 December Newsletter
A Note from the Director: Gender Affirming Care is Life Saving Care
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My life would not be what it is without gender affirming care. I would not be able to be the mother I am without it. Thinking about what our family could look like without this essential healthcare is one of those thoughts you cannot linger too long on without it taking your breath away. Considering the possibility makes me nauseous and overwhelms me. Gender affirming care has been the greatest gift to allow my daughter to flourish and chase her dreams. Access to a team of medical experts is something every parent and caregiver deserves for any need a child has.
On December 4, 2024, the most consequential case to date for trans youth will be heard in the U.S. Supreme Court. ACLU iconic attorney, Chase Strangio, will make history as the first openly trans person to make oral arguments before the nine Justices on U.S. vs. Skrmetti. This case centers on the gender affirming care ban in Tennessee. It is one of 26 bans in the United States. There are legitimate fears that if SCOTUS uphold this ban then it will create a stronger pathway for a federal ban, not just for youth but for all people receiving and seeking gender affirming care. Given that one of the first priorities of the controlling party in the U.S. House of Representatives was to institute a bathroom ban on Capital grounds, as well as a drafted bill to expand this ban, only escalates these fears. SCOTUS will not be deciding on this case until June of 2025.
Full disclosure, I am not an attorney. But because of the weaponization of the existence of trans identities, out of necessity, I have learned to read and track court cases and rulings to best be able to prepare, respond, and fight to protect the rights of trans and queer humans. The members of the highest court in the country are not medial experts, nor are state legislators or members of Congress. Instead of rationally relying on the most experienced doctors and mental health professionals and medial associations - like we do in all other types of healthcare - we are being forced into a manufactured moral panic with real life consequences. Life and death consequences.
What can we do while we wait in the in-between space? Share your experiences about the importance of gender affirming care whether for yourself, as a parent of a child receiving this care, or as someone who works directly with this population. Write your legislators and congressional representatives. We need to make our voices heard as an antidote to the outrage based in misinformation, bigotry, and bad science. In Washington state, our legislators and Governor Inslee took a strong stance to protect gender affirming care and abortion access for youth and young adults experiencing homelessness and fleeing hostile state governments. Again and again, decade after decade, Washington leaders have said yes to protecting the lives of LGBTQIA+ people. They didn't stop with expanding anti-discrimination protections for gender identity and sexual orientation in 2006 or marriage equality in 2012. Educational laws continue to be strengthened and expanded for queer, trans, and nonbinary students. This progress must be defended and protected.
This in-between space brings about anxiety and worry. I encourage you to channel these feelings into being proactive and taking the steps above to share your views on this incredibly important issue to our community.
 Lisa Keating, Executive Director - Washington LGBTQ Commission
““It takes no compromise to give people their rights... it takes no money to respect the individual. It takes no political deal to give people freedom. It takes no survey to remove repression” — Harvey Milk (First Openly Gay Man Elected to Public Office in California)
Reflecting on World AIDS Day: A Call to Action and Remembrance
This past Sunday, December 1st was World AIDS Day. This day, held annually since 1988, is a global campaign dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic and to stand in solidarity with those effected by HIV and AIDS. This day not only honors those who live with HIV/AIDS but also remembers the countless lives lost to the epidemic. Since the emergence of HIV in the early 1980s, this virus has had a deep and profound impact on marginalized groups, especially 2SLGBTQIA+ and BIPOC communities.
Here in Washington State, the legacy of the AIDS crisis continues to influence public health policies and community organizing. According to the Washington State Department of Health, nearly 14,000 individuals are living with HIV in our state. Organizations, including non-profits and community health programs, work tirelessly to bridge gaps to access medical treatment. Despite many advances in treatment since the virus was discovered in the 80s, HIV stigma and systemic inequalities remain barriers to care for many Washingtonians. The Washington State LGBTQ Commission works organizations and individuals across the state and county that are passionate and committed to promoting health equity and standing in the fight against HIV/AIDS.
We asked some of Commissioners what World AIDS Day meant to them, and here is what they had to say:
Commissioner Jason Serinus, Jefferson County: “For over thirty years, LGBTQ+ activists and our allies have worked to reverse the edict that an AIDS diagnosis is an automatic death sentence, and secure adequate funding and care for people living with HIV. At a time when the rights of our community and other marginalized communities are under attack, the importance of World AIDS Day has increased as a means to enhance public awareness of the disease and the importance of treatments that can prevent and control it.”
Commissioner Amasai Jeke, King County: “World AIDS Day is a time to honor the lives lost, celebrate the progress made, and reaffirm our commitment to equity in care and prevention. The fight against HIV/AIDS reminds us that access to healthcare is a human right, and our collective work is far from over.”
For more information and resources, check out the Washington State Department of Health’s HIV website or head to HIV.gov.
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LGBTQ Commission Visits Spokane
This past month, LGBTQ Commission staff, Executive Director Lisa Keating and Executive Assistant and Communications Coordinator Sawyer Tuttle, traveled to Spokane to meet with community organizations and advocates serving the 2SLGBTQIA+ population in the greater Spokane area and throughout Eastern Washington. Visiting communities and connecting in-person with individuals and groups is a cornerstone of our mission. Outreach to regions of the state that are outside of the I-5 corridor remains vitally important, as experiences being 2SLGBTQIA+ vary greatly across our state. Face-to-face interactions provide an invaluable opportunity to listen deeply, build and foster trust, and learn firsthand about the unique experiences people are facing. We engaged in conversations that emphasized the resilience and resourcefulness of Eastern Washington’s 2SLGBTQIA+ community, where distances between support systems and limited resources often necessitate innovative approaches to advocacy and community building.
We met with Spokane City Councilmember Zach Zappone who shared Spokane’s inclusive vision for the future including the city’s new motto: “In Spokane We All Belong”, as well as highlighting work the city has done around rainbow crosswalks to show support for the 2SLGBTQIA+ community year-round.
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Commission staff also met with several community organizations, like Spokane Pride, an organization that hosts events and education opportunities for Spokane’s 2SLGBTQIA+ community, including the annual Spokane Pride Parade and Festival. Spectrum Center Spokane is an organization whose mission is to create a safe, intersectional, intergenerational, 2SLGBTQIA+ space for individuals to get access to resources and find community and support.
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We also got to meet with Gonzaga University’s Lincoln LGBTQ+ Resource Center to learn about the support they provide to 2SLGBTQIA+ students, including their Lavender Mass, held annually for over a decade on National Coming Out Day, and their Lavender Graduation, an annual ceremony to honor 2SLGBTQIA+ graduates. Staff also dropped by a Pride Club meeting at Spokane Community College to share about the Commission and hear policy concerns and suggestions from students..
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In-person visits like this allow the Commission to better understand regional disparities and tailor our advocacy to reflect the needs of all Washingtonians. Meeting with leaders and community members in their own spaces underscores the importance of visibility, solidarity, and collaboration. We are committed to ensuring 2SLGBTQIA+ representation and equity extend to every corner of the state. We would like to extend a thank you to the organization and individuals that took the time to meet with Commission staff, and we would like to also extend a special thank you to our Commissioners in the Spokane area that joined us for some of these meetings and consistently keep us engaged with their community, Commissioner Alvaro Figueroa and Commissioner Roo Ramos!
 In Their Words - Messages from the LGBTQ Youth Advisory Council
We are proud to feature articles written by our LGBTQ Youth Advisory Councilmembers. Want to learn more about the council? Head to www.lgbtq.wa.gov/YAC!
The History of Trans Day of Remembrance
Mateo Acuña (he/him) - King County
Beginnings
The first Trans Day of Remembrance (TDoR) was on November 28th, 1998 in the form of a vigil commemorating Rita Hester, a Black trans woman. Rita was a passionate activist and drag queen. She loved animals and poetry. She was two days away from her 35th birthday when she was violently murdered. Gwendolyn Ann Smith, a trans writer and activist from the San Francisco Bay Area, was online
in an AOL forum for trans people called The Gazebo just after Rita Hester was murdered. In discussing Hester’s death, Smith wrote that the circumstances around it were remarkably similar to the murder of Chanel Pickett, another black trans woman who died in 1995 in the Boston area. The Pickett murder had received a lot of media attention and was written about extensively in trans circles, yet no one in the chat room was familiar with the case. Smith then created the Remembering Our Dead web project in order to track these instances of violence against the trans community. The following year, trans people in San Francisco and Boston held the first
TDoR using Smith’s project as source material.
Creating New Trans Day of Remembrance Traditions
Many people still do a traditional vigil for TDoR, but it can be a re-traumatizing event, especially for trans people themselves. My first encounter with TDoR was last year at a community college, and it was intense. Because a vigil hadn’t been held over the lockdown years, the organizers added two more years of names to the reading list. For two and a half, almost three hours, a reader would say the name of a trans person who died, and everyone in the dark room would repeat it back. The picture of the person would appear on the projector if there was a public picture of them. The way each person died was listed in italics under the image. There was nothing about their hobbies, their life—anything that would humanize them. Because of the
nature of the event, they were reduced to their victimhood.
For the next few days, I was completely out of sorts: despondent, snappy, on-edge and depressed. I realized I had been re-triggered to an extreme. As a trans person of color that has faced anti-trans rhetoric from my own parents, and already have a lot of trauma as a racialized person, that Trans Day of Remembrance seemed like it wasn’t for other trans people, especially trans people of color. I gave feedback to the college and the following year I was involved in creating posters highlighting a sample of people who had died from trans violence that year from around the world, including information about their hobbies, personality, life, and aspirations. The actual
vigil was still hard to attend, and I had to step out early.
In some ways, the difficulty is the point of Trans Day of Remembrance. It’s a time of mourning. Yet being in that room, hearing hours of names made me realize that I couldn’t grasp the magnitude of trans violence in the world. I hated the feeling of hopelessness. That I couldn’t do anything, as active as I am.
At my own college, I led the TDoR event by creating an ofrenda with others from our LGBTQ+ club. Being Latine, this idea came very organically to me, since we wanted to celebrate their lives and honor the spirit of our trans brothers and sisters. The ofrenda is for family and friends, and in this case, a representation of chosen family and the support queer and trans people give each other. We used the same posters I helped create for the other college. I created fake flower bouquets that were the color of the trans flag: white, pale pink and baby blue. Our Diversity, Justice &
Sustainability office bought us iridescent butterfly decals and lights, and we re-used the plethora of candles from Dia de los Muertos. The result was a display that was both beautiful and educational, with data about trans violence, what people can do, and how to report any experiences that people experienced on-campus. We positioned the ofrenda in the main student hub behind a black curtain, meaning it was in a high traffic area to draw people in, but it also allowed students privacy as they observed the ofrenda and left offerings.
This is what I found worked for me and my LGBTQ+ community. We were able to mourn while also celebrate the lives of those who passed. It wasn’t triggering and people could come and go as they pleased. We also had shifts of people from the queer club watching over the ofrenda outside the curtain while it was going, that way no one messed with it. What the other college did wasn’t necessarily wrong, it just didn’t work for us. There’s no right or wrong way of celebrating Trans Day of Remembrance, just consult with the trans people in your community when planning an event, and make sure that those who are being commemorated are not simply treated as victims, but people with rich and complicated lives.
HIV/AIDS Awareness Month: Reflecting on the Role Lesbians Played Throughout the AIDS Epidemic
Desi Quenzer (any pronouns) - Yakima County
During the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s, lesbians played a crucial, yet often overlooked role in supporting gay men living with HIV.
At the time, HIV/AIDS was wrongly labeled a “gay disease” and largely ignored by governments, which withheld funding for research and care. Fear and misinformation about the virus’s transmission created widespread stigma, leaving many gay men without medical care or family support. In this void, lesbians stepped up, offering critical care and advocacy when others turned away.
They volunteered as caregivers and nurses, filling gaps left by hospitals that refused to treat people with HIV. They organized blood drives to address shortages caused by discriminatory bans on gay men donating blood, and provided emotional support and dignity to dying men. Beyond direct care, they fought misinformation by educating the public and working to combat stigma.
Their contributions saved lives, and reinforced bonds within the LGBTQ+ community. By demonstrating compassion and solidarity, lesbians played a pivotal role in the fight against the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This instance is just one of many throughout history that proves the importance of education and advocacy.
Disability Awareness: Exploring Diverse Experiences and Language Preferences
Jaanvi Ganapathy (they/them) - King County
In 1992, the General Assembly of the United Nations established the International Day of Persons with Disabilities (IDPD) which is celebrated annually on December 3rd. It recognizes the importance of acknowledging the contributions of people with disabilities and uplifting disabled individuals to be in spaces where decisions are made. According to the Human Rights Campaign, 36% of LGBTQ+ adults reported having a disability (“Understanding Disability in the LGBTQ+ Community”). But what is a disability?
A disability is a condition that makes it more difficult for a person to participate in certain activities or interact with the world. That doesn’t necessarily mean that an individual with a disability is unable to engage; it just means that participation might look different. Disabilities can include physical conditions such as spinal cord injuries and hearing impairments, neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and dyslexia, mental health conditions such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and major depressive disorder, and many more. Disabilities are diverse and there’s no singular way to experience one.
Language is another important aspect to consider. Even within the disability community, individuals have different preferred labels for their identities. For example, a person on the autism spectrum may prefer identity-first language (i.e. autistic person) while another person may prefer person-first language (i.e. person with autism). The same is true in LGBTQ+ spaces—one person may prefer the label “gay” while another person may prefer being called “queer.” The best thing you can do in this situation is to avoid making assumptions. Instead, you should ask and respect each individual’s preference. By doing so, you can help create a more inclusive society.
Two-Spirit. What does it mean?
Oliver Ockerman (he/they) - Benton County
The term “Two spirit” is widely misunderstood. Many people will equate it with just simply being a transgender Indigenous person, but this outlook is too narrow, it doesn’t capture the full idea of the identity. A two spirited person is someone who is recognized in their tribe as having a unique gender that is neither man nor woman. However, with over 500 different and diverse cultures, it is essential to note that this is not a catch all definition, we are going to explore the shared characteristic across various cultures.
In the Cherokee tribe, for example, Two-Spirited people are known as to as “Asegi udanto”, Someone who blends or even transcends traditional gender roles. Similarly, a Two-Spirited individual in the Navajo tribe may be both a weaver and a hunter.
Additionally, There is also a spiritual aspect. Historically, it was widely believed that two-spirited individuals had supernatural involvement in their gender. Visions and dreams provide insights, which proved their identity was rooted in their mythology. Across Native tribes, Two-Spirited people filled supernatural based roles, such as Healers, Ceremonial leaders, and Shamans.
To wrap this all up, the concept of being Two Spirit does not match a simple understanding of gender identity, rather it weaves a rich tapestry of cultural, spiritual, and social fabrics. As seen through various traditions, Two-Spirited individuals embody unique roles in their society. Recognizing and honoring the diversity of this identity across over 500 cultures is necessary to understand the beautiful complexity of it, and by appreciating this complexity we can celebrate the value in this identity, and open our mind further past traditional gender roles, and work towards more inclusive perspectives on gender identity, within indigenous communities and beyond.
Have you taken the WA LGBTQ+ Survey?
This first-of-it's-kind survey empowers LGBTQ+ Washingtonians to share their experiences to help us build a more inclusive and supportive environment for all LGBTQ+ people across the state. PLUS - Those who complete the survey will have a chance to win one of over 300 $50 gift cards in appreciation for your time and input.
Take the survey today, and share this with your LGBTQ+ friends and family!
For more information, head to www.walgbtqsurvey.com
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