Billy Porter isn’t mincing words about how the 2020 election season has taken a toll.
The Pose star wrote a searing op-ed for The Daily Beast on Monday, issuing an emphatic appeal for people to get out and vote while reflecting upon the feelings the coinciding pandemic has surfaced for him as a Black, gay man living in America. But while contemplating an election that has been characterized as a battle for the soul of the nation, Porter said he hates it when people say “America is better than this.”
“So let me be clear right up front: America is not now, nor have we ever been, better than this,” he wrote. “We have tried and, for suspended moments in time, we have succeeded. But make no mistake: This moment we are in is pure and purposeful chaos.”
The Emmy and Tony Award-winning actor noted that he’s been navigating traumatic stress because COVID-19 has harkened back to his experience of coming of age during the HIV/AIDS crisis and the government’s failure to respond as people suffered and died. He also shared the hesitation he had about learning Black history because it would mean acknowledging the “unadulterated” truth about the community’s “horrific ancestral past.” Instead, he opted to focus on the present as a coping mechanism to survive.
But with time and greater personal education, Porter noted that he’s grown exasperated from feeling a range of emotions about having his rights and personhood up for debate.
“And as we have seen the entire Republican Party in the last four years, with few exceptions, line up behind this malignant narcissist lock, stock and barrel, it’s become clear that to reign in absolute power has always been the plan, and the vessel to get there matters not,” Porter wrote, referencing President Donald Trump. “The GOP has been playing the long game and the rest of us got played. But nobody anticipated a pandemic.”
But following an administration which has witnessed the president’s near-constant attacks on the LGBTQ+ community, Porter added that he’s “done being scared.”
“I’m over being terrified,” he said. “I’m simply filled with rage — a kind of rage that causes me to involuntarily tremble from the inside of my soul. This rage keeps me in a broken place where there is no peace. Ain’t never been no peace for me: a Black, gay man living in America.”
Porter has put that rage to good use, advocating voter participation ahead of the 2020 election, which takes place next Tuesday. The singer and fashion icon performed a cover of “For What It’s Worth” with Stephen Stills during the Democratic National Convention, a Vietnam War-era protest anthem intended to call attention to police brutality against the burgeoning counterculture movement.
Porter has also made numerous get-out-the-vote appeals via social media and participated in conversations with the likes of Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar and South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg.
All the while, the actor has continued work on the long-anticipated return of Pose, which had to halt production earlier this year amid the emergence of COVID-19. A premiere date has yet to be announced, though Porter and other stars have shared behind-the-scenes teaser posts while clad in masks and face shields.
Although Porter admits that he’s “sick of beggin’ folks to participate in democracy,” he still urges people to make their voices heard next Tuesday.
“Voting is one of the only powers we have as American citizens,” Porter wrote. “My ancestors died for us to have this right. Voter suppression is also psychological — to make one think their vote doesn’t matter and create apathy around engagement is the point. So, I’ma beg one last time: Vote. Please.”
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