There are periods of time, sometimes years, when that uneasiness recedes into the background of our lives. LGBTQ+ people, particularly those of us who are older, live with the daily fear that our livelihood, relationships, and safety can be ripped from us by the whims of others, simply for living a life that truthfully acknowledges who we are. But for years after that, I felt I was working on borrowed time. The US attorney in Detroit, who later became the chief justice of Michigan’s Supreme Court, chose to keep me on. There were no protections for LGBTQ+ people at that time, and the DOJ authorized my firing.
In 1990, during my Department of Justice security clearance investigation after I was hired as a federal prosecutor, the FBI learned that I’m gay. I remember when being gay was a fireable offense. Criticizing Florida’s discriminatory law will get you labeled a “groomer” by the likes of Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene or Governor Ron DeSantis’s press secretary, Christina Pushaw. In a more underhanded attack, high-profile Republicans - including members of Congress - have dredged up the disproven and vile trope that LGBTQ+ people are child predators. When Disney stood up for LGBTQ+ rights and criticized the law, Florida’s governor and legislature mounted a financial assault on the company in retaliation. Worse, it contains an enforcement provision that pits members of the public against their children’s teachers. The recently passed Florida law that’s colloquially known as “Don’t Say Gay” is strategically written so as to stop a teacher from answering simple questions from students like why another student has two mommies. Gutting LGBTQ+ rights is not just the province of the Supreme Court. It is likely only a matter of time before the Supreme Court tells owners of restaurants, hotels, and businesses that they can refuse to serve gay people.
The Atlantic published a piece in 2019, “ The Struggle for Gay Rights Is Over,” that downplayed the threat of violence to LGBTQ+ people and quoted a University of Virginia Law School professor who claimed that Supreme Court decisions protecting LGBTQ+ rights, like marriage equality and participation in consensual sexual relationships, were “secure” from Republican efforts to roll them back.Īn earlier harbinger of the trajectory of LGBTQ+ rights came in 2017 with a procedural win for the owner of a bakery who refused to make a cake for a same-sex wedding. Since the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in 2015, some have alleged that LGBTQ+ people no longer have legitimate concerns about their safety and civil rights. He felt that it was not safe for two men to hold hands. And last week, as we were walking to dinner on a well-lit street in Memphis, for the first time ever my partner brushed my hand away when I reached for his. Two weeks ago, at a hotel in Tennessee, several employees were downright rude when they saw that I was sharing a room with my partner of 11 years. Last month, on a bus in Chicago, a man repeatedly screamed “faggot” at me and threatened to bash my head in.