In Case You Missed It: June

Resolution Passed at Southern Baptist Convention Endorses Ban on Gay Marriage

By Ben

Thousands of Southern Baptists came together in June to endorse a ban on gay marriage. The 2025 Southern Baptist Convention was held June 8–11 in Dallas, Texas. The annual meeting serves as an opportunity for representatives of the denomination’s churches to conduct administrative, fiscal, and governmental activities. This year’s convention boasted over 10,000 church representatives in attendance. 

Discussion at the annual meeting largely revolved around marriage and family, specifically how civil law covering these topics can be better molded to align with the Southern Baptist interpretation of scripture. This dialogue resulted in wide-ranging resolutions, covering a variety of policies. Trans and gender non-conforming people are targeted by the delegates’ insistence that civil law should be written in “the biological reality of male and female.” Pronatalist views are also expressed in the resolution to address low fertility rates and the importance of children being born to “intact” married families. These married families are of course asserted to be between a man and woman only, the resolution going as far to call for the reversal of laws and court rulings in the United States that oppose this stance. The most focal ruling being Obergefell v. Hodges, which the resolution specifically mentioned, the Supreme Court’s 2015 precedent that legalized same-sex marriage. Although the overturning of this ruling would not ban same-sex marriage in all states, 24 states had yet to legalize when the court’s decision was made. Additional notable resolutions passed at the Southern Baptist annual meeting include calls for public bans on pornography and sports betting. 

Although it is no surprise that a staunchly conservative church would speak against same-sex marriages and trans rights, the specific naming of Obergefell v. Hodges and the calling for its legal reversal shows a recent boldness among the largest christian denomination to denounce the existence of entire groups of human beings and call for their legal erasure. 

After 10 years of Obergefell v. Hodges in action, a reflection on the sentiments of same-sex marriage in the United States anxiously reveals greater polarization on marital dynamics than in previous years. Although data from Gallup shows that Americans are more supportive of same-sex marriage than they were in 2015, the poll also found that the gap in approval between Republicans and Democrats has been the highest in the 30 years since the poll began. The resurgent conservative disapproval of same-sex marriage is but a symptom of the far-right extremism that has had mainstream Republican politics in a chokehold since the advent of Trump.

The 2022 overturning of Roe v. Wade following Trump’s first-term appointment spree and these sentiments among conservatives, specifically conservative religious groups that are increasingly involving themselves in politics, despite the first amendment, show that there is active risk to civil liberties we hold near and dear. 

Child Killed After Ran Over, Driver Remains Free While Parents Charged

By I. Pliskin

A young boy was struck and killed by a vehicle in a small North Carolina town in late May. The 76-year-old woman who hit the kid with her car is facing no repercussions, but the parents of the child have recently accepted plea agreements after being charged with involuntary manslaughter. The reasoning for the criminal charges being that it was negligence to allow the seven-year-old boy and his 10-year-old brother to walk themselves home a whopping distance of two blocks.

This situation solidly shows just how wildly car centric we’ve allowed the world around us to become. The police said in a statement “In such cases, adults must be held accountable for their responsibilities to ensure a safe environment for their children”. Interestingly enough, in the same time period a five-year-old was killed when someone in his family backed over him in their own driveway. In that case no charges were filed whatsoever.

It’s evident that the real crime, in the eyes of the law, that the first set of parents committed was not showing a deep enough reverence for the providence of the automobile. Americans have been conditioned by media and culture to think of their cars as a tool of their self-agency and freedom. Not much thought is put into the fact that car accidents are consistently one of the leading causes of death in the country. For most, their cars are the box that they’re trapped in going through traffic to and from work. The way our society permits violence through vehicles enables people to continue thinking of their cars as a tool of  freedom, rather than heavy violent machinery they’ve been made deeply reliant on by structures outside of their direct control.

What would the result be if the drivers in the stories I mentioned were the ones being held criminally accountable? The contradictions would rip the fabric of our car centric culture from its own seams. 94% of car accidents are reportedly caused by preventable human error, but only a small proportion of fatal crashes result in criminal charges being filed. If people were facing jail time more often than just a higher deductible it wouldn’t be so easy to sell cars as a source of freedom. And so, to keep car culture going along, it becomes necessary for that not to be a consequence people consider when buying their cars, driving them around, and supporting policies that structure our world around those cars instead of the people inside and outside of them.

Because our society has decided that car-based violence should have minimal consequences, lest we upset the status quo, our cars and the structures around them are becoming more and more dangerous to us by the day. Cars are being made bigger and bigger in an arms race where people are trying to protect themselves from other way too big cars. The streets in metro areas are widening and allowing higher speed limits that are fundamentally unsafe for pedestrians, and paving the way for deadlier accidents.

Unfortunately, I don’t think these problems can be fixed by individuals, say, deciding to buy smaller cars or Teslas with cameras on every side of the car. Substantial legislation needs to be passed which prioritizes human safety over profits and maintaining the status quo. We need smaller cars on the road rather than allowing car makers to take advantage of loopholes, and giving big tax credits to people who buy bigger vehicles. We need lower speed limits when we know that for every 10 mph faster we drive the risk of fatality doubles. And we need people to understand that driving faster isn’t going to get them where they need to go that much quicker than they would have by driving slower. Ultimately, we need streets and neighborhoods that are designed for the needs and safety of people rather than propping up the auto industry and the car centric status quo.

Elementary Schoolers Target Trans Woman in Acid Attack

By I. Pliskin

Back in 1989, a Japanese game company was coming into an issue when trying to localize “Final Fight”, a beat ‘em up video game they had just finished, for the US. They were worried that they would get push back for having a woman character “Poison” as one of the enemies players would fight during the game. They feared that they would be blamed, and potentially sued, for encouraging violence against women. The solution the developers came to was to inform the players that this enemy was actually a trans woman – in their eyes this would be a much more palatable target of violence. Eventually the decision was made to just replace the enemy character in American releases of the game. Nonetheless, there was a notion embedded in that decision making that remains and is popular – trans women are acceptable targets to redirect misogynistic violence.

Early in the month, a trans woman was attacked with acid by a group of three elementary school aged children. The woman, heading to a pride event in the city, had just gotten off the train at 52nd street when the group of children ran up to her. One of the children was carrying a cup full of what is presumed to be battery acid, which he threw onto her face, after which the group of kids ran off.

Acid attacks are commonly understood to be a form of gender-based violence. A report by the BBC in 2017 aimed to dispute this as, at the time in the UK, more victims were men than women – a few years later in 2023 a report by the Independent found a significant rise in acid attacks overall, and that women had become the most common targets. Young women especially are the common targets of acid attacks. Attacks are commonly carried out by those who feel entitled to access those women romantically or sexually. After getting rejected to that access they aim to disfigure the woman to reclaim and reestablish a sense of power over the specific woman, and women in general. These types of attacks aren’t just about the individual victim – they are a form of gender-based terrorism where men are seeking to establish control over women in general by creating a social atmosphere of fear and difference. The message they want to make pervasive is women should defer to men what men makes them valuable – that is, their looks –  or accept the risk of having that value violently stripped from them.

That all said, it leaves the recent attack in an odd position sociologically – but not that odd all things considered. The three boys, influenced by the society they live around, were likely seeking to feel powerful and to develop higher belonging under the heteropatriarchal frameworks they live within. As individuals they likely weren’t concerned about their own access to the target – but were probably aware that this was a queer woman heading to a queer event. In that way the target represented, in aggregate, rejection of the control of heteropatriarchy – which cemented her as an ample target of heteropatriarchal terror.

My mind goes to talk about a “male loneliness crisis” and about how there needs to be more “good male role models”, that happens broadly but I’ve seen specifically left-wing people advocate for as well. I think we’re seeing a rising crisis in patriarchy that is itself an extension of the rising crisis in capitalism. Growing wealth inequality day-by-day is declassing more and more people, and the people at the top of the pyramid have no intention of letting go of any of their share of the wealth to those who are getting left out. Instead, wealthy people are pushing media and power networks to convince men to look away from the wealthy who are hoarding wealth, and to instead look to the women around them. They’re being told that they are entitled to the value and utility that women could be producing for them. And men are going along with the messaging because they feel like it’s easier to pick and push on the women around them than it is to go toe-to-toe with the super wealthy and the systems they command. Until men understand that, they will be fighting to preserve the very systems that alienate them.

In the Streets: Fishtown Traffic Victory Echoes Early Black Panther Party Action

By Alex Watts

Early in June, the Streets Department finally gave in to a months-long push from Fishtown residents to increase the crossing times of Girard Avenue in the neighborhood. Beginning in February, Fishtown Neighbors Association (FNA) collected signatures from over 500 residents, along with at least 130 public comments in support, to pressure the city to address what FNA president Ashlei Tracy referred to as a “highway in the middle of [the] neighborhood.” The description is apt—the stretch of Girard running through Fishtown is part of Philadelphia’s High Injury Network, the 12% of city streets where roughly 80% of traffic deaths and serious injuries occur. Despite the known dangers posed by the road, the city’s 2025 Vision Zero Plan contains no projects to address the threat Girard poses to those who work and live in Fishtown. Even the minor change to the crossing times was met with resistance according to Tracy, who said the city expressed concerns over extended commute times. One would think avoiding additional injuries and deaths at the hands of speeding drivers would take priority, but the economy must come first.

This isn’t the first time a community has had to step in to remind government officials that traffic violence bears real consequences for everyday people. In 1967, the Black Panthers took one of their first public actions by lobbying for a traffic light at a dangerous intersection in Oakland, CA. In Seize the time: the story of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton, Bobby Seale tells how nearly every day, “there would be some kind of accident—a wreck or somebody’d get hit crossing the street,” at the intersection of Market and 55th. Many of those killed were children attending the Santa Fe school only a block away. The nascent Black Panther Party, in response to the near-constant violence, organized community-members to petition for a traffic light at the intersection. The Oakland City Council insisted they couldn’t put a light in until at least 1968, prompting the Panthers to threaten a direct, armed presence at the intersection until it was installed. The light was up and running by October 1967.

Fishtown is by no means Oakland. The relatively well-off, white area should not be conflated with the impoverished neighborhood that gave rise to the Black Panthers. Nor should the Fishtown Neighbor’s Association be compared with the Panthers themselves. Even the ask isn’t the same. The Panthers were demanding a new light be installed; FNA just wanted a software change. However, there are parallels. Both groups began by organizing within their communities and gaining support on the ground. Both groups were initially met with resistance justified by concerns about traffic engineering. Both groups continued to push for necessary change. Both groups won.

I don’t expect FNA to develop into a nationwide militant organization pushing for a radical vision of equality and social change. A registered community organization will never (and should never) be a substitute for other lanes of organizing. But it’s also important to recognize that small local changes can lead to bigger things. These smaller steps are the ones that touch people’s lives. They’re how we get more people to see that a better world is possible. Once they do, they might just start making demands of their own.