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Taking a Moral Stance on ENDA

The heart of a movement is judged by whether we fight for those who might easily be cast aside as "different"
An Advocate.com exclusive posted October 3, 2007
Taking a Moral Stance on ENDA

I’ve been fighting for gay rights since 1974 in Cleveland, when I was part of GEAR (Gay Education And Rights) as we became the first gay group to purchase our own building. We were proud of that, although its windows were soon broken and swastikas spray-painted on the walls.

Back then, although most people saw me as an exceptionally effeminate gay man, I was largely accepted. Yet when I transitioned, my (female) lover and I were asked to leave lesbian meetings. I was publicly disinvited to women’s events. I was twice thrown out of the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival. A National Organization for Women chapter told me I was welcome to join as a man.  Even by 1995, when 40 of us showed up at a Falls City, Neb., courthouse after the murder of Brandon Teena, many gay newspapers ignored us, not considering Teena's murder “gay news.”

Practically the only places where I remained consistently welcome were the gay bars where I had first come out, where other genderqueer gays, lesbians, and bisexuals were always sheltered. My family had largely stopped speaking with me (even today, I have yet to be allowed to meet my nieces and nephews, now in their 20s). I was forced out of my tutoring job through daily harassment by students and coworkers who refused to even speak to me. I began a new career in clinical psychology, but left after it became clear that few of my peers would refer patients to me. I began another career consulting on Wall Street, but even there gender sometimes cost me clients and accounts.

If you’re a gay, lesbian, or bisexual person of a particular age, you may have had similarly painful experiences at some point. We’ve probably been in the same marches together, come out in the same bars, fought many of the same battles.

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Wilchins is the executive director of GenderPAC.

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