Hector Martinez
Blogging Scholarship Winner
Reporting from Creating Change
January, 2012
Baltimore, MD
Do You Have a Plan for 2012?
My first time at the National Conference on LGBT Equality and the theme is Change in 2012. This leads me to wonder, how will change happen in 2012? One speaker had volunteers stand up and simulate a conversation with their boss with the intention of creating change in thinking about the LGBT movement and racial justice. One young woman stood up and said we need to implement HR policies that are LGBT inclusive. Another woman was more aggresive and said, we need to stop funding programs that are not LGBT inclusive.
It was exciting to see the passion and interchange of ideas. This morning I randomly asked people that I did not know the same question. One young man who I spoke to, a lobbyist at a grassroots non-profit in Washington DC, was energetic and passionate in his response. His primary role is to lobby Congress to make sure that the Fair Housing Act is LGBT inclusive. He went on to say that currently in politics there is not a lot of space for LGBT or racial justice conversations. His biggest challenge is to engage LGBT people of color into this conversation. However, listening in at the “Quieting Internalized Oppressions and self care as People of Color” workshop led him to think about how he will approach these topics to a Congressial Aid.
There is an atmosphere of hope for the future at this conference. Everyone is eager to see the system change for the better. It seems to me that change happens one conversation at a time. Hope and courage can be as simple as engaging conversations. I can almost see the day when being LGBT is non-consequential.
Hector Martinez
LGBT HealthLink, The Network for Health Equity 
My plan is to continue building and facilitating more intergenerational LGBTQIA-specific programs. We have growing rifts between the generations, which are being compounded by lack of adequate care/services for both our youth and elder populations, especially low-income populations.
Queerlycomplex, thanks for commenting! That was one thing that stood out to me at Creating Change this year- There were people of so many different ages and generations. There is so much that we can learn from the people who blazed the paths that we walk on today.