Extremist politicians have been stepping up their efforts to demonize transgender people and take away their rights. Through new laws, lawsuits, and executive orders, they are denying the existence of trans people and trying to keep them from living full and happy...
Rebecca
Okay, But Why Is ICE Detaining Children?
During the presidential election, Trump pledged to crack down on immigration, but he claimed he was only talking about criminals. But over the last several months, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been increasingly targeting people who are legally following the U.S. immigration process. Some of them are just kids. So we have to ask: why is ICE targeting people who aren’t criminals, and why are they targeting children?
Okay, But Why Are We Still Talking About Racism?
Most of us can agree that America has a racist past. We enslaved other human beings, and even after the Civil War, injustices like lynching and Jim Crow laws persisted. But despite a troubling resurgence of white supremacy groups — a nearly 50% increase since 2022 — many Americans believe that racism is all in the past. “This is America,” we might think, “Everyone has an equal opportunity, right?” Or, talking about race or “seeing color” may feel like what is actually racist. So, why do we still need to talk about racism?
Okay, But Why Are They Defunding the Weather Service?
If you’re like many Americans, one of the first things you do every morning is check the weather. And we definitely pay attention when there’s extreme weather – like hurricanes, blizzards, and tornadoes – on the horizon, putting our lives and property in jeopardy. Whether you get it from your phone, the morning news, or a Google search, that information all comes from the same place: the Weather Service, a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). So why is the Trump administration getting rid of it?
Okay, But Why Do We Need Community More Than Ever?
Right now, many of us are feeling a ton of stress and anxiety. Add that to the rise in loneliness in our country, and it creates a toxic soup that isn’t just bad for our mood, it’s bad for our physical health too. The good news is, community connection can help with both of these problems! In these chaotic and stressful times, community is more important than ever. It isn’t just good for our hearts and minds, it’s good for democracy.
Read This: Supporting the Transgender Community
June is Pride Month, a time to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community and advocate for their rights.* This year, supporting the transgender community and advocating for their rights is especially urgent. That’s because the Trump administration has launched a series of...
Do This: Empower Your Friends to Help Protect our Reproductive Rights
We’ve spent the last two weeks learning about the ongoing threats to our reproductive freedom. These threats are particularly dangerous because extremists are intentionally trying to keep them under the radar. We’re not gonna let that happen! We’ve just added a great...
Watch This: The New Attacks on our Reproductive Rights
Last week, we learned about the new ways that extremists are coming for our reproductive rights. We know that they have a plan to take away the abortion pill everywhere, even in states where abortion is legal. We also know that they’re testing a variety of state and...
Read This: The New Attacks on our Reproductive Rights
The majority — 63% — of abortions in the U.S. are performed using medication, not surgery. The FDA-approved drug mifepristone is one of the main pills used in medication abortions. Its safety has been proven for decades through more than 100 studies. It’s safer than...
Do This: Spotting and Stopping Disinformation
Disinformation is everywhere, from social media posts to blogs to online influencers. It works because it’s convincing and easy to share quickly. Disinformation is not just pervasive and persuasive, it’s also persistent! That means we need to create routine, online...
Recent Posts
Do This: Unite Against Soft Censorship
The only way to end censorship, whether it’s the quiet removal of books from library collections or in-your-face book bans, is to fight it head on. We saw a huge example of this – and a big win for free speech – this week when ABC and Disney returned Jimmy Kimmel and...
Watch This: Learn How to Spot Soft Censorship
A lot of people are talking about freedom of speech right now. As Americans, it's a right that has always defined us and that we all hold dear. That’s why the majority of us oppose book bans and censorship. The rise in book bans over the past few years has been well...
Read This: The Quiet Danger of Soft Censorship
We’ve been fighting the explosion of book bans since Red Wine & Blue started. PEN America reports 16,000 book bans in public schools since 2021 — a level not seen since the 1950s during McCarthyism. This increase has been driven by organized groups with a...
Okay, But Why is Gerrymandering Legal?
Lawmakers in Texas made headlines for leaving their state to protest the unfair re-drawing of district maps, known as gerrymandering. Almost all Americans, regardless of political party, are against gerrymandering. But over the past few decades, it’s gotten worse and worse.
So… what exactly is gerrymandering? Why is it legal? And how do we get back to a fair system where all of our votes matter equally?
Okay, But Why Were The Suburbs Shaped By Racism?
We know that the suburbs have been diversifying over the past few decades, and today “suburban woman” is no longer code for “white woman” – no matter how much the media tries to simplify us. But there’s no denying that the suburbs have excluded families who aren’t white for most of their history, and if we’re not careful, they will again in the future. So why – and how – did the suburbs end up so white for so long? What happened to make them more diverse, and why are some people worried that we’re reversing that progress?