From a column by Becky Juro (to be published on Monday):
In other words, HRC, an organization that purports to fight for transgender rights, has actually been actively working to ensure that nondiscrimination bills were being limited to not include transsexuals, and pressuring other GLBT organizations from supporting bills that do. We’ve long suspected that HRC, which holds themselves out as “working for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender equal rights”, has been at least passively opposed to transgender rights. Now it’s more evident that they’re more than passively opposed: the opposition appears to be quite active.
Curiously enough, HRC now claims to support trans-inclusion in ENDA, a policy change made last October (supposedly). But we’ve yet to see them really stand behind this claim; they still aren’t backing any version of ENDA that contains transgender-specific language nor are they backing the companion bill introduced by NTAC (as far as I know). The two-facedness of HRC’s position is especially galling. Either actually stand for us, or stop claiming to.
The full text of Becky’s article will be published tomorrow on another site. Becky’s confirmed that she wrote it, and I have had communications with other people who were involved in the late April protest at HRC’s headquarters that the events described in the full text really did take place. I’ll update this thread with the full text when it’s otherwise available. I could post it here (Becky’s given me permission to do so) but I’m not going to simply because it’s long.
I’m pissed off. Nothing like being betrayed by people who ask for your money and claim to work for you, but are in fact stabbing you in the back. While still asking you for more money.
Damn, and I’ve given them money in the past.
Hypocrites. I don’t get the assimilationist agenda that would have us abandon some queers in an attempt to win the favor of those who hate us for no reason. :mad:
Oh my fucking GODS! throws things It really pisses me off to see that the little groups that I’m a part of bust our asses to really merit the T in GLBT, only to have something on the scale of the Human Rights Champagne Fund talk out of both sides of their mouth and leave trans people out in the cold.
Makes you wonder whom they’re going to decide is too inconvenient next: genderqueers? bisexuals? young queers? lesbians?
(Shameless plug time in saying that queer youth, especially students, will always have a home and advocate in the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network! Fighting, despite its name, for the rights of all GLBTQ students and teachers. Join your local GLSEN Chapter today. Be a sucker and get coerced into the Co-Chairship of your chapter like me! Shameless plug ends here.)
My WAG, not that it improves things at all, is that the HRC feel that a measure that doesn’t include TG folk is more likely to pass/have some effect on the national “gay rights” scene than one that includes 'em.
Except that since HRC started practicing this form of lobbying, we’ve managed to pass nondiscrimination laws in two states and countless municipalities that cover both sexual orientation and gender identification (despite, in some cases, HRC’s best efforts to prevent it).
The long and the short is that when the bill covers both sexual orientation and gender identification, the Religious Right gloms onto the sexual orientation part and ignores the gender identification part, but if you do them separately they glom onto them separately, plus you have the problem of trying to explain why gender identification isn’t covered by sexual orientation (since the majority of people still believe that being trans is just a form of being gay). Adding gender identification appears to have no impact on adoptability of a bill that already includes sexual orientation, but trying to adopt it separately is usually much harder than getting the original sexual orientation-only bill adopted. If you’re truly for both gay rights and transgender rights, you’ll do them both at the same time and skip the second fight.
The reason you suggest was HRC’s official reason for not supporting transgender rights up until (apparently) last October. “The culture just isn’t ready for you to get those rights. We’re going to work on gay rights now, and deal with your problems later. Thanks for your support, yadda yadda yadda.” Sound at all familiar?
HRC is the Human Rights Campaign, an organization which claims to be “America’s largest gay and lesbian organization… provid[ing] a national voice on gay and lesbian issues.” I never much cared for it and stopped supporting it altogether when it endorsed Al D’Amato for Senate over Chuck Shumer, despite Shumer’s having a better record on gay issues than D’Amato. It was a cynical endorsement calculated to make HRC appear “bipartisan” and insulate it from charges that it was a “gay Democrats club,” but it backfired and IIRC lost them a lot of support, and Shumer won without them.
ENDA is the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, proposed federal legislation to prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Not sure about NTAC…I’ll guess National Transgender Action Committee?
HRC = Human Rights Coalition, a major gay rights advocacy group
NTAC = National Transgender Advocacy Coalition, a transgender rights advocacy group
ENDA = Employment Nondiscrimation Act, a proposed federal law adding sexual orientation, and possibly gender identification, to the list of characteristics that federal law prohibits discrimination on the basis of
GLBT = Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered (or Gouda, Lettuce, Bacon and Tomato)
Dont’ feel bad — I was sitting here reading this and getting thoroughly astonished that my senatory, Hillary Rodham Clinton, was doing something so divisive and offensive.
Oh, but FYI, the IRT is the Interboro Rapid Transit, one of the old subway companies in New York (they are all unified under the MTA now, but the old names persist).
I realize this is probably a stupid question, but I really don’t know, so please dispel my ignorance on this issue.
If people think transgender is simply a different way to be gay, then why is the transgendered-rights movement so closely linked to the gay-rights movement?
That was the “nice” answer. The cynical answer is “so that we can insure that transsexuals never get rights”.
My problem with HRC is not that they’re not fighting for transgender rights. The Concerned Women of American don’t either, but I’m not Pitting them for that. My beef with HRC is that they claim to be for transgender rights, but when push comes to shove they’re not. They say they are when they want our money, but when they talk to lawmakers, they’re against them. If you say you support something, then you shouldn’t be trying to undermine it at the same time.
Damn, and I’ve given them money in the past.