Last year, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy organization, the Human Rights Campaign, labeled 2021 the “worst year” for LGBTQ rights in modern U.S. history, citing a record number of anti-LGBTQ bills introduced in state legislatures across the country. This year, the amount has nearly doubled, the group reported. But as 2022 comes to a close, advocates say this surge of legislation is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg when it comes to the onslaught lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer Americans have faced. Over the past 12 months, they say, they have watched in horror as homophobic and transphobic slurs have become mainstream in political discourse and as threats of violence directed at the community have become something of the norm.