June 1, 2022 – Happy Pride Month!
This June, the Council for Global Equality and its member organizations celebrate 53 years since the Stonewall Inn rebellion. 53 years since the crowd at the bar in lower Manhattan – mostly transgender people of color – fought back against a police raid, ushering in a new era of LGBTQI+ organizing, in the United States and around the world.
The patrons at Stonewall knew from their everyday experience that LGBTQI+ rights were human rights and that human rights were LGBTQI+ rights. So too did the gay liberation, lesbian feminist, and revolutionary trans activists who organized in the years right after Stonewall, as they drew explicit connections between homophobia, transphobia, racism, sexism, and classism on the one hand and state violence, discrimination, and prejudice on the other.
Over the last five decades, we have come a long way — and we have a long way to go, especially as anti-democratic movements at home and around the globe fight to undermine civil society and to rollback LGBTQI+ and reproductive rights.
Indeed, Jessica Stern, the U.S. Special Envoy to Advance the Human Rights of LGBTQI+ Persons, told the Washington Blade today that "We see autocracy is on the rise globally. We see that democratic institutions and democracies themselves are being undermined and we see LGBTQI+ people are often the canary in the coal mine … We need to fight back against these homophobic and transphobic trends."
Similarly, the Presidential Proclamation issued by the White House for Pride Month warned that "the rights of LGBTQI+ Americans are under relentless attack" and that an "onslaught of dangerous anti-LGBTQI+ legislation has been introduced and passed in States across the country, targeting transgender children and their parents and interfering with their access to health care."
With that in mind, we strongly welcome Secretary of State Antony Blinken's Pride Month declaration today that "Countries are stronger when all people — regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or sex characteristics — are fully recognized as free and equal members of their society." Secretary Blinken aptly notes the persistence of violence and discrimination against LGBTQI+ communities around the world and how Pride events themselves are banned or violently disrupted, whether by governments themselves or by non-state actors driven by prejudice. Indeed, we know too well how authoritarians — from Russia and Hungary to Florida and Texas — seek to restrict discussion of LGBTQI+ issues.
CGE appreciates the various initiatives noted in Secretary Blinken's press release, from the introduction of an "X" nonbinary option for U.S. passports to increasingly robust reporting on LGBTQI+ issues in the State Department's Human Rights Reports. We are delighted that the Global Equality Fund at the State Department has surpassed $100 million distributed to local recipients for LGBTQI+ programs and emergency support in more than 100 countries over the past ten years, and we continue to call on Congress to substantially increase funding by allocating $60 million annually to global LGBTQI programming —$30 million each for the Global Equality Fund and for USAID's LGBTQI+ programming in the Inclusive Development Hub.
We are especially glad to see the updated guidance from the State Department this year that empowers U.S. embassies to support local marriage equality movements in countries where activists agree that such a victory is possible through legislative or judicial processes. This policy clarification is grounded in President Biden's February 2021 memorandum on global LGBTQI+ human rights.
Special Envoy Stern noted today that "the administration acknowledges that married or not, LGBTQI+ people, couples and their families deserve full equality, access to legal protections and should have their families legally recognized … All of this is consistent with President Biden's commitment to LGBTQI+ equality and marriage equality specifically." And it reflects the White House Proclamation that "we recommit to delivering protections, safety, and equality to LGBTQI+ families so that everyone can realize the full promise of America."
Given the onslaught this year against LGBTQI+ youth and families here in the United States, and the rising tide of anti-LGBTQI+ violence and discrimination abroad, the words of Marsha P. Johnson, one of the heroes of Stonewall and of the modern LGBTQI+ movement, still sit heavy: "No pride for some of us without liberation for all of us." But Urvashi Vaid, another hero of the movement whose loss earlier this year weighs just as heavy, reminds us of our future: "We stand for freedom as we have yet to know it. And we will not be denied."
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