Blog
Date
Month: November 2014
Blog
A Sunday Well Spent
Earlier this month, I had the chance to take the pulpit at Cathedral of Hope, a Dallas institution. I had not visited the Cathedral in more than 10 years, but when I received an invitation from my long-time friend and community hero, Reverend Jim Mitulski, who has been serving as the interim Senior Pastor, I jumped at the chance to return. While I’m no longer a part of any religious community, I see every day the difference that faith communities like COH make in the lives of people, including...Blog
Transgender Day of Remembrance
Today, International Transgender Day of Remembrance is being observed worldwide. It is day to honor the memory of transgender people we have lost to senseless acts of hatred and violence and to reflect on the transgender community’s incredible strength and resilience. Both globally and in the United States, transgender people—and transgender women of color in particular—are assaulted and often murdered with impunity, simply because of who they are. In most cases, these crimes are not...Blog
Working to Ensure the Safety of Transgender Individuals
Interacting with law enforcement can be stressful for anyone. This is especially true of transgender individuals who all too often face discrimination, inappropriate comments, and hostility. While most law enforcement personnel want to do what is right, we hear from many transgender people about the demeaning and degrading experiences they have had while under police custody. That’s why the National Center for LGBTQ Rights, along with several other national and local LGBTQ groups, worked with...Blog
Our Goal—End Conversion Therapy in Five Years
No child should ever be hurt because of who they are. That’s why we started the #BornPerfect campaign to end conversion therapy across the country over the next five years. We need your financial support to make it happen. All attempts to change their sexual orientation or gender identity through conversion therapy damage LGBTQ youth, causing depression, substance abuse, and even suicide. Conversion therapy has been condemned by every major medical and mental health organization in the...Blog
The Human Element: Making Conversion Therapy in the U.S. an International Human Rights Issue
There we were. Around the illustrious circular United Nations briefing tables at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, among the 70 human rights advocates from across the United States, the largest delegation in the history of the U.N.’s Committee Against Torture (CAT). Together, as a leader of the National Center for Lesbian Right’s (NCLR) #BornPerfect campaign, I had spent a sleepless few days working around the clock to make Committee members aware of the dangers of convention therapy,...Blog
NCLR Urges U.N. Committee Against Torture to End Conversion Therapy
This Tuesday, I will walk into the historic Palais de Nations in Geneva, Switzerland to meet with representatives of the United Nations and the U.S. Department of State as part of the National Center for LGBTQ Rights’ #BornPerfect campaign to protect LGBTQ youth from conversion therapy, the dangerous and discredited practice of attempting to change someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity through everything from talk therapy to exorcism to “orgasmic reconditioning.” Under the Convention...Blog
