(Las Vegas) Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is supporting the National Equality March (NEM) saying in a letter addressed to steering committee members, “I write to join in your commitment to ensure equality under the law.”  The letter was delivered on September 30.
 
“We are honored that Senator Reid has endorsed the National Equality March and our fight for full equality,” said Derek Washington, Clark County Nevada Democratic Black Caucus director and director of diversity outreach for NEM.  “Senator Reid is a man of his word and I believe he supports the LGBT community and our struggle for full federal equality.”
 
The full text of the letter follows.

Dear Members of the National March for Equality Steering Committee:
 
As you prepare to come to Washington, DC, for the National Equality March, I write to join in your commitment to ensure equality under the law.  As Senate Majority Leader, I will continue to work tirelessly to pass the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act and the Employee Non-Discrimination Act, as well as to repeal the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy.  I will also continue to advocate for funding of HIV/AIDS prevention treatment research and housing programs.
 
I believe that every American should be treated equally under the law regardless of religion, sexual orientation, gender, race or other forms if identity.  I see your struggle for equality as part of a larger movement for peace and social justice.
 
My best wishes to you.
 
Sincerely,
 
Harry Reid
United States Senator
Nevada
 
A PDF copy of the letter can be seen here: http://equalityacrossamerica.org/blog/?p=5265

Buses leave from Williamsburg, Chelsea (where you can ride with NYC Countil Speaker Christine Quinn), the Upper West Side/Columbia, the West Village and Washington Square/NYU Most tickets are $34. Broadway Impact’s free buses are sold out)

Buy a ticket here.

Jenny and I will be driving. Ali Davis will be flying from California. James Withers – OK, I don’t know how James is getting there, but he’ll be there. We all hope you’ll be there, too.

Bond likens the National Equality March to the Civil Rights March of 1963.   “We had a dream and marched on Washington to demand our rights; I am proud to stand with the LGBT community as they march for theirs,” he said.
 
St. Olaf college student Richard Aviles will be speaking on behalf of student activists from across the country, who have organized for the march and are descending on Washington.
 
Also speaking will be Judy Shepard, who lost her son Matthew to a murder motivated by anti-gay hate and who founded the Matthew Shepard Foundation in his memory. The Foundation is dedicated to working toward the causes championed by Matthew during his life: social justice, diversity awareness and education, and equality for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.
 
Following is a complete listing of speakers to date.
 
Stuart Applebaum
Richard Aviles
Jarret Barrios
Dustin Lance Black
Julian Bond
Marsha Botzer
Staceyann Chin
Lt. Dan Choi
Tanner Efinger
Hawaii Board of Education Member Kim Coco Iwamoto
Cleve Jones
Michelle Lopez
Robin McGehee
David Mixner
Nicole-Murray Ramirez
Chloe Noble
Tobias Packer
Reverend Troy Perry
New York City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn
Los Angeles Council Member Bill Rosendahl
Babs Siperstein
Judy Shepard
Maxim Thorn
Urvashi Vaid
Derek Washington
Falls Church City Council Member Lawrence Webb
Kit Yan
Kip Williams
Sherry Wolf

The march will be the first step toward a larger goal of creating a national movement – the 50 State Legislative Outreach Campaign — in all 435 congressional districts to demand of elected representatives full equality under the law.

“The march is just the beginning,” said McGehee. “We are not expecting to wake up on Monday morning with a federal bill on the presidents desk to sign.”
 
“We will no longer be told to wait. This march is our chance to demand full equal protection under the law, and it will help us realize the dream of Equality Across America: a committed group of grassroots activists in all 435 Congressional Districts,” added Williams.

Here’s a map of the route; the weekend’s events are here; Here are travel discounts if you haven’t booked yet. (Plus some cities, like New York, are sending free buses.)

From the National Equality March:

Nobody has been more anxious about getting our final march permit than the volunteers working for the National Equality March. Permitting is typically given approximately one month before the event. The permitting office only recently finished their September march permit requests and finally got to ours as they go in by order of month, not date of request submission. The march route request was agreed on last week but needed one final signature from a Commanding Officer that was out of town. Today 9/29/2009 it was signed off and we now officially have the march permit. Click to download PDF file of the march route and click to download a large map of the DC area. Thank you for our patience and we are glad this one is finally behind us.

• Gather on 15th Street at “I” (Eye) Street – we will be staging in the street and 15th between “I” Street and “M” Street will be closed for this purpose. The March will kick off from 15th and I Street, right near McPherson Square (Metro stops close by are at McPherson Square, Farragut West – both Blue and Orange Lines, and Farragut North – Red Line)
• From there we go South on 15th to “H” Street
• West on “H” Street to 17th Street
• South on 17th Street to Pennsylvania Avenue (closed portion)
• Pennsylvania Avenue (closed portion) – right past the White House – to 15th Street
• South on 15th Street to Pennsylvania Avenue South
• East on Pennsylvania Avenue South, all the way to the U.S. Capitol West Lawn for the National Equality March Rally.

National Coming Out Day is Oct. 11, and it will be marked worldwide with a series of events — demonstrations, letter-writing campaigns, lobbying pushes.

National Coming Out Day, not coincidentally, falls on the day of the National Equality March, when GLBT activists will come out, come out to the National Mall to demand “equal protection in all matters governed by civil law in all 50 states.”

But the majority of GLBT people in the United States will not be marching on Washington. A majority of GLBTs will not be coming out to America from the Capitol, but coming out in smaller ways, more subtle ways — and possibly not even recognizing the significance of their actions.

Even those of us who have been out for decades still come out on a daily basis to acquaintances or long-lost friends, to distant relatives or new co-workers, to new neighbors and sometimes strangers.

Just the other day, I came out 16 times.

The first pronouncement of my sexual orientation was an awkward reply to my new gynecologist, who had wanted to know the answer to, “Are you engaging in intercourse?”

“Um, well, not the straight kind,” I clumsily answered.

He just made a note on his scratch pad and nodded matter-of-factly like, yeah, OK, a member of the low-maintenance club.

But I came out to him, and study after study shows that these interactions, however, small, have an impact.

Later that day, back home from the doc, I set about to accomplish the agonizing task of trying to get a stable Internet connection after installing the buggy new Snow Leopard operating system on my MacBook.

I made 15 telephone calls to the technical support division of my Internet service provider, and each technician asked me the standard, “What is your relationship to the account holder?”

The account is in my partner’s name, and I could have saved time by pretending to be her, but I once pretended to be her when renting “Spice World” and she got irked.

So I came out to each and every technician as I answered, “She’s my partner” and “She’s my girlfriend.”

Sometimes the technicians repeated the statement for verification. Sometimes they responded with an “OK” and sometimes “Thank you.” At no time did I get attitude, though the technicians did get touchy when they failed to resolve my computer challenges.

Did the technicians think twice about my answers? I can’t say, but at least they had to think once about them, and doesn’t that illustrate the power of GLBTs coming out, living out and celebrating National Coming Out Day?

Many of us have had big coming-out moments — the talk with the parents, the full-disclosure to best friends, the this-isn’t-working confession to the boyfriend or girlfriend, the first “I’m gay and I’m proud” march in a pride parade.

Such moments, we might even say occasions, are profound, meaningful, likely life-changing happenings, but the small outings have such impact too, the small outings are the ones in which we say, “Yep, I’m gay” or “He’s my guy” or “I like a girl.”

Looking ahead to National Coming Out Day, I see that I have a record to break: I’m going for a personal best and planning to come out to 17 people that day, though I’m hoping it won’t be to 16 cable company customer service representatives and another doctor.

So, what’s your record? And can you break it?

Dear Marchers for Equality,

As you think about your travel needs to DC, we want to let you know about the many travel and accommodation discounts we have secured for marchers.  The full list of details can be found here:

Travel and Accommodations

For lodging, we want to highlight the Madison Hotel, who is partnering with the National Equality March to offer great rates as well as free use of public space for meetings and planning areas. Group rates are $189.00; to book please call 1-800-424-8577 and reference the EQU109 or National Equality March. The cut-off for these special rates is September 21, 2009. To find out more, please visit their website.

For air travel, American Airlines and Delta/Northwest are offering 5% off their regular fares. For rail travel, Amtrak is offering a 10% discount on trains booked to DC. Full details of how to book these discounted fares can be found here:

Travel Discounts

In addition to these offers, we have secured many other lodging and travel discounts for marchers.  Please visit our Travel and Accommodations page for more information.

See you in the streets,

Again in 1987, 1993 and 2000 we marched on Washington to demand equal rights.

The themes changed. The routes changed. The organizers changed. The speaker lists changed. The celebrity lineup changed. The priorities changed. The vocabulary changed. The heroes and the enemies changed — for the most part. And even the symbols changed.

But with four marches and hundreds of thousands of citizen activists there was one constant demand — a demand for equal rights.

Now, on Oct. 11, our community again will march on Washington to demand equal rights. Participants in National Equality March will celebrate the strides over three decades, the leaps in 30 years. We certainly are not marching from the same place we were in 1979.

But marchers also will make known that their governments treat them as second-class citizens and that they are challenging unconstitutional laws and questioning unacceptable policies for our military, our workplaces, our schools and our families.

You might hear arguments that the march being planned will divert resources from the fights in the states.

I remember hearing similar arguments nine years ago and perhaps even repeated them before I arrived to the National Mall April 30, 2000, to be wowed by the crowd for the fourth march.

The argument of limited resources is deeply flawed.

We, as a movement and community, have not begun to tap our full potential. How can anyone seriously claim that if a person goes to Washington for a weekend in October that he or she is spent out and has nothing left to give a state gay rights organization or a local GLBT center?

I would argue the opposite.

Marches energize some, radicalize others and connect many to people and organizations and campaigns and causes. I would guess that few returned home from D.C. in 2000, 1993, 1987 or 1979 drained and tapped out.

For all the feuding, fussing and misdirected focus on celebrity and flash, the 2000 march helped drive a community through eight long, hard years of painful losses and tremendous victories.

In 1993, marchers left for home committed to meet the challenge issued by Urvashi Vaid, former director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. “We have got to match the power of the Christian supremacists, member for member, vote for vote, dollar for dollar,” Vaid had said. “I challenge each of you to not just buy a T-shirt, but to get involved in your movement. Get involved. Volunteer. Volunteer. Every local organization in this country needs you. Every clinic. Every hotline. Every youth program needs you, needs your time and your love.”

The 1987 march, which introduced America to the AIDS Memorial Quilt and included the first mass marriage protest at the Internal Revenue Service, helped build a national coalition for civil rights. The Rev. Jesse Jackson Jr., told marchers, “Let’s find a common ground of humanity.… We share the desire for life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, equal protection under the law. Let’s not dwell on distinctions.”

And the 1979 march — inspired by Harvey Milk who famously said “Rights are not won on paper. They are won only by those who make their voices heard” — moved so many to carry on through a decade of so much personal and community loss and hardship.

And, on Oct. 12, marchers will return to their hometowns, their home states, the districts and territories, powered to campaign for the demand made on Oct. 11.

The march will be the forum for issuing the demand for equal rights. The demand will not be won that day, but in the days that follow, with our community nourished for the fight.