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I’m a bad gay.
As in, I don’t stay up on LGBTQ news and politics like I should.
It’s not good, and it’s not something I’m proud of.
Maybe it’s because I easily pass as straight and don’t deal with the struggles that many non-heterosexual or non-binary or non-cisgender people do. Maybe it’s because much of the time the news is just too traumatizing or too infuriating or too depressing.
Whatever the reason, I was just reminded of my bad-gayness while walking down the street.
I was in downtown Boulder and ran into one of those street campaigners. You know, the ones who hold clipboards and make us nervous with their enthusiasm and their pestering about causes we should all really give more of a damn about.
Well, this guy was from HRC—the Human Rights Campaign. I felt like I would be an especially horrible gay if I didn’t even stop and talk to the guy. After all, he called out to me, “Can you spare a minute for gay and transgender rights?” I almost kept walking—but how can you in good conscience respond to that question with a “No?” So, I stopped, and I listened.
He started telling me about the state of gay rights in the United States, and I suddenly realized: I have no f*cking clue what he’s talking about.
So I rushed myself to my favorite smoothie spot in town, sat down with my laptop, and did my gay homework.
If you—gay or straight or whatever the hell else—are also wildly undereducated about gay rights in this country, I’ll ask you the following: Can you spare the next minute for gay and transgender rights?
The Equality Act
The HRC (again, Human Rights Campaign—not Hillary Rodham Clinton) is currently focusing their energies on the Equality Act.
The Equality Act is essentially a bill that seeks to make antidiscrimination laws more universal—taking them to a national level as opposed to the current individual state laws. The intent is also to expand the groups included in the Civil Rights law—adding “sex,” “sexual orientation,” and “gender identity” to the list.
The Equality Act was passed by the United States House of Representatives on May 17, 2019. Now that the House passed the bill, the United States Senate has received it for consideration.
This is where the HRC, the enthusiastic man I met on the street, and we come in.
There are a variety of ways we can take action, offer our support, and get involved in the fight for the Equality Act. Go to HRC’s website to find out more and do what you can.
And, because you’re probably bored of hearing me talk (and who doesn’t love “Queer Eye?”), here’s the one and only Karamo Brown explaining what the Equality Act is and giving us the pep talk we need to get off our butts and get involved:
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