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NEWS ROOM Get the Latest on Birmingham's Inclusion Resolution Website Calls Gays Terrorists (more) Council can change some civil wrongs Short Film of the Twin Cities Gay Men's Chorus Tour of the South (click) Equality Alabama to hire Executive Director (more) Speech for Town Hall Meeting June 7th 2006 Yesterday was a new beginning for all of us. Yesterday we learned that we can WIN. Yesterday in district 54 we made history. The first openly gay candidate had a majority of all the votes cast. Yesterday at precinct 54-14, the Crestwood Community School, we defeated the marriage amendment. Yesterday 170,400 fair minded Alabamians stood up and said “No” to writing discrimination in our constitution. Today’s a new day and while some of may still feel hurt and angry or sad, today is the day we take those feelings and turn them into action. Today is the day that we, as a community, make the decision to change the hearts and minds of the people of this state, one by one, city by city, county by county. WE working together can create the community that we want. We working together can get recognition for our families and protect our children and all the benefits that nongays enjoy. There is however only ONE way that this can happen, there is only one way to get where we want to go: if we do the work. No one can do this for us. We must work together hand in hand and make our state a great diverse place to live. Together each of us must talk to our friends and neighbors and help them to understand our vision. There are three main ingredients to creating our own political power. There is Education, Resources and Coalitions. With these three ingredients we can change our community! The Education component is critical to create widespread support for our cause. In Alabama, the general public, often comment, when polled, that they do not know any gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender people. Why is that? It is most certainly attributable to the environment here in our state. The climate is one where we have managed for years to blend in, not wearing who we are on our sleeves but paying our taxes and minding our own business. In doing so we have also perpetuated our own problems. When we begin the process of revealing who we are to the circles of people around us we demystify and humanize ourselves. It literally will change the people around us forever. The most effective form of education is, the face to face, across the kitchen table, sipping coffee and having a conversation about your life, with your neighbor. Our own stories will work to change the hearts of non-gays. The second component, resources, money/volunteers, while it sounds like an easy one, is not an easy one to create. As a community we have not always been so quick to make an investment in our own community. The antigay industry over the past couple of years has spent from 300-400 billion dollars to work against us. We need to respond in kind, we must support our statewide organizations, Equality Alabama (a 501c3, organization focusing on education) the Equality Fund (our statewide PAC, to work with candidates and defeating candidates) and a soon to be named c4 organization, which will allow us as a community to work against unfair ballot initiatives and to work on getting laws passed that are inclusive and fair in our state. These organizations have and will continue to work together to create power for us, and they do need your support with both money and time. The third component is coalitions. Coalitions are critical for any minority group. Through creating relationships with other organizations we can achieve monumental change. The most recent example of this was last year in California with the passage of the bill to allow marriage in their state legislature. Because of the hard work of Equality California and other organizations (including Freedom to Marry) in building relationships with the NAACP, the AFL-CIO and other organizations the marriage bill was passed in the legislature. We can create these relationships and we can WIN. We have our own example of doing this. This year one of our own made the decision that the time has come. The time has come for us to run for public office openly. We gathered our resources, we all worked hard, we worked with a great partners including the Victory Fund, we educated voters and today we are this close to representation in the state legislature, this was not by accident but by design…It only goes to show you what we can achieve when we work together. We must however do the hard work. This will not happen over night and most likely this will take decades. But this can be done and we can do this, starting here, right now moving forward from today…We can make this the Alabama WE want it to BE. Alabama Newspapers Support a NO vote on ONE No to Amendment 1 Amendment 1 not necessary Amendment One adds nothing to state law Constitutional amendment Vote No on Amendment One
The full House of Representatives in Montgomery will vote on House bill 57 Tuesday January 31st. This bill will add "sexual orientation" to Alabama's existing hate crimes law. House Bill 57 PASSES Judiciary Committee on 1/18/06 – The next step for this bill after the second reading is the Rules Committee! The Senate Bill is still in the Judiciary Committee. They have introduced a bill to add "sexual orientation" to Alabama's current hate crimes law. The introduction of the bill is the first step of many that we will need to accomplish to help this bill become law. We will ALL have to work together to try to make this a reality! (more) Equality Alabama Insists on Inclusive Legislation in the Face of Second Hate Crime in 2 Months Let your friends know about Equality Alabama - Share Equality Alabama, PO Box 13733, Birmingham, Alabama 35202 ©2008 Equality Alabama, All Rights Reserved.
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