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With Blend readers hailing from across North America and beyond, Tuesday’s International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (“IDAHO”) seems a fine time for folks to weigh in with a description of the state of LGBT (in)equality in your town, state or country. How about with your employer or within your church or family?
Have conditions improved or worsened for you over the past year? Take the poll (below the fold): Compared to last year, my life today as an LGBT person has…
Here’s a bit about IDAHO itself:
In more than 80 countries around the world, loving someone of the same sex is still considered illegal, at times involving life-time imprisonment. In 7 countries, homosexual acts are punishable by death. In almost all countries, freedom not to act as socially determined by one person’s sex at birth is being limited by Transphobic laws and attitudes.But even in progressive countries, Homophobia and Transphobia still exist in the form of discriminatory laws, unjust representations in the media, unfair treatment by employers, negative social attitudes, etc.
Homophobia and Transphobia target all people who don’t conform to majority sexual and gender roles.
The International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia (“IDAHO”) was created in 2004 to draw the attention of policy makers, opinion leaders, social movements, public opinion, the media, etc. to this issue, and to promote a world of tolerance, respect and freedom regardless of people’s sexual orientation or gender identity. As much as it is a day against violence and oppression, it is a day for freedom, diversity and acceptance. The date of May 17th was chosen to commemorate the decision taken by the World Health Organization in 1990 to take homosexuality out of the list of mental disorders. (read more here)
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For me, it’s about the sameAlthough there have been some positive changes with the repeal of DADT under way and the DOMA & Prop 8 challenge cases progressing, not to mention three pieces of significant legislation that got passed here in Washington state, the laws and regulations that affect me directly haven’t changed noticeably. So I voted “stay the same”.
IDAHO?Wow, that’s completely different than the Idaho I remember growing up in.
By the way, I still maintain my dream of returning to my home state, buying an old ghost town, and rechristening it “Udapimp”.
That’s right… Udapimp, Idaho.
Illinois is average,according to all indicators, although we did manage to avoid tea party madness in the midterms. I voted “slightly better,” since we now have civil unions — as well as a state government that doesn’t take a lot of crap from the crazies. Taxes are up slightly, but that just means the governor is actually doing something about our deficit, not like Wisconsin and Indiana — and we still have a middle class.
The interesting thing is that civil unions are recognized by all sides as an interim step — even the governor is quite open about full marriage equality in a couple of years. Remember, this is the state where Peter LaBarbera made his reputation as a failure.
Oh, and religiously affiliated adoption agencies don’t get a free pass here on discrimination — in fact, there are reports that they’re being audited to be sure they’re in compliance with non-discrimination laws.
The downside is that Rahm Emanuel was sworn in yesterday as Chicago’s new mayor. We’ll see how that works out.