Baltimore OUTloud asked her how activism has changed since her early days in the movement.
There are a lot more people now who are interested in “participating in grassroots political activity than there were twenty or thirty years ago. So we’ve seen a real explosion of interest and activism on the part of, not just of those us who work at LGBT organizations, but people who live their lives in all kinds of work environments, school environments, religious environments and bring their LGBT activist energy to those places and spaces. I think that’s a real difference between now and then.”
She explains that change as the result of a rise in a general level of confidence. “As more non-discrimination laws have been passed and more and more people come out and more and more companies and corporations and educational institutions and religious institutions take positions of support for LGBT people, our ability to be visible and to identify ourselves has really increased.
“There are a lot of companies that are way ahead of the laws where they do business so there are many companies that have nondiscrimination policies in place in states where there is no statewide nondiscrimination law,” she said. Asked why she thinks companies are ahead of the law on this she said,
“I think for companies it’s a recognition that they want to build for themselves the best workforce that they can. Excluding people on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity is counterproductive to bringing together for themselves the best and brightest people. I think for them it’s a very simple decision, it’s sort of a simple calculation that we lose more than we gain by discriminating against LGBT people in the workplace. It’s true that even when policies or laws are in place they’re not always abided by, but the fact that they are there does give a person recourse if the policies aren’t followed.
Sue is particularly pleased that Benjamin Jealous, the current president and chief executive officer of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) would speak at the opening plenary session on Thursday evening. The Mayor, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, and Maryland’s First Lady, Katie O’Malley were also scheduled for the Thursday session. The Mayor’s office has been working closely with the LGBT community on several initiatives and Katie O’Malley’s December initiative to combat bullying in our schools are seen as more than passing commitments to many in the LGBT community.
New to this year’s conference is a greater focus on international LGBT rights.
“On Saturday we will be doing a plenary session on international LGBT organizing issues with a transgender woman from Malaysia, a lesbian from Uganda, and a gay man from Guiana; talking of course from their own experiences in their own countries,” she explained. “Also on the panel is Cary Alan Johnson, who is the Executive Director of the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission. He will be moderating, and kind of guiding, the conversation. I think that will be really exciting because we haven’t before focused that much time and attention and done a spotlight on international issues.”
When asked about Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s December 6 speech to the United Nations, Sue said, “It was fantastic really fantastic and such a big surprise when I got the little notification about that speech. By her delivering that speech I thought, ‘oh human rights day maybe she’ll do a paragraph on LGBT people.’ But, no, it was the entire speech, quite amazing.”
Also new to the conference is that they have arranged to take a large group to Washington D.C. to lobby members of Congress. “We have not done that before in large part because we have not been in close proximity to the nation’s capital for over twenty years.” Sue said. “So that’s a pretty exciting feature.”
This is the second year that the conference has offered a large element of programming for people who work within faith communities. It is called, Practice Spirit, Do Justice, and comprises about 32 different sessions.
There was some controversy on the interwebs a week prior to the conference that there was a lack of lesbian inclusion. That problem was addressed, “particularly by the strength of a request from one of our host committee co-chairs, Meredith Moise. We added to the schedule a lesbian caucus that will take place on Saturday evening at 6:30,” Sue said.
