Robert Eads was a transgender man who transitioned later in life and as such it was deemed inadvisable for him to seek sex reassignment surgery. He was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 1996 but was refused treatment by more than a dozen doctors, some for personal reasons and others on the grounds that taking him on as a patient might harm their practice. When he finally found a doctor to treat him in 1997, the cancer had already metastasized to other parts of his body, rendering any further treatments futile. He passed away in 1999. His life and death was the subject of the award-winning documentary Southern Comfort (2001).
As i’m sure many of you have heard, the Trump administration just passed a ruling that would remove LGBT+ anti-discrimination protections in health care and health insurance. I immediately thought of this man’s story when I heard about the ruling. Stories like this are the reason why those protections are necessary.
It’s easy to feel hopeless with all the bad news our community has been bombarded with recently. But we have to keep fighting, and one way we can fight is through legal means.
Here are some organizations that have announced plans to take action in court. If you can donate to any of them, please do!
Lambda Legal: one of the first to announce they would take legal action against the ruling, Lambda Legal is the oldest and largest national legal organization advocating for LGBTQ+ people and people with HIV.
Transgender Law Center: the largest American transgender-led civil rights organization in the United States. The stated mission of TLC is to connect transgender people and their families to technically sound and culturally competent legal services, increase acceptance and enforcement of laws and policies that support transgender communities, and work to change laws and systems that fail to incorporate the needs and experiences of transgender people.
Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund: Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund is committed to ending discrimination based upon gender identity and expression and to achieving equality for transgender people through public education, test-case litigation, direct legal services, and public policy efforts.
UPDATE: removed one group from the list as I heard they’ve been involved in some shady stuff. Plus, I want to focus more attention on the LGBT+ specific groups
