Even the most politically engaged members of our community have been shocked by the speed, efficiency and sheer cruelty of President Donald Trump’s attacks on America’s queer community. As a Black trans man in my 50s, I’ve grown up in a country that — on its best days — acts ambivalent about my existence. But we appear to be backtracking; this administration is committed to driving trans people back to society’s fringes and dividing the progressive resistance with a daily cycle of executive orders, political broadsides and inflammatory remarks.

Today, as concerned queer Americans, organizers and political leaders strategize about how to counter the ongoing attacks on the community, I urge them to look to what might feel like an unexpected place for guidance: our country’s underground ballroom scene.

When I first came out, I was 18 years old. I left my Brooklyn neighborhood to find people like me. In my search for an inclusive community, I found the ballroom scene. For those who are unfamiliar with ballroom, this tradition goes all the way back to the 1890s when gay society would host interracial drag balls that mocked the strict and restrictive parties thrown by upper-class society. These balls satirized the elite, featured performances that pushed gender norms and, most important, created a safe space for thousands of queer folks — many of whom were Black, brown and Hispanic.

The ballroom community, which sprung up as a response to the anti-LGBTQ+ attacks of its time, nurtured generations of progressive organizers, offered chosen families to many whose relatives refused to accept them, vaulted voguing to the heights of pop culture and, most importantly, gave trans people a voice in a society that previously refused to hear them.

Ballroom houses rose to popularity in Harlem in the early 1930s and ’40s, but the movement quickly spread as the success of a network of houses emerged across major cities from Washington, D.C., and Atlanta to Los Angeles and New Orleans. There were overbearing efforts to squash the movement, arrest organizers and shutter dance halls, but this only spurred more houses to pop up. Frankly, society’s rejection of ball showed us that what we were doing was working.

The legacy of ballroom persists today in its many iterations, including shows such as “RuPaul’s Drag Race” and Ryan Murphy’s ”Pose.” Drag brunches are another contemporary format in which people celebrate ball’s legacy. And while ball culture is largely lived through the lens of entertainment, its roots are firmly grounded in social advocacy and political empowerment. In the same way that unions, political organizations and social clubs gave a voice and a platform to specific communities, ballroom accomplished this for the LGBTQ+ community members.

The first time I ever walked was for New York City’s House of LaBeija in 1989. I participated in the “male illusionist” category. This was pre-transition, so I had to embody realness — the act of appearing as male or masculine as possible. When I walked onstage for the first time, the room applauded me. That was the first time I ever felt like I could be myself. This was no small thing in 1980s New York, and it changed my life.

In an environment where your identity is rejected by the vast majority of your peers, affirmation is power. This sense of community saved people’s lives, and I watched how New York City’s ballroom community quickly evolved into a sophisticated engine for political advocacy. Ballroom gave LGBTQ+ community members — most notably, Black, brown and Hispanic LGBTQ+ community members — a space to align and organize.

When the Stonewall Movement erupted in 1969, our most strident activists came from New York City’s ballroom scene. When the rest of America refused to acknowledge the AIDS crisis, organizers in the ballroom space educated members about safe sex, organized fundraisers for AIDS awareness and provided community resources. Many of these activists would go on to lead national campaigns for ending Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, protesting the Defense of Marriage Act and enshrining same-sex marriage into law.

If the ballroom movement can teach us anything today, it’s this: Affirmation is power, diversity is our strength and winning coalitions grow from the grassroots up. And it’s time to pay attention to what worked back then and buckle down to assert our right to exist and thrive in today’s anti-trans atmosphere.

While national LGBTQ+ nonprofits like the Human Rights Campaign claim to champion their roles as advocates for trans and BIPOC community members, departments that serve these communities are the first to get cut when economic pressure surges.

At this moment, when so many members of our community are suffering, revisiting the tenets of the ballroom scene can renew its promise for LGBTQ+ people everywhere. Ballroom gives us a vehicle to channel our isolation into community, our anger in activism, our despair into hope and our lived experience into art. It gives us a space to explore our highest aspirations and broadcast everything we have to offer to the world. It may not seem like it now, but I promise, something beautiful will emerge from this moment.

Not unlike earlier moments in our history, our nation is governed by leaders who reject our humanity, underfund vital public health measures, gut economic justice resources established for our most vulnerable community members and seek to drive us to the fringe. We must actively revisit the core tenets of the ballroom movement: a celebration of gender identity and emphasis on multicultural representation and chosen family. No compromises — just unapologetic realness.

We will firmly and universally reject any and all efforts to write us off. If our programs aren’t funded, we have to fundraise. If our stories are ignored, we can engage the public’s imagination with protests, demonstrations and rallies.

We cannot secure equal rights for all LGBTQ+ people by abandoning specific segments of our community along the way. Where we’re rejected by others, we’ll solidify our own communities that celebrate our identities until the world sees us for what we are. We can’t give in or give up. As painful as this moment is, I promise it will produce something beautiful if we resist and apply the willful tactics perfected by activists from the ballroom scene.