Tag Archives: queer labor

Home, Labor Studies, Student Work

#MovementEquality

By Tamara Robinson

I consider myself an ally to my LGBTQ brothers and sisters, and I am damn proud of it.

This can make me less proud of the labor movement I am so committed to due to its tendency to overlook the experiences of gay, lesbian, trans, queer, bi-sexual, gender questioning, and otherwise unconventionally-sexed individuals in the workplace in the fight for workers’ rights.

This tendency to overlook falls into an all-too-familiar pattern in which social movements fight for the empowerment of marginalized groups by waging a segmented battle for air time, resources, and legal wins. In this model, a “victory” carves out one minority population’s access to a right or institution from which they were previously excluded, with the hope that this will leave breadcrumbs so that the next group can take up the fight. Continue reading #MovementEquality →

Home, Labor Studies, Media

Making History: Banning the Box & Labor in Queer America

Audio

 

We’re living in historic times. Over the past few months, we’ve seen marriage equality become the law across the United States. More locally, we’ve seen the NYC Fair Chance Act fundamentally alter the economic opportunity landscape for those with criminal records, requiring public and private sector employers to wait until after a conditional job offer to make any inquiries about criminal history.

Just how did we get here? On this week’s edition of Building Bridges Radio with Mimi Rosenberg and Ken Nash, the hosts talk with Miriam Frank, author of Out in the Union: A Labor History Of Queer America, along with Brandon Holmes, Community Civil Rights Organizer with VOCAL-NY, which has been instrumental in NYC’s Ban the Box efforts.

Check it out.