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Capitol Queens: The Women Fighting for Our Equality

Capitol Queens: The Women Fighting for Our Equality

When I met Representative Leslie Herod at the state Capitol, she led me through a doomed room. Every day to get to her office, Herod must first walk past paintings of old white men, spiraling several layers up the walls, staring down at her.

“It’s great to come in here and not be the first or only LGBT person; it’s great to come in here and not be the first or only African American person,” she said, talking about all the people who have crossed unspoken (and sometimes spoken) lines to work in that building.

Herod is the first out, LGBTQ, African American person to hold elected office in Colorado.

Even though she’s shattering the glass ceiling for queer people of color in Colorado, she’s not blind to all the work and sacrifice the people before her laid down. In fact, her face lit up with excitement as she lead me down the hallway where photos of recent Colorado House of Representatives hang.

She took her time fondly pointing out the people who have impacted her: Mark Ferrandino, the first out LGBTQ Speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives, Terrance Carroll, the first African American Speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives, and many others. She then led me into another room where she pointed out three women standing amongst a very homogenous House in a black-and-white photo. Their faces look tired — whether that’s the faded paper or the struggle to be taken seriously was hard to tell.

“Can you imagine what it must have been like to be one of them?”

Herod’s passion for politics began while she attended UC Boulder. As she walked around the majority-white campus, she felt lost looking for other people of color. Eventually, she found a group of students comprised of people of many different races, nationalities, and sexual orientations that became a sort of campus family for her. But it troubled her to see the lack of representation of minority groups in the governing body. She knew the importance of having a student government that mirrored her diverse friend group.

So she organized her friends to run on a ticket with her, and they won (by a lot). That was only Herod’s first victory. Now, she has a seat at the Capitol representing Colorado’s 8th District.

“It’s important to have political representation from people with many different experiences because it changes the perspectives and the conversations,” Laura “Pinky” Reinsch said.

As the Political Director of One Colorado, the state’s leading LGBTQ advocacy organization, Pinky’s job is to organize people’s voices. She facilitates communication between LGBTQ people and their political representatives because she doesn’t want the concerns of our community to go unheard.

So she travels through Colorado and talks to the queers that make our state that much more colorful. Pinky listens to stories and helps spread those words to the ears that have the power to make a difference, whether that be a teacher, the state legislature, or the media.

It’s not just about changing the laws; it’s also about changing the culture.

Pinky has held Tell Your Story trainings for trans people and their families, in which she emphasizes relatability. Experience has taught her that language encourages empathy and familiarity, and she cautions against intellectualizing or using alienating terminology, leaning instead towards phrases that elicit feelings everyone has experienced, such as “being who I know I am on the inside.”

Pinky’s work uses the experiences of people from the community to strengthen the push for LGBTQ equality from people like Herod. She sets up opportunities for community members to contact legislators, sign petitions, and testify when bills are in committee. Pinky recognizes, though, that it can be difficult and scary to talk about personal experiences. It takes a lot of bravery, for example, to testify as a survivor of conversion therapy in front of a legislative committee and talk about how the experience impacted one’s health and self-worth. “I get really emotional,” she said.

That’s why allies are so important. Pinky is encouraged by her community of people who are passionate about these issues. She is bridging the gaps that still exist within our community, both on a personal and legislative level. Luckily, she’s not alone in this.

Herod agreed that productive communication is often about understanding where someone is coming from and meeting them in the middle because “We’re all a part of this ecosystem.”

Legislating requires compromise and empathy, and Herod found that cultivating sincere relationships with people who don’t share her political views has helped engender cooperation and respect when dealing with controversial issues.

In fact, she makes it a point to sit next to a republican in every committee meeting. Herod tries to keep an open mind, even when a confused older man, disoriented by her fem appearance, asked her, “So you’re gay, huh?”

“I think even saying the word ‘gay’ is something he doesn’t do. And the fact that he did that and he acknowledged it, it was his own way of taking a step out.”

But for both Herod and Pinky, their work is about more than just talking to people. They both fight to show the impact of the law on people’s lives. The laws that are passed through the Capitol have serious consequences for the LGBTQ community that need to be considered. When it comes to policy-making, Herod doesn’t let her fellow legislators off the hook. For her, intersectionality is key.

She makes sure that they’ve considered the impact their bills would have on the LGBTQ community, people of color, and people in the low-income bracket — even when they don’t seem directly related at first glance. For example, part of the conversation surrounding sex assault needs to account for safe places for LGBTQ people who have been assaulted.

In her search for allies, Herod met a very impactful group of people through an organization called the LGBT Victory Fund, a national organization that trains and promotes openly LGBTQ people for government positions. Through them, she now has a support network that she can turn to whenever she needs.

“We lean on each other a lot,” she said. Herod emphasized the importance of having safe spaces and people you can trust within your political community.

Herod pointed out that it’s not common for a black lesbian to be elected into office in Colorado. She is vocal and honest about who she is, and she encourages others to be the same way.

In the face of adversity, she calls for speaking up, being authentic, and showing self-pride. In that, she and Pinky agree and stress the importance of not being restricted to a box designated by society. They also stressed that we need more people outside of that box to have a seat at the Capitol.

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