Unity above all...

I am not gay. I am a very straight female who is aware of her own sexuality. That being said, no one should struggle alone with anything or lose their family for being who they are. While what I have been through is not exactly their struggle it is in a justice sense.

I have always "had a gay." Meaning a a very good friend who was. In Arizona it was a man who worked at the salon where I went, a sheriff's deputy who was my best friend. In Georgia, it was Tad Duncan who was a vet tech at the vet I used for my beloved animals.

They were just people to me. I didn't look at them as gay or straight, their value was never on who they loved or had sex with. They were just my friends.

Years ago I feel in love with Anderson Cooper. Not in the "I want to date him and have his kids" way but a a deep respect for him as a person. He made speech on CNN that I always remember. He said something to the effect of "I heard what whoever said about me and I thought about it, but he is wrong." This pretty much sums up my feelings on a lot of important people, all of whom I valued and respected very much. Somehow they have decided that they are going to judge me from a pulpit of hate. Which makes no sense- You are going to attack a woman who cared about you, respected you, who you respected, who has been victimized from her career being destroyed by the people she always looked to with trust - law enforcement, a woman who was sexually assaulted in the course of trying to get her job back in law enforcement, whose every friend has turned on her for advocating for herself because law enforcement won't give her the time of day from the sexual assault, to having her ex and his patrol buddies leaving her in a Starbucks parking lot, arrest her after they left her in the street after they illegally took her car with the everything she could pack it with including her two animals to go somewhere safe after she was physically assaulted by her ex boyfriend while he was armed and in uniform, then after 2.5 months of starvation and having her animals taken and left in the car by law enforcement, was arrested only for buying coffee, walking to buy a soda, falsely accused of everything from getting a cigarette to trying to steal a car, when her own car was in the parking lot , needed a jumpstart and was studying for my LSAT in the middle of the night outside a restaurant , then went through a gallbladder surgery alone, a molestation by a stranger because the Savannah PD thought it better to threaten to arrest me for Criminal Trespass after being forced to walk of the Memorial Hospital Campus in the middle of the night then to charge the man who did this, dumping me in front of a CVS rather than get me medical care or let me make a phone call. For two years, I have been dumped in the street every time I have gone somewhere for help, or threatened by the staff, had my electronics taken by a sheriff's department with no authority to do so, had my diamond earrings stolen by a sheriff deputy during one of these illegal arrests, been denied the opportunity to have the actions of all these people investigated, while my friends who I loved did nothing, While everyone I loved did nothing no matter the emails, phone calls, or texts- no one said "Not her." She matters in the world. So I kinda get what it must feel like when you come out. I didn't, I will always be a straight woman. In some sense though I get it, and I wouldn't let it happen to anyone.

Nothing can prepare you to be shunned and ostracized for other people's failure to be a human being. Nothing prepares you to go to everyone you ever trusted and have them remain silent who were your biggest fans and trusted goto's. Nothing prepares you for injustice so epic and everyone who could do something about it not. Nothing prepares you to be treated as less then literally for doing nothing wrong but trusting the system and God himself. Nothing prepares you to have everything you ever owned taken by a friend Lanna Henze, and attacked for being raped, molested, and told you deserve it "because you lead to your own downfall. Nothing prepares you to hear "Just forget you were raped" by case managers, told "You don't want to be out in the street again by a domestic violence shelter advocate and then had it done to you, only to be attacked online by Brookhaven Mayor Johns Ernst and then a sitting judges staff attorney who don't know you.

The LGBT population is not a marginalized population unless it is made one. Does anyone have any concerns that Anderson Cooper is going to go kill someone because he prefers men to women? I don't think so. Andrew Cunanan , Jeffery Dahmer that is a different story. Who you have sex with doesn't create a serial killer, psychopathology does.

Just like race, it is something that divides a nation by label and not based on an actual reason. Seriously, it is none of my business who and how you are having sex. That is not a factor in how I look at you as a person- how you treat people- that is number one. I also don't care about if you have tattoos, piercings (unless we are talking " Cry Baby" tattooed across your forehead, and you have abandoned your child because you have mental health issues and spend your time using your cat to con people out of money while you walk around the streets of Savannah drinking alcohol and jumping on to trains.)

I will admit I am always going to think Bruce Jenner for a minute when someone brings up Caitlin Jenner. It is not judgement, it is merely an association because I am old enough I know about Wheaties and sadly Keeping Up With the Kardashians (some things can never be unseen, trust me crazy women who are on SSI, calling themselves bloggers, nurses and claiming to be trophy wives who can't keep their stories straight, claiming their sister is JAG officer, who is covered in scars, who can't manage to keep their clothes on even around other women and need a pharmacy tech to follow them around to dispense their medication- you can't unsee those images, no matter how much time and distance.)

I would rather hang out with Caitlin Jenner then anything that belongs in a mental hospital. We have to see people for who they, what do they do for others, what is their character, how do they treat other people. My God is not concerned with whether someone is in love with someone of the same gender and far more concerned with what you to to people who hurt them.

There was a time , not so long ago- 1973 to be exact it was a mental disorder. Just a note here, we don't see them asking for reparations do we? In context, people are asking for reparations from almost 200 years ago, and getting them from the government. Being Gay was a mental disorder less than 40 years ago, and we see the LGBT community advocating for inclusion - which really shouldn't even be a question unless it requires a demographic for research purposes. Seriously, are you kidding me. They are not asking for money but humanity. I think in 2021, this would be moot issue. I would rather give them safe places like the PRIDE Center in Savannah then be handing out checks for government funded reparations. God don't like ugly- and by that I mean he doesn't like people who can not behave like decent human beings to each other.

Two years ago, I came up with a small change to driver's licenses and ID's. A small watermark that would let law enforcement and other emergency personnel know they were dealing with a member of the LGBT community, not to separate them but so these dynamics could be taken into account and they could be treated from a perspective that is includes their gender identity. It was a small step toward minimizing the trauma that could be associated with arrests, medical treatment, and if prescribed by law arrest, an accommodation based in understanding. Not ever going to be gay, but to me who you sleep with has no bearing on who you are as a person, or the amount of respect you should be treated with. I wanted to do Civil Rights law for the LGBT community, to do child custody cases for them (I still think it is a civil rights violation to interfere with them adopting.

They have a long history of persevering in a time when the law and the world views them not by who they are but who the have sex with. I am a Republican, I have a lot of ideas that have to do with bettering society based on hard work and common sense but me and the Republicans will have to disagree on worth determined by who you are having sex with. We don't through stones at people because they are different.