“I ask you to allow me to love my husband the way you are allowed to love.”
Quoting my grandfather is something those around me have come to expect. I grew up admiring the shadow he threw and having no problem walking in it, aspiring to cast one of equal standing. He is not a liberal person by nature and does not quite perhaps understand why I am gay, but his words cross all chasms of opinion. “To thine own self be true, doesn’t mean you walk only thinking of yourself, it means you walk thinking of others and how to best learn from them so that you are true.†I find myself thinking about that on a daily basis. Here is a man who grew up “knowing†that being gay was immoral, wrong, deviant, and yet he is able to also understand that it does not take away from who he is. It empowers him to be a wiser man, having learned from another.
Some people KNOW that being Jewish is wrong. Some KNOW that being black is wrong. Some KNOW that praying to Allah is wrong. Yes these people know these things. Are they wrong? This is where many today forget the important lesson I was blessed to have been shown at an early age, even though I am only now fully understanding its depth. It’s easy to say you are beautiful when you have no mirror. Each ignorant or maligned thought that we send out into the world is being sent back towards us. There was a time that “white†people were enslaved, yet was the lesson learned? There was a time that Allah was known and accepted far more than Jesus, was there a lesson learned? There was a time that the Israelites were segregated into a lot of land and oppressed, was there a lesson learned?
We are all no doubt thinking the same thing, those who do not learn from history are bound to repeat it. Maybe we aren’t all thinking the same thing. Perhaps some of you are thinking that I am an anti-Semite, or racist or an all-out bigot because of the times and questions I raised. I want any of you who for even a moment thought any of those things of me to keep that feeling. Keep that anger, that fight, that indignation and that need to protect yourself. That is what every gay person feels each day that goes by that we are not equal in this country.
Did you know that Charlene Strong was kept from seeing the person she had spent years with, built a home and family with, loved with as they laid passing away in a hospital room because she was not viewed as next of kin? Did you know that a young man was brutally gunned down right here in Washington, D.C. for being gay? Did you know that there are children, and I mean children not teens, running away from homes because they are being beaten, even threatened with death, because they are gay?
Look at your wife or husband and imagine their life slipping away, and now imagine being told you can’t walk the ten feet to hold them and reaffirm your love?
Watch your children for a moment. Now imagine them with bruises and broken bones that you inflicted. Then imagine them on the street, scraping garbage pails for food while you eat a full meal. Can you?
Look at your best friend and imagine taking a gun and pulling that trigger simply because their hair was brown.
Take that disgusting and vile hurt, sadness and anger and ally it with that feeling from before when you wanted to stand up and remind the world that you were not to be marginalized. That is the foundation on which we are calling for a change. As I write this I am watching the love of my life work. It’s not interesting or amusing, but I love every second of it. Why? I never know when the hatred and ignorance may keep us apart. I never thought I would ever feel this way or have these thoughts. Growing up in Canada I was fortunate in some ways. It’s a small country that for the most part is young and change is easy. I grew up in a world that protected and recognized me and said yes please marry the one you love! I don’t make this comparison out of a self-righteous motivation. I make it with a sad heart that I may never be able to say I do love you forever before the world. Or even worse, that I may not be able to say goodbye to the man who I have devoted my life to.
I learned last week that a good friend of mine from childhood lost his partner two days earlier. He was viciously stalked and ripped (yes I mean ripped) apart by a gang of, dare I use the term, people who felt that his being gay was wrong. My friend could not see his partner, nor collect the body of his beloved due to the ignorance of the government in the country within which this attack took place. His partner apparently cried out for hours, calling his name as he lay feeling his life slip away. He died not hearing that he was loved, and my friend lives on knowing this fact.
Please read this not with a mind to toss it aside as we do so many sad things that pass in front of us. Look at your family and picture any one of them feeling even a tenth of what real people are feeling each and every day. This is not a plea for people to change their minds about gay being ok. This is not a plea whatsoever in fact, this is a statement being sent to everyone out there who has ever loved someone to remind themselves that this life is fragile. We need to live and not just let live but encourage it! The only way to achieve that is to be sure that every person, every human, is afforded the ability to work, love and live freely and equally.
I ask you to allow me to love my husband the way you are allowed to love.
Growing up in Northern Ontario as a Jehovah’s Witness, Michael Talon experienced firsthand the struggle for equality. Now living in the U.S. with his partner, they work with advocates for federal equality, including immigration. Working side by side, Michael and his partner Brad, head of Luna Media Group, help to deliver messages for equality to the nation.
Enjoy this piece?
… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.
NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.
Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.
|
Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
