This week is the first I’ve heard of this, but I am old, so of course I would have missed it before. However, it’s out here now, and looks kind of exciting, as to GOTV.
The internet has entered its Kamala Harris ‘coconut tree’ era
To many young people on X and TikTok, the vice president is unironically funny and all too easy to meme.
Democrats may soon nominate a presidential candidate capable of rivaling GOP nominee Donald Trump in memeability.
After President Joe Biden announced his decision to forfeit re–election, a tidal wave of memes about Vice President Kamala Harris — whom Biden backed as the Democratic presidential candidate — flooded the internet.
On platforms like TikTok and X, the mood felt celebratory as many left-leaning accounts posted upbeat fan edits of Harris and made memes out of her more memorable lines from speeches. On Sunday, British pop artist Charli XCX appeared to back Harris, calling her a “brat,” a reference to her new album, which has become the Gen Z theme of the summer.
Some political strategists say the memes are helping Harris generate a level of organic social media clout among Gen Z that Biden has struggled to cultivate, amplified by the spotlight of a possible presidential nomination.
“She doesn’t take herself too seriously. She knows how to have fun, and she’s somebody that is willing to be a little bit less stuffy than a traditional presidential candidate would be, and I think that’s a good thing in this election cycle,” said Marianna Pecora, the communications director for the Gen Z-run political advocacy group Voters of Tomorrow.
But Pecora said the viral moments aren’t just for laughs — they also indicate broader support for Harris, particularly among young people who have at times felt disenchanted by presidential candidates.
“I don’t think that anyone is going to necessarily meme their way to the presidency,” said Pecora, 20, a student at George Washington University. “But I do think that being able to make this election something bright and fun and exciting and something that’s infiltrating people’s feeds and therefore their everyday lives is only a good thing.”
Part of Harris’ frequent virality comes from her tendency to show off her seemingly authentic personality online. It’s why many of her vocal online supporters — who call themselves the KHive — have staunchly defended her since her first presidential run in 2020.
“My mother used to, she would give us a hard time sometimes and she would say to us, ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with you young people. You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?’” Harris said in the speech. “‘You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you.’”
On Tuesday Night, the Teamsters Union posted a tweet criticizing President Sean O’Brien over anti-trans article endorsement. This comes after O’Brien spoke at the RNC, a first for the union.
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On Monday evening, Teamsters President Sean O’Brien made history by speaking at the Republican National Convention—the first time a Teamsters Union President has ever done so. The move, however, didn’t come without controversy. Union Vice President John Palmer called the decision “unconscionable.”
O’Brien then stirred more debate by tweeting in support of an article by Republican Senator Josh Hawley, which criticized corporate initiatives supporting diversity, equity, inclusion, and transgender workers. The situation then erupted when the official Teamsters Twitter account posted a statement condemning O’Brien’s endorsement, which was swiftly deleted.
“Unions gain nothing from endorsing the racist, misogynistic, and anti-trans politics of the far right, no matter how much people like Sen. Hawley attempt to tether such bigotry to a cynical pro-labor message. The message this sends to Teamsters of color, Teamster women, and LGBTQ Teamsters is that they are not welcome in the union unless they surrender their identity to a new kind of anti-woke unionism. You don’t unite a diverse working class by scoffing at its diversity,” said the now deleted tweet.
O’Brien’s support for Hawley’s views received swift backlash. “We get it. He promised you Secretary of Labor,” read a response by transgender writer Parker Molloy.
“If you’re a Teamster of color, are LGBTQ+, Sean O’Brien has just said he doesn’t give a fuck about you,” said the Daily Union Elections account.
“Scab,” said American journalist and labor activist Talia Jane.
O’Brien’s speech at the RNC puzzled many observers. He used the platform to advocate for unions while also praising Donald Trump, calling him “one tough SOB.” Throughout much of the speech, the applause was tepid to nonexistent. Reports even indicated that at least one audience member shouted “right to work,” reflecting anti-union sentiments in the Republican Party.
Meanwhile, other labor union leaders were critical of O’Brien’s appearance at the RNC. Liz Shuler, president of the AFL-CIO, responded, “Donald Trump and J.D. Vance are on the bosses’ side… We won’t be fooled.” These critiques were echoed by members of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, and other union leaders.
Even John Palmer, the Teamsters Vice President, weighed in: “A speaking engagement at the Republican National Convention by Teamsters President Sean O’Brien, regardless of the message, only normalizes and makes the most anti-union party and president I’ve seen in my lifetime seem palatable.”
O’Brien’s support for a senator’s explicitly anti-diversity and anti-LGBTQ+ views runs contrary to Teamsters Union’s official documents and policies. One document on the Teamsters website states, “We are pro-union and pro-equality. In keeping with the labor movement motto, ‘an injury to one is an injury to all,’ we support a strong and progressive labor movement that promotes full equality and respect for LGBTQ workers and their families.”
The Teamsters president’s participation and apparent endorsement of anti-trans and anti-queer politics from the Republican Party could signal a profound betrayal to LGBTQ+ workers, who depend on union protections for their safety and rights. As the Teamsters Union remains silent on its presidential endorsement, the stakes have never been higher for those workers impacted by Republican policies. LGBTQ+ union members are left with the question of whether or not their rights will be bartered away for political favor with a party that has repeatedly positioned itself against their very existence.
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Humanitarian groups are considering a mass vaccination campaign for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip after traces of variant poliovirus type 2 were found in water sources in the war-torn territory. The disease was detected in six locations in Gaza, the World Health Organization said.
Geneva-based WHO said it was working with partners – including UNICEF and United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) – to conduct a risk assessment. Polio vaccination rates in Gaza before the war were “optimal,” according to the organization.
Israel on Sunday confirmed the resurgence of the virus, which can be spread by contaminated water and direct person-to-person contact, and said it would offer booster shots to its soldiers operating in and around the Gaza Strip.
Poliovirus has been detected in samples of sewage water in Gaza, placing “thousands” of Palestinians at risk of contracting the highly infectious disease that can cause paralysis https://t.co/foPyQihGcPpic.twitter.com/oWv6n9GPqc
This is what terrifies the fundamentalist and republicans. That is why the attacks on LGBTQ+ kids in schools, it is an attempt to stop this acceptance of people different, of people not straight or cis. This is what it is about. They are terrified their outdated unreasonable hates and moral superiority of straight people is going away. So like the people who hated equality for black people, they created Jim Crow laws for gay or trans people. Hopefully we can beat back this attack on liberty and rights. Hugs. Scottie
Madeline Monroe/iStock
Story at a glance
Roughly 1.6 percent of American adults are now transgender or nonbinary, according to a 2022 survey.
That number is higher still among young adults, with 5 percent of people under 30 now identifying their gender as different from the one assigned them at birth.
The growing visibility of transgender and nonbinary people comes amid rising societal acceptance and new efforts to count the populations.
One young adult in 20 is now nonbinary or transgender, communities that society barely recognized and seldom counted until a few years ago.
Those populations are not new. Only recently, though, have survey-takers thought to ask people about gender identity, invoking terminology that did not exist for prior generations. The word “nonbinary” did not appear in The New York Times until 2014.
The rising visibility of nonbinary and transgender people reflects the nation’s growing acceptance of gender fluidity, especially among the young. One landmark study found 1.2 million nonbinary people in the 18-60 age group. Of that total, three-quarters were under 30, which suggests Generation Z has explored gender identity to an extent that older Americans have not.
“We have a world in which we are finally counting these groups,” said Kay Simon, 28, an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota who studies the experiences of queer youth and their families. “You can’t identify as something if you don’t know what the word is.”
Simon grew up in Florida and Texas. “From a very young age, I kind of realized I was gay,” they said. “At the time, I probably could have told you that I felt different about my gender, but I didn’t have a word for it.”
The word was nonbinary, denoting a person who identifies with neither the male nor female gender.
Simon remembers when the academic community introduced he-she-they pronouns on faculty pages and email salutations, during their grad-school years. Even now, teaching about sexuality and gender identity in the presumptively safe space of a college campus, Simon must decide “kind of regularly” whether to correct someone who refers to them with the wrong pronoun.
“I’ve had students misgender me,” they said. “And it becomes this joke of, A, you’re referring to your professor wrong, and, B, you didn’t read the syllabus. So, we have two problems.”
The population of young nonbinary and transgender people is clearly large and probably growing.
A 2022 report from the Williams Institute, a research center at the University of California, Los Angeles, estimates that 1.3 percent of adults ages 18-24 and 1.4 percent of 13- to 17-year-olds are transgender, with a gender identity different than the one assigned at birth. Teens and young adults are much more likely to be transgender than older adults.
Five years earlier, in a 2017 report, the Williams Institute had found roughly half as many young transgender people. But the earlier analysis used different methods and drew on comparatively sparse data, so it’s hard to know how much of the increase is real.
Is the transgender population exploding, or are researchers simply counting better? That is a common quandary, researchers say, in studies of the nonbinary and transgender communities.
“I would argue, actually, it is not an increase,” said Russ Toomey, a professor of family studies and human development at the University of Arizona. “We are seeing the numbers of people disclosing nonbinary and trans identity on a survey because we are asking people in more inclusive ways about their gender.”
Perhaps the most expansive tally to date of transgender and nonbinary people comes from the Pew Research Center. In a 2022 survey, Pew found that 1.6 percent of U.S. adults reported a gender different from the one assigned to them at birth.
Pew, too, found that the nonbinary and transgender populations skewed young. Three percent of adults ages 18-29 said they were nonbinary and 2 percent said they were transgender. In the 50-plus population, by contrast, only 0.3 percent of respondents identified themselves as transgender or nonbinary.
“I think that Gen-Z individuals are not alone in this, but they are kind of leading the charge,” said Rachel Farr, an associate professor of developmental psychology at the University of Kentucky.
Today’s young adults have grown up in a society that is gradually recognizing the rights of the LGBTQ community. In 2010, the Senate voted to repeal the Clinton-era “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, allowing LGBTQ people to serve openly in the military. In 2015, the Supreme Court recognized a legal right for same-sex couples to marry.
“It’s not that there are more people. It’s that there are more people who are open and who are out,” said Shoshana Goldberg, director of public education and research at Human Rights Campaign, the LGBTQ rights group. “The reality is that when you talk to the average person on the street, they’re going to be more accepting and more affirming than they’ve ever been.”
Within Generation Z, polling suggests the LGBTQ population doubled in just four years, from 10.5 percent in 2017 to 20.8 percent in 2021.
Bisexuals, and especially bisexual women, populate the majority of the Gen-Z queer community, according to research from Gallup and others. Transgender and nonbinary people constitute a smaller but significant share.
Researchers say social media played a defining role in helping transgender and nonbinary young people define themselves.
Landon Richie, 20, grew up in Texas and came out as transgender at 11. “But since I was two,” he said, “really as early as I could think and express myself with some sort of agency, I understood that I did not fit into the role that I was assigned as a girl.”
Richie couldn’t fully process his identity until around age 10, when he “gained larger access to the internet and saw people who were transgender and who talked about their experiences,” he said. “And I was able to see myself reflected in their stories and their experiences.”
Now that the transgender and nonbinary communities have been identified and counted, researchers say, they need society’s support.
Both groups face a heightened risk of physical, emotional and sexual abuse in both childhood and adulthood, the UCLA study found. Depression and suicidal ideation are alarmingly common.
Transgender and nonbinary people often feel under attack, and with good reason. Research shows queer people face a heightened risk of being victims of violent crime. Transgender and nonbinary individuals also face higher rates of workplace harassment and discrimination.
The communities also face legislative attack. GLAAD, an LGBTQ media advocacy group, tracked more than 300 anti-LGBTQ bills across the nation in 2022, many of them targeting transgender persons by seeking to bar them from equal access to sports, restrooms or health care.
“Almost for as long as I’ve been out, there’s been a target placed by the Texas legislature on my back,” said Richie, who has been politically active in his state for several years.
Some faith-based and socially conservative groups have argued that influential Instagram posters and overzealous educators seed gender confusion in young people.
Advocates for the queer community counter that social media and progressive curricula help transgender and nonbinary people discover their identities, rather than create them.
Friends and loved ones can play a crucial role, researchers say, simply by honoring the name and pronoun requested by a transgender or nonbinary person.
“I think the first thing is just to accept them and listen to them,” said Allison Eliscu, M.D., medical director of the adolescent LGBTQ* Care Program at Stony Brook Medicine in Stony Brook, N.Y.
“If you make a mistake, because we all do, apologize, say it correctly and then try to do better.”
Scottie's Playtime 