EQUALITY PLEDGE NETWORK: Campaign Update (Yes, on my bday :-), this is my passion.) Hello Equality Makers, The Equality whirlwinds are gaining strength all over the world! And in the United States, it is clear from conversations with HRC, NGLTF, NCLR, Lambda Legal, etc., that everyone is focused on creating a full equality bill for filing next Congress. And marriage equality is headed to the Supreme Court! Yahoo, but no celebration yet! We still have a bill to create and file, and only then does the real work begin. To keep this momentum going, the Equality Pledge Network is engaging with all relevant groups. And pointing the way, the 2014 Equality Poll has thirteen 100% Yes replies - all from the LGBT Congressional Caucus! The search for co-sponsors is also underway. In New York, Equality Pledge community leaders had an in-depth meeting with Rep. Jerrod Nadler (D-NY-10) who is on the Judiciary Committee and represents all the gayborhoods from Hells Kitchen through Cheslea to the West Village. As we see it, he has a mandate to lead this effort because he is actually duly elected by the LGBT community en masse. He and his team affirmed their support of grassroots participation and their long-standing commitment to co-sponsor a comprehensive bill. We now need that bill. To help focus attention on bill drafting among the D.C. groups, weve shared the draft American Equality Bill, written mostly by Karen Doering, a former Legal Counsel at NCLR, along with a 3-page worksheet-memorandum on the various issues. (weebly/…/worksheet-sogi_human_rights_bill.pdf - feedback welcome). The Network has also expressly asked for a place at the table in whatever internal D.C. framework and process is designed to craft the bill. At this point, the belt-way groups are all working internally through these issues themselves, regrouping post ENDA. So that is all in motion and simmering. Our goal since 2009, has been to get the D.C. organizations to adopt a one-bill strategy, and that remains a key aspect until the ink is dry and a good bill is ready for filing. It is still unclear how much effort we will need to do to ensure this happens timely. Hopefully, this will happen smoothly, but we can not let up until it does. After a bill is filed, the D.C. groups have the capacity and relationships to move the core supporters, but not so much in the opposition arena, which is where our real work lies ahead. In terms of legislation and politics, the real work is collecting the votes. And for this, the A-game would be to tackle all 435 districts with campaigns. Those campaigns are most deeply about local education and connection with the community leaders from politics to soccer moms. For this, we need teams and coalitions all over the place geared up to get our messages out. So, please start outreach and team building as soon as you are ready. All state organizations will hopefully direct some of their capacity to this front. When we get into it, the messages can be varied and many. But one key message the Pledge Network will advance is that we are Americans, suffering horribly from societal discrimination and abuse, and we demand that it stop. Ideally, we need to reach every church, every barbershop, every grocery store, etc., to say LGBT Americans deserve dignity and respect as the neighbors we are to one another. For those eager to take action now, the focus is still on the 2014 Equality Poll and outreach to get replies and to establish relationships for the road ahead. This outreach should be friendly and engaging. Get to know who in the office works on LGBT issues, and start the education process. (A full legislative briefing is in the works). This will help generate the conversation in their offices and prepare their minds on the topic. It also helps to identify early co-sponsors and makes sure the Pledge elements are included in the bill. And strategically, once we identify early support, the contours of the campaign will become more evident. So please go pick the low-hanging fruit and get the lay of the land from the resistance. In terms of actually passing this legislation, ultimately, we will need state groups and local activists to organize around persuading their own congress people. The main D.C. groups simply do not have the capacity to mount the kind of ground game in each District that we need. And we need that game because there are LGBT children in all of those districts who need us to be there to make this case for them. Keep in mind, the legislative campaign is an organizing tool to change public attitudes. And the comprehensive bill is a rallying cry to call the question: Do you support full LGBT equality or not? This will call the question on homophobia and transphobia in America. And when we win the bill, major progress will come from the actual protection of the laws involved, which is extensive and backed by every federal $$$. Importantly, this push is going to provoke the religious opposition - because of their federally funded social programs. But this is where our children need the most protection, so in we go. Our broad vision is that LGBTQ people be safe and welcomed everywhere on this globe - asap, because our lives and peace of mind are being stolen from us every single day. So we need to speed up that process in the United States by pushing the envelop and digging where the resistance is the greatest. We need to call in our favors, and take the name count of who stands where on equality, and then hold their feet to the fire like never before. Big picture, they will respect us more when we claim our dignity without compromise. So for now, we must organize. First, we must get the bill agreed upon within our community. And then we need to get creative. For example: 1. Create a national coalition with capacity to support grassroots participation. 2. Build sister-state relationships where advanced state groups can support newer ones. 3. Organize our media capacity to communicate in campaign mode to LGBT people en masse. & 4. Create major PSA campaigns to tell our truths to stop the abuse. Simply put, we need to build the infrastructure that can then demand and secure our human rights both at home and abroad. Personally for the next few weeks, Ill be taking a much needed break from the pressures of this campaign, now waged incessantly since 2008 when I lived in Africa and experienced at the age of 44 the pain of the closet and abject fear of being gay. Coming home, I found the omnibus bill and eQualityGiving and set one life goal: to get the movement to shift strategy to a one-bill, full equality strategy. It took too long and was very painful. But it has happened. And while again, its not in ink yet, Im slowly releasing the cumulative anxiety from the intra-movement efforts that were necessary but never fun. Moving forward we must unite. We must be a coordinated team. We are already one tribe, a small percentage of Earths humanity, scattered and tormented, alienated and injured. We are clearly a community, among the most abused of all time. Yet we are uniting. We have to unite. We are too few to succeed divided. And it is time to heal old angers. It is time to clean the slate of our own internal shame and disappointments of one another. It is time to lead ourselves forward with healing love in our hearts. And to shine proudly as the next great frontier of universal human rights for the world. Remember that we are Lincoln and Eleanor Roosevelt. We are Bayard Rustin. We are Jane Adams and Susan B. Anthony and Ellen! We have been at the forefront of every major human rights cause in history. Our community presence is a force of spirit changing ancient religions, saving humankind from judging their LGBT neighbors and others. We are the defenders of love and the individual. Survivors against the odds. Creative minds beautifying the world. We are here - we are queer - and its time everyone got used to it. Our day has come! Liberation now! Equality now! 100% Yes: 2014 Equality Poll 1. Rep. Paul TONKO D-NY-20 2. Rep. Louise M. SLAUGHTER (D-NY-25) 3. Rep. Jerry NADLER ((D-NY-10) 4. Rep. Nydia VELAZQUEZ (D-NY-07) 5. Rep. Rosa L. DeLAURO (D-CT-3) 6. Rep. Suzanne BONAMICI (D-OR-1) 7. Rep. Eric SWALWELL (D-CA-15) 8. Rep. Charles B. RANGEL (D-NY-13) 9. Rep. Nita M. LOWEY (D-NY-17) 10. Rep. Carolyn MALONEY (D-NY-12) 11. Rep. Anna ESHOO (D-CA-18) 12 Rep. Eliot ENGEL (D-NY-16) 13. Rep. Jose E. SERRANO (D-NY-15) 14. Call your Rep: bit.ly/CongressByZip Worksheet: SOGI Human Rights Bill: (weebly/…/worksheet-sogi_human_rights_bill.pdf)
Posted on: Sun, 30 Nov 2014 16:41:04 +0000