Letter to my Normie Friends.
Felt good to be joyous. Man doing something is so much better than sitting, watching, and feeling like shit isn’t it? Remember that feeling. Cherish it.
I never wanted this blog to be political. The intent was to force myself to practice writing and to start marketing my novel but events over took my intent and I've never been good at keeping my mouth shut so here we are. In the aftermath of Sunday's "No Kings" march, after seeing so many friends and family take to the street to protest for the very first time I decided to sit down and write them all a letter, something of a thank you note, and a rally crying to keep going. Like everything I write, I hope it resonates but I won't know if I got it right until y'all read it.
06/14/2025
Dear Normie Friends and Family,
Thanks for coming out today and welcome. I know, being normies, y’all had better things to do but it was good to see y’all come out to a protest. Your costumes were on point. I like the creative signs. Love seeing y’all waving the flag for good, representing what this country is supposed to be about. I hope y’all had a good time.
I feel a little dirty admitting this, and I didn’t set out to trick you, but now that you’re home and safe I gotta tell you it was brave stepping out today. There was a legitimate terrorist threat against rallies in Minnesota and Texas. Proud Boys showed up in Georgia and Florida. Neo-Nazis showed up in Pennsylvania. Someone drove their car into a march in Virginia. Someone was shot in Salt Lake City. Police acted out in North Carolina and L.A. needlessly attacking an otherwise peaceful crowd. Bet y’all didn’t know you were putting your body on the line today, but you did, you survived, and it seems like y’all had a good time.
That’ll make it easier next time.
And yea, I’m sorry, but there’s gonna have to be a next time. This was just a start. Today was fun, but the harsh reality is, 2025 was always going to be a long, hot summer. Tomorrow there will still be troops in the streets of Los Angeles. Tomorrow there will still be armed threats against Democrat officials. Tomorrow masked goons will still be snatching working people out of parking lots. After the bust of the Washington D.C. military parade our President is gonna be pissed and we all know he’s going to lash out. Today was just the beginning.
It felt good though, didn’t it? Felt good to do something. Felt good to be surrounded by people who cared, moving together toward some common goal. Felt good to be in a community and to do something positive. Felt good to be joyous. Man doing something is so much better than sitting, watching, and feeling like shit isn’t it? Remember that feeling. Cherish it.
Because now I want you to do something hard. I want you to do something scary and shitty that I know is going to make you feel bad. I want you to read the comments. Check Facebook. Peek at Instagram. Scroll Tik Tok. Look under news articles. (Whatever you do DON’T go to Twitter/X.) I want you to go and look at what the people in your community, what the deacons at your church, have to say about what happened today. I want you to go read their hateful words. Are you an outside agitator? An anarchist? A communist? A paid agent? Do you hate America? Do you have Trump Derangment Syndrome? Are you mentally defective? Are you a brainwashed sheep? No. But your neighbors, the car dealership owners and landscaping company bosses say you are. They’re calling for your blood right now. They’re cheering for you to be run down with cars, mauled by dogs, beaten and shot all the while whining that you were violent. You’ll find a lot of your local politicians are egging this kind of talk on too. Go ahead, put on Fox news. Look.
Remember what your protest was like and think about how these people describe it. Hold on to that awful thought.
Whether like me you’re a veteran and an ex-cop, or you’re a college professor, or a retired school teacher and former Republican, you are now officially a communist. You’re a leftist. You may have been born in the town you protested in but you are now an outside agitator bussed in by “THEM” to cause trouble. Now you’re ANTIFA. Now you’re a drag queen. Now you’re queer. Now you’re mentally defective. Now you’re weak. Now you’re sick. Now you’re the bad guy. You getting what I’m laying down here yet? Those people in the comments, on the news, the ones sharing memes calling for blood, they hate you just as much as they hate the homeless. They hate you just as much as they hate my trans friends. They hate you the same as they hate LGBTQ folks, or black folks, or Latinos. That sense of shock and outrage and betrayal you feel when you read your neighbors talking about killing you is what some folks have been feeling every day for their entire lives. Don’t forget that.
They, the immigrants, the minorities, the disabled, the homeless, the LGBTQ, they’ve dealt with that fire hose of violent hate that you just experienced for their entire lives.
And it’s our fault. Mine and yours. We’re responsible for it because we didn’t stand up soon enough. When the great-aunt at Thanksgiving talked endlessly about all those godless liberals we just rolled our eyes and kept our mouth shut. When the dipshit, failson, cousin started spouting conspiracy theories at Christmas we tsk tsk’d under our breath and let it go. When our grandparents used racial slurs we cringed but didn’t say anything because they’re old right? We have to judge them based on the time they were raised in? When we heard a pastors kid call President Obama a racist slur we kept our mouth shut because it wasn’t our place to discipline someone else’s child, besides, we knew where they got it. We pretended that the internet wasn’t real, that “jokes” and memes on our cousin’s Facebook didn’t count.
Most of us didn’t do it out of malice, or hatred. We ignored the problem because we weren’t black, or brown, or queer, or broke. It didn’t affect us so it wasn’t worth the fight. We didn’t want to hurt people’s feelings. We didn’t want to lose friends. We didn’t want to miss out on birthdays and christenings. We were raised not to rock the boat. We were raised that blood was thicker than water. We were raised not to cut loved ones out over something as silly as “politics.” So we let that hate fester and spread and the people we loved and respected, the one we thought we were protecting with our silence, are turning the hate they had for “others” against us.
I’m sorry for what you’re about to experience. I truly am. It is shocking and devastating when people you loved and respected turn on you. It hurts so bad when your own blood mocks and belittles you for standing up for the values you thought they’d instilled in you. The die is cast now I’m afraid. You’re going to lose friends. You’re going to become estranged from loved ones. It’s going to hurt. Remember though, we’ve all been there. More importantly, our black and brown and queer friends have been dealing with this shit their whole lives. We’re all in this together now. You’re part of a found family now. A chosen family. Remember that, and remember how good it felt today, to be out doing something with like minded people. Remember it felt good to take action. It feels good to try to make the world better.
And we can. We really can. Hell, look how far you’ve already come. You protested. You’d rather be sitting on the couch watching golf or working in the garden or fishing or playing with the grandkids but you went out to the streets. That’s a big first step. Now we have to sustain it. So I’ve got another challenge for you. Take Sunday off. Rest. But after you read this I want you to do something, anything, to keep protesting. Put up a lawn sign. Buy some Pride month merch. Donate to bail funds. Call your congress people. Write a letter to an editor. Have a hard conversation with a friend. Choose something and take action because the more you do it, the better you’ll feel and the easier it comes.
The most important thing you can do though is remember today. Remember the crowd around you, how joyous, spirited, and welcoming they were but also remember those awful comments. Remember the way the news covered your march. Remember what your congressman said about it. Next time, when things go sideways and the cops unleash tear gas and the politicians tell you violent thugs had to be suppressed remember you were standing there once and things were peaceful. Hell things were fun. Things were cheerful. Remember when you were singing and chanting and waving your cute signs that they were calling you the outside agitators. They were calling you the violent thugs. Next time, when they label it a riot instead of a protest and the men in body armor and masks begin cracking skulls remember the people to your left and right today. Remember it could be you and when it is they won’t care.
Today was a beginning. 2025 will be a long, hot, summer. People are going to get hurt. People have already gotten hurt, assassinated by a violent right wing, run over by cars, gassed and beaten and trampled by cops. Yet millions of people took to the streets peacefully to make their voices heard in towns big and small all across this country. Y’all should be proud of that. Y’all should be proud of yourselves. We can win. You saw that today. Our neighbors are decent people. This country is a decent place. We can make it better. We can make it what it’s supposed to be, but it’s going to take work.
I appreciate what y’all did today. It took more courage than most people will admit. I’m proud of y’all. No matter how bad it gets we’ll make it through. We’ll win. On the bad days remember how good today felt and when you feel down remember doing something makes you feel better. Welcome to the fight. We’re glad to have you. I’m glad to have you. Take a second to pat yourself on the back, then pick a lane and let’s get to work.
Love you,
Jeremy
To help get you started, here are links to two of the charities I've donated to this month.
Lambda Legal is a legal org that focuses on Civil Rights of LGBTQ and HIV+ folks.
National Bail Fund Network provides bail money to people who cannot afford cash bail. Since y'all are new to this, bail is set by the courts and "dangerous" "violent" offenders who are a threat to the community are typically not given bail or are given bail amounts too high to be covered by donated bail funds.
Everyone's Healing is an org raising money to provide low cost/no cost therapy to family members of people detained by ICE
https://donorbox.org/therapy-for-immigration-detainees-and-family-members
