Gender Warriors in Support of Chelsea Manning Running for Senate

MALIC WHITE

GO

All Neos hold a plank position for the entire play.

LU: In 2013 we performed a play-

MW: “Gender Warriors in Support of Chelsea Manning.”

IC: We called her a hero.

DKH: We called her by her name.

JJ: And when the media challenged her womanhood

NH: And the prison refused her healthcare

TC: And her solitary confinement went on and on,

MW: I was sure she wouldn’t live. In 2013 I wrote a play.

ALL: Chelsea Manning was in prison for nearly four years and I never wrote her a letter.

MW: I couldn’t fit this feeling on an 8 X 10 page.

ALL: You make me proud to be myself if that means a piece of me is somehow cut from the queer place you came from.

LU: In 2013 we performed a play.

IC: We asked the audience to hold a two minute plank–

DKH: To do a small thing that feels hard.

JJ: And it’s hard,

NH: But most people have never practiced.

TC: Most people have never tried.

MW: Most people are too scared to do hard things when they’re right things,

LU:  Like writing a letter,

IC: Like breaking the law,

MW: Like staying alive.

DKH: Chelsea Manning was released from prison last year

JJ: And this year, she’s running for Senate.

NH: It would have been enough for her to survive.

MW: It would have been enough to know that

ALL: A piece of me is somehow cut from the queer place she came from.

MW: And this play is the letter I’ll write her when she wins.

CURTAIN