Fighting for Change: Norwich University and Beyond
Last week was an historic one for Norwich University in Northfield, VT. Indeed, it’s obvious that the end of the school year is going to be very different from the beginning.
The first class of cadets to allow members in their ranks to openly admit their sexual orientation will graduate in a few weeks. Thanks to the end of "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" (DADT), this will be true nationwide. Although private schools may not have banned LGBT students from their campuses, DADT was an obvious career ender for any gay student who wished to pursue a career in the military.
Norwich is special because one of their graduating cadets, Joshua Fontanez, has brought vision, passion and a sense of fairness to campus in the form of a LGBTQA club, which first met on the night of the repeal. This week saw the group host the nation’s first Pride Week to be held on a military college’s campus.
Vermont - and Norwich University - are used to being leaders on social issues. Norwich was one of the first schools to allow female cadets, and Vermont led the way in creating civil unions and then marriage equality for LGBT citizens. Saturday night, members of Norwich University’s club presented Josh with an award, which will become an annual tradition for the club. Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin opened the event by speaking about Vermont’s leadership on social issues such as abolishing slavery and creating equality for LGBT citizens.
Charlie and I were the keynote speakers at Saturday night’s prom. We saw obvious ties between Charlie’s experiences and those of the LGBT students at the school. In our speech, we reflected upon those similar experiences and offered encouragement and support for students to make a difference just by being who they are.
We lived - and Charlie taught high school - in a rural Kentucky community that seemed destined to be mired in discriminatory thoughts and practices forever due to the religious and political influences of their past. It could be a dangerous place to live or go to school as an openly gay person. There were no community or state laws to prevent harrassment or hate crimes. Bullying was not just an issue - it could be an everyday occurance.
To our amazement, we saw the community slowly open and accept LGBT students by allowing same-sex partners to attend prom and be represented in the school’s yearbook. Change was accompanied by struggle and resentment, but members of the school administration stepped up and backed Charlie’s decisions to recognize LGBT students. Just like the military, Pendleton County didn’t implode or disappear from the face of the earth just because it began to accept gay people in its community. Life continued as normal for most heterosexual people, but it became a little better for the LGBT students and citizens who lived there.
Charlie wasn’t able to give her speech on Saturday night due to her illness which has affected her voice in the last few weeks. We’ve talked about the irony of this because she has so much to say, and it’s frustrating to her to not be able to do it. We wrote the speech together so there was a give and take built in. Her stories and experiences were interspersed with my own thoughts and encouragements. We had planned to take turns speaking, but I ended up reading the whole speech that night.
Our main message was to pursue the things that you might think are impossible. Take the road less traveled. Make the hard decisions. Those are the the things that will make the world a better place. We never contemplated the possibility that we might sue our own government until the need arose. When that time came, we realized that it is possible to stand up for your rights and still love your country and want to be of service. Each step of the way has brought difficult decisions, but we’ve made them together and supported each other through each one. This is what families do for each other. You are never alone.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Karen Morgan is the wife of Chief Warrant Officer Charlie Morgan of the New Hampshire National Guard. The two are plaintiffs in SLDN's landmark case on behalf of married gay and lesbian service members and veterans challenging the so-called Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and other federal statutes that prevent the military from providing the same recognition, support, and benefits to all military families. CW2 Morgan is battling incurable, stage IV breast cancer. They have a five-year old daughter, Casey Elena.
04-05-12 By Karen Morgan |
