This Week's Opening Thought: November 17, 2025

This week’s opening thought, directed at people of pallor: Last Friday, I posted about how the current hubbub around that one particular Epstein e-mail was rooted in homophobia. By Sunday morning, I watched as hundreds of comments from an overwhelmingly large number of people of pallor called my queer self everything from a coward and a hetero mansplainer to homophobic for calling out casual homophobia and hoping we could all be just a little better than the 800 sexual innuendo memes floating across the internet right now. Most of them had profile bios touting their liberal views. Fun!

Meanwhile, a person of pallor I know posted a similar message to my own a day after my original post. The response they got? Nothing but kudos, atta boys, and agreements from other people of pallor.

Real talk?

I really need people of pallor, especially the “moderates” and the “allies,” to own why they hop online and attack Black and Brown folx, especially Black women and intersectional melanated folx, for having informed views and opinions that call you in or out for doing and saying harmful things then turn around and applaud people of pallor who damn near copy and paste what we already posted or said that irked you so much you couldn't contain your outrage towards us but could swallow hearing it from a plagiarizing skin-susceptible-to-the-sun virtue signaler.

I mean, we, the melanated masses, know why you do what you do. But I can't help but wonder if y'all ever have a moment in your day where you take a second to sit with your ingrained white supremacist values long enough to realize no matter how many rallies you attend, causes you swear you support, or books you read, you're still too thin-skinned to look yourselves in the mirror and process how angry Black and Brown folx, Black women, and melanated queer folx make you feel about how “good” as neighbors, co-workers, and community members y'all actually are

On Emails, Allegations, and Collective Engagement

TW: mentions of homophobia, pedophilia, hebephilia, ephebophilia, sex trafficking.

So... let’s talk about the elephant in the room.

At this point, I’m sure you’ve seen that one email from the 20,000+ Epstein emails alluding to an alleged sex act between two former presidents (one of them being the current acting president).

In less than 24 hours, that damn email has produced countless memes, skits, sketches, and jokes, and has become one of the hottest topics of conversation across the internet. We’ve all had us a nice lil’ laugh about it, our minds speculating wildly. I, too, got caught in the salaciousness of the situation, bringing it up to my wife a couple of times last night. My wife, being the person that she is, did not engage in the laughfest. Instead, she hit me with some realness.

We’re all participating in some groupthink homophobia, and it is not a good look, y’all.

Real talk? An alleged sex act between two consenting adults, regardless of their public personas and heteronormative nonsense they’ve both spewed over the years, is the most “whatever” part of this email leak at this point. Seriously. There are thousands of emails talking about sex trafficking, sexual abuse, and the assault of minors by prominent and wealthy people, y’all’s president likely being one of the people who either openly participated, knew all of this was happening, and decided not to stop it, or both. And yet here we all are, stuck on an alleged sex act between two cis men. We’re laughing about sexual relations between two men, likely because many of us are either unconsciously latching onto the piece of information from this info dump that is the least upsetting to us or taking this as another opportunity to engage in anti-gay rhetoric. Either way?

We’re collectively in the wrong, and many of us are doing inadvertent harm to our gay and queer friends, family, and neighbors.

Let’s not allow this distraction - because that’s precisely what it has become - to dominate our collective consciousness and pull us away from the fact that two of this country’s presidents were likely a part of a sex trafficking ring that catered to pedophiles, hebephiles, and ephebophiles.

And their victims deserve justice.

This Week's Opening Thought: July 14, 2025

Trigger warning: brief mentions of sexual abuse, pedophilia, and human trafficking.

This week's opening thought: It is wild to me that after everything we've all collectively had to endure with y'all's president and his administration, not to mention the things they've done that have targeted the most impoverished and vulnerable communities in our country, that the one thing y'all's president's fanbase is angry with him about isn't his "big, beautiful bill," tariffs, constant warmongering, and the upcoming widespread harm to their lives, medical care access, and financial situations but the DAMN JEFFREY EPSTEIN FILES.

Like, I'm not against outing pedophiles, abusers, and wealthy creatures who have engaged in assault and human trafficking. Far from it. Get 'em all, regardless of their political affiliations. But MAGA folx, y'all's president gaslighting y'all about the Epstein evidence and documentation we've all known has existed for some time is the one thing that was somehow the final straw? I mean, he's been gaslighting y'all MAGA folx for years now and doing harm to you and your families for 10 years, but this was somehow all that y'all could stand and y'couldn't stand no more? Y'all are burning your MAGA hats and posting TikTok diatribes with tears in your eyes over this situation when he's been dogwalkin' y'all for a decade and telling you to your face that you're better off with him as y'all's president when you weren't? And you've been defending y'all's president and his billionaire buddies for years because he told y'all to, even when it was obvious they were doing heinous things he was protecting them from having to atone for, but NOW you're enraged?

I ... don't even know how to begin to unpack that.

That's gotta be some damn good Kool-Aid for y'all to keep drinking it this long. What did he do, swap out the sugar for Sweet'n Low?

White supremacy is wild, y'all.

On An Election and A Country's True Identity

I'm not surprised. I'm saddened, but I’m not surprised.

I'm unsurprised that 59% of men of pallor and 52% of women of pallor voted the way they did. I'm sadly not surprised that after everything he said and will do to immigrants when he takes office, he still got 54% of the masculine-identifying and 37% of the feminine-identifying Latine and Hispanic vote.

I'm saddened, but I’m not surprised.

I am disheartened but unsurprised.

I didn’t need a reminder, but for those who did, this election was a firm reminder that the United States is precisely what it has always been: a country steeped in individualism and fear of moving forward, unwilling to be progressive and care for all its citizens, and legitimately uninterested in trying to be the country it likes to claim it is.

He won this election, and it wasn't even close in the popular or electoral vote. A party with a platform of hate, oppression, and regression will be in complete control of the Government come January 2025, and it wasn't even a fight.

And I know so many of y'all voted for this man and this party while playin’ in the faces of the people in your life who you know their policies and governance will do extreme harm to. Most of y'all are quick to bust out a Black Lives Matter sign or bring up trans and reproductive rights just to have a smoke screen to vote against everyone’s best interests.

I loathe that most of y'all won’t own your hatred and fear of losing what you think is exclusively yours - rights, privileges, and safety from tyranny.

I loathe that most of y'all won’t own who you are in front of those your choices impact.

I loathe that most of y’all will be shocked when the people you elected do the exact things you hired them to do and you find yourself and your families adversely impacted and in physical, mental, emotional, and economic distress.

But I’m not surprised.

You're Americans! That's what Americans do, right?

I'm saddened. I'm disheartened. I'm not surprised, though.

This is the American way, y'all.

Note: This poll data is from a subsection of the voter base from 10 states.

This Week's Opening Thought: June 3, 2024

This week's opening thought for senior leaders in organizations: Your homophobic, biphobic, transphobic workplace should probably not be celebrating Pride Month.

Ain't nobody got time for all of that performative nonsense. Real sh-- is going on all around us to the point where we're tired enough without having to put up with a month of performative shenanigans that are nothing more than another weapon to harm folx who work for you while you pat yourselves on the back.

We need more than a shout-out to Pride in a company email or team meeting. We need more than a performative PR stunt.

We need y'all to take the actionable steps to bounce the homophobes and transphobes from your organization's roster.

We need y'all to stand on business and call in and out those who do LGBTQIAA+ communities harm while representing you in these streets.

We need y'all to check yourselves and hold yourselves accountable for contributing to harm to queer and trans folx and looking the other way when your queer-identifying colleagues are hurt so you can stay in good standing with the oppressors you consider the in-crowd at work.

We need y'all to hold your human resources department accountable for allowing homophobia and transphobia to be shoulder-shrug moments and not actionable offenses.

Trinkets and hollow platitudes mean nothing when your workplace reflects the world outside of it in the worst possible ways.

There's a list of things that do not look good with a rainbow motif.

Your company logo is at the top of that list.

Stand on something or let the month pass you by.