It's yet another day that Donald Trump and Mike Pence are exploiting our military for political points. As a military veteran and proud transgender woman, tonight hits home for me. It's personal. So, let's be absolutely clear about what this means... (thread)
#ProtectTransTroops
#ProtectTransTroops
2/ For over three years, I carried caskets in Arlington National Cemetery. I folded American flags for loved ones. I ceremoniously unloaded transfer cases of the remains of fallen women and men in uniform being carried home from Iraq and Afghanistan to Dover Air Force Base.
3/ Every casket and transfer case I carried was covered by an American flag. Every single one. And that is all I remember about any of them. I never knew their race. I never knew their sex or sexuality or gender identity. I never knew their religion or education or birthplace.
4/ I didn't know their political party or if they voted for Bush or Kerry or Obama or McCain. I didn't know what music they liked or their guilty pleasure movie or what they did with their friends on the last Saturday night in their hometown before shipping out to war.
5/ I'll never know the names of their parents and spouses and children. I'll never know the intimate details of their personal lives. I'll never know who they loved and how they saw themselves in the world. I don't know anything about those I carried to their final resting place.
6/ All I knew about those I carried were that 1) they died in service to this country and 2) they wore the flag of this country to the grave.
No one at Dover Air Force Base or Arlington National Cemetery asked if those we buried were secretly transgender. It didn't matter.
No one at Dover Air Force Base or Arlington National Cemetery asked if those we buried were secretly transgender. It didn't matter.
7/ The lies perpetuated by Trump + Pence about transgender people serving in the military have been thoroughly debunked. By medical experts, by budget analysts, by military leadership, and not least: by a history of Americans who were barred from service and proved bigots wrong.
8/ They barred black people. They barred women. They barred gay, lesbian, and bisexual people. We have been at this intersection of cowardice and fear many times, and we always are reminded that the only true threats to our military's strength are hatred and an absence of ethics.
9/ Trump and Pence are cowards who did not serve a day in uniform, who actively avoided service, who could not muster the courage to sign up when their country needed them. They have insulted and abused members of the military. They have betrayed service members repeatedly.
10/ This attempted ban on transgender people in the military is not done for the good of our national security or the strength of our military. It is done as a disgusting act of hatred that seeks to alleviate the same fears that have always arrested the progress of our nation.
11/ Transgender people are not going anywhere. We will not be erased. We will not yield an assessment of our humanity and patriotism to treasonous cowards. And mark my words: we will prevail. November is coming. /thread
