Year 2013: I’m a 22 year old queer who moves to Kansas to paint a rainbow house across from a notorious hate group. I realize the politicians here are more dangerous than the hate group; however, the people seem nothing like the politics that dominate. I start to really like Kansas. My boss asks me when I’m coming back to New York since this project was suppose to only be a few months. I tell him “I think I live in Kansas now.”
2014: The most extreme right-wing one-sided government in KS history is elected.
2015: Brownback rescinds LGBTQ protections by executive order making it legal to fire and harass LGBTQ state workers. The KS government increasingly uses prejudice and scapegoating to distract from their failing economic experiment. In response, we organize the largest protest in many years. I get messages from gay state workers who are scared for their safety and future. Kansas is a very dark place in this moment... A Senator walks by me in the Statehouse and softly mentions how wrong the attacks on the LGBTQ community are.
2016: I leave LGBTQ activism to devote myself completely to voter registration and turnout. I’m convinced that if more young Kansans voted things would be different.
2017: 1/3 of the KS legislature is newly elected as a rebuke to Brownback. The first week of session they are greeted by over a thousand Kansans screaming “Whose House? Our House.” We’ve united different groups under a Kansas People’s Agenda demanding change. The Legislature starts to turn things around and activism is growing. The Brownback Experiment is repealed… Some random lady messages me saying she wants to talk about the future of Kansas. She’s pretty great.
2018: That random lady, Sharice Davids, is elected the first LGBTQ Congressperson from Kansas. She gives a victory speech surrounded by LGBTQ youth. I’m overwhelmed thinking back to how most my life I thought accepting my sexuality meant forfeiting my future. The same night Brandon Woodard and Susan Ruiz are elected the first LGBTQ Kansas State Representatives.
2019: The Senator who softly spoke words of solidarity to me in 2015, Laura Kelly, is the Governor and her first executive order is restoring LGBTQ protections to state workers.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing happens by accident.
Every drop of decency is fought for.
November 10th 2018
Woah! 
Thank you for liking and sharing my story! Didn’t expect it to be liked by [126] thousand people
I’ve received a ton of messages so I want to address a few:
If you want to support my work please donate to Loud Light.
If you want to support work in your community please find a small nonprofit that could really use your help before donating to a big name.
If you want to work for change: just do it. Start by showing up for others. Find where you can be helpful. Once you get engaged you may realize you should be doing something very different than you first thought.
The last 6 years have been filled with ups and downs. None of this happened just because of me. There is a larger community working for change. If it’s organizing a protest or calling to check up on someone who’s struggling, arranging transportation or formatting a zine, all work is valid and critical. 99% of the work goes without public recognition. 0% of the change could happen without the thankless work. I want to reiterate all labor is valid and critical. This is hard to recognize when you're at an event of 5 people and feel like things are getting worse.
Kansas isn’t an oasis against prejudice. I’m not suggesting that any of our gains mean prejudice disappeared. There is a ton of work to be done politically and socially. The work needs to be done in every single community.
No state is a monolith.
No person should be written off.
There is good and bad in all places.
We need change everywhere.
Human Rights
Politics
Social Issues