At the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, D.C., we like to say that music is our “weapon” of choice and our performances are part activism rally. Activism takes many different forms and being advocates for protecting our community’s health is one way our collective voices make an impact.

Right now, we’re singing from the same song sheet as it relates to COVID. Yes, COVID. That five-letter word is still with us, nearly five years after the first case of this viral infection arrived in the United States.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends the updated 2024-2025 COVID-19 vaccines to help protect against serious illness and hospitalization during the fall and winter.

Many remember that during the pandemic a CDC report found that gay and lesbian adults had greater confidence that COVID vaccines were safe and were more likely to be vaccinated than heterosexuals. There were important caveats in the research and there were disparities among some groups in the LGBTQ+ space. However, the fact was LGBTQ+ people in the U.S. were largely seen as understanding and accepting the science and taking the steps necessary for COVID protection.

This includes the leadership demonstrated when visitors to Provincetown “didn’t spread the virus; they, and their allies, controlled it. On the fly, they created a model for how a community can organize against a disease threat,” according to WIRED magazine. A feather in our cap, for sure, during a very intense time.

Since those early years of COVID, there have been important developments. Now, when selecting a COVID vaccine, there are different options available — mRNA and protein-based non-mRNA vaccines.

The mRNA vaccines, developed by Pfizer and Moderna, teach our cells how to make copies of the spike protein that triggers an immune response. The non-mRNA protein-based vaccine, developed by Novavax, uses protein fragments of the virus that causes COVID-19 along with an ingredient called an adjuvant to help the immune system respond to the spike protein in the future.

It’s safe to mix and match COVID-19 vaccines, so if you previously received an mRNA vaccine, your next dose can be the non-mRNA protein-based vaccine developed by Novavax, and vice versa.

Ask your healthcare provider about your vaccine options. Also, be sure to visit vaccines.gov.

A chorus is beautiful because it symbolizes the power of diversity — each member has a distinct voice, but when we join together, we create something truly extraordinary.

This summer GMCW is excited to showcase our collective talent by producing the marquee arts and culture event for World Pride with the International Choral Festival. As we prepare to welcome over 3 million visitors from around the world, let’s show them that we take our health — and their health — seriously. Let’s put on the best World Pride that’s ever been organized by getting vaccinated now so we can sing, march, and celebrate safely in 2025. 

Justin Fyala is executive director, Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, D.C.

Of all of Trump’s problematic Cabinet nominees, Pete Hegseth’s stands out as a sick joke. Unfortunately, if he is confirmed, the joke will be on the world. 

Hegseth has ZERO qualifications to be Secretary of Defense. If merely serving in the military (and I thank him for his service in the National Guard) constitutes an acceptable qualification, then millions of veterans are qualified. While so many of them would be better qualified than Hegseth, they are still not qualified simply based on their service, and I think nearly all would agree on that. 

The Department of Defense is one of the largest organizations in the world and the most lethal. What is coming out now as people look at Hegseth’s past is he was apparently forced to step down from one small veterans’ rights non-profit based on financial, and other issues. Then there are the issues his mother brought to light when he was in the process of divorcing his second wife, when she sent him an email saying he was a sleazebag all his life when it came to his dealing with women. 

Then there are the allegations of excessive drinking from a number of sources, including those who worked with him at Fox News. So, it’s not just one thing, it’s a host of things added to his admission that he was investigated for sexual assault, and then paid off the woman who made the allegations. Hegseth’s views on the LGBTQ community have been made clear a number of times. GLAAD reported, “such as when he opposed the New York Times’s decision to announce same-sex marriages writing ‘that it was a path to incest and bestiality: At what point does the paper deem a ‘relationship’ unfit for publication? What if we ‘loved’ our sister and wanted to marry her? Or maybe two women at the same time? A 13-year-old? The family dog?”

Were he to be confirmed, we would be the laughing stock of the world. I am pretty confident that there will be at least four Republican senators who will vote against his confirmation, if it’s not withdrawn before a vote. How could Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) herself a veteran who served overseas during the Iraq war, vote for someone who has said women should not be allowed in combat? Ernst herself is clearly more qualified to hold the position than Hegseth. I am not supporting her, but compared to Hegseth, she is the superior choice. But then most people compared to Hegseth would be better. I see Ernst is now kowtowing to Trump, going as far as saying she is keeping an open mind on Hegseth, but it will be interesting if the FBI investigation comes up with even more negative reports on him. 

The Republicans in the Senate are faced with working with Trump. They can go along with every dumb thing he wants to do, or face his wrath. I am betting there are four senators who will not go along with everything. They will show they have some balls. While I can’t off-hand name the four, it is my hope and prayer, they will materialize. 

We are living in a weird world where Trump can nominate Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence , another nominee with absolutely no qualifications. Her support of deposed Syrian dictator Assad may come back to haunt her. Then there is Trump nominee Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as Secretary of HHS, with his dangerous views on healthcare. Republicans will somehow have to deal with these nominations and now they have added a new issue. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) tweeted, “It will be my objective to phase out Social Security, to pull it out by the roots.” We will see what the Senate does with that, and what the House of Representatives does with it. We will be looking to see what the views of the person Trump named to head the Social Security Administration, Frank Bisignano, thinks. Let’s hope the Senate committee vetting him will ask detailed questions. Then Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House, hasn’t guaranteed he won’t support some cuts to Social Security. 

If Congress cuts either Social Security or Medicare, it just might be the fastest way for Democrats to take back the House in 2026. 

Peter Rosenstein is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist.

It will be the fifth Christmas season I will have as a person who is estranged from their ultra-religious and abusive parents. 

I have never seriously regretted my decision to estrange my family, despite it sometimes felt tough. Well, I regret not seeing my little brother, but all communication with him was controlled by my parents, and without them I was estranged from him as well. Hope he will find me one day, but I didn’t mourn not having my parents near me, more like I’m mourning a perfect family I dreamed about and never actually had.

The holiday season could bring an additional toughness for people like me, especially now, when more and more families are broken apart by a political turmoil that shattered and polarized American society after the election. Donald Trump winning the 2024 presidential election is more than just a regular political event; it is a social phenomenon that shows a lot of American trends.

Gen Z and Millennial adults are less likely to become Republicans and Trump supporters than their parents and grandparents who are Baby Boomers, Gen X, or members of the Silent Generation. Of course, it is not universal, because Trump somehow managed to win the hearts of alienated young men, while some Boomers turned left in this election. Not all LGBT people are Democrats, but the vast majority of them are. 

This year the LGBT electorate moved away from Trump even more dramatically than in the previous election. Many young LGBT people felt like they were betrayed by the older generation and their cis-hetero peers; LGBT youth felt scared, angry, and helpless. Despite the fact that the majority of LGBT people are leftists and liberals who generally do not support free arms trading, after Trump’s victory, more and more LGBT people — and cis/hetero women — bought guns and are learning how to defend themselves. Folks do not feel safe near Trumpists! 

You may see what tension exists in the society if LGBT people need to take such a radical step as arming themselves or cutting family ties. And during the holidays, when our culture pushes families to meet together and makes you believe that there is something deeply wrong with you if you do not want to spend the festive season with your loved ones, this tension could move from streets to houses and could lead to serious problems.

It is particularly tough when we are speaking about conservative religious families that do not accept their queer children and siblings. Despite the fact that Christmas has had less religious and more cultural meaning in recent decades, it is still a deeply religious holiday, and so that day all the religious-based, bigoted, homophobic, transphobic, and biphobic conversations with well-meaning relatives who “just wanted to save your soul” will be more likely to accrue. It is especially true for white families. Despite the majority of Black religious people supporting Harris, MAGA supporters are often the white Christian religious people. According to a pre-election  Pew Research Center survey, 61 percent of white Protestants were planning to support Trump during the last election, and among them 82 percent were white Evangelicals. NBC News showed a similar statistic, with 72 percent of white Protestants, including 82 percent of white Evangelicals, being Trump supporters. 

Some of them even saw Trump as a savior with a divine mission.

I personally knew how it felt because my toxic father was trying to justify Russian military aggression as a divine mission and promoted Trumpism during our holidays dinners, and it was almost impossible to argue with a person who justified political violence by supernatural means. In this case being an enemy of a political figure made you into the enemy of God. Religious zealotry and political bigotry are hard to bear even when they are not intersected, but together they may bring something that was planning to be a perfect family reunion with vibes of the “Home Alone” ending scene turned into a nightmare that will leave you broken and completely traumatized. 

You may dread the Christmas season like other folks dread complicated medical operations, or have a strong but fading hope that the Christmas miracle will occur, and the family will accept you for who you are. Unfortunately, it is not very likely to happen, and there are always chances that home could be the most dangerous place.

I wouldn’t advise someone to estrange their family because of political or religious beliefs, and I know a lot of cases when people had a good relationship with someone who has completely different beliefs as you are. The fact that someone is voting for Trump or visiting a homophobic conservative church does not automatically make a person dangerous, but if this person is trying to push their views on you and change who you are, it is a big red flag. Unfortunately, in our society we used to forgive parents for things we would never forgive any other human beings. I had a pretty traumatic experience with it, and I spent years in therapy because of it.

If you are a well-meaning friend of an LGBT person who had family problems, the only good thing you may do is to let the person make their own decisions and not press on them. Sometimes the home — and the church — is the least safe place in the world, and you may never know what is going on behind closed doors.

Ayman Eckford is a freelance journalist, and an autistic ADHDer transgender person who understands that they are trans* since they were 3-years-old.