I first found out about this rally in church last weekend, and again in an email from our local interfaith group. My first impulse was to post about it on the various blogs I frequent, to help spread the word. Because, well, that’s just what I do. For one reason or another I often can’t make it to these events, but I hope that I can make at least some small difference by making sure word gets out.
Here is the web site of Equality Ohio, and below the fold is the event information I received via email. Equal rights for all Americans is an issue near and dear to my heart, and I was greatly saddened by the passage of Issue 1 in November, and I very much want to see Ohio move in the direction of being more fair and inclusive. I have bold-faced the part of Equality Ohio’s vision that concerns me, because I think it could be a stumbling block.
Homecoming Rally with Equality Ohio.
Equality Ohio is an organization which advocates for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) citizens. A gathering will take place at Ohio’s statehouse in Columbus on October 1, 2005 at 3:30 pm to declare a stronger vision for our state, including: Equal civil rights and protections for all Ohioans and families including LGBT and straight Ohioans, statewide Employment Non-Discrimination Act Foster parent and adoption laws that do not discriminate against loving LGBT parents, a Safe Schools bill that protects all our children, a Hate Crimes Act that protects all our citizens, and the legal right for an individual to amend a birth certificate after sexual reassignment if they so choose.
At the Homecoming Rally the Equality Ohio and the Equality Ohio Education Fund will be officially launched. For more information on Equality Ohio, visit www.equalityohio.org
I understand that coalition isn’t pretty, and when you have a group advocating for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Americans, all of those groups want to have their voices heard. But that last goal just threw me for a loop. So often we say that this isn’t about “special” treatment, but about equal treatment under the law (or some words to that effect). The legal right to change your birth certificate really seems more like a “special” right, and one that will seem unreasonable to many people who support the other goals on that list.
The legal right to change your birth certificate really seems more like a “special” right, and one that will seem unreasonable to many people who support the other goals on that list.
Adopted children generally have the right to have their birth certificates changed to reflect their new family names, and no one seems to see that as a “special right”. I’m not sure I understand why someone would see a similar amendment to the same document as a “special right” when it’s applied to a GLBTQ issue. Could you offer more explanation for your view Renee?
Well, I wasn’t aware of the thing with adopted children, which is why I said “seems”–I am always totally upfront about the fact that I’m not all knowing and all seeing. I understood birth certificates to be legal documents that reflected the state of things at the time of one’s birth, and changing them seemed akin to trying to rewrite history.
I did, by the way, along with my husband, devote a fair amount of effort and energy to educating people about Issue 1 and why they should vote against it. Even to the point that I actually spoke up to the woman in front of me in line at the polling place, who asked, “Which button do you push to vote for man-woman marriage?” and tried to explain to her what the issue was really about, and how even many prominent Republicans opposed it. You’ll have to take my word for it that speaking up on such things in a face to face environment is extremely out of character for me and wasn’t easy to do. But I felt pretty strongly about this. So I think I am probably pretty far left as far as these issues go, as compared to much of the population of Ohio. It’s my thought that that particular bit of legislation might be a sticking point for people, many of whom are not yet convinced more “basic” rights like the right to visit a loved one in the hospital, have joint insurance, inheritance rights, etc.
But I’m truly not looking for a fight here.
I hope you didn’t misinterpret my asking you about your opinion as being argumentative.
I understand that people are mostly uneducated regarding the complexities of many GLBTQ issues and that people are frequently reflexively defensive about the unknown, so I do understand that this is a difficult issue for many to get their heads around. As always, the most marginalized subject positions have it the roughest.
But opening up dialogue is a good thing, I think. Perhaps I’m naive, but I do believe that if there are more places where people can ask questions and the issues can be discussed, then greater understanding will further us down the road toward equality. For example, if people can feel safe to ask and learn that changing a birth certificate is an already existing right, then fewer of them are apt to misunderstand it as a “special right” and thus there will be less opposition.