Juneteenth-Now!

Queering Liberation

Juneteenth-Now!

Queering Liberation

I was SO excited that Raquel Willis and I were going to have a conversation tomorrow, on Juneteenth Now: Queering Liberation. I love this woman. She is beautiful, inside and out, smart, kind, and a committed feminist love warrior. Listening to her talk—whether on a stage, on television or in a room—her voice makes me think of cornbread and honey, of honeysuckle and magnolias, of the majesty of a self-possessed southern women, poised, pulled together, quietly powerful.

Raquel had to change plans because on June 18, the Supreme Court upheld the state of Tennessee’s law that withholds gender affirming care from Trans gender minors. This is likely to have broad implications for access to medical treatment for transgender youth in half the country. The highest court in the land concluded that Bb1, the states measure, does not run afoul of the equal protection guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment. Justices Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson were in dissent; Sotomayor wrote that Tennessee’s law discriminates against transgender adolescents.

With irrevocable damage to equal protection under the law at stake, Raquel had to go to work.

Why am I writing about Transgender youth on Juneteenth? Because we are not free until everyone is free. Because the surviving and thriving of humanity—liberty land justice for all—are tied up together. Because I can’t be fully who I am intended to be until you are fully who you are intended to be. Because though the Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, the Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship, due process and equal protection to freed Africans. The Fourteenth Amendment supports Black liberation.

I write about Transgender rights on Juneteenth because if this regime and the courts it has stacked to help put its agendas forth all believe that the equal protection clause does not put a demand on us to protect folks on the basis of gender and sexuality, it is also weakened around birthright citizenship, and it is also weakened about the civil and human rights of Black people.

I write because our movements must be intersectional. Our demand for liberation must be for all the people. We don’t get to decide upon whom the bright light of freedom should shine. We don’t get to be silent while human rights and liberation are eroded. We’ve got to stand up for all the people and stand up for love. Love liberates.

I missed Raquel today, but I am following her in all she does. You should, too. Check out her pages here and check out the Gender Lib movement here. If you want to be more intersectional in the spaces of Black and Queer liberation, follow Zayn Silva and Tiq Milan.

Tiq and I had a powerful conversation on my Love. Period. podcast. Listen to it here. And if you are looking for a spiritual community that will love you, no matter how you look or who you love, come hang out at Middle Church. This Sunday, we are celebrating Juneteenth, and Pride. I’m preaching about our shared liberation, and the music is going to be popping.

Happy Juneteenth!

Happy Pride!

You are beautiful,

Jacqui