As part of 2019 Pride Week on the College of Charleston campus, local television journalist Megan Rivers moderates and interviews four speakers at an "LGBTQ+ Justice: The Road Ahead Panel Discussion" sponsored by the Charleston American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Ryan White Wellness Center. The panelists introduce themselves sequentially and then, slightly out of order, each one answers one question posed by Rivers. Cora Webb (pronouns: she/her/they/them), Program Director of We Are Family, addresses issues facing LGBTQ+ youth such as bullying; the failure of schools to stop it; bathroom access for trans students; and the state's "No Promo Homo" law prohibiting discussion of queer identifies except in a negative light. Michael Luciano (pronouns: he/him) speaks on HIV and AIDS as a Peer Treatment Educator at Palmetto Community Care, a member of the National AIDS Treatment Advocacy Project, the Southern AIDS Coalition, the Southern AIDS Strategy Coalition, the Tri-County Sexual Health Awareness Prevention and Education Initiative (SHAPE Tri-County), and other councils and committees. He mentions living with HIV for decades and focuses on SC state laws that target, criminalize. and stigmatize people living with HIV. Jerry Evans (pronouns: he/him), introducing himself as gay lawyer passionate about First Amendment issues, then discusses "religious refusal" and court cases pitting religious objections on certain topics against equal protection under the law for LGBTQ+ and other people. The last to be introduced, Kenya Cummings (pronouns: she/her/they/them), the Opportunities Organizer for Carolina Youth Action Project, speaks of her organization that serves and educates for girls, trans youth and gender non-conforming youth. She advocates for comprehensive sex education and discusses the state's over reliance on School Resource Officers (SROs), law enforcement officers who apply police tactics instead of educational approaches in difficult situations in schools, creating more problems than they solve.
Jayson Gulick (pronouns: He/They) speaks of the challenges and satisfactions of his growing up, discovering his gender and sexual truths, and embracing both trans masculine and androgynous identities. Born in Wheaton, IL, into a Catholic family that faced prejudice from the Protestant majority, he moved with his family to Charleston when he was in the fifth grade. Having discovered and defined himself as trans by searching out information on the internet, he delayed coming out, feeling that the move to the Lowcountry would provide an appropriate opportunity. Experiences in public school and Catholic school convinced him to delay the announcement, however; he told his family just as a friend in Catholic school was denouncing Gulick for posing as a male on social media. Accepted by his parents and one sister, and rejected by another who had become fundamentalist, Gulick was out and visible at Wando High School, getting support from some staff but not others. He describes an attempt by the school to censor a student interview on the topic, noting how he and others posted it on YouTube instead. Gulick then describes his experiences at the College of Charleston, speaking of his good fortune of having previously legally changed his name, thus not having to experience being called by his dead name, as happened to some of his peers. He describes clandestine meetings of other trans students on campus (called T-Time) and some of their unwillingness and fear to have their identities known. Noting how therapy, top surgery, and association with We Are Family have been extremely beneficial, Gulick describes his connection with androgyny, his dislike of sexual assumptions about him by others, and how affirming participation in Charleston Pride events has been. Torn between being a teacher and a guidance counselor, he has decided on the latter, to help spare others from having to undergo experiences similar to his. Since South Carolina does not offer specific gender and sexual protections, he regrets that he may have to go elsewhere to fulfill that profession. The interview ends on a positive note with Gulick commenting that people just a few years younger than he are accepting on a broad array of gender and sexuality issues.
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