James Talarico Wants The White Men Of Texas To Feel The Pain Of Being Nonbinary

So they can expiate their sins through weaker gods

In 2019, James Talarico said that “prophetic voices like Jesus have helped me reckon with my own whiteness, my own masculinity, my own certainty, my own ego. It’s a never-ending process, and it’s a painful process.” Masculinity and whiteness are sins. White men have to feel pain for their sins. That’s what Talarico and the progressive Democratic Party want for white men: pain. Democrats want the white men of Texas to cry like Jesus and beg forgiveness for voting the wrong way, all these years.

Talarico also carries his bible upside-down, fingers to page edges. A symbolic choice, perhaps. As the rainbow-draped cross from the inside of his church shows, James Talarico holds beliefs that are bigger than the Bible and larger than Jesus. I say this having no dog in the sectarian fight. Rather, Talarico’s Christianity is a recognizable bricolage, a pastiche of beliefs in which the Bible and Jesus are but one element. I have learned to recognize them. They are common.

Today, there are six colors in the progress flag rainbow. Originally, there were eight, but the hot pink stripe was removed because the color was expensive. Bunting and hanging arrangements looked better with even-numbered stripes, too, so turquoise was removed to leave six colors. While the flag of sexual freedom was never the Seven Rays of a secret Rosicrucian brotherhood, it was from the beginning a nod to the ‘New Age’ of Carlos Castaneda, sex magic, yoga, and ‘vibes’. In the cross arrangement above, the twisted white and blue fabric stripes are the suffragette colors. Talarico’s Christity is postmodern. His Jesus is a queer feminist suffering for your sins, and he wants the gun-hugging white dudes to feel the pain they/them feel.