*images from Hall of Shame
“I am incredibly optimistic and confident about the prospects we have for ensuring that our entire community is included in the legislative fight,” promised Joe Solmonese. President of the Human Rights Campaign, he was a keynote speaker at the Southern Comfort Conference–a national gathering of transgender people and their families which takes place annually in Atlanta. He spoke of the HRC’s commitment to pass only inclusive legislation, which was going to provide protections for the entire LGBTQ community, not simply gays and lesbians.
As we all know over the past several weeks, news of ENDA has dominated both gay and mainstream press. Over 300 LGBT rights organizations came forward and mobilized in an effort to fight the removal of gender identity from the bill, which was spearheaded by Barney Frank. Frank argued that they didn’t have the votes in the House to pass a fully inclusive bill. He claimed the community needed to take what they could get in a trickle down approach with promises of coming back for transgender people next year. Meanwhile the HRC played smoke and mirrors with contradictory statements and later a community poll whose ethics and validity has been called into question. In the midst of this battle, the HRC’s lone transgender board member Donna Rose resigned with a public statement exposing her disgust at what the HRC was doing, and stating she could no longer stand by them.
As LGBT rights organizations, private individuals, and activists came forward discussing the need for protections for transgender people (who are arguably the most vulnerable to employment discrimination), the HRC stood by silently saying they would not oppose nor support non-inclusive ENDA legislation. Right before a vote on the non-inclusive version of ENDA legislation, the HRC issued a statement urging members of the house to pass the bill–a complete reverse of message from where the organization had been only weeks prior. It is unlikely that even this watered down version of ENDA will make it through the house and even if it did, President Bush will veto the legislation. At the end of the day the HRC must now go back to a community who they have blatantly lied to, one only needs to look as far as the numerous transgender blogs to see that the HRC has backed themselves into a corner, and few are going to be quick to forget.
–Sassafras Lowrey
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: barney frank, donna rose, enda, hrc, human rights campaign, joe solmonese, legislation, rights, trans, transgender
