Stop and help? Or walk on by?

     As someone who transitioned over two decades ago, I don't have much to fear with respect to being called out on gender identity. I have much more to fear due to my identity as a lesbian in a 17 year relationship. Yet I am unwilling to use my privilege as an apparently cisgender person to grab for protection as a Lesbian while leaving behind my less privileged brothers and sisters.

     It is morally wrong for me to abandon my brothers and sisters. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus tells of two respectable leaders who chose not to help a man who was robbed, beaten, stripped naked, and left for dead. They knew they were at risk of becoming ritually unclean, requiring them to turn back to Jerusalem - a costly delay.

     Yet a Samaritan - who didn't even get along with the Jews - was so moved by the man's situation that he stopped to help and even paid to have the man stay at an inn and recover.

     We have the opportunity to stop and help - even if it causes us delay - or to walk on with the hope that the man will not suffer too much waiting for us to come back

     If it is more difficult to pass ENDA with transgender language included, what does that tell you? It tells me that more people are willing to accept discrimination against transgender people and, therefore, transgender people need this law even more than gay and Lesbian people do.

     Waiting until people don't want to discriminate before passing an anti-discrimination law makes no sense.

     Waiting until people don't want to discriminate against a class of people before passing an anti-discrimination law to protect that class makes no sense.

     I'm siding with the Samaritans on this. Walk on by at your own risk.