The National Center for Lesbian Rights

The National Center for Lesbian Rights is assisting us with an issue right now. I have to say that this organization, like all the others I have dealt with so far in activist issues, is amazing.

I would deeply like to thank the LGB community for adding the T, and dragging the transgender crowd under their wings. There are so many groups out there fighting for equality that it amazes me. The part that really gets me is the fact that these groups like NCLR are just so welcoming to us as a T couple. They are really great people working on a lot of important cases right now, and if you haven't visited their website, you should.

For now, trans couples have a benefit that gay and lesbian relationships don't have, yet. They can marry, or stay married. If nothing changes, Claire and I can stay married after she fully transitions. While I am obviously very happy that the transition doesn't mean we have to divorce or annul our marriage, it brings with me an extra heavy weight that we have something our brothers and sisters don't have.

It makes me redouble my efforts as an activist. While obviously I care about issues that affect us, they pale in comparison to the stories of those kept out of hospital rooms while their partners lay injured or dying, unable to hold their hand, or worse yet, say goodbye. Who the hell is our government to tell us who should be recognized for basic things like car insurance, access to sick partners, or adoption? I have a friend that was separated from his partner because of immigration laws. It makes me angry to think that we the people only have the right to love who politicians deem suitable.

Georgia just stopped an attempt to ban adoptions for the LGBT community. Florida holds firm in refusing to let gay and lesbian couples adopt. They have thousands of children in foster homes or group homes, but God forbid that loving homosexual parents be allowed to offer a safe, loving and centered home for a child. We need more voices. It doesn't take much to join the activist alert lists, and even spending 5 minutes is a help when added up.

Please take a moment and get involved. You may not think it affects you, but odds are you have a family member or a friend that it does affect. And it's just the right thing to do.

Some other great groups:
Human Rights Campaign
Use Google to find your state's Equality group (example)
National Center for Transgender Equality
American Civil Liberties Union

Really cool doctors, HR, and family reaction to Steve Stanton

Claire came out to our chiropractor today. We see her at least once a month, and she's really great. It's a lot of fun to go see her, as she has a great sense of humor. A couple of visits ago, some joking went on that led to Claire getting close to the truth, laughing and saying "Oh, I prefer to be called Claire." Last visit, Claire said "it's the meds" in response to something the doc said, and I started laughing so hard I cried. I think she thought we were talking about illegal drugs or something. Yikes.

We decided it might be time for disclosure, as the changes from the hormones are starting to get noticeable. So Claire emailed her and let her know the situation, and sent her here. So, doc, you know who you are, if we don't get a call cancelling our appointment we'll assume we can still come back ;)

On the job front, apparently our HR person has been watching the Stanton issue still. When I called him about something else, Mr. Jones asked me how his "friend" is. I said she was fine, nervous and scared, but okay.

Mr. Jones then went on to tell me that he had been speaking to people in our agency and another agency he is involved with, and found that discussing Stanton's issues with them didn't come back as negative as he thought.

He seems to think it is time to start laying the groundwork for making our agency "trans friendly" by subtle means. He knows Claire wants to stay stealth and had planned to quit before transitioning. He expressed concern about losing a good employee, and asked if we'd stay on if there was a way to make it easier on her. I told him that we would love to stick around as we like the agency we work for.

He's looked around and realized that with over a thousand employees we certainly must have some GLBT employees. I know of one employee that makes no secret that he is gay. He expressed concern that there doesn't seem to be a place for employees to have a support group. I explained that we couldn't attend a group without outing ourselves, and although our agency has no problem with gay and lesbian employees, trans employees are the big new scary step.

So his plan is to start conversing with department heads about what the county needs to know about trans employees. When he gets to the department Claire works for, he's going to report back to Claire what the "climate" is like there from a supervisor. He assured me he was actively working on a plan, and to let Claire know "he's got our backs." Hoo boy, I sure hope so.

My mom, who lives in the area that Steve Stanton was just fired from, spoke to me about the firing. She was really upset and asked how they could get away with blatant discrimination like that. She really couldn't understand it. I can't either, really. I know she worries about us, and the Largo 5 sure aren't helping.

To Steve/Susan - I know you didn't intend to become such a poster child for your disorder, but I have to say thank you for appealing the decision. I hope you let the groundswell of support you have received carry your case to court and hopefully get the 11th Circuit Supremes thinking about human rights.

Metta

Annie

Stanton

I am on the edge of my seat, following the commissioner meeting in Largo.

Here is the blog that is tracking the breaking news.

I pray that we can move this country forward where people that are born with this birth defect now longer have to live in shame, to be discriminated against.

Perhaps tonight we'll take a step forward for tolerance.

Annie

Is "sleepy" considered a long or short-term disability?

If you’ve read the earlier post you’ll know that, using an email with a fake name, we emailed Mr. Jones at our HR department and asked what our local government agency would do in the event of a situation like Largo. We let him know that just like Largo, he had a transsexual employee on the payroll. We had also asked him to investigate whether the current or new insurance plan would cover hormone therapy.

So today it stepped up quite a bit. We spoke with Mr. Jones in Human Resources today in person, or at least I did. Claire couldn’t get free to come across town for the appointment, so I just went in her place, since I’m only 4 blocks from the HR building. I walk in and Mr. Jones isn’t expecting me. I close the door and say that my spouse has been the one emailing him. Now, Mr. Jones knows me, and didn’t realize that the person he had been corresponding with was married to a fellow employee, so he was a bit surprised.

He pulled out a load of printed out paperwork that he had been reading, including the transgender workplace guide from HRC that we had linked to him in an email. We talked for a couple of minutes about the Largo reaction, and he asked how long Claire and I had been married. I told him it was 6 years today. After a “happy anniversary,” he then asked me if I had known Claire was TS before we were married. I told him that I had not known, but that I was much happier now that Claire has told me. I explained that James was always depressed, but I would see flashes of the essence of Claire that I fell in love with. He jumped in and finished for me and said “And now you have her all the time.” I believe he gets it.

We started discussing what he could do for us. It was a little disappointing. Basically, he asked if we had a lawyer and advised that we might want to speak with one. I told him that I had been told - by someone that deals with the corporations/agencies to develop their transgender policies – that we were unprotected by the laws in Georgia, and that our only hope was for the corporation to stand behind us with a gender identity policy.

He told me that basically, our government agency is in the middle of the bible belt, and that any attempt to add GID to our non-discrimination policy would be shot down like Largo’s commission did. He said that only one county and one city in Georgia had adopted employee protections, and not to count on him being able to get ours changed. He did reiterate that our agency would try to assist however possible, but that changed the discrimination clause change is unlikely at this point.

He reminded me that Georgia is an at-will state, and that Claire works at the “leisure of” her boss. He said that although she can be terminated at any time for any reason legally, she could not have it done for a discriminatory purpose and the agency would not allow that. However, her department could make things up and fire her for reasons unrelated to transgender issues. He spoke about ideas Claire could do to protect herself from getting set up in that fashion,none of them foolproof though.

He asked me to go into detail about the day her supervisor made the jokes about Claire’s nails and said “Well, over here (the USA) the only guys that polish their nails DRESS” and started laughing, making Claire and her male coworker both a bit uncomfortable for a couple of minutes. The only way we could fully protect her from being fired from a legal standpoint is very radical. He suggested that should she file a sex harassment claim against her female boss, any retaliation would be covered by EEOC and her department would find it impossible to try to set her up and fire her. He did agree that this was probably a very tough road, because that meant generating extreme hostility in the workplace. I do have to concede that it certainly is a creative approach to find at least one method where she would be protected by law. Anyway, we nixed this idea.

So, he tossed a couple of other ideas on the table. One was that we could start putting different knowledgebase types of article on the agency intranet about topics like diabetes, cholesterol, GID or anything else that employees might like to learn more about or contact HR discreetly and ask questions about options, insurance coverage, etc. Another idea was to publish - on the agency's website - a calendar for local young adult activities groups including a local group that is a GLBTIQ support group. The idea is to start slowly introducing the concepts of transgender issues casually to just raise awareness.

So basically, we left it as a stalemate. Claire wants to stay stealth as long as possible and HR really can’t come out and be too forceful ahead of time. So, Mr. Jones is still brainstorming ideas in the meantime and is prepared to go to the agency’s attorney and Claire’s department head immediately if she calls him and tells him she needs him to. Now the real stress kicks in, right?

Well, we're hanging in there. We're only mildly stressed, because we have so many other things happening right now, both scary and fun. I'm facing hand surgery again and co-writing a book, and Claire is looking at starting hair removal and getting into photography. The pink tornado is hovering over our heads and we have our storm chaser vehicle loaded with survival gear. Floor it Claire!

Annie

Which way should we go?

The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche

This has been a morning filled with anxiety. On the way to work we discussed the pros and cons of giving Claire's identity to our HR equal opportunity specialist. We have been communicating anonymously with HR since the Stanton issue broke asking what would happen if a currently employed TS employee were outed. After 3 conversations now, he insists that Claire should confide her identity so that she may be fully protected by HR in case she is outed soon. Claire has been subjected to comments and ridicule from her supervisor about having moderate length fingernails with clear polish on them and has been told in the past that her hair may not touch her shoulders; she must keep it short.

This HR individual has expressed the following sentiments by phone:
"We can't protect you if we don't know who you are."

"You should not have to submit to being held to identity expression standards simply because your supervisor prefers a particular look. It pains me deeply that we are doing this to you. There is no statement in the SOP of this organization that mandates the length of your hair or nails."

"We don't care about how you look, or what your identity is, just about the job you do for us."

"We would never allow you to be fired for gender expression. If we did, you would definately not have any further worries about how to pay for any surgeries, and your new wardrobe could be purchased from Fifth Avenue after the lawsuit."

Our organization's code says this:
"Discrimination against any person in recruitment, examination, appointment, training, promotion, retention, discipline, salary increase, or any other aspect of personnel administration because of race, creed, color, sex, age, national origin, religion, mental or physical handicap, or any other factor not related to requirements of the position is hereby prohibited."

HR insists that the open-ended statement would positively include gender expression and identity. We can only look at the wording in Largo that clearly stated gender identity and gender expression were protected and wonder just how protected we would be.

I can see the logic of being on record before a bad review is added to her file, or other manipulation of records to demonstrate that she should be terminated without being attached to a discriminatory act. On the other hand, the person in HR also has expressed great dismay that a valued employee is being harassed about hair, etc. If this confidential name is handed to HR, would he then begin an "educational campaign" to teach that department that supervisors may not impinge upon gender expression? I can understand he would want to be proactive in making sure it didn't happen. If they are made to look twice at the employees in the department, Claire's supervisors will surely put two and two together. The supervisor herself would just have to hear nails and hair to know exactly who she has been leaning on. The loss of Claire's job months before we pay off all of our bills would surely mean ruined credit.

On the other hand, if she is harassed or fired shortly after speaking officially and in confidence with HR it would be at the fault of HR and the loss of employment would, by HR's own opinion, be merit for a lawsuit or settlement. But that would be long after said ruination of credit.

We continue to ponder this one. We know HR is watching the Largo result, as do we. In the meantime, we worry. Any comments from others that faced this would be welcome.

Go Susan Go!

Just got this alert from Google.

Read Newsweek Story

Steve (Susan) Stanton discusses plans to fight the decision to put her on administrative leave as the first step to fire her for being transsexual.

Hang in there Susan, we're rooting for you.