Danica Roem Helps Ground Politics

Following Danica Roem on Twitter feels like following a casual acquaintance. She retweets journalism and other politicians, and tweets about her community and about fixing Route 28. A lot about Route 28.

To be honest, I don’t really pay attention to her. I get a little thrill whenever I see her mentioned in my Twitter feed, but I don’t live in Virginia so I didn’t really care.

But last week, Danica Roem retweeted an article from AP Politics that caught my attention.

She tweets, “This headline is exactly why I’m planning to title my upcoming book Transgender Candidate Writes Book. Even after I win an election, my name is still “transgender candidate” in the headlines. That said, my main problem is the story omits my willingness to find common ground.”

I felt guilty reading that tweet. Even though I’m supportive of Danica Roem, her identity was the sole reason I started following her – an openly transgender women in politics, how cool! But I know how shitty it feels being reduced to your gender when you have so many unique skills and viewpoints to offer.

That’s not to say last month’s election wasn’t socially groundbreaking. Danica Roem defeated anti-LGBT Republican Robert Marshall and became the first openly transgender woman to take state office. The election also saw seven other transgender candidates win elections across the country.

It’s inspiring for queer kids, especially trans kids, to see that you can make a difference – that your life doesn’t have to be the sad torture that’s often portrayed in stories.

But reading Roem’s tweet got me thinking about identity politics and how she’s dealt with them over her campaign. Looking back though her Twitter and old articles, I noticed Roem consistently focuses on the issues and not on her identity. Yes, she promises to make Virginia a more inclusive commonwealth, but she spends almost all her time talking about schools, jobs, and traffic.

And even though there were smear campaigns against her because of her gender, Roem continued to talk about equalizing teacher salaries, eliminating the BPOL tax, and Route 28. As the New York Times writer Frank Bruni put it: Danica Roem is really, really boring.

In a society where queer people are starved for representation on TV, in literature, in politics, it’s easy to get excited about surface level representation. But if we want the rest of the world to take us seriously as three-dimensional human beings with hopes and dreams and talents beyond our identities, then it’s important to talk about each other that way.

I may have started paying attention to Danica Roem because of her identity, but I continue paying attention because she’s a smart woman who is dedicated to rising above the sensationalism of current politics to focus on the boring, gritty details to better her community.