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Our Voices

Closets Are For Clothes: The Social Justice Sexuality Project

This morning, the National Center for LGBTQ Rights attended a national briefing sponsored by the National Black Justice Coalition and the Congressional LGBTQ Equality Caucus titled “Closets Are For Clothes: Being LGBTQ and POC in America.”  The briefing included a presentation by Dr. Juan Battle, a professor at the City University of New York, regarding some of the key findings of the Social Justice Sexuality Project, a national study of the experiences of LGBTQ people of color in the United...

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Protest Chick-Fil-A’s Hate with a Kiss! Or Two…

This Friday, LGBTQ folks across the country will be gathering outside Chick-Fil-A restaurants and kissing up a storm as part of National Same Sex Kiss Day, aimed at protesting recent anti-LGBTQ comments by a Chick-fil-A leader and the outpouring of support from restaurant chain-goers. And what better way to protest? Visibility is a powerful answer to oppression, and in order to show that our love is real and should be fully legal, we are proud to support National Same-Sex Kiss Day. But this...

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Obama Administration Takes New Steps to Protect Children of LGBTQ Federal Workers

Last week, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) took a major step towards ensuring family equality for its federal employees. In the Administration’s continued efforts to provide equal benefits to LGBTQ federal employees, OPM proposed a rule that will extend important benefits to children of same-sex couples. OPM’s proposed rule will allow federal employees who receive health care insurance though the federal government to cover their partner’s children even if the partner is not a...

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DREAMers Get Clarification on Applying for Deferred Action

NCLR Asylum & Immigration Project Director For the first time since President Obama’s momentous announcement that undocumented youth will now be protected from deportation and granted work permits, the Department of Homeland Security has shed more light on the program’s implementation. This “deferred action” policy will take away some of the fear of deportation for many LGBTQ undocumented youth who are impacted by homophobic and unfair immigration laws. One of NCLR’s Immigration Project...

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Transgender Non-Discrimination Law Now in Effect in Massachusetts!

It’s hard to believe that many people think the law of the land already protects LGBTQ people from discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. In reality, not only are there no federal protections regarding employment discrimination for the LGBTQ community, only 16 states and the District of Columbia have laws that explicitly prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Without these crucial protections, the transgender community remains...

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A Dream Come True: Young LGBTQ Immigrants Need Not Fear Deportation For Being Brought to This Country as Children

Today, in a courageous and much needed policy shift, the Obama administration announced that it will stop all deportations of undocumented young people who were brought  to the United States  as children and have remained in the country for at least five continuous years, are under the age of 30, have either obtained a high school diploma or GED, or have served in our country’s military, and have no prior criminal history. This is the right thing to do, and will bring an end to the unfair,...

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Bunk “Study” Defames Same-Sex Headed Households

Many times, when the anti-gay industry pops out with a new absurd lie, I simply sigh, remind myself of the arc of history, and move on. But the latest vicious volley landed, quite literally, too close to home. Earlier this week, a University of Texas sociologist named Mark Regnerus published a paper purporting to show that kids raised in same-sex households have poor outcomes as adults. His conclusion runs counter to 30-plus years of peer-reviewed research and contradicts the formal positions...

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An NAACP Announcement for Equality

Here at NCLR, we know that LGBTQ people of color face some of the greatest injustices our movement strives to address. Racial and economic oppression mean that LGBTQ people of color are often poorer, have worse health outcomes, and are more vulnerable to hate crimes than their white counterparts. LGBTQ youth of color face harsh and unfair discipline in schools. This weekend, the nation’s leading civil rights organization made it clear that they too understand that reality. On Saturday,...

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New Obama Initiative for LGBTQ Prisoners

Today, the Obama administration announced new rules designed to launch a major offensive to help stop the epidemic of sexual violence in the nation’s prison system and youth detention system. The rules, released by the Department of Justice (DOJ), aim to “prevent, detect, and respond to sexual abuse in confinement facilities.” The new rules—and a new report from DOJ that was also released today—recognize that sexual violence is an especially urgent issue for LGBTQ youth in juvenile justice...

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Family Acceptance Project Publishes Pioneering Resource for Youth Suicide Prevention

For the past decade, Dr. Caitlin Ryan of the Family Acceptance Project (FAP) at SF State University has been studying the impact of family acceptance and rejection on suicide risk among LGBTQ youth. Today we’d like to take this moment to congratulate FAP and Dr. Ryan on their truly groundbreaking work. Because youth suicide is typically the result of many complex interacting factors, our community needs comprehensive suicide prevention strategies and interventions to reduce the risk to LGBTQ...

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