At the end of September, the folks in DeKalb finished up a piece of business that was started in 1998… they added a new definition of gender (one recommended by It's Time, Illinois) to their human rights ordinance to include all gender variant people. "I am most pleased that DeKalb has completed a process begun over two years ago to protect all sexual and gender minorities in DeKalb from discrimination." With these words, Norden Gilbert neatly summarized an incredible drama with a surprise ending. It was a drama filled with hopes and passion, excitement and jubilation, betrayal and tears, bitterness and resentment, reconciliation and rebirth, and finally elation and pride in achievement. Maybe, some day, someone will write the stage play to go along with that drama. But right now, I want to go back and finish something of my own, to set one last scene right. Back in January 1999, I lashed out at CMAD and DeKalb for excluding transgender protection at the last minute. At that time, they had an opportunity to use the same wording which had been used in Evanston, which includes sexual orientation and gender identity under the same definition. |
However, for some reason, that wording was changed between the first reading of the ordinance and the final vote to include sexual orientation only. In my anger at the perceived betrayal of part of the LGBT community in DeKalb, I publicly said some rather nasty things about the DeKalb community leadership. I also berated myself, as one of the leading transgender advocates in Illinois, for not being more proactive and visible in the DeKalb initiative. I was certain that once sexual orientation was added to the DeKalb ordinance, they would never open it up again to add the additional definitions to protect gender variant people. But the wonderful people of DeKalb really surprised me. They did something that is rarely done. No, it is never done! No one ever does what they did! No one ever goes back and picks up the pieces and fights with the same energy that went into the original fight just to make it all right. But that's just what they did, and they are truly to be admired! To put the magnitude of this achievement in perspective, you must realize that DeKalb is now only the second jurisdiction in Illinois to provide broad civil rights protections to gender variant people. The other location is Evanston, which added gender identity to their ordinance in 1997. |
I should note that Urbana and Champaign have had human rights laws since the mid-70's that include protections for those in the process of changing sex, making them perhaps the first jurisdictions in the country to protect transsexuals. The Evanston law goes beyond the Urbana/Champaign laws by protecting all transgender individuals. The DeKalb law goes even further by providing protection based on gender identity, appearance, or behavior… a definition which encompasses all gender variant people, whether or not they self-identity as trans-anything. It took the courage of two DeKalb transgender people, Kathie Hankins and Molly Judd, who came out in this small farming community, who stood tall knowing full well that they had no legal protection at the time, to show the human face of the transgender community, and restart the CMAD initiative. The CMAD group didn't have to get involved, that last battle left them drained. But faced with their friends who were still unprotected, they jumped into the battle again and worked constantly until they won the rights for the entire LGBT community of DeKalb. |
Photo by Israel Wright, Copyright 2000, Lambda Publications,
Chicago