTIN, BY THE BOOKS

One thing that’s been made readily apparent in recent years is that history is not static. In an era of “alternative facts” and politicians meddling with educational curricula, the past stories of a time, place or person can be controlled to align with a particular narrative. 

 

This isn’t entirely new. As a boy living in Canada, I often heard it said that America’s first president never told a lie. It was part of the ongoing effort to enshrine him as a legend, a hero and a symbol of goodness. George Washington being the first president was not enough. If only America still valued truthfulness. What will the “legend” of Trump be?

 

History has long been his-story, told by men, mostly white, presumably straight. The subject matter went down smoothly with clear heroes and villains. Now that women and minorities are diving deeper into history and insisting that their roles be included in the telling, it’s causing resistance. It’s becoming more uncomfortable. Statues of revered white men get toppled. Extra perspectives clutter long-established accounts of The Way We Were. It’s so inconvenient. 

 

I find new accounts fascinating. I’ve always enjoyed history. It was one of my majors in university. I especially liked when a professor or a resource offered stray bits that muddied standard accounts. My eyes glazed over when lectures centered on battle scenes, but I leaned forward every time key moments in history were analyzed in terms of societal impacts. Blemishes in a nation’s history were not to be suppressed. Weren’t we supposed to learn from our mistakes? Alas, we’re in a period of time when many want to avoid discussing mistakes, much less learning from them.  

 

MY GOVERNMENT MEANS TO KILL ME: A NOVEL

 

By Rasheed Newson

 

(Flatiron Books, 2022)

 

 

A few months ago, I read a historical gay novel set during the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, Rasheed Newson’s My Government Means to Kill Me: A Novel. The tacked on “A Novel” is important because Newson’s story is heavily footnoted, a practice lending a scholarly quality to the telling. (I think it’s the history geek in me that adores footnotes. They are the equivalent to DVD extras—little anecdotes and explanations that often spur me to exploring online rabbit holes.) Most of Newson’s footnoted references were already familiar to me, having lived through the ’80s and reading my share of both Black history and gay history. It pleased me to know that much of Newson’s extras would offer new learning for others. However, this footnoting, while refreshing and offering something unique in gay fiction, became a hindrance at times. It made the story gimmicky, as the author had, Trey Singleton, his Black gay main character, stumbling into too many historical moments like a queer Forrest Gump. A good idea, taken too far.

 

And one of the things that felt far too far was the author’s inclusion of Baynard Rustin, a real life Black gay civil rights leader, who becomes a guru for Trey, Rustin’s perch not on top of a Himalayan peak but in a New York bathhouse, a simple white towel around the waist serving as an apparel modification from the draped white cloth worn by cartoon gurus. In Newson’s account, Rustin spends A LOT of time in the bathhouse. I recall at least one scene with him having sex. In a footnote, Newson explains that there is no evidence that Rustin frequented bathhouses. This is when I sighed. I may love footnotes, but I’m aware that many readers skip them. An important clarification will be missed.

 

Martin Luther King, Jr.
and Bayard Rustin

To some readers, and likely the author himself, this portrayal may come across as humorous, even enlightened. While the novel states this is a pure fictionalization, it feels like an unnecessary stunt. Rustin is credited with being an early mentor of Martin Luther King, Jr. and helping organize the 1963 March on Washington. No doubt, Rustin was as flawed as any human and entitled to a sex life, but this feels like an offensive twist. Call me a prude. 

 

Still, credit that novel with making me seek out more about the actual life of Bayard Rustin, a name I’d vaguely recognized and associated with the civil rights movement without anything more substantive. I read the Wikipedia blurb and clicked on a few of the footnotes. And then I stumbled upon a picture book about him, A Song for the Unsung: Bayard Rustin, the Man Behind the 1963 March on Washington. I was pleased to find four copies in the Vancouver Public Library system. 

A SONG FOR THE UNSUNG: BAYARD RUSTIN, THE MAN BEHIND THE 1963 MARCH ON WASHINGTON

 

By Carole Boston Weatherford & Rob Sanders

 

Illustrated by Byron McCray

 

(Henry Holt and Company, 2022)

 

 

A Song for the Unsung is a fitting title for a book about Rustin. Music was an integral part of Rustin’s life. Raised as a Quaker, Rustin attended university with support from a music scholarship and at one point recorded an album of spiritual songs. (All this makes his fictionalized bathhouse presence more of an affront.) In many ways, he was an unsung civil rights leader due, in part, to being an openly gay man. His activism took place behind the scenes since his homosexuality was considered a distraction and a way to disparage not only Rustin but civil rights activism. How far we’ve come to have a picture book celebrate the life of Bayard Rustin and, in particular, his leadership in organizing the March of Washington, an event attended by 250,000 and the occasion when Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. The book doesn’t focus on Rustin being gay, offering only a passing reference: “As a young Black gay man, Bayard Rustin was also learning about another kind of inequality and injustice.” 

 

Rustin during his later years, skirted any attempts to cast him as someone who fought for gay rights. In his own words:

I was not involved in the struggle for gay rights as a 

youth ... I did not "come out of the closet" voluntarily

—circumstances forced me out. While I have no 

problem with being publicly identified as homosexual, 

it would be dishonest of me to present myself as one 

who was in the forefront of the struggle for gay rights.  

 

While Rustin was open with peers about being gay, the matter became public knowledge due to an arrest in Pasadena in 1953 for allegedly have sex with two other men in a parked car. He pleaded guilty to “sex perversion” and served sixty days in jail. Rustin received a posthumous pardon from California Governor Gavin Newsom in 2020.

 

In My Government Means to Kill Me, Rasheed Newson portrays Rustin as a wise advisor to Trey and Rustin’s social activism is referenced. I have no idea how Rustin would react to the portrayal of him being a regular presence at a bathhouse. Maybe he’d shrug, maybe he’d roll his eyes, maybe he’d pick up present-day lingo and say, “WTF?” It seems as dignified of a response as warranted.

 

Rustin wasn’t a saint. As well, some of his political leanings and his motivations may be questionable. All that is worth of research and scores of footnotes. To make him a bathhouse fixture comes off as trivializing and downright rude.

 

I shall close this post, recasting Bayard Rustin in a more accurate, reverential regard, quoting from Barack Obama in 2013 when Rustin was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom:

Bayard Rustin was an 

unyielding activist for 

civil rights, dignity, 

and equality for all. 

An advisor to 

the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., he promoted nonviolent resistance, participated in one of the first Freedom Rides, organized the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, and fought tirelessly for marginalized communities at home and abroad. As an openly gay African American, Mr. Rustin stood at the intersection of several of the fights for equal rights.

 

 

 

EXIT, STAGE RIGHT

I’ve delayed this post because I thought the issue would go away. And yet this guy’s like the dinner guest who won’t take the hint and just leave.

 

Haven’t we all said it? “Bye, George.” 

 

Still, he stays.

 

It seems apropos to
mention toilet paper.

Why can’t George Santos fade away, unceremoniously flushed from memory like Milli Vanilli, that “Cats” movie and pumpkin spice toilet paper. Let anyone’s retelling about any of them follow with the uninformed saying, “You’re kidding, right?” If only.

 

As a Canadian, I remained blissfully ignorant of George for a while. Every country’s political arena has a few kooks; I didn’t need to gawk at what was going on regarding a newly elected member of the House of Representatives from New York. But then the bits and pieces of the representative’s misrepresentations leaked out in tweets I read and news stories I skimmed. George Anthony Devoider Santos claimed to have a degree in economics and finance from Baruch College in NYC. Never happened. He said earned an MBA from NYU. He didn’t. Worked for Goldman Sachs and Citigroup. Nope and nope. While writing this, I came across an article that said Santos lied about attending a high school in the Bronx and being a star volleyball player while at Baruch. That’s just some of it. I don’t want to know more. I’m not a constituent, thankfully. 

 

This is the kind of person who would lie about watching “The White Lotus” and digging Beyoncé if he thought it would improve his standing. Heck, I don’t think I could even trust his answer to “What’s your favorite color?” 

 

To be sure, the guy is delusional. A pathological liar. Someone who delights in deception. I know there are cynics who shrug and say, What do you expect? He’s a politician. They’re all liars. But even the most cynical would concede that something truthful might slip out once in a while. Not so, it seems, from Santos.

 

I also realize plenty of people embellish their resumés. There are limits, of course. Lying about degrees and previous employment should get anyone fired. It appears that George Santos’s entire resumé is a fabrication. (Who lies about their high school? Did he make it through ninth grade?) Who is he really? How can the 746,000 people living in New York’s 3^rd congressional district have any trust in him? 

 

George Santos isn’t as much of an anomaly as I’d like him to be. A person like him can feel emboldened by his idol, Donald Trump, a man who regularly makes things up about elections, his intelligence, his medical records and his businesses. Trump knows that his base will swallow anything he dishes out. Too many of the supposedly reputable Republicans have not dared to call bullshit. “That’s just Trump” some seem to say with a shrug. Much of Trump’s hot air about wealth and corporate success may have been dismissed as puffery, but the lack of fact checking and holding the former world leader accountable only gave him carte blanche to tell more dangerous lies. Then there’s Kellyanne Conway who introduced the public to “alternative facts” back in 2017. An impressionable wannabe politician like Santos only had to point to the most powerful members of his party to inspire him to run for office on wholly false qualifications. As galling as it is, it’s no surprise at all.

 

I’m disappointed with the Republican Party for either not vetting him or, as The New York Times, intoned yesterday, discovering the falsehoods and not disqualifying him as a candidate. Naturally, I’m disappointed—astonished even—with Democrats at the local level in opponent Robert Zimmerman’s campaign office and at the state and national level who didn’t do their own fact checking. Furthermore, the media needs to be called out for its own negligence in covering a key race. According to The Times, only “The North Shore Leader on Long Island, run by a Republican lawyer and former House candidate, Grant Lally,” found cause to label Santos as a “fabulist—a fake.” (According to Wikipedia, it has a circulation of 20,000.) A telling statement in yesterday’s article: “None of the bigger outlets, including The Times, followed up with extensive stories examining his real address or his campaign’s questionable spending, focusing their coverage instead on Mr. Santos’s extreme policy views and the historic nature of a race between two openly gay candidates.” 

 

It's only because Santos claims to be gay that I’m blogging about this audacious hanger-on. I can cast this vial individual aside, knowing I’m not an American or a New Yorker. But I feel the slightest association in that he’s gay. My knee-jerk reaction when I heard this was to dismiss him as one of those Log Cabin Republicans whom I cannot relate to. I don’t know how a gay man can put economics ahead of social issues, particularly regarding the LGBTQ community. Republicans have neither been our allies nor our advocates. Most recently, they have railed against trans rights to rile up the base, translating fear and ignorance into increased campaign coffers and votes. The fact they’ve stoked hatred, resulting in threats and violence, lowering the sense of safety and self-esteem among trans and nonbinary individuals matters not to them. Honestly, it’s unfathomable to me that anyone queer identifies as Republican. I don’t think such a person has any true sense of the history of LGBTQ hate and discrimination. 

 

Reps. Barney Frank and Gerry Studs
(undated photo)

Thirty years ago, I would have been embarrassed and appalled to learn someone so undeserving as George Santos got elected to Congress and refused to do the right thing and step down. Nowadays, it’s ridiculous for someone like Santos to make me feel any personal sense of shame. Clearly, doing the right thing is not in Santos’s playbook. Moreover, my gay identity is neither dented nor dinged because of someone like Santos. Thirty years ago, there were far fewer out-gay men, particularly in politics. Every move by gay Representatives Gerry Studs and Barney Frank mattered. (Indeed, both fell under scrutiny for sex scandals though each weathered the investigations and continued to be reelected to Congress.) We’re now in an era where, with the exceptions of country music and sports, coming out as a gay public figure warrants little, if any, attention in North America. Maybe a day of trending on Twitter alongside other topics like today’s popular fodder, #Conspiracy (yawn) and #TheLastOfUs (shrug…I don’t pay for its streaming channel). There are currently eleven other queer members of the House. More importantly, we can be proud of how brightly Pete Buttigieg shines in American politics. 

 

I could question Santos’s gayness as some have. Apparently, it’s come out—no pun intended—that he was previously married to a woman. Further, his purported husband seems to have disappeared from public view, along with the wedding ring Santos wore. It’s clear that we don’t know who George Santos is. I’m not sure if even he knows.

 

If Santos is gay, so be it. That has nothing to do with why he needs to fade away. My frustration with political parties and the press don’t compare to my astonishment over George Santos himself and the lies he hath spun. He is ultimately responsible for the breadth of deceit. He must be held accountable. 

 

May we forget him as quickly as we’ve erased another disgraced Republican congressman, Aaron Schock, who came out in 2020, five years after his resignation. Don’t Google him. Let him live in his newfound obscurity. Let that be Santos’s ultimate fate as well.