Jay Kibble

An Open Letter to Performative Allies Asking Me How To Help

Torch the damn buildings down and speak with your whole throat.
 
Make your actions meaningful, the profile pic filters and memes are embarrassing at this point and don’t mean shit. (I’m so sick and tired of having to teach people how to show up for me as if I’m a new element on the periodic table that humankind has never encountered before.) Show empathy. Show up. Fuck politeness politics, put others in their place. Do big things. Do small things. Consider a reverse Uno of January 6. Give us our flowers while we are still here. Create safe houses, speak up in rooms of power, create avenues of opportunity. Fuck up and try again. Build community, build trust. We are desperate to feel the joy vibrating in our weary bones. Kill the part of you that thinks you’re doing enough because Nex Benedict, and San Coleman and Meraxes Medina and Alex Franco and Cocoa and Honee Daniels and Kassim Omar and Redd (also known as Barbie) and Tai Lathan and Vanity  Williams (also known as Chanel Williams) and Dylan Gurley and Monique Brooks and Shannon Boswell and Kenji Spurgeon and Pauly Likens and Liara Kaylie Tsai and Tayy Dior Thomas and Jazlynn Johnson and Kita Bee and Andrea Doria Dos Passos and Starr  Brown and Nevaeh “River” Goddard and Tee Arnold and Diamond Cherish  Brigman and Reyna Hernandez and África Parrilla García and Sasha Williams and Kitty Monroe and the 5,000 beautiful souls taken from us since 2008 would disagree if they were here to breathe.
 
Die for us so that we can keep going.
Die for us so that we no longer have to.