Editorial: 2 national LGBTQ groups step up

  • by BAR Editorial Board
  • Wednesday January 29, 2025
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PFLAG and Advocates for Transgender Equality seem to have the most robust information on President Donald Trump's executive orders. Images: From the websites
PFLAG and Advocates for Transgender Equality seem to have the most robust information on President Donald Trump's executive orders. Images: From the websites

Back in the fall of 2008, as the No on 8 campaign was flailing and it looked like a California amendment to ban same-sex marriage would pass, we published a huge "RED ALERT" headline on the front page in the hope of waking up the LGBTQ community. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough, as voters passed Proposition 8. (It was eventually overturned by the courts, and same-sex marriage became legal here in 2013.)

We were thinking about that headline the other day, when we decided to take a look at the websites of some national LGBTQ organizations to see how they're highlighting information about the new Trump administration and its anti-trans actions so far. What we found was encouraging for two organizations, PFLAG and Advocates for Trans Equality.

PFLAG is the organization that used to be called Parents, Friends, and Families of Lesbians and Gays. It has rebranded and is now known just by its acronym. PFLAG has a budget of about $9 million, according to its financials. Its website has a big "You Are Not Alone" section and under resources has information on President Donald Trump's executive orders, plus it has links to the websites of the Human Rights Campaign and Advocates for Trans Equality. The one quibble we have is that the information on Trump's anti-LGBTQ orders is hard to find. (We only found it by entering "Trump" into the website's search tool.)

PFLAG's site also contains information on advocacy, contacting legislators, and more helpful resources. To find it, click "Join the Fight" at the top of the main page.

Advocates for Trans Equality is the result of a merger last year of the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund and the National Center for Transgender Equality. It has a budget of about $8 million, officials told us last year. A4TE is perhaps the least known of the groups we looked at, yet has the most information available. It has a "Trump Day 1 Executive Orders Explained" item right on its homepage.

Under News, it has items on other executive orders, including the one on trans youth issued January 28. While its website may not be as flashy, it provides an up-to-date resource for members of the trans community.

We urge other national LGBTQ organizations to get with it and more fully update their web presence so that they can be a reliable resource for trans community members, as well as the broader LGBQ community, because we suspect Trump — and Congress and the courts — won't stop with anti-trans actions. That's only the beginning. While we understand the need for the organizations to solicit donations and increase their membership rolls, it seems to us that more action is needed so that people can access timely, factual information.

Our own state Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) — a gay man who has faced homophobic vitriol and threats over the years for fighting for our community in the Legislature — stated on X recently, though it's easy and tempting to tune out the negative news, we can't afford to.

"I know folks are exhausted. This is a firehose designed to get us to tune it all out. But we can't just tune it out. We can't normalize this. Too much is at stake," Wiener stated, before listing a number of Trump initiatives. "This country is playing with fire. This is so real. We can't afford to tune out & normalize what this fascist movement is doing to our country. We must organize & fight back."

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