The Employment Non Discrimination Act
S. 1584/H.R. 3017 (
ENDA) was introduced in the 111'th congress by Barney Frank (D - MA) and Iliana Ros-Lehtinen (R - FL). The Human Rights Campaign describes ENDA this way:
"ENDA simply affords to all Americans basic employment protection from discrimination based on irrational prejudice. The bill is closely modeled on existing civil rights laws, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Americans with Disabilities Act. The bill explicitly prohibits preferential treatment and quotas and does not permit disparate impact suits. In addition, it exempts small businesses, religious organizations and the military, and does not require that domestic partner benefits be provided to the same-sex partners of employees."
What does this mean for the average person, how does it impact the workforce, how and why is it important? An even better question is, why is this bill important to me? It all started in the fall of 1992, I was out with my family for just four years, having come out in the spring of 1988. At just 24 years old I had this altruistic view of the world. At the time the only place I was not out was at work.
For nearly two years I had been working for a Civil Engineering company in the suburbs of Detroit. It was a 32 mile commute, but for me it was the best paying job I could find with my education and experience. It meant $11 an hour with benefits, not bad for a wet behind the ears kid without a bachelors degree. It was the first real job where I had responsibility and was in charge of the laboratory I worked in doing physical testing on soil and asphalt materials.
The idea of being an activist was not something that I really considered myself to be at that point. I gave money to Act Up, HRC and other organizations, marched in parades but never really stepped out personally to do anything as an activist. Back in those days, I used to stop and buy a real newspaper on my way to work, along with a mountain dew. When I would arrive at work I would spread the paper out, drink my mountain dew, would light a cigarette and read the paper while I worked. The testing of the materials often gave me the opportunity to have free time between readings so that was how I filled my day.
There was an interesting article one day in the Detroit Free Press about the school board in Birmingham, Michigan and how they were considering incorporating LGBT issues in the sex ed curriculum. Mostly it was meant to reach out to LGBT teens who were struggling with their sexuality and to let them know that there were support networks out there. At the time I had been volunteering as a facilitator for the LGBT community center and led a support group for young men. The article struck a chord in me and my own struggle with my sexuality. The school board was to hear arguments from both sides and I decided to go and address the board.
When I drove to the northern suburb of Birmingham I didn't think twice about what I was doing, it was not about me but about the kids that I knew who could be impacted by this. As a teen I had been horribly taunted, teased and beaten because it was suspected that I was gay. I knew I had to do the right thing and tell my story. During the day I worked on my address, I would have three minutes to plead my case, so I wrote out my story, read it aloud to myself during my lunch break and kept it to the time line, less than three minutes.
When I arrived at the meeting I sat in my car and worked up the courage to do what I was about to do. There were news cameras and lots of people milling about. Once I worked up my nerve I got out of the car and went into the building and signed up to speak. Sitting in the auditorium behind two teenage boys, with their mother who was on the opposing side I sat and listened until my name was called. I walked up to the microphone, knees shaking and told my story. It was an impassioned three minute speech.
When I left the meeting I was relieved that I had managed to make it thorough it without a major gaffe. I went home thinking that not only had I done the right thing but hopefully I had made an impact. The next morning I stopped to get my paper on the way to work and there greeting me on the front page was a photo of myself at the board meeting. I nearly choked. I read the article sitting in my car at the gas station, with beads of sweat popping out on my brow. There was no turning back, no putting the genie back in the bottle, I had opened the can of worms and this was going to be a night that would change my life forever.
When I arrived at work I was prepared for blowback. I was basically ignored, my boss would not even look me in the eye. When I went home that night my phone rang and it was the newspaper, they wanted to interview me about the experience. To my surprise I agreed to speak to the reporter. We talked on the phone for nearly an hour, about my experiences in High School, about coming out, about my battle with reconciling myself with my sexuality, about my attempted suicide as a senior in High School.
The following Sunday the article ran in the paper. It was titled "Cries, Shouts & Whispers" and it was there in black and white for the world to read. It seemed as if everyone was pissed at me, my family was upset with my decision to come out in such an open way, my boss couldn't even look at me, but I knew that I had done the right thing. The school board had passed the measure that would allow LGBT issues to become a part of the curriculum, my story I hope had some impact.
Two weeks later I was let go from my job. The excuse was cutbacks. For the first time in my life I found myself unemployed. Since the age of 16 I had always had a job, and then in an instant it was gone. I will never be able to say that one had anything to do with the other. There is no evidence that says I was let go just because I came out, but I also know that I never did anything wrong. The news didn't even come from my boss who had not spoken to me since I came out, it came from Human Resources.
The upside of that was that it gave me the courage to leave Michigan, to start my life over in a new city and that led me here, to Charlotte. Had I not lost that job I would have missed out on the greatest opportunity of my life. With all of that said, no person should ever loose their job just because they are LGBT and they decide to come out. Those months between the time that I lost my job and found a way to start over were the worst days of my life. I can't think of a more important reason to pass ENDA than that, can you?
