Ryan Jamaal Swain, one of the stars of the FX series Pose, is speaking out about the politics of the Trump era.
If you weren’t aware, Donald Trump is mentioned several times throughout the first season of the series and he’s basically an unseen character.
“Just knowing that Pose exists in this climate, in this time period, in this Trump Era…,” Ryan said in an interview with W Magazine. “I’m from Alabama and I’ve never seen Alabama so much in the news before this abortion ban. I was kind of freaked out when I got all of these notifications. Like, why is Alabama in the New York Times? Why is it here? Why is it there? Then I saw, and I was mortified. Because now, we have people trying to shut down women’s bodies, shut down trans military soldiers, we have these things that are trying to separate us in our social caste system that has been implemented in this country for so long.”
“What Pose does so beautifully is it allows people to create and to live in the presence of fear,” he added. “Having the courage to create, having the courage to say and be who they are, and truly choose their happiness and their truth over their safety, which is an unfortunate thing to have to think about especially in 2019, right? Like, you don’t want to ever have to think that you are not safe or your body is not safe in America, yet that’s what we have to deal with.”