HRC Business Council member Meghan Stabler certainly has a way of making a lasting impression on people. Not only is she a knowledgeable and convincing spokesperson on transgender issues, but she's also a force of positivity and authenticity that is infinitely reassuring. I was made aware of this Bilerico Project post that's based on an email Meghan received from a former co-worker who witnessed her transitioning in the workplace. As she proved during her recent rock-star appearance at a Capitol Hill briefing on LGBT business and tax issues that had staffers clamoring for More Meghan, Ms. Stabler's courage, class and personal dignity as a transgender woman allow her to do what we're all here to ultimately accomplish: change the hearts and minds of people around us to actively support LGBT equality.
Here's a snippet from the
email Meghan received:
[caption id="attachment_4476" align="alignleft" width="197" caption="Meghan Stabler speaking at HRC's 2008 San Francisco Gala Dinner. "]
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No reason for you to remember me, but I was a DSM rep in J----'s org for a few years. I think we only met once or twice in group settings.
Anyway, I just wanted to tell you that as someone who was raised Catholic and is currently raising children in the Catholic Church...and also someone who has voted Republican in every election since becoming eligible to vote....that I really, really admire and respect you. More than that...you sort of opened my eyes to something I was seeing but not at all getting- hopefully that will make a little more sense when I'm done.
So...I was never AGAINST equal rights for the LGBT community (and I recognize that this is not the norm for Catholic Republicans)...but I wasn't necessarily for it either. I was more or less neutral. I had (still do) gay and lesbian friends that I really care about...but I never really saw them struggle with it. Anyway...I was still more or less neutral while I was at BMC and I heard about you - when you were still M-----, although I suppose you've always been Meghan, right? 
Anyway...my first thought was something like, "How is this person going to go through this in such a public way, for all to see, working for a company that from my perspective felt like an ole boys club?"
...My wife and I were watching a special on Martin Luther King and they were showing Rosa Parks and some of the marches. One of the storylines was about the white people that walked arm in arm with the black people in one of the marches. Its a powerful image and I said to my wife that if I had lived during that time, that I hope I would have been one of those brave few to get involved... and all of a sudden it was like a switch flipped. I had never made the parallel before but once I saw it, I couldn't UNSEE it. I know unsee isn't a word but I had to use it anyway. I realized that neutral was just as bad, if not worse than being against it. Being neutral was being lazy and apathetic to the injustice of it all. It shouldn't be a question of 'Am I being impacted'...it's a question of 'Is ANYONE being impacted'....and once I started thinking in those terms, it just gets clearer and clearer. And then I thought about my gay friends and realize I haven't really been walking arm in arm with them...which triggers deep feelings of guilt...especially since on of those friends passed away a few years ago. He was a good friend to me and I thought I was a good friend to him as well...but now I'm not so sure.
...I would like to do something...take some kind of action...any suggestions? I know I'm being a little naive...but I really do want to get involved...
