Boston’s Run For Cover Records Drops Whirr Over Transphobic Tweets

They followed it up by donating $3,000 to three separate LGBTQ organizations. —Michael Marotta

A version of this post originally appeared on Vanyaland.


Run For Cover Records

Run For Cover Records

On the Internet, life moves pretty fast.

About four hours after shoegaze band Whirr tweeted transphobic comments toward trans-feminist punk band G.L.O.S.S., Boston’s Run For Cover Records promptly dropped the group and disassociated itself from them. Run For Cover had released two split 7-inches and an EP from Whirr, but stated last night they won’t ever work again with the Bay Area rock band.

“We as individuals and as a label are accepting of all people and require the same from the bands and people we work with,” Run For Cover tweeted on Monday.

The label’s statement came hours after Whirr began tweeting at G.L.O.S.S., an Olympia band of trans, queer, and femme musicians, who, as Noisey put it, “released one of the most important demos of the last few years a few months ago—five brutal and forceful transgender anthems.”

Among the tweets Whirr sent out included a photo of Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs—you know the scene we’re talking about—and lines like this: “misogyny is hating women. g.l.o.s.s. Is just a bunch of boys running around in panties making shitty music.”

Other bands, like Waxahatchee, Chumped, and Crying, jumped to G.L.O.S.S.’ defense on Twitter, and the band’s singer, Sadie Switchblade, created a Twitter account to fire back. (Noisey has a recap of all the back and forth.)

And it didn’t take long for Run For Cover to take things a step even further: Yesterday they announced a donation of $3,000 to three separate LGBTQ organizations. “In light of recent actions by an artist we were formerly affiliated with, we’ve decided to donate $3,000 to a non-profit organization supporting LGBTQ rights,” the label wrote online. “After speaking to Sadie from G.L.O.S.S. we decided to split the donations equally amongst three different organizations of Sadie’s choice. Please check out all three with the links provided, there is an incredible amount of information and resources on all three sites that go far beyond my short summations of each. Also, listen to G.LO.S.S.”

Read more about each group below, via Run For Cover’s news page.


Non-profit LGBTQ organizations: Interfaith Works / Sylvia Rivera Law Project / Black and Pink. Posted on October 21st, 2015

Interfaith Works Emergency Overnight Shelter is the Olympia, WA based homeless shelter that Sadie from G.L.O.S.S. works at. Their mission is to ‘advance the social inclusion and empowerment of the homeless through innovative practices of sheltering, mental health, and basic emergency needs.” IWshelter provides a 24 hour “Peoples House” which serves a wide range of needs for homeless people, and has for almost 25 years.

Sylvia Rivera Law Project is an New York organization that focuses on ‘increasing the political voice’ of transgender and gender non-conforming people, particularly with people of color and low income. SRLP’s goals include providing free legal services to low income transgender people, as well as ending sanctioned prison related discrimination based on gender identity. SRLP is an anti-oppression organization that fights for fair legal treatment for some of the most marginalized people in our country.

Black and Pink is an organization aiming to expose the American prison system for its violence and discrimination against the LGBTQ community. Black and Pink is a group of LGBTQ prisoners and formerly incarcerated LGBTQ people. Black and Pink is a feminist, anti-racist, organization fighting for queer liberation.

And take Run For Cover’s advice: Listen to G.L.O.S.S. via their Bandcamp.