This past weekend the world lost Niki Massey, who was an asexual “Social Justice Daemon” (as she put it); abortion clinic escort; reproductive rights, disability, and Black Lives Matter activist; and scathingly snarky atheist blogger at Seriously?!?

Olivia wrote a beautiful commemoration, as have many others.

Those of you who don’t follow the progressive side of the atheist blogosphere closely may never have heard of her, as she was not very closely involved with the asexual community, despite being unabashedly ace. She cited racial stereotypes and prejudice as a major barrier to her participation in August, on the Bi Any Means podcast. It makes me sad to know that. It makes me feel like on that level, we failed her. I can only hope that we do better in the future to make the ace community feel more welcoming to everyone, especially multiply marginalized people like her.

To that end, I don’t want to let her go unrecognized among the wider asexual community. Her life mattered. She made a difference. Her influence was much more widely felt than she ever knew. She will be remembered even among people whose lives she never knew she touched, myself among them.

I am only someone who followed her blog, and now any other possibility has been cut short, but still I feel her absence. My feed will never be graced by her vivacious, DGAF personality, her keen insight, and her biting wit again. She was much too young for this.

I want to highlight for posterity some of Niki’s writing that sticks with me the most:

• A Slight Sign of Change? – about how even though “the fight for social justice feels damn tiresome” there’s hope, because we’re winning. This is one to look back on when I need a reminder that all is not lost.
• Evidence, Anecdotes, and Disability and Performative Disability
• Piss Checks on the Poor and Dignity and Today in “The Party of No Government Waste Wasting Government Money”
• Dance of the Brain Weasels
• Hold My Hand – about Inattentive ADD
• Borderline Personality Disorder Month
• …and, of course, The Relief of Asexuality

I will always appreciate her candor and bravery in sharing these posts, and aspire to make even half of the difference she did.

My condolences to all of her colleagues, friends, and chosen family.