With the recent “No Kings” rally reaching a fevered pitch across the country, questions have surfaced about the nature of protest itself.

Is it really a protest if you have to register? Is it still a fight for liberty if we’re told to “follow the rules” of civil engagement? And how much resistance is there if the police are cheering you on from the sidewalks?

But here’s the truth: Any means of protest matters. Representation matters. Boycotts matter. Presence matters. Even when it feels small or symbolic, it still counts. Because when you’re living in a body that feels perpetually under attack, everything you do to survive becomes political.

Channeling Fire into Activism 

It’s November 2024. I’m standing at the edge of Lake Mendota. My hoodie and jeans are weighted with rocks. I’ve taken off my shoes. The water is cold, but I don’t care—soon, the cold won’t matter. I shove my hands into my pockets for warmth. That’s when I find it. A butterfly.

To the outside world, I was the model first-generation kid: Respectful, high-achieving, driven. First in my family to go to and finish graduate school. The shining example for my nieces and nephews, both here and back in the Philippines. I got good grades, said “please” and “thank you,” and never cracked the illusion of the “perfect child.”

What I didn’t show was the fight burning inside me. My parents didn’t raise me to shy away from challenges. I wasn’t allowed to use a calculator until I could prove I could solve the problems without one. That push to be better shaped me—and so did the fire I carried as a queer person of color navigating the world.

I channeled that fire into activism, working with organizations like UndocuQueer and Black & Pink. I wasn’t a “social justice warrior.” I was a social justice barbarian, storming through the world with relentless passion, demanding dignity and safety for those who, like me, dared to live authentically.

That fire brought me to Wisconsin. I taught LGBTQ+ and ethnic studies at colleges across the state. It brought me to Madison where I worked in diversity initiatives to make campuses safer for first-year students. I fought to make this country live up to its promise.

Then, on March 9, 2024, everything changed.

Hiding my Reality after a Hate Crime 

I was unloading groceries outside my apartment on Monroe Street, just three blocks from campus. Two strangers walked by and asked about a sticker on my bumper. I thought they were laughing at my “Bigfoot is real” sticker, but they pointed to the one beneath it: A faded heart in the colors of the trans pride flag.

“It’s a trans pride sticker,” I said.

Minutes later, they were at my doorstep.

They ambushed me. Shattered a bottle and used it to slash my throat. They stomped on me, screaming slurs. I fought back—biting, scratching, slashing with my keys—until they fled. They left me bleeding on the ground. My neighbor stepped over me and drove away.

No one tells you what comes next. After something like that, your other identities—your queerness, your culture, your ambition—all fall away under one label: Victim.

I wore that label tightly. I disappeared from my own life. Stopped returning texts. Cancelled plans. With the semester ending and my lease almost up, it seemed easier to vanish. No students waiting on office hours. No obligations. No one to disappoint.

There was one final commitment left: I’d agreed to be a camp counselor for the GSAFE LTI Leadership Camp for LGBTQ+ youth.

Assigned the color orange, I brought streamers, garlands, and a box of tiny monarch butterflies to decorate our space.

The campers, aged 13 to 21, were just beginning to step into their identities. They wanted to lead, to learn how to uplift their communities. I lied to them, told them how proud I was to be thriving in my identity. But the truth was that I had already decided to die.

And then something unexpected happened.

They opened up. They learned. They shared pieces of themselves with me, and I saw them grow. And every time I saw that spark of understanding, I handed out a butterfly.

“You learned.”

“You grew.”

“You matured.”

What they didn’t know is that I was giving everything away—my books, clothes, games—because I didn’t plan to take any of it with me. I made sure they were fed, happy, taken care of. It was easier to care for them than for myself.

On the final day, one camper told me how much it meant to see a queer adult living, thriving. I broke down. I wasn’t thriving. I was barely living. I told them what happened to me.

They didn’t call me “brave” or “resilient.” They didn’t tell me how strong I was.

They just sat with me.

One camper, Kyle, stood up, handed me back the butterfly I had given him, and said, “You learned. You grew. You matured. You survived.”

To paraphrase Margaret Cho: You may become a victim, but you don’t have to be victimized.

From Victim to Survivor 

I became a survivor the day I put my hands in my pocket and found that butterfly.

I emptied my rocks. Put my shoes back on. Walked home.

Being trans in America is living life on hard mode. Our “holidays” are either about being seen or being mourned. That’s it.

When I told the campers what happened to me, one of them said, “In the drag world, if you fall and they laugh, you get up, serve cunt, and make them eat it.”

I still don’t fully know what that means. But I think what they were saying is: Live well anyway. That is your fight. That is your revenge.That is your thriving.

I’m not the social justice barbarian I used to be. Now, I’m a bard—telling stories that make people feel, think, and change.

Orange is the color of healing. And the word mariposa—Spanish for butterfly—has long been a slur for queer people. I’m reclaiming it. I give butterflies away as symbols of transformation.

We fight in different ways. We have to, even in liberal Madison.

If you want to stand up for the marginalized and don’t know where to start, you can start here. You can say our names. Mourn our dead. And fight like hell for the living.

I’m still here. Living for not just my students, but for myself. Might as well keep fighting.