Hello, hello NWI...from a different Lake soon!

Hello, hello NWI. If you’re watching this after the great changeover, you probably saw a new url and can guess what I’m going to tell you. I’m moving my show to Indivisible NWI. If you are a current follower or subscriber, you don’t need to do a thing. I’ll be moving my substack and all my social channels over to the new name and logo sometime next week, but your subscriptions will remain unless you opt to change them. So what’s the new show going to be like? Well, Indivisible by the Lake will be exploring Region life through an Indivisible lens. We’ll be educating NWI on the critical issues facing our Democracy: civic education, voting access, and, most important to me at least – how to restore the civil rights that have been eroding under our feet. Which is the perfect place for me to talk to you about this final episode. I recorded this back in June, after I went to my very first drag show with my trans teen. I learned some lessons about my own preconception, and I was saving it for a moment when ugly rhetoric reared its head. And oh my stars, are we there, folks. Every Democrat knows the stakes this November. Many have made the calculation – willing or otherwise – that the need to form an accountability check on the Trump administration means some issues matter more than others. I’ve watched thinker after strategist after pundit say time and again: “the trans issue isn’t important. It can wait until the next cycle.” But let’s say what they are really saying. “Trans people aren’t important. Their rights can wait until the next cycle.” Now let’s try something else. Let’s put another group in there. “Black people aren’t important. Their rights can wait until the next cycle.” Or “Immigrants aren’t important. Their rights can wait.” or “Pregnant women aren’t important. Their rights can wait.” And look how all that turned out: cops kneeling on a black man’s neck until he dies, ICE, and Roe v Wade overturned so miscarrying women bleed out in parking lots. Every time we ask a targeted community to wait for us to care about them, they suffer. For GENERATIONS. Guess how many of the 510,000 NCAA college athletes are trans? Ten. That’s 1 and 0. I’ve put a link to the NCAA’s report in the shownotes so you can read it yourself. As the parent of a trans teen, it’s been incredibly frustrating and disheartening, watching intelligent people swallow, unquestioned, arguments about sports and bathrooms and fairness that are clearly fruit from the same tree that sprouts things like ‘third-trimester mothers are aborting their babies for kicks” and ‘immigrants are gang members taking over our cities’ and ‘inner city welfare queens are making millions on welfare payments.’ Edge-case scenarios that play upon general misunderstanding of nuanced and rare situations. It’s the meat and potatoes of every ugly discriminatory argument we’ve seen since this nation was founded. Democrats should know better. Democrats should be better. I know better. And I’m not throwing my kids under anyone’s bus on their way to the white house OR the state house. I’m not throwing anyone else under the bus either. Now, when you see me next, I’ll be introducing you to the Indivisible candidates who earned Indivisible NWI’s first ever round of endorsements. And in the meantime, please please watch Miriam and her parents break through all my assumptions about drag performers. If you saw my clip in June, you’ll remember how dazzled I was. I left all my pearl clutching assumptions at the bottom of the hill I rolled down, because it was THAT joyous. It was glorious and humanizing and it made me realize immediately that if I, progressive blue podcaster, could have such hidden assumptions, who else might share that who needs a gentle nudge to explore those biases? Miriam, who is not trans, for the record and her parents did me the great honor of trusting me with their experiences. I challenge ANYONE to listen to this and not leave with a different viewpoint. Thank you to all of them for offering hope in these times that, yes, we can be ourselves and YES, the world can change for the better and YES, we CAN make Indiana a place that our children can thrive and be themselves and call home. And I hope you will stay with me as I help Indivisible bring the same spirit throughout NWI. I can think of no other organization better suited to do this work, and I’m beyond honored that they trust me to be one of their voices in this fight. So stay tuned! We’re just getting started. If you want to see more about Absolutely Dreadful, here they are! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit indivisiblebythelake.substack.com/subscribe