OK everyone tired of myself pushing / punishing posts about my childhood please skip this one. I won’t be talking much about my abuse only in vague terms. I am very tired, got up early to take care of the cat and been doing as much as I could all day. But I was OK, when my back gave out I let Ron do the dishes while I dried them so we could have the supper I made. It was a pork tender lion seasoned my way, mashed potatoes, green beans, and brown gravy. By the time that Ron was done, I was exhausted and hardly able to stand up, so he took over washing while I dried the few remaining dishes.
Then when I finished eating and got back to blogging. That was when YouTube slammed me with the song I will put at the bottom. The song is about a man and child abandoned by the mother as she got wealthy. But in my case when I did talk to my sires kids they told me why the little boy that was so shortly in their home and disappeared never to be spoken of. Seems that my sire’s wife said she wouldn’t tolerate another one of his off spring with other women to live in their house. She was already raising several of his children from women not her, and she was going to pull the line here. The little boy who already knew to hide and not be seen did not come into her concern at all. According to her daughter she was not a really nice person as she tried to pretend to the world she was. She simply did not care what happened to me as long as I was not in HER house nor taking her husband’s time away from her own kids. I asked my real sibling if the wife knew what would happen to me, and she said yes but she was willing to have it happen rather than take me into her home. I still have the letter and it causes me to cry each time, that an adult knew what I was going to face but simply did not care as raising me safety was more work for her and a reminder of her husband fucking other women.
So the song. All that glitters is not gold. I often wondered what would have happened to me if I had been raised in that family instead of the abusive one I did. But would it have been as abusive in the house of my sire as in the house of my adopting rapists? My sister from that family thinks in some ways yes. No I wouldn’t have been raped but I would have been blamed for everything wrong, I might have been disciplined very harshly, and yes made the scape goat of everything wrong in the family … if the man who sired me had let her do it. All just too scary and hurtful. A little boy sold to abusers because adults couldn’t reconcile where and how they used their private parts. I will place the song below and you can tell me if my tears were worth it. Hugs.
From coast to coast, Americans are being harassed, assaulted, injured, and even murdered by sneering masked thugs hired to attack their countrymen as part of a vengeance presidency that is obsessed with hurting people for sport.
Portland Avenue and 34th Street in South Minneapolis where City of Minneapolis officials have confirmed an ICE agent shot an observer. A neighbor who saw what happened told local MPR news: “She was trying to turn around, and the ICE agent was in front of her car, and he pulled out a gun and put it right in — like, his midriff was on her bumper — and he reached across the hood of the car and shot her in the face like three, four times,” (Photo: Chad Davis)
Under wannabe dictator Donald Trump, the federal agencies of the United States tasked with keeping the nation safe are rapidly becoming a grave threat to the physical safety of the American people, as trigger-happy officers open fire on those they’re supposed to be protecting with increasing frequency in communities across the country.
Then, on October 5th, 2025, agents shot thirty-one-year-old Marimar Martinezin Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood. Martinez was not seriously injured and was thus able to drive away. Although she committed no crime, Trump’s minions charged her and a companion for assault and attempted murder. But prosecutors were forced to drop all charges against both of them only a few weeks later, with her attorney stating: “These agents jumped out and shot Ms. Martinez, a U.S. citizen, whose only crime was warning her fellow community members that ICE was in the neighborhood… That is not a crime. She didn’t deserve to be shot.”
Today, officials at Roosevelt High School in Minneapolis said that “armed U.S. Border Patrol officers came on school property during dismissal Wednesday and began tackling people, handcuffed two staff members and released chemical weapons on bystanders.” MPR News spoke to a school official about the incident, who related on condition of anonymity: “The guy, I’m telling him like, ‘Please step off the school grounds,’ and this dude comes up and bumps into me and then tells me that I pushed him, and he’s trying to push me, and he knocked me down… They don’t care. They’re just animals… I’ve never seen people behave like this.”
Also today, right here in the Pacific Northwest, CBP agents opened fire on a man and woman believed to be a married couple in the parking lot of Adventist Medical Center Pavilion in southeast Portland. Here’s more from The New York Times: “The driver of the vehicle that federal officials fired into drove off after the shooting, local officials said, and the victims were found by the police more than two miles away, with gunshot wounds. Emergency medical technicians who rushed the victims to hospitals described both as Spanish speakers in conversations captured by emergency radio broadcasts. The woman had a gunshot wound to the chest, an E.M.T. told a dispatcher. The man was described as having two gunshot wounds.
Details about this latest shooting in Portland are still coming into focus. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) posted a statement to Twitter about the shooting which was subsequently deleted — and that leads us to worry that the investigation may already have been compromised by political interference from Trump’s regime.
“This violence in our community is devastating,” Portland Mayor Keith Wilson said. “These are not statistics. These are human beings. Portland is not a training ground for militarized agents. When the administration talks about using ‘full force,’ we are seeing what that means on our streets. The consequences are not abstract. They are felt in hospital rooms, in living rooms, in the quiet moments when families try to make sense of what happened. We know what the federal government says happened here. There was a time when we could take them at their word. That time is long past.”
“That is why we are calling on ICE to halt all operations in Portland until a full and independent investigation can take place. Our community deserves answers. Our community deserves accountability. And most of all, our community deserves peace.”
“We are all shaken and outraged by another terrible, unnecessary violent event instigated by the reckless agenda of the Trump administration, this time in our own state, in our largest city, coming just one day after the tragedy in Minnesota,” said Governor Tina Kotek, the chief executive of Oregon.
“While details remain limited, one thing is clear: when a president endorses tearing families apart, and attempts to govern through fear and hate rather than shared values, he fosters an environment of lawlessness and recklessness.”
“I am aligned with Mayor Wilson: the priority right now is a full, completed investigation, not more detentions,” the governor added. “The Attorney General, district attorneys, and I have been clear about our concerns with the excessive use of force by federal agents in Portland, and today’s incident only heightens the need for transparency and accountability. Oregonians deserve clear answers.”
“There are those who want to cause chaos. But Oregonians know how to stand up and speak out, peacefully. We must remain united in peaceful opposition to efforts to tear our communities apart and turn against one another. We will not take the bait.”
“I am grateful to the first responders who have been on the frontline of today’s events. The state will continue to support Portland, and stand united with Minnesota.”
“Huge concern about a reported shooting of two individuals by federal agents outside Portland Adventist Hospital,” said Senator Jeff Merkley, Oregon’s junior United States Senator. “My team and I are closely monitoring this situation and are working hard to get answers. I will share any updates as I learn more.”
The Preamble to the United States Constitutions explicitly refers to “domestic tranquility.” That’s how important it was to the Framers that the people of this country be able to live peacefully and prosperously, without fear of social disorder or unrest. Domestic tranquility is a key objective of our plan of government, and the federal government is supposed to meet that objective by enforcing the laws with great care and discretion.
Obviously, that’s not happening right now.
And that’s fine with the people who worship Trump.
What happens when law enforcement officers attack the very people they’re supposed to protect? What then? People are trying to go about their lives in this country and they’re ending up killed or injured because trigger-happy agents full of testosterone have been told they can be as brutal, aggressive, and careless as they want to anyone they happen to come across — and they won’t be held accountable or punished.
This is not “law and order,” this is oppression and systemic violence. Trump has decreed it and Republicans at every level — federal, state, and local — are enabling it.
Renee Nicole Good was murdered on-camera. The footage is widely available. It’s ghastly and horrific. We can see with our own eyes and hear with our own ears that we are being lied to on repeat about yesterday’s tragic events.
That’s exactly what Trump-controlled federal agencies are doing.
With Trump’s kakistocratic regime, no American is safe. This is a government of the least qualified and most unscrupulous individuals in the land. It’s the worst government in modern American history by a lot, and the terrible people who are in it seem determined to staking a claim to being the very worst government of all time.
It is our patriotic duty and moral responsibility — all of us who are loyal to the Constitution and to the values of freedom, inclusion, peace, and tolerance — to fiercely oppose this regime and all the evils it is trying to inflict on our country.
In memory of Silvero Villegas-Gonzalez and Renee Nicole Good and everyone else who has died at the hands of the thugs working for Donald Trump, we will carry on.
When I first posted this I was rushing to do a lot of things. I failed to post the entire article. So this is try two to see if I can do it correctly this time. Here is the rest of the story. Hugs.
There are videos at the web page of the article linked below. Sorry I do not trust or give credit to the words / stories from the government. It is just sending the message to ICE thugs that the government have their backs when they terrorize, harass, and kill people. Instant obedience to their self created authority / power grab is what they want. Let’s not give it to them, but do try to stay safe when using your right to protest. Hugs
Federal immigration agents shot and wounded two people in a vehicle outside a hospital in Portland on Thursday, a day after an officer fatally shot a woman in Minnesota, authorities said.
The shooting drew hundreds of protesters to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building at night, and Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield vowed to investigate “whether any federal officer acted outside the scope of their lawful authority” and refer criminal charges to the prosecutor’s office if warranted.
The Department of Homeland Security said the vehicle’s passenger was “a Venezuelan illegal alien affiliated with the transnational Tren de Aragua prostitution ring” who was involved in a recent shooting in the city. When agents identified themselves to the occupants during a “targeted vehicle stop” in the afternoon, the driver tried to run them over, the department said in a statement.
“Fearing for his life and safety, an agent fired a defensive shot,” it said. “The driver drove off with the passenger, fleeing the scene.”
There was no immediate independent corroboration of that account or of any gang affiliation of the vehicle’s occupants. During prior shootings involving agents from President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdowns in U.S. cities, including the fatal one Wednesday in Minneapolis, video evidence has cast doubt on the administration’s characterizations of what prompted the shootings.
Law enforcement officials work the scene following reports that federal immigration officers shot and wounded people in Portland, Ore., Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane)
Trump and his allies have consistently blamed the Tren de Aragua gang for being at the root of violence and drug dealing in some U.S. cities.
According to the Portland Police bureau, officers initially responded to a report of a shooting outside Adventist Health hospital at 2:18 p.m. Thursday.
A few minutes later, police received information that a man who had been shot was asking for help in a residential area a couple of miles away. Officers went there and found a man and a woman with gunshot wounds. Officers determined that they were injured in the shooting with federal agents, police said.
Law enforcement officials work the scene following reports that federal immigration officers shot and wounded people in Portland, Ore., Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane)
Their conditions were not immediately known. Portland police said officers applied a tourniquet to one of them.
City Council President Elana Pirtle-Guiney said during a meeting that “as far as we know, both of these individuals are still alive, and we are hoping for more positive updates throughout the afternoon.”
At a nighttime news conference, Police Chief Bob Day said the FBI was leading the investigation and he had no details about the events that led to the shooting.
Mayor Keith Wilson and the City Council called on ICE to end all operations in Oregon’s largest city until a full investigation is completed.
Multnomah County District Attorney Nathan Vasquez, center, speaks to the media following reports that federal immigration officers shot and wounded people in Portland, Ore., Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane)
“We stand united as elected officials in saying that we cannot sit by while constitutional protections erode and bloodshed mounts,” they said in a statement. “Portland is not a ‘training ground’ for militarized agents, and the ‘full force’ threatened by the administration has deadly consequences.”
Wilson also suggested at a news conference that he does not necessarily believe the federal government’s account of the shooting: “There was a time we could take them at their word. That time is long past.”
Democratic State Sen. Kayse Jama, who lives near where it took place, said Oregon is a welcoming state — but he told federal agents to leave.
“You are not welcome,” Jama said. “You need to get the hell out of Oregon.”
The city officials said “federal militarization undermines effective, community‑based public safety, and it runs counter to the values that define our region. We’ll use every legal and legislative tool available to protect our residents’ civil and human rights.”
They urged residents to show up with “calm and purpose during this difficult time.”
Several dozen people gathered in the evening near the scene where police found the wounded people.
“It’s just been chaos,” said one, Anjalyssa Jones. “The community is trying to get answers.”
U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat, urged protesters to remain peaceful.
“Trump wants to generate riots,” he said on the social platform X. “Don’t take the bait.”
___
Johnson reported from Seattle. Associated Press writer Audrey McAvoy in Honolulu contributed.
The report / written article has several sections with different versions. But it seems clear that Gestapo leader Stephen Miller is pushing everyone to send the message to ICE thugs and all right wing news media that the government would shield ICE gang thugs as long as they kept the harassment and terrorizing the brown people. The goal of ICE is to make brown people too scared for their lives to stay in the country or come here. The goal of the government is to force the public into instant obedience and to never protest anything the tRump people do or demand no matter how illegal, abusive, or scamming. Hugs
A third officer, positioned in front of her car on the left, drew his gun and fired three times while jumping back, with the last shots aimed through the driver’s window after the car’s bumper appeared to have cleared his body.
The video did not appear to show contact and the officer stayed on his feet, though Ms Noem said he was taken to a hospital and released.
US Vice-President JD Vance says an ICE officer was clearly justified in shooting a woman during an immigration enforcement surge.
Minnesota authorities have accused the FBI of seeking to block their access to an investigation into the death of Renee Nicole Good, 37.
What’s next?
Protesters have taken to the streets and some local schools have cancelled classes for the day.
US Vice-President JD Vance has defended the immigration agent who shot and killed a 37-year-old Minneapolis woman amid tensions between state and federal officials.
Renee Nicole Good was shot in the head in front of a family member on Wednesday, local time, during an immigration enforcement surge.
Mr Vance said the shooting was justified and that Ms Good was a “victim of left-wing ideology”.
“I can believe that her death is a tragedy while also recognising that it is a tragedy of her own making,” he said.
Mr Vance said the officer was clearly acting in self-defence.
There has been an outpouring of grief and anger in the community following the shooting. (AP: Mike Householder)
FBI ‘reversed course’ over joint probe
Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) said it had been blocked by the FBI from taking part in a joint investigation into the shooting.
Following the shooting, the BCA initially said it had agreed to jointly investigate the shooting with the FBI.
But on Thursday, a day after the shooting, BCA Superintendent Drew Evans said the federal agency had “reversed course” and taken sole control over the probe.
He said that step meant the state bureau would no longer have access to the scene evidence, case materials or interviews.
“As a result, the BCA has reluctantly withdrawn from the investigation,” Superintendent Evans said.
The FBI and the office of US Attorney Daniel Rosen, the chief federal prosecutor in Minneapolis, did not immediately respond to questions about the BCA statement.
Keith Ellison, the state’s Democratic attorney general, told CNN the FBI’s decision was “deeply disturbing” and said state authorities could investigate with or without the cooperation of the federal government.
Renee Nicole Good was shot inside her car on Wednesday, local time. (Reuters: Tim Evans)
Ms Good’s death has left Minneapolis on edge, with protesters taking to the streets in anger and schools cancelling classes as a precaution on Thursday.
Minnesota and Trump administration officials have offered starkly different accounts of the shooting, with US President Donald Trump describing the slain woman as a “professional agitator”.
Democratic politicians and protesters have contested that claim, with the Minneapolis City Council saying she was “out caring for her neighbours” and died “at the hands of the federal government”.
Vance says officer deserves gratitude
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said on Wednesday, local time, that the officer who shot Ms Good had been “dragged” by a vehicle during a previous incident in June.
According to court documents, the officer was part of a team trying to apprehend a man in the country illegally.
JD Vance defended the shooting as self-defence during a press conference on Thursday. (Reuters: Kevin Lamarque)
He broke a window and reached into the vehicle, attempting to open the door when the driver sped off, dragging the officer the length of a football field in 12 seconds.
The officer’s right arm was bleeding, and an FBI agent applied a tourniquet.
He was transported to a hospital, where he received more than 50 stitches.
Prosecutors said he had “suffered multiple large cuts and abrasions to his knee, elbow, and face”.
Mr Vance said the ICE officer “deserves a debt of gratitude”.
“This is a guy who’s actually done a very, very important job for the United States of America,” he said.
“He’s been assaulted. He’s been attacked. He’s been injured because of it.”
City and state officials blame immigration surge for shooting
Federal authorities in Minneapolis used chemical agents on protesters during democrations on Thursday, a day after the shooting. (AP: Tom Baker)
The agent was among 2,000 federal officers that the Trump administration had announced it was deploying to the Minneapolis area in what the Department of Homeland Security described as the “largest DHS operation ever”.
But Wednesday’s shooting drew immediate condemnation from city and state officials who blamed Mr Trump’s immigration enforcement surge for sowing chaos in the city’s streets.
DHS officials, including Ms Noem, defended the shooting as self-defence and accused the woman of trying to ram agents in an act of “domestic terrorism”.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat, called that assertion “bulls**t” and “garbage” based on bystander videos taken of the incident that appeared to contradict the government’s account.
Videos showed two masked officers approaching Ms Good’s car, which was stopped at a perpendicular angle on a Minneapolis street.
As one officer ordered Ms Good out of the car and grabbed at her door handle, the car briefly reversed and then began driving forward, turning to the right in an apparent attempt to leave the scene.
A third officer, positioned in front of her car on the left, drew his gun and fired three times while jumping back, with the last shots aimed through the driver’s window after the car’s bumper appeared to have cleared his body.
The video did not appear to show contact and the officer stayed on his feet, though Ms Noem said he was taken to a hospital and released.
Randy in a post asked the question I think many ask here. Why do I champion the trans community so forcefully? Nan asked me a few years ago if I was feeling like I was trans, and no I am a cis gay male and happy in it. Although if not for my past I would have liked to be free to explore a more feminine side of myself. Ron and I do have trans people in our family but I have never met them. The truth is in the page why I do this. I want to give a voice to those that have no voice and right now the most targeted unfairly groups are trans people / kids and brown skinned people ICE is going after. Why do I put so much effort in to giving them a voice? Because as an abused little boy people in my town knew I was being abuse but no one gave me a voice, no one spoke up for me. Hugs.
How Americans are manipulated by online misinformation and political rhetoric.
Joseph McConville’s first memory of being online was at 13 years old when he started playing Neopets, a virtual pet game, at his home in Boynton Beach, Fla. At the time, he had no clue that just months later, the internet would suck him into the alt-right.
As a young, white man, McConville says he was taught to believe that he’d have everything he wanted.
He started to realize this dream wouldn’t come to fruition when he was pulled out of private school as his parents struggled during the 2008 recession.
McConville quickly graduated from kids games to popular social media sites like Myspace and Facebook. But it was when he found FunnyJunk.com in ninth grade that he started being exposed to alt-right content.
The website gave users the ability to upload memes and upvote popular content. When McConville began using it, he was initially exposed to dark humor and edgy right-wing memes.
He then migrated to 4chan, a website known for hosting anonymous, fringe, right-wing communities, where he started engaging with content used to stoke extremist meaning —pushing us vs. them narratives that alienated McConville from his multicultural South Florida community.
“Everyone else is wrong. … These guys are right. These guys get it,” says McConville. The deeper he got, the more anger he felt—especially towards transgender people.
“It’s all a psyop … there’s a big trans psyop to destroy manhood,” McConville remembers believing for nearly a decade. “It’s all about making men hate themselves, to become women, to weaken the American hegemony.”
McConville, now 30, eventually found his way out of the alt-right world around 2018 when he was deradicalized by a friend who had previously been a part of the community.
But since then, the pervasiveness of this thinking has grown. What was once conspiratorial thinking on fringe websites has now become commonplace. “The [2016] Trump election changed a lot of things, it all became serious,” McConville told Uncloseted Media and GAY TIMES. “You feel like, ‘Wow, we’re actually being listened to—we’re changing the mainstream talking points.’”
Transgender Americans have been one of the biggest targets of this alt-right rhetoric, and it’s effective. Since 2022, Americans have increased their favorability towards laws limiting protections for trans people and have become less favorable towards policies safeguarding them.
The site of Charlie Kirk’s assassination after it took place. (KSL News Utah)
This change in public perception may be because of the growing claims that falsely link transgender people as perpetrators of mass violence and domestic terrorism. After Charlie Kirk’s death in September, these narratives reached a boiling point.
But how did Americans get taken to believe this anti-LGBTQ lie? And what does it say about how people can be brainwashed to hate?
Who’s Pushing the False Link Between Trans People and Domestic Terrorism?
One reason many Americans began to believe that trans people are more likely to be linked to terrorism is because trusted sources in mainstream conservative spaces are telling them it’s true. Even though the overwhelming majority of mass shooters are cisgender men, the Heritage Foundation, notably behind Project 2025, recommended the FBI create a category of domestic terrorism called Transgender Ideology-Inspired Violent Extremism, which suggests transgender people pose an imminent threat.
“I think some people know that this is false, but push it,” Thekla Morgenroth, a professor of psychology at Purdue University, told Uncloseted Media and GAY TIMES. “It’s worth giving false information if you get people on your side and support your opinion, and I think that is malicious.”
Unlike when McConville was in the alt-right, many of the people behind the rhetoric today hold powerful positions in the government. After a shooting in August at a Minnesota Catholic school perpetrated by a transgender person, Rep. Lauren Boebert falsely said there was a “pattern of transgender violence in our country.” Trump officials and other members of Congress used this as an excuse to attack gender-affirming care. And Harmeet Dhillon, an assistant attorney general at the Department of Justice, has insisted that hormone replacement therapy played a role in the shooting, although officials do not believe the perpetrator was using hormones.
This narrative has bled into the mainstream media who are used to trusting government sources. Just a few hours after Kirk was pronounced dead, The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets picked up claims from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that the bullet case engravings pointed to a motive related to “transgender ideology,” a term coined by transphobic commentators. The bullet casings ultimately did not have any reference to transgender people.
Nevertheless, suspicions around this shooter being connected to the transgender community spread like wildfire.
Megyn Kelly in her video. (Megyn Kelly on YouTube)
Former Fox News personality Megyn Kelly posted a video titled “Megyn Kelly Reveals the Truth About the ‘Trans’ Phrases Found on Ammo of Gun Which Shot Charlie Kirk,” to YouTube on Sept. 11, 2025, where she falsely told over 4 million subscribers, “There’s a particularly high percentage [of transgender people] committing crimes these days and it is responsible and important to say so.” The video now has 2.1 million views and Kelly has not retracted these comments.
Her followers—who believed her false claims—began calling for extreme action in the video’s comment section. @WonkoTheDork wrote, “Trans insanity needs to end. I don’t care how, this has to stop.” And @kathleenbarton-m6c wrote, “As an American, I completely agree that this [Trans] movement needs to be completely eradicated.”
Referencing Kirk as a martyr, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton took it a step further, writing in a press release that “corrupted ideologies like transgenderism and Antifa are a cancer on our culture and have unleashed their deranged and drugged-up foot soldiers on the American people.”
The Social Psychology of Transphobia
Morgenroth thinks many people who endorse rhetoric around transgender domestic terrorism are threatened or afraid of otherness and of the breaking of traditional gender norms.
“People are very attached to the way that they think about gender because it gives them a sense of certainty—it gives them a sense of who they are and who they’re not,” they say.
Morgenroth says people come up with justifications for their discomfort, even if they don’t make sense.
“‘Here’s an explanation for why I should be scared. I’m gonna endorse that and I’m gonna believe that regardless of whether that makes logical sense or not,’” they told Uncloseted Media and GAY TIMES. “I think that’s what’s happening and why people are so willing to endorse these conspiracy beliefs or theories about trans people.”
Joseph Vandello, a psychology professor at the University of South Florida, says that when influential figures ramp up a threat, it triggers an emotional response of fear or anger, which leads to a desire to punish or exclude people.
“This is the same playbook that people were using against gay people going back to the 1970s or against other kinds of marginalized or minority groups like Jews,” Vandello told Uncloseted Media and GAY TIMES, referencing the gay panic of that era. “I think there’s this idea that if you frame the issue in terms of a threat, then it becomes an issue of moral protection of the community.”
Another One Down the Rabbit Hole
Vandello says many young men fall for anti-trans narratives because they confirm their place of privilege in the world and validate their insecurities. He coined the term “precarious manhood,” which is the idea that manhood is a social status that has to be won and can be lost. His research indicates that threats to one’s sense of manhood—like trans and queer identities—provoke not only insecurity, but aggression.
Jordan Peterson (right) being interviewed by Sean Hannity in 2025. (Fox News)
Ten years ago, Justin Brown-Ramsey became a case study of precarious manhood, lashing out when he began thinking that trans people were a threat. At 18 years old, and in search of an escape from his parents’ divorce, he started binge-watching YouTube lectures from Jordan Peterson, a clinical psychologist who’s best known as an outspoken anti-trans thought leader and has said that using someone’s preferred pronouns is the road to authoritarianism.
“He has a degree, he’s working at an institution, it seems like if that’s the kind of guy that has this opinion, I should probably also have that opinion,” Brown-Ramsey told Uncloseted Media and GAY TIMES.
This intellectualized version of transphobia appealed to the sense of insecurity Brown-Ramsey faced growing up in a household with strictly enforced gender roles.
Eventually, Brown-Ramsey became an active participant in anti-trans rhetoric. As an anonymous keyboard warrior, he’d fight in the YouTube comments against the #MeToo, feminist and trans rights movements.
Near the end of his senior year of high school, Brown-Ramsey brought this hatred into the real world against another classmate.
“They mentioned they were trans, and I recall always taking issue with that for seemingly no reason, and being just generally antagonistic about that,” says Brown-Ramsey, now 28.
He purposefully misgendered the student in class and started lashing out against friends, family and romantic partners until he was almost totally isolated.
“I think over time, the less acceptable my behavior was for people in person, the more it became acceptable to lean into the online version of that,” he says. “It went from those lecture videos to watching long rant videos about trans people and gay people, or seeking out stuff that was more 4chan-adjacent.”
Brown-Ramsey, who eventually left the alt-right after deeply engaging with U.S. history in college, believes he was manipulated to hate trans people because it helped him displace his anger about other elements of his life. “I think it was the fact that I was lower working class or lower middle class, and didn’t have an economic future ahead of me,” he says. “I was like, ‘Well if the world is that way then I just might as well be hateful and try to be more powerful than somebody.’”
Undercover in the Alt-Right
Anthony Siteman (Photo courtesy of Siteman, design by Sam Donndelinger)
This phenomenon of young men getting drawn in by alt-right algorithms fascinated 21-year-old Anthony Siteman, who started investigating online extremism ahead of the 2024 presidential election.
“My main goal was to understand how and why people became radicalized,” Siteman, a senior at Quinnipiac University, told Uncloseted Media.
Siteman immersed himself on right-wing sites like Rumble and Gab as well as encrypted messaging apps like Telegram where he joined channels that included Proud Boys. He noticed trends that draw people in: all caps text, red alarm emojis and inflammatory language, which all trigger a sense of urgency and concern.
He saw constant racist, sexist and transphobic language, but also violent videos and memes created from the livestreamed footage of the 2019 mosque shootings in New Zealand that left 51 people dead.
Even though he entered this project to learn about indoctrination, sometimes he felt his own views slipping. “ I was really questioning myself and what I believed,” he says, adding that he had to turn to his professor to keep him grounded. “They make you really question all of reality.”
“Social media companies are feeding people more extreme content, more emotional content,” Vandello says. He explained that emotionality is what has made the online alt-right successful at manipulating users against transgender people.
Siteman agrees: “ It’s always framed about fear, anger, and just some sense of belonging.”
The Way Out
Siteman believes that to exit these spaces, people outside the alt-right should use empathetic communication to help those in their network who have been radicalized.
For Brown-Ramsey, it was a professor that pulled him out.
“Unlike online spaces, where I curated the information that I wanted to see, and the algorithm fed me more of the same bigoted, hateful content, college was perhaps the first time I was required to engage with media outside of my usual diet,” Brown-Ramsey published in an essay about his experience.
Brown-Ramsey had to read books aloud in class like “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,” which detailed the abolitionist’s experience being born into slavery. “The narrative turned a mirror onto me and, in upsetting detail, showed me that my inclinations toward antagonizing those who looked, acted, or believed differently than myself [were the same beliefs that] led to Douglass’ dehumanization,” he wrote.
“That trajectory is really just me learning, ‘Why should I be at odds with a trans person if both of us work crappy jobs and can’t pay our bills?’ Obviously, that’s not who I should be angry at, but it took a while to get around to that,” Brown-Ramsey says.
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Full disclosure. Ron was working for tRump at Mar-a-largo as his nighttime butler and nighttime house supervisor. He knew all about this and told me of it. Sadly he couldn’t do anything about it other than give the doctor and staff comfort and support.
Meredith Kile is a Digital News Writer-Editor at PEOPLE. She has been an entertainment and political journalist for more than a decade, previously working for Entertainment Tonight, VICE and Al Jazeera America.
The report, which cites unnamed former Mar-a-Lago and Epstein employees, claims that Trump’s spa would send masseuses, manicurists and other spa workers to Epstein’s nearby residence.
“Epstein wasn’t a dues-paying member of the club, but Trump told staff to treat him like one, the employees said,” according to the report.
It also alleges that workers “warned each other about Epstein, who was known among staff for being sexually suggestive and exposing himself during the appointments.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement to the Journal that the publication was “writing up fallacies and innuendo in order to smear President Trump.”
“No matter how many times this story is told and retold, the truth remains: President Trump did nothing wrong and he kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of Mar-a-Lago for being a creep,” Leavitt said in a text message.
Leavitt’s claim about Trump kicking Epstein out seems to align with the Journal’s reporting, which goes on to say that, in 2003, an 18-year-old worker returned to Mar-a-Lago from an Epstein house call and said the billionaire had “pressured her for sex.”
“A manager sent Trump a fax relaying the employee’s allegations and urged him to ban Epstein, some of the former employees said,” the report claims. “Trump told the manager it was a good letter and said to kick him out.”
The incident was not reported to police, according to WSJ. However, two years later, Epstein would be investigated after a parent alleged that he sexually abused her 14-year-old daughter. Ultimately, he pleaded guilty to solicitation of prostitution and solicitation of prostitution with a minor under the age of 18.
That conviction preceded the 2019 charges of sex trafficking, for which Epstein was awaiting trial when he died in prison. The billionaire’s friendships with many high-profile celebrities and businessmen have been highly scrutinized in recent months as Trump’s Department of Justice — which was ordered to release all evidence in the Epstein case by Dec. 19 — has continued to release documents and photos one batch at a time.
One of the documents, dated Oct. 27, 2020, appeared to be an FBI intake report that featured the account of a former limo driver, who claimed to have met Trump in 1995, when he said he drove the real estate mogul to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.
The document read, “[Driver] reported some of the things President Trump had spoken about during the ride while on his cell phone were very concerning. [Driver] reported he was ‘a few seconds from pulling the limousine over on the median and within a few seconds of pulling him out of the car and hurting him, due to some of the things he was saying.’ “
Donald Trump, Melania Trump, Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell at Mar-a-Lago in 2000.Davidoff Studios/Getty
While telling the story to an unnamed woman years later, the driver alleged that the woman went “stone cold.”
“[Woman] stated, ‘He raped me,'” the FBI intake report read. “[Driver] said, ‘What?’ as [Woman] replied ‘Donald J. Trump had raped her along with Jeffrey Epstein.’ “
The Department of Justice took proactive measures against the claims while releasing the new batch of documents. In a Tuesday, Dec. 23, statement on social media, they wrote, “The Department of Justice has officially released nearly 30,000 more pages of documents related to Jeffrey Epstein. Some of these documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election.”
“To be clear: the claims are unfounded and false, and if they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already,” the statement continued. “Nevertheless, out of our commitment to the law and transparency, the DOJ is releasing these documents with the legally required protections for Epstein’s victims.”
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