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"Transgender? You're fired!"

Or worse—you may be murdered. Transgender people may face discrimination on the job, in housing, or even in trying to pee. Some turn to legal proceedings to establish their rights. Some never get the chance to fight back. Part 9 in The Advocate’s ongoing Transgender 101 series
An Advocate.com exclusive posted July 28, 2006

Many Americans do not realize that in much of the country you can be fired just for being transgender. According to the National Center for Transgender Equality, only 31% of Americans live in areas that explicitly ban discrimination based on gender identity and expression. For the other 69%, legal proceedings may be the only way you can establish your rights. This means that revealing your transgender status could have the same result as that experienced by Sarah Blanchette and Diane Shroer.

Sarah Blanchette was a computer programmer for Saint Anselm College in Manchester, N.H. In March 2004 she informed her superiors that she would return from a two-week vacation presenting herself as female. St. Anselm College then fired her, stating in a letter, "As you know, you recently disclosed to senior college administration your transsexual status. Upon consideration, you are immediately relieved of your duties...." The Boston-based LGBT advocacy and legal group Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (not to be confused with the LGBT national media watchdog GLAAD) filed a lawsuit against Saint Anselm on May 26, 2005, reaching a settlement early this year.

Diane Schroer was an Airborne Ranger–qualified Special Forces officer who completed more than 450 parachute jumps, received numerous decorations--including the Defense Superior Service Medal, and was handpicked to head up a classified national security operation. Shortly after retiring as a colonel after 25 years of distinguished service in the army, she accepted a job as a terrorism research analyst at the Library of Congress. She thought she'd found the perfect fit. But when Schroer told her future supervisor that she was in the process of a gender transition to female, the job offer was rescinded. The American Civil Li berties Union is now representing her in a lawsuit against the Library of Congress.

If you are transgender and believe that your industry, employer, or trade will not accept a transgender person, you might decide to leave your current position before disclosing your transgender status. But after disclosure you will likely run into another problem: It can be very difficult to find new employment as an “out” transgender person, especially if your presentation does not rigidly conform to the gender binary. You may end up settling for employment considerably below your capabilities for the sake of having a job. Or you may not find a job at all.

Of course, however rampant and chronic employment discrimination may be for the community, it pales in comparison to the gravest issue facing transgender people: hate crimes. One example was the murder of Gwen Araujo in California in 2002. Gwen was a sexually active teenager who had not disclosed her transgender status to some of her male sex partners. She was murdered by her companions after their forced inspection revealed her to be biologically male. In the ensuing trial the defendants tried to use the transgender version of the “gay panic” defense--that Gwen had deceived them and therefore deserved to be murdered. In the end, two of the defendants were convicted of second-degree murder, but the jury concluded that no hate crime was committed.

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Herman is the first transgender member of the boards of the Point Foundation (a scholarship lifeline for LGBT students) and of Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, the New England LGBT legal rights organization that helped bring marriage equality to Massachusetts. She is also a member of the advisory board of the National Center for Transgender Equality. Find more information about these organizations at ThePointFoundation.org, GLAD.org, and NCTEquality.org.
From the archives of The Advocate and Advocate.com

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