Probst's Problem, and Ours
Jason Probst needs to do better for LGBTQIA+ Kansans; probably most Democrats do because it's pretty damn certain most Republicans won't
Back on April 5, I defended Kansas Reflector's opinion editor Clay Wirestone and his interpretation of the Kansas anti-porn bill in his fight with Democratic Rep. Jason Probst in this newsletter .
I made three arguments:
that Probst dipped into gay-bashing language in his argument with Wirestone;
that Wirestone's fears that anti-porn rules being used against just-plain-gay content are absolutely not bonkers, given history and the bad faith of the Right; and
Probst's judgment should be questioned if he's going to be citing the notorious anti-LGBTQIA+ American College of Pediatricians.
On April 6, Wirestone addressed the beef with Probst, first checking the light gay-bash:
On his generally excellent Substack blog, That Guy in Hutch, Probst eviscerated my column and called it “patently false.” He also deemed my interpretation “hysterical,” which is an … interesting choice of words for criticizing an openly gay opinion writer.
Then he dealt with the issue of whether the anti-porn law would be used against normal gay content pretty summarily:
“As far as I know, Probst does not have a law degree.
I’ll tell you who does: Lawrence First Amendment specialist Max Kautsch, who not only served as my source for the column, but who responded at length to Probst. You can read a comment from him underneath the Substack post, and a longer explanation at Kautsch’s website. In this case, I tend to believe the person with legal experience.
Listen, I know that folks get stressed in the heat of the session and say things they don’t mean. I respect Probst and enjoy his writing.
On this subject, though, he’s mistaken.”
On April 11, Probst replied:
He spends most of his time debating whether or not his legal take on the anti-porn bill is valid, utterly ignores the charge that he gay-bashed Wirestone (maybe the two of them had a beer and sorted it out), and then adds this at the end:
To that end, I want to address something in my original post on this. I cited a source that upon further research, I wasn’t happy about. The American College of Pediatricians is more of a political organization than a healthcare organization, and they seem to be decidedly conservative and support policies against the inclusion of LGBTQ members.
My citing of them was an error of haste. I had read several reports about the ill-effects of pornography on children and mistakenly pulled from that group’s report without taking proper time to explore them. I should’ve relied on the statement from UNICEF, which outlines many of the same concerns, but from a much more reliable source.
Being wrong isn’t fun, but the ability to admit when you are is important.
Okay, a couple of things here.
First, this is why Probst had to continue the debate. He may have wanted to go on with the legal back-and-forth, but that's just in-the-weeds stuff at this point, so I don't really see it as the prime motive. The fact is, he majorly screwed the pooch among people in the know about the ACP, and some of us have known about the ACP—i.e., frickin' Googled them—for 22 years.
Because, you know, gay rights has kinda been in the news and the subject of state and national controversies here and there a little bit over the course of…the past 22 years.
Remember that Probst was an editorial writer for the Hutch News before heading to the Statehouse. A fiery editorialist. A progressive editorialist.
Who didn't know about the primary, bullshit, astroturf, breakaway anti-gay "professional" front group laundering fake science about conversion therapy, bathroom bills, transfolk, you name it…for a quarter century.
He now calls them “more of a political organization” and says “they seem to be decidedly conservative and support policies against the inclusion of LGBTQ members.”
It’s the reason they were formed, Jason.
This. Is. A. Problem.
Windom, Kansas, 8/5/09. Photo by me.
I’m not gay or trans or bi or ace. I have family and friends who are. Have had such connections since I was five years old, though I didn’t know it at the time (and maybe they didn’t either, but maybe they did).
That’s 49 years for me, and once I figured out that I had LGBTQIA+ friends and family, it kinda seemed important to pay attention to stories and news and research and shenanigans concerning these folks, because I care about them and did not fall victim to the bigotry that says they’re out to give me cooties or recruit me or mine to anything other than a Pride Fest or a really baller karaoke.
Now, I get that not everyone can be up on the latest news about every issue. But the ACP isn’t the “latest” anything, and LGBTQIA+ folks aren’t “an issue.” They are communities. Of human beings. Whose rights and even existence is pretty much constantly imperiled by the political party opposite the aisle from Jason Probst.
Turns out, Probst is only four years my junior. That…kinda fits, sadly. I’ve noticed the phenomenon before. Gen X or just a scooch older, white, male, opinionated, considers himself well-informed. Not infrequently with journalism backgrounds. Turns out, a lot of these dudes have astonishing blind spots.
Maybe my sample size is too small to generalize, but I’ve often encountered really smart guys I can respect on a lot of counts who eventually just show their asses when it comes to stuff that I have either worked very hard to know or picked up because I believed in advocating for certain issues or certain communities over the years.
It may be the advocacy thing. Journalists aren’t supposed to be advocates, though Probst was an editorial writer, so that doesn’t really work for him. Though he was likely driven by the damn news cycle, which is a truly shitty norm binding opinion writers because it forces them to task-switch from topic-of-the-day to topic-of-the-next-day instead of getting good and deep on much.
Still, gay rights and the medicalization and psychologization of those rights, especially the faux-psychological weaponization of children (whose well-being Probst says he cares deeply about) go hand-in-hand back to Anita Bryant at least. Did Probst never write on the topic? Or never research that deeply?
I’m just flummoxed here. It’s not just the ACP citation. Sometimes I have to double check that those bastards are the evil motherfuckers because of the deceptive-sounding group name, which is the entire point of the deceptive-sounding name.
But at least I am always aware that there’s a group of terrible people out there trying to kill or closet my loved ones, and I need to always make sure to check to make sure if I’m in doubt.
But Probst’s apology seems to admit he was not aware that ACP is the devil. Again, this isn’t just some detail on some issue he’s unfamiliar with; it’s his constituents’ lives and livelihoods. Knowing this stuff is pretty important to being able to call it out, to pounce on it, even to know that those who cite them are probably some of the Worst People On Earth, so you can watch your back.
Combine this with the suggestively gay-bashing language he initially used against Wirestone, and I have to wonder how reliable an ally Probst can claim to be.
I’m not suggesting he’s a raging homophobe. But that’s not required to be a disappointing ally. He may very well vote the right way for LGBTQIA+ communities across the board (except, arguably, on the anti-porn measure). In some ways, at the end of the day, that’s all that matters.
Except I don’t think it is all that matters. I’m not saying that every legislator needs to know the engineering specs and tolerances of waste-water treatment plants down to the self-sealing stem bolts in the flanged intake manifolds of the 12-inch pre-cast (running out of bullshit here…) whats-its—in order to be a responsible representative for municipal water issues.
I’m saying municipal water issues are not the same as LGBTQIA+ lives and livelihoods (unless you live in Flint, Michigan or Jackson, Mississippi). The former can be tackled with testimony and briefings and phone calls from experts. Issues can be weighed by considering the standard cui bono questions.
The latter concerns a heated civil and human rights debate where one side is notoriously bad-faith, deceptive, and regurgitating tactics used through history to demonize and dehumanize marginalized populations—and it ain’t the side with all the out queers.
In such a battle—and it is a battle—an ally’s responsibility ramps up to include much better, deeper and fine-grained knowledge. Or—and this is an option—to have trusted people at hand who have such knowledge to advise him or her. Given that Probst was rebutting a gay columnist on the question of whether a law he supported would be used against gay people, it would have make sense for him to run a draft of his newsletter post past such an advisor before publishing if he wasn’t pretty confident he wasn’t going to step in shit.
My point here is that Probst may be “good enough” in terms of voting record for many communities, including the LGBTQIA+ communities. But he really ought to strive to be better than this.
No, he doesn’t need to jettison his position on the porn law to suddenly agree with Wirestone and me. I will, however, simply remind him that his argument that the gays will be safe under the anti-porn law rests on how existing legal definitions do not criminalize vanilla depictions of gay folks, and we live in a world where, um…
Do I really need to tell him that Supreme Court justices signal to outfits like the Alliance Defending Freedom that they want to judge cases where cases like gay marriage are challenged now that Dobbs has been decided?
The thing about the ACP citation is…maybe I do have to tell him this. Maybe he doesn’t get it. Maybe he thinks this is all normal lawmaking stuff, that people will respect the laws on the books, that this isn’t a war for dominance of a worldview that sees LGBTQIA+ folks as less-than and wants to keep them that way.
My larger point goes to all the Democratic electeds: when you’re outnumbered this badly in this state, yes, people will accept you and vote for you as long as you’re not Satan. I’m not saying Jason Probst is Satan or even remotely, distantly related to Satan’s 471st cousin 89 times removed.
I’m saying that beleaguered and outnumbered resistance fighters have to fight smarter and harder and can’t afford to even accidentally quote a favorite hate-group of the Right.
I’m saying that when the bad guys have a 2-to-1 numerical advantage, they can afford to fill seats with dead weight and stuffed shirts and dim bulbs, while every one of the good guys really has to strive to be an All Star all the time. Those movies where the tiny little person, surrounded by menacing thugs with nasty weapons whups all their asses? It’s because the thugs are just thugs, while the slight figure in the middle is a martial arts master.
Probst’s was an unforced error born, I think, from a blind spot about the battles that a marginalized and threatened community faces. He represents that community, and they deserve the best fighters in their corner, not just acceptable ones.
That’s not a call for him to be replaced. It’s a call for him to get better, do better, drop the ego and hit the books, get a Rainbow Advisory Council, whatever it takes.
Decent people do this simply because they care enough to fight with and for others. For a state legislator, the imperative seems even greater.