Stories from the Circle

Atticus Circle believes education is one of the most powerful tools to fight discrimination based on who someone loves. Sharing personal stories is one way to open hearts and minds to the need for equality for all partners, parents and their children.

Whether describing the individual impact of discrimination on loving families, relating the joy and normalcy of same-gender couples, or simply expressing outrage at the presence of inequality, your stories demonstrate Atticus Circle’s sense of mission better than anything else.

We hope that "Stories from the Circle” will serve as a forum and a resource—to show solidarity, strengthen determination, and maybe even change someone’s mind. We plan on sharing these stories with our members online and in our print materials, and hope you will send a friend to visit the site, as well.

If you would like to share your story with us, and are new to Atticus Circle, click here to join the circle. If you are already a member and would like to share your story, please email equality@atticuscircle.org. We recognize that there are more stories than we have space for on our site. We keep every story shared with us, and will post a rotating selection of them on this page. Check back periodically to find new reasons why people are joining the Atticus Circle.

I am a life-long, 50-year-old Baptist, a Sunday school teacher, and have served as Church Council chairperson for more years than I can count. My congregation has taken a stand for gay and lesbian folks in our community. They are ordained and married in our church, care for your children, and teach adult classes... And they are loved as brothers and sisters and as couples. The presence of their children is a blessing to us. How can Christians do less?
—David Chapman, Austin, TX

I am a lesbian preparing to ‘marry’ the love of my life in a few months. We are planning for a family. We are blessed. But our great state of Texas has passed Proposition #2 to keep us from having the same basic rights as other married couples. We fear this could impact our family and we want to fight against this discrimination. We are good people. But being treated as ‘invisible’ by the same government who is supposed to serve and protect us is unfair.
—Kerry Gray, Austin, TX

I work with at-risk youth who are wards of the state, mostly due to unfit parents. A fit parent is not determined by their color, sexual orientation, or race, but by their ability to love and care for their children.
—John Pizzo, Chicago, IL

I have been enlightened. I have three gay best friends. They are like family to me. I had not always been for equal rights for gay and lesbians until I realized one simple thing: [my friends] deserve to have every right that I have. I can only hope one day they will.
—Emily Mebane, Dallas, TX

I grew up a straight male in Montrose, TX, so equality has always been a given for me, and it was only going out into the world that I realized [equality] was not the standard. For most of my life hate seemed to be receding, but things have turned and it seems a radical hate agenda is upon us, especially in my beloved home of Texas. This hate requires an equal and opposite force of equality.
—Jay Crossley, Houston, TX

I work at a GLBT store, where we sell all things rainbow. Just after the 2004 election I had a straight couple come in one night looking for a rainbow flag. I quizzed them a little and they said they were so disheartened by the election results that they decided they, as straight folk, had to speak up more and do more for the gay community. I found this refreshing and wonderful – just as I do this organization.
—Melanie Calhoun, Lakewood, OH

My husband and I support equal rights and opportunities for all of God’s children.
—Mollie & Scott Vickery Hattiesburg, MS

My life partner and I have built a relationship of 15 years that is a fine family. I believe in legal protection and respect for all families and households, whether they fit majority stereotypes or not. I believe citizens have to be activists for human and constitutional rights in our country.
—Jack Brannon, Austin, TX

It offends my patriotic sensibility that anyone would argue to deny a person access to their loved one in a hospital, prevent protection of and care for children whose parents split up, or the ability of a caring couple to adopt children who desperately need their love.
—Jessica Graves, Washington, DC

I have always supported the right of people to choose their family. Now that I have a child who is gay, I am even more committed to the principle that all families have equal value and should be recognized under the law.
—Lisa Harris, Birmingham, AL

I believe that you don’t always plan who you fall in love with. Sharing your life with the person you love and choosing to include children in this love is important. To be able to have all the same rights as a heterosexual couple is essential!
—Liz Barrera, Austin, TX

My only cousin on my paternal side and I are four months apart in age and we were raised more like sisters than cousins. She happens to be a lesbian, while I grew up straight. It infuriates me that my husband and I can have a wedding, a marriage license, tax breaks, and rights to make medical decisions for one another simply because we’re a mixed-gender couple. My cousin and her partner should be able to get married just the way we did. And I’ll stand up for her at her wedding, just like she did for me at mine.
—Catherine Diedrich, Chicago, IL

I have had the fortune of having four wonderful parents guide me through life. After their divorce, both my mother and father provided me with wonderful parenting models in the life partners they chose. My mother and her husband gave me love and support just as did my father and his partner. I’m now a father of a little boy myself. I want to raise him with the same example my parents set for me. He needs to know that I’m proud of his Papa Mike and Papa George, that there is nothing immoral, unnatural, or abnormal about their relationship. He also needs to know that it is not okay to discriminate or hate nor is it okay to do nothing while others are doing so.
—Barney Grossman, Dallas, TX

I utterly support all people living with the same rights: equality is the American way. Discrimination is not.
—Mobeen Shirazi, Rochester, NY

Parenthood is an incredibly difficult proposition. Two people devoted enough to each other and to their children to face that challenge (and experience those joys!) should not be fettered by outside limitations. I am a mommy, married to someone of the opposite sex, who is proud to know that my children know it’s completely normal to have two mommies or two daddies... I hope someday it will seem completely common sense to America that parents are parents, whatever their gender.
—Katelena Cowles, Austin, TX