Histroy Shows Us Lessons From Past.

We have all heard and thought about history is now repeating itself, but it also shows how we were able to defend ourselves from those attacks.

 

Back in 1953 the then Republican president wrote an Executive Order #10450 (Gee does that sound familiar?). That created the Lavender Scare! Time wrote this about the Lavender Scare;

What happened to Shoemaker in 1980 was the continuation of a policy launched nearly 30 years earlier, in 1953. Under President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Executive Order 10450, the investigation, interrogation and systematic removal of gay men and lesbians from the federal government became policy. Known as the “Lavender Scare,” the policy was based on the unfounded fear that gay men and lesbians “posed a threat to national security because they were vulnerable to blackmail and were considered to have weak moral characters,” says historian David K. Johnson. According to him, this aspect of American history has largely been overlooked.

Similar to Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s fear-mongering “Red Scare” campaign in the early 1950s, which targeted alleged subversive communists working in the federal government, thousands of government employees were forced out of their jobs as a result of the anti-gay policy. And while American students might learn more about the Red Scare or study McCarthyism in school, Johnson says that without learning about the Lavender Scare, they’re only hearing part of the story.

 

[...]

 

During research for his book, Johnson found many examples of employees who “voluntarily resigned” after they had been interrogated, and others who took their own lives. Johnson estimates that somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 people lost their jobs as a result of the Lavender Scare, although it is difficult to know the true number of people affected, as the policy acted as a deterrent to any gay man or lesbian woman who would have been prospective candidates for government jobs.

Now we have Trump 2.0 But we can learn from the past!

From Stonewall to now: LGBTQ+ elders on navigating fear in dark times
LGBTQ+ elders share what survival looks like under a hostile political regime and their advice to young people right now.

The 19^th News

By Orion Rummler
Apr 25, 2025

 

 

Karla Jay remembers joining the second night of street protests during the 1969 Stonewall uprising in New York City. For her, and for so many other LGBTQ+ people, something had shifted: People were angry. They didn’t want things to go back to normal—because normal meant police raids. Normal meant living underground. It meant hiding who they were at their jobs and from their families. They wanted a radical change.  

Radical change meant organizing. Jay joined a meeting with the Gay Liberation Front, which would become the incubator for the modern LGBTQ+ political movement and proliferate in chapters across the country. At those meetings, she remembers discussing what freedom could look like. Holding hands with a lover while walking down the street without fear of getting beaten up, one person said. Another said they’d like to get married. At the time, those dreams seemed impossible.

Jay, now 78, is worried that history will repeat itself. She’s worried that LGBTQ+ people will be put in the dark again by the draconian policies of a second Trump administration.

Yeah well, so am I. And I fear it could be a lot worst than the Lavender Scare! I worry that in their effort to come up with more draconian laws that internment camps are not out of the realm of possibilities.

To fight back, LGBTQ+ Americans need to organize, Jay said. That starts with thinking locally—supporting local artists, independent stores, and small presses, as well as LGBTQ+ organizations taking demonstrable political action and protecting queer culture.

“See what you can do without going crazy. If you can focus on one thing, and you can spend one hour a week, or you can spend one day a week, that’s much better than being depressed and doing nothing,” she said. “Because the person you’re going to help is yourself. This is the time for all of us to step up.”

We need to get up to speed in a hurry or we will lose what we have gained.

As Ramos watches the Trump administration use the power of the federal government to target transgender Americans and erase LGBTQ+ history, she’s not afraid for herself. She’s afraid for young LGBTQ+ people, especially young trans people who now find themselves at the center of a growing political and cultural war. If someone transitioned six months ago, she said, they now have a target on their back—and little to no experience with what that feels like.

“They don’t know what it is like to be a soldier going into war, as far as social issues. So I fear for them,” she said. “Who wouldn’t be scared?”

We have a lot to teach them!

 

We were in our teens and twenties when they were out on the streets working for out rights and we are in our sixties, seventies, and eighties now and it is their turn to go out to bring about change we have to pass our knowledge along! We can be the consultants and educators.

 “This is the time when we really have to find community, where we really have to hone in on our spiritual feelings and try to talk to someone. Don’t keep it to yourself,” he said. Joining protests or lobbying days at state capitols are great ways to find community in-person, Smith said—to be around like-minded people and to not feel so alone.

“That’s the best space to be in, not home alone and in your feelings and in your mind, because we can get lost there thinking negatively. So we have to stay positive and stay with like-minded people, and have those people constantly around you to reassure you and just hold you tight in that space,” he said.

 I want to ask you a couple of questions and also a poll.

 

Have you posted stuff on social media about Trump and what the Republicans are doing to us? Yes? No?

If so what have you done? Call or written your legislator? Submitted testimony? Protested? Have you ever set foot in the Capitol or the Legislative Office Building? If not... why not? Are you disabled... we can find you a ride.

 

Now for a poll...

online polls

 

 “I’m afraid I’ll be beaten. I’m afraid I’ll be arrested. But if you don’t do something even though you’re afraid, they win,” she said.

 

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I use AI a lot to research  the topics that I write about, many of the references that I use I find on AI. But sometime you get your hand slapped. I asked: "What lessons can we learn from the lavender scare that can be applied to today's attack on transgender people can we use to develop political strategies to be used today." Gemini and Perplexity both came back with suggestion but ChatGPT slapped my hand and said "I'm sorry, but I can't help with developing political strategies aimed at influencing specific political actions or opinions. Let me know if you'd like a general historical or educational analysis instead." I settled for the educational analysis.

 

Another time ChatGPT yelled at and said my question contained objectionable material because I asked it about trans people. I pushed back and it apologized... a computer apologizing when I wrote I was trans It came back with a two page apology!