Last month, the world lost a transformational giant in the LGBTQ+ rights movement. Urvashi Vaid was a pioneering social justice activist, attorney and award-winning author. She was also one of my great human rights teachers. Urvashi was bold, unflinching, driven. She brought the question of race, nationality and ethnicity into the LGBT space in the …
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As a teenager in the late 1970s and early 1980s in Los Angeles, I didn’t feel safe coming out as gay — even to my liberal Jewish family. Although strides were being made by the LGBT community, rampant homophobia kept me in the closet. When I finally came out as a young adult, I was …
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In honor of LGBT Pride Month, watch our newest video in which members of the AJWS community share what motivates them, as Jews, to fight for the rights and dignity of LGBT people everywhere.
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This past weekend, I marched with AJWS staff and supporters in New York City’s Pride Parade. It felt especially poignant to march together in the wake of the Orlando shooting; to show that love will triumph over hate. As we marched, I thought of fellow activists around the world who are risking their own lives for the dignity of LGBT people. Some of these activists are LGBT people themselves. Others are not.
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I am horrified, as I know the world is, by this past weekend’s murderous and hateful attack on LGBT people in Orlando. In the wake of this atrocity, I am joining with our AJWS community to pause, remember and mourn, so we can find the strength to fight another day.
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