(Also posted at The Bilerico Project and Get Busy, Get Equal)

To illustrate why Congress must pass the Employment Non Discrimination Act (ENDA), a federal law that would ban discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people in the workplace, we will be posting the firsthand accounts of people from across the nation who have been fired, refused a job, or harassed in the workplace because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. This summer the ACLU put out a call for stories, and these are just a fraction of stories we received.

Laura J. Doty, Boise, Idaho
I was hired in April 1997 as an adult probation officer in Power County, Idaho. I was closeted except for my direct supervisor, who had no problem with my sexuality. It was a professional environment, and my peer reviews indicated I was respected and did a good job. I liked being able to help people overcome difficulties and improve themselves. I had letters of recommendation from the prosecuting attorney, a letter of recommendation from my direct supervisor, and positive reviews from a judge and the public defender.

In September of 1997, I ran into a co-worker from the county building at a store and introduced my partner to her. Two days later, the Power County Commissioners called me in and told me I was unhappy at work and I could quit or be fired. I said they would have to fire me.

After I was fired, I immediately called the Human Rights Commission in Boise, and they told me I had no basis to make a claim because sexual orientation is not a protected status. I was devastated because I considered myself a dedicated employee and hard worker. I cared about my probationers, and I worked very hard to help them succeed, whether in getting a GED or staying in a 12-step program.

My partner at the time was in graduate school, so we struggled financially after I lost the job.

Gypsey Teague, Pendleton, South Carolina
In 2002, I was hired as the branch librarian for the Oklahoma City Branch of Langston University, Oklahoma's only historically black university. I have both an MLS and an MBA and so, not only was I the library director, but I also taught classes in the business department.

In late 2004, after I had been successfully employed at the university for almost three years, I decided to begin the process of transitioning from male to female. The administration was very accommodating, both in supportive words and in providing generous leave, which made my transition very easy. I spoke with the campus director, my library director, and the Vice President of Academic Affairs. All three were helpful, and promised to support me and help in creating a smooth transition. I was pleased, but not surprised, to find that this historically black university understood issues of diversity. With their encouragement, I took an extended vacation over the Christmas holiday to finalize my transition. When I returned, I conducted myself as a woman, professionally and properly dressed at all times, and afforded myself of the bathroom of my new gender. Things went extremely well, and I felt that success in both my professional life and my personal life.

I went to a professional conference in February 2005. When I returned, I was stunned to learn that a student had circulated a hate-filled petition calling for my removal from campus, and had posted offensive flyers around the campus. Various reasons were cited, but all were related to my transgender identity. I never saw the actual petition but there were over 100 copies circulated throughout the small campus building. I spoke with the campus director, and asked for his assistance in removing the offensive flyers. I was stunned to hear him say that the student had a right to freedom of speech, and that he could and would do nothing. In fact, when other students also complained about these hateful flyers as being inappropriate, he went so far as to support the right of the students to pass out the flyers.

The very next day, the campus director issued a rule that all faculty and staff must use the bathrooms in the break room, at the other end of the building, and not the student bathrooms across the hall from the library. Surprised by this, I noticed that none of the other faculty were adhering to this policy. When I mentioned this to the director, he told me that he could not control the actions of all faculty and staff, but that I would adhere to the policy or be disciplined.

The petition-circulating student, encouraged by the administration's failure to support me, circulated another petition, this one stating that God wished me dead, and expressing the hope that something to this effect should happen. I spoke to several high-level administrators, who I was sure would see reason at this point. Instead, they told me my concerns were unwarranted, and to stop causing drama. Then, suddenly and surprisingly, my teaching schedule for the summer was changed to the late-night 7:30-10:00 p.m. time slot. This meant I would be the last instructor to leave the building, and I would have to exit into an empty parking lot in a dangerous section of the city.

I decided to apply for a job at another college, even though it would require relocating. In May 2005, I left Langston University and accepted a position as branch head of the Architecture Library at Clemson University in South Carolina. Having to relocate was difficult because my mother was in a nursing home in Oklahoma and she passed away there before I could return to see her.

Had the administrators who were charged with my welfare stood up and supported me in the face of mean-spirited prejudice, I think I would have been able to stay and to prosper. When they failed to take decisive action, I was forced to choose between my safety, both emotional and physical, and my job.

To learn more about the ACLU's work to support ENDA, check out the letter the ACLU sent to the House Education and Labor Committee. And please urge your Representative and Senators to support the bill.

Yesterday morning, a sixth grader in California gave a report in one of her classes. That might not sound like terribly exciting news, except that the report was about Harvey Milk, and the student only got to give her report after the ACLU threatened her school with a lawsuit for censoring it.

Natalie Jones, a sixth grader at Mt. Woodson Elementary School in Ramona, California, had been given a class assignment to write a report on any subject she wanted. Natalie got a score of 49 out of a possible 50 points on her report about the gay civil rights icon. Students were then told to make PowerPoint presentations about their reports, which they would show to other students in the class. Natalie put together a 12-page presentation on Milk that you can view here.

But the day before Natalie was to give her presentation she was called into the principal's office and told she couldn't do so. Then the school sent letters to parents of students in the class, explaining that Natalie's presentation was being rescheduled for a lunch recess and that students could only attend if they had parental permission due to the allegedly “sensitive” nature of the topic. School officials tried to justify all of this by claiming Natalie's presentation triggered the school's sex education policy.

Please note that by playing this clip YouTube and Google will place a long-term cookie on your computer. Please see YouTube's privacy statement on their website and Google's privacy statement on theirs to learn more. To view the ACLU's privacy statement, click here.

After the ACLU threatened to sue them for violating the First Amendment as well as the California Education Code, school officials finally backed down. Natalie has received a written apology, and school officials sent a letter about that apology to all the parents who got the original “warning” about the presentation. The school also agreed to bring its sex education policy into compliance with state law, and acknowledged that the mere mention of a person's sexual orientation isn't enough to invoke sex education policy. And perhaps most important of all, Natalie gave her presentation to the entire class Thursday morning.

Natalie's mom Bonnie tells us it went really well. She's terribly proud of Natalie, and we are too. But I suspect Harvey, if he were around today, might be proudest of all.

CORRECTION: The title has been amended to better clarify the subject of the this blog post.

Nine months after an employee at a McDonald's restaurant in downtown Louisville called a group of gay customers a series of anti-gay slurs – and after the ACLU intervened on the victims' behalf – we're happy to announce today that McDonald's has agreed to a cash settlement and diversity training for management at 30 of its Louisville-area restaurants.

Ryan Marlatt, Teddy Eggers, and three other friends had stopped for lunch at a McDonald's restaurant on East Market Street last July while visiting Louisville for the weekend. While they waited for their food to be prepared, an employee behind the counter referred to them as "faggots" to another employee. When Marlatt and Eggers objected to the slur and asked to speak with a manager, the employee who had called them "faggots" started arguing with them, repeatedly calling them "faggots" in front of other customers and calling one of them a "cocksucker" and "bitch." Here's a video of Ryan and Teddy telling the story of what happened to them:

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The supervisor on duty refused to refund the group's purchase, and after Ryan attempted several times in the following weeks to contact both the general manager of the McDonald's and the corporate offices with no results, he called the ACLU. We filed a complaint with the Louisville Human Relations Commission. With the public and the commission's eyes on them, McDonald's finally backed down, agreeing to school its managers on Louisville's anti-discrimination law and offering Ryan and Teddy $2,000 each, which they accepted. Originally, Ryan and Teddy had only asked for $28, the cost of the meals they and their friends bought on the day they were verbally abused. Would have been much cheaper and easier for them to just apologize and maybe tell their staff not to call paying customers "faggots," don't you think?

For those of us who work for equal rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, it’s been clear for years now that we are slowly but surely getting closer and closer to attaining equality. Thanks to the Lawrence v. Texas decision five years ago, our intimate relationships can no longer be outlawed. Many state and local governments ban discrimination against LGBT people, hundreds of major corporations offer domestic partner protections to their LGBT employees, and many other advances have been made.

But it’s just as clear that we still have a long road ahead of us. In the last election, California voted to get rid of marriage rights for our community; 29 other states have done the same. LGBT people still get fired from their jobs just for being who they are, young people still get beat up in school for seeming "queer" while school administrators do nothing about it, and in some states, same-sex couples can't foster or adopt while children in need go without homes.

LGBT visibility has brought a lot of progress, but being out and visible just isn’t enough. What we’ve learned from social science research is that the thing that most changes people's hearts and minds and gets them to support equality is having had meaningful, detailed conversations with LGBT people about what our lives are really like.

That’s what Tell 3 is all about. Tell 3 is a campaign we just launched in partnership with Join the Impact; Equality California; the Equality Federation; Freedom to Marry; the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force; the National Center for Lesbian Rights; and Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays to encourage LGBT people and their supporters to have three conversations with friends and family to help build support for LGBT equality.

Please note that by playing this clip You Tube and Google will place a long-term cookie on your computer. Please see You Tube's privacy statement on their website and Google's privacy statement on theirs to learn more. To view the ACLU's privacy statement, click here.

So check out the Tell 3 website, where we have suggestions about what to talk about, ideas about who you can talk with, resources and more. Who are you going to tell?