If you’re anything like us, your email was likely bombarded earlier this week for requests to contribute to “Giving Tuesday.” Countless nonprofit organizations across the country, including many LGBT agencies in our region, used the occasion to promote their work and encourage financial or other support.
The philanthropic pseudo-holiday has been gaining steam in the last few years with an aim of countering the over-commercialization of the holiday season — and its message was never more important than this year. In the weeks since the presidential election, many LGBT and progressive-minded people have been looking for outlets for their frustration and fear.
As we’ve seen in the past with challenges our community has faced, getting involved in the community is one of the best ways to fight inequality. When the HIV/AIDS epidemic was at its peak, our community mobilized and organized: Activists formed organizations, lobbied for funding and policy changes and banded together to challenge the stigma some sought to cast over the suffering. When LGBT people faced expulsion from the military, the community launched agencies to fight the law, and when Proposition 8 barred same-sex couples from marrying, LGBTs and allies across the country staged rallies and protests that are credited with raising the public profile of the LGBT community among future allies. When a gunman took the lives of 49 people in an LGBT nightclub, LGBT and ally communities across the globe shared messages of support and encouragement with the victims and their families; Philadelphians turned out to a massive multi-bar event that raised more than $100,000 for those impacted.
Our community knows how to weather storms and it’s by coming together. We’re heading into four years of uncertainty — that could include the lifting of LGBT-inclusive laws and programs and the enactment of restrictive policies. Investing in the organizations that will fight those moves, and work to pick up the pieces for our most vulnerable community members if opponents are successful, is vital. We have a tremendous network of agencies, in Philly and beyond, that will be spending every day of the Donald Trump administration working to protect our rights.
They need our support. Give back beyond Giving Tuesday and help the organizations who will be helping us through what is sure to be a trying time.